Transcript
dan mccoy
On this episode we discuss—Mortal Engines!
elliott kalan
The movie that will make you realize—cities that roll around on tank treads and harpoon other cities and then eat those cities? Are kinda boring.
music
Light, up-tempo, electric guitar with synth instruments.
dan
Hey, everyone, and welcome to The Flop House! I’m Dan McCoy.
stuart wellington
Oh, hey there, Dan McCoy! I’m Stuart Wellingtown!
elliott
Hey there, Dan McCoy and Stuart Wellingtown! It’s me—Elliott Kalan! And I’m joined today by a very special guest: Brendan, say hi!
brendan hay
Hi! I’m Brendan Hay!
elliott
This is Brendan Hay. Uh, he’s the showrunner of the Netflix Animated Series Harvey Girls Forever. Third season is out now?
brendan
Uh, yes!
elliott
And he is also, y’know, a great friend of ours!
brendan
Aww!
elliott
He’s been a long-time friend of mine, uh, he was one of my groomsmen, and he has a boatload of stories from when he was the head writer of Star Wars: Detours, a Star Wars animated cartoon that never aired. [Dan laughs.]
brendan
And never will!
elliott
We’re not here to talk about that, are we?
brendan
I mean, we can, but I think Mortal Engines is far more fascinating.
elliott
Yeah. So, Brendan, what brought you to—
crosstalk
Elliott: —The Flop House today? Stuart: Yeah, it’s—it’s more fascinating than Star Wars. [Laughs.] [Dan laughs.] [Brendan laughs.]
brendan
Hey, look, guys—I think the success of Mortal Engines proves, uh, the world is hungry for cities that eat cities, and not for anything Star Wars-related content!
elliott
Yeah.
brendan
Yeah.
elliott
Star Wars—it’s too bad that it’s kinda hit a downsurge.
brendan
It really has.
elliott
[Laughs.] People aren’t as into it anymore.
brendan
It’s about time! You know? It’s—everything has its phase, and Star Wars is done!
elliott
You know, I was at Engine’s Edge, at Disneyland?
brendan
Oh, yeah, yeah!
elliott
And the Mortal Engines themed theme park? [Brendan laughs.] And—I was just having so much fun, riding around in the bumper cars that are shaped like cities on tanks.
crosstalk
Stuart: Mm-hm. Brendan: Yeah.
brendan
And Disney+ is going to be huge, because now they have the engineer—that spinoff of the— [Elliott laughs.] Mortal Engines—
crosstalk
Brendan: franchise! Elliott: [Laughs.] The Enginorian! Yeah! [Laughs.]
brendan
Yeah, the Enginorian! It’s gonna be huge!
stuart
So Dan, what do we do—
crosstalk
Stuart: —on this podcast? Brendan: Um—
dan
Uh, wait, is Brendan done being introduced? I thought Elliott was about to say something.
crosstalk
Elliott: Nope. Brendan: Oh, how I know you—or, yeah. Dan: Okay.
elliott
I mean, I’m always about to say something—dudes, you gotta interrupt me! Once you—
brendan
Yeah.
elliott
Once you—once I pop, I can’t stop. So I just—
brendan
I will throw out the reason I know Elliott is because I used to have a X-Force Doop, uh screensaver? And when he was an intern and I was a writer’s assistant at The Daily Show, he was probably the only person ever on staff to be, like, hey, is that a Doop screensaver? And we talked for about a half-hour and there you go.
elliott
And we were—have been friends ever since!
brendan
Yeah.
elliott
Uh—I mean, I was cooler than that. I was like, [casual voice] “Hey, sweet Doop.”
stuart
Mm-hm. Mm-hm.
brendan
Yeah. That actually is more—more accurate.
elliott
Yeah, yeah. Exactly.
brendan
You were the cool dude in the situation.
elliott
Yeah, yeah. I was the cool dude in my black jeans and tucked-in black Frankenstein t-shirt. [Dan laughs.]
brendan
[Brendan laughs.] I was gonna say, yeah. Might’ve been the Boris Karloff, uh—yeah. [Elliott laughs.]
stuart
Yeah, you were, uh… you’re smoking cigarettes and staring at the ceiling wistfully. [Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.]
elliott
Am I Sidney Carton in the trial scene in A Tale of Two Cities?
stuart
Possibly! Uh, I mean, I was kind of mashing up, like, a traditional French cool guy with Jordan Catalano. [Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.]
elliott
[Through laughter] Okay. The coolest of teenagers, yeah.
stuart
Yeah.
elliott
Uh, so, Dan, what do we do on this podcast?
dan
Uh, this is a podcast where we watch a bad movie and then we talk about it! And today we’re discussing Mortal Engines, which was, uh, produced by Peter Jackson and—
stuart
Now you guys keep saying that we watch Mortal Engines—
dan
Sure, interrupt me.
crosstalk
Dan: That’s fine. Stuart: But I’m pretty sure—
stuart
—I watched Mortal Instruments: City of Bones.
crosstalk
Elliott: Oh no! That’s a different movie! Nooo! But it stars the same person! Dan: Oh no! Brendan: No! Stuart: Now, the movie—the movie I watched—
stuart
—was, yeah. My—the movie I watched was a YA, uh, based on like a YA property.
crosstalk
Dan: Yeah? Well, that’s— Elliott: Oh, no, no, this one is, too. Okay, sure. Brendan: That—that—that’d be correct, yep.
stuart
And there’s, uh, the bad guy’s last name is Valentine.
crosstalk
Elliott: [Through laughter] Okay, yep. You got us. Brendan: Uh-huh. Yep. All check out so far. Stuart: And it stars that guy—
stuart
—that was in that terrible Umbrella Academy TV show, uh…
crosstalk
Brendan: Mm-hm. Mm-hm. Elliott: Okay. Have—haven’t Umbrella Academy—
elliott
—but yeah, same guy. Yeah.
stuart
[Laughs.] So… how—I watched the right movie, right?
dan
Um… [Brendan and Elliott laugh.]
elliott
Most of the way! Let—well, why don’t—
crosstalk
Elliott: —I talk about what happens in this movie. Stuart: Robert Sheehan. Okay.
stuart
That was his name.
elliott
And you—why don’t we—I’ll talk about the movie and we can figure out how much it—it, uh, lines up or doesn’t line up. The two “Mortal” movies that also star the same guy and have a bad guy [through laughter] whose last name is Valentine! [Laughs.]
stuart
‘Cause the only mortal—
elliott
And are based on YA novels.
stuart
—the only Mortal Engines—
brendan
Prominently featuring cities.
stuart
No—don’t worry about it. Let’s just move on. [Laughs.]
dan
Okay.
elliott
No, no, what were you gonna say? What were you gonna say, Stuart? What were you gonna say? I dare ya! I double-dog dare ya.
stuart
Um, I’m—I’m checking my phone. [Elliott laughs.]
elliott
Okay. Mortal Engines. So, guys, let’s talk about the movie. The movie opens with a voiceover. Over the production credits, of all things? Uh, not over footage, but just over the names of production companies. About how in the future, society collapsed, and resources were scarce, so the age of the predator cities began. Long story short: this is doled out to us in—not so much clues, but varied info dumps, so I’ll just tell ya—the movie takes place years after the 60-Minute War, when a doomsday quantum weapon called “Medusa” destroyed the world’s big cities, and now the only cities that are left are enormous vehicles on tank treads. Something that—I never—was never really explained how the way for a city to survive was to become a tank tread city? Guys, did I miss—
crosstalk
Elliott: —the explanation for that? Dan: No, this was—like—uh—
dan
—in a movie that I had a lot of problems with, this was my major problem, which is the entire premise—
crosstalk
Stuart: The basic premise? Okay. Dan: —of the movie, the basic thing—
dan
—in the movie, is that these cities roam around and—there’s no explanation as to why, after the apocalypse, that is a better model of— [All laugh.] —living.
stuart
I’m gonna—I’m gonna—I’m gonna tell you right up top: it’s so that you don’t get blasted by somebody’s Medusa laser.
dan
What?
stuart
If you’re driving around—
brendan
Ahh!
stuart
—if you’re like, hotdogging around Europe, they can’t—
crosstalk
Stuart: —blast you with a Medusa! Dan: Well I thought they didn’t—
dan
—have Medusa lasers anymore! That was the whole point—
crosstalk
Dan: —that they—okay— Stuart: Now the other thing that—why do they call it— [Elliott laughs.]
stuart
Why do they call it a Medusa when a Medusa, traditionally, turns a normal thing into stone, and the laser turns stone into rubble? [Dan laughs.]
crosstalk
Elliott: [Laughs.] That’s a—you got— Brendan: Excellent point!
elliott
You got your bit! That’s your tight five on the Medusa right there! [Laughs.] [Someone laughs.] Uh, I have to assume they named it after their favorite parody of Madonna: Truth or Dare. [Brendan laughs.] The Julie Brown movie Medusa: Truth or Scare, is it called? [Dan laughs.]
brendan
I think that sounds correct. Yeah.
elliott
Okay.
dan
[Through laughter] Wow.
elliott
Uh— [Brendan laughs.]
crosstalk
Dan: It’s—it’s rare that you mention something, Elliott, that I have never, ever heard of. Brendan: I remember that parody poster in a video store. Elliott: Yeah. Dan: But you did it! Elliott: Really? Okay! Brendan: Oh, wow!
elliott
Someone didn’t have HBO growing up! Uh— [Stuart laughs.] The only place where you could reliable find—at any time of day—one of Julie Brown’s two movies. That, or Earth Girls are Easy. Okay! So. Uh, we’re open up, and there’s this little steampunk city with a—a multiethnic cast. They all love each other. They’re great. They’re having a peaceful time. There’s a girl who has a red bandanna over her face who lives there, but—uh-oh! London is coming! And the city splits up into little tank cities with lots of smokestacks and levers—everything steampunk—and it gets chased around by London, which is this huge predator city that’s riding around Europe looking for resources. Again, this is the best way for a city to exist in the after times—
stuart
Uh-huh.
elliott
Is for it to literally need more gasoline to run itself than if it just sat in one place and sent people out on horses, I guess. But uh, London, we soon learn, is piloted by—he’s gonna be the villain! How do you know? He’s played by Hugo Weaving!— [Stuart laughs.] —his name? Thaddeus Valentine. [Dan laughs.] Who’s a sort of—what’s his job? He’s like, an archaeologist-inventor-administrator-pilot? Like, what— [Laughs.] Like—
brendan
Well—yeah. Which gets a little bit to, also, this does seem to be instead of the road warrior, it’s the road bureaucrat? So instead of the—it’s like, oh, here’s a badass warrior with like, tons of fighters and flaming guitars! It’s like, no! Here’s an… architect? With a room full of, uh, navigators and some historians!
elliott
Yeah. He’s got a good beard, though.
brendan
He does have a good beard!
elliott
Now, Stuart, you know Hugo Weaving best, of course, from your favorite three-film series of films—
stuart
Uh-huh.
elliott
—the Matrix movies!
stuart
[Laughs.] Yup! [Dan laughs.]
elliott
So, uh— [Laughs.]
stuart
Yup! He said, uh… he was always, uh, chasing that Mr. Anderson, right?
elliott
[Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.] Uh, so here’s where—so I—I was like—and this is around the point where I was like—so is it that the world is, like, too radioactive for the cities to stay in one place? I don’t think so.
stuart
Nope! I mean, I don’t think the—I don’t think that specific weapon—I feel like part of what makes that—the blaster thing, the Medusa—is that it—it’s not rad—it’s not radiation. It just, like… fucks everything up.
elliott
Yeah, it’s some kind of quantum energy.
crosstalk
Elliott: Which this movie needs, for—it doesn’t need science. Stuart: I wasn’t—I wasn’t paying attention to the, uh—
stuart
—exposition of the movie, so I can’t remember exactly how they explain how it fucks it up? [Elliott laughs.] But it fucks it up.
brendan
Sure! You were just too distracted by the production logos! Of course! [Dan laughs.]
elliott
I mean, that—that would be an amazing scene, if it was like—in the 60-Second War, the Medusa weapon was unleashed. The Medusa—what does it do? It really fucks things up. [All laugh.] Like, it hits a city and it really fucks that city up. Like, that city is in deep shit. After the Medusa hits it. And the—and, uh, Peter Jackson’s reading the script and he’s like, yes, Fran, perfect dialogue. I love it. [Someone laughs.] Uh, so London catches one of these little cities. It hits it with harpoons and ingests it and starts taking in all the people and taking apart the machines and the old tech, and at that point—the cool part of the movie is effectively over.
dan
Yeah. [Brendan laughs.]
elliott
We are about 10 minutes in at that point.
stuart
Yeah, and I mean, at that point, that’s also when you—we get—we finally get the title. Like, before the title, we see a lot of characters running around with a variety of wigs and variety of, like— [All laugh.] Ye Olde Victorian London-style outfits that are slightly post-apocalyptic? But not really.
dan
[Everyone agrees.] Yeah. I mean—you say that the cool part of the movie is over, but—I really had big problems with this, uh, opening action sequence. Not only is it incomprehen—
elliott
Well, tell me about it!
dan
Not only is it incomprehensible in the way it’s shot, but like—it expects you to care right away about what’s happening? When you’re all—you’re—you’re baffled by these cities.
stuart
Mm-hm.
dan
Like—I feel like—we already mentioned The Matrix—like, The Matrix starts out with a big action sequence where you, like don’t really understand what’s going on. But you understand enough, in that, it’s like… okay, this woman needs to get away from these—these people, and like—and then when weird stuff starts happening, like, you have these cops around who are like, what the fuck?! Like, acknowledging that it’s weird?
stuart
Yeah.
dan
Like, here it’s like—I don’t care about these people right off the bat; I don’t know what’s going on with these fucking cities. Why do you assume I’m gonna be thrilled by this action sequence?
elliott
Hey! All you know is the little city’s being eaten by a big city! [Stuart agrees.] It’s the circle of life. What are you gonna do?
stuart
You’re—you’re like—why does this remind me so much of The Pirates of Dark Water? [Laughs.] [Dan chuckles; Elliott laughs; Brendan joins in.]
elliott
[Laughs.] And—as we’ve all known, we learned what the Mortal Engines are.
stuart
Yep! The—
elliott
Which are?
stuart
The god-machines of the Adeptus Titanicus. [Dan laughs.]
elliott
Yeah. [Laughs.] Well this— [Laughs again.] [Brendan laughs.] The—the Mortal Engine, we realize now, is our own heart, which will eventually stop beating and we’re wasting its time watching this movie. [Dan laughs, agrees.] Now. Uh—so—we—good—you’re—you’re in luck, Dan, ‘cause we’re about to meet the hero of the movie—and I know you’re gonna love him!—he works at the British museum. He’s a clumsy eccentric who’s very handsome. I would call him, like, a blander Eddie Redmayne?
dan
Yes. [Laughs.]
elliott
His name’s Tom Natsworthy. [Laughs.] And he has a collection of dangerous old tech that he keeps hidden so nobody can use it.
crosstalk
Elliott: Instead of— Brendan: And also Minions!
elliott
And he also—they have—there’s a— there’s a hilarious joke where, uh, there’s some Minions statues and they uh—people think that they are deities from the old worlds. So here’s what I don’t understand—they have video of the 60-Second War. Of the 60-Minute War.
stuart
Mm-hm.
elliott
They… wear the same clothes; they have the old tech; why do they think the Minions were gods, when they should have a copy of—at the very least—Despicable Me 3 on hand? [Brendan laughs.]
dan
Yeah. I will go you one better—you talked about how everything was like, is—is steampunk in this world? And it does not make any sense to me. It’s like, after the apocalypse, why isn’t everything just, like, cobbled together from various shit instead of, like, you’ve got airships in the bot—in the—at the end of the movie there’s like, okay, I guess Leonardo DaVinci designed this. [Laughs.] [Elliott laughs.]
