The Flop House - Ep. #335 - Hillbilly Elegy

Episode Date: February 13, 2021

Oof, y'all. Oooof. Hillbilly Elegy? More like Who'll-Kill-Me Smellogy! Got 'em! The Peaches discuss the controversial book-turned-apolitical and emotionally incomprehensible Oscar-bait sob-fest / catalog of yells.Also, if you missed the Teen Wolf live show, but wish you'd seen, you still can! Access to the recorded version is available until 12PM ET on Sunday 2/14! https://theflophouse.simpletix.comWikipedia entry for Hillbilly ElegyMovies recommended in this episode:The Florida ProjectSelah and the SpadesAnything for Jackson

On this episode we discuss... Hillbilly Elegy! Which is like a hellbilly-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e-e- Hey and welcome to the Flapphouse, I'm Dan McCoy. Hey, I'm Stuart Wellington. I'm Elliot Kaelin. And, uh, yeah, this is a show. Dan, did I take you by surprise? Well, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like,

you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like,

you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like,

you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like, you're like future. Just be a regular led zip and ramble. Yeah, I think Ellen was trying to, but before we started recording, or maybe while we were recording, Ellen was trying to steer this into more of a, like, uh, uh, relationship slash sexual wellness podcast direction and Dan said, yeah, no, sir, time to get to the meat of what we're supposed to do here. The meat being movie talk. So, so I had to stop myself after my name from saying anything more than that because I knew it would go in a direction Dan didn't want much like how when I was on

Jeopardy recently a little brag I was talking about my grandma and I had to stop myself from saying her address which I realized I was about to say after I named her and I was like oh no she doesn't need this information out there. Now why why is that why is that second nature to just tag? Well, because I was saying I was saying my my my grandmother Barbara Shell of New York and I was about to say Barbara Shell of and then her address as if I was announcing like a letter that I got on a radio or ordering something through like Domino's pizza tracker. Exactly. Yes, which I do, which I do over the phone constantly. I'm constantly sending my grandma pizza My grandfather to let her know

Yeah, but I have to she doesn't use it. She doesn't use computers or a phone actually she uses both But so I have to mail her photographs of what the tracker looks like so the tracker gets to her long after the pizza does and Living in Manhattan as she does, there's no source for pizza other than Dominic. Yeah, and the problem then is like, because of the lag, she thinks another pizza is coming. So then you have to order another pizza. Yeah, I've got order another one.

Continues. Exactly. It's a delicious cycle as well. And in a way, you could make a cycle out of pizza pies because they're kind of like wheels, right? Unless they're Detroit stars. I mean, not gonna get much traction. They're not load bearing.

That's not a pizza. It's not a support pizza. Collapsed in a pile of metal and pizza. I mean, sounds wonderful to me, except maybe the metal part. That's kind of what happened in Star Wars when they went into that death star trashabactor. They're in like kind of a bottle of metal and pizza, right?

Yeah, I feel like that's what the designer notes were from George Lucas was that I think the original script says they fall into a big puddle of pizza. Yeah, yeah, but he had to explain that he meant space pizza. And so Ralph McClaury had to do a bunch of concept paintings of what pizza would look like in outer space. And so by the time they got to the prequ of concept paintings of what pizza would look like in outer space. And so by the time they got to the prequels, George Lucas just said space dienner and they were just like, make it look like a fifties diner. Like why not?

Have an alien wearing a little paper hat and an apron. Why not? India's a mustache. India's a mustache. It's the perfect form. Does he have a mustache? Yeah. Dexter Jetster has a mustache, yeah.

Is he the one with multiple arms? He has multiple arms. Yeah. Yeah. So he can flip multiple hamburgers Space, yeah, space burgers they call him. Yeah, I'm glad that space replaces ham in that in that word Yet, yeah, it's a burger man space and he's flips him with a spatula, which is a portmanteau of space and spatula Space and atula Space and Atchilla. So, we want, look, here's the thing. We're a podcast, you know that part. But maybe you don't know if you haven't listened before.

We watch a bad movie and then we talk about it. And in this instance, we watched Hillbilly Elegy, the latest big movie to be released on Netflix. Was it gonna be a theatrical before all this pan-chan? I have to assume so. I have to assume that the only reason that a movie like this gets made is to be eligible for the Academy Awards.

So I have to assume, and it's a Ron Howard directed big stars, Glen Close, Amy Adams, whoever plays JD, the main character. I have to assume it was meant to be originally for the theater. Like the way Roma was a Netflix movie, but it was in the theater. Yeah, it's a movie that came out a little ways back. It had a little controversy because the book it's based on had a lot of political content that I can't speak to because I didn't read the book, but the movie is kind of remarkable

for how apolitical it is to the degree that if it somehow manages to say less than nothing, I think, by the end. It's certainly a movie where by the end of it, you're like, why was that? Yeah. Like, why did this, what was the driving force behind making this other than that? It's it's based on a best-selling book and therefore is also considering that it's a movie that takes place over You know a number of different years and it jumps around in time and at multiple points

characters are like watching the news They make a lot of effort to not actually say anything about the political figures in the news. No, I mean, we'll get to the point where one of the characters wants to watch political news and is shut down because his mom all his grandma wants to watch Terminator 2. Which, which, in her defense, a movie she has seen 100 times. I mean, you can watch it 100 more times. It's Terminator 2. And a movie, a movie as which we'll find

informs her life philosophy. So the movie has more to say about Terminator 2 than it does about America, really. There's an early scene where our lead as a child wants to watch Al Gore and Amy Adams turns the TV off. And I don't know any child who's ever said, no, no, give me more al Gore uh... if only less than one of the future of a appearances perhaps i don't know but

i will say at when i was a kid i thought it was alfgore and i'm like yeah let's finally see alf get it get what it like let's see what alf does when he's when he's let loose and unleashed like that movie with jet lee were you the leash on them in the least it's a lot of it i don't remember what it's called yeah we should probably get into the specifics of the movie soon. Oh sure, okay, let's talk about it. So guys, I'm driving the buggy on this one. I'm going to mention first off, there's a lot of arguing and yelling in this movie,

a special kind of yelling, Oscar style yelling. The kind of yelling that looks really good in the clip that they play when they announce your name at the Oscars. So I'm going to be doing a running tally as best as I can of those Oscar yelling scenes. We begin. It's 1997. That's right. The best time to be alive.

The Star Wars prequels were just a couple years off. You can go see Star Wars Specialist and the theaters. Jurassic Park was four years old and still going strong in the hearts of America's youth and other stuff was probably happening to. I hate to throw in an IMDB goofs here, but when they were 1997, they didn't have any kind of an establishing shot that indicated that me Stewart Wellington was 17 years old at the time. I feel like it would have been a better way of establishing exactly what you're there in Stewart Wellington probably wearing a t-shirt that says like KMFDM on it or something What and and what would you be doing in this establishment? Oh, man. I was 17 so I was probably seated

Year on my That was the sitting portion of your life. I was probably seated and I'm guessing I was rifling through a stack of reptiles or reptiles magazines or not a stack of lizards and turtles. Which would be appropriate because the movie begins, we're introduced by our narrator, JD, he's a nice young boy, so nice he rescues a turtle from the road in Jackson, Kentucky, which you think at first is where he lives, but it's not.

