One of the staples of geek life is the alpha-wannabe male. You know the type; that one guy who has some semblance of intelligence and insight, but feels so inadequate that everything he does is tinged with a sense of desperate dominance. The alpha-wannabe male generally bullies a group of people weaker than himself into following him, and resents any interloper who may actually have a chance at usurping the group leader position.

Scott is this stereotype. He’s an awkwardly tall, overweight, unkempt, death-metal-loving, emotionally-inept, rageaholic who is the dungeon master over his gaming group. The group has been running a single story over the course of 3 years with no additional friends. When one guy is going to lose his wife due to his absences and drops out of the game, Scott’s real world unpopularity comes to full view. He has a list of people who probably expressed interest to game in the past, but reject Scott’s attempts at recruiting because of Scott’s asshole behavior.

Scott finds a replacement in the form of Miles, who is the typical hipster geek who dares to bring BEER to the game. Miles embodies all of the charismatic traits that Scott doesn’t have, and is also as much of a phony as Scott. Scott sees him as a threat to the group, and ends up creating a war of passive-aggressive nerdrage over who gets to control the game and the group, who are treated as pawns in the game of dominance, not just by Scott and Miles but also by the movie itself.

Zero Charisma also has two other stories centering around Scott. Scott lives with his grandma, who has a stroke, causing his previously absent mother to swoop in and take control of the house. Scott also was fired by the local gaming and geekery store, where he wishes he could work again. After his firing, however, the game store doubled their sales and also successfully got their game nights going.

Distributed by Tribeca and Chris Hardwick’s Nerdist Industries, Zero Charisma is unflinching in its portrayal and incision into an all-too-common geek cliche. Writer and co-director Andrew Matthews brings a knowing examination into the manchild character, inverting the lovable Apatow staple into a monster who makes you wonder why anybody hangs out with him. Matthews doesn’t let Scott off the hook either. He just makes him occasionally insightful, even if accidentally so. Scott mixes his boisterous and preposterous lies with genuine doomsaying and insight that makes it hard to actually tell where the trolling lies stop and the soothsaying begins.

The main problem with Zero Charisma is that the movie embodies the traits of its main character. The movie isn’t attractively shot or edited. The cinematography is frequently flat and boring, challenging Neil LaBute and Kevin Smith for most utilitarian framing. The script never polishes the edges, and some of its embellishments (especially the family situation) are as false as some of its insight is true. The humor is frequently caustic and abrasive, and you never know if you’re laughing at the character or relating to him. And, as such, it’s hard to actually like Zero Charisma.

I’m stuck with the question of is that actually a fault? Zero Charisma never tells us to sympathize or empathize with Scott. Matthews and co-director Katie Graham say that Scott may be insightful, but they never actually say that charisma is a completely unnecessary trait (as anybody who’s played an RPG knows, Charisma can go a long way). Much like their non-comment on their main character, that’s where I come down on it. Zero Charisma knows its characters, but the boring visuals and caustic sensibilities really make it difficult to enjoy, but that may be the point.