stuart
Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Why—why is basically everyone in this movie British?
dan
Yeah. [Laughs.]
crosstalk
Stuart: Like, did they not—did they not— Elliott: Well, that too. They—
stuart
—get blasted by the Medusas?
elliott
That’s one of the weird things is—London is—they’re in Europe and they’re like, we never should’ve come to—to Europe. But everyone they meet is British? For the most part? But uh—or—at the very end they meet a—a Chinese person!
crosstalk
Dan and Brendan: Yeah.
elliott
So there’s that. Uh, but Dan, I think you’re forgetting that after the apocalypse? I’ll tell you one thing the Medusa can’t destroy: humanity’s innate need for style.
dan
[Laughs.] Okay.
elliott
So why should I be in some crappy old airship when I can be in one that looks to the past, but at the same time also looks to the future? I call it—the DaVinci 5000!
dan
Yeah.
elliott
It’s retro. Real retro. You might even call it a Renaissance in airline design. [Dan laughs. Stuart agrees frequently as Elliott continues.] Let me take you aboard. The DaVinci 5000 has the latest state-of-the-art old stuff that we found in the remnants of the old cities and put together in some big heap of junk. But at the same time, it’s got modern-day amenities. Now, modern-day is after the apocalypse, so those amenities include Twinkies—which, we’ll see later, have survived—and also Minions statues. So the great thing about the DaVinci 5000 or 6000—I can’t remember what number I gave this model number—is that it comes with Minions statues. Dan, how do you feel about the Minions?
crosstalk
Stuart: Now—I-I— Dan: Uh— [Laughs.]
stuart
I wanna jump in here. Before I purchase this, you know, before I put cash on the barrelhead—or “quirks,” as they call it—
elliott
Okay, we got a customer! I love it! Yeah.
stuart
Uh, as—as our currency is called “quirks,” which is appropriate since this movie is filled with them. [Laughs.] [All laugh.] Uh—oh man. Uh—so before I do that, I—I’m in possession of a cassette tape that my mom made me—it’s a mix—it’s filled with ‘70s rock’n’roll. [Elliott laughs.] She gave it to me before she died from alien cancer.
crosstalk
Stuart: Is there any way that— Elliott: Oh, yeah, yeah?
stuart
—I could play this—
crosstalk
Elliott: Classic story. Stuart: —in the DaVinci 6000 or whatever you call it?
elliott
You are in luck!
stuart
[Through laughter] Oh, really!
elliott
Because we actually have—not— [Stuart laughs.] Yes! We have a tape player. It doesn’t work, but it looks cool. And if you find the parts that would make it work, I’m sure you could install them, too. And then you can bop around to your mom’s favorite ‘70s hits—let’s call it, like, “70s Awesome Mix Volume 1—"
stuart
[Through laughter] Oh wow, wow.
elliott
Volume 2, of course, you’ll save for the sequel. Uh—and— [Brendan laughs.] —when you meet up with your alien buddies, or perhaps when you read your dad’s book about how love came from the stars in the form of Darth Vader or something, then, uh… y’know. It’ll all be—you’ll enjoy it really much! So how much can I ask you to pay me? [Dan laughs.]
crosstalk
Elliott: We live in a world without a market for me. Dan: “How much can I ask—" Stuart: Wait, there’s no—there’s no— Dan: You can ask him to pay anything!
dan
You have the power. [Elliott and Brendan laugh.]
elliott
I know.
brendan
Remember, he’s paying you in quirks.
elliott
Oh, and you’re paying me in quirks, so that’s—one quirk is worth, what, like a—like a piece of turkey? [Dan laughs.] I don’t understand.
brendan
Well it’s one eccentricity, so he could start wearing a bowler hat everywhere he goes?
crosstalk
Elliott: [Laughs.] Okay. Stuart: Oh, wow!
elliott
That’s true—so, yeah, you’re gonna have to pay me by looking like a character from another movie who’s been ported into this movie, as we’ll see later on. Okay. So. We meet this—this guy, Tom Natsworthy—he’s talking to Kate, a pretty woman who is looking for information on the 60-Minute War. I don’t know that we ever find out why. [Brendan laughs.] It’s basically just so that she can meet Tom, and Tom tells her—as he tells everybody—he always wanted to be an aviator, but he couldn’t for some reason that is never fully defined as far as I can remember. And so now he’s an apprentice historian. So Tom and Kate, or—sorry—Tim and Kate—no, Tom.
crosstalk
Dan: Plus eight. Elliott: Is it Tom or Tim?
brendan
Tom.
crosstalk
Elliott: Right? Dan: I said, “plus eight.” Is— [Laughs.]
elliott
Yeah. [Through laughter] Tim and Kate plus eight.
crosstalk
Stuart: I—I think it’s Tom. Right? Elliott: They go to where a— Brendan: Tom. Yeah. Elliott: Is it Tom? Okay.
crosstalk
Brendan: Tom—Newsworthy or something. Elliott: I wrote down “Natsworthy.” Stuart: Tom Noseworthy. Brendan: There we go. [Laughs.]
elliott
Or Noseworthy! It could be. Look, he’s more worthy of a nose than a nat. Let’s just say that. [Laughs.] [Dan laughs.]
stuart
Oh, wow! High praise! [Elliott laughs.]
dan
Like the old saying goes— [Laughs.]
elliott
Like the old saying goes, “Better a nose than a nat. Better a nat than a cat. Better a cat than a hat. Better a hat than a nose. The circle of life continues.” [Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.] Uh—Tom goes to where they’re processing the city that just got eaten stuff, and he impresses Thaddeus Valentine by identifying an old toaster! [Someone giggles.] And we learn that Thaddeus Valentine is Kate’s dad. Her name is Kate Valentine. We also meet Tom’s friend Bevis, who’s kind of a frost-tipped maintenance dude, and he’s kinda the Stuart Wellington of the—
crosstalk
Elliott: —movie, I think. Stuart: Yeah, he’s—he’s pretty cool—
stuart
—and kind of always underfoot. Y’know? [Elliott and Brendan laugh.]
elliott
Yeah! He’s always there when you least expect it, and then he disappears for most of the end of the movie! Uh, so in that way he’s kind of like the Dan, too. [Dan laughs.] Ohhh! Anyway, so.
dan
[Through laughter] Oh, wow.
stuart
Fair enough.
elliott
Uh, they’ve—and they find in all this old tech a dangerous fusion inverter cell. And Valentine is like, I’ll take that so it can be destroyed and not misused. And you’re like—uh, guys, don’t give that dangerous tech to Hugo Weaving! He’s obviously the bad guy! [Brendan laughs.] The only thing that would be worse is if his boss, Max von Sydow, showed up and took it from him. [All laugh.]
dan
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
elliott
Okay. So the red bandanna lady from earlier? She finally makes her appearance. She jumps out and she stabs Hugo Weaving and she goes, “This is for Pandora Shaw!” That’s right! We’re learning the name of a character- [Someone laughs.] —we haven’t met yet before the names of characters we have met! [Dan laughs.] Thanks, Mortal Engines! Uh, and Tom chases her around, and uh… they run through the giant chainsaw factory that’s breaking up the city—
crosstalk
Elliott: —that got eaten, and she gets t— Stuart: I’m glad that he, like—
stuart
I’m glad that he takes the initiative on this one. That he’s like—he’s like, fuck it, there’s trained professionals here; there’s guards whose only job is to prevent people from causing any violence— [Brendan laughs.] —instead, I’m gonna chase after [though laughter] this person.
elliott
Like, most of my job is to polish an old Minion statue, but no—it’s time for me to take down this would-be assassin.
stuart
And he—
brendan
Jump among the chainsaws.
elliott
Yeah. And jump through the chainsa—like, just like the old, uh, the old Metallica song, “Jump Into the Chainsaws.” [Brendan laughs.] [Laughs.] Now, uh, Dan, Stu—how did you guys feel about this giant chainsaw level? Did you think it was just there for the Mortal Engines videogame that I assume was being developed that I don’t know if it was ever released?
stuart
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s—you gotta duck, you gotta jump—jump to the left.
dan
I mean, all I know is like, for a— [Elliott laughs.]
brendan
It’s the, uh, controller tutorial!
elliott
[Through laughter] Yeah!
dan
For a postapocalyptic world, they are doing pretty well. ‘Cause they have figured out how to put entire cities on treads and move ‘em around and they’ve got giant chainsaw rooms. I mean… like, for someone that—
stuart
Uh-huh.
dan
—someplace that’s supposed to be low on resources, they [though laughter] have done some crazy shit. [Laughs.]
elliott
They are wasting a lot of resources. It’s a—it’s a system that makes no sense.
brendan
Yeah.
elliott
Uh, but—good thing! It’s also boring. [Stuart laughs.] So—so don’t worry! Uh, you won’t have time to answer those questions, because—or ask them—she—because—this woman, this mystery woman, gives Tom a cryptic warning, then jumps down into what is essentially the city’s anus?
crosstalk
All: Mm-hm.
elliott
And—
dan
Yeah.
elliott
Where all the waste material goes? And it’s kind of implied that she… has—is in danger by doing that. And then Thaddeus shows up and Tom’s like, oh, this woman said that you’re a bad dude. And Thaddeus is like, yep! And he shoves Tom into the same city anus. And he falls to—we assume—maybe his death. But guess who saw the whole thing? That’s right! Bevis!
crosstalk
Stuart: Oh, yeah! Dan: Mm-hm.
elliott
And he’s gonna go home to his friend Bett-head, and tell him all about it while they watch ‘90s MTV music videos! [Dan and Stuart giggle.]
stuart
Y’know… [long pause]. That’s it. That’s all I got. [Laughs.] [All laugh enthusiastically.]
elliott
[Through laughter] That’s all you got? Now, Stuart—
brendan
That’s all the movie deserves.
elliott
I called Bevis the Stuart Wellington of the movie. What would you have done in this situation? You just saw a friend of yours get pushed—to maybe his death—at—into the city’s butt by the man who runs the city.
stuart
Yeah.
elliott
Who is conveniently not surrounded by anybody, even though he was just stabbed. Uh, so—what would you do with that information?
crosstalk
Elliott: What—what—what would you do? Stuart: O—obviously—
stuart
—what I would’ve done is I would’ve pulled out my, uh, my hoverboard, and surfed down into that butt to catch— [Elliott laughs.] —to help my friend because I don’t wanna be stuck in this boring city anymore. [Laughs.]
elliott
Alright. [Brendan laughs.] And Brendan, what would you have done in that situation?
brendan
Um… I think the ‘90s music videos actually sounds like a pretty good option. Just to go back there and just— [Elliott laughs.] —y’know, uh, numb the pain of watching my best friend having been murdered—
stuart
Mm-hm.
brendan
Uh, with a little bit of, uh, Metallica’s “One.”
elliott
Okay. Sure. Yeah. Alright. And—and—Dan, let’s—you do it, too. What would you have done in a situation. You just saw your best friend get—I assume—or maybe. I actually don’t know how good of friends they are. They just bump into each other. Like, there are plenty of people where—if I was with a girl and I bumped into them, I’d introduce them, but it’s not like they’re my bestie or something. Uh, Dan, what would you have done in this situation? Actually, let’s say—you’re Thaddeus Valentine. ‘Cause you have a beard, too, just like him.
crosstalk
Stuart: Uh-huh. Yep. Dan: Uh-huh.
elliott
What would you have done in the situation? Would you kill this nice boy? Just to keep your secret that you’re maybe evil?
dan
Sure, man. What do I have to lose? I’ve just been stabbed by this lady, like, no one else is around.
crosstalk
Stuart: And Tom—Tom Nanceworthy’s pretty boring. Dan: Come on. I gotta—
dan
I want to, like— [Brendan laughs.] —zap the world with my Medusa ray—spoiler alert—so I don’t think that this one kid is gonna— [Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.] —get in my way.
elliott
Okay. Fair point. I mean, he does later—spoiler alert, we’ll—as we’ll see—blow up an entire prison full of people.
brendan
Mm-hm. Yeah.
elliott
To release one zombie mechano-assassin. But okay! Thaddeus, uh, Valentine, he’s like, the traction cities can’t live in peace with the static cities! [Stuart laughs.]
dan
Yep!
elliott
Especially this big Eastern city called Shan Guo, which has a big wall around it.
brendan
I thought Shan Guo was the person.
crosstalk
Brendan: Who ran that. Elliott: Shan Guo—
elliott
Uh, maybe—might be the same? [Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.] Might be!
brendan
Okay. Fair enough!
elliott
It might be, the same way that, like, in Star Wars, sometimes a per—a name applies to both a race and a planet—
brendan
Oh sure!
elliott
—and a person?
crosstalk
Dan: Yeah. Brendan: Yeah.
elliott
Uh—I think he’s the mayor of Shan Guo.
crosstalk
Brendan: Okay. Dan: This is yet—
dan
—another thing that’s not explained? Like, why, like, mobile cities and stationary cities hate each other and, like, what side we’re, like, really supposed to be on—
crosstalk
Stuart: Probably—probably jealousy. Dan: —whether—like—take Hugo Weaving—
dan
—out of the equation. Like, why—why they hate each other and, like, why one is better than the other or more evil.
brendan
Yeah.
stuart
It’s—I mean, it is—it’s—it’s very weird. It’s weird that, like, people are super-conc—like, Hugo Weaving’s nervous that it’s gonna get out that he murdered somebody who we don’t even know yet?
dan
Yeah.
stuart
Because like… this city just ate another city! [Laughs.]
dan
Uh-huh! [Laughs.]
stuart
Like— [All laugh.] —I feel like these people wouldn’t give that much of a shit!
dan
Yeah. I mean—and also—
brendan
Yeah.
stuart
He could just be like… oh, yeah. Well, the person I murdered lived in a static city, so of course, uh, duh, she had to die. [Brendan laughs.]
elliott
And they’d be like, ohhh! Yeah! Yeah!
dan
Maybe the fact that we don’t know why they hate each other is meant as some sort of, like, allegory against the meaningless of war? Because right now, it really feels like a Star-Belly/Non-Star-Belly Sneetch situation? Where it’s like—
stuart
Uh-huh.
dan
—I guess one’s better than the other ‘cause they think it is.
elliott
Yeah. And then—well—as we see later on, uh, Morgan Spurlock has them do a 90-day swap where they— [Brendan laughs.] —change lives for 90 days—
stuart
Oh, wow.
elliott
—and they realize they’re not so different after all.
brendan
Aww.
elliott
It’s a very surprising ending to this act-belt-blockbuster-science-fiction-adventure movie! [Brendan laughs.] That a hologram of Morgan Spurlock— [Dan laughs.] —has them switch places— [Laughs.] And also then he supersizes himself and becomes a giant—
crosstalk
Elliott: —eats the planet, so. [Laughs.] Stuart: Oh, wow! Dan: yeah. Brendan: Wow. Elliott: Yeah. Dan: And everyone there is like—
dan
—aren’t you problematic for some reason that I forget but kind of remember reading about?
elliott
And Morgan is like— [Brendan laughs.] —it’s because I unknowingly sexually harassed my assistant! And we’re like, oh, of course! [Brendan and Dan agree.] That’s why it is. Uh—
brendan
But only for 30 days!
elliott
Yeah, yeah. They go—Spur-lock’em up and Spur-throw-away the Spur-key. [Dan laughs.]
stuart
Mm-hm. Yep. Wait, who said that? The—the police? [Dan laughs.]
elliott
Yeah. [Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.] Yeah, uh, The Police.
stuart
[inaudible]
elliott
Uh, ju—just Sting. Just Sting, solo, said it. Not the whole Police. Uh, so— [Someone laughs.] Uh, don’t worry, Dan. You’ll find out why they hate each other. Because they hate each other ‘cause it’s a movie.
crosstalk
Stuart: Mm-hm. Dan: Okay.
