We're All Going to the World's Fair (2021)
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2025-09 to 2026-08
A lonely teenage girl participates in a viral internet challenge that leads to disturbing physical and mental changes.
The story
The film follows Casey, a lonely teenage girl living with her single father, who decides to participate in a viral internet trend known as the "World's Fair Challenge." As she documents the experience online, she begins to experience and record unsettling mental and physical changes. The narrative explores her growing isolation and the escalating consequences of her involvement with the online community, as she interacts with a mysterious collaborator who monitors her progress while she navigates the blurred lines between her online persona and her reality.
Full plot (contains spoilers)
Casey, a lonely teenager, records herself taking the "World's Fair Challenge," a viral trend involving a ritual that leads to physical and mental changes. She begins interacting with a mysterious online collaborator, JLB, who monitors her. As the challenge progresses, Casey's behavior becomes increasingly erratic and disturbing, culminating in her declaring she might use her father's gun and claiming her identity is not real. She eventually cuts contact with JLB, only for him to hear from her a year later. She reveals she spent time in a facility and eventually met him in New York City, claiming she was briefly transported to the "World's Fair" but was pulled back by his prayers.
- First release year
- 2021
- Runtime (minutes)
- 86
- Production countries
- United States
- Original languages
- English
- Directors
- Jane Schoenbrun
- Writers
- Jane Schoenbrun · writer
- Cast and characters
- Anna Cobb · Casey; Michael J. Rogers · JLB
- Genres
- coming-of-age; psychological horror
- Themes
- gender dysphoria; online identity
- Tone and mood
- unsettling; haunting
- Premise and plot tags
- social media; internet culture; transgender-related
- Franchise connections
- Screen Trilogy
- Reception
- The film received positive reviews from critics and was ranked among the best of the 2020s by IndieWire.
- Reported review scores
- Rotten Tomatoes · score: 90% · review count: 118; Rotten Tomatoes · score: 7.4 · scale: 10; Metacritic · score: 78 · scale: 100 · review count: 24
- Production trivia
- The film is the first in a trilogy.; The director was inspired by their experiences on fanfiction sites and forums.
Film metadata comes from the open sources listed in Credits & Contact. Catalogue details may be incomplete.
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