The Faculty [extra — Quality]

The star quarterback who quits the football team to focus on his academics.

The goth outcast who hides her vulnerability behind a wall of sci-fi trivia and sarcasm.

Nothing cements The Faculty in the annals of 1990s counterculture quite like its third-act plot device. In a direct nod to John Carpenter’s The Thing , the students discover that the only way to kill the moisture-dependent parasites is by drying them out using Zeke's homemade, caffeine-based illicit drug, nicknamed "Scat." the faculty

The Faculty: How Robert Rodriguez’s Alien Insurgency Redefined 90s Teen Horror

Political attacks on tenure have intensified, with some state legislatures considering bills that would ban tenure or any permanent employment status at public universities. Texas introduced HB1830 in March 2025, which would eliminate tenure in the state's higher education system. In South Dakota, the Board of Regents announced a new policy in December 2025 that weakens tenure protections for faculty at the state's public universities. The star quarterback who quits the football team

The film works as a launchpad for future stars. Elijah Wood delivers a brilliantly fragile performance as the put-upon hero Casey. Josh Hartnett, in one of his earliest roles, plays the cynical drug-dealer Zeke with a dangerous, leather-jacket cool that practically steals the movie. The film also features Jordana Brewster in her film debut, Clea DuVall as the iconic goth queen Stokely, and even Usher Raymond in a supporting role as the cool kid Gabe.

The story unfolds at Harrington High in a small Ohio town. A group of six socially disparate students—including the brainy newspaper photographer Casey (Elijah Wood), the cynical loner Stokely (Clea DuVall), the burned-out drug dealer Zeke (Josh Hartnett), the new girl Marybeth (Laura Harris), and star jock Stan (Shawn Hatosy)—stumble upon a terrifying secret. In a direct nod to John Carpenter’s The

In one of the film's most famous and chaotic sequences, the students discover that Zeke's homemade illicit drug—a caffeine-based powder called "Scat"—acts as a lethal dehydrant to the water-dependent aliens. To prove they aren't infected, the teens force each other to take the drug in a tense, high-stakes interrogation scene heavily inspired by John Carpenter’s The Thing . It is a brilliant, rebellious twist: the very thing the adult establishment condemns becomes the world's only salvation. The Soundtrack: The Sound of 1998

Released in 1998, the film is a slick, high-energy hybrid of The Breakfast Club and Invasion of the Body Snatchers . While it didn’t receive the critical adoration of its contemporaries upon release, a retrospective look reveals a film that perfectly captured the anxieties of the late 90s teenage experience while delivering some of the most memorable creature effects of the decade.