elliott
Uh, so Kate, his daughter, disagrees! We can live in peace! And, uh, he gets a phone call from the Lord Mayor of London who’s like, “Thaddeus! Your big energy plan isn’t done yet! Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.” And uh, pretty soon Kate and Bevis are suspicious about Hugo Weaving’s true intentions, because why wouldn’t you be? He’s [though laughter] Hugo Weaving! Anyway. Uh, meanwhile, Tom and the red bandana lady, they’re walking around in this wasteland of the future, inside the giant—train tracks or—tank treads of, uh, of the cities. And we learn that she’s Hester Shaw, daughter of Pandora Shaw, because in the future, there are people who have dumb first names and people who have regular first names.
stuart
Uh-huh.
elliott
And the T—the Toms and Kates, and the Pandoras and Hesters, are in civil war with each other. And she teachers city-boy Tom how to drink mud and eat Twinkies! Which are [though laughter] kinda the same thing in a way! [Dan laughs.] Guys, that’s a real hot take. How do you respond to that?
dan
Uh…
brendan
We need to—I wanna say that we as a culture need to come up with a new shorthand for food that will survive the apocalypse beyond Twinkies?
crosstalk
Brendan: I feel like we’ve been coasting— Elliott: Uh, why is that?
brendan
—on that for a very long time? Like—except—maybe it’s just ‘cause I re-watched Zombieland recently, but I’m like, they have the Twinkies jokes there. I feel like, everybody, it’s like, cockroaches and Twinkies.
elliott
I mean, you could also—‘cause you could say other Hostess products—
brendan
Yeah!
crosstalk
Elliott: —are probably gonna last just as long. Brendan: I mean, that would be great.
brendan
And also, like, I see the stuff my children eat? There’s a lot of that that will survive forever. So just—Hollywood!
crosstalk
Brendan: Come on! Be Holly-bread for once and pick a different item! [Laughs.] Dan: Now, Bren—now, Brendan— [Elliott laughs.]
dan
I don’t wanna, y’know, as a non-parent I don’t wanna talk about your parenting, but it seems like you’re— [Brendan laughs.] —in control of what your children eat. To some degree.
crosstalk
Brendan: [Through laughter] I wish that were—I wish that were true. Elliott: Uh—you—you—surprised. Dan: Yeah.
brendan
If, uh, Halloween week has taught me nothing else, I am a mere pawn in all of this. [Dan laughs.]
elliott
Yeah.
brendan
They have long cons and wheels within wheels going on all around me on how to get sugar. [Elliott laughs.]
elliott
Yeah, yeah. It’s—it’s truly, uh— [Laughs.] It’s truly, uh, cream candy rules everything around me? [Dan laughs.] Yeah.
stuart
[Brendan laughs.] I also—I also find that, with children’s hands being so close to the ground, they have a tendency to just scoop up stuff and toss ‘em in their little mouths.
crosstalk
Dan: Yeah, like Twinkies. Yeah, ground Twinkies. Stuart: Kinda like those—kinda like the city of London! Elliott: Oh. [Brendan laughs.]
elliott
[Through laughter] Yeah. Yeah. My—my—my baby boy, who’s 15 months today, he is very much a miniature city of London, just walking around scooping things off the ground, throwing it in his gullet. I have to reach in and pull it out, and often it’s like—best-case scenario—it’s an old Cheerio. Worst-case scenario—it’s a nail? [Stuart laughs.] Why is this on the ground?
brendan
Well, it’s from the mining colony he ate. Sure.
elliott
[Through laughter] Yeah! Maybe that’s it. Yeah. And inside his belly you’re saying there’s a little Hugo Weaving who’s holding up— [Stuart laughs.] —little old-fashioned toasters?
stuart
Mm-hm.
elliott
And occasionally pushing little Tom Noseworthys at my son’s butt.
stuart
[Through laughter] Yeah. Yeah. Yup. [Brendan laughs.]
elliott
And then I open up his diaper and there’s just a little, like, faux Eddie Redmayne in there going, “Hey! I gotta get back to London!” And I squish him ‘cause I’m so scared. [All laugh.]
dan
Much better movie. Much better movie.
elliott
Yeah. And then he radios back to earth and goes, “It’s a planet of giants!”
brendan
The Mortal Engines, meet Dave.
elliott
Yeah. Oh, y’know—is it the Mortal Engines meet—Meet Dave?
brendan
Oh, yeah. Meet Meet Dave.
elliott
‘Cause it’s—if you—where Mortal Engines meet Dave, that would be the movie where Thaddeus Valentine is sick and a fake Thaddeus Valentine takes his place— [Someone laughs.] And he’s kind of a good guy and kind of a goofball?
crosstalk
Stuart: Uh-huh. Dan: Yeah.
elliott
And suddenly he’s, like, making friends with Shan Guo? And everybody’s like, we like Thaddeus Valentine a lot!
brendan
Yep.
elliott
So Dan got up and left because he doesn’t like it when I badmouth the movies Dave or Meet Dave.
stuart
Yep. Uh—we—we’re just talking about your opinions on the movie Meet Dave, Dan.
dan
Uh—
stuart
Now, the—it’s an ironic name because in that movie, Dave is like, a—is like a robot piloted by tiny guys. So he isn’t actually made out of meat.
dan
[Through laughter] Yeah. [Brendan laughs.]
elliott
I think we might’ve made that joke about 150 episodes ago. [Through laughter] On this—on this very show.
stuart
Let me… go back and listen. [Laughs.] [All laugh.]
dan
[Through laughter] Oh boy.
elliott
Okay.
dan
It’s gonna be a long episode.
elliott
Episode 1—Stealth—okay. [Dan and Brendan chuckle.] So they get kid—so anyway, Tom and Pandora—and Hester, I’m sorry, Pandora’s her mom. Tom and Hester are walking around and they get kidnapped by a kind of vehicle with fake ground on it? And inside they get served tea and cookies because of course this is continental Europe and everybody is British—
stuart
Mm-hm.
elliott
And Hester— [Brendan laughs.] —explains, eventually, that her mom was an archaeologist who found something Hugo wanted—a piece of old tech—and Hugo killed her for it. And left Hester with a bunch of scars. And Hester was just roaming the wasteland as a kid. Hester obviously knows too much, so Thaddeus Valentine, he goes to this big ocean prison on spider legs out in the middle of the ocean—
stuart
Uh-huh.
elliott
—to release Shrike, a leftover zombie automaton killer from the Lazarus Brigade, who’s obsessed with killing Hester for some reason. Stuart? Was this when you went, “Awesome!”
stuart
[Laughs.] I—
elliott
And had to like— [Brendan laughs.] —hide your boner from the movie?
stuart
[Through laughter] Yeah. [Laughs.] I was like, I don’t want the movie to see it or else the Shrike’ll take it off! [All laugh.] He—I mean, this was one of those great scenes where, like… it’s—you’re starting to wonder if every—every, like, domicile or whatever in this—every building in this world, is built in the most easily-to-be-destroyed manner possible. [Elliott and Brendan laugh.]
elliott
You mean, it’s a prison that’s on spindly—
crosstalk
Elliott: — spider legs for some reason? [Laughs.] Stuart: Uh-huh! And I would think like—
stuart
—like, taking a city and just slapping it on some treads and having it fucking dune buggy around, like—that’s gonna blow up. Like, that’s gonna… that’s gonna fuck up. Like, there’s no way that’s gonna survive. And then, of course, later on there’s like, a pirate colony that lives in the air and like, one Shrike gets there and then it’s all fucked up. [Elliott laughs.]
elliott
There goes the neighborhood! [Brendan laughs.] So what you’re saying is, in the future people don’t think ahead.
stuart
I guess not!
dan
Yeah. I will say that there are, like, two characters in this movie that I found interesting at all. One—
crosstalk
Elliott: Dennis? Stuart: Go on.
dan
—was Hugo— [Laughs.] One was Hugo Weaving’s—
crosstalk
Dan: —character. Valentine. Elliott: Bevis and Kate. Okay. Stuart: Yeah.
dan
Just because—
elliott
Thaddeus Valentine.
dan
Just because Hugo Weaving is charismatic, not because of any way that the—the part is written. And then Shrike, here.
stuart
Uh-huh.
dan
Who is—
crosstalk
Dan: —like Alien. Stuart: Played by—
stuart
Played by the—the cable of my heart, Steven Lang?
dan
But he’s—
brendan
Yeah.
dan
Like, he actually has the most of—like—he—his story carries the most emotional weight over the course of the movie? Like, the thing about this film is like, I have no idea who any of these characters are or why I’m supposed to care about them. And—
elliott
Yeah! I think—you’ve—you’ve pinpointed the main issue with this movie, is they did a lot of worldbuilding and they didn’t do a lot of character-building.
dan
Yeah.
brendan
Yeah. And Shrike has the only immediately understandable character goal. [Laughs.] Yeah. Of like, oh! I raised this girl; I want to get her back.
elliott
Yeah.
brendan
Yeah.
elliott
And—and—of course, Dan, you were so excited ‘cause you’re like, “Shrike?! This a crossover with Dan Simmons’ Hyperion novels?” [Dan laughs.]
dan
[Through laughter] Yeah, yeah.
elliott
And you must’ve been so disappointed when you found out it was a different unstoppable killer Shrike. [Dan laughs.]
stuart
And you’re—and you’re a big fan of Dan Simmons’ Hyperion novels because, of course, his name is Dan and your name’s Dan. [Laughs.]
dan
[Through laughter] Uh, I mean I have—
crosstalk
Dan: —read them. Stuart: You also—
stuart
—are not a fan of resolution. [Laughs.]
dan
Yeah. I have read a bunch of Dan Simmons— [Elliott and Brendan laugh.] —novels, but… not that one. Not those ones. [Laughs.]
elliott
That’s why your favorite skins are Danskins. [Brendan laughs.]
crosstalk
Dan: Uh-huh. And I like dan-dan noodles. Elliott: Yeah. Brendan: And your favorite yogurt is Dannon.
elliott
Dannon! Yeah, Dannon yogurt. Uh, Dan, what other Dan thing—oh yeah, your favorite play is those—is called Damn Yankees but you thought it was called Dan Yankees— [Dan laughs.] —for a long time.
stuart
[Laughs.] Yeah, yeah, yeah, and his favorite, uh, Disney animated movie that was later turned into a live action movie is Alad-dan!
dan
Now you would think— [Elliott and Brendan laugh.] —you would think that I love Dan in Real Life, but I was very angry at it ‘cause there weren’t a lot of pancakes in that movie. [Laughs.] I feel like it was—
crosstalk
Dan: —terrible false advertising. Elliott: Yeah. You’re right. You thought it was— Brendan: Fair.
elliott
—you thought it was the life story biopic of the inventor of the pancake pillow.
dan
Yeah.
elliott
The pillow you can eat! [Dan and Brendan laugh.] Why get out of bed? Have breakfast in bed with the pancake pillow! [Brendan laughs.] But no, you were wrong. But your favorite Scorsese movie is Kun-dan, right? [Dan laughs. Brendan joins in.] The story of the Danlai Lama?
dan
[Through laughter] Yep. Goddammit. [Stuart, Elliott, and Brendan chuckle.]
crosstalk
Elliott: No, god-dan-it! [Laughs.] Brendan: God-dan-it! Yeah. [Laughs.]
elliott
So, uh, anyway, so Thaddeus, he got—wants to free the Shrike from this prison so—but he can’t do it with anyone finding out he’s involved. So he just gets in his helicopter and fires missiles at it until it blows up— [All laugh.] And the Shrike is—this is after Valentine goes to the prison, shows up, introduces himself, and goes to see the Shrike in person. So everyone—it just doesn’t make sense. Why would he do all that? Hester and Tom, they’re at—out in the wildlands, they’re getting—in the wild ways, they’re getting put up for a slave auction. But they’re freed by—you guessed it—Anna Fang!
stuart
Yup.
elliott
A Matrix-style freedom five—freedom fighter with little narrow sunglasses, and she’s got a gun and a sword, and she has one of those big fights where all the bad guys try to attack her one by one, and she never runs out of bullets from her weird little pirate rifle shotgun—
stuart
Yeah, she has, like, a—she kind of has, like, a Vash the Stampede type thing going on from Trigun.
elliott
Yeah.
stuart
Like, she’s—and she’s—in—I mean, this is—
elliott
In that she wears a coat that looks like it’s made out of plastic?
stuart
Yeah, like a bright red high-collared coat. She’s got giant hair. And she’s, like, spinning guns and stuff! And some—
brendan
And her name’s out of a They Might Be Giants album.
stuart
Exactly. [Laughs.]
elliott
Oh, yeah. And so, uh, Dan, this was your—obviously, your favorite character. Right? Anna Fang?
dan
Uh… you know, like… again, there’s not really a lot of—of… energy put into making this person interesting? Like, the—
stuart
She looks pretty cool, though.
dan
Yeah, but the idea was just—I think she’s one of these people where—
elliott
She’s got those little sunglasses!
stuart
Yup!
dan
Yes. But I think the idea of—
crosstalk
Dan: —this character— Stuart: And everybody else is super—
stuart
—like, dirty, and covered in dirt. But she’s, like bright and fresh.
dan
Mm-hm.
elliott
And they—Dan, they did do the job of casting an Asian woman in the part, which this movie takes as a character. [Brendan laughs.] Like… well, we know who her character is! She’s Asian!
dan
No, but what I was gonna say was—like, it’s one of these characters where they think it’s cool just to make her steely all the time?
elliott
Yeah, like Steely Dan, your favorite band! [Dan laughs.] ‘Cause it’s got “Dan” in the name!
dan
Yeah, and I’m a 41-year-old man. [Laughs.]
stuart
Yeah. [Brendan and Elliott laugh.]
brendan
Look, the Venn diagram fits. It all overlaps.
crosstalk
Dan: Yeah. Stuart: Yeah.
stuart
You’re either gonna listen to Steely Dan or Dan Folgo—Fogelberg.
dan
Mm-hm. [Brendan laughs.]
dan
Uh… that’s all I have to say about that.
elliott
Uh, wait, no, you didn’t even finish. [Laughs.]
crosstalk
Elliott: That was a half a sentence then we [though laughter] lost you. Stuart: Dan—Dan’s texting someone. [Laughs.]
dan
Well, I just thought—I mean, like—I got interrupted so much—
elliott
No, Dan, that’s cool, ‘cause—no, I mean, you’re—you’re—you only have a limited amount of time to text so we’re going to be recording all day.
dan
I—I— [Laughs.]
elliott
[Through laughter] So.
dan
I only—well, I mean, if the fifth time I’m interrupted I feel like—when I’m set—I’m trying to say is not actually valued by the group, so I gave up.
elliott
Well, of course it’s not! But we—
brendan
It’s valued by me, Dan.
elliott
Nuh—oh, that’s why Bren-dan is here! [Brendan laughs.] Because he—he values it and he’s your favorite cohost right now ‘cause his name has Dan in it!
dan
No, it’s just what I—what I’m saying before, is like, the characters are not developed. They’re given one thing. Her thing is emotionless, which is the least interesting thing. [Laughs.] So…
stuart
But she’s, like, good at fighting and stuff!
dan
Yeah. I want—
elliott
Uh, Dan—I think you’re gonna like her a lot more, ‘cause she’s about to take them on her airship to—Airhaven! The floating pirate city staffed by young, attractive, multie—multiethnic freedom fighters with goggles on their heads!
dan
Dan: Yeah. Stuart: Mm-hm.
elliott
Now, this is when we first start to see people who are not British in the movie.
crosstalk
Stuart: Yeah. I was ho—I was really hoping, like— Elliott: And I was like—
stuart
Porco Rosso was gonna show up. Or— [All laugh.]
elliott
[Through laughter] I mean, that would’ve been ama—I mean—
crosstalk
Brendan: Such a better movie! [Laughs.] Elliott: —this movie—
elliott
At this point, this movie should just become Ready, Player One and just be pulling in characters from other movies since that what they want so badly.