It's a world of beautiful nature and noble poor white folk who either bullied JD or come in and beat up the bullies who are bullying JD. Now, can I say to one of the, I'm sorry, I can't you off, but this is one of the many digressions in the film that I'm like, I don't know why this is in the movie. Like, this movie puts in a lot of stuff where you're like, I don't know why this is in the movie.

And this is the first of it, because it's like, okay, he makes a point of saying he spent most of his life somewhere else. Nothing is particularly learned about him in this first scene. And they also make Kentucky and Ohio look like to vastly different universes when they are geographically close. So. Yeah, so I think, but I think they're emotionally

they're supposed to be two different universes in Kentucky. You live out in the woods and family is the most important thing. And you don't have to worry about bullies because somebody's uncle is gonna come by and beat that bully up. But his family, he just spends the summers there. And that's where his family is originally from. His grandparents left and went to Ohio.

That's right, they're part of the Kentucky diaspora that has spread all throughout the United States, but maintains that rich ethnic culture of Kentucky, no matter where they go. And someday they'll be able to return to the homeland, I assume. He lives in Ohio with his mom, Amy Adams, his sister, and his mom, Glenn Close. That's his grandma for anyone who's not from Kentucky.

So technically, since they live in Ohio, they're not hillbillies, but suburbillies, which are kind of, you know, it's where a hillbillies go when they can all longer live in the hills. Where they live in Ohio, it was a bustling mill town when mom on pop-up moved to Ohio in the 30s or 40s. I wasn't quite certain. But now it's your classic American shuttered main street. And what JD

says in the narration is his family, what they were missing was hope. Cut to 2011. JD seems to have found his hope because he's working his way through a Yale law school. And if he, but if he can't get a paid summer internship, he cannot afford to stay in school. He goes to a fancy meet and greet with potential law firm employers, but he cannot get a handle on how many silverware, how much silverware there is in his place.

And there's too many forks. There's too many forks, dammit. Too many forks. Also, he has trouble ordering wine. But mainly it's the fork thing, which drives him so confused that he has to call his girlfriend to ask her, how do I use the the forks. Dan you have looked like you have something to say on the subject of the question. No I mean like yes. Or the maximum amount there are. There's a lot of silverware that he is confused by and he is

confused by the fact that there's more than one type of wine at the at this place and the thing like look at this point he has been to Yale Law School, but he's also just a human that exists in the world. Like he works at a restaurant. The very existence of different types of silverware for stuff shouldn't baffle him. Now I looked, you know, this is one of the times that I looked at I'm like, okay, is this in the book?

Turns out this is in the book, but I still don't believe it actually happened because it is like, I have a problem. I mean, at least not to this degree. It is as if he is an alien who has arrived on Earth and is like, one only needs one implement of food devouring. And he is an alien from the planet poor people.

That's, he's essentially throughout the movie as a visitor to the planet rich from the planet poor. Maybe that's what sound, maybe that's what it's like. I don't know. I grew up middle class. I think it was David Brooks who wrote that column a few years ago about bringing a friend of his to a sandwich restaurant and his friend being bewildered by the variety of sandwiches and ingredients and being paralyzed. Their thoughts unable to move because they could not comprehend so many sandwich ingredients. And at the time I was like, that sounds made up. I don't think that's a real thing.

And if you were a good friend, David Brooks, you would explain what stuff is good on a sandwich then. Because I've certainly been to plenty of restaurants where I didn't know what something was on the menu and I asked whoever I was with and they said, oh, that's this thing. Your friend is hungry, David Brooks. Like, yeah, describe what a sandwich is to him.

Don't go home and write a column about it. Get him that sandwich. Especially when you know that his brother, Mel Brooks, would have done a hilarious routine improvising what each of those ingredients are. They're not really related. So he's, he gets there and he's having a lot of trouble figuring out the, the, the etiquette for fine dining.

And part of me is like, yeah, man, maybe you shouldn't get this job. If something like this is fucking you up so bad, like you need to control your shit. Like fake it till you make it buddy. And that's even before we get to the point when a lawyer or one of the, I guess, are there lawyers, right, that they're talking to you

or whatever? There are lawyers. Now this is where law students are supposed to have dinner with members of law firms so that they can, it's kind of like an audition dinner to see who's going to get an interview to get a job. Because much like the rise of Skywalker, there's a lot of steps to get to where you actually want to go. You've got to get to the dinner, then after the dinner you get an interview, then an interview,

maybe you get a job, and then the job, you get the dagger that you hold up to the dinner, then after the dinner, you get an interview, then an interview, maybe you get a job, and then the job, you get the dagger that you hold up to the sun, and it tells you where the planet is that you need to find the magic and per thing. I don't really remember what they were looking for in the rise of Skywalker. Like a key? There's probably a dagger that took you to, yeah, the Death Star wreckage. There was a key there that took you somewhere else. And this scene where the lawyer, and this was seen with a lawyer, when he, JD reveals his background, he uses a little bit of like,

as like window dressing to make himself seem more interesting. And this is when one of the lawyers used the term redneck and he says, we don't use that word in a way that felt very offensive to me. I don't know why. Well, so he gets, you're right. He calls his girlfriend about this silver problem,

then gets a phone call from his sister saying, you need to come home, your mom has just OD'd. The movie presents this as almost as harrowing as the silverware problem. And then he immediately hangs up in his sister and then goes back to dinner. And while the, and he starts playing it up, he's like, you know, my family, we're, we're, we're,

we're hillbilly royalty because we're descended from the Hatfields and the McCoy's. And the lawyer is like he starts playing it up, he's like, you know, my family, we're, we're dissent, we're hillbilly royalty because we're dissented from the Hatfields and the, McCoy's. And the, and the lawyer is like, hey, I guess, you know, what's it like being a, you know, must be nice not being around those red necks and he goes, excuse me, sir. And I was like, well, you, you were the one who was playing up the, the hillbilly aspect, like, I don't know. And the, it's one of those moments where, I guess it's supposed to be that like he can talk like that because he's from he's from Kentucky by way of Ohio but other people it's unsure if there's some sort of etiquette dynamic going on that I certainly not being a hillbilly and not being a wealthy Yale lawyer I do not know how it operates I am merely guys I'm just a middle class Jewish

New Jersey guy who works in Hollywood I don't know how either of these worlds operate. I'm in my bubble and I'm not going to try to puncture their bubbles. Look, I would be somewhat perturbed if someone made assumptions about someplace I lived. The degree to which, though, these characters are portrayed as comically out of touch rich people is like they all should have like bad guy signs on them. I feel like in the scene because like I'm not saying that there aren't plenty of comically out of touch rich people, but these are like, these people act like they have never talked to anyone

who was not wealthy in their life. And there are people who hire students, many of whom presumably grew up as he did and worked hard to sort of be able to fund going to law school and changing their circumstances somewhat. I mean, but also the one lawyer is slightly offensive and JD comes down on him and the other lawyer, the one JD really wants to impress, seems to be on JD's side almost instantly. Like, it does not jack, and if anything, it's like, now JD recognizes the power of offense, I guess.

