The Bechdel Cast - The Princess Switch 2: Switched Again

Episode Date: November 18, 2021

In anticipation of the new Princess Switch movie, Jamie and Caitlin switched places and unlocked a Patreon (aka Matreon) episode on The Princess Switch 2: Switched Again!(This episode contains spoiler...s)For Bechdel bonuses, sign up for our Patreon at patreon.com/bechdelcast.Follow @BechdelCast, @caitlindurante and @jamieloftusHELP on Twitter Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Starting point is 00:00:00 Kay hasn't heard from her sister in seven years. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. What was that? That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. Can Kay trust her sister or is history repeating itself? There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing.
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Starting point is 00:00:54 sponsored by Gilead, now on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Thursday. There's so much beauty in Mexican culture, like mariachis, delicious cuisine, and even lucha libre. Join us for the new podcast, Thursday. Santos Escobar, emperor of Lucha Libre and a WWE superstar. Santos!
Starting point is 00:01:30 Listen to Lucha Libre Behind the Mask on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you stream podcasts. On the Bechdelcast, the questions asked if movies have women in them. Are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands or do they have individualism? The patriarchy's effing vast. Start changing it with the Bechdel cast. Hello and welcome to the Bechdel cast. My name is Caitlin Durante. And my name is Jamie Loftus. Unless... My name's Caitlin Durante. And my name is actually Jamie Loftus. And wait a minute minute i just realized that we look exactly alike oh my god we should do some royal hijinks your you should do some royal hijinks and then i'll just
Starting point is 00:02:13 have sex with your friend i think that's how the first one goes right basically not the worst deal in the world this is well welcome to the vect cast. This is our show where we take your favorite movies and analyze them using an intersectional feminist lens, using the Bechdel test, which is, I bet neither, I bet none of the Vanessa Hudgenses know what this damn test is. But what is it, Caitlin, for the sake of fullness and clarity? It is a media metric created by queer cartoonist Alison Bechdel, sometimes called the Bechdel-Wallace test. And there are many variations. And here is ours. Two people of a marginalized gender have to have names. They have to speak to each other, and their conversation has to be about something other than a man for two lines of dialogue. And ideally, that conversation is narratively significant. Make of that what you will, you know it when you hear it. Right. And
Starting point is 00:03:20 in the case of this movie, as you'll hear in the episode, you know, there's a lot of Vanessa Hudgens is talking to Vanessa Hudgens. It's not that big of a problem. There are three many Vanessa Hudgens and they're all talking to each other. Yeah. And if you thought that my British accent I just did was offensive. Wait till you hear her as baby. You are just not going to like it. So this episode you're about to hear was recorded last year for our Patreon, a.k.a. Matreon. So you'll notice it's just me and Caitlin.
Starting point is 00:03:57 We're keeping it loose. We kind of let it all hang out on the Matreon. I would say about 80% of this episode is just us recapping the movie that'll happen we're discussing things throughout the recap but the recap takes a long time and honestly you're welcome yeah it's it's i we go to the matrion to really vibrate on a different frequency where it's the format is technically the same and yet there is this um this wild reckless abandon that we bring there so if you are in if you enjoy this please go over and join the matriarch community it is such a fun like
Starting point is 00:04:39 life-affirming cool space to hang out in uh it's five bucks a month and you get two bonus episodes at the Bechtel cast with just Caitlin and myself every single month this month we are doing two of our most popular requests that for whatever reason we never got around to um they're both rom-coms that you've got mail which we've been getting really uh lovely feedback about I've been very happy about yes yes we have yeah not to brag a person listening that isn't a member of the matriarch we're so good at our jobs wow we really pulled one out this time uh and and we're also uh doing how to lose a guy in 10 days uh which i canonically recognize as a katherine han vehicle you know, maybe the poster is telling you a different story.
Starting point is 00:05:28 Fair, fair. I see it as a Thomas Lennon piece myself. Oh my God. His outfit in that movie. I'm like, who dressed this poor man? I love Tom Lennon. And why did they do that to him? That's not nice.
Starting point is 00:05:42 I don't know. In any case, this is from the Matreon. And we're doing this, you know, technically an observation of it's not for many Vanessa Hudgens is the problem. There's still three of them. So it's kind of three many Vanessa Hudgens two. But it's the Princess Witch three. Yes. Which I believe is being released on Netflix the very same day that this episode is being unlocked from the Patreon and put on our main feed. They really missed an opportunity to include more Vanessa Hudgenses in this sequel.
Starting point is 00:06:19 At some point, I'm like, I wonder if she was like, I don't think so. Because there were, I think we talked about it in this episode. She's done interviews where she was like, oh't think so because there were i think we talk about it in this episode she's done interviews where she was like oh the next one should be scottish and it's like right well let's take a look at the accents you're already doing and maybe reassess but i'm open to a fourth uh in so many ways but in in terms of vanessa hudgens's i'm open to a fourth for sure uh but it's not happening. However, we will be covering The Princess Switch 3 on the Matreon, speaking of the Matreon, in December. So if you're loving this and you're like, wow, I'm really on a journey, you can go back to our Matreon to listen to our very intellectual genius, quite honestly,
Starting point is 00:07:01 thoughts on The Princess Switch 1 and then very soon on the princess switch three and if you like netflix christmas movies we've also done all three all of the christmas princes correct and that is a burden we took on for you so yeah get ready it's our our holiday movie block on the bechdel cast is vroom vroom vroom rev rev revving up um and enjoy this unlocked matrion episode the princess witch 2 enjoy the Bechdel cast hello matrons happy holy days it's that time of year when we cover terrible Netflix original Christmas movies. I forget. Did we talk last year about the extended universe
Starting point is 00:07:50 that Netflix has confirmed? I don't remember. I meant to go back and listen to the other Princess Switch and Christmas Prince movies we've covered. I wanted to listen back to those episodes and rewatch those movies, but I simply didn't have time for any of it i re-watched i re-watched all the princess witches and all the christmas princes because i needed an excuse to um yeah of course but did did you i don't know i
Starting point is 00:08:18 don't think that we did i didn't listen to the re-listen to the episodes i don't think we did talk last year about how all the movies are confirmed happening in the same universe which is further depending on how you look at it either confirmed or complicated by what happens in princess switch switched again because it would seem that it contradicts okay so this is a matron this is obviously the bechdel cast matron we're doing princess witch 2 i thought the movie was essentially a delight well sorry first we have to the the full the full title princess switched to three many vanessagenses. Three many, yeah, too many Hudgenses is the general vibe. I love that they just called it Switched Again. The real title is The Princess Switch Switched Again,
Starting point is 00:09:14 which is so lazy, so incredibly lazy. You really like- I almost admire it. I fully admire it. I'm like, oh uh this movie has no doubt of what it is which is extremely lazy but but so okay so the the netflix christmas universe which is a confirmed thing includes oh my god there's literally a chart have you seen this have you seen this chart okay no okay you gotta see this chart uh okay so it essentially connects the christmas prince uh saga series yes
Starting point is 00:09:54 all the various princess switches as well as the night before christmas which was vanessa hudgens last year christmas effort yes which we almost covered and made a last minute switch well switched again uh then there's also a movie called the holiday calendar from 2018 that I haven't seen a movie called Christmas inheritance from 2017 which I unfortunately have seen and a movie called holiday in the wild which I also have seen and i'm pretty sure is that the who's in that it's like it's actually like some famous people right holiday in the wilds yeah isn't that the what's that guy's name who was in rob low is that that one uh yeah yeah yeah the kristin davis rob low yeah yeah yeah sorry i've seen so many of these i'm like honestly and the
Starting point is 00:10:44 names are all so familiar they i'm like i don't want to confirm something i can't guarantee yes kristen davis and rob low so that's a bigger budget one not very popular i don't think really anybody necessarily watched it not a lot of hype yeah i skipped that one but it is and then and then now this year there was a movie called operation christmas drop which is military propaganda that is Christmas. There's also the Christmas Chronicles, which is what's-his-face as Santa Claus.
Starting point is 00:11:12 Yeah, what is his face? And Goldie Hawn. What is his face? I never... Kurt Russell? Kurt Russell. Yeah, Kurt Russell. But also, maybe this is controversial, but who the fuck is Kurt Russell? What was he in that I would know that you would know probably
Starting point is 00:11:32 not a lot okay see he got big in the 80s and then like a lot of his most famous movies were from the 80s and 90s and I mean he's still around. But also, I always get him confused with early Patrick Swayze. And I feel like there's someone else who I get him confused with, too. I'm sure I haven't seen the Christmas Chronicles. But either way, the Christmas Chronicles are a Netflix Christmas movie, but they're not in the Netflix Christmas universe. I see. So all of the Netflix Christmas universe, I'm pretty sure. I mean, it's the netflix christmas universe i'm pretty sure i mean
Starting point is 00:12:05 it's a vague qualifier but i'm pretty sure that you have to it has to be like a clear hallmark ripoff which christmas chronicles isn't uh and then jingle jangle which i did see and whoa it was pretty good uh forrest uh forrest whitaker is in it he's saying christmas chronicles was not bad i i'm you know it's whatever it's you It's kind of like turn your brain off and hope for the best season movie-wise. But Jingle Jangle, it had some catchy tunes, some real catchy tunes, but it's not included in this universe. I think this is like the overly romantic, confusing, hallmark ripoff extended universe that's occasionally nationalist propaganda in the case of Operation Christmas Drop.