brendan
We’ll just send Shrike and Porco Rosso off on an adventure together and we’re set!
elliott
That would be fantastic.
dan
Also, can I say that, like, every air city since Cloud City in Empire Strikes Back has had to have these kind of, like, uh, like basically electronic stalagtites on the bottom of them? Like, antennae coming down the bottom? And like, that’s great. That’s a great design, but wh—why have we decided that’s the thing? You—y’know, Come on.
crosstalk
Dan: Do a different thing. Stuart: Yeah, why didn’t you—
stuart
—carry over the Ugnaughts?
dan
Yeah! [Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.]
crosstalk
Dan: More Ugnaughts, please! Elliott: [Laughs.] Yeah. If you’re gonna do it! [Laughs.]
stuart
Which is… kinda like Porco Rosso, basically. [Laughs.] [All laugh.]
elliott
Yeah, I mean, yes, it is—they are—
crosstalk
Elliott: They are the Porco Rossos of the Star Wars universe. Brendan: Yet again, yeah! Yeah!
elliott
Let me—a true story!
brendan
Oh, man.
elliott
Uh, we—I was showing Sammy Empire Strikes Back, and he could not wait for the Ugnaughts to be on. [Dan and Brendan laugh.] And—I think he was disappointed that they have relatively little screen time.
stuart
Uh-huh! And— [Laughs.]
crosstalk
Stuart: And then the—when they’re there, they’re unpleasant. [Laughs.] Elliott: But not as disappointed as he was— [Dan laughs.]
elliott
[Through laughter] And—they’re also very—they’re very unpleasant! And they’re—they’re basically, like, if you met an Oompa-Loompa in real life you’d be like, whoa! [Dan laughs.] [Through laughter] This is—a little—this is weird. This guy is not cool. And do you think the Ugnaughts are singing in their own language?
brendan
They are. So to pull back the curtain on Detours, weirdly enough, uh… we—yes. The Ugnaughts very much are singing in their own language.
elliott
Okay.
brendan
Um, we did an entire episode where it was—the Ugnaughts are basically the most obnoxious species, according to George Lucas—
elliott
Uh-huh. [Laughs.]
brendan
They were intended to be aggressive and obnoxious, so we did an episode about how they’re really shitty roommates, and, uh, what they’re actually trying to talk about is their SKA band. This is—I am not kidding you, this is actually—it’s an episode of TV that’ll never air.
elliott
[Varied expressions of disappointment]
elliott
Oh, man, I wanna see it so badly! Uh, guys? We’re gonna have to break into the Lucasfilm vault.
stuart
Uh-huh.
elliott
And steal that stuff, along with the original Salacious Crumb puppet—
crosstalk
Elliott: —for my own personal amusement. Brendan: Naturally! The original Howard the Duck is in there, too. Stuart: So Dan— Dan: I mean, is it literally in the Disney vault now that, uh—it’s all been bought by Disney?
brendan
Oh, no, no. It’s all up in San Rafael, uh, in Northern California.
stuart
So Dan, I think it’s finally—
crosstalk
Stuart: —time for you to— Brendan: Pretty easy!
stuart
—break out that pair of, uh, stretchy pants you bought from the Entrapment, uh— [Laughs.] Set? [Laughs.]
dan
Okay. [All laugh.]
stuart
Uh, costume and set sale?
elliott
When they—
dan
Yeah.
elliott
[Through laughter] When they—when they were auctioning off all the props and costumes from Entrapment? And Dan was like—if they can make Catherine Zeta-Jones’s butt look that good, they’ll do wonders on my butt. And it’s like, Dan—her butt is always—already looks great! [Dan laughs.] I don’t understand—you don’t know how butts work? [Brendan laughs.]
crosstalk
Elliott: You think it’s just the pants? Stuart: He’s like, I thought—
stuart
—it was the lasers that did that! [Laughs.] [Elliott laughs.]
elliott
That was. We’ve talked about it many years ago on the podcast, how amazing it is that that movie was essentially sold on one shot— [Stuart laughs.] —of the main actress’s butt. [All laugh.] I think that was the shot in the—in—I’m surprised it wasn’t the poster. [Dan laughs.] Was just her—her butt under a laser beam. But. Uh, which brings me to a movie pitch, guys!
brendan
Oh yeah.
elliott
It’s called Laser Butt. [All laugh.] Now, you’d think it’s about someone who can fart lasers, and you’d be right.
crosstalk
Stuart: Mm-hm. Brendan: Mm.
elliott
Now, who—who should we cast in this movie? It’s not a comedy, keep in mind. [Someone laughs.] It’s a tense political thriller. [Someone laughs.]
brendan
Catherine Zeta-Jones is age-appropriate now to be the mentor figure.
elliott
Okay.
brendan
Who trains the younger, chosen Laser Butt.
elliott
Okay, but who would be the young Laser Butt? Dan, you’re a perv!
crosstalk
Elliott: Who would you cast? Dan: Well, uh—
dan
I don’t have answer for this, but as long as we’re talking about butts, I do wanna say… uh, like—spoiler alert! At the end of this movie, uh, Hugo Weaving gets crushed by his own city? And, uh, my girlfriend turned to me and was like, “So if you had an ironic death”— [Laughs.] [All laugh.] “What would it be?” And I’m like, uh, probably crushed by a giant butt?
stuart
Mm-hm. Yep. [All laugh.]
elliott
Uh, ironic death, or the death you chose? [All laugh.]
dan
Well—uh, y’know, a little from column a, a little from column b. [Laughs.] [Elliott and Brendan laugh.]
elliott
Yeah. So anyway, we’re gonna learn—now they’re in Airhaven and we learn the story of how Shrike found Hesper as a girl, raised her, and she promised that one day he could make her into a robot like him, and then she decided—I don’t wanna be a robot! And she left and he got mad. Shrike attacks Airhaven. You know it’s gonna happen. There’s a big fight, and it ends when Shrike sees that Hester loves Tom and forgives her. And gives her a locket from her mom and shuts down while remembering his memories of her as a child. And this all happens just in time for it to be too late, because Airhaven is crashing and on fire.
dan
Yeah, it’s like—why don’t you have this realization that you’re gonna turn good before you destroy this whole city?
crosstalk
Dan: And by—no, go on. Sorry. [Brendan laughs.] Elliott: Yeah. And also, it’s one of those things—
elliott
No, no. It just—that—that he—he notices that they’re in love in the way of, like, similar to the principal noticing that that girl is in real trouble in The Book of Henry?
brendan
Mm-hm. [Laughs.]
elliott
Where he just kind of looks into her eyes and, like, sees her emotions? Straight through?
dan
Well, and this was another thing that made me really angry while watching the movie, where I’m just like—what have we been given to show these two being in love? Other than the fact that they are the male and female leads of a movie. Like… she…
crosstalk
Brendan: Hmm… Let’s see. Dan: —kind of warms to him in that she—
dan
—doesn’t let him die over the course of the film— [Elliott and Brendan laugh.] —but there’s—there’s nothing that shows that they have, like some sort of connection.
stuart
Well, she could—yeah, she could’ve cut him loose when he was hanging from a rope, but instead she threw the knife to him.
dan
Yeah, I guess that’s love, guys.
stuart
And the power of love allowed him to catch it.
dan
[Laughs.] Yeah.
elliott
Yeah. [Elliott laughs.] [Brendan laughs.]
stuart
Now, don’t you think she would suffer some kind of consequences from these air pirates for… like, knowing that this Shrike dude was chasing her and she led him right to Airhaven and then Airhaven was exploded?
elliott
Uh, you’d think so. But they don’t even have time to talk about that, because—uh-oh!—Thaddeus found Tom’s cache of old tech and he’s used it to rebuild the Medusa!
stuart
Mm-hm.
elliott
And it turns out when he killed Hester’s mom—the tech she found? Was the Medusa— [Someone gasps.] —control system! Oh nooo! He’s got it working, kills the Lord Mayor of London with just an Uzi—
dan
Yeah.
elliott
—in the—uh—and he doesn’t even have a cool—he doesn’t even have a cool catchphrase line, right?
dan
No.
brendan
It’s actually shockingly graphic and direct, that execution. [Laughs.]
elliott
Yeah.
brendan
Yeah. [Laughs.]
elliott
Uh—especially—well, it is Mortal Engines.
crosstalk
Stuart: Mm-hm. Dan: Yeah. Brendan: That’s certainly—
brendan
You know what? That’s true!
elliott
And the movie’s got “mortal” in the title.
brendan
Mm-hm.
elliott
You know there’s probably going to be combat.
stuart
Mm-hm. [Laughs.] [All laugh.]
elliott
And it’s gonna be spelled with a “k”—
crosstalk
Elliott: And that ‘k’ stands for home run. A strike out? Brendan: But that’s why I assumed he was gonna—I assumed he was—
brendan
—gonna freeze the room. [Laughs.] Not shoves him.
elliott
Oh yeah, that’s right. So guys—what Mortal Kombat characters would you wish were in the movie? Maybe instead of Strike? Or Shrike, I should say.
crosstalk
Dan: Uh… I was more of a— Elliott: Strike is a—not a—
elliott
—is not a character in the movie.
dan
I was more of a Street Fighter guy, so I actually don’t know the—
crosstalk
Dan: —Mortal Kombat characters that well. [Elliott sighs deeply.] Stuart: Mm. Cool. Yeah.
stuart
You’re—you’re more into like, uh, like spacing and—
crosstalk
Stuart: —poking and all that sort of stuff. Y’know. Dan: Why are you sighing? I like—
dan
It’s just a—a true fact about me! I’m just saying!
elliott
No, no, it is—it is the mo—it is the most Dan moment for me to be like— [Brendan laughs.] “Hey, what’s a character from a video game you’d like, as a goof” and you’re like, “Um, no—and—"
crosstalk
Elliott: “—I don’t know that video game.” [Brendan laughs.] Dan: But I don’t know the characters! What am I supposed to do? Stuart: [Laughs.] I mean, dude—
crosstalk
Elliott: So—so—name a—name a street fighter! Stuart: There’s a guy named Raiden in it!
dan
Alright, I’ll make up one! Uh… [Elliott laughs.] Strike-knife is my favorite! [Laughs.] [Elliott laughs.]
stuart
That—well—I mean—
elliott
Now what is—
stuart
There is a guy named Striker.
crosstalk
Brendan: [Laughs.] There’s— Dan: Oh, okay. Stuart: Maybe that’s who Dan’s talking about. Brendan: And there is Scorpion, who throws a strike knife. Stuart: That—that’s actually true, yeah. Elliott: Yeah, so. Stuart: Now, that’s— Dan: Wait, is—is—is Ice—Ice Subzero? Okay. Subzero. Stuart: Subzero, yep, that’s a character. Yep. He’s one of the originals.
elliott
His name—yeah. Okay. He’s one of the OGs of MK.
crosstalk
Brendan: [Laughs.] Yeah. Stuart: [Laughs.] Yeah.
brendan
Uh, I’ll go with Gor—what is it, Goro is the—
crosstalk
Elliott: Goro? Yeah, with four arms? Stuart: Uh-huh. Brendan: Goro?
brendan
Because everything should have four arms. It’s just more fun that way. So yeah.
crosstalk
Stuart: [Through laughter] Yeah, that’s—that’s his—that’s his tagline. [Laughs.] Elliott: Yeah. And I’m gonna with uh, Noob Saibot. [Laughs.]
dan
I mean, I do ha—I do have four arms. I don’t know what you’re talking about.
elliott
Everything’s more fun with four arms! Oh yeah, Dan, you have forearms, that’s true. On your arms.
dan
Yeah. Anyway.
elliott
Yeah.
dan
That’s a pun, guys!
elliott
So— [Dan laughs. Brendan joins in.] Yeah. So anyway, he’s got the Medusa working and now he’s going to attack Shan Guo! Shan Guo turns out to be kind of this vaguely pan-Asian kind of TaleSpin, Only Angels Have Wings, 1930s Temple of Doom early scenes type place?
stuart
Uh-huh.
elliott
And uh, the mayor of Shan Guo is like, a, a wise old man in robes with a—some kind of magic amulet that I kept assuming was gonna shoot lasers but it wa—maybe it was just he won it in the Olympics? I dunno. [Brendan laughs.] In the last Olympics before the 60-Minute War? There’s a big fight between London and the Shan Guo air fleet, which is made up of—as Dan said—a lot of, like, crazy old DaVinci helicopters and ‘30s seaplanes and things like that, and this scene—it should be really cool, right, guys?
stuart
Uh…. Well, I mean, it’s—it’s just them blasting the walls with a giant laser, right?
elliott
Uh-huh.
stuart
I mean it’s—it’s basically just, like, the opening of, uh, of Empire Strikes Back. Right?
dan
Yeah.
elliott
Oh! Well, we’re gonna get to see the closing of both— [Brendan laughs.] Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi later, so it makes sense. Uh, so—it—we—Hester realizes: mom’s locket! It has the shutdown key for the Medusa system in it!
stuart
How has she not found this before now?
elliott
Well, Shrike had the amulet for a while, I think.
stuart
Oh, okay. Right. That makes sense.
crosstalk
Dan: But also, like—what the— Elliott: But it does take her—
elliott
—a long time to open it. Up ‘til that point.
dan
What the fuck—like, why does—like—just—why does she have a fucking locket with this [though laughter] in it? Like, why—why?
elliott
To keep it out of the hands of Thaddeus Valentine!
crosstalk
Elliott: The villain! Dan: Yeah, but like—
brendan
I give all of my weapons keys to my children in jewelry. [Elliott laughs.]
dan
So like…
brendan
It is a very time-tested parenting method.
elliott
Yeah.
dan
So like—
elliott
You’ll understand when you have kids, Dan!
dan
20 to 30 years ago, Hugo Weaving was like, “Oh, someday I wanna use a Medusa thing and I realize that this could shut it down, so I gotta get it away from this woman and I’ll like burn the house down and injure her daughter in the course of getting it back.”
crosstalk
Dan: “Because I need it for some—" Elliott: I don’t think he knows that—
elliott
I don’t think—I don’t think he knows that the shutdown key exists.
dan
Okay, like—
elliott
It’s more like she—“I gotta keep this away from Hugo Weaving; I better give it to a child, because out of the mouths of babes…”
crosstalk
Brendan: Mm-hm. Dan: But why—why does she know it’s— Elliott: “…comes mostly vomit.”
dan
—a thing that needs to be kept from Hugo Weaving? Why does Hugo Weaving want—like, what is going on?
elliott
‘Cause he’s—he’s Hugo Weaving, Dan!
dan
[Laughs.] Okay.
elliott
[Laughs.] She’s like, weren’t you the Red Skull? And he’s like, yes, but they didn’t give me much to do with the character— [Brendan laughs.]
dan
So I didn’t come back. They got a—they got a lookalike for later on. It sounded like.
stuart
But man, he does that accent so well in that movie. Oh man, it’s like a weird Austrian-specific thing. That’s great. Um—
elliott
So—so—Thaddeus—oh, what were you going to say, Stuart?
stuart
Uh, yeah! The—I mean, I’m gonna jump ahead to one of the later reveals, of course, that he—Tha—uh, that Thaddeus Valentine is Hester Shaw’s father. Which should surprise no one. Um— [All laugh.] Especially her! She should be like, oh yeah! Of course. That makes sense. Um, but it seems—then looking back, it’s like—wow, they jump to murders—like, murdering each other—super fast!
dan
Yeah.
stuart
In the scene where they’re—
crosstalk
Stuart: —remembering— Elliott: Yeah, well that’s the—
stuart
—her—them finding the Medusa control box? And then they immediately start, like, setting stuff on fire and blasting each other in the face?
elliott
Yeah. I mean, that’s the special relationship that dads and daughter have.
crosstalk
Stuart: Okay. Dan: Mm-hm.
elliott
And Brendan?
brendan
Yeah.
