A Geek History of Time - Episode 49 - Conan and Reagan Part III

Episode Date: April 4, 2020

And we begin with good days, sir. Geeks come in all shapes and sizes, and that they come into all kinds of things that happen. I was thinking more about the satanic panic. By the scholar Gary Guy-Gakse. Well, wait, hold on. I said good days, sir. Not defending Roman slavery by any stretch.

No, but that's bad. Let him vote. Fuck off. When historians, and especially British historians, want to get cute, it's in there. OK. It is not worth the journey. This is a geek history of time. Where we connect Nurgere to the real world.

My name is Ed Blalock. I'm a world history teacher at the seventh grade level. And right now in English, two-tricks of the grade level. I'm a world history teacher at the seventh grade level and right now in English two-tricks of the grade level here in Northern California. With a two-year-old son who has recently started sharing with us the names of his classmates, usually with the phrase no-no student verb of thing they shouldn't be doing Because that's what he's bringing home from daycare. Nice. Yeah.

No no killian, no no play water. OK. Yeah. No no no no puddles. Miss Tracy. Teacher. OK. No play in puddles.

So that's what I've got going on in my life right now. Who are you? I'm Damien Harmony. I'm a Latin teacher. I'm a history teacher in Northern California. And I have no cute stories like that because I have a 10-year-old and a 7-and-a-half-year-old. So they're fully verbal, often to their own detriment at times. Sometimes too verbal. Yeah, but it's all good. It's a lot of fun. Okay, so last time we talked about Ronald Reagan, even though you promised we were going

to talk about Conan the Barbarian. Well they're tied together. Okay, show me now. And okay, well that's my whole thesis here. And I want to open a little bit here, because right where we left off, because I think this is important. Carter, president Carter, Reagan's predecessor.

The man who sold his family peanut farm, because he didn't want there to be any... Because he didn't want there to be any appearance, even. ...of any kind of trouble like that. And of course, who's brother wound up then embarrassing him horribly by being forced by the government to register as an agent of the Libyan government. But anyway, Jimmy Carter, the guy who rejected a

South Florida property because he didn't want the idea. He didn't like the idea of there being a White House in Florida a summer White House, right. Yeah, he that was too decadent. Yeah, hey Decadence Howard there we go. There you go. Yeah Yeah, so so Carter was seen, mm-hmm fairly or unfairly as ineffectual hapless a hippie dip and unmanly. Yes. Okay. We've got to come back to decidedly unmanly. He was and is of course a pillar of moral rectitude and amongst the best man ever to hold

the office of president of the United States. One of the smartest too. Yes. But in 1980, everybody was pissed at him. Yeah. Because he was the figurehead and the world sucked. And there was just like, if, if anybody could wind up stuck in a no wind situation politically, yeah, like, like, it was, it was going into the 80 election, there had to be this like, since the back of everybody's head on the democratic side that like, we're pushing a rock up a really steep hill.

Well, Ted Kennedy couldn't stand him. Like he blocked... Oh, well, yeah. Universal healthcare, because he didn't like that. And that couldn't help. Right. Didn't help at all. Well, it's because he ran as an outsider.

And you can't run as an outsider when your party How to put this When your party has morals yeah and stands for principles and is a coalition party You can't run as an outsider the only time you can run as an outsider or an insurgent is if your party is lockstep behind you Yeah, and zealous. Yeah. So. Yeah.

Not that, like, that ties in with anything going on in the world today, at all. Nope. No. We're talking about the 1970s. Allegory is for chumps. We've proven that. Yeah. So. I thought allegory invented the internet.

No, he contributed to the environment that allowed it to be invented. Oh, okay, cool. But yeah. So the internet is largely allegorical? Nice, nice time stamp. 42, you're okay, back on. I'm back, baby.

You're back. So the next line in my note says, Hither came Reagan Reagan speech in hand. Reagan campaign with the slogan, no shit, let's make America great again. Look at the fuck up. My next note says pause for contemplation. Wow.

Wow. Wow. That the 1980 campaign slogan, let's make America great again. No, no, I'm going to address the grammar difference between that and make America great again. Let's make America great again is what we call a Hortatory Subjunctive. Make America great again is what we call a imperative. Okay. Hortatory subjunctive is a command, but it's what we call the gentle command. Okay. Come on, let's all get together and do this.

Let's go. Follow me. Yes. Follow me. Now it's clearly a command. It's really big. It's clearly a command. Yeah. However, it feels like an invitation. It is. Yeah. It is, it is

Hortative. You are exorbitant. Exactly. Whereas the imperative is, I'm telling you, motherfucker. Right. Yeah. Hortatory is inclusive. It's always in the first person. Imperative is demanding. It's always in the first person. Imperative is demanding. It's always in the second person. So I would just like to point out that the great communicator, which he was called and he deserves. How much you hate the man. Right. Yeah. You have to respect. Well, actually, I'm gonna say this about both men. Ronald Reagan had a specific genius that worked at that time. Yes. And it made people feel good.

Yeah. Which everybody needed. Yes. The current president has a specific genius that works at this time it taps and everybody's rage and fear fear. Yes The the moment the moment in the Republican Convention of 16 Mm-hmm when he literally said and I don't remember the specific quote But I want to say it was I am the only one who can save you. I alone. I alone. It was even worse than I'm the only one Yeah, I alone. Yeah only one who can save you. I alone. I alone. It was even worse than I'm the only one.

Yeah, I alone. I alone can save you. Like, I genuinely do not know. Like I don't get the paradigm, the worldview, the mindset, none of that quite, quite jell around the concept I'm trying to get, but I don't, I genuinely have not been able to figure out how that line can be not chilling. Right. Because like, if you look at the picture of it, it's very much citizencane. You know, and the whole thing was and my statement still stands. Yes, don't like. Yes, but somehow. Well, it's it's warm under the wings of a dragon that just burnt down your village. Yeah, okay. Um, but I my point my larger point

here is this both slogans are attached to both men who are extremely effective at communicating on their own terms. At a particular time, we're not catching something important to the zit guys. Right. That at any other time, they would have fallen away long ago, but at those times, that particular kind of narcissism caught fire. So. So, Reagan's plan to fix the economy. Oh, God. my, okay.