Starting point is 00:12:53 So anyways, last year, Netflix confirmed the Netflix holiday movie universe is the official title. And I'll just unpack this chart and then we'll get to before we start talking about princess which switched again how princess switch switched again is maybe the most integral piece to this puzzle yet so okay it's like the keystone that holds the whole arch together and maybe i mean i haven't i bear i was like only half watching holiday in the wild and i haven't seen the holiday calendar but it seems like it connects a lot of movies together in ways that are exclusively confusing so here's great here's an overview of the chart we'll we'll link this it's like a tweet
Starting point is 00:13:33 from Netflix okay so it starts with the Christmas Prince 2017 gets everything started and I think these are all basically made by the same production company which doesn't hurt um so a christmas prince is shown on a tv in both the holiday calendar and it's also if you recall vanessa hudgens watches a chris the christmas prince in the first princess switch so as of 2018 when the princess okay i'm like literally i sound like that um it's always sunny meme with the board okay um yeah so as of 2018 in the princess switch a christmas prince is a movie that exists in the world of the princess switch on netflix it was like a product placement moment we were like tiki okay uh Aldovia from A Christmas Prince the the fictional country I'm familiar just there's 500 trillion countries that border Lithuania apparently and Aldovia is one of them what is whatever the princess switch
Starting point is 00:14:39 countries are anyways Aldovia is mentioned in The Night Before Christmas. So in The Night Before Christmas world, Aldovia is an actual place. But in The Princess Switch world, it is not a real place. It's a Netflix movie. It's a fictional place where a movie that Vanessa Hudgens watches takes place. Make it make sense. Okay,mas inheritance uh a christmas inheritance is shown on a tv in both the holiday calendar and in the princess switch holiday in the wild is shown on a tv in the night before christmas so in the night before christmas a christmas prince is a real thing in the world but holiday in the wild with kristen davis and rublo that's still fictional and on netflix and then apparently i don't remember this um because by the time honestly the last in this marathon the last movie i watched was christmas prince royal baby and i was just
Starting point is 00:15:39 my brain was skunked so i wasn't looking for this reference but apparently the princess switch the country from the princess switch is referenced in the third christmas prince movie oh so now things get a little complicated because we were told in 2018 that a christmas prince is just a netflix movie a work of fiction but then over in aldovia, the Princess Switch country is canon. Right, because it's Belgravia and or Montanaro, because those are like the two countries in Princess Switch. Right, right. I'm going to keep mixing up the names. So Belgravia, I believe, is mentioned in A Christmas Prince Royal Baby.
Starting point is 00:16:20 Okay. baby okay but at that point as of last year a christmas prince aldovia is fictional to vanessa hudgens but vanessa hudgens is very real to amber and whoever the fuck that guy is richard richard richard um so that's confusing and then things get even more confusing so basically it seems like they shouldn't have put a christmas prince on tv in the princess switch because now they want it to all be real yes because at the end of fucking oh my head princess switch switched again princess switch switched again amber and richard are at the coronation for yeah what's her name margaret a few things about that when they popped up on screen at the end of princess witch with with their royal baby sorry did i say ugly
Starting point is 00:17:12 i meant royal um when that happened in princess switch to switched again i was in my apartment by myself and i screamed at my i was like yes it was like hold on and then i had to go back to the chart because i'm like it how could that be true if and um i don't know i don't know how that could be true i have a theory okay yes the movie that vanessa hudgens is watching in the first princess switch movie that is about amber and richard is actually a documentary that was she's watching a documentary i've seen this okay got it yeah uh great minds think alike yeah i i think that she just must have been watching like maybe it was like a 60 minutes special or just like a poorly produced i thought that too but then i went back and watched the
Starting point is 00:18:11 scene from princess witch i'm like no she literally had vanessa hudgens has the same netflix as you or i and it's presented the same way and she literally watches a scene from our a christmas prince and so to I'm like, reporting instincts. I'm like, and so, if a Christmas prince is documentary, so,
Starting point is 00:18:29 okay, if a Christmas prince is a documentary for Vanessa Hudgens in 2018, then it's also a documentary for us.
Starting point is 00:18:37 And that could be true. That could very well be true. I think that they're just, and someone, I wanted to shout out a tweet that made me laugh so much from I got
Starting point is 00:18:47 DeLeon from at DeLeon Ica. She, she tweeted, Oh my God, Vanessa Hudgens is the Robert Downey jr. Of the Netflix Christmas cinematic universe. And it's true. Oh,
Starting point is 00:19:00 because of iron man. Cause like iron man kicked everything off and is I know. No, well, I will know. Cause Vanessa Hudgens didn't kicked everything off and is I know no well I well no because Vanessa Hudgens didn't kick everything off but I think we can all agree she has more you know she has she has a little more charisma than Princess Amber no offense um I mean but then okay other things we need to talk about for we talk about the movie okay sorry I'm like too prepared for this episode uh no it's great really down in the dumps and really needed this um okay so the other
Starting point is 00:19:32 thing is i feel like we should do a vanessa hudgens update because she has had a very problematic tumultuous few years really but like especially she we're not going to get too into it here uh but she did if you remember about nine months ago she famously went live on instagram and said a whole bunch of insensitive things about coronavirus and was basically the the gist of it was vanessa hudgens has no regard for human life um which was upsetting then and I honestly it has been such a year that I kind of forgot and then was like wait we're mad at Vanessa Hudgens what did she do again and I was like oh she said she literally has no regard for human life so that's something to keep in mind yes that said Robert Downey Jr uh you know has also done some
Starting point is 00:20:24 pretty messed up stuff in his life. So maybe that's the connection. Oh, could be. They don't have. I don't know that much about Robert Downey Jr. I just wanted to, you know, we are aware that Vanessa Hudgens is problematic and also just like a weird part. Like she will like pop up in my trending topics every once in a while and it's always just like i just don't understand like why can't celebrities just like log out like vanessa hudgens has more money than god like she has a million a million year deal signed in blood with netflix like why can't she just like not go live on instagram that will never make sense to me because she just is always live on instagram doing in that one case a very like stream of
Starting point is 00:21:13 consciousness insensitive rant and then in other cases she's just doing weird stuff and you're just like vanessa like call your like friend or something call Zach like I don't know what you need to do but like I want no part of this so Vanessa Hudgens is a confirmed questionable weirdo is yes my is my take on the age uh but that so so we're going into prince just to set up the mindset of where we're going into princess switch to switched again yeah i have to suspend my upset with vanessa hudgens because i do have to watch this movie not just because this is our job but also because i just like have to watch this movie it's yeah I have to know what happens in Princess Switch 2 Switched Again I understand I have to know what the third Vanessa Hudgens is like
Starting point is 00:22:12 and I loved the third Vanessa Hudgens oh my gosh she's so awesome I her. She's a sloppy bitch and I love her. That was, okay, that was all of my precursor to talking about. Okay, I'm going to shut up for the rest of the episode because. No. That was a lot. Please keep going. But, oh, and then also there is some connection in the third one to like, oh, I guess there's four shot i missed this on my watch of the movie but per the clickbait rounds that happen every year around these movies a grand tradition there is a slight possible maybe
Starting point is 00:22:55 sort of hint that there's going to be i mean of course there's going to be a movie with a fourth vanessa hudgens i have a pitch for it that i'll reveal at some point in this episode hell yes uh i did a little bit of research this is so embarrassing um there was a there vanessa hudgens has been very like dodgy about whether there's going to be a third or a third one with a fourth vanessa hudgens that's never gonna get easier uh-huh she's been dodgy about that um but then she said in like an interview she's like i don't know but maybe the next vanessa hudgens will have a scottish accent and everyone's like what that's weird um i'm not confident vanessa hudgens can pull off she can barely do
Starting point is 00:23:38 three accents which includes one that is just her regular speaking voice um she can barely talk um okay so but but i think it's it's been hinted at at some point in this princess switch that the fourth vanessa hudgens is going to be her character from a night before christmas therefore tying in that whole thing. Which would be kind of genius. Yes. That wouldn't have even occurred to me to do that. But that's also the perfect choice to make. There's already a fourth Vanessa Hudgens on the table. And she already has experience kissing a royal knight, a royal figure.
Starting point is 00:24:22 Robert Pattinson lookalike. She already has been making out with this robert patinson impersonator for you know two years and yes on screen so she she has the experience that character is ripe to be a part of this franchise what's that character's name was it like brooke that i'm just spitballing here i don't remember i watched that movie last year when it got released the only thing i remember about it is there is a plot witch and then there is like random time travel and there's this like fish out of water uh like middle ages knight who shows up and yeah i don't i i did not enjoy that that one wasn my favorite, which is weird because it's on Rotten Tomatoes.
Starting point is 00:25:08 It's one of the highest rated Netflix Christmas movies. I like, it has a lot of the elements for a movie that I enjoy with like the time travel and the fish out of water and that, but like, it just didn't add up. I don't know the sum of its parts. Yeah. Just didn't add up to anything that I thought was great.
Starting point is 00:25:22 Also. And her name was Brooke. Wow. Good memory. That was Brooke. Wow. Go Jimmy. Wow. Good memory. That was a total mistake. There was also, someone was mentioning, I'll link, I've read so many pieces.
Starting point is 00:25:34 I'm sorry. Like I can't really distinguish one writer from another. But someone mentioned in their piece from this year that this production company, which is called MPCA, that produces most of these movies they must have some connection to chicago because all of these movies are vaguely related to chicago like it's always someone is from chicago the and then do you remember in the first christmas prince movie there's an establishing shot of chicago but then're in New York like there's they're obsessed with Chicago they show the Chicago River and then they're and then it was like pizza like you're like I'm walking here you're like that's not Chicago
Starting point is 00:26:16 also doesn't doesn't the company name stand for something like motion picture company of america something so yeah generic and motion picture that you're like corporation of america it's just like you this is a fake company wait the history of this company is also very weird okay so they were it was established in 1986 the year i was born thank you brave um good luck topping this incredible life that the motion picture corporation of america has had yeah who did it better they did who did life better founded in 1986 much like caitlin um they made a bunch of crappy movies that didn't do well. And then they made Dumb and Dumber. And so that's no good. And then they were acquired. And then 15 years passes.
Starting point is 00:27:17 And then they made Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2. And then they started making Netflix Christmas movies. And that's their life wild really make it make sense i i don't know i might be missing other stuff but i just don't care but either way they're obsessed with establishing shots of chicago mentions of chicago even though the company is based in Century City in Los Angeles. So I don't know. Confusing.
Starting point is 00:27:47 Who cares? Much like the plot of this movie. Should I recap it? Good transition. Yes. Thank you. Actually, we're going to take a quick break first and then we will come right back. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16, 2017, was murdered.
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Starting point is 00:29:26 Absolutely not What was that? You didn't figure it out? I think I need to hear you say it That was live audio of a woman's nightmare This machine is approved and everything? You're allowed to be doing this? We passed the review board a year ago
Starting point is 00:29:43 We're not hurting people There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing You're allowed to be doing this? We passed the review board a year ago. We're not hurting people. There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This summer, the nation watched as the Republican nominee for president was the target of two assassination attempts separated by two months. These events were mirrored nearly 50 years ago when President Gerald Ford faced two attempts on his life in less than three weeks. President Gerald R. Ford came stunningly close to being
Starting point is 00:30:24 the victim of an assassin today. And these are the only two times we know of that a woman has tried to assassinate a U.S. president. One was the protege of infamous cult leader Charles Manson. I always felt like Lynette was kind of his right-hand woman. The other, a middle-aged housewife working undercover for the FBI in a violent revolutionary underground.