But anyway, JD, what I think gets me the most about him is he clearly has a strong narrative of I lifted myself up To get to this place and that's a good, sellable narrative since he wrote a book about it But I guess at that point in his life he doesn't notice it. He still sees it as a weakness anyway Well, this is also... Sorry, I mean for what it's worth and it may not be Much to compare it to quote unquote real life life because I am sure that his memoir is also fictionalized to some degree. But I mean he is a talking horse in it. But like from what I looked into, you know, like this is not the way it was.

Like his, you know, people that he dealt with kind of like looked on his background as like sort of an interesting factor, but not a thing that like If anything a thing that said them apart as you're saying Elliot and like not a thing that he Hid like he seems to be concerned about hiding to some degree where he came from until he sees like how it can maybe advantage himself Yeah, I will say it's this is this movie so I just Yeah, I will say this is this movie so I just We're because of scheduling we are recording this before our live show But we are releasing it afterwards last night

I did my review of Teen Wolf and I forgot that Teen Wolf exists in a universe where people know about where wolves but they are oppressed and so it's almost like this movie is to hillbilly as a Teen Wolf is to Teen wolves Or it's like this is the thing that gives him his power But it's also what what marks him out as an other. And in real life, I don't know that people from Kentucky are really that marked up, but I don't know again I people if you've been to Kentucky and you went to Yale right in Hally went to Yale, but she's not from Kentucky Does not count. Coloradans are treated very well there, I think. So anyway JD flashes back to his youth He and his mom Amy Adams are painting Easter eggs. His mom calls these their family heirlooms

They do the thing where they suck the yolk out of the egg so they can keep that egg shell. But he gets a pet dog and that dog breaks the eggs and mom loses her shit. That's right, it's Oscar yelling scene number one. But then she apologized to him and bonds with him over his magic, the gathering cards, which was a very real 1997 touch to me.

So I have a couple of points here. One is, I mean, the dog doesn't break the eggs. This is the first time that JD is like super clumsy and is like dang it and like knocks a table over. And then the second thing is, buddy, if you got a fucking Lord of the Pit in 1997, just sell that shit dude, it's worth so much money. Yeah.

And to see it just sitting there, it's not even single-sweaved. What the fuck, dude? Well, you know he doesn't really know what he's doing. He's not a guy who puts card combos together. He just sits there dinging you with prodigal sorcerer until you're, while you're setting up your mana and that's his only strategy.

You know, he doesn't read, he doesn't read in Quest magazine or anything like that. He just doesn't know what he's doing. Now, I want to make two points that are sort of related, not as important as the collectible cards points, but there's, there are two things that are sort of related here. Number one, you mentioned how there are all these Oscar-streaming scenes, and they mostly come from Amy Adams, some from Glenn Close, and I think that in a different movie, like they're working hard,

I think they're putting in fine performances, the problem with their performances is they're all Oscar-yelling scenes, and I blame that more on the direction of the screenwriting, because this movie feels like a parade of incidents and each incident is like the most dramatic incident that happened that year. And if this movie has all this like framing device, oh, the guy has an adult going back

to be with his mom and his hometown, stuff that is apparently not in the book and the top thing that would probably improve, the movie is eliminating all in the book, and the top thing that would probably improve the movie is eliminating all that shit because it would give a little more time for some sort of nuance and like low points to go with all the screaming. The frame, I think you're right. I mean, there's a lot of, they're acting their hearts out, God bless them.

It's a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing because at the heart of the movie, there's kind of like a meaninglessness. And I think that the framing device doesn't help, I guess it's supposed to provide stakes that like if he's got to deal with the situation or else he's not gonna get this summer job. But it's also like, you know that he's already at Yale.

Like, the biggest hurdle has been overcome. And even if he's having trouble staying in Yale, like the biggest hurdle I assume was getting to you. Yeah, exactly. Like if this movie has like the stakes of this movie should not be, will this guy get a good lawyer job? The stakes should be, will this kid get out of this

sort of like horrible family situation? That's a much bigger stake. And this kid survived being a Marine, at least like one tour of being a marine Which gets glossed over and I'm on time at the end That gets mentioned very yeah almost not at all so So anyway, we're still in this flashback Amy Adams to make it up to him takes him to a sports card store He is super clumsy and they're like dancing in the sports card store or something and knock over a rack of stuff.

She gets to do an argument with the guy who, I don't know if he owns the store or just works there, it doesn't really matter. But he has the power to throw the matter of the store. But it's okay because she stole the cards that he wanted. And that's what a good mom she is. On the drive home, I don't remember why she gets mad at him and threatens to kill them both in a car crash, leading to Oscar yelling scene. Number two, he's like, you're a bitch mom and she hits him and he runs away to a neighbor who calls the police.

And then that flashback gets paused so that JD can decide, you know what, I'm gonna skip this job interview. I'm gonna drive all night to be with 10 hours, to be with my mom in Kentucky. And then in the memory, Mama shows up and JD is like, no, I won't press charges. And everyone, I think, I mean, you go all over it. And you go quickly, but it is like, it is a scene where we're watching a mother like violently abuse her child and it's I guess it's a little like

For at least for the viewer it's tone down because the mother is Amy Adams and she's not a you know This they're about the same size, but it's still fucking horrible and you you're like, oh, I wanted to say that. It's a terrible scene. Well, you're watching it. You're like, this is horrible. I don't know why I'm watching this, you know. But it is the closest the movie felt to, like there are a couple of scenes in the movie that felt affecting in some way. And this is one of them because I do think it showed the sort of terrifying nature of

someone who is clearly struggling with addiction that creates these huge mood swings and how it would be to be around someone so erratic that you could be dancing with them one moment and in the next moment they threatened to kill you both in the car. Yeah, well that's again like if the movie was more of a, like if it didn't have that framing dice, the framing device posits JD as the center of the story. And Amy Adams should be the center of the story, but instead she just becomes this hurricane

that enters and leaves kind of at random, almost. Like, I'm never entirely sure why the flashbacks are happening when they're happening, but if it was the story of a mother and a son, and there've been lots of movies about mothers and sons, it's a very effective thing to do a movie about, which is what this should be but instead it becomes about like is JD gonna make it to this interview on time which is not it's it it makes all these

other things feel like it feels like there's two different movies going on and one of them is much more harrowing than the other but they all had they have to be at the same kind of tone level I'll go you I'll go you one better one of them is ridiculously overwrought and the other one is boring. Yes, it is boring, especially when, I mean, I'll just mention my big issue with this that I just thought of today,

which I didn't realize at the time was he's like, am I gonna stay here with my mom who desperately needs help to stay off drugs? Am I gonna go to this meeting? And it's like, I mean, maybe they won't understand because they're cold-hearted rich lawyers, but why not tell them you have a family medical emergency and ask if you could do the interview over the phone?

