2 Nerds Talking: Me and Earl and the Dying Girl by Jesse Andrews

Duration: 10:46 2058 transcript words EN summary

Video summary

In this episode of "2 Nerds Talking," hosts Liam and Agnes discuss Jesse Andrews' 2012 novel *Me and Earl and the Dying Girl*, a story that blends humor with heavy themes of mortality. The book follows Greg, an insecure teenager who makes low-budget movies with his eccentric best friend, Earl, as they navigate their senior year of high school while caring for Rachel, a classmate suffering from leukemia. Although the narrative deals with a depressing subject matter, the authors highlight how the book successfully balances this darkness with comedy and creativity, utilizing a script-like format that mimics teenage dialogue to make the reading experience more detached and engaging. The setting in their final year of high school is crucial to the plot, as it emphasizes the theme of transition and the characters' realistic fears regarding college and adulthood. The hosts praise the book's unique style, noting its playful tone and clever use of formatting, which reflects the scatterbrained perspective of a teenage boy. While they acknowledge that Greg's constant self-deprecation can sometimes feel repetitive or annoying, similar to the ungrateful nature often found in 2012 humor, they argue that this flaw is minor compared to the story's overall fun and inventiveness. The narrative effectively portrays the internal struggles of Greg, who lacks confidence, against the external challenges faced by his friends Earl and Rachel, who have their lives more together. Liam particularly favors Earl as the most interesting character due to his weirdness and silly humor, while Agnes appreciates how Earl serves as a grounding "straight man" to Greg's chaotic inner monologue. Moving into the spoiler section, the discussion turns to Rachel's tragic fate and the book's predictable yet well-executed conclusion. The hosts describe the famous "F moment," where Greg and Earl get high after trying their teacher's mysterious "Oracle" machine, as a hilarious and memorable scene that showcases the book's ability to find joy even in dark situations. They note that while the relationship between Greg and Rachel is complicated by her illness and public perception of them dating, the lack of forced romance feels authentic to life rather than saccharine. However, they also touch upon the criticism that Rachel might feel like a plot device for Greg's character arc, a point the author attempts to address through meta-commentary but which can still feel inconsistent within his stream-of-consciousness narration. Ultimately, Liam and Agnes recommend the book as a truthful and well-crafted depiction of high school life, tragedy, and human selfishness, rating it around six or seven out of ten. They appreciate that the story avoids being overly sentimental despite its heavy subject matter, instead offering a raw look at how teenagers react to loss and friendship. The hosts conclude by encouraging viewers who haven't read the book yet to pick up a copy from their local library, specifically mentioning Long Beach Public Library, before signing off with their usual quirky sign-off about researching alien vomit.

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[Music] hi welcome to another episode of T nerds talkinging I'm Liam and I'm Agnes and this time we're trying out a new format that we'll probably keep for the rest of our videos we like we do a spoilers free commentary section in the beginning and then at the end we have a section with spoilers in it where we like discuss the ending of the book and stuff for those who have already read it or who just don't really care yes and today we're talking about me and and the dying Girl by Jess Andrews it came out in 2012 and it's very apparent that it came out in 2012 mhm uh the story follows this guy named Greg uh and his friend that make movies uh eventually making a movie for a girl with leukemia who's dying of it hence the title mhm it's a it's a pretty depressing book yeah but it's still funny you know it is it is still funny how did you feel about the sense of comedy in it um I thought it was funny I thought it was very there was also a lot of segments that are in list format there's just there's a lot of interesting like messing around with uh words and like formatting and um I think it's really creative and I and I like it and it definitely feels like like some teenage boys scatterbrained attempt to write a book like it's a very playful weird book and I think like for the style of dialogue that it's going for um it can be kind of grading because it's like what a teenager would be going through and like conversations with like parents and friends and stuff so it's kind of nicer to read it in that script format because it's a little bit more like you know it's easier to read CU there's less words more detached yeah it's more detached mhm oh and uh I don't know if we forgot to mention this yet or not but it's set in high school it's both um it's all of their senior year actually of the three main characters and I think that plays like an important role in the story like it wouldn't really work if they were in like middle school or like a different year of high school school I think it's very important um yeah yeah and it is definitely very much about I feel like transition and so the fact that's their last year it's it's it works yeah obviously yeah and they talk about like college and stuff and I think it portrays like that feeling of being someone who like makes casual little movies with your friends as we do um I think it portrays that super realistically like I read parts of it and I was like wow this is like so relatable I've literally experienced this before like when um he like mentioned his movies to someone and they were like oh you should like submit those to a college and and go to like film school with your little films and it's like my movies aren't that good you know they're just for for fun so uh would do you recommend this book to anyone and like what's your rating out of out of 10 um my rating it' probably be like a solid seven out of 10 um it can kind of feel like it's repeating itself and how much it says that Greg is insecure and that he hates himself but um that's sort of a a minor annoyance if you're reading it cuz it is so fun and playful and there is so much other interesting stuff going on in the story that that doesn't interfere too much but it can get annoying I'd probably give it yeah like like a six or seven I totally agree that the self-deprecating nature of a lot of the humor 2012 um can be a little tiresome like he says stuff like he's genuinely like why are you reading this stupid book like stop reading this stupid book like it's so dumb and stupid like I'm reading the book man come on like be a little appreciative it's like the it's like that level of self-deprecation that's a little like ungrateful which I guess is true to the teenage boy experience but still it definitely can be kind of annoying to read but it's still good um I think we've talked enough about the main character Greg I think we should talk about the two other titula characters Earl in the the dying girl yes what were your thoughts on them did you like them did you like them more than Greg which one of them I definitely like as as like a person forming an opinion on Greg even though he's fake as a person I like Earl and Rachel more yeah um but I definitely think Greg you know works better as the center of the story just because Earl and Rachel even though Rachel has leukemia obviously they both have their life together and that's how they play off Greg cuz Greg does not and Greg has a lot of issues and or internal issues and Rachel and Earl both have more external issues right and you could obviously make a movie about them but you'd have to change the whole story yeah the narration probably wouldn't be as like just like depthy and interesting yeah but yeah I think as characters um just thinking of them as such I really like Earl the most he's so interesting and weird and funny I kind of prefer his sense of humor over Greg's I don't know what that says about me but but I love Earl he's like so weird and silly and his I just like I want to hop inside his mind and see what's going on in there no he's definitely like the best character in the book I think and I do love how he's like a he's like at the straight man to Greg's like self-deprecating insanity just constant self-hate okay so we are going to talk about Rachel but we're going to put that in the uh spoiler section which we'll be starting right now so just you pre-readers and risky kids can watch this section don't any spoilers scroll we're going to be spoiling the whole book just read it first and then come back and watch it go check it out from the library come on yeah okay okay spoiler section spoiler section Rachel's character she dies I will say the plot of the book is pretty predictable it's like yeah they're in high school he's kind of a weird little guy it it all turns out pretty much exactly how you expect it to turn out by the end but it was still pretty good and it has a lot of good little moments along the way like the F moment the F moment oh my God that was like my favorite part of the whole book The F moment is hilarious um oh my God it's so good a quick synopsis if you forgot or if you are being risky and haven't read the book um Earl and Greg are best friends with this teacher and he's like kind of crazy yeah he's a weird teacher and he he he has this um ther full of F that he calls the Oracle that is just in his office and they ask to try it one day and he says no and he leaves the room and they try adamant about it mhm and then once uh he leaves they go and try it and then they end up stoned out of their minds are we allowed to talk about this okay they end up there was drugs there was drugs in that they are on drugs for like 30 pages and it's a delight to read a very funny scene Greg is a mess Greg is a total mess and he has to go and talk to Rachel uh who is yeah dying of leukemia so she's a little depressing yeah it is it is pretty rough so Greg and Rachel's relationship is kind of strange yeah yeah everyone at school thinks they're dating because they're a guy and girl that are friends but really they're just friends yeah yeah they're just buddies and it's like really complicated because she's dying so you know they don't really know how much they can get done with their friendship and like how much they can actually do so it's still kind of like standoffish the whole time you know because they see no point in it but it's it's not it's like interesting but I love that it's not like sacarin you know it's very real uh with the way that his character is he's very selfish in a way that's so true to being a teenager and just being like a human being you know I think everyone is a lot more selfish than they like to admit but he's very truthful and I think the whole book is a really truthful depiction of being in high school and experiencing a tragedy and how people react to that you know MH um yeah and I thought it was great and usually with that stuff it's like way too sappy and just like yeah just way too like sacon and I hate it but um this one was really well done it didn't overdo it it was if anything not sweet enough but yeah I thought it was really well done another thing about the style that I really loved was how you can tell that this guy just has a lot more experience writing movie scripts because there's so many great callbacks within it it's like watch it's like binge watching a bunch of episodes of Full House like the the callbacks are so good like in the earlier part of the book uh when the F things h f thing happens their teacher recommends them a restaurant and the book ends with them going to that restaurant and I just love all of that stuff it makes it really enjoyable to read yeah I enjoyed that there was a lack of romance between him and Rachel usually I feel like most romances and stuff are so forced you know it's like this doesn't need to be here but that was like there wasn't actually much of that at all and I thought that was really nice but I feel like the way that his whole Arc revolves around like the death of Rachel mostly it's like I don't know it just felt kind of weird like she's just like a a prop in the story I wish that they had talked more about her but I guess that wouldn't be true to life cuz it's based off of Jess Andrew's like actual life experiences I don't know yeah it does I feel like it was not a conscious choice but it does feel at some points and after thinking about it that like Rachel died to serve this random white teenager's like character AR but I feel like it denies that in the book and then actively does that you know I feel like he does a lot of that like self-aware like you know stating issue with the book but he misses a lot and he says stuff and then still does it you know it's like when someone's like oh like I don't like to say mean stuff but and then they say something mean like you're still saying something mean he's constantly lampshading and that's he's const that's yeah and that's true to a teenage boy but again when you're reading a book that's just his stream of Consciousness and his like thought process it gets annoying oh yeah thanks for watching our video go research some alien vomit we'll see you next time bye and check out the book from the library check out the book from any Long Beach Public Library in your area check it out we want you we want you okay bye bye