Starting point is 00:30:46 Identified by police as Sarah Jean Moore. The story of one strange and violent summer. This is Rip Current, available now with new episodes every Thursday. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back. All right. So I'm just going to have to assume that you, that listeners have watched the first movie or at least listen to our episode on it or have some understanding of what happens in the first movie.
Starting point is 00:31:17 Cause what happens in the second movie, you have to have an understanding of the first movie. So I'm just going to operate on that assumption that you're familiar so uh stacy who is the vanessa hudgens from chicago who's a former baker is married to prince edward the most boring person someone who makes king richard look like a fucking like interesting person the most boring person ever committed to screen i have more notes about him than i thought i would for this movie but i do have a few things to say when we get there but yes he's so he i he i feel bad i almost yeah i was gonna say i almost feel bad for him because of just like how he's treated in this movie and just like i feel bad for him because of just like how he's treated in this movie and just like
Starting point is 00:32:05 i feel bad for him because his wife clearly doesn't love him very much like it's like i don't i think that like prince edward needs to like wake up and smell the coffee i don't think vanessa loves him as much as he thinks she does or like wake up and smell the cocoa that kevin insists on making all the time oh kevin's a whole other thing like that but prince edward especially like he's so whatever that i felt bad for him i'm like you need to find the world's most boring person and marry them because like i'm not feeling it with you and vanessa i'm just not i have no chemistry she's trying to get away from him all the time and he's like i love you hang out with me and she's like i can't hear you la la la
Starting point is 00:32:49 so mean and also like just don't want to marry him there's one scene where like he's clearly trying to have sex with her because she's like blah blah i'm distracted or i'm stressed out or something and he's like well i know something we could do to take your mind off it and then she's like no i'm too busy trying to get my look-alike to have sex with my best friend kevin and she would rather like she would rather fly to chicago from belgravia than spend a day with her husband and and also it's so sad like that beginning they that scene that same scene where she's like avoiding him but it's in this way that i'm like it's they're making it sound like she literally can't hear what he's saying yes which is just it's just confusing the
Starting point is 00:33:38 way it's written but he like they're both at the beginning of that scene they're like oh we're so busy and we're like with what and then later prince edward says literally says like i'm not actually that busy i just say i'm busy so that because i feel bad because my wife is busy and i'm like i don't think she's busy i don't think she's busy if she has time to drop everything and go to chicago to like do do something that her friends don't want. Do this weird matchmaking thing. Yeah. They have to get divorced.
Starting point is 00:34:10 That marriage is no good. It's a mess. Anyway. They live in Belgravia together, which is apparently adjacent to Montenaro and Aldovia. And let's throw Genovia from Princess. I was about to say, where does Genovia come into the mix? What's that movie called? Princess? Princess Diaries.
Starting point is 00:34:31 Diaries. Diaries. Too many Princess movies. Okay, so that's Stacey. Her lookalike, also played by Vanessa Hudgens, of course, is Princess Margaret, who is the person she switched places with in the first movie. And in the first movie, Margaret fell in love with Stacey's best friend, Kevin. But between the first and second movie, Kevin and Margaret have broken up.
Starting point is 00:34:54 So that's important to know. So fucking frustrating here, because we had to spend a lot of the first movie rooting for Margaret andvin to get together and then we just have we're expected to just do the exact same thing for the whole second movie i'm like and guess what i am not rooting i don't care i'm not rooting for them no one's rooting for them i'm just like kevin deserves better margaret does like they're just not. It's not. I don't. I well, I kind of dislike Margaret. I like Kevin, but I also think that he really is not very respectful of boundaries. That's a whole other thing.
Starting point is 00:35:36 I just I'm like, I wish them both the best separately. Clearly together as a no go. They broke up. They broke up for a reason. I like Kevin. I don't like margaret for kevin i think that margaret and prince edward who i both find to be really boring and bland should have gotten together wouldn't the royal family have been happier if they had just done that i'm like okay just get the two boring people married yeah they're already both royals they
Starting point is 00:36:00 understand the lifestyle stacy's clearly obsessed with kevin like that should have worked out i guess that's the thing is i was never really rooting for the couples that they clearly want you to root for in the first movie i wanted the ones that they were pushing which was stacy kevin yeah and edward margaret i'm like yeah that makes way more sense to me stacy's still obsessed with who kevin's having sex with and needs it to be someone who looks like her like that's projecting that's literally like look in the mirror Stacy talk to your therapist Stacy I it's so frustrating there also the whole thing with Margaret in this movie I'm Margaret is I totally agree so so so so boring and I feel like you could have done something way more interesting with her by even like borrowing plot points from a christmas prince because a christmas prince while really bad at
Starting point is 00:36:53 least like amber when she's like becoming a queen has like you learn about her trials and tribulations in the castle and like people don't take her seriously and she has to like you know fight for herself and her stay tuned to our christmas prince 2 episode coming out later this month she does investigative reporting like she at least like yeah it's all super pointless and like makes no sense but at least it's like oh you see she's like fighting for herself whereas margaret i would have rather have seen margaret like they reference that she's having a tough time adjusting but you don't see it ever you like you just see her apologize to kevin to be like sorry i was sorry i'm i have to do this thing called being the queen of a country so i can't hang out with you at 2 p.m on a weekday like obviously she can't kevin
Starting point is 00:37:45 this other weird thing happens where in the first princess switch movie the reason they switch places is because margaret like doesn't really want to be a royal she like doesn't like the lifestyle she doesn't like to be in the public spotlight and that's the whole reason they switch but then suddenly in the second movie she's's like, I was born to do this. I freaking love being a queen. She's a plot queen. But then she also still doesn't seem committed to like she doesn't seem like she wants to do it still. Also, OK, here's a question I had that I was I told myself I had to pay attention during the first Princess Switch when I rewatched it.
Starting point is 00:38:22 I was like, did her father die? Like who was the king? Was the king her father uh for margaret yeah and then her because they said like the king died the brother abdicated and then so now margaret is going to be the sovereign yeah does that mean her father died and we just didn't talk about it her father that's what they mentioned in the opening montage of princess switch 2 right but they don't but we don't see her deal with oh yeah no yeah her father died very very recently that's a huge thing to happen like we i don't think we were told by the movie they had a bad relationship so you have to imagine she just lost a parent and is not at all affected by it.
Starting point is 00:39:05 Right. She's the only thing is like she put a tarp over a Christmas tree and she's like, this is how I grieve. And like, well, there's no wrong way to grieve, Margaret. But like, it just is weird that you don't bring it up. And then also, I mean, also, I've been watching The Crown. So bear with me here. But like an abdication of the throne is a big fucking deal.
Starting point is 00:39:24 Like people would be talking about the fact that the like where is her brother at? Like that's another plot line for Margaret. I would have been way more interested in is her struggle with her brother being like, well, why the fuck did you abdicate? You know, I didn't want to be queen. And he's like, I didn't want to be king. Like we hate being royals. Like it would have been so more interesting.
Starting point is 00:39:44 Okay. king like we hate being royals like it would have been so more interesting okay another a separate pitch than the one i was originally going to pitch for the next princess switch movie wait okay what if her brother shows up but it's also played by vanessa hudgens genius or her brother shows up and he's and it's kevin when it's a second kevin and then they're like oh my god wait her brother looks just like her ex-boyfriend how did we not know that and then it becomes a whole too gross yeah that's actually nasty but either way there are so many directions because margaret is canonically boring as hell. Like give her something interesting to do. So at least we're watching a boring person do interesting things.
Starting point is 00:40:32 That's why A Christmas Prince works. Amber is boring, but she does things that are interesting. So it's sort of like you're like, man, this is kind of interesting. But Margaret is boring and all the things that are interesting about what's happening in her life are not talked about at all i truly like correct me in the comments if i'm wrong but it seems like she just lost if not her father a very close family member there would have been a huge political like reckoning if someone abdicated from the throne it would just be like this should have been season one of the crown for margaret right yeah instead the only thing we get is like
Starting point is 00:41:12 a couple shots of what looks like tabloids like not even like prestige journalism just like a few like tabloid headlines of being like is margaret ready to be queen seems like she's a mess and it's but then she's not dealing with that either like that doesn't you know she's being scrutinized by the tabloids and she doesn't care even though margaret is boring boring boring and every time she's on screen i'm like oh my god margaret like they could have done something interesting with her in a bunch of different ways. And then instead they were like, what if we just repeated the exact,
Starting point is 00:41:49 her exact plot line from the first movie? Like why? You know, why? Sorry. I was just, I wrote down at the beginning, like the top of my nose. I'm like, Margaret's father died. Why aren't we talking about this?
Starting point is 00:42:03 That's, even in like a corny movie kind of way of like this is what he would have wanted or you know like that kind of corny right but no nope sadly no um all right where were we uh okay so she goes to visit kevin and his daughter olivia in chicago and she is a new a different actor from the last movie. Okay, I thought so. Yes. I was like, but I didn't rewatch the first movie, so I wasn't sure,
Starting point is 00:42:31 but I had a feeling that they recast her. Absolutely. Okay, so Stacey invites them to Margaret's coronation ceremony because she is about to become Queen of Montenaro. And Kevin reluctantly agrees, and then they all show up at margaret's palace and then they all decorate it together uh margaret and kevin start flirting by throwing flour on each other the flower fight is so the flower fight i'm like okay fine fine fine also i'm curious on how you feel about i feel like
Starting point is 00:43:08 kevin really should have like not let himself get steamrolled by princess stacy when princess stacy rolls in and also like she's not a good friend to him because she is like mocking him in front of his child like olivia i also feel bad for olivia because olivia should not be brought into this so much like first of all the trope of like a child who's obsessed with their parents romantic life for kind of no reason when has that ever been a thing in all of these movies that's just canon whatever that's a movie trope that is just like it's neither here nor there it's just kind of creepy and weird but whatever it's a plot device
Starting point is 00:43:52 but when vanessa shows up unannounced and is like look at you wearing sweatpants you make me sick and you better come to belgravia like he should have just been like no like he shouldn't have done it he should have called margaret and been like hey stacy's being a fucking bully because she's like obsessed with us being together for question mark reason is it okay if i come like another interesting if we have to have kevin and Belgravia for this movie to happen, then when he shows up, why couldn't Margaret be like mad at Stacy? Like there, that was another thing where there's just like no conflict between Margaret and Stacy at any time.