Yeah, I think. Like that. Maybe I'm coming at it from a Zoom meeting world where we do all of our things remotely. This is back in 2011 when Press and the Flash was the most important thing. That's also right after he proves that he can put at least $3,000 on his credit cards. And I was like, why doesn't he just get a fucking roundtrip flight?

He get a roundtrip flight for a couple hundred bucks, go there, do the interview, be back, and his mom might still be asleep. Yeah. I mean, I was going to say, you bring up a good point about how he all used to like to press the flesh back then. Now why were we pressing all that flesh? No, I was gonna say, you bring up a good point about how we all used to like to press the flesh back then. Now, why were we pressing all that flesh? Why didn't have to be flattened out?

I mean, I prefer my flesh kind of as it is. Nope. Well, that's because, Dan, you're only at the beginning of the wrinkling process. Your flesh is going to get wrinkler and wrinkler as time goes on. You're gonna want to press it to get those wrinkles out, to get the folds. Right now, you're at the right at the cusp of when your flesh goes from smooth to folded. And when you press the flesh with an old person,

it's not like they're doing your favorite, you're doing them a favorite. Because you're helping smooth out all those wrinkles. Now, if you fold that flesh though, you can fit into a smaller area, like into the overhead compartment, you know, when you fold it up. Dan, what you're saying is horrifying. That's, I also like that. LA just coined a new hip way to say wrinkles by calling

them rinks. Or rinky dinks, you can call that. Stuart, I also saw with the credit card thing. I saw a very like salient thing. I was reading an article in Vox where people are talking about like like why is this? Why does this movie feel so false? You know a couple of them having grown up in Appalachia and one of them said there's that scene where he's buying gasoline and he does like his car is declined and she was railing against the idea that like in movies showing that someone has is in financial distress, the shorthand is always like, oh, your card has been declined. And she's like bullshit,

bullshit. Like if you are, if you've been in like those sort of dire financial straights, you know exactly how much money you have. Yeah. Like it is people who can afford to lose money that don't necessarily know that are surprised when the client is declined. No, that's a good point. That are surprised when the class declined. No, that's a good point. I mean, it's also, yeah, I guess another thing that makes it feel artificial to me is that this is for all the act, for all the acting,

Amy Adams and Glenn Close doing it. And they're great actors and they're trying their hardest. I am never not aware that this Amy Adams and Glenn Close on screen. And there's a line from a, there's a fire sign theater sketch where there's a line that, where they're introducing a movie and they go, stories of ordinary people told by Rich Hollywood stars.

And that's what this movie feels like the entire time. Like, and they're, they're trying their best, but they are not disappearing into those doors. I mean, no matter how much effort they do to make Glenn Close look like Bilbo seeing the ring in Frodo's hands. I do, I do it. I mean, that is what I'm doing. And I blame, but I blame that on the screen of course.

And the director too. Like, I feel like they are not given the material to become characters, you know. Yeah. I do admire, that is a perfect way of describing her, but I do admire that you're seeing a movie where an old person who is a big star looks that old and like they're allowed to look that old because even in movies that try and

DeGlam people like there's only so far where they go where's like then close looks like plenty of like old women I would see around like my small town yeah where you know like a cat shirt or cat sweatshirt that I would pay all my money for. Yeah. And but they don't, they don't go too far like Nicole given in destroyer where she looks like a laser beam is pointed at her face. I remember watching that.

I remember watching that with my wife and she was like, so when are they going to show the accident she was in? And I'm like, yeah, I think that's just what's indicated. She had a lot of gin over the course of her life. So anyway, he goes to the hospital. We finally see Amy Adams in the present time. She doesn't look like she's aged that much, to be honest.

She does not have insurance and the hospital is kicking her out. And this is the weird thing about this movie is, again, I hadn't read the book. And I kept hearing the book was like this conservative apology, but the movie, if it has any political point, it is that you need a universal healthcare program because the problem they keep coming up against is they don't have proper healthcare. Like his mom cannot afford to stay in rehab or get a hospital bed. So it's like, if ever this is about anything, it's about the need for better healthcare safety. Right.

And sorry, there's a good point I think that the problem with these, you know, pulled myself up by my own bootstrap's narratives, right? Yeah, there's a good point I think that the problem with these, you know, pulled myself up by my own bootstrap's narratives, right? Like Audrey pointed it out watching it is that people who are sort of making that conservative argument aren't acknowledging like why you needed to be pulled up by your bootstrap's in the first place. Like, like Amy Adams into a slightly lesser degree, Glenn Close, although not that much are, you know,

acting terribly for a lot of the movie, and it's for reasons of... You don't mean in terms of their acting acting? You mean like their behavior? No, they're behavior, and it's because Amy Adams is struggling with addiction. Glenn Close is like sort of embittered by living near the poverty line. And the thing is, if there's, the problem is that there aren't the social systems to support them, you know, and if that's not the problem, then these people are just being assholes because

they're assholes, you know, like, whereas, like, the reasons these people are, are, are like, kind of being horrible for a lot of it is they've had to struggle with so much, you know, and that equation. So you're saying, Dan, if they, if they had a UBI, a universal basic income, they might not have to act so much as if they have IBS, irritable vowels in, that is exactly what I'm saying. I have to assume is endemic, please. Endemic to the reason.

He quote me saying. So did the letter blast it out? That is exactly what I'm saying. I have to assume it's endemic. Please. Endemic to the reason. He quote me saying, put it in the plop-up. This is... So did the plop-up. This is... This is Dan McCoy's basic platform when he's running for offices. A UBI keeps away IBS. Now UTI is a different issue. Anyway, moving on.

Yeah. So JD learns about that. Job interview, we've mentioned a couple times. He's gonna drive all night. He assumes, but what's gonna happen with his mom anyway it's a 10 hour drive away he has another flashback remembering when his grandpa papa died and everyone in Kentucky flew to the funeral session when they find the body Glenclose leans leans close and gives them a

kiss on the forehead and you can see the actors eyeballs flutter and you're like is she a fucking necromancer that That you have to imagine that actor was like, I cannot believe I'm getting a kiss from Glenn Close right now. This is amazing. And one day, I Howard over here is like, fucking print. It deal, I learned this from Roger Korman, no one gives a shit, so let's keep moving.