elliott
As a father-daughter, someday you’ll have that. Where you’re both trying to kill each other, uh, Clouseau and Cato style?
brendan
That—I won’t—it’s not a someday. I believe I currently have that with my twin daughters.
elliott
Oh, wow. I mean, it starts, yeah, with them leaving out little toys for you—
brendan
Mm-hm.
elliott
—to trip on.
brendan
Exactly. Uh, surprising me by jumping on me to wake me up in the middle of the night? Sure! [Elliott laughs.] Yeah!
elliott
[Through laughter] That’s terrible.
brendan
Yeah. No, they know that the only way to prevent me trying to murder them and their mother later, is to try to murder me first. So.
dan
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
brendan
I mean, it tracks.
elliott
Yeah. That’s—I mean, that—
brendan
It’s the airtight plotting in this movie!
elliott
I think that’s all in, uh, in, uh—Paul Reiser’s book about being a parent? [All laugh.]
brendan
Exactly. Yeah. [Elliott laughs.] Mortal… Fatherhood!
elliott
[Through laughter] Mortal—Mortal Fatherhood! Uh, so anyway. The—that—the Shan Guo fleet—it’s too late; Medusa blows up the wall. So many CGI buildings destroyed. Uh, the air pilots take Hester to shut down Medusa—well, Tom takes a ridiculously long time to change his jacket into an aviator’s jacket? [Brendan laughs.]
dan
Yeah.
elliott
And it’s like—they’re getting on the plane to leave, and he’s still slowly reaching out to take this jacket. Uh, he will, of course, live his dream of being an aviator even though I think he has no experience flying?
brendan
Yeah, which I was gonna say, by the way, just as a quick digression bump me—that’s—that was ridiculous, that all the characters treated this as like, you finally get to be the aviator, Tom! I’m like, no! This was a childhood interest, I took it as, of like, I want—like, I wanted to be a vet! I shouldn’t perform surgery on a cat! [All laugh.] Like, that was a terrible, terrible thing!
elliott
Sometimes, we get to live our childhood dreams. When I was a kid, I wanted to leave my house.
stuart
Mm-hm.
elliott
And I did, eventually!
crosstalk
Brendan: Wow, alright. Fair enough. Yeah. Elliott: Yeah, so.
elliott
I wanted to run away and the way I ran away was I grew up. [Stuart laughs.] Y’know, isn’t growing up a little bit—kind of running away from your past? [Someone laughs.] Dan, have you ever ran away from something?
dan
Uh….
elliott
‘Cause there’s a tiger right behind you! [Everyone yells in faux panic.] [Dan and Elliott chuckle.] It’s okay! It’s Tony the Tiger. He just wants to serve you some Frosted Flakes.
dan
Oh, okay. Phew!
elliott
But right behind him is a cheetah! [Dan laughs, makes fake scared noise.] Oh, it’s okay. It’s Chester Cheetah. He just wants to give you some delicious Cheetos. But right behind him is a lion!
dan
Oh, um. I don’t know how to feel about it after those last two ones.
elliott
This is a—it’s a fucking real lion, Dan.
dan
Okay.
stuart
Uh-huh.
elliott
You gotta run.
dan
[Through laughter] Alright, I will.
elliott
No! Just kidding! He just wants to tell you about the MGMUA Library of film titles! [Various chuckles.] And that ours gratis artists, uh, but watch out—behind him there’s an alligator!
dan
Okay. Well—I’m just sort of tired of it.
stuart
Think of possible alligators it can be. [Brendan laughs.]
dan
Uh… let’s see. Uh, is it, uh, Albert Alligator? From Pogo?
crosstalk
Stuart: That’s a weird one, but okay. [Laughs.] Elliott: It is.
elliott
It was Albert Alligator. You’re right. He’s smoking a little cigar stub and he’s got a little hat on sometimes, and he’s talking in a dialect that I’m not sure if it’s offensive now or not? But I certainly feel weird when I’m reading it out loud to my children.
dan
Yeah. I don’t think— [Someone laughs.] —it’s meant to be, like, an ethnic thing. I think it’s just, y’know. Dialect.
brendan
Just men.
dan
Like, Pogo dialect. I think that’s all it is.
elliott
Okay. Well, I’ll tell people that when they get mad at me about it. Okay, so! [Stuart laughs.] Tom changes jacket. There’s a big air fight. All these pilots we just met get killed. It’s kinda like the end of Star Wars that way, where they’re like, hey, remember all those characters you’ve been watching this whole movie? Forget about ‘em. [Brendan laughs.] It’s time for—it’s time for Porkins and Biggs and—and Red Five to take— [Dan laughs.] —center stage! Uh, Anna Fang has a hand-to-hand pi—battle with Thaddeus Valentine, which ends with her dead. Uh-oh! Looks like the Fang… got bitten. Hester? She plugs in the kill drive and stops the machine before it can fire again, and the people who lived outside the wall of Shan Guo are like, too little too late, Hester, but thanks! Appreciate it. And Kate shows up and she’s mad at her dad. And her dad has now reached that level of movie villainhood where he no longer cares if he lives or dies? He wants—just wants to destroy his enemies? So he’s like, I’m gonna smash London right into the wall to keep destroying it! And it’s like, that’s crazy. Why would you do that? [Brendan laughs.] Like, I don’t understand. Uh, Thaddeus runs away. Hechtor—Hester catches up to him and there’s the reveal, as Stuart mentioned, that he’s here dad. Meanwhile, Tom—Tim—Natsworthy, he flies a plane into London’s guts to blow up the gears to stop it, and then flies out, followed by flame. That’s right—they stole the endings of Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. As I mentioned, they put ‘em into one movie! So this movie must be twice as good as either of those movies!
stuart
Yeah.
elliott
Guys, do you agree? With that movie math?
brendan
I mean, it checks out.
elliott
Yeah.
brendan
Yeah. There is a remainder, but—it mostly works. [All laugh.]
elliott
Uh, how many—how many _Empire Strikes Back_s do you think Mortal Engines is worth? Dan?
dan
Uh, 1/18th of one.
stuart
Wow.
elliott
Okay.
stuart
I’m gonna have to—I’m gonna have to check the worldwide box office before I can, uh— [Dan laughs.] —tell you that one, Elliott. [Elliott laughs.]
elliott
I mean, then it’s actually like probably like 1/1000th, but uh— [Brendan and Stuart chuckle.] —yeah, what about Return of the Jedi, Dan?
dan
Uh… 1/13th.
elliott
Okay. What about the Star Wars Holiday Special?
dan
[Laughs.] Oh, boy. They’re about par.
stuart
Wow. [All laugh.]
elliott
Okay. Wow. Okay. Uh—uh—her—Hester’s dad is like—Thaddeus is like—so let’s just kill each other! That’s what we’re supposed to do, right? And Hester goes, no, I choose life! And she jumps onto the rope ladder to Tim’s airship or whatever, and Hugo Weaving gets in a—his ship. Tim shoots down Hugo Weaving’s ship, which crasses—crashes. Hugo’s okay.
crosstalk
Stuart: Tim immediately gets fucking— Elliott: Then he gets crushed—
stuart
—bloodthirsty there. He’s like, [Schwarzenegger accent] “You’re fired!” And then he shoots a missile at him. [All laugh.]
elliott
[Through laughter] Oh. And—
stuart
I’m like, wow! You know, it’s—it takes a lot to kill a man, and he can like look him right in the eyes from where he’s shooting that missile. That’s crazy. He’s cold-blooded. [Someone laughs.]
elliott
Yeah. And it’s espec—especially after—a—weird after his girlfriend of a day is like, no, I won’t kill you. And he’s like, hey babe, I’ll take care of this one! I—
brendan
Was she maybe like, “No, no, no! He’s my dad! He’s my—okay.”
elliott
Oh, boy. This is gonna be awkward. Uh, and then, uh, as mentioned, Hugo Weaving is crushed under London’s tank’s treads. So ironic.
brendan
[Under his breath] London crawling. [All laugh.]
elliott
[Through laughter] Did you say London crawling?
brendan
[Through laughter] I did! [Elliott laughs.]
elliott
What I like is you said it so quiet, ‘cause you were both proud of it and ashamed of it. [Dan laughs.] And you were like, if they don’t—
brendan
I wasn’t really sure I wanted to commit to it.
elliott
If they don’t like this, I can pretend that I didn’t say it. If they do like it, then I’m like, cool for saying [though laughter] so little. Uh—yeah. I guess London crawl—was crawling to the faraway town—Shan Guo! [Stuart laughs.] ‘Cause war is declared and the Medusa rains down!
brendan
Ooh!
elliott
Yeah. Calling to the underworld, which I assume would be— [Dan sighs heavily.] —uh—the people who live in the tank treads?
brendan
Mm-hm. Mm-hm.
elliott
Uh, get out of the cupboard, two boys and girls?
crosstalk
Brendan: Oh, then— Elliott: The cupboards—
elliott
—of course, being Airhaven. Yeah.
brendan
Yeah, yeah.
elliott
Or is it covers?
brendan
Get out of the cov—get under the covers—
elliott
Get under the covers? Oh, boy.
brendan
I think—
elliott
Turns out I don’t know the lyrics—
crosstalk
Elliott: —to “London Calling” as well as I thought. Brendan: I don’t know. You—[inaudible] far.
elliott
Guys—
brendan
The point is, Joe Strummer is trying to warn us.
elliott
Yes. About Mortal Engines. Uh, guys, Shan Guo? The mayor is super cool. He’s like, people of London, come and join us. And Tim and Hester, they kiss finally and fly off planning to travel the world together, and we’re left with some questions: will the world of Mortal Engines be okay? Will someone else find the Medusa Drive? Will their two-day-old relationship survive being on a small plane with no bathrooms— [Dan laughs; Stuart joins in.] —for I assume weeks on end? I guess we’ll find out in Mortal Engines 2: Summer Vacation. [Brendan laughs.]
dan
[Laughs.] Okay. Uh—let’s just speed on to final judgments on this.
stuart
Yeah.
dan
Whether it’s a good, bad—
elliott
Let’s drive our city tanks over to final judgments.
dan
Is it a good-bad movie, a bad-bad movie, or a movie you kinda like? I-I wanna say, uh, I’ll—I’ll start off. Uh—I feel like, actually, my girlfriend made the most salient, uh, critique of this while we were watching? And—
stuart
Uh-huh.
dan
Y’know, I—I—I mention her a lot, but we watch the movies together, so I—if she makes a good point I wanna pass it on. And um, it’s—
elliott
[Laughs.] This is a—this is an awful lot of backstory and explanation for—
crosstalk
Elliott: —what she’s about to say. Dan: Yeah, well. Uh— Stuart: Mm-hm. Yeah, what is this—
stuart
—the opening 20 minutes of Mortal Engines? [Dan laughs. Elliott and Brendan join in.]
dan
Well, she made the point that, like, y’know, this movie is obviously trying to be this big fantasy epic like a Star Wars or something like that, but what it doesn’t realize? Is—those movies don’t actually have a ton of action overall? Like, a lot of it is the anticipation of action? Like… as the—as—
elliott
You’re saying they’re edging us. The Star Wars movies are edging us a lot of the time.
dan
Well, like, they have less than kind of like you imagine. Like, as they go along? Uh, I think, like, each progressive sequel does have more action in it? But that’s because you’ve already learned the world. You’ve learned the characters. So there’s more room to just skip to that stuff? But like, a lot of it is the anticipation of action. This has no anticipation of action.
stuart
Uh-huh.
dan
It, like, thinks that you want shit thrown at you every single second, which doesn’t leave time to learn about characters or their motivations! [Laughs.] And I sort of assumed, while watching it, that this was… a… um—as we’ve said, this is based on a series of young adult novels, and I sort of assumed it had so much plot I was like, okay, they probably took multiple novels and boiled it down.
stuart
Uh-huh.
dan
And I looked on Wikipedia; I was reading summaries of the novels. It was like, no, this is basically the first book. They made a lot of changes in the second half, but it’s basically the first book, and… uh—it’s written by Fran Walsh and Philippa Boyens, and I think maybe Peter Jackson himself, I’m not sure. But like—
elliott
The script is—
crosstalk
Elliott: Not the book. Dan: The script! And—
brendan
Yeah.
dan
You know, obviously they are the team who did Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit, and… people criti—criticized The Hobbit for taking a fairly simple book and expanding it into three movies?
stuart
Uh-huh.
dan
This is one case where I wish they had taken one book and expanded it [though laughter] into three movies. Like, I actually wish they’d done the same Hobbit thing here, ‘cause there’s so much shit going on, I think it would’ve worked better if it had more time to breathe.
crosstalk
Stuart: [Thoughtfully] Yeah— Dan: Bad-bad, is what I’m saying.
stuart
Yeah. When I was watching it, I was—I was—like, knowing that this is the first book in a series, and knowing it was made by—it was, y’know, made by the people who made the Lord of the Rings trilogy, it made me think about, like, what makes—what—some of the things that made Fellowship of the Ring work so well as a first movie, and parts of it are, like—aside from the opening, you don’t have any other big battles! Like, you have some f—like you have action sequences, but, like, it doesn’t end with like a big, like, armies facing off against each other blasting lasers at each other. Um, and you—it does take the time to build the, like, develop these characters. Um—also, part of the problem with this movie is so much of the just why. Like, why should I care about any of it or anybody? Like… what are their beliefs? What—why—should I care about the people of London? Should I hate them? Should I care about Hester Shaw? I mean, her only motivation is revenge, and that’s… a relatively thin motivation! And she… I don’t know.
dan
No, you’re right!
stuart
Yeah. [Laughs.] Like, it’s—
elliott
No, yeah, no.
dan
It’s all true.
elliott
Yeah. There’s it’s—it’s—there’s a lack of character and a lack of reason to like it. I’ll mention—Dan, uh, my wife was watching with me and Brendan and she made a interesting comment which was: [Snores.] [Dan laughs.] ‘Cause she fell asleep about 30 minutes in. [Laughs.]
dan
Well, I—I have to say it—for once I watched this in two parts? Because we were watching it; I started falling asleep, and she was like, “Honey, we can watch this, uh, the second half tomorrow [though laughter] if you gotta take a nap.” [All laugh.]
brendan
Very wise.
elliott
You—you were just so worn out from all the excitement.
dan
Yeah.
elliott
Uh, so I’m gonna say—that it’s also bad-bad. There’s a lot of neat-looking stuff in it! But… it’s… they—it’s like they—yeah. They—they forgot to give us characters or a plot that we would care about. Brendan?
brendan
Yeah.
elliott
I know you’re gonna say something different!
brendan
I’m gonna go out on a ledge here—uh, no. It’s bad-bad. It’s super boring. Um, but the—my main hope or takeaway after it is, I wish a different Peter Jackson had shown up? I wish it was…
elliott
Some other guy with the same name?
brendan
[Through laughter] Yeah! [Laughs.] Absolutely. Give that guy a chance! [Elliott laughs.] Um, no, but like the Peter Jackson of, like, Dead Alive, of, like… Frighteners, or Meet the Feebles, even. Basically, who would take a crazy concept and make it fun?
elliott
Mm-hm.
brendan
Because all of the other problems wouldn’t have also mattered to me as much? Like, if I couldn’t explain it but it was at least fun? It was so somber and serious. There was no joy to be had in a movie that is about cities on tank treads eating other cities.
stuart
Which I’m sure is the reason he bought the rights to make that book into a movie. Right? Like… and—and the thing about—the thing about Peter—like, I’ve been thinking about this a lot, ‘cause there is that, like, dream that Peter Jackson’s just gonna make another fun, like, low-budget movie. But I feel like he’s become… I’m—he’s become such a, like, industry now that like… if he were to make a small movie, he—like—he would not be able to hire as many of the people that rely on him! [Laughs.]
elliott
Yeah. Thousands—thousands of people would be out of work if he decided to make Bad Taste 2.
stuart
Yeah.
elliott
Yeah, or something like that. Although, uh, I wonder if—now that you mention it, him buying the rights to the book, I wonder if he was like, “Get me that YA book! The Mortal something!” [Someone laughs.] And he wanted Mortal Instruments: City of Bones? And they brought him this one and he was like, “This wasn’t the—“ Like, when you’re—when you tell your grandma, like, “Oh, get me that Avengers movie!” And she comes back with the boot—with the, uh, with the generic, like, uh, like The Avengerers! [Brendan laughs.] Like, the ripoff? And you’re like, grandma!!!
brendan
I’m sure this is just as good.
elliott
In fact, I think that’s what happened. Peter Jackson sent his grandma out to go buy the rights—
crosstalk
Stuart: Mm-hm. Brendan: Oh, man.
elliott
And she got the wrong rights. Oh, Grammy Jackson!
stuart
Grandma doesn’t know. [Scattered laughter.]
elliott
Yeah.
music
[Light, up-tempo, electric guitar with synth instruments.]
promo
Music: Chill, down-tempo music plays in the background. Jesse Thorn: Going into a Bullseye interview, I know it’s somebody who does amazing work? But it’s an actual conversation! I don’t know where it’s headed. Speaker 1: The—absolutely! I—you’re absolutely right! You said it, actually, better than I did, so I have to think about what that means. [Laughs.] [Deep laughter.] Speaker 2: Hey, these are the—this—this—this—this is the straight talk that—that you’re gonna get on this show. Jesse: Bullseye. Creators you know, creators you need to know. Find it at MaximumFun.org or wherever you get podcasts.
promo
Music: Cheerful banjo music plays in the background. Biz Ellis: Hi! I’m Biz. Theresa Thorn: And I’m Theresa. Biz: And we host One Bad Mother, a comedy podcast about parenting. Theresa: Whether you are a parent or just know kids exist in the world, join us each week as we honestly share what it’s like to be a parent. Biz: These are really hard questions! Theresa: They are really hard questions! Biz: [Voice getting louder and more agitated] I don’t have any answers for that! Theresa: I don’t either! Biz: [Yelling] Sack of garbage! Theresa: I know! Biz: [Yelling in frustration] Ahhhh! Ughhh! [Laughs wildly.] Ahhhh! The end of the show will just be five minutes of Biz— [Theresa giggles.] Biz: —and Theresa crying and screaming until the outro is played. So join us each week as we judge less, laugh more, and remind you that you are doing a great job. Theresa: Find us on MaximumFun.org, on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts!
dan
Alright. Let’s move along to, uh… a few, uh, sponsors?
stuart
Uh-huh.
elliott
Uh—before we talk about our regular sponsors, I was wondering if we could let Brendan talk a little bit about the new season of Harvey Girls Forever! on Netflix now!
brendan
Thank you very much! Yeah. Uh, starting November 12th and any time thereafter, uh, season three of Harvey Girls Forever! will be streaming on Netflix. Um, it’s the third season about our show which is about, uh, Audrey, Lotta, and Dot, three classic Harvey comics character reimagined for, uh, modern audiences and… their goal is just to make it—make their block the best place to ever have a childhood! It’s trying to keep the feeling of… that time between when you left school and before you went home for dinner alive forever. Uh—we try to keep it relatable for all kids and adults and a lot of jokes for people of all ages, uh, especially the episodes written by Elliott here?
elliott
Oh yeah! There’s two! Written by me!
brendan
Yeah. One of them does feature a Judas Priest-style song about a—uh, trove of deadly toys that were pulled from the market?
elliott
Mm-hm.
brendan
Um… but yeah! Season three has just premiered, where we add Richie Rich, uh, far and away the biggest name out of the Harvey comics characters? Uh, he joins our cast for this season, uh, voiced by Jack Quaid from The Boys, uh, he’s super hilarious and really fun and we reimagined him also so now he’s a self-made child billionaire and, uh, y’know. Just—I think—a pretty fun character and, uh, yeah. We have some good comedy folk always in there. There’s Lauren Lapkus is our star, and got Danny Pudi and this season we got Kristin Chenoweth and Anna Camp and a whole lot of really funny people coming by and, uh, having a good time with us!
elliott
It’s a really fun show, and I like it a lot, and my children like it a lot, and I think you’ll like it a lot, too. And uh, if enough people watch, maybe you’ll finally get that season where you can bring Baby Huey in!
brendan
That has been our dream the entire time. [Elliott laughs.] I think, actually, oh—you know what? I don’t want to spoil but I’ll say, uh, astute watchers, uh, to season 3—perhaps there is some Baby Huey Easter eggs in there! [Elliott laughs.]
elliott
Which would be huge eggs!
crosstalk
Brendan: It’s ginormous eggs! Elliott: It’s just he’s—
elliott
—an enormous bird! [Stuart laughs.]
stuart
Now, I apologize for not actually previously being, uh, familiar with the show, But um… I have to ask—so, it’s based on these Harvey comics characters. Have you expanded uh—have you expanded the character of Dot? Because if I recall— [Brendan laughs.] —her whole thing was just that she liked polka dots.
brendan
Yes. Uh… no. That was absolutely our—Audrey, thankfully—Audrey, actually, pretty much worked as-is. Dot we expanded to be, um, she is very, very precise and exacting about everything? So to her, it was like, “The dot is the most perfect thing ever ‘cause it’s a perfect circle!” So it’s something she always strives for and loves, but it’s more of just a—
stuart
Yeah.
brendan
—exacting character?
stuart
And then she starts seeing dots everywhere, and then those dots become spirals, and then her body— [All laugh.] —starts growing into a spiral [Dan laughs.]
elliott
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It’s called—it’s called Uzumaki Girls Forever. Yeah!
brendan
Yep. And then she ends—then she meets Spiral and goes to the Mojoverse, and yeah!
crosstalk
Elliott: Whoaaa! Stuart: What?!
brendan
[Through laughter] It’s a pretty cool crossover.
elliott
Spiral is one of those X-Men characters that I love and I don’t know why, ‘cause I’ve never read a story where she’s been any—really good in it?
brendan
She’s a cool design!
crosstalk
Elliott: Yeah, except she got— Brendan: Uh—
elliott
—that weird Samurai helmet and—
crosstalk
Brendan: And six arms? Yeah! Um— Yeah. Mm-hm. Yeah. Elliott: —all those arms, yeah. And those furry boots? Boots with the fur? Apple bottom jeans? [Dan and Brendan laugh.]
elliott
Spiral gets low, low, low! [Brendan laughs.]
brendan
Um, and then, yeah, uh, Lotta—we took—basically Lotta as-is, but made it her—she has an appetite for life! And for love and for passion, and took out the fact that every comic basically just had jokes about her eating giant sandwiches.
crosstalk
Dan and Stuart: Mm-hm.
stuart
Save that for Dagwood. [Dan laughs.]
dan
[Through laughter] Yup! [Elliott and Brendan laugh.]
brendan
Look, it’s hit bit! I don’t wanna steal it!
dan
Uh, okay! Alright, well, thank you for that! Uh, but—
brendan
Yeah, thank you guys!
dan
I’m moving on to sponsors. Um, I do want to say, I don’t feel like we acknowledge this enough outside of the Max Fun tribe, but, uh, The Flop House is supported overwhelmingly by listeners like you who choose to donate at MaximumFun.org, but we also have some corporate sponsors. This week, The Flop House is sponsored in spart—in part by Squarespace. A dream is just a great idea that doesn’t have a website yet. Make it a reality with Squarespace! Create a beautiful website to showcase your work, blog, or publish content, sell products and services of all kinds, and more—whatever your heart desires for a website. Squarespace helps by doing y—by giving you—by doing you— [Though laughter] —by giving you—[breaks off, laughing.] [Elliott laughs.]
elliott
I mean, some websites are about doing you— [Dan laughs.] —but that’s—
crosstalk
Brendan: And they help! Elliott: But that’s— Dan: Not Squarespace.
elliott
And they—they help in a way, yeah. They help one thing.
dan
Squarespace has a beautiful, customizable, mobile-optimized templates to—created by world-class designers. A—a built-in search engine optimization and analytics to help you grow, and 24/7, award-winning customer support. Check out Squarespace.com/flop for a free trial, and when you’re ready to launch, use the offer code “FLOP” to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.
elliott
Uh, guys, I had an idea for a website and I was wondering if it—if, uh, Squarespace might be able to help. It was inspired by this movie that we’re talking about—
stuart
Uh-huh!
elliott
Uh, and it’s—so—we’re all worried that at some point, a city’s just gonna come along and eat us. Right?
stuart
Yeah!
elliott
We saw it in the movie. It’s pretty scary. Like, what if Pittsburgh just comes—I’ve—we’ve heard of the fish that ate Pittsburg!
brendan
And the car that ate Paris!
stuart
Mm-hm.
elliott
Oh, boy! Well, what if Paris was eating cars, and Pittsburg was eating fishes?
crosstalk
Stuart: And Paris was burning? Elliott: Was it a fish that—
elliott
—saved—yeah— [Brendan laughs.] Well, I mean Paris— [Laughs.] I mean, Paris is burning in—in the dance floors all of—of—of the world, but the uh, no—the—what if—there was a way—
stuart
Uh-huh.
elliott
—to track these cities and to know where they’re coming from? That’s why I’ve got citytracker.com—that’s the idea—it tells you where every city is located whenever you check, just in case they might’ve moved. And you could put a tracker on any city in the world and it’ll tell you if that city has moved and gotten closer to you, so you know to get out its way.
brendan
Now what if you are in one of the cities?
elliott
Uh, the—your com—phone would explode.
brendan
Okay. [Laughs.] Fair enough.
stuart
So your—your parsh—
elliott
If you’re using it on your phone. If it’s not on your laptop, your laptop would explode.
stuart
So you’re partially subsidized by a venture capitalist firm who, uh, who makes money off of people having to buy new phones. [Laughs.]
elliott
Yes! [Brendan laughs.] It’s called “Apple.”
dan
[Through laughter] Oh wow!
elliott
And— [Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.] And so hope—maybe Squarespace will help me get this so that it can scale to all different types of explodable, uh, media?
brendan
Yeah!
elliott
Or platforms? Uh, so anyway, that’s citytracker.com—look out for it, so you’ll always know where cities are!
brendan
Mm. I have been looking for some cities lately, so thank you!
elliott
Yeah. No problem. Uh, Dan? What’s next after Squarespace?
dan
Uh, I believe I sent you a couple of Jumbotrons!
stuart
Uh-oh!
stuart
J-J-J-Jumbotrons! That’s right!
elliott
I’ve certainly got one!
stuart
This message is for Rusty! This message is from Hailey. “Happy 40th Birthday! I hope this message finds you sometime around November 7th, but if not— [Laughs.] oh well! You’re still getting a shoutout on one of the greatest podcasts of all time.”
dan
Mm.
stuart
“You’ll always be the bikini to my carwash; the castle to my freak; and you make every day feel like Cage-mas. Dottie and I love you so much.” Now, I’m staring down the barrel of the big 4-0 myself, guys, so.
dan
Mm.
stuart
I wish somebody would have, uh, get such a nice message for me on one of my favorite podcasts! [Laughs.]
elliott
Alright, Stuart, I’ll get you a Jumbotron on uh, [though laughter] on some kind of, uh, small figure painting podcast. [Dan laughs.]
stuart
Thank you.
crosstalk
Elliott: I don’t—I don’t know of any, but I’ll look Brendan: Or Car Talk?
elliott
What?
brendan
Car Talk?
crosstalk
Elliott: Or Car Talk, yeah. I mean— Dan: Mm-hm. I mean—
elliott
—it’s hard to get Jumbotrons run on Car Talk since they just run re-runs—
crosstalk
Elliott: —since one of them is dead. Still. [Laughs.] Dan: And also, uh—
dan
—Jumbotrons is kind of a specific-to-Max-Fun thing, so—
crosstalk
Stuart: Car Talk’s not on Max Fun? [Laughs.] Dan: —only a few— [Dan laughs.]
elliott
I mean, it should be! To be honest, if you told me there—that Car Talk—it—before—if I didn’t know it was a public radio show, if you told me it was on Max Fun, I’d be like, oh yeah! Like two crazy guys who are brothers and they talk about cars, but really they kinda talk about whatever and they tell a lotta corny jokes—yeah, that—
crosstalk
Dan: That’s true. Elliott: —fits on Max Fun! Sure!
elliott
Jesse, get on it! Get—get the Car Talk license! Okay. I’ve got a Jumbotron, too. This message is for Ollie, and it’s from Emily. And it’s—reads: “Happy Anniversary to my sexy science nerd. Thank you for the best year of my life. You are the most caring, loving, fun person I could’ve found.” Parenthesis. “(And that ass, tho!)” [Someone laughs.]
dan
Wow!
elliott
End parenthesis. “I’m so glad that you accidentally accepted my friend request. I’d rather be in a long-distance relationship with you than a short-distance relationship with anyone else.” That’s for Ollie, from Emily. A couple o’sweet messages.
stuart
Oh yeah. That’s adorable.
dan
Uh—are there any other plugs? We’ve done our, uh, touring for 2019.
stuart
Mm-hm.
dan
We’re in talks for 2020, figuring out where to go.
elliott
We passed—we passed the Turing Test.
dan
Yeah, that’s true.
elliott
That’s when people—we do a show and people tell us if it’s a computer or—
crosstalk
Elliott: —[inaudible]. Yeah. [Dan laughs.] Stuart: Yeah, if it’s robot or not, basically.
dan
Um… yeah. We’ve plugged Brendan. Uh, do you guys have anything?
brendan
Mm-hm. Thank you.
dan
Uh—
elliott
Uh, well— [Stuart laughs.]
dan
At all? Anything?
crosstalk
Dan: Anything going on in your life? Elliott: Well we could also remind people that there is—
elliott
—there’s—there— [Laughs.] I mean, yes! I—there’s lots of stuff! There’s, uh, Flop House merchandise available online; uh, Stuart is looking into some new possible things for future shows; uh—
crosstalk
Stuart: Yeah, I got my fingers in a lot of pies! Elliott: Yeah, we’ll be able to sell—
dan
Merchandise, specifically. [Someone laughs.]
elliott
Yeah, merchandise specifically, uh, and… we just, uh, I don’t know! I—you can always go pick up a copy of Horse Meets Dog, but we could also move on to the next part of the podcast!
stuart
Mm-hm.
dan
Sure! I just didn’t, y’know, I just wouldn’t wanna… blow over you guys!
stuart
Yeah, yeah, yeah! Give us a chance to, y’know, uh, strut around like the peacocks that we are?
dan
Mm-hm.
elliott
Yeah, yeah. Actually, Dan, blow over me for a second!
dan
[Laughs.]
elliott
Ooh! That feels nice.
dan
[Laughs.] Okay.
elliott
Oh. Oh that feels very nice.
dan
Don’t like this bit.
elliott
There—oh—D—
crosstalk
Elliott: Oh, yes! Brendan: It’s a 40 Days and 40 Nights thing.
crosstalk
Elliott: Yeah, yeah! [Laughs.] Just like Stuart— Stuart: Never talk about that movie! [Stuart laughs.]
dan
Alright. Uh, this first letter is from Julie, last name withheld. It’s—
crosstalk
Dan: —a follow-up— Stuart: Mm-hm. Taymor.
dan
—to a previous letter. Uh, Julie writes: “Please accept my apologies for the confusing email about coming-of-age movies. To clarify, what movies can I show my son once he becomes a 13-year-old man that he would not have seen as a mere 12-year-old boy. Our secret theme to his Bar Mitzvah is Werewolf Bar Mitzvah, so maybe Ginger Snaps works? Love always, Julie.” And, uh, I just wanna point out, I correctly interpreted this email. Elliott foolishly thought it was about coming-of-age movies. So put it on the scoreboard, Stuart!
crosstalk
Stuart: Uh—okay. Let me— Elliott: You’re right. I guess you’re Danny, Champion of the World! [Dan laughs.]
elliott
Okay. And I’m— [All laugh.] And I’m Elliott the big—biggest loser! [Laughs.]
stuart
So it looks like, uh, Dan’s got a point, and Elliott’s got— [Brendan laughs.] 300 points! [Dan laughs. Elliott and Stuart join in.]
elliott
Neck and neck! You’re getting closer! I can feel you nipping at my heels, Dan!
dan
Just wanted to get on the board!
stuart
Yeah. Uh— [Brendan laughs.] So, of course, it depend—this obviously depends on, uh, when, uh, when he turned 13, but I would say—I dunno. Maybe, like—Star Wars: Rise of Skywalker? [Laughs.] [Dan laughs loudly; the others join in.] ‘Cause he wouldn’t have been able to see it when he was a little guy.
dan
Yeah. That’s true.
elliott
Yeah, yeah. It’s— it’s— it’s— [though laughter] it’s been so hard for him to see Parasite before he turned 13. [Brendan laughs.] Uh, I rec—y’know, there’s a couple—but the kinds of movies I started to watch when I was 13 was like, that’s when I became a real serious cineist.
stuart
Uh-huh.
elliott
And so I would recommend, maybe, like, Hitchcock’s movies?
crosstalk
Stuart: Uh-huh. Dan: Mm-hm.
elliott
Are good ones to start watching when you’re like 13? But also, the ones I plan to show my son when he turns 13: RoboCop, Alien, Taking of Pelham 123—the violent and swear-filled movies that I can’t show him now, but when he turns 13, God says he’s a man. So I guess it’s time for him to watch movies where people’s head explodes.
dan
Yeah.
stuart
I just watched—I just watched a movie that my mom made me watch when I was a little kid ‘cause she thought I’d love it. Uh, I watched Creep Show 2 again, and uh— [Elliott laughs.]
brendan
Ah.
stuart
Yeah! I don’t—
crosstalk
Stuart: My mom’s pretty— Dan: The rap segment—
dan
—is pretty good, otherwise it’s not that great.
stuart
I mean, it’s—I mean it’s all pretty good, but it also, like, as a kid, like, I couldn’t swim in a lake ever?
dan
Yeah. [Brendan laughs.]
brendan
Uh—it is funny. My exact pitch on that was gonna be horror anthologies actually? ‘Cause that was kind of my gateway to horror was around 13 and it was, like, I mean, partially it was the TV show, like Tales from the Dark Side or Tales From the Crypt, but it was also, like, the Tales from the Dark Side movie, or also then loving the two Creep Show movies, so.
crosstalk
Stuart: I—I also watched Tales from the Dark Side: The Movie— Brendan: Yeah. It’s a good entryway.
stuart
— this week [though laughter] and uh— [Brendan laughs.] Wow. What a—I just love that they’re—the college students are Christian Slater, Steve Buscemi, and Julianne Moore. [Dan laughs. Brendan and Elliott join in.]
dan
Um—yeah, if we’re talking about movies that, uh, that we, uh, watched when we were 13—
elliott
Dan, you—you answered—Dan, you answered this question the right way last time! You don’t need to worry about an answer this time—
crosstalk
Elliott: [Inaudible.] Dan: No, no, no! I—
dan
I was gonna say, uh, so if you wanna do it, uh, Dan McCoy style, what you gotta do is you have to, uh, you should, uh, purchase some premium cable channels—preferably, at this point in time, uh, Showtime—just have ‘em around, so your son can sneak out late at night— [Brendan laughs.] —and watch whatever erotic programming is available!
stuart
Like episodes of Shameless?
crosstalk
Dan: Yeah, yeah! [Laughs.] That’s what I’m saying. Stuart: That’s on Showtime, right? [Brendan laughs.] Elliott: Yeah. Showtime—
elliott
—so showing him, like, Nurse Jackie?
crosstalk
Stuart: Uh—yeah, Ray Donovan. Brendan: Ray Donovan gets pretty hot.
dan
Or, y’know, like, have it scrambled and then like have him hear like an urban legend that if you like run it through your VCR it descrambles it a little bit?
crosstalk
Stuart: Oh, cool! Elliott: Or if you— Brendan: Oh, yeah.
elliott
—if you flip back and forth between the channels really fast—
crosstalk
Dan: Yeah. Brendan: Yeah, you get a few—
brendan
—seconds of clarity before it goes out?
dan
Yeah.
elliott
See, Dan, I would’ve thought you’d say Cinemax, the show—the channel that—after a certain point, was just like, this is what we do!
dan
Yeah, Cinemax is good, too. HBO has cleared all that stuff off, like it’s trying to pretend it never happened, but uh.
brendan
Mm-hm.
elliott
I was talking to somebody about the show Dream On recently, and they did not know it had ever existed.
crosstalk
Dan: Yeah. Stuart: Uh-huh.
elliott
And I was like, this was HBO’s bread-and-butter for a while! It was like, a dumb sitcom where ladies took their shirts off!
crosstalk
Dan: Yeah. Stuart: Uh-huh.
elliott
Like, that’s all they had for a while!
stuart
I—uh, you know, I just got done watching the first season of The Righteous Gemstones, and I feel like they kept the nudity, but it’s all [though laughter] dude’s wieners. [Stuart laughs.] It’s all wieners, all over. [All laugh.] It’s all, like, guys with big old bellies with wieners hanging out.
crosstalk
Stuart: Yeah, good stuff. Dan: It’s great.
elliott
Mm-hm.
stuart
Um…
elliott
That’s HBO! Home Ball Office. [Laughs.]
dan
Uh—the second and—for this episode, the final letter is from Hannah, last name withheld. Hannah writes: “Dear Dan, Stu, and Elliott”—and, I guess, uh, of course Brendan, our guest—
brendan
Aw, thanks!
elliott
She wrote that? How did she know?
dan
Uh, y’know. We gotta ask Hannah. Uh, “I wanna start by saying I love your podcast—"
crosstalk
Elliott: Uh, Dan, she’s a child assassin. Dan: “—here’s my question—"
elliott
I don’t wanna get on her bad side. [Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.]
dan
Uh, “Here’s my question. I did a cool mental exercise recently where I figured out what interests me in a character. I thought it might be cool for you guys to give it a shot, too. So think of, like, three to five favorite characters, uh, from different pieces of media or canons if you like. I did 10, but you don’t have time for that. Um, once you have them all lined up see—lined up, see what they have in common! Some of mine were Han Solo, Luke from The Adventure Zone, Hawkeye from Marvel comics, uh—not MCU—” she’s very clear about that, “And—”
elliott
[Through laughter] Wow.
dan
“And Sherlock Holmes!”
elliott
Take that, Jeremy Renner!
brendan
Yeah, no. She’s right.
dan
Uh— [Someone laughs.] “Using them, and some others, I found the thing that I look for are characters who are self-determining, self—” sorry, “—self-determining, self-actualizing. They decide what they’re going to be, slash going to do, and they become it or do it, good or bad. They make their own paths rather than following. Maybe this is too complex a question, but I’m really curious as to what draws the Floppers to characters. Keep on Flopping! Hannah, last name withheld.” Um… yeah. If you don’t have anything off the bat, I—I thought about mine. I picked, um… Sherlock Holmes, of course.
stuart
Sure.
dan
Like Hannah did. Uh—Scrooge—
elliott
Because the thing you like is characters who are addicted to cocaine.
dan
Scrooge Mc—Scrooge McDuck.
stuart
Mm-hm. Yep.
elliott
Yes. Yep. Okay. [Brendan laughs.] Cocaine still.
dan
And [though laughter] Indiana Jones.
stuart
Okay.
dan
And— [Elliott laughs.] And the things I came up with for those are, um… they’re kind of, like, these characters that have this… this comfortable, normal life, uh, from the day-to-day? But they cannot be happy unless they’re out on adventures? Um… and also, they’re all… sort of… throwback characters in a way? I mean, obviously, like, Sherlock Holmes is not throwback; he’s just old. But… uh… y’know, uh… Scrooge McDuck is in that tradition of globetrotting adventurer and Indiana Jones is a self-consciously, uh, old-fashioned, uh, story. Also, my—my girlfriend, like, immediately when I told her these characters, she’s like, “Oh. They’re all grumpy people who are secretly nice underneath it.” And I— [though laughter]— [Elliott laughs.] And I’m like, oh I didn’t notice that! [All laugh.] [Through laughter] It took some—it takes someone who spends a lot of time with me to see what I might have in common with these characters that would draw me to them.
stuart
Yeah. Yeah.
dan
But also, um… a couple of other characters, like, uh… I really—like, despite Chris Pratt’s, um, weirdness in real life, uh, and the fact that he was—his character was not particularly written well outside of the Guardians films, I think—I don’t like how he was treated in the Avengers movies as much—I like Starw—Starlord a lot, and I like Han Solo, obviously, a lot, and both of those are kind of the same, uh… guy who’s secretly very capable but is also kind of a doofus? Uh… and I find that very appealing.
elliott
I don’t know about “secretly.” They’re always talking about how great they are.
dan
Okay. Not secretly. But the—like—well, secretly in that, like, beneath their bragging they actually are good at what they do, but they’re also, like, just dorks. Uh—
brendan
Yeah.
stuart
Yeah, let’s see. Uh… so… I’m gonna pick three. Let’s see. Uh, obviously, Jack Burton from Big Trouble in Little China.
dan
Ooh, good one.
stuart
Uh… Alexis Rose from Schitt’s Creek. And, uh— [Someone laughs.] I guess Ted Sushimo from Akira! So let’s see—what do they have in common? [All laugh.]
crosstalk
Dan: [Through laughter] What do they have in common? Elliott: Interesting. Alright. [Brendan laughs.]
crosstalk
Elliott: Interesting. [Inaudible.] Dan: Jesus Christ! Stuart: Uh—well, they—
stuart
I mean, they all have an impeccable sense of style. Uh—
dan
Okay.
stuart
They have great—great hair. I mean, hair is a big deal. Um—
elliott
Oh, yeah. Tetsuo has fantastic hair.
stuart
Uh, I think they’re, y’know, a little mysterious backgrounds. Uh, but they’re also—yeah, I think they’re—they’re capable. Uh… let’s see. Uh, they’re—they’re uh… y’know, the—they’re products of the—the hostile environment in which they exist, that they uh, have to—they have to deal—they have to overcome their adversity and they do it kind of, y’know, uh—and they’re all—they’re all—they have magic powers. And yeah.
crosstalk
Stuart: It’s all great. Dan: [Through laughter] Wait, they all have magic powers? Elliott: Wait— [Laughs.] [All laugh.]
elliott
Al—wait—Schitt’s Creek? They have—they do? [Laughs.]
stuart
Yeah, you haven’t been watching Schitt’s Creek? It’s crazy!
crosstalk
Stuart: It gets crazy! Brendan: Later seasons.
elliott
I guess I have—I haven’t gotten past the first season yet. I guess it—I guess it gets a little different.
stuart
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well you gotta catch up.
elliott
Uh, I picked four characters. One of them is a kind of a—grandfathered in. I don’t feel the same way about them, but I did for such a long time. Those characters: Spiderman, Nick Charles, Bugs Bunny, and Hall of Famer: Boba Fett! And I guess, thinking about ‘em, they all have kind of like, uh… a certain amount of real competence, but also confidence in themselves. Except for Spiderman. And they’ve all got—Stuart mentioned style—they’ve all got their signature look. You can identify them by a silhouette. Uh, if the silhouette shows you Nick Charles’ mustache and also he’s holding a whiskey tumbler in his hand. Uh, and—except for Boba Fett, they’re all real talkers and jokesters!
stuart
Hmm.
elliott
So—who woulda thunk it? Now, Boba Fett, of course, I’ve talked on the podcast previously about how I liked him when I was a kid because of the fantasy of being so cool that, uh, people were just always in awe of you and also you had—wore a mask so no one could see your true face?
stuart
Mm-hm.
elliott
But—you know what? He’s kind of a doof when it comes down to it. Since—as we’ve seen in the Star Wars movies—he’s not very good at his job!
dan
Yeah.
elliott
Everyone thinks he’s great, but it turns out he just has a good press agent.
stuart
Mm-hm.
dan
Yeah. And a cool helmet!
elliott
Yeah. I have to assume there’s, like, there’s some kind of Fox News type thing in the Star Wars universe that’s always spinning Boba Fett’s failures as huge victories? [Laughs.] [Brendan laughs.] And they’re like, “Boba Fett showed those rebels! Got knocked into the Sarlaac!” [Dan laughs.] “They fell for his trap! Oh boy! He’s playing three-dimensional chess here.” Although that’s a Star Trek thing.
crosstalk
Elliott: Although that’s a Star Trek thing. But anyway. Stuart: Yeah, yeah, yeah. And he’s the guy—he’s like the, uh—
stuart
He’s like that character “King” in One Punch Man, who everybody thinks is the strongest man— [Elliott laughs.] But he’s actually just a guy who looks scary. [Laughs.]
elliott
[Laughs.] Yeah. [Brendan laughs.] So Brendan, who do you choose?
brendan
Um, alright. So obviously it was Rorschach, John Galt and Zack Snyder’s Superman— [Elliott laughs.]
crosstalk
Elliott: [Through laughter] Um— Brendan: [Through laughter] I don’t think that says anything about me. [All laugh enthusiastically. Someone claps.]
stuart
[Through laughter] Oh, no! Oh, yikes!
brendan
[Through laughter] Um—
elliott
[Through laughter] Oh boy. [Laughs.]
brendan
Um, no, my uh—my three, uh, I went with, uh, Raylan Givens, uh, the Elmore Leonard character from the books in Justified—
stuart
Oh, nice!
brendan
Uh, Martin Blank, from Grosse Pointe Blank, and Yorick Brown from Why the Last Man.
elliott
Okay.
brendan
Um, and basically is all—would-be smartest men in the room type who cover their emotions in humor? Is what I kinda realized? And ultimately, most—at least two of those three are ultimately pretty damaged underneath? But all three are slowly trying to, uh, be a little more self-aware and better?
elliott
And one of them has a pet monkey!
brendan
And one of them does have a pet monkey. And honestly, that’s—I mean, Raylan would’ve been even cooler. [Laughs.] [Elliott laughs.] [Through laughter] With a pet monkey. [Elliott laughs.]
elliott
And the monkey has a gun, too, and little sunglasses—
crosstalk
Brendan: And the hat! Yeah! He’s gotta have a hat! Dan: Yeah. Elliott: —on his head, and a hat.
elliott
You know what? And then they—that—they could do another season ‘cause it’d be about the monkey!
brendan
Oh my god, yeah!
elliott
Yeah!
brendan
The monkey’s traumotic—traumatic past! And uh, yeah! Exactly!
elliott
Oh, boy.
brendan
Yeah.
elliott
Every monkey that you see that it is a pet has a traumatic past. [Laughs.]
stuart
Oh, mm-hm.
elliott
There—nobody—like, recruited that monkey at a college and the monkey was like, yeah, this sounds great. [Brendan laughs.] I’d love to be your pet.
stuart
Oh, man. You’re—you’re putting, uh, Friends into stark relief right now. [Laughs.] [Brendan and Elliott laugh.]
elliott
Well, I mean, it’s—it’s clear now that—that Ross in Friends is a bad person. Right?
crosstalk
Brendan: Yeah. I think society has come around to that, yeah. Elliott: That he’s a bad dude. That—there’s no— Stuart: [Exaggerated surprise] Whaaat?! [Stuart laughs.]
elliott
There’s no—there’s no monkey who is hanging out in the jungle and is like, I really wish I lived in an apartment in New York and someone else—who was not even my species—controlled when I ate and where I shat. I would love that. It just doesn’t exist.
dan
Yeah.
elliott
Okay, Dan—counterpoint. Argue why monkeys wanna be pets.