Starting point is 00:44:35 Right. When it seems like there, it would be very justifiable. Like Stacy is getting so into other people's businesses and no one gets mad at her i would be so mad at her if she took my ex to montanaro three nights before my coronation i'd be like stacy stay out of it like your marriage is over there with mr boring so like there's so little conflict between them to the point where during the part of the movie, and we'll get to this, but when they've switched again, hence the subtitle of the movie.
Starting point is 00:45:11 For also very low stakes reason. Like the reason they switch is so low stakes. I am so confused about why they switch. I have so many thoughts and questions and notes about that. Thank God for third Vanessa. There's a little twist where a third Vanessa is present and she also has done a switch. So there's so little conflict between Margaret and Stacey that when Margaret goes back to who she thinks is Stacey and tries to switch back, except that who she thinks is Stacey is actually cousin Fiona. Right.
Starting point is 00:45:44 We'll explain that whole thing. Whenever this Fiona person is like, get the hell out of here. Margaret's just like, okay, I sure. Even though Fiona is occupying her bedroom, like that,
Starting point is 00:46:00 like Margaret gets sent away from her own bedroom and she's just like, okay, honestly, that was, that was was iconic like that was like so i was thinking that too but then i was like okay first of all fiona is amazing i love her so much i was kind of like the most compelling thing was i was rooting for her to successfully take the throne from marg Because I'm like, at least she wants it. At least she wants to do it. Like, just let her do it. Whatever. And she's also the only good Vanessa in this one.
Starting point is 00:46:32 But that was so, like, bully older cousin move for Fiona to, like, gaslight Margaret so hard. She's like, I guess I'm not myself. I guess I am leaving the room. I was like, God, Margaretaret we need to like stacy and margaret need to like go to some self-esteem workshops because they're just like struggling um yeah i don't i i was also kind of like i was really baffled by the lack of conflict between stacy and margaret at all i felt like it like worked against the plot it would have been yeah way it would have helped the like switch level confusion it would have been interesting
Starting point is 00:47:11 if like margaret was like oh maybe stacy's not who i thought she was instead of immediately being like stacy would never do this who is the third vanessa like i'm not like rooting for it's it's it's i don't know it's like one of those things where these movies are so bad it's almost like well what kind of yardstick is this but sometimes i feel like people think they're making a feminist choice by like having two female characters have zero conflict right when it's like no just treat them equally don't like make the reason that there's a conflict be extremely gendered and irrational there's a very there's a very like i feel like a very obvious reason why they would be in conflict at multiple points in this movie right but it just
Starting point is 00:47:58 never happens they're like nope besties i let myself get pushed around by Stacey for no reason. Like, right. Yeah. Like Margaret could be like, stop meddling in my love life. And yeah, like Stacey can be like, shit, I should go to therapy.
Starting point is 00:48:15 Like get like Stacey. Yeah. I've just like, none of the Vanessa's are okay. But the third Vanessa is amazing. And we're about to get to her. So yes but before we do um so we see kevin and margaret start to kind of like flirt again it's but but then we meet antonio who is margaret's chief of staff and he is in love with margaret and he's like you're great i'm so happy to be serving you blah blah blah blah blah
Starting point is 00:48:46 unnecessary get rid of but also he looked like British Jared Kushner like he I was like what is going on with Antonio he is clearly bad news just by the way he's like he's the only person
Starting point is 00:49:02 in this movie I'm convinced is actually British also like with the scenes with person in this movie i'm convinced is actually british also like with the scenes with the henchmen i'm like are none of these people british i didn't look it up but i'm like oh my gosh it seems like no one is british i tried to look up the two people who play mindy and reggie uh fiona's henchmen there's they're off the grid they're off the grid i just couldn't find anything about them i don't't know. Especially the male henchman. I was like, I don't. His accent was so over the top that I'm like, it sounds like he's doing the same thing Vanessa is.
Starting point is 00:49:34 I don't know. And then the hench person that looked like Saoirse Ronan was just distracting because she looked so much like Saoirse Ronan. I will say that Reggie, the one henchman, is the best character of the film. I love him, but I don't think he's British. Did you ever watch The Only Way is Essex or any of those like trashy British, like Jersey Shore except like British? No, I haven't. No. Oh my gosh. They're terrible shows. They're amazing.
Starting point is 00:50:04 Because there's another one called like Geordie Shore. I think that one I haven't seen that one. I think is maybe even more trashy than the only way is S6, but I've only seen that one. Anyway, I used to watch them with my friend, British Martha, but the two characters who are the, the hench people reggie and mindy especially
Starting point is 00:50:28 reggie feel to me like characters who would be in a very trashy british reality show like the only way is essex maybe he is brit maybe my my view of of britain the uk is too myopic and i just don't know well they have way more like kind of working class british accents so maybe that's i don't know to our british listeners could you shed some light these actors are british uh leave your answers in the comments i genuinely i could be totally off here but i think it's i was also thrown by how clearly fake vanessa's british accent is i'm like maybe they are british and they're just trying to match her so that they all like there could be a lot of things going on here either way the best chemistry in the movie is between vanessa and the hench people yes bar none best incredible perfect um okay so we've met antonio he's in love with margaret then there's this ball because there's of course like 500 christmas events there's a
Starting point is 00:51:35 concert there's a ball there's a coronation there hudgens she is blonde she is part of the royal family because she is cousins with margaret but she's like not in the line of succession for queen or something like that but her name is fiona pembroke i just confirmed that reggie is british he's a british soap opera actor oh wow which i had a feeling he might have been authentically british he is british and he's and he he knows how to do camp he's a he's a goddamn soap character so there you go incredible reggie all right anyways so fiona pembroke she's an incredible character she and reggie to me are like tied for first place best characters that scene where reggie steal really aggressively steals a wallet from someone that like was my i will i rewatched that
Starting point is 00:52:39 shot three times i'm like oh my god what a bold move because she which what fiona does is she brings her hench people who love to take pictures against um whatever you call them those backgrounds those photo backgrounds step and repeats yes um but she has her hench people just like pick pockets at public events so that she can maintain her lifestyle it's a really bad plan. But it was fun. It was fun to watch Reggie just pickpocketing everybody. It was great. He's not good at it. And then later when they're like huddled together in what appears to be just a completely empty, dark castle.
Starting point is 00:53:19 Yeah. The Pembroke Estate. They're like unloading. They can't even keep the lights on there they haven't stolen enough wallets like it's a mess they're like unloading their haul of the stuff they have stolen that evening at this ball and this movie is comedy gold especially in this scene because one of them has stolen a roll of toilet paper and she's like and and fiona vanessa hudgens is like this isn't gonna help pay for our summer in whatever place that we're gonna go he's like
Starting point is 00:53:54 but it's double ply and she's like i don't care and he's like don't you understand it's double ply and i'm like this is the best joke i've ever seen in a movie it's not my favorite joke i guess that's the end of my sentence but i did i did think this movie was genuinely like i don't know i mean it's all these movies are slightly they're enjoyable to me in slightly different ways and then also not enjoyable at all but i think part of what makes a christmas prince funny is that it doesn't seem to realize that it's funny but the princess switch movies are being funny on purpose and i'm kind of laughing so i'm laughing quite a bit and and and it was uh written by two women robin bernheim burger and megan metzger so there you go that's why it's a feminist text just kidding women in comedy you love to see
Starting point is 00:54:52 it hilarious i did laugh at several points in this movie oh wait no wait yes yes okay no at that same ball okay i wanted to know if you i was i wanted to text you about it but then i'm like no i'm gonna save it for the pod there's i i watched it with with isaac and there was like a scene where i'm like huh kevin and margaret kevin like cuts in with antonio and is like yeah i may have a dance with blah blah because he's like mr smooth cool chicago baker whatever right he and margaret are dancing and then at one point they stop dancing and start just spinning around in a circle did you notice that i didn't i re-watched the scene like four times because they start out dancing everyone is slow dance like whatever it's all vaguely royal and you're like i know what this scene is and
Starting point is 00:55:45 then at some point they stop doing the dancing and then they just have their hands on each other's shoulders and they're continuing to talk and they're turning just in a circle i'm gonna honestly i'm gonna get the time code so i can just like explain to you like okay it was continue but i'm gonna stop and just show you what i'm talking about because i i can hear what i sound like right now but i swear to god jamie i believe you i swear to god they just start turning in a circle and it's so okay amazing um let's take another quick break and then we will be right back. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017 was murdered.
Starting point is 00:56:39 There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. is desperate. and she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. I've been thinking about you.
Starting point is 00:57:30 I want you back in my life. It's too late for that. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. One session. 24 hours. BPM 110.
Starting point is 00:57:47 120. She's terrified. Should we wake her up? Absolutely not. What was that? You didn't figure it out? I think I need to hear you say it. That was live audio of a woman's nightmare.
Starting point is 00:58:02 This machine is approved and everything? You're allowed to be doing this? We passed the review board a year ago. We're not hurting people. There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm.
Starting point is 00:58:21 Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. nearly 50 years ago when President Gerald Ford faced two attempts on his life in less than three weeks. President Gerald R. Ford came stunningly close to being the victim of an assassin today. And these are the only two times we know of that a woman has tried to assassinate a U.S. president. One was the protege of infamous cult leader Charles Manson. I always felt like Lynette was kind of his right-hand woman.
Starting point is 00:59:03 The other, a middle-aged housewife working undercover for the FBI in a violent revolutionary underground. Identified by police as Sarah Jean Moore. The story of one strange and violent summer. This is Rip Current, available now with new episodes every Thursday. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And we're back.
Starting point is 00:59:30 Okay, so then Antonio professes his feelings for Margaret outright. And then he tells Kevin that Kevin is getting in the way of Margaret's happiness, which Kevin's daughter Olivia overhears. So then she goes to Stacy and and margaret out of school anytime her dad's horny like what is this what's going on right uh and it's like maybe it's her
Starting point is 00:59:55 like holiday break from school i don't know i don't know how long they're there for i'm gonna need that specified because i'm like we need need Olivia in school we need her like less in Belgravia with her dad's ex like involving her on Kevin's end first I know for the movie it makes sense but involving her on Kevin's end is so irresponsible your child should not be involved in your love life to this extent like your child should not be coming with you on like operation get her back like that's just not right that's bad parenting it would be and it would be one thing if within the context of a movie there was like a stronger motivation established for her if she was like i want to be a princess that's why i have such a vested interest in like my dad marrying
Starting point is 01:00:43 this queen to be right but there's absolutely no motivation established for her whatsoever so it just feels weird and creepy creepier than it already is and it's not like it's not like she's like oh Margaret has such an amazing personality like we know that's not true um wait how should I do this should I just show you my computer screen what's the i have it already um just let me know the time code the time code is around just go to 21 minutes okay and you'll start to see what i'm what i'm talking about they start by i've never seen a dance like this where it starts as dancing and then it just turns into slow spinning while continuing to. Oh, yep. I'm seeing it.
Starting point is 01:01:26 And then they do a wider shot of it and it looks even weirder because they're just like no one else is doing that. It's just them. That's incredible. There's turning in a circle and he's going, maybe we could hang out as friends. I'm like, why aren't you dancing anymore? What's happening? I wonder if they like, they like had to learn like an actual ballroom dance, but it was too complicated for both of them
Starting point is 01:01:50 to do the dance and deliver their lines. So they're like, we're just going to spin. Just spin, just spin. We know, I mean, Vanessa Hudgens is confirmed not a good dancer. We've known this since High School Musical 2006. So not to put her on blast, you know it is true yeah so that happened sorry that was just like a big bump for me I was like whoa where where are we what's
Starting point is 01:02:15 happening okay thank you for sharing that I don't know if I would have noticed otherwise how would you survive without this truly um okay so olivia has overheard uh antonio bullying kevin basically so she goes to stacy and margaret and proposes that they switch places again so that stacy can do margaret's queen duties at the like christmas concert that night or whatever or like the following day and margaret can still like here's the thing margaret the states are so stays herself the only one okay so the whole reason for this switch is so that margaret and kevin can have some alone time together so it's really just stacy masquerading asading as Margaret in public so that Margaret has the time to be alone with Kevin. So there's a makeover montage, of course,
Starting point is 01:03:13 when which all the Vanessa Hudgens is switch place. But because they're doing this whole switch so that Margaret can have alone time withvin kevin knows that he is spending time with margaret yeah the only person that is seeing margaret as stacy is kevin so there's no reason that they needed to actually switch places all the way yeah absolutely you're totally right you're totally right because he knows he knows he's spending time with margaret but even so she dresses as stacy which just makes the whole thing weirder because now he's like well the woman i love now has like the hair and clothes of my best friend which wouldn't that be weird for him like i just don't but also this is this again, I'm overthinking this by a trillion. But were I putting myself in the shoes of either Kevin or Edward, first of all, I would not be involved
Starting point is 01:04:14 with any of these Vanessa's. Like these Vanessa's only bring chaos. But I would be constantly like, I think it would almost be like probably a problem in the relationship. I would constantly be carding Vanessa. I'd be like, can you show me some ID? Like, who are you? Like Edward, especially who is somehow like both obsessed with his wife and has no idea what she looks like. Because he like so that was when I started feeling less bad for Edward. I'm like, well, he doesn't even know what his wife looks like what's wrong with this guy like Mary Kate and Ashley's boyfriends husbands
Starting point is 01:04:50 whomever like they can always tell the difference those French boys met them one time before and they knew exactly which one was Mary Kate and which one was Ashley if it's true you know which Vanessa you're married to is all I'm saying like it's just another strike against that marriage and then also Kevin at the end who's been we'll get there but like particularly if I were Kevin after what he goes through in this song he granted he should never have come but after what he goes through in this saga I would have been like okay before I marry you at the airport can you just like can you just confirm which Vanessa you are please stop asking me to take your word for it because it
Starting point is 01:05:32 doesn't work you know like yeah I don't know I would just be like I'm sorry like I'm sure at least one of the Vanessa's is a lovely person but I just need to like remove myself from the whole Vanessa situation because it's too much it's so confused and it's so confusing why does margaret go through the trouble of dressing as stacy when the only person who is going to see her is kevin who knows that she is still margaret doesn't make any sense the place they go to is a an abandoned christmas festival no one's there no literally he's like let's go to the christmas festival and then there's zero people there but it's open it's like how many people live in montanaro is it six is it seven so how many people is she queen of if you wanna i'm just like if you
Starting point is 01:06:21 really want some alone time wouldn't you like spend a like romantic evening together? Like just like not building snowmans together in what feels like a very platonic. Well, that's just like a casting issue. Vanessa has never had any chemistry with this actor. Wait, what is his name? But she's never had any chemistry with this guy. So no matter which Vanessa it is, she doesn't have chemistry with him. And I mean, and if you don't think she has chemistry with him,
Starting point is 01:06:51 wait till you see her in a lack of chemistry. Like, do you know these people? I, she's allegedly known both of these actors for like at least three years. Yeah. But also, oh my God,
Starting point is 01:07:03 no, wait, the guy who plays Kevin is also kind of untraceable. He doesn't have a Wikipedia page. Oh, Kevin. What is his deal? Oh, he's British. Wait, this is so confusing.
Starting point is 01:07:14 Kevin is British. This is... Oh. Make it make sense. It'll never. It will never. So Kevin's secretly British. that's also a better plot point um but no yeah they revealed the whole time i'm part of the royal family you're like
Starting point is 01:07:34 wait i'm not a baker at all um but also to your point of how nonsensical it is to have them switch it would first of all be a better date if they were in private. And also there would be no need like there would be no there would be zero stakes. No need to switch. There would be zero stakes if there was even no risk of her getting caught in public. But then there's no risk of her getting caught in public because they went to an abandoned carnival. Right. The more I think about it,
Starting point is 01:08:06 the less anything makes sense. Yeah. The stakes are on the floor with Margaret and Stacey at the beginning. The stakes are subterranean. But meanwhile, Fiona,
Starting point is 01:08:14 they couldn't be higher. Everything's riding on this. Okay. So, Margaret and Stacey agree to this completely unnecessary switch. Meanwhile,
Starting point is 01:08:24 Fiona is hatching a plan of her own to pretend to be Margaret so that she can get access to Margaret's royal money and steal some of it. That's how it works. You get the royal pin number on the day of the coronation. Okay. The stakes are higher for her, but her storyline still makes no sense because it was not at all clear to me why she needed to go through with the coronation ceremony to gain access to the money she could have just because reasons it makes sense that she was still that she would still need to kind of masquerade as margaret for a little while to like hack into her bank account or whatever but to do the whole coronation i was like that's
Starting point is 01:09:06 not necessary it definitely isn't no um okay i felt the same way but i also was just like it i feel like this movie really is a case study of like how much nonsense you'll put up with based on how much you are personally invested in the character because no one's storyline makes sense but i'm rooting for fiona why because she's interesting oh she's so messy she's the only vanessa whose plot line isn't connected to like a man like she's just like true i'm trying to i mean granted she's trying to steal the throne but you know it's like she's gonna be literally what she's gonna be a queen of 14 people Margaret did not want the job except she suddenly does in this movie which is I mean talking about a switch that's the real switch the
Starting point is 01:09:59 completely yeah the completely out of nowhere motivation switch of margaret's character from the first movie to the second movie that's what the princess switch should be about but i like that fiona i like that fiona um justifies she's like oh no i could totally look like margaret look at here's a picture of me from my ariana phase and it's like a picture of her as vanessa hudgens and the hench people are like oh totally yeah and then sersha goes like nuclear and is just like okay here's what we have to do and like starts training her to be a princess even though it's like um last time i checked sersha you are a hench person so i don't know what you know about and fiona is again part of the royal family she might be like i don't know if she's
Starting point is 01:10:45 like a duchess or something but she's like she would know more to be a royal right uh she lives in an estate that doesn't have electricity but you know it's in a state nonetheless she could still flip it uh the the that's another story this is just becoming a story notes podcast over time but another story note that i had that another yet another thing that could make margaret one percent interesting is like the only connection we know about like uh i keep wanting to say vanessa fiona and margaret are that they're cousins yeah and we know nothing about what their actual relationship is as cousins like i thought it could i wrote down it could have been interesting if like maybe fiona brings out margaret's wild side and they used to like have fun together and like they had a close
Starting point is 01:11:36 relationship but then something happened and now they're estranged and like that would give some sort of connection on like it would make it even funnier slash maybe wouldn't be as funny if Fiona bullied Margaret like she does. But it's like there is no we have no indication of we just know they're cousins. We don't know what their relationship is like. We don't know if they have any fond memories together. I just felt like contextualizing that a little bit would have given us a stronger connection with a female character than Margaret has with Stacey, who she just trusts without questioning, even though Stacey's a disaster. Just because they look exactly alike, which is not a basis for trust and a friendship. Watch any Mary-Kate and Ashley movie. They always fight. There's always conflict and then it's resolved that's how twin movies work yeah but yeah it's like we don't know anything about like i wanted i was like oh it would have been fun if
Starting point is 01:12:36 margaret's like oh i don't hang out with fiona anymore because just things would always get wild when she's around and i'm just not myself around fiona i just like it would have been fun that's a great uh like that's great backstory for them the only other thing we know about fiona because we don't know much about her character but the one thing we do learn is that her father also died maybe recently i'm not sure they could talk about they could bond over the uh loss uh the grieving process. You know, there's there's all kinds of stuff. And apparently, like, I mean, wouldn't like the king have been Fiona's uncle?
Starting point is 01:13:11 Like, that's also. Right. Yeah. It would be grieving the same two people. That's true. Right. Yeah. Why didn't they see each other at the funeral?
Starting point is 01:13:18 Why didn't Fiona? Did Fiona not go to the king's funeral? And wouldn't that have caused a scandal? Not only a scandal in the family, but like a public scandal someone hire me at a bulgaravian newspaper like there's a lot going on here and no one is writing about it what like the pot i i i got really too fixated on the politics of bulgaravia and aldovia in this one uh this year and it's like everything is a disaster but yeah again that's that i didn't even think of that the fact that they both recently lost parents who would have been each other's uncles right right well it's because they play off fiona's
Starting point is 01:13:58 father's death as a joke because stacy is like you mean perval Pembroke who died of a peanut allergy and that whole thing is just like that's not funny oh uh not to backtrack to the beginning of the movie but did you find the opening montage to be very aggressive because i found it to be very aggressive and gaslighting in a way that was like it made me laugh but it was like so the beginning is animated and it's just recapping the previous movie which i do appreciate because everyone watching it needs that because it's not a memorable movie um but the way that it's written and the way vanessa hudgens reads it is really aggressive where she goes like of course you probably remember that my name is Stacy and I'm from
Starting point is 01:14:49 Chicago and naturally you remember Kevin and then like every time something happens you're like no I don't remember that no I don't remember that no I don't remember that and Stacy's just like being she's like and naturally you would be remiss not to remember margaret and you're like i don't remember that like it was just i i know it was a joke and i feel like it's the movie acknowledging how how like ridiculously unmemorable the first movie was but i found it to be a really aggressive way to start and then it goes like and of course you know that the king is dead and of course you know that the prince abdicated the throne and you're like well i really don't know that the king is dead and of course you know that the prince abdicated the throne and you're like well i really don't know i don't know because those things never happened on screen is
Starting point is 01:15:29 anyone going to be sad about that is anyone gonna be no no it doesn't matter anyways the beginning i was just like the beginning like vo i was like stop yelling at me like it's not my fault your movie sucked and i don't remember anything from it. Jeez. Oh, it really sets the tone, though. Okay. It really does. Yeah. So Fiona is hatching her plan to become Margaret so that she can gain access to the throne to steal the money. Right.