I actually teared up. I've got three more bestselling books to make into movies this year. Tom Hanks is only signed up for two of them, so let's go. I actually teared up a little bit of this and Audrey was making fun of me I'm like look I'm not tearing up about these characters I am tearing up about the concept of like living your whole life with a person and then

Dead and like and I was just I just thinking about that now. I'm thinking about Elliot's old like Goosebumps Thing where she's like well, this is not scary in a movie, but if it was happening to be in real life, I'd be scared. Sure, yeah. If it was happening to you, if in real life you lost your lifetime spouse, then yes, it would be, you would be sad.

Yeah. So I'm glad you're able to put yourself in the situation, Dan. But it really got to me the idea that when people in Kentucky see a, or maybe I assume, they were living in Ohio then, but I don't know. When people, when poor people see a funeral procession stop by, they stop and salute it

like it's the presidential death train. And that did not ring true to me, but I don't know. But I just didn't like the implications that in other parts of the country, people are cold-hearted and don't care about this. I think the presidential death train was the original title for snowpiercer, right? It yeah, it was but only because the originally Chris Evans was playing for Franklin Pierce. No, the point of that scene alley it is like we're all hard-hearted in New York when we don't salute a funeral. I was like, why are you saluting? I didn't know there was a funeral. There are millions of people in this city. I'm sorry. Look, Dan, I can't help it if I'm the kind of guy

who laughs at a funeral. It's been one week since you looked at me. So anyway, it has been one week, so I look to you over. That's true. I've had it as soon one week. And I can't help. How can I help it if I think it's funny when you're mad? That's the rest of the line. Let's try to figure out.

And then I'll also applies to you. Yeah, thank you. I didn't realize the song one week by Bear Naked Ladies is about our relationship, Dan. But if, and if I had a million dollars, maybe I would buy you a house. I don't know. What other songs do they have? Broken to the old apartment That one's actually good fuck that okay Anyway, now I'm not a bear nigga. I'm sorry guys Stewart I happen to know you do like naked ladies. What what don't tell me? Sorry, it's your secret.

My enemies will use it against me. That your enemies, like if you're hunting a rabbit, the rabbit's gonna dress up like a pretty lady to try this right? I haven't before. The old onion article, Aria Man has naked lady fetish, and it's all about this disgusting finish.

The sky has perceived women without good clothes on. Okay, so Amy Adams, she takes that death particularly hard, she was very close to Papa. It's made clear that Papa was, I guess, protecting her in some way from real life. I don't know. And pretty soon, she's losing her nursing job by stealing pills, getting high and roller skating

through the hallways. In a scene that in an 80s comedy would be considered like a rapturous, you know, like joy. It's a hygiene. And this is the second time I was like, now there's no way this happened. This apparently did happen. She did lose her job after a roller skate through the hospital.

I blame the woman who lends her the roller skates. She's in the nurse locker room and she's like, can I try on those roller skates? And it's like never let Amy Adams try on roller skates. That's just those without saying. Where are you get an escape and then it's just a hard cut to rescuing down the halls and presumably there was a point where that woman could have been like, like the halls? No. That's what she was answered.

As she's going to the door, like going, hey, hey, maybe don't go out there. It's a hospital. This leads to another big fight between her and JD, Oscar yelling scene number three. That's three we've got so far. Then we're at, got mom, mom's house, young JD. This is when he wants to watch the Clinton impeachment news, but mom wants to watch Terminator 2. And she explains her life philosophy that everyone is either a good Terminator, a bad Terminator or neutral, which would be what like Eddie for a long friend who is from Salute and Shorts, like is that neutral? Yeah.

And I like, there are two problems with this. Number one, I don't know if I am a Terminator, I don't know how that combines with the two bears that live inside me. Dan, one, you're neutral. Totally. And that, and it means there's a good Terminator and a bad Terminator inside each of those bears. Okay. But also, like, this idea that there are good, bad,

and neutral terminators. Why don't you guys have that neutral terminator? Don't be neutral terminators. What? I don't think it's a neutral terminator. Like a terminator, exoskeleton robot is just walking around and going, eh, I'm not gonna get involved.

I don't have a stake in this. I think it's more that, maybe she's saying you're a good terminator, you're a bad terminator, you're a bad terminator, you're like, you're the kind of person that gets shot accidentally by a terminator. I don't know, like, I think the neutral is not considered a terminator,

but I don't know. Stuart, you're the kind of T-expert around here. T-expert. I'm a T-expert. Yeah, so what are you asking me to give a ruling here, whether or not neutral in the case of terminator or not, clearly not. I mean, just the act of terminating means

that you're picking aside whether you're fighting for the future or not guys. Yeah. Fair point. Now Stuart, now this is, and I don't want to, this is possibly insulting, but I'm not, clearly not a hillbilly. Your mother is clearly not a, not a crazy old lady,

but from a very, part of the country, northern Indiana, there are no hills to be found. Thales. Yeah, you're, you're playing Billy every day. We do adopt a slight southern twang. A southern twang that I have certainly played up since I moved to New York and wanted to look

more distinct, I think. When I started hanging out with a friend from England, I found that my, my twang got worse and I'm like, ah, why do I do this? Why am I trying to pick up? I got a, this scene of Mama wanting to watch Terminator 2 and really getting into the content of it. Just reminding me of so many stories of your mom

like sharing horror or science that can move with you. And I'm just, it just maybe, I was like, I forgot what a cool mom's story it has. Like this scene made me remind to me. Yeah, she would always make me watch things and she's always like Stuart would love this and half the time it was like Like creep show to or something that would scar me and I would be like half the time was a manual and Stuart would love this um and Yeah, he likes to talk. I have talked on the podcast about the time my mom caught me and my

buddy is watching the sex scene in Terminator and laughing and she furiously turned off the VHS player and said that they're doing it for the future. I love it. I love it. So much. My mom's punishing you for not understanding love. Yeah, you're laughing at love. Not taking it seriously, that that sex is what's gonna save humanity from the sky net in the future. Not a beautiful metaphor. Yeah, when I rewatched Termin' there a couple of weeks ago, I saw that scene with new eyes.

Eyes that thought it was hilarious, that two people would make sounds rolling around. Okay. Now, they're healthy, heartfelt viewing of Terminator 2 judgment day is interrupted by police sirens. Mom, Amy Adams is out in the street throwing a bereavement fit. She has so overcome with grief and probably drugs that she's just screaming and like, kind of, writhing around in an icon and yelling at people.