dan
[Through laughter] Uh—um, they like grinding organs? Or dancing to organs that are ground? [Someone laughs.] How does that work? [Elliott and Brendan laugh.]
dan
What—what are you with all those ground-up [though laughter] organs?
elliott
Now is—now is that a pet? Is—or is that a coworker? [Laughs.] [All laugh.]
dan
Um— [though laughter] Okay. Well, let’s move on to recommendations. Movies that you should watch definitely instead of Mortal Engines, which was a big waste of everyone’s time. Um— [Laughs.] Editorializing. I’ll—I’ll go first. I—I—I wanna do—
elliott
No, no, Dan, Dan—I appreciate you going out on a limb after this podcast. [Someone laughs.] We were pretty ambivalent about whether we didn’t like it or not.
dan
Uh, I’m gonna—uh—run… through actually a bunch of movies and do it very quickly. Because—
stuart
Wow.
dan
—this—think of this as my Shocktober, like, a cap to the Shocktober season?
stuart
Uh-huh.
dan
I saw, like, literally… 11 or 12, uh, horror movies over the past couple, uh, of weeks? And I just wanna highlight a few of them. Um… I saw the movie Pieces, which I think is a Spanish film? Am I right in that?
stuart
I think so, yeah.
dan
It’s a—a slasher—it’s, uh, it’s not a good movie, it’s a very silly movie? Uh, it’s a slasher movie with all that implies; if you are not, uh, into a mo—
elliott
It’s like slash fiction.
dan
No, I’m just—it— [Elliott laughs.] If you are not into a movie that has a fair amount of female nudity and violence against women, I understand. But that’s, like, a big component of what slashers are. Uh, if you want to see a dong, though, there is one in that movie! So, there ya go!
stuart
Dong alert!
crosstalk
Stuart and Dan: Dong alert!
elliott
Nowhere— [Laughs.] Nowhere else to see ‘em! [Dan laughs.]
dan
Yeah. But it’s a— it’s a—
elliott
Run to Pieces! [Laughs.]
dan
It’s a very, very goofy horror movie. I—I—I showed it in my house if you want a movie that a lot of people are gonna have a lot—a ball laughing at?
crosstalk
Dan: It’s a good one. Stuart: So come to Dan’s house!
dan
Um, yeah. Come to my house! [All laugh.] Uh, I saw at The Alamo, uh, marathon, I saw Centipede Horror? From 1982. It’s a Hong Kong horror movie. Um, and it has kind of, like, a Hong Kong Kung-Fu vibe? Even though it’s a horror movie? It’s about, like… uh, people getting cursed with, like, centipede curses? [Laughs.] Like, a family being cursed. And I realized that—
elliott
So how does that—how does that manifest? What d—you said that like we know what “centipede curses” are.
dan
Well, uh, basically like centipedes are attracted to these people and then they’re like these highly poisonous centipedes that…
crosstalk
Elliott: Ohhhh. Dan: —cause them to die. But um— Stuart: Oh, gross.
dan
I realized—
stuart
Luck—luck—luckily they only have, uh, a million legs. Right?
dan
Yeah. [Brendan and Stuart laugh.] I realized that— [Elliott laughs.] There’s a— [Elliott laughs.] There’s a lot of the supernatural in, uh, Western horror? But there’s not a lot of, uh, straight-up magic in Western horror compared to Eastern horror? Like, this is a movie that literally has two wizards’ duels in it? So if that appeals to you— [Elliott laughs.] —try and find Centipede Horror. It was very entertaining. Uh, I watched the movie Bones, with Snoop Dogg?
dan
Which I—had heard—
crosstalk
Brendan: Oh, yeah! Stuart: Yeah.
dan
—was not good? Uh, I think because… on it—in addition to horror movies—
stuart
And you’re here to set the record straight?
dan
Well—[sighs impatiently.] Look. Just let me say my thing.
stuart
Okay.
dan
[Laughs.] In addition to horror movies-
elliott
[Laughs.] Wow.
dan
There’s no need to interrupt. In addition to horror movies, uh, not being a critical favorite genre, I think that, uh, black-themed movies are often not, uh, given their due? And I will take my licks in that area, too. Like, I am not going out and watching as many, uh, black-themed movies as I could as a white dude.
elliott
I—I remember you—I—I think you said it on the podcast. You referred to Selma as “Snorefest 2017.”
dan
Uh— [Laughs.] Please do not spread that around! As a thing that happened! [Elliott laughs.] Uh—your lies. Uh—
elliott
I thi—I believe—I believe that the—the quote was “Get over it!” [Dan laughs.] “Said Dan McCoy.” [All laugh.]
dan
Uh, but Bones is a lot of fun. It’s directed by Ernest Dickerson, who was Spike Lee’s cinematographer for a long time, and then a, uh, director in his own right. He did Tales From the Crypt: Demon Knight, another horror movie that’s—
stuart
It’s great.
dan
—better than you would think. Uh, and Bones is fun. It’s kinda starts out like a socially-conscious horror movie and then turns Snoop Dogg into Freddie by the end of it? Uh, it’s fun, and then last—
elliott
So he gets fingered.
dan
Yeah. And last night I watched, uh, Crawl, the movie by Alexandre Aja, who did, uh… Piranha 3D, that Elliott and Brendan and I all watched on Elliott’s, uh, wedding day? And uh— [Brendan, Dan, and Elliott laugh.] —it’s a movie about a woman trapped in a flooding house during a hurricane, trying to save her dad, as alligators swim all around. And it’s a lot of fun.
stuart
And Berry Pepper plays her swim coach dad!
dan
Yeah. That’s it.
elliott
Oh. [Laughs.] What a lot of movies! Uh… I’m gonna recommend a movie called Ashes and Embers. Uh, this is an independent film from 1982 that—until recently, was really only seen much on festival circuits, but Ava Duvernay’s, uh, company has arranged a limited release for it. And I saw it on the Turner Classic Movies app so it may still be available in other streaming areas. Uh, it’s directed by, uh, Haile Gerima? Uh, and stars this actor John Anderson. And it’s the story of a black Vietnam veteran who is having trouble reintegrating into main society, and it does such a good job of, like, getting you inside of his head? It’s a very independent film; it’s like, a very like, y’know, rough production-wise movie. In some p—in some parts. But it’s like—and it leans a lot on, uh, Vietnam stock footage at times? In a way that is sometimes removing and sometimes it’s like, yeah, yeah, I’ve seen that footage. But uh, it’s—it does such a good job of putting you inside the mind of this character. And it’s a story that a lot of other movies have told about Vietnam veterans having trouble getting back to mainstream America? But it’s rare that I’ve seen it in this way, also about someone who is dealing with the fact that they are black in America, and that is not easy. And it touches on the kind of multigenerational aspects of that? What it means to the people around him and how he interacts differently with the people that he has different relationships with, and it’s just a really, like, deep, rich movie. And it’s structured almost more like a novel than like a straightforward plot? And so I found the whole thing very, like, hypnotic by the end. Very moving. And there’s a couple of really great speeches in it. So if you can find it—and I hope you can—it’s called Ashes and Embers. Brendan, what have you got?
brendan
Um, I got one and I checked The Flop House wiki and I don’t think you guys have recommended—uh, Ready or Not? The recent horror comedy?
crosstalk
Dan: Oh, yeah. Yeah, I saw it. It was good. Elliott: I don’t think so. Oh, Dan. Brendan: No? Safe? Alright. Um—yeah!
crosstalk
Elliott: But he didn’t—but he didn’t recommend it. Right? Dan: I don’t think so, no.
brendan
Okay. Cool. Um, but yeah! Ready or Not, uh, super fun horror comedy. Very—it reminded me of You’re Next, uh, while playing a little bit with class warfare. Not very subtly, but in a really fun, entertaining way. Um… yeah! Stars Samira Wiley, who is also in the other super fun horror movie, um, Mayhem. It’s just—it really is just a kind of case of—a bride learns on her wedding night that the family she has married into has a crazy, um, tradition? That could potentially lead to the family trying to kill her and, in this case, does. And madness and hijinks ensure! It’s, um, it’s gory and funny and… uh, worth checking!
elliott
Oh, wait. They wait until she’s ready, right?
brendan
Uh, well I mean, they give her a standard count and they do, I believe, let her know, uh, they are coming.
crosstalk
Elliott: Oh, okay. Stuart: Mm-hm. Yeah.
stuart
So, uh… I’m gonna recommend a movie that kinda keeps with the theme of a young woman who is wronged and seeking revenge. Uh, I’m recommending, uh, the laugh-a-minute, uh, fun rollercoaster of a movie called The Nightingale. Uh, and I’m being totally sarcastic. It is not fun at all. [All laugh.] Uh, this is a very difficult movie to get through. Um, it is the latest movie from Jennifer Kent? The writer-director of the Babadook and this is the movie that she, uh, felt very passionately, uh, she wanted to do—follow—following that? Um, it’s about a, uh, it’s a period piece. It’s a young woman in, uh, young woman who is like—I guess getting out of indentured servitude, or trying to, in, uh, Colonial Tasmania. And she suffers, uh, so—a horrible abuse at the hands of, uh, the—the man—the English officer running the outpost. And, uh, it’s very difficult to watch and then the story kind of pulls back and you get to see, uh, kind of the situation all through, uh, Tasmania at that time and the horrors that are being, uh, uh, put upon the indigenous peoples there. And, it’s uh… yeah! It’s a really difficult watch. Um, but it’s also very good! So, if you are ready to watch something that is not going to be easy to sit through and you might have to walk away a couple times, uh, yeah! Check it out. The Nightingale.
elliott
Uh, and if people want something that’s easy to watch, they should watch the old cartoon Tasmania? Where it’s— [Someone laughs.] —Taz and his family?
stuart
[Laughs.] Oh, man. Uh—they actually edited new scenes into that. I don’t think they’re— [Brendan laughs.] —gonna wanna watch it. It’s pretty rough.
dan
Yeah.
elliott
Oh, no! [Through laughter] Oh, no!
dan
If people want something that’s really easy to watch, uh, they could look at the wall! Which is, like, right there. Unless you’re outside, and then…. It’s kinda hard to watch ‘cause you have to go back inside. [Stuart laughs.]
stuart
That’s true. [Elliott and Brendan laugh.]
dan
Um…
stuart
Yeah. Can’t—can’t watch it on your phone, you know?
dan
[Through laughter] No!
stuart
Yeah. Chris—Christopher Nolan loves it. [Laughs.] [Brendan and Elliott laugh.]
dan
Uh, so guys, what—
elliott
I—I mean, he’s li—he’s like—he’s like, [British accent] “Every movie is projected on a wall! The most basic movie is that wall. What if we—we don’t have to worry about film stock, because there is no film. It’s just the wall.” And they’re like, “Take him away, boys!” [All laugh.] “He’s gone insane!”
dan
Uh—
elliott
“It wasn’t me that did it! It was the wall! The wall killed them! The wall!” [Brendan laughs.] “Whatever you say, Director Nolan!” [Brendan and Dan laugh.]
dan
Very respectful. Uh— [Laughs.] Uh, hey, before we go? Uh—
stuart
Yup.
dan
Just wanna say thank you to Maximum Fun, our network. Thank you for J—to Jordan for editing the show. Uh… go over to Max—MaximumFun.org, check out all the other podcasts on the network. Some of them, uh, like us, are about film. Some of ‘em, like, us, are comedy.
stuart
Mm-hm. Some—
dan
Some have neither of those things!
stuart
Mm-hm! Some of them are just culture!
dan
Yeah.
elliott
Yes. Some of them don’t like us. [Brendan laughs.]
dan
Yeah. Some of them—do—hate us.
stuart
I—I get that. [Laughs.]
dan
Uh— [Laughs.]
elliott
Yeah.
dan
So—
elliott
We’re jerks!
brendan
Who do have the food—feud against?
elliott
Uh, well, we—uh—what feud should we start right now that doesn’t actually exist—
crosstalk
Elliott: —but we’ll— [Brendan laughs.] Stuart: I mean, we have that—we have that existing feud with Hodgman, right? Dan: We have a fake feud with—yeah.
crosstalk
Elliott: Oh, oh, actually, yeah! Brendan: Oh, oh yeah.
elliott
He do—actually doesn’t like us. Yeah, okay, so yeah! Hodgman.
crosstalk
Elliott: That’s—that [inaudible]. Yeah. Dan: Umm— Brendan: There ya go.
dan
Elliott, you usually say some stuff around this time about promoting ourselves. What do ya got?
elliott
Well, uh, if you liked this podcast—and I hope you did—then please leave us a review on iTunes. Please make it a good review—five stars, perhaps?—and say something nice about us. Why don’t you tell people about the podcast? Tweet about us. Instagram about us. TikTok about us. Uh, YouTube about us. Whatever you wanna do. Blog about us. Splog about us. Maybe jump in a bog about us! [All laugh.] Uh— but please, wear, like, wading pants if you do that.
dan
Yeah.
elliott
I don’t want you to ruin your good slacks— [Dan and Stuart laugh.] —because you’ve got a Bar Mitzvah to go to.
stuart
Yeah. So—so go to your, uh, local Dick’s Sporting Goods and ask for some bo—bog wading pants.
dan
[Through laughter] Guys!
elliott
Get some bog-trotters—
dan
Guys! [Laughs.]
elliott
—and, uh, go on out there! And spread the word about The Flop House! Uh, once again, we—as Dan mentioned—we rely on listeners like you to support us throughout the year, uh, from the Max Fun Drive and we really appreciate it. It keeps the lights on and it keeps the beat.
stuart
Yeah. And—and—thanks for being our guest, Brendan!
dan
Yeah. Thank you!
brendan
Thank you guys so much for having me on! I really appreciate it! And as a fan? It was quite nice to be on this side of it!
elliott
Thanks for being here and now you see how the sausage is made.
brendan
Yeah.
elliott
It’s hideous. [Brendan laughs.]
brendan
I’m—my stomach has been churned this entire time.
elliott
And, uh, Harvey Street Ki—uh, Harvey—
crosstalk
Elliott: —Girls Forever! Now— Brendan: Harvey Girls Forever! Formerly Harvey Street Kids. It’s not crazy.
elliott
Now Harvey Girls Forever! It’s, uh, on Netflix now and it’s really good. But, uh, go watch it! Leave a good review for that!
brendan
Yeah!
elliott
And then leave a good review for The Flop House. And until then, I remain Stuart Wellingtone.
stuart
[Exaggeratedly deep voice] I’ve been Dan McCoy!
dan
I guess I’m Elliott Kalan.
brendan
I guess I’m just me.
crosstalk
Brendan: Brendan Hay! Elliott: Oh, wow. We didn’t let Brendan play. Do you wanna make up a name that you could do? Dan: [Laughs.] Aw. Alright. Yeah.
brendan
I am… John Galt. [Stuart laughs.]
dan
[Through laughter] Noo!
stuart
[Through laughter] Noo-ho-ho!
dan
See ya next time!
elliott
And he disappeared. [Laughs.]
music
[Light, up-tempo, electric guitar with synth instruments.]
stuart
I think William Shakespeare said—
dan
Uh-huh. [Laughs.]
stuart
[Laughs.] Uh…
elliott
“Love the one you’re with?” [Brendan laughs.]
stuart
Wait, I gotta look it up.
brendan
“Just chill, bro.”
stuart
Okay.
elliott
Yeah, I think sh—I think William Shakespeare said, “Just chill bro.”
crosstalk
Stuart and Elliott: Yeah. [Music ends.]
speaker 2
Comedy and culture.
speaker 3
Artist owned—
speaker 4
—Audience supported.
About the show
The Flop House is a bimonthly audio podcast devoted to the worst in recent film. Your hosts (Elliott Kalan, Dan McCoy, and Stuart Wellington) watch a questionable film just before each episode, and then engage in an unscripted, slightly inebriated discussion, focusing on the movie’s shortcomings and occasional delights.
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