Starting point is 01:15:59 Okay. So then Stacey becomes Margaret for the night. Margaret becomes Stacey and they proceed with their plan. Everything seems like it's going to be fine until Fiona shows up, also pretending to be Margaret. And she abducts Stacey, who Fiona thinks is Margaret. Okay. Having trouble following along because I am. This scene, this is like the only, like one of the only parts where i'm like okay this is
Starting point is 01:16:25 like kind of compelling and then it like falls apart really quickly but but when sersha puts like the the chemical rag over vanessa's mouth you're like whoa that escalated really quickly i didn't think that they were gonna like you know actually like really commit a crime against vanessa but they did well it's not soirse it is Vanessa Hudgens oh wait you're chloroforming herself that's iconic like you have in an incredible piece of cinema you have to admit that is like pretty amazing it's it's incredible that's brilliant writing but yeah they they commit a pretty serious felony in this movie which oh which fiona only gets a slight slap on the wrist for i do love that antonio goes to the dungeon and fiona gets community service again iconic like
Starting point is 01:17:13 clearly there's some nepotism at play here maybe um okay so now f Fiona has taken the place of Margaret and abducted Stacy because of this whole comedy of errors thing. Yeah. Then Margaret shows back up at the end of the night after her night with Kevin where they platonically build snow people together. And Margaret goes to the person who she thinks is Stacy, but it of course is really Fiona and Fiona to Margaret is like Stacey get out of here and Margaret's like wait a minute Stacey the game is up what are you talking about it's time to switch back and then this is when Fiona kicks Margaret out of her own bedroom wrecking balls Margaret's like entire life and sense of self in a single scene and i was like oh my god why am i cheering her on but i was so was i was like fiona you're amazing like she she's such a villain she's like
Starting point is 01:18:14 a perfect villain she's like trying on the crown like and then she flings it into a christmas tree she like frisbees it in and then she's like get out of here margaret you're not the queen and she's like oh okay oh it's so good yeah fiona there's this there's a moment where fiona is staring at herself in the mirror wearing margaret's crown laughing maniacally and being like off with their heads and it's just like you're like yeah off with their heads um yeah it's really hard to get me to to root for um you know a character that is privileged but fiona is really cool she nails it yeah i'm you know i'm really i really wish that she had taken the crown because clearly margaret doesn't i mean if anything proves the fact that margaret is not fit to rule it's the fact that she got you know steamrolled
Starting point is 01:19:12 by her own cousin out of her own identity in less than a minute like okay that's not the constitution of someone who could run a country it's just not right what's gonna happen to you what's gonna happen to you in the royal court you're gonna be a disaster anyway yeah you if you have no sense of self what where are your convictions where is your where's your sense of anything where's your like i guess her only staff is antonio and she's constantly refusing his help which granted ends up being a good idea because he's also a villain but like she keeps being like it's so confusing because she's like i don't know how to be a queen and this is really confusing but then whenever she's offered help she's like
Starting point is 01:19:53 i don't want help and i'm like so do you just want to be like a bad queen like what do you what do you want well that's also a weird dynamic because like yeah he is her advisor but he's also constantly throwing himself at her so that would that would give me some kind of like imposter syndrome like something but if i were margaret and i were the fucking queen i mean i know i'm like putting a lot on her but i'm like she can fire him yeah and hire an advisor she trusts happens in christmas prints all the time they they like lose them like defense against the dark arts professors there's a new one every movie like you can you can fire antonio like right she's the queen like i just and again it's like if that dynamic were explored at all of like oh i
Starting point is 01:20:38 really need to like you know become more assertive and i need to like stop worrying about pleasing other people and like do what i know is right for my country like yeah that's a compelling narrative to center on like and i wouldn't be so judgy of her if i thought that that was being done to like tell a story but it isn't there she's just like she's just i'm like just fire and literally fire and fire him lie to him be like sorry things aren't gonna work out it's out of my hands and i'm gonna hire someone qualified you know i'm gonna hire she could have someone else on her staff because she's going to have a large staff if she's about to be queen she can get someone else to fire him she never even has to talk to it's so confusing anyway hire simon simon's right over
Starting point is 01:21:26 there in aldovia oh cousin simon right cousin simon it turns out he really redeems himself you know it turns out simon can be trusted so just you know hire simon he's got experience and um you don't need antonio hire a woman in this position like hire fourth vanessa hutchins is your like whatever but don't just be like, oh, this is so awkward with Antonio. I wish I could do something. It's like you, you, you can't. You have more power than anyone to do something about it. Literally, you're like the only person who can't.
Starting point is 01:21:56 So you got to do it. Yeah. Okay. So then, so now that there's like this snag in Fiona's plan, she has to act more quickly. This means she has to move the coronation ceremony to that night. But first, she cancels her dinner plans with Kevin, who had just had this lovely evening building snow people with. So Fiona, still pretending to be Margaret,aret yeah tells kevin that things are over between them and he's devastated and he heads to the airport meanwhile the real margaret goes to
Starting point is 01:22:33 prince edward who has just been like bumbling around this entire movie not aware of where he is or who his wife is or anything he's just been gaslit by so many people and then he asks vanessa for help and he never receives the help he asks for that was when i was truly at my like most sympathetic for prince edward is when he like asks well and least because you're like you can't tell that's your wife yikes um but also half the time i can't either there's some times where i'm like wait who is that but um i think they should have made a little bit more difference in the hair because sometimes I'm like,
Starting point is 01:23:08 all the accents are so fake. The only thing that gets me to figure out who is who is that Margaret always wears like a deep red lipstick and usually more eye makeup, but not as much eye makeup as Fiona. So yeah, I know they all have to kind of look like vanessa hudgens but like it does get confusing there should be more yeah there should be like a
Starting point is 01:23:33 greater visual signifier of like which one is which i did feel bad for prince edward when he was drinking cocoa just in the middle of an empty room and was like oh like my wife doesn't want to hang out with me i'm so sad i'm not even that busy i'm lying about being busy being a king isn't even that hard like oh this sucks and then he's talking to his wife and and she's like oh um it'll probably all work out you're like that's all you got oh it's sad i oh yeah i felt bad for him in that scene i was like edward just move on man well my main note for him was that not that i even appreciate this per se because i don't like it when like any character who because he seems like a pretty kind decent man doesn't seem like a bad person he just seems like the world just seems boring and unaware of his surroundings but parents are probably cousins
Starting point is 01:24:38 he's royal you know and they're probably dead maybe from a peanut allergy. Who can say? Parents, peanuts, parents, peanuts. What I noticed, I suppose, is that in most movies that revolve around a romantic storyline, and there is also some kind of lie or bet or game component to the romance where a character is being lied to about what's really happening it's usually a woman who is like the victim of this lie so for that to be switched a little bit and it's it's edward who is constantly being lied to and gaslit uh again i don't like to see it the thing is like it's like i i don't like when people like writers are like oh i'm not you know they invert it instead of subverting it right where
Starting point is 01:25:32 they're like oh let's just do a fucking oceans 12 of this plot point like you're like it's still not compelling i felt the same way about um kevin and the sweatpants like i feel like that's usually a plot point that's like right taken against a female character who went through a breakup and they're like oh get yourself together you're wearing sweatpants you have to like get him back and I think that's right oh yeah and he's also like I'm gonna get another cat and it's like come on like cat lady sweatpants think to him and they're like oh but it's a cat daddy it's a daddy and you're like it's still like no like what well we're trying to say is like let's do one better for everybody like yeah i every time they it's just such lazy laziness to i mean but these movies
Starting point is 01:26:20 are lazy so i wasn't like outraged but i'm like yeah kevin and edward are both kind of like treated how women in this genre are often treated which is interesting but it's still bad writing right it's not like good writing to take a stereotype and then just gender flip it that's not that's creative stop doing that like yeah but in this genre i guess it makes the i don't like it but it's like i guess i'm not like why isn't this movie better written like we know why yeah but yeah i totally agree i was i find edward he's just sipping cocoa he's he's wearing sweat pants spiritually not literally right he might be literally wearing a tuxedo but spiritually he's also a sad sweatpants cat daddy that's true but yeah like you said our
Starting point is 01:27:15 as an audience our expectations need to be as low as the stakes are for stacy and Margaret, which is like basement level apartment style. All right. So Fiona has sabotaged Kevin's relationship with Margaret. Meanwhile, the real Margaret goes to Prince Edward and tells him and her, the other few members of her staff that she does have about the situation and then they figure out that this imposter is fiona and she must have kidnapped stacy and that they must be keeping her at the pembroke estate how they managed to figure out exactly where stacy is based on what little information they have only deduced and not even confirmed is a bit confusing but they figure it all out it just happens to be right and then fiona as margaret is trying to convince antonio to like move the coronation ceremony to that night so that she can be crowned queen for reasons unclear that
Starting point is 01:28:20 for plot doesn't need to happen plot reason um but. But Antonio realizes that Fiona is not Margaret. And he's like, well, I'll rat you out or you can let me in on this scheme and we can split the money. So that's their plan moving forward. Meanwhile. Sure is. I liked when they combined forces but again i just felt like even like the stakes were confusing for antonio i like if we're gonna have antonio which we don't need really i kind of wish he wanted more or like i didn't understand why by the rules of this movie you would think that
Starting point is 01:29:03 antonio would like fall madly in love with fiona right away he's like oh i love women who look like vanessa hudgens and you're evil just like me like just there was no he was just like okay i guess i'm on board as long as i'm involved right i didn't want them to fall in love but i just like thought there should have been some other thing he wanted like it shouldn't have been so easy for her for fiona to just be like okay we're evil together now like right like it because then his his function kind of like goes away like i don't know yeah well and then his motivation is established to be that because she's like why do you need my why do you need the money you're filthy rich and he's like no my brother inherited most of the estate i only have a very small income which i'm
Starting point is 01:29:52 sure is still very substantial but by royal standards are like identical in that they're like i want to maintain my lifestyle but i can't yeah exactly so but that implies that if his brother inherited the estate, his dad also must be dead. Right? What's going on? Who's killing all the elder members of this royal family? Do they all have peanut allergies? Could you trace it back? Is there a royal chef that's got it in for everybody? Is it Kevin? Is it the same royal chef who is in The Christmas Prince 2? Who Rudy befriends?