Okay. Cut taxes and eliminate regulations. Quote, government isn't a solution. Government is the problem. It's just the guy who got public assistance in this trial. Yeah, yeah. Oh, well, but he, he, he later in a quote where he was, you know, denigrating public assistance programs.

He, he talked about, you know, my, my, my my, my childhood, you know, I grew up in a time where there weren't public assistance programs because for part of his life he did. Yeah. And then public assistance programs fed him. Right. But anyway, sorry, again, we go back to, you know, the Democratic Party left me as horse shit. So anyway, this is where supply side economics appears on on the stage in US political discourse at the time, which has been proven wrong time and time again, by the way.

Oh, well, yeah, since since then, yes, even at the time, they're at the time, even other Republicans thought he was crazy or an idiot. Yes, his own eventual vice president, mocked vice president mocked it as voodoo economic. You know economics. He was a cold warrior to his core who spoke far more confrontationally about the Soviet Union than Carter had. Well, okay. So here's the difference.

Yeah. Yeah. He cheated in the one debate that he had with Carter. Somehow his campaign got a hold of Carter's, Carter's team's prep notes. And in that debate, that's the moment where he asked the question, are you better off now than you were four years ago, which has gone down in political history? And in that same debate, also having gone down in history is there you go again. Now the context of that, I think is important.

Carter had had a, I don't know, minute and a half attack essentially, a rebuttal to something that Reagan had said, where he said, you know, you're, you're talking about social security in this way. You know, this is just like back when you spoke out against Medicare, which we all now recognize as being a fundamental benefit in part of our social safety net and you have a history of being against all of these kind of things and you just need your against any kind of, you know, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're, you're

socially, any, any kind of social, anything. And Reagan turned around with their, you go again. And his response took the teeth out of Carter's attack. Right. Without, in my opinion, having, having read the context, actually answering the accusation. Yeah. He said, you know, at the time I was in favor of different legislation, you know, to achieve that. And that's not an historical record. Right.

I mean, no. Show, show, seriously. You said, you said, this is where we lose our freedom about like, like, no. We literally have it on wax. You made albums of this Yeah, you had you made album. So Didn't he also like he he cuz Carter wrote a bunch of zingers that he was gonna hit him with Yeah, didn't he find some way to blunt each one of them to yeah, oh yeah, yeah, I mean yeah

By the way when Al Gore got a hold of the binder of all of bushes talking points in 2000, he turned it over to the FBI. Yeah, he handed it over because there's one thing Democrats do. It's a Lose with dignity, I guess. I'm sticking principle over over utility utility. Reagan ran a relentlessly upbeat campaign, um, I mean, I'm just a little bit more about the thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the

thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the

thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the thing that I'm going to say. I'm just a little bit more about the thing that he won another landslide. This was, it's the city on the hill, right? He's drawing on it.

His speech about city on the hill is here, yeah. Shining city on the hill. Yes. His campaign played up his image as a vital masculine. That again, Matt Neidle from his movie days, and both during the campaign and later on on he cultivated an image as a cowboy. He won an elector a landslide and with a majority of the popular vote. He got just over 50 point something percent. His margin probably would have been bigger if Anderson hadn't been running as an independent. Anderson was a moderate Republican running to to counter Reagan's hard right everything and he didn't get any delegates. He didn't he but he but he drew off the cream off the very top of Reagan's margin. After he took office in 81 Reagan signs of economic recovery act,

which cut the top marginal tax rate from 70% to 50, lowered the capital gains tax from 28% to 20%, more than triple the amount of inherited money exempt from the estate tax and cut the corporate tax. He ballooned the deficit with all these tax cuts. He said, we're going to cut taxes, but productivity is going to go up and we're going to make money. Right. Never happened.

We'll be graded. Greed it as liberators. Yeah. Paid in oil. I'll put $1.5 trillion into the stock market and only 50 billion into fighting a virus. Yeah, I saw that post today. That's beautiful. He ballooned it like just like a jiffy pop pan on the stove.

He increased military spending because of course we had to worry about the missile gap with the Soviets. Right. Missile gap in the States. Right. Because a Republican-controlled Congress had in 81, I want to say it was 81, turned down salt. Right.

Still had to worry about the missile gap. And so national debt more than tripled between fiscal year 1980 and 1989 It went from 914 billion to 2.7 trillion at that time Oh, I heard for unheard of I a yeah, just yeah He never in all of his eight years in the presidency. He never submitted a balanced budget right And debt as a percent of GDP rose from 33 to 53 now during his 10 year in office in world war two when we were spending money on shit that blows up not a good investment no no bad return on it

because well well I shouldn't say bad return on investment because we got rid of Hitler But right anyway return on investment But in terms of a material return. Yeah, if it works you can't use it again Yeah, if it doesn't work you shouldn't use it again Like it's dangerous to pick up. Yeah, you're you're also exporting it only you're not getting anything back for it You know at that point are our debt to GDP ratio was 52%. Yep. Cold war, baby.

Right. We're going to break the Soviets by outspending them if we don't do anything else, which by the way, wasn't actually a conscious tactic, but that's what wound up happening. As I mentioned already, he increased military spending. He placed missiles in Germany to counter the Soviet deployment of their own mobile missile systems. Right. And up the confrontational nature of policy. Yes. He dubbed the Soviet Union the evil empire. Now, there are a couple of things. And I have a hate boner for Reagan. He offered, now whether it was genuine or not, he offered, which means it goes into the lexicon. He offered to denuclearize completely in a meeting with Gorbachev.

Yes. He did do that. Now whether he was serious, I don't care. He offered it. That's something. He also, again, that great communicator bullshit. It's true. He, he, for those, for those listening at home, the, I could, he, he gritted, Damien gritted his teeth so hard, I could hear them crunching across the table. I don't know if the mic picked it up. Probably not. Anyway, I can tell you.

So he communicated very well with Gorbachev in private while publicly keeping that yeah maintaining the confrontational front while behind closed doors being like okay you know let's be really let's talk yeah which is a good argument for absolute rulers but yeah I mean Metternek had the same idea when there weren't nuclear weapons. Yeah. So he did that. He also, what was the other thing I was going to point out, he had to do with the Cold War.

You said he stepped up the rhetoric, which is true. Oh, he also got us involved into the Strategic Defense Initiative. Yes. I don't bring up SDI. Right. Because SDI is after... Oh, good point. The time period that I'm talking about. Okay, and yeah, a lot of things I'm bringing up are later.

