Milk & Serial is a 2024 found footage horror film written and directed by Curry Barker in his directorial debut, and starring Barker alongside Cooper Tomlinson, both known for their YouTube comedy channel that's a bad idea.

The plot concerns Milk (Barker) and Seven (Cooper Tomlinson), the duo behind the popular YouTube channel Prank Bros, and centers around Seven's attempt to pull the ultimate prank on Milk during his birthday party. As you can guess, things don't go according to plan...

The film was made on a budget of $800, most of which was spent on hiring an actor and buying a Sony camcorder. After a year of trying to find traditional distribution, Barker decided to release the film online for free. It premiered on YouTube on August 8, 2024, and can be seen here.

This film contains examples of:

• Ambiguous Ending: The movie ends with Seven seemingly killing Milk before committing suicide. But The Stinger strongly implies that Milk survived being shot (likely replacing the first bullet in Seven's gun with a blank), which would mean that he succeeded in pushing Seven over the Despair Event Horizon. Another possibility is that the second gunshot was Seven double-tapping Milk to make sure he's dead. The movie doesn't give us a definitive answer on which outcome happened, and invokedeven Curry himself isn’t sure.
• Artistic License – Gun Safety: Contrary to what the film depicts (as notoriously made known by the Jon-Erik Hexum incident), it is absolutely never a good idea to fire a blank at close range (or directly into your temple), prank or no.
• Antagonist Title: Milk is the villain of the film, and his alias makes up half of the title.
• Ax-Crazy: Milk is a sadistic sociopath who wants to be the best serial killer ever and glories in torture and murder for minor slights.
• Bad People Abuse Animals: At his birthday party, Milk openly admits to killing a cat when he was seven, hinting at who he truly is; the closest thing to a motive that he gives is saying, "It's just something you're not supposed to do."
• Bait the Dog: Milk claims he'd never kill one of his friends. Not only is this not true — we see him killing Lara on camera — but he also has no problem torturing them emotionally and driving them to suicide. In fact, he's gleeful about it.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: Milk, seemingly the more mild-mannered of the duo, is a psychopathic Serial Killer.
• Bait-and-Switch: Milk briefly laments that the night's events were "not part of the fucking plan", leading one to believe that he realized he went too far in killing Greg... only for him to chastise himself for forgetting the shovels.
• Bittersweet Ending: Heavily leaning on the "bitter" part here, bordering on a Downer Ending. Milk is ultimately stopped, but not before three people are killed — including Lara, whose body is found by Link and Naomi in the penultimate scene. The second gunshot also implies that Seven killed himself after shooting Milk, just as Milk wanted him to. And The Stinger implies Milk may not be as dead as assumed.
• Card-Carrying Villain: Milk has no qualms about being a serial killer, and in fact takes pride in it. He voices wishes to have a legacy surpassing the likes of Jeffrey Dahmer and Ted Bundy, claims that he specializes in "serial art" rather than murder, and states that his plan to make Seven kill himself will make him go down as "the greatest and most creative serial killer that's ever lived".
• Chekhov's Gun:
  • Throwaway dialogue during the film's first minute has Seven wondering what became of Milk's ex-girlfriend Jessica. Milk eventually reveals that he's keeping Jessica's severed ear in a jar, suggesting she met a bad end.
  • The wooden box underneath Milk's bed. When discovered by Link and Naomi, it's revealed to contain blood vials of past victims of Milk's (including Lara) and the address of Milk's hideaway, where they find Lara's body.
  • The blanks. As seen in Pants-Positive Safety below, Milk panics when Seven stuffs his gun down his waistband. Milk says he is afraid that Seven will shoot his dick off, though The Stinger suggests he put one of the blanks in the gun and was afraid Seven would discharge it.
• Cold-Blooded Torture: Milk keeps his victims imprisoned and tortures them for days (methods including depriving them of food and water and beating them with a brick) before murdering them.
• Creepy Souvenir: Milk keeps blood and body parts of his victims as trophies.
• Deadly Prank: Not Seven's prank at the birthday party, but Milk's elaborate psychological assault on Seven in the form of tricking him into killing Greg and Frank.
• Despair Event Horizon: Milk's goal going into the third act is to push Seven to his mental breaking point until he kills himself. He succeeds after killing Greg's son in front of Seven, but Seven takes Milk down with him. Maybe.
  "Just turn me in or fucking kill me, 'cause I'm fucking done. I'm fucking done."
• Disproportionate Retribution: The whole reason Milk gaslights Seven into killing Gus and Frank is because Seven kept rejecting Milk's content ideas and locked him out of the channel.
• The End... Or Is It?: Seven shoots Milk and then himself after hearing Milk brag about what he's done. Seems Milk is dead, but the camera moves just a bit at the end, indicating Milk might have survived.
• Evil Is Petty: Milk's reason for tricking Seven into murdering Greg and gaslighting him toward suicide? Because Seven shot down his content ideas and locked him out of their channel.
• Failed a Spot Check: Milk and Seven visit a Home Depot to get shovels for burying Greg. In a panic, Milk parks in a handicapped spot and nearly gets the two of them caught.
• Foreshadowing:
  • During the "Never Never Have I Ever" game at the birthday party, Milk casually admits that he killed a cat as a kid. This is the first clue as to his real nature.
  • After knocking Greg's hat off his head, Milk repeatedly states that it's all part of the prank. As he later clarifies, he means his prank.
• Frame-Up:
  • Lara is framed by Milk for breaking up with Naomi by using her phone to do so.
  • Seven is framed for the death of Greg, which he arguably did do by shooting him, but was under the impression that he was acting in self-defense.
• Gaslighting: Milk employs a double-con of this nature against two characters: first, there is his elaborate "prank" against Seven, and then there's the way he kidnaps Naomi's girlfriend and sends fake texts over her phone, breaking them up.
  "It's like when you prank somebody but they think it's their fault."
• Green-Eyed Monster: It's repeatedly implied that Milk's "prank" stems from jealousy over Seven being more popular and having more creative control over their content than him.
• Madness Mantra: "What do you mean you don't like it?"
• Malevolent Masked Men: Milk has an unsettling clear mask (as seen in the poster) that he wears while committing his more depraved acts, which he calls his "happy mask".
  "It's clear, so you still see me, but it just... it's like a different version of me, you know?"
• Murder-Suicide: The film ends with Seven shooting Milk dead… then another gunshot ringing out, heavily implying he shot himself afterwards.
• Once More, with Clarity: Following The Reveal that Milk set up the sequence of events with Greg as part of a revenge prank, the film jumps back in time several days revealing how this was all set up.
• Pants-Positive Safety: When going to kill Greg's son, Seven briefly stuffs his gun into his waistband. Milk panics, stating that Seven will shoot his dick off.
• Psychopathic Manchild: One moment, Milk is tricking Seven into killing a man; the next, he's pulling childish practical jokes on Seven in order to gaslight him.
• Pun-Based Title: Comes across as similar to the breakfast food of "milk and cereal," but actually is a reference to Milk the serial killer.
• Red Herring: Greg, the unhinged next-door neighbor, is initially presented as the film's antagonist and seemingly drugs Milk and Seven before driving them into the desert. He's actually an actor hired by Milk as part of his prank against Seven and ends up as one of Milk's victims.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: Greg tries to call it quits after Milk reveals the "drug the both of us and take us into the desert to kill us" stage of his prank, only for Milk to talk Greg back into it by stating that there's channel precedent for such an act and that he won't be filming. He's lying, on both counts.
• Serial Killer: Milk is revealed to be one, and at one point brags that his crimes will surpass Jeffrey Dahmer and Ted Bundy.
• The Sociopath: Milk shows no empathy for the people harmed by his actions and lacks any remorse or guilt for what he does. He also puts a convincing front of superficial charm to everyone around him and casually manipulates them to suit his needs. While he does manage to come up with a detailed plan for tricking Seven into murder, there are a few moments that show he didn't think it all through, most notably never considering what would happen if Seven overheard him talking about what he does.
• Thousand-Yard Stare: Seven is seen with one in the wake of Greg and Frank's murders, clearly haunted by his complicitness in both.
• Trans Tribulations: A while after Greg breaks into Seven and Milk's apartment, he begins ranting about having a woman trapped inside of him, implying this. As Milk praises his improvised monologue, Greg mentions that he did "a little research" to get material, meaning that he's deliberately drawing upon the trope In-Universe.
• Villain Protagonist: Milk is a psychopathic prankster who has a love for torturing women and seeks to become one of the greatest and most creative serial killers the world has ever known.
• Wham Line: After Seven accidentally kills Greg, and he and Milk are fretting over what to do, the film abruptly cuts to Milk smiling at the camera and saying this:
  "Let’s see the setup."