Panic Fest: Grind is gig-economy horror showcasing exec-level talent
Panic Fest 2026 just wrapped up at Screenland Armour in KC. The yearly homegrown genre festival is a delightful cavalcade of feature films hitting theaters soon, and some with releases further down the road. Read all of our coverage of these debuts.
The best horror movies hold up a mirror, reflecting (or sometimes distorting) trending societal fears: the slasher boom of the 1970s and 1980s as a response to the rise of serial killers; torture porn trends of the 2000s aligning with the pessimism and anxiety of the Bush administration. In the modern day, there is almost no greater source of anxiety for late millennials and early Gen-Z than the job market, a sentiment captured brilliantly in the four stories featured in horror anthology Grind.
Co-written by Brea Grant and Ed Dougherty, and co-directed by Grant, Dougherty, and Chelsea Stardust, Grind wastes no time onboarding the audience. In the first of the framing segments directed by Stardust, we meet Maria (Mercedes Mason), an employee at a DRGN (the film’s stand-in for Insert Megacorporation Of Your Choice) warehouse. Maria has just failed the third fulfillment task of her shift and has been reassigned to “Special Gifts.” After a winding journey through the fulfillment center, she arrives at a tall, mysterious black box. We then follow the box as it gets loaded onto a delivery truck and travels to the first segment.
“MLM,” directed by Grant, centers on Sarah (Jessika Van), a struggling leggings sales rep. After missing her sales goal for a second month, her upline Molly (Courtney Pauroso) warns her of the consequences. Let’s just say they’re a bit more dire than missing the annual cruise.
Barbara Crampton ascends from Scream Queen to #BossBabe in this segment as The Founder, popping up in promo videos and on laptop screens to provide necessary exposition and dread. Eagle-eyed viewers will also spot a digital cameo from author (and Grant’s Reading Glasses podcast co-host) Mallory O’Meara as an audience member viewing and commenting on one of Sarah’s desperate Hatchbook Live leggings sales parties.
The second segment, “Delivery,” follows Benny (Vinny Thomas), a DRGNDash driver steadily being beaten down by the gig. Getting tips docked for the sins of “seeming like a cat person” and “ensuring the food was delivered” and unable to pay even half of his half of the rent, Benny accepts a mysterious delivery that’s part Groundhog Day, part Jigsaw trap. This one felt the weakest, perhaps due to the time-loop getting a bit repetitive.
Segment three, the Dougherty-directed “Content Moderation,” is the most traditionally horrifying. Joel (Christopher Marquette of Fanboys and Freddy Vs Jason) is settling into his first day on the job at DRGN. A starting salary of $175k, free lunches and dental insurance are all his—as soon as he completes his time in “The Pit,” reviewing 6 million increasingly disturbing videos. This segment features multiple thoughtful throughlines connecting to the other stories, as well as cameos from James Urbaniak and Panic Fest favorite Frogman.
The final segment, “Union Meeting,” features the largest cast of the film so far, including Dropout regular Ify Nwadiwe as Todd, assistant shift manager at DRGN-owned Neptulia Coffee. The execs at DRGN aren’t too pleased that the staff at this store has decided to unionize and hold a lock-in protest, but maybe a Special Delivery will motivate the beleaguered baristas to back down.
Grind expertly plays on the insidious way corporations continue to monopolize our very existence. Just like DRGN, the movie offers something for everyone, and it’s my hope that mainstream audiences and horror die-hards alike have a chance to see it.