Our later. So yes. But they do tie into the theme of the thesis here. Yeah. But also he's getting all of his advice on how to do shit from an astronomer in San Francisco or an astrologer an astronomer would be a step up would be yeah um because he's like non-sequitor but a step up right uh yeah but like he's getting advice from an astrologer like he's setting meetings yeah based on some hippies based on based on yeah, no, I know like What the after he tried the hippies yeah, so

He he developed and enacted the Reagan doctrine which led to American support of anti-communist insurgent forces across the globe The idea was to try to roll back communist gains majoring earlier phases of the Cold War Generally he decried social programs spending a socialism. Mm-hmm. He dog whistleed consistently about domestic social assistance programs Like like to to modern ears. Mm-hmm. It is obvious and disgusting. Yes Um, oh, and he also brought crack into. Yeah. Yeah, in order to pay for the Reagan doctrine through CIA. Right. Uh, and his labor relations board was consistently and

strikingly anti-union. And that, and that pun was on purpose. Yeah, thank you. So he broke the back of the air traffic controllers. Right. Which was the very first light hammer blow to the forehead. And then he got, that was after he got shot, right?

Yeah. I literally just talked about it in the Dark Crystal of a sudden it's all he got shot, right? Yeah. Yeah. I literally just talked about it in the Dark Crystal Bliss said it's all right, left my head. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That was after he got shot, which by the way, him getting shot

is the thing that helped his numbers a lot. Oh, catapulted his popularity. Yeah. Yeah. His approval rating shot up. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So to boil down the themes that are involved in his policy, and at at this point I'm going to stop talking about Reagan for a little while He's talking about military might yes confrontation with a great enemy Individualism and the integration of community assistance. I'm starting to see a theme here promotion of self-reliance exceptionalism vigorous masculine virtues acceptance, exceptionalism, vigorous masculine virtues. He pushed a narrative of national resurgence through hard work, struggle, and an individual freedom. That was the point I wanted to bring up last time, by the way. We talked about the punchy, punchy fight with the awkward and wonderful that way wonderful that was and I went I went in on the the futurists. Yeah, but it also occurred to me

that you've got Howard and His love of this violence and this exceptionalism and basically like the chattering classes the bad the bad people are weak ones And they they have to use tools and shit like that, right? Yeah. How Nietzsche can a guy get? Because that is some Nietzsche shit right there. Yes. And Nietzsche died 10 years, 11 years before Howard was born.

Yeah. And I mean, he went crazy 15 years before Howard was born. But he died, 11 years before Howard was born. And Nietzsche feeds big time into that study all you need to do. Nietzsche and the idea of the Uber match feed really, really hard into that. What I'm gonna say, this is my own interpretation of it,

is the Nietzschean ideal and what Howard idealized. I'm going to say parallel. Okay. Howard was less concerned with the idea of an ubermensch, operating outside of the idea of good and evil. I mean it becomes that because he writes his characters being this cynical amoral survivor. Right. But his focus like all the time great at like wearing length to to to lovecraft was this idea of of of vitality right and and and you know masculine strength and all of this and and the niche and idea of the exceptional individual the exceptional individual is not so much a part of howards thinking. If that makes sense.

It does, except for this being in the front of the movie. Yeah, okay, okay. I'm getting there. All right, all right. Because that, what you just showed me, which I'm about to quote here in a moment, or well, because I got to talk about the background of the movie, when I get talking about the film itself, I'm going to talk about that. And that's, that's how it mutated. Oh, okay. So it's, it's kind of, that's, that's Millius. Okay. Coming in.

Again, a 30-year-old tent turns out, doesn't mean shit. It's, yeah. George Lucas misinterpreting Buddhism. Yes. okay. Yes, totally. So I can see that with Millius by the way. Yeah. I have. I have. I have. I have. I have. I have. You're did white dudes. Yeah. Autours of the 70s. Yeah. Really loving the idea of full of bullshit, wank and all on whether they're the visualism shit. Yeah, they're right. They're all pricks. Okay. So, anyway, so those are all of the themes in Reagan's policy with a side order of late and racism and homophobia thrown in for flavor. And now, finally, we get to talk about the movie Conan the barbarian

Conan goes to the movies licensing issues That's just an image sitting there with a bucket of popcorn. Yeah, the the Atlantean sword sitting on the chair next So licensing issues prevented a movie being made through most of the decade of the 70s. Nobody could figure it out Yeah, oh, yeah, yeah, uh, Milius in particular from from a very early Course Millius in particular. Yeah, duh So so but from a very early stage are we gonna talk about Millius because you and I know He's coming up good good um, and and so people have been trying to make the movie and and it stayed in development hell Forever because there was legal stuff and nobody should figure out how to do it.

And eventually, simplifying the whole thing, eventually those issues got worked out. But other problems kept the project in development hell longer until John Milius agreed to direct using a modified script written originally by Oliver Stone. Right. And Edward Pressman, who had the production rights, agreed to co-produce with Dino De Laurentiis, with Dino Rantis financing and getting to keep all the profits, but with Pressman having control over casting and script decisions.

Wow. Okay. And was in Dino's... That's the simplified version. Yeah, and Dino's daughter was in on that. Yes Yes, Dino's daughter was the active actual day-to-day runner. Yes of things Millius wound up having a very heavy hand in the scripts that got filmed mm-hmm now would be a good time to review his earlier screen writing credits Okay, Jeremiah Johnson

Robert Redford playing a mountain man. Right. Apocalypse Now. I didn't know he was in on the hideout. Okay. Makes sense because one of his colleagues going through film school was Frankie Ford Coppola. Speaking of Autours with Beards. Right. And an uncredited draft.

Say the both of us. By the way. Yeah. An uncredited draft of Dirty Harry, which he also directed. Good God, oh my fucking God. Hold on, hold on, it gets better. His remarks about that Dirty Harry script, he says his contribution to the film was,

quote, a lot of guns, and the attitude of Dury Harry being a cop who was ruthless. I think it's fairly obvious if you look at the rest of my work, which parts are mine? The cop being the same as the killer except he has a badge and being lonely. That's a quote from an interview he gave to Film Comment magazine that I found on Wikipedia. If it was any other director, I'd be like, okay, they made a satire and we all took it seriously. No. Yeah, no. Yeah.

