We know what you're watching is a rebus puzzle and the fifth puzzle of the 2022 Cryptex Hunt. It is presented as text conversation about movies involving a lot of emojis.
Solve Paths
The flavortext and title of this puzzle should point solvers towards it being about movies, specifically ones that can fit in the blanks provided. The emojis can be interpreted like rebus puzzles to form the titles as follows:
CAR + RAT + TEA + KID --> KARATE KID
SMOKE + KEY / (BANDAID - AID) + (SHIT - SHHH) --> SMOKEY and the BANDIT
DIE + (HAT - AT) + (CARD - C) --> DIE HARD
VARIOUS BREAKFAST FOODS + CLUB --> BREAKFAST CLUB
SNAKES / PLANE --> SNAKES on a PLANE
The letters that would fall into the brackets in each set of blanks form the final answer for this puzzle.
Part 1 Final Answer: Click to revealRERUN.
At this point in the puzzle, there is actually no more content on the initial image to use. However, the "Low Memory Warning" message at the bottom of the right half of the image can actually be clicked on, leading to a separate gif. According to the text in the glitchy image, this is a continuation of the previous topic (movies) but without the benefit of having the emojis already matched up. Solvers should be able to form new movies and characters using two of the images for each. Within each pair, one of the two images will disappear for one frame of the gif, providing an ordering for them. Doing so puts the resulting films and characters in this order:
YELLOW + SUBMARINE --> YELLOW SUBMARINE
POP + EYE --> POPEYE
BAT + MAN --> BATMAN
RAM + BOW --> RAMBO
MONSTERS + UNIVERSITY --> MONSTERS UNIVERSITY
Near the end of the gif's cycle, the word "COUNT" flashes red in the bottom text, followed by the word "LETTERS" showing up (also in red). If solvers count the number of letters in each movie title, and convert those numbers to letters via A1Z26, they get their final answer.