Starting point is 01:30:36 It makes you, whoa. Oh, that would be Rudy. I can't even think about Rudy right now. My head will explode. Hey, I'm walking here. I'm from york you're like this is just this is we need to turn the television off uh yeah i don't they i didn't even think of that where he i i don't know the the whole antonio antonio i feel like should have been like left in a previous draft i don't by the end it's like fiona's doing what antonio is doing and then it's like well then why do we need two of these
Starting point is 01:31:18 characters what i guess he technically is like well i can get the coronation to happen earlier but i'm like well all right yeah i guess i liked i liked when the priest was confused that was fun that was very fun anyways so yeah now antonio is like dot dot dot involved like i don't know yeah he's in on the scheme meanwhile edward margaret and the others margaret staff rescue st from Pembroke estate and then rush to the cathedral to stop Fiona from going through with the coronation. And then that's when the priests are all confused. And then they successfully stop all that. Antonio gets thrown in the dungeon. Fiona just sort of slips out unpunished. And then they all rush to the airport where kevin is about to
Starting point is 01:32:07 get on a plane again the tropiest thing that the movie possibly could have done they do it uh and then margaret's like no that wasn't me who sent you away that was fiona i love you i want to marry you and he's like i want to marry you so then they find a random priest who is about to board his flight in this belgravian or whatever the fuck country they're in at this point i was like sure i also something i got really stuck on but apparently they were i was i was outraged at the very idea that there would be a direct flight from chicago to belgravia but i guess that they were going to london to get a connecting flight to chicago so you know what good job movie good job movie i was like there's no way there's a direct from chicago to belgravia
Starting point is 01:32:57 i just don't believe it no anyways but yeah yes they find a priest who is about to get onto a fucking delta flight and then they make him officiate their impromptu airport wedding kevin does not card vanessa no one has to prove their identity first of all priest needs to like get his act together because i'm pretty sure you need to prove who you are before you can get married and you need to like sign documents and stuff it was a sham it was a sham of a wedding and i hope that they know that they weren't they're not actually married and that kevin can still go back to chicago and we don't need to continue oh maybe that's part of the plot of the third movie anyway the mary was the marriage was clearly not legitimate. The priest was coerced.
Starting point is 01:33:46 So this completely not legally binding marriage happens at the airport. And then the next day is Christmas. And that is when the real Margaret has her real coronation to become the real queen. And this is where Queen Amber and king richard from christmas prince and their royal baby they are present and we go and then everyone lives happily ever after and that's the movie this is the smallest reward that i'll get i was concerned that the coronation was also going to turn into a second wedding I was at least glad that like after the airport wedding I'm like oh my god they're gonna do like and now here's the real wedding but at least at very very least the
Starting point is 01:34:37 coronation stayed focused on Margaret as it should have stayed focused on margaret even though it was uh nothing makes sense but i did appreciate i was concerned there was going to be a second larger wedding following the airport wedding sure a few few things that we blew through that i just i just stacy escaping from the hench people is extremely compelling that was the coolest thing she's ever done in her entire character's life is when she escapes from i'm like okay so you have skills you can at least bake and escape old castles like you know apply these skills somewhere you know just do that and i like that i do i will hand it to the movie that she got herself out of that situation. Edward throws a punt at the very end, but that's literally the first thing he's done
Starting point is 01:35:31 in the entire movie. So I guess I'll give it a pass. But like he didn't rescue her. She rescued herself. She rescues herself. And then Edward throws a ceremonial princely punch at the end to um what's his name the right does it pass the test when the most boring character in the movie punches the most interesting character in the movie in the face yes it does and then also does it we also skipped over this does it pass the
Starting point is 01:36:00 battle test when uh one hench person locks another hench person in a trunk does that because sarsha ronan gets locked yes for some reason does it pass the bechdel test when she get out when third vanessa hudgens aka fiona is looking at herself in the mirror laughing and being like off with the heads yes okay that actually i think it does when any of the venus i will say it does not pass the bechdel test very much i wasn't keeping like super close math on this yeah me but it barely passes between stacy and margaret if at all because all they ever do is talk about fucking kevin uh right so that's not good i think it does pass between the gals and olivia at one point um it definitely passes between fiona and margaret that basically that whole scene is fiona does
Starting point is 01:36:53 it pass when vanessa hudgens tells a different vanessa hudgens that she's useless and to get out yes yes um so it does pass between various vanessas and also with olivia and then i think with sercia a couple of times but the okay the end the end the end where fiona okay so i do love when margaret rolls up and you're like okay we know that stacy has been captured we haven't figured out that kevin is going to the belgravian airport i'm assuming the only one or not Belgrade, Montenaro. I don't know where they are. Yeah, I guess they are in Montenaro. Yeah, it's pretty close.
Starting point is 01:37:31 But like they're going to the Montenaro airport by. Oh, OK. I have another question, but just a second. OK, so they roll up. I'm like, OK, this is where Margaret's arc is gonna go it's gonna be like she's finally gonna stand up for herself for the first time in the entire movie and she's gonna be like fiona you're going you're out of here sweetheart but she she sends antonio to the dungeon which is something that also exists in a christmas prince that i'm like do those still
Starting point is 01:38:03 exist i don't know they send antonio to the dungeon life imprisonment right without a trial fiona talks her way out of it within a minute again i'm like we needed to see margaret stand up to her bully cousin and she doesn't do it she's like okay you're gonna have to do so much community service and fiona's like thank you so much this was a big misunderstanding yeah you're my family and i've always looked up to you she's lying her way through the whole monologue and margaret completely buys it if you're rooting for fiona it kind of rocked like if you're rooting for fiona at the end you're like wow she was like a devious lying villain to the very end because there's no way she's like yeah cuz oh like cuz oh you just realized that or also how that did you remember that line where fiona like is talking
Starting point is 01:38:56 to margaret and she says something to the effect of yeah you didn't realize that you wanted to be a queen until now how do you know that yeah what are you talking about it was iconic it reminds me of that meme that's like no don't do that you're so sexy haha fiona does that but she's like no don't put me in the dungeon you're so sexy haha and margaret's like okay i won't and then she doesn't yeah um but then she's told she has community service but then she's seen surrounded by cops and then at the coronation so right right yeah did the hen people go to the dungeon why weren't they at the coronation what happened there right what's that all about who was that cab driver what was that all about okay isn't that a reference to the first movie?
Starting point is 01:39:45 Yes, but then I went back and watched the first movie and I'm like, I also don't understand him in the first movie. Is he Santa? I think there's some implication that he's sort of like this magical Christmas figure who orchestrates these fantastical storylines or something. But then I also was like like we didn't get a satisfactory enough answer of who he was in the first movie to justify bringing him back because what his plot he's like a plot santa because all he does is all he does he also does more in the first movie than he does in this one the only thing he does in this movie drives kevin and olivia to the airport the wrong way correct he just drives into the airport really really slow in a very roundabout way yes classic santa um he just drives him to
Starting point is 01:40:35 the airport wrong because he knows that one of the vanessas has to get out of a castle and the other vanessa has to also that wasn't the castle they were describing like a good hour away from the they they say that the castle is an hour away so you have to factor so I'm like how long were they in this cab um right that's such a commute that's like a two hour how far away is the airport unless the the airport just happened to be right next to the Pembroke estate. But we're not given a map. We don't know.
Starting point is 01:41:09 We assume it's quite a drive. I felt like I was just spinning around in a circle when I was supposed to be dancing. It was a really jarring experience. Also, Olivia, I guess, you know what? Fuck Chicago, Olivia. We live in Montenaro now.aro now just like oh what's that you say Olivia just like the end of the last fucking movie that's right
Starting point is 01:41:31 these characters have the exact same ending as the last fucking movie I mean it's easy to like uproot a child character from her life when you don't do anything at all to characterize her or give her like an interior life at all and only make her obsessed with whether who who her father
Starting point is 01:41:53 is having sex with and whether or not they are having sex i feel for kevin to an extent but also like he shouldn't have shown up like that margaret could have been justifiably mad at him he shouldn't have shown up like that. Margaret could have been justifiably mad at him. He shouldn't have brought his child into this whole situation again. So what's what? So what? Let's not forget. So this movie opens after the animated montage, but before the plot starts.
Starting point is 01:42:22 And the whole plot of the first movie revolves around this baking contest yes which what is up with belgravia and montanaro that they have their royal family being the judges for these low budget baking contests yeah it's like are you that's it brings me back to the first scene where like stacy and ever they were like we're so busy yeah it's like are you that's it brings me back to the first scene where like stacy and ever they were like we're so busy and it's like doing what you're going to going to a baking competition sure yeah it's like okay yeah you're booked right up um i will say that that of and this is like not really a compliment, but the Princess Witch movies are a little more diverse than some of the other Netflix Christmas movies.
Starting point is 01:43:13 Because usually, especially in A Christmas Prince, which we'll talk about in our other episode, when there are non-white characters, they are troped, troped, troped in very offensive ways. And usually relegated to like secondary or tertiary characters exactly so in in the princess switch um that doesn't happen uh it's still very aggressively hetero and the movies are still like god awful but um you know there that's the end of my sentence there it is yep take it or leave it most will choose to leave it um and that's okay no but yeah i mean christmas movies in general when we've talked about this i mean there's a whole conversation to be had, which we've had on on different episodes about just the centering the rigid white heteroness of that and just like holiday movies predominantly being about Christmas, which is obviously a very Christian holiday, leaving out many other holidays of this season, other holidays of any season, any other religions, any non-religions, you know, like, what about secular people and their celebrations? And, you know, just completely erasing any kind of other cultures or religions, holidays, and traditions and things like that. So there's just like a very like Christian white hetero centric idealization of.
Starting point is 01:44:50 It's I mean, if you look at some of it, I'm sure that a lot of our listeners have seen already like the montages of Hallmark Christmas movie posters. It's always like a hetero white couple in when one's wearing a green sweater and one's wearing a blue sweater and they're all the same exact movie yeah i mean it's it's something that it seems like at very least these companies are becoming aware of and they're aware that there is a demand for more diversity in this genre so i hope we continue to see more of that even in the netflix christmas movie universe like you've seen things improving the movies are always bad but that's also the genre like i don't know the princess switch is like definitely a nudge in the right direction in in in that regard yeah
Starting point is 01:45:40 the movies are never going to be good and we all and on top of that um we need movies that are less rigidly hetero i mean again a christmas prince tries to do this but they do it in mostly a way that's tropey and bad yes so it's it's interesting how i feel like these genres especially these very formulaic genres are interesting to keep an eye on in terms of like progress and representation yeah i don't i don't know this genre in particular has so much work to do in terms of casting more diversely telling literally and a second story a second story would be amazing um because it's mostly the same movie 5,000 times. Yes. There's been a lot written about it as well that probably speak to this more articulately than we are.
Starting point is 01:46:33 And I feel like we do talk about it every year. Yeah. So this genre is, this movie and this series is not the worst offender, which is definitely. Is not saying much. Not saying much. But, you know, it's I think that like it is true that when movies like these do well and they're continually like nudged and pressured to have more representation in the worst film genre of all time. Like it does make a difference. And it's important that we keep yeah talking about it um for sure you know i do want a fourth vanessa hudgens
Starting point is 01:47:10 well here let me tell you about my pitch for okay yes princess switch three switched again again this episode is officially longer than the movie. Whoopsies. Well, I luckily have most of my notes. They've already been said. I do have a couple other things. So here's a pitch that I spent exactly five seconds thinking of. So it doesn't make any sense, but neither do any of these movies. So it's actually very in keeping with the the brand okay so the movie opens margaret
Starting point is 01:47:49 is six months pregnant with a royal baby but her airport wedding with kevin was only three months ago oh no so to avoid a premarital sex scandal, she and Stacey have to switch places again because Stacey is not pregnant so that Stacey can appear in public as Margaret looking non-pregnant. But Stacey is getting tired of being in the public eye. So she's like, this is so much pressure. I don't know how much longer i can deal with this and then just then a long lost cousin of stacy's who comes from deep within appalachia shows up and she's like why do you get all the like royal fun i want a part of this you know we're we're for family i should be entitled to some you know royal whatever so but she this this this cousin almost discovers this secret pregnancy so then they have to get fiona back sorry what did you say i'm sorry gregnessy thank you you're welcome so then they have to get margaret's cousin fiona back to pretend to actually no i
Starting point is 01:49:09 don't this is the i've lost the thread but basically there's something there you get the four vanessa hudgens is i want vanessa hudgens to give birth to another vanessa hudgens oh full vanessa size they're like she or like one of the okay here's my pitch stacy lays an egg one day and she's like oh my god what is this and then it's called it's called princess switch three switched again again the royal egg and uh it's all about an egg that stacy lays and she has to sit on the egg. And meanwhile, Fiona and Margaret have to switch for some reason. Someone has to switch with Stacey. So now a different Vanessa is sitting on the egg.
Starting point is 01:49:52 And all this stuff happens. And then at the end, Edward eats a peanut and he dies. And he dies. And just as he's dying, a fourth Vanessa Hudgens hatches out of the egg. Wow. And then everyone has dad trauma. All the Vanessas. Wow. Is Stacy's father alive?
Starting point is 01:50:12 Do we know? Is he? I forget. I don't know if he ever gets brought up. So I'm not sure. Well, my pitch is fourth Vanessa Hudgens hatches out of an egg. Incredible. Could be fun.
Starting point is 01:50:24 Love it. Let's pitch it to the most generic sounding production company in the world, Motion Picture Corporation of America. Corporation of America. Motion Picture Chicago of America. I just have a couple last. I mean, we've talked about how tropey these movies tend to be. They're tropey in the kind of Christmas movie sense. They're tropey in the rom-com sense.
Starting point is 01:50:53 Part of that is a makeover montage in which we get not one, not two, but three different makeovers happening because of all the switches. I guess necessary to the plot. But is it um but is it oh okay a couple notes on um fiona who again is the best character at one point she gets into a convertible while it is snowing with the top down and drives off in the snow with the top still down explain that i honestly did not even notice and now it's just i'll try to figure out the time code for that because it's a must watch i honestly didn't even register the aggressive makeover scene because i think i'm so gaslit by these movies good call good call um let me see was there anything else my last question i had this is kind of a crossover question with our christmas prince
Starting point is 01:51:54 two episode but my question is what side of world war ii was belgravia on great i could see it going either way i don't know i don't know i don't trust i don't trust um maybe that's why vanessa wasn't upset that her father died maybe he was on the wrong side of world war ii i don't know could be don't know uh yeah there's what's the history of this country i feel like with aldovia we get too much history in bait where but their history is mostly related to curses and ghosts but But Belgravia, we know nothing. We know nothing about the history of the country. I wouldn't be surprised if they had a pretty fashy history.
Starting point is 01:52:31 That's just my thought. We got to get to the bottom of this. We got another year. We certainly do. The movie does pass the Bechdel test, as we mentioned. Yes. However, nipple scale wise, what do you even do with this i guess i would give it
Starting point is 01:52:51 i this is too generous i will say this right now but i will give it one and a half because i was so passionate about fiona's character i was genuinely like i know vanessa hudgens there is a lot to criticize there and also she is terrible at apologizing when she fucks up that said her performance of fiona is i think my favorite performance she's ever given same and i really was rooting for fiona to steal montanaro and i thought she was like a highly motivated even if the motivation made no sense i was rooting for Fiona to steal Montanaro and I thought she was like a highly motivated even if the motivation made no sense I was rooting for her she was in she was in charge uh she didn't care if her family lived or died like I just was like wow what uh what a compelling character so I'm gonna give one and a half nipples exclusively for fiona and also
Starting point is 01:53:46 her two hench people who were also iconic yeah one of the mindy is wearing safety pin earrings and they're i'm like where can i buy those um all very 2007 yeah yes i would say one of the better female movie villains i have seen really ever so yeah especially i feel like there's not a lot of female well this could this maybe isn't true but like in terms of like christmas movie villains in particular i feel like there's not a lot of female this is so in the weeds but like female christmas movie villains there's not a lot of them and and fiona is an incredible one she's so good she's better than simon oh yeah obviously but yeah it goes without saying so i was good i mean and one and a half nipples generous yes i was going to give it two which is
Starting point is 01:54:37 really too generous two nipples i'll up it to two oh because Oh, because when you do the math, two out of five is still 40%, which is an F. That is a failing grade. So I feel okay about that. But you're right. Let's give the full nip. It's the holidays. Yeah, I'm feeling generous. Yeah, we're in that mood.
Starting point is 01:55:02 Two nipples. Yeah, it's still rom-com Christmas movie propaganda. It's very tropey. It's not well written or thought out. The female characters are nothing really interesting is done with them speaking specifically about Stacey and Margaret. But I do really enjoy Fiona as as a character as a villain i think the movie was probably written uh in less than a week and then maybe that's why it's so sloppy 45 minutes i also i'm like it has to just be like no one because i think that if you were going to write
Starting point is 01:55:40 a movie that made this little sense on purpose it would actually be really hard you know like maybe it would be easier to write a movie that sort of made sense in a week than write a movie that makes no sense on purpose in a week true yeah which which supports the the 45 minute draft uh hypothesis i can see that yeah um yeah yeah this movie isn't contemptuous of women but it just uh didn't try very hard that said fiona pembroke is contemptuous of fathers it's really murdering fathers right and left yeah but i do love the fiona character uh another really great female movie villain from josey and the pussycats is also named fiona is it a trope we'll find out um anyway two nipples uh and i will give one to fiona and i will give one to reggie oh i love what you and reggie have um I feel like he and I could be best friends.
Starting point is 01:56:45 I'm just obsessed with Fiona. It's not okay. It's not right. But it is. Yeah. So here we are. Well, that's the end of the episode. What else needs to be said?
Starting point is 01:57:00 What else? We said it all. We said it all and then some. Yeah. In this essay essay we did so if you don't already subscribe to the matreon once again now's a great time to do it to get episodes like this it's a gift you give to yourself this is a gift giving season so you know why not give the gift of the matreon to a loved one they'll be so grateful we guarantee it and the thing is uh we we keep most of our bonus episodes locked up yeah we've only
Starting point is 01:57:36 ever released a few there's over a hundred now on the matron so if you are a bexel cast super fan you've heard most of the episodes on the main feed there's literally hundreds and hundreds of hours more where that came from we can't stop creating content we it's sick there are like 10 it's more like four or five but so many titanic episodes on the Matreon. We're out of control is what I'm saying. Oh, it's wild. There's just so much going on over there.
Starting point is 01:58:14 And, and you know, it's just a lovely community. Five bucks a month. Give a gift to yourself. Give a gift to a friend who, who enjoys the show. Yeah.
Starting point is 01:58:23 And you can also find us on all the social media platforms that you would expect. Twitter, Instagram, at Bechdelcast. And if you would like to get merch, another great gift to give to yourself and others, that's over at tpublic.com slash the Bechdel cast and hopefully this movie this this episode um has inspired you to go watch the princess switch there were three many Vanessa Hudgens the second part part two and we'll just I'm starting to like create my circle of crystals to manifest for Vanessa Hudgens next year you know what why not five well what if that would be wild if they skipped from three to five I want to believe it anything could happen it would
Starting point is 01:59:15 be a Christmas miracle that's why I love you Caitlin you're not afraid to really dream, you know. Thank you so much. Well, bye bye. Bye. Kay hasn't heard from her sister in seven years. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. What was that? That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. Can Kay trust her sister or is history repeating itself?
Starting point is 01:59:47 There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Curious about queer sexuality, cruising, and expanding your horizons? Hit play on the sex-positive and deeply entertaining podcast Sniffy's Cruising Confessions. Join hosts Gabe Gonzalez and Chris Patterson Rosso
Starting point is 02:00:12 as they explore queer sex, cruising, relationships, and culture in the new iHeart podcast, Sniffy's Cruising Confessions. Sniffy's Cruising Confessions will broaden minds and help you pursue your true goals. You can listen to Sniffy's Cruising Confessions, sponsored by Gilead, now on the iHeartRadio app or wherever you get your podcasts. New episodes every Thursday.
Starting point is 02:00:31 What happens when a professional football player's career ends and the applause fades and the screaming fans move on? I am going to share my journey of how I went from Christianity to now a Hebrew Israelite. For some former NFL players, a new faith provides answers. You mix homesteading with guns and church. Voila! You got straight away. They try to save everybody. Listen to Spiraled on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

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