The film opens with a quote from each before anything gets said before, if you can remember back a couple of episodes, the quote that I read into the microphone from the beginning, Akiro, the wizard, whose name we don't actually learn until Conan and the destroyer. That's right. Before even that. And Arnold says it, Akiro.

Akiro. Yeah. The title card. Yes. Is a quote, the central quote from Nietzsche, that which does not kill us makes us stronger. That's Melius trying to get deeply philosophical. I like that Melius getting deeply philosophical is literally two lines long.

Yeah. 13-year-old me watching the movie thought that was deep, bro. Yeah, I didn't get it. 44-year-old me is left with your five. 44-year-old me is less impressed, but it says something about the theme. The very first part of the movie shot 44 year old me is less impressed, but it says something about theme. The very first part of the movie shot was actually the very last image in the film. Oh, that image of King Conan on the throne. Oh, yeah, that would make sense. You could do that.

The throne of Aquilonia. Yeah, but that is another story. Film the October of 80 on a soundstage in England, filming-hmm. Filming on location in northern Spain. What soundstage in England? I... Is it Ulstery? Might have been. Because that's your connection to a dark crystal.

The whole thing was filmed in Ulstery. Okay. Could be. I've got to work it up and confirm. But real quick, before you get to northern Spain, because there's some fun stuff there too. I would just point out that adult me sees that title card by Nietzsche and I want to argue with it immediately.

Like, well, no, I mean, because it could make you weaker and then a parasitic infection could just settle in or an opportunistic disease could come in. Well, yeah. Normally, wouldn't it kill you? And this would totally kill you. And this would just totally do it. Yeah, yeah. So, I mean, sorry, Nietzsche.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So I mean, sorry, Nietzsche. Yeah. So, yeah, no, yeah, that's, that's, you know, yeah, I mean, that's, that's, that's the central problem with, with trying to distill, I don't know how many books worth of work down to, you know, two lines, right, you know, right. So filming on location in Northern Spain, again, January 81, the same month Reagan was inaugurated. Uh-huh. Okay. They had thought about filming in Yugoslavia. Right. But Tito had died.

Yes. Things became untenably unstable. Yes. And Spain turned out to be cheaper and logistically easier. Right. The script went through several drafts. Milius eventually used several scenes out of stone's draft. Totally discarded all the story ideas.

Right. We're going to get more on that in a minute. Milius insisted on practical effects on the use of miniatures. He didn't want to use matte paintings or other film effects if he didn't have to. So actually the film does not use any math paintings. He specifically espoused a dislike for magical elements and wanted to tell a story. Here we go. Yeah. Focused on individual accomplishment through effort. Mm-hmm. Again, struggle, perseverance, strength through conflict, Nietzsche. At the same time, true or to what Howard was trying to write?

In a way, but with a different emphasis. Okay. Howard again was, this is this, this, Howard was less concerned about the power of the individual and was more interested with this individual exists outside of your corrupt civilized. Oh, okay. You get shading there? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, yes. Essentially Howard was smarter than Milleus. Like, Milleus's understanding is way more simple.

I'm hesitant to boil it down to something quite that, quite that reductive, but rice. Yeah, well because Milleus is looking at like power of the individual yeah and where Howard literally is like okay but there's this whole other This is whole other context that you're setting against like it's more complex. Yeah. Yeah, you know, yes Yeah, okay definitely agreed on that. Mm-hmm principal photography Was finished in May of 81 mm-hmm when the film was released in 82

was finished in May of 81 when the film was released in 82 it grossed 68 million in ticket sales it was a success but not a blockbuster okay by the by it was in Sheperton Studios not not the other all right not else street when it got released on video it's been 23 weeks on billboards top 40 for video rentals. I believe it and Wait went what you're do to get released on video I want to say it would have been 83 or 84 yeah, yeah, that cons okay So back when you had to like rent a VCR at the time. Yeah, yeah home video sales Over over a long stretch of time.

Mm-hmm. Brought the films gross up to $300 million by 2007. Mm-hmm. Now I want you to look at the longevity of that. Wow. And the scale of that, to me, that speaks to the films and influence of its legacy. Mm-hmm.

Is that that story is still one that people are picking up when it gets re-released on picking up when it gets re-released on DVD, when it gets re-released, like on laser disk, whatever the new format is, it gets re-released, people go out and they buy it. Yep. And that's sales. Yes.

That's not rentals, that's sale. That's somebody going out and saying, I wanna own a copy of this film. Speaking of sales, Ooh, time to show stuff. Now is a good time to show stuff. Hello Geek Timers, this is producer George, interrupting this podcast to let you know that we have space available. This space could be used to promote your product, book, event, group, even wish a special someone happy birthday. If you're interested in using this space, please contact us on Twitter via private message at Geek History Time. Well, we're done selling stuff now. Yeah, well, yeah, for the time being, if there is anything you want us to sell, there's still time.

There is still time. We still have bills to pay. We still have episodes to record. To record, we still have children to feed. Yes. So, you can reach either one of us individually. Yes. You can reach me at at-e-h-blay-lock on both the Twitter machine and Instagram. Yep. And my partner can be reached. At Da Harmony, both on the Twitter and the Insta. And I'll tell you what, if you buy space for our show, I'll even shave my head down to a quarter of an inch.

Okay. Yeah. So everybody understands, right now I think the length of hair on his head is close to an inch. Three eighths. All right. Yep. So that's going to be some definite measurable difference there.

Yeah. Maybe not to the naked eye, but if you got a ruler, you could do that. Yeah, absolutely. So We're talking about the production. Yes, going going back to the to the thread here. Yes basking in the glory of being in Northern Spain. Yes Good day, sir So the movie departed from the book in books, plural, in a lot of ways. One of the first ones. I started us off on what is going to be my wrestling opus. It looks like with that quote from a key role at the beginning of the film.

I want to read to you what was actually published as part of as as the opening to The Phoenix on the sword. Okay, very first kind of story of a published Oh before you do are we gonna get into the amount of injuries that Sandal Bergman caused during the movie We can we can segue that on onto that. Okay. I didn't. That woman was dangerous as fuck in that movie. Okay. We'll have to talk about it. All right. So, to give you an idea of the beginning of the differences between the film and the

books, the books, all of the first story ever published, starts with no oprints that between the years when the oceans drink Atlantis and the gleaming cities and the years of the rise of the suns of areas there was an age undreamed of when shining kingdoms lay spread across the world like blue mantles beneath the stars. Namedia, Ophir, Brythunia, Hyperborea, Zamora with its dark-haired women and towers of spider-haunted mystery, Zingara with its chivalry, cough that bordered on the pastoral lands of Shem, Stigia with its shadow-guarded tombs, Hercania whose riders wore steel and silk and gold. But the proudest kingdom of the world was Aquilonia, reigning supreme in the dreaming west.