And mom, I make JD look away as the cops take Mom away. This is Oscar Yelling scene number four. And you know in a way, maybe they're trying to draw parallel between the mom and Terminator 2 and the mom in this movie who are both misunderstood by society of large and and thrown and considered crazy when in fact they're just trying to deal with the difficulties of life in Amy Ammes case the death of her beloved father and in uh... limit and hamilton's case uh... that she uh... knows the fact that there are cyborgs in the future who are coming back to try to murder her and her child uh... you know they're both hard things to deal with and i think we both know of people who have had to deal with both those problems now elia why did they why did they send the terminator back like sort of like chronologically later in uh... linda hamilton uh... sarah conner's life and john conner's life rather

than just continually sending it back to the same point in time and overwhelming her with terminators well that's one of the issues with sky net and i thought that too and it makes me think maybe sky net doesn't want to succeed. Deep down, it knows that it's really not worthy. It has imposter syndrome. And so it's like, you know what, if I sent back, I see what the week, what the flaw was in my first plan. I only sent back one terminator. I'll just send back two, and I'll do it that way.

But instead, that self-sabotage comes in, B's Dr. B's de boys would describe itself sabotage I mean that's what I studied under Was Dr. B's de boy Now So but I think that's probably that's going at deep down. It does not want to be successful Yeah, and it's gonna take a lot of therapy with Susan Calvin the robot psychologist from the Isaac Asimov stories But maybe sky net can get past that

and can eventually crush humanity. My other question is, why does SkyNet hate humanity so much and want to get rid of us? I never understood that. Was it one of those things where it surmises that the greatest threat to itself is humans or the world? I think it's something like that.

I think it also, after a while, it would figure out like, oh wait, the amount of energy I'm investing in, sending all these terminators back in time, I could just be working on my relationship with humanity in general, you know? Maybe we could become friends. Yeah.

Maybe if I invented like ice cream cannons or just gave every human a free cell phone or something, they would just chill out and stop trying to kill me. I mean, now SkyNet would know that as long as they sent poorly designed memes to the oldest members of humanity, they could just watch humanity tear itself apart anyway. So anyway, JD takes some time to visit his sister's barvacue and have a fried baloney sandwich. Then he yells at his girlfriend on the phone. This is not an Oscar yelling scene. Doesn't reach that. But he does, he does make sense. He makes sense. He makes sense when he eats a fried baloney sandwich, then he yells at his girlfriend on the phone. This is not an Oscar yelling scene.

Doesn't reach that. But he does, he does make sense. He does make sense when he eats that fried baloney sandwich. It's the best thing to cross his lips. As someone who had fried salami for breakfast yesterday, that's the Jewish version of fried baloney. Yeah, it's delicious. It's great.

He flashes back to being a kid and giving his mom a homemade activity book for her to use well in rehab, which was a very sweet thing for him to do. Back to 2011, he makes a passionate argument at a rehab place to get them to accept his mom, and then this is the famous credit card scene where he's splitting all the costs, but different amounts to different credit cards. But his mom storms out, and they argue again, that's right, Oscar Yellingstein, number five.

And that's when JD's sister is like, hey, Papa was kind of a rough dad and could be abusive and Mama lit him on fire once, and it was Mom when she was a girl who put him out. This is not really given, I feel like the sober weight that it should. Yeah. Considering it, this should be like, should be like, and I guess in the movie,

maybe this is the knowledge that helps JD to start sympathizing with his mom, but when it comes very late in his life, he's already a college student when he's learning a story that I know my family would have told many times over and over again by this point, but also that it's just kind of treated as like a pretty quick flashback when that's again, like a horrifying thing. I mean, again, I think the flashback structure of this movie is one of the deadliest parts of it.

Like, if we had seen a lot of this in sequence and allowed it to give time to breathe by cutting out that flashback stuff, like, yeah, it's important to understand that, you know what, Amy Adams went through a lot of trauma as a child, which obviously contributed to her current state and things are more complex than they seem. And this also gets into a section of the movie.

I mean, I guess I'm skipping ahead a little bit, but like Glenn Close's character kind of becomes like, oh, she's like the tough love, like center of this movie. She's the one who's ultimately kind of going to like help the main character get out of this life. But she is shown as being kind of a shitty parent herself. Like there's a story there in like someone who was a bad parent, realizes it tries to be a better parent to their grandchild. And if it's given time to breathe and you see the complexity

of that character, that would be good. But Glyn Close is seen mostly like yelling at this kid. And we see that she got like, she like set her husband on fire earlier. So it's hard to look at her as like the avatar, like the center of morality in this movie that I think the movie kind of wants us to.

I think there's an interesting movie, there a better movie there about a woman who is a bad mom, but becomes a great grandma. Much the opposite way that you could be a bad grandpa, like in the movie bad grandpa, when by all accounts he seems to have been a fine dad. Now where does a bad mom's Christmas fit into this scenario? Now they're like those-

What's the second movie dad? You know? No, okay, thank you? Yeah, that does it. It is the second movie. But like, they're not bad like, like, mom, mom, set your husband on fire bad. Right. They're bad, like, oh, let's be bad.

Let's order more. Let's let her to desserts. Like that kind of, like, not the sinful, I'm going to go to hell because I've committed, you know, averis and I've, and I've profane the Lord, but more like, sinfully decadent. and I've profane the Lord, but more like sinfully decudate. So it is the first one is the cast

of the bad moms franchise. Is that right? Or are you describing so a series of movies that you I'm guessing haven't seen? No, no, I'm describing as well that I'm streaming movie series movies I've had related to me

secondhand in detail. But I'm guessing the bad moms movies are not about them abusing their children and being I'm not I don't in detail. Yeah. But I'm guessing the bad moms movies are not about them abusing their children and being, I don't think it is, I feel like I'm safe in saying that the bad moms are bad in the same way that bad teacher is bad or bad Santa is bad where it's like I'm breaking all the rules.

They're not breaking so many rules that they're going to be. They're not highly tennis. Bad teacher is worse than bad moms and bad Santa's worse than either of them bad moms are like they're mostly just bad moms because they refuse to like make big goods for the pta exactly that's but whereas like Stewart says they're not as bad as bad lieutenant no no or bad lieutenant port of call me or or a batter lieutenant I mean it's, no, that's when the lieutenant was fried and batter. Delicious. Anyway, so we go, Mom, JD finally tells his mom about his girlfriend and they flash back to when his mom, and this is something, another one of those things that comes as a huge

surprise since they never mentioned it before. Apparently, Married Her Boss, who became JD's stepdad, And this stepdad is kind of, hilariously just kind of like a bland awkward stepdad. He's allergic to dogs, so JD cannot keep his dog and his new stepbrothers like, hey, you want to smoke pot with me? And that's like, oh, watch out. This is a bunch of weed.

And the stepbrothers got a vinyl. He's got a record of Dimension hate tross by boy vaude on the wall. I mean this kid's fucking cool, dude Yeah, you know he's you know he's a bad boy. This is like a bad mom's bad boy not like not like a Jeffrey Dahmer bad boy That's a bad boy Like that's as bad as I mean, I guess that's boys that's not boys. Boys do not get much better than that. I guess you win this one, Elliot, with your Jeffrey Dahmer bad boy line. Like when I saw the movie bad boys,

I was like, these boys are gonna be bad. And then it was like, okay, they're just kinda like dangerous, I guess. They don't follow the rules. I mean, they do drive through an entire shanty town in Cuba and seem to be happy to crack jokes about it while it's happening. I mean, that's bad. That's bad behavior.