Hither came Conan the Samirian, black haired, solenied, soared in hand, a thief, a reaver, a slayer, with gigantic melancholys and gigantic mirth to tread the jeweled thrones of the earth under his sandal feet Wow, so I mean obviously it's a lot longer because you're dealing with a printed medium rather than right a visual beginning of a visual film but It gives you the idea from the very beginning. Mm off, it establishes, because you find out, like, lines later that Conan is the usurper king of Accellonia.

Right. And he's now built up how awesome Accellonia is. But beyond that, it gives you the idea that this is a moment in time, in a big world that we're now focusing on this small character, right? The the opening in the film with its brevity Doesn't doesn't give us the vastness of that world. Yeah, it's it puts us in that locale It zooms us in right away and therefore everything that's going on is epic in scale because

of their focus on the protagonist. Yeah, because that's everything. Because that individual. Right. Okay. He's destined for this. He's destined destined for whatever. You know, interestingly, you mentioned a bunch of places that show up in the movie.

Yeah. Zomura. I think it mentioned the end of places that show up in the movie. Yeah, I believe Subotai is Hercanean. Yes. Which is to say, a Mongol. Right. Because Subotai. Right. And Archer. Yes.

For those of you unfamiliar with the history, Subotai was a Mongol general under Chingus Khan. Yes. So, yeah, they're borrowing, they're borrowing from clear sources here. Yeah, and then also Stigia. Stigia, oh yeah. Like Lotus. Stigia, the best, yeah. Think I would sell Haga? Yeah.

And then what was the others? There are a few others that were mentioned, I was just like, oh, yeah. Well, Shem is a name of one of the sons in the of Noah in the Bible so I thought that was interesting because you and Shem went west if I recall yes so boom there's there's your lower Kelta yeah yeah hyperborea yeah um why do I know that name is that uh um a for England it's it it was it was term used for the ultimate ultimate fool. The North

Hyperborea. Yes. Boreal. Yeah. Yeah. So Schwartz and Higger got cast in the film specifically because Millius and I don't remember who else saw a pumping iron. And they said that dude. That's our guy.

There were a couple of other people they had considered. One of them notably being Sylvester Stallone. Really? Yeah, before they saw Arnie and Leigh. No, no, no, no, that guy. Bigger. Bigger, bigger, and square or more tutonic jaw. That's true.

I'm sure he had to be part of it. Yeah. And he was cast specifically because sure I had to be part of it. Yeah. And he was cast specifically because he looked like the Frizzetta covers. Oh, okay. He looks very little like Howard's Conan. Yep. I mean, his hair is their own color.

Like they could have fixed that. Easy to use. Like all the shit they could have done. Didn't do it. But anyway, he was a body builder in his true universe with a massive physique. While again, book Conan is described frequently as being panther like right. He's strong, stronger than most, but he's not bulky.

There's even a line where Conan punches the camel. Yeah. And then everybody's staring at them and and Subatai goes, you're too big to be a thief. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. One of the one of the one of of the better little side moments in the film. Now, Book Conan, as a character, is exactly as described what you see on the 10. The label on the 10 is exactly what you get with Book Conan. He's a character of Robert Nagey in kind of nature.

He's a hedonist. He's a hothead. He's a braggart. Like several stories of especially younger Conan, start with him making some claim that like well now you got to back it up loudmouth. Oh, okay. Get some self into trouble, but he's like, all right, fine. Right. I'll do it, man. Um, yeah. Very Texan. Yeah. very Texan. I mean it ain't bragging if you could do it. Right? Right. Millius' version of the character. Ooh. I have things to say. Is Lake Connick and emotionally,

I have here muted, but I've realized that Stunted is a better description better description. He laughed, we see him laugh, we see him get drunk, but compared to Book Conan, he's pretty humorless. And he's pretty grim. Yeah, so there's a couple of things there. One, movie Conan is a young boy who sees his whole village slaughtered and is literally holding his mom's hand as he sees her head fall. Yeah. That's going to stunt you.

Desperate draw. And then he's sold into slavery. Yeah. Where his whole life is that wheel. Yep. And that's very much the, you know, like you, you will either die on this thing or you will make that you will become its master. And then he's sold again, if I recall, into pit fighting. Yep. As a gladiator. and he just spends all this time around people, where death is his only way of communicating. Life, death, the same. And he's so emotionally stunted that the only goal he has in life is revenge for the trauma

that was inflicted upon him. And once he has his revenge, he is empty. He's thoroughly empty and has nothing to do. Now, what's interesting is in the director's cut compared to the theatrical cut, and I don't know if you're going to dive into it. I touch on it. Okay. In the director's cut, there's a cap Nahab scene where he talks to Subataya about how his life could have been different.

It's a shitty scene. It should have been cut and it was cut and it's good that it got cut. It didn't get cut for the right reasons. It got cut for time. And then at the end, and at the end, also there is a scene where after he set fired everything, the princess still kind of cultified. She prostates at his feet and he steps past her and then he carries her home. And it's really stupid fucking scene.

Instead of he burns it all down and then that's the last thing that we see and then it's his crown. So in the theatrical cut, they do a better job of, and that's the other thing in the movie, Conan doesn't speak much. Now this is because Arnold has an accent, but in the movie Conan doesn't speak much. In the same way that in the Kurt Russell movie, soldier, Kurt Russell doesn't speak much. Yeah. And I think the effect is very similar and incredibly evocative. These are men who are broken men. The only language he knows is violence and conquest. And once he has his revenge, he literally has no other reason to live. Yeah. No, you, you, yeah. And there's, there's, there's an awful lot there.

Yes. And I, that's, that's why I think this movie is vastly underrated by the way. Oh, yeah. And when you add in those two scenes, you take a movie from being an A movie to a C-plus. Oh, yeah. Well, because there's superfluous and, and masturbatory. Yeah. And, and they take away from everything else that's been shown about the sky.

Yeah. Millius missed a point with his own movie. Was it tough? Yeah. So, Conan in the books, you talk about the emotional stuntedness. Conan in the books, like, it's really self-actualizing. It was intensely, ultimately self-actualized. And he'll be in a sword fight with five guys and mocking them.

Like, come on, come on, here canian dog. You know, I mean, you know, you know, borrowing from swashbuckling fictional, these things, and he pulp. Yeah, and it's pulp. So, but, you know, that's not who we see on the screen. Right. All in this in this version of the film. And all everything you just talked about about his childhood, the murder of his people, death of his mother, that's a whole cloth invention.

Whole cloth invention. How it's Conan. How it's Conan was never a slave in the middle of nowhere. He was never a gladiator. That's all new material to push the weird philosophy that Milius is trying to show them the fruits. I mean, he's in love with Nietzsche. Yeah, and my own notes, film Conan is a traumatized emotionally stunted figure by who realized Macho endurance, what didn't kill him literally made him stronger right Like yeah, there you go. That's that's it. Have you ever heard of?

I'm a lot and now here I am jacking off on the screen Like again like Okay, have you ever watched it with the director's commentary? No so fucking funny First of all because Milius is just like jerking off while he's talking about it like practically He's like and there's the wheel and oh, and it's all about Nietzsche and he's just Coming all over And he's talking about it with Arnold Schwarzenegger

Who's who's saying like so? Just make sure the check layers no no no no Schwarzenegger it looks as though Schwarzenegger has never seen the movie it doesn't understand how commentary works because because he's like okay so so die and with the wheel but what was the wheel used for why did they have the wheel well it was probably the grind grain oh okay so then they would take the grain and then they would sell that and make that flower and then they would like and He's like getting into the micro economics of the fucking wheel and they's like well where would they get the grain?

Well probably from the next mountain over Arnold like what the fuck you doing? Like there's there's like Totally that's what's going on. It's so worth watching like that. Okay, because Arnold does it the whole movie the whole movie Poking holes not poking holes asking the most like if you ever had a relative who like will come in while you're watching a movie And they'll come in and be like well, what's that? Why is he doing that? It's like where are you? Okay, so here's a question. Yeah, I'm legitimately to make sure. Because what I know about Arnie's personality, everything I've heard about is reputation.

What do you think is the over-under on that being him trolling, Millius? I don't think so, because he makes other dumb fucking jokes. Oh, okay, yeah. Yeah, like the woman that he gets to throw into the fire and stuff, he talks about her and about how he just saw at a cigar smoking convention.

And shit like that, and he makes jokes about all that stuff. But like, he's asking all these agriculture questions. I wonder if he was stoned. That, I will give you a run-around. But yeah. It's like that's the kind of thinking that I associate with like, you know, okay, how many have I had?

Like, like, before I come in here, how many am I gonna, you know, like, so. Oh my God, it's hilarious. You gotta watch it with that commentary. It's a point I'm gonna, okay, I gotta watch it. It's a point, yeah. So, the movie is a revenge epic.

Like I said, that's the whole goal in life, Tholson Doom, character borrowed from the books. But in a completely different revamp, the name is taken, he's a sorcerer, that's the same thing. But his role changes entirely. He murders Conan's family, slaughter's his village, and sells him into slavery. Conan gains his freedom and counters the snake, called, and then, pursues, and sells them into slavery. Conan gains his freedom and counters the snake cult

and then pursues a vendetta. Right. Likely because of the episodic nature of the stories because it was short stories, public sure pulse. But Conan never has this kind of vendetta to pursue. Yeah, because you can't, you can't, you can't, you can't stretch it over multiple. And when you're submitting stuff to a pulp like Weird Tales,

it's like I'm submitting this to you and you say, well, rework that, throw something back at me. And then I send you this other thing and you're like, oh no, this is great as is. I'll make a couple of formatting changes and here we go. You can't know what order your stories are gonna get published in. They have to be standalone.

Serialized and they They have to be standalone. So you can't serialize them, they all have to be standalone. So his conflicts are all short-term. Uh-huh. They're all mostly. They're bottle episodes. Yeah, they're bottle episodes. And they're motivated by more immediate, less, less high arching trauma emotional concerns. Like, you know, I just said, I'm not afraid of whatever it is that

Wizard has the top of his tower guarding his treasure. I'll break in, I'll steal it, I'll make all of you look like idiots. Yeah, I'm a foreigner, you think I'm a barbarian? Fuck that, I'ma do it. Right. That's a fun one. Alright, northerner. Yeah, do it. Go do it. Alright, like we said, alright, fine. You right if I fail I'm dead whatever I won't care Right if I succeed I'll show all of you up and I'll be fucking rich, right here. I go right now That's that's the level of his emotional concern Sure in other cases it's we're in the middle of a battle I'm commanding part of a mercenary force that I'm the captain of and like my motive is no no

We're gonna cut our way through these motherfuckers. We're getting out of here in one piece and I'm gonna find the guy leading him and I'm gonna kill a shit out of him. Okay. Like, I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's blood and guts adventure.

Oh, sure. You know, and, and it's, it's, the scale is bigger because now we've got two armies and there's the fate of a kingdom on the line all this but his emotional concern is no no no I'm angry at you right so I'm gonna kill however motherfucker I'm ever many motherfuckers. I got a kill to get to you right and then I'm gonna rip your Pencil your head off your pencil neck right that's that's Conan. Yeah, I hope you leave enough room for my fish because I'm gonna Ram it. Yeah, I'm gonna rip out your goddamn spine. Yeah, yeah, you know, and so The cult of set in the books is the state religion of Stigia

Mm-hmm in the movie right it's a cult right. It's a tumor on the on on on on on on the planet Well, I mean, it's not a tumor. Not a tumor. Nice. Fuck you. That's what for you. Yeah, that's good. But but the set cult in the movie is like our 20th century conception of a cult. It's it's not. I would list that you just had Jim Jones. That's what I'm about to get to. I'm sorry.

I'm sorry. We see doom and throwing a horde of young people to follow into the point of literal self-sacrifice. Yep. One of my favorite scenes of that lesson because nearly naked, well, one at one point naked girl and another point nearly naked girl. Through weird charisma, sorcery, magical powers, moments before his moments before his death at the heroes hands he exhorts his standing at the top

of the temple all all of them out in front of him yeah and he exhorts them all you my children are the water that will wash away all that has gone before yes in your hand you hold my light the gleam in the eye of set. This flame will burn away the darkness, burn you the way to paradise. Now the director's cut he goes on, right, purging is at last at hand. Right. Day of doom is here, all that is evil, all their allies, your parents, your leaders, those who would call themselves your judges. All judges. Those who have lied and corrupted the earth, they shall all be cleansed. And my very next line is, think of the Manson family,

Jones Town to a lesser step, Harry Krishna. Yep. Real quick, also the religious right. Yeah. Yeah. And fall well. Yeah. Also, I would point out that what you said was part of it's part of the director's cut and part of his project will cut.

Interestingly, when it was shown on TV, they cut out sexy, sexy. They cut out booby booby. They cut out a few of the violence. That's the snake that murdered though. Yeah, they did. Because it was a snake. Right. But they left out some-

Talk about buckets of fake blood like you see right now. I love how he's chopping and chopping, and he chops through it, and he goes to chop one more time and he's like confused. And he's like, oh wait, no wait, yeah. It's dead. That's brilliant, it's brilliant moment. But so just real quick, the trap that he sets for Falcore. Yeah.

Not Falcore. No. Falgrim. But so just real quick, the trap that he sets for fallcore. Yeah. Not fallcore. No. Fallgroom. Fallgroom.

The the luck dragon from the never-ending story. So the trap that he sets that impales the guy, that impaling in the blood splatter doesn't show in the TV version. But the speech that you said is shown its entirety on the TV version to make up for the time that they lose. So they were cutting in pieces. Wow. So the TV comes.

That's weird. Yeah, I gotta say. All right. So talking about, I gotta talk about the giant snakes. Sure. One of the funniest moments of my adolescence and Bishop, I know, is listening. So you're gonna get your your miss you man so I don't remember what time it was we were probably 13 or 14 everybody had been playing Dungeons and Dragons

we'd finished with the game it was probably two o'clock in the morning we're watching Conan the Barbarian and in that scene you know they break into the tower they're down there on the floor, and up top is the Coltie stuff. The Coltie stuff, they're all being hypnotized. And Rex or doing the clappy thing. Yeah, I'm sort of doing the clappy thing. So they're down in the pit and they're sneaking around. Yeah, they're up.

And they see the giant serpent. And they're trying to figure out you know how they're gonna get it and get out of there and the snake slowly uncoil you know that's because Conan was sneaking so much that he was sweating in his sweat drop on snake's eye. Yeah, it's a great thing snake. It's a snake and the snake starts uncoiling yes and by this time Bishop and I had seen this movie so many times yeah I don't even even know. So we knew what was coming. Yeah. And because we were punchy,

because it was, you know, two, 30 in the morning. Sure. The snake rears up and Bishop with absolute, perfect comic timing says, look behind you, dip shit. And the insurance around. We're gonna turn around. Oh, we still hold up this way. Yeah, and and we disintegrated

Like fell up. I'm amazed we didn't wake my parents up right in the other end of the house Just like to us in that moment. That was the funniest fucking thing We know and even telling the story now. I'm like that is one of bishops better moments of comic time And he he knows from when to when to throw his thing. Sure. So anyway, massive massive segue. But so the the cult. Yeah, the cult. Conan cuts dooms head off. Yes. And the cult leaderless disperses. Cut off the head of the snake. Yeah, yes. The cult of set, when he cuts the head off though,

he comes down with his father's broken sword. Yes. The broken one. Yeah. The one that Rexore had and Conan fucking broke. Yeah. Like all of that. Oh, yeah. Right? And he comes down and Thal'sa Doom is holding it as it's spurting.

And then he turns them around and he hits them the other. He does a wedge cut, like Subway Sandwich wedge cut, you know, on a dute head. And then he does the final, you know. Oh, it's well, like everything else. I mean, buckets of fake blood. And so the cult is hierarchical with doom at the top,

pursues an agenda of corruption of existing kingdoms. Yep. It's leaders engage in decadent, literally, orgeastic rights. This ties in with Howard's ideas about decadent foreign civilizations. Okay. I also see a parallel to perception of the Soviet Union.

Hierarchical, masses controlled through propaganda, programming, all this. The orgies I'm not seeing. But the rest of them are in that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. In this sense, Conan symbolizes a victory of individual will over mechanism mechanistic corrupt state forces. Much his momentous libertarianism. Yeah, oh yeah. You know, back to the, because they're rescuing Max von Sido's daughter. Yeah, right. King Osirik's daughter.

Yeah, King Osirik, Max von Sido, the much mist. Yep. Even with a long life gone to seven. Yeah. Excellent. So his daughter joins the cult. Yeah. In the 70s, you had Patty Hearst joining the SLA. Yep. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah. And so the aesthetic of the film is very dark ages. Yes. They even discuss doing the music as using all ancient music music. Oh, yeah. Well, and the Poledora Square, of course, has all those. All those Tampini, John, the Tampini, and all of, you know, big, heavy, huge horns.

Yeah, you know, low range. Yeah, yeah, relatively very low pitch. Not a lot of rhythm section. Yes With with just enough melody to make it to carry through to the next year through to the next time you're just banging on the drums Yeah, it's like if Danny Elfman tried to be a James Horner. Oh, that's brilliant. Yeah And and so now in the books Many of the questions. Oh my God, I'm sorry to interrupt you.

But the Danny Elpin thing just remind me of the beginning of the Orgy scene. Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. And at the end, sometimes I feel I've got to run away.

I've got to Wrong way, got it. Nice. Um the snakes you try to fire at me Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm gonna work on that. Okay, so The books described a whole bunch of the kings of the high-borian ages being glittering cosmopol on places. That's not what we saw. That's not what we see in the movie. The film imagines a world where even the civilized are barely above barbarians themselves. In fact, does it always smell this bad? How does the wind get in here? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Civilization.

Well, that's barbarian virtue versus the corruption of civilization right there, which is like the only time the movie is true to howards, themes is like that one throwing line. Right. But Conan's companions, Valeria, who does show up in the story. She's a lover of his in one. She's turned into the love of his life in this one. Subotai, the two of them don't dress or think very much

differently than Conan does. Sure. The film calls him a barbarian, but the line between barbarian and civilized is very blurry. Even King Osric, and I have here played by the great Max von Sydow in a role that clearly paid the mortgage for him, looks like a Viking chieftain more than the king of a civilized nation. Oh, yeah. So, so, in Millius's version of Hyboria, in Millius's milieu, the theme is no longer civilization

versus barbarism because there's no, we don't see a real distinction. Everybody's a barbarian, it's the fucking Dark Ages. Yeah. It's individual vitality versus collective malaise. It's all, it's all Nietzsche. Wow, no, that's all 1980. That's all, that's all the, that's 100% the 1980 presidential race.

Yeah, it's Nietzsche, it's Nietzsche with Conan and Silvermatch. There's a weird post-apocalypse vibe to it all. Despite there never being a state of apocalypse, everything looks dusty. Yeah, well they're in Northern Spain. They're in Northern Spain. They're Spain, Spain, yeah.

Taring ruins in the middle of nowhere. Right. Everybody dresses in furrs, ties in with the zit guys being petrified of nuclear doomsday. True. Okay. Now, remember how I said we'd come back around to script drafts? Yes. Now, you've already shown enough that you probably already know this, but for listeners, Stone's original script was a post-apocalypse story, in which

based, that mashed up the Howard stories of which shall be born in Black Colossus, and in it the climax of the movie was going to be Conan leading an army against a horde of mutants. I can say their mutants are gobbling to some point. Yeah, mutants. Yeah. And it should be noted that Stone was using a lot of coke and depressants at the time. And commentary on that script says, yeah, it was a cocaine fever dream.

Like it was, it Like it was fucked up. And so again, the aesthetic is dusty, can I post apocalyptic, first, nobody's clothing looks new, you feel rich. I just wanna say, this is one of the things that twigged when I was watching Dark Crystal. Cause it's a very living universe. Desert landscape, very lived in universe.

Same kind of dark age kind of feel to it. Now Dark Crystal was literally post-apocalypse. It was. You know, but you know, the vibe is there. Wow, oh, hang on a second. Okay. George Lucas did Star Wars. Yes, very much a lived in universe.

A lived in universe. Which was revolutionary. Alien. A lived in universe. A lived in universe. All these guys are making, well, it's the 70s. It's the 70s, they're coming up. So there's this idea of, well, and there's this idea

of urban light. They live, I mean, they're going to school in LA. Yeah. And a lot of them did a lot of bicocial stuff, LA to New York, right? Yeah. And so, both Skid Row is part of the visual lab. Yeah, absolutely. So, I think also they were reacting to the, the whizbang, buck Rogers, shiny future,

chromed rocket ships, aesthetic that science fiction had been before. And the relatively inexpensiveness of being on a sound stage compared to shooting. And again, that auditor, the authenticity, they were going for that. You're shooting in real places, so everything needs to look real. Yeah. So, um, book cone in, doesn't really have a partner. Doesn't have a best buddy. Subatai, this is Sidekick and Loyal Companion.

Yeah. I'm gonna point out, Subatai, I think is the only non-white character in the film. No. No, the wizard. Oh yeah, okay. Yeah. And also, it's a dude. Also kind of a Sidekick figure though. Yeah, oh yeah, No. No. No. The wizard. Oh yeah, okay.

And also a dude. Also kind of a sidekick figure though. Yeah. Oh yeah, yeah. And Thosadum. Also no. Oh yeah, well, yeah. No.

My. Right. But no, you're right though. I mean, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's, there's that I thought I'd do. Yeah. So, yeah. Racial implications. Yes. That's, I'm gonna leave it there. The character of Valeria, I already mentioned once before, appears in Red Nails in the books and nowhere else.

Oh, okay. Red Nails, by the way, is an awesome story. Okay. It also has its moments where you're like, Bob. Yeah, that's good. It's an age well. Apparently he had a phobia of lesbianism So one of the one of the one of the antagonists is a

immensely queer-coded female sorceress kind of figure that's essentially who is who is looking like it the the Sorceress element is she's trying to transfer her soul into Valyria's body and possess her so she can maintain her immortality. Is that kind of flabbers of what we see in the Red Sonia movie? Kind of. Yeah. And anyway, but there's huge almost overt lesbian overtones and it's really clear that for Howard, this is like not okay. Not okay. But anyway, so Valeria appears there and nowhere else. Movie Valeria is a mashup of that Valeria and Belet, the pirate queen, in Queen of the Black Coast.

Okay. Belet, in Queen of the Black Coast, also dies and has a supernatural return to save Conan when he's in desperate peril, just like Valeria. And Ovie, you know, she appears as that apparition and all that stuff. Right. As a Valkyrie. As a Valkyrie. Yeah. Yeah. So, looking at time, I think we can, we can pause it here. And the next one can be the analysis of stuff and conclusion. Absolutely. What, what do you want to say here? What are you thinking? That thing that you pulled on, and you only kind of

tugged at it for a second, but it was the individual exceptionalism against the collective malaise. Yeah. That's, I mean, let's make America great again versus, I mean, Carter literally had a speech called the General Malay speech. It's been called that since then because he was the only person to actually say the state of the union was not good.

And so I just really... The law honesty. Yeah. Yeah. So I really just kind of like to kind of come back to that. That's what's selling at that time. Yeah. So yeah.

All right. Well, I am not reading anything new this week. Nine or a minute. OK. So I really look forward to the conclusion of this, because it's fascinating stuff. I think it's funny to me that both of us are such fanboys of this movie.

Oh, yeah. That maybe it's a generational thing. I think it's generational, part of it is it's a generational geek thing. Yeah, yeah. Because I own the DVD, you know, and prior to that, I had the VHS, it was always a thing that I bought. Like you said, you know, you buy every version

that you come across. But like it is a movie that I will watch almost annually. And I forever have touted it as being a vastly underrated movie. Like I have a genuine appreciation of it. And it's not just because it imprinted on me as a five year old. Yeah. There's a lot more to it than that. It manages to overcome the... The director. The darkness of the bluntness of what the director was trying to do with the material. You said when we were talking about doing this episode, you said it's accidentally a great movie.

It is. And you're right. I have to go over back. I fell over back. I fell over back into a remarkable artistic success. Yeah. Yeah. So.

All right. Well, for a key history of time, I'm Damien Harmony. And I'm Ed Blaylock. And until next time, look behind you, dipshit. And until next time, look behind you, dip shit. Ha ha ha!