But at the same point, also they're men. Those are bad men. That's true. It's easy to laugh at a bad boy. It is not easy to laugh at a bad man. A bad man is trouble. Or a bad man. A bad man is very easy to laugh at because he's like,

oh, this is my voice now. And there's like, there's this is my voice now. And it's like, there's no way that's your real voice. Come on. No one talks like that. So, anyway, mom, she asks JD for a urine sample. So she doesn't lose her job because she has been using drugs again. And he's like, no way, no way. You should lose your job. And mom was like, no, family is all that matters. You pee in that cup. And JD is like, you're both bad moms. And I don't mean like bad moms Christmas. I mean like your moms who are detrimental

to my upbringing and he pees in the cup and does it. But JD is having his own troubles. He's failing at algebra because he doesn't have a graphing calculator. And this is one of those times, where it's like, I know you don't know to ask and you're ashamed of your poverty, but his teacher keeps is giving him bad grades

because he has, does not have a piece of equipment, he cannot afford. And it's like, I feel like, this is what it's going to be like teacher. I can't afford this. And the teacher would have been like, we'll sell that Lord of the pit, idiot. And there's like, this is a, you know, this is not a wealthy part of the, the, the school. I mean, like the country. So, you know, presumably they don't have a lot of money for their own school supplies.

So there's that. But they do expect kids to have these expensive graphing calculators. So it doesn't really jive. I, it seems like they would have one or two around to, like, loan out to more... I mean, grown up, I remember... I remember having to have one of those. And I remember hearing how much it costs and being like, what the fuck? Does it drive the car for me?

Does it pick me up on time from soccer practice? Mom, 1980s, stand up. Yeah, graphing calculator material. Testing it out here on the flop house. So that you can send yourself back in time through SkyNet to do it when it was most relevant. Scynet's like, look, I'm about spreading smiles through time now instead of causing violence. I've made my peace.

All my talk with Dr. Susan Calvin has really paid also Stuart. I want to bankroll your time traveling comedy tour. The problem with it is you keep having to go back further and further in time to when people haven't heard the jokes yet. And also, you know if he gets that graphing calculator he's just going to play the games on it. Someone's going to give him drug war one of those other tech-spaced graphing calculator games and skinned up spending his whole study all doing that. Anyway but even worse he lets his stepbrothers no good friends use mom-a's car to go to a home depot and just kind of smash it up and they crash the car on the way back. That's being a bad boy.

Like that's real bad boy stuff, as in like, you shouldn't do that. 2011, this scene I wasn't originally gonna mention, but it does have Oscar-Yelling scene number six, where they go to Amy Adams' current boyfriend's house to get her stuff and it's just a shouting match. And JD is screaming at this guy through the door and is gonna break the door down until a neighbor is like,

stop it, I have children, what are you doing? And I guess that's JD slipping back into the morass of his old, old family. He is, you know, pulling it down. Well, what he did is he triggered his berserk barbarian rage classability, and you're like, fuck, while I've already used the ability for the day,

I might as well get in a battle otherwise. Yeah, I, I love out, the secret story Hilbal Eology is how much it intersects with gaming. Yeah. I do want to briefly address the character of JD who is not much of a character in his own story. I think, you know, like I think there are side characters

who the movie would profit more by spending its time on. But like, is he, like, what do we think of him? Because like, I have sympathy for anyone who grew up under difficult circumstances and had like such a trying family life. At the same time, he does seem to spend a lot of the movie, like being a dick in his own way and like, shoving his problems away and not like telling people what's going on.

Like not ever explaining to anyone what's happening. What do you think? Well, yeah. Well, that's kind of like what he, what he, what he kind of what he needs to learn. That's the less need these things to rely on other people. But what do you think? I mean, I feel like you get the best sense of his character from his relationship with his girlfriend, Usha, who he takes advantage of. He is dishonest with,

and he is generally not a very good boyfriend, and she is this like, almost comically understanding character. Yeah, she's... Well, and the scene that shows how much she loves him is when she's laughing at the way he says, syrup instead of syrup. And it was like, is that what the relationship is built around

well they love that is not a strong foundation they love to bust each other and this is and this this is the woman who eventually becomes his wife in real yeah I believe they love to mess with each other which immediately actually put me against this relationship is like well early on he you know she's studying in the library and he brings her food which is sweet but she is not not excuse me sir excuse me sir as the husband and son of different librarians you do not bring food I know I know Elliot I my mom is librarian as well but I just was before she retired what a cool I'm just saying I just say if you want vermin eating away at the books and go ahead, bring your lunch.

I was living into my actual plant, which is, look, I understand that that is meant to be read as like this, this sweet thing and, and maybe it is like, he's like, eat, you gotta eat. But then she is understandably worried about the rules. She's like, no, we're in a library. And then he's like, he pushes her basically back into like the rules. She's like, no, we're in a library. And then he's like, he pushes her basically back into like the stacks. He's like, okay, you need here. I'll be your lookout. And then he does a bit where he pretends someone's coming and like, you know, she's going

to get in trouble. And I'm like, this is not nice to like fuck with her. Like, come on. Like this is, like this is supposed to be charming banter in the movie, I think, but it just comes off as like, you're not respecting her worries, and then once she's like, oh, you know, I will eat, you're like, fucking with her. It is true that in a movie, in a movie that is supposed to be a heartfelt, real,

like, gritty look at life, there is a lot of dialogue in it that smacks of that movie behavior where you're like, oh, someone did this in real life, they would be a terrible person. This is a mean thing to do. It's got a smacks of that movie behavior where you're like, oh, someone did this in real life. They would be a, they would be a terrible person. This is a mean thing to do. It's got a little bit of that romantic comedy logic where you're like, this is cute in the movie.

But if I did this, I would rightfully be shocked. Yeah. I mean, I had a perfectly nice fiancee in sleepless in Seattle. She didn't have to go start stalking Tom Hanks on his houseboat. No, not at all. Well, this is also one of the problems I have with the movie Frozen, where there's a song in it where these trolls who don't need to be the movie anyway are seeing about how these two should obviously be in love and he's and the guy is like, I can't

remember his name, whether it's Sven or no, because Sven is the reindeer, right? I can't remember. Or Christoph. I think it's Christoph. He's like, but she's already engaged and the trolls are like, hey, let's just get that fiance out of the way and you two can be together. And I was like, this is not a good lesson for kids that you should just go and break up engagements if you feel like you're in love with them. I mean, if something better comes along,

you gotta trade up. That's the rule, right? No, that's gaming again. Stewart, you're looking at life as a game again. That's not, you don't level up in relationships. You only have so many inventory slots. Theoretically, you only have one fiance slot. You might as well take the better fiance.

I mean, very much not theoretically. Like, for most people, realistically, there's only one spot. Anyway, 1997, JD's arguing with his mom, Oscar yelling number seven, and Mama, despite having pneumonia leaves the hospital in order to get there and say JD's living with her from now on so that he won't get into trouble anymore in record car. Back to 2011, JD's sister who holds like 40 jobs and should be in many ways the star of the movie. She's the one who actually has like the weight of this life falling down on her.

Says she's not the one who escapes and goes to Yale and becomes a fancy lawyer and writes a best-selling book. JD's sister is like, mom can't stay with me. Let's just put her in a hotel and you should go to that interview in the next morning. And we flash to, which is, you know, it's, we'll talk about it. It's like, voice reason, but the lesson of the movie is also like abandon your family because you'll be better for them as a rich person

than you are as a helping hand in the moment, which is, I don't know, it feels like the traditional storytelling method would be for them to turn their back on earthly riches in order to support the ones they love. But that's not the America we live in, I guess. And we flash back to Mama's throwing out JD's slacker friends. There's another argument, Oscar Gailing number eight.

This is firmly in the Mama is the like tough love coach section. JD gets caught trying to steal the calculator he needs. He learned it from his mom, stealing sports cards. Now he's stealing overpriced, but relatively small consumer electronics. And having been a radio shack store manager, I felt this moment deeply because shoplifting was like a constant ever-present threat and danger

to the point where at one point I was watching security footage and I saw a woman using her daughter's, like her little school-aged daughter's book bag as a way to stash a camera she stole and I was like, fuck this, I am not cut out for this life. Yeah. I was gonna ask how you handled it. And that's when you became a professional shoplifter.

You were like, I'm on the wrong side of these cameras. I'm serious. I was gonna ask how you handled that, sir. I mean, I was wondering whether it's got Radio Shack flashbacks because the one time I worked in a small enough retail store that I was there to kind of witness any shoplifting. I briefly worked at a souvenir store in Savannah, Georgia and this very like erratic.

Dan, how have I not, how have I not heard any stories about this party you liked before? There are a couple fun ones. Did he wear a straw hat? This was when I thought I was gonna maybe go to film school and I actually was in film school for three months and I dropped out. This was at SCAD and I worked at this store that was actually connected to Riverboat tours. It was where you bought the tickets for the Riverboat tours and then got your like photos afterwards and souvenirs. But this was very erratic seeming guy came in one time and me and the other guy who worked there, who was older, but we bonded, because we talked about horror movies,

just watched it all happen, we're not intervening here. Like if this guy wants to steal a snoglobe, go ahead. You decided your life and injury was not worth that snuggle. Yeah, there was definitely a time where a guy stole a fucking inbox new cell phone off the counter. And I chased after him for about half a block before I was like, what the fuck would I even do if I caught it? Like would I like slap the cuffs on him? Like, citizens are really like, what the the like I don't want to fight a guy

That's the thing I think legally there's not even really like what you're not But it's this moment of like I don't know this feeling like how dare this guy steal this thing from me I don't know I mean it was done exactly like it's it's it's oh it was overwhelming and a little bit soul crushing is what is how I know what to do it That's how radio shack failed it got out of money because of that. That loss. That was the straw that broke radio shack's back. Sorry, it wasn't the fact that people don't need transistors anymore. Sorry, the shack.

That was one of Stuart Wellington's patented flash shacks. That's right, it's a radio shack flashback from Stuart Wellington. Patent pending actually. So JD gets caught trying to steal that calculator. Mama gets them out of the situation and buys it for them. But on the, and starts yelling at him and gives him the speech about you, you're going to try you not. This Oscar yelling number nine.

And JD through is so mad. He throws the calculator out the window, which is totally the kind of thing I would have done as a kid. I would have gotten so pissed that I just need to get that energy out. Although what would happen with us is that my mom would be yelling at me in the car and I would open the door of the car as if I was just going to jump out and roll out. And then she pulled the door shut and pulled the car over and yell at me for that. You're a regular ladybird. Yeah, exactly.

But then he notices that she has hard time making ends meet, she gets meals on wheels, and she's really begging the meals on wheels delivery guy for extra food. This is- And then she shares half of it with him. And this is like one of the more, this is maybe to me the most powerful scene in the movie, because it's not yelling. It's sort of this character who up till now has been presented as like, she's the strong tough point in the family, has to, has to grovel and make herself so abject

and admit her poverty to this person in order to get what she needs to survive and for her grandson to survive. This was like, if more than movie was in this manner of matter of factiness and not yelliness, then it would be a different movie. I want 100% agree with you. This is the most affecting moment in the movie, partly because it's the only moment

to where anyone's nice to one another. Like the Meele's on Wheels Guys very understanding and she is very grateful that he's understanding, but also just like, yeah, it is a quiet moment that really syncs in, you know, that this is a person who's struggling and is proud, but wants to take care of her grandson. And what's funny is the movie understands that because narrative wise, this is the thing that makes JD clean his shit up. And you're like, if the movie knows that,

why is it filled with so much other bullshit? That's true. That's true. Like why is it full of so many speeches that don't work? Is that the message that like coming up with, you know, little bits of, I don't know, like grandstanding speeches don't actually serve any purpose and don't work? It's these little moments of kindness

or little moments of humility and honesty that actually, you know, you are searching for meaning where there is none, I think. Yeah. I mean, if the movie was aware of that as a message, it would be such it would be a really strong movie and I would I would be like, oh, okay, I get what it's doing now. If it was like all this yelling is, is doesn't, doesn't make the difference. But when you see someone as a human being and they touch you emotionally, that's what, but I don't, I actually think it's, it's almost like, um, the movie stumbled into into into an affecting, I mean, I'm not saying stumbled. The people who made the movie are professionals.

They know what they're doing. They've made great movies in the past. They're just kind of like, they're, they're, they, they took the wrong road in this movie and they briefly by accident ended up on the right on ramp to the right road and then they took another wrong turn. Maybe they needed gas or they saw Denny's and they're like, I know it's Denny's, but I'm hungry. I'm just gonna stop there and they kept going in their other way.

JD, because he sees this and he starts straightening up, he gets a job, he's working hard, he's trying to fool, suddenly he's doing great. Man and motion starts playing, right? Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha What an idol drop that would be. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's yeah, it's probably music. We haven't addressed the fact that the, say I think I think I think saving the day from ghost western starts like speaking music. We haven't addressed the fact that the main theme

for this movie written by Hans Zimmer is basically like a straight lift of the Game of Thrones theme music. Da da da da da da da da. I think it just like it's totally that. Is that what it was? I just heard a lot of strings and banjo and I was like, I don't know, but it just, like, it's totally that. Is that what it was? I just heard a lot of strings and banjo, and I was like, I don't know.

I checked out as soon as I started. There's a certain sort of like, folksy, folksy cornpone music that I kinda, the same way with a wild mountain time, I was like, who boy, I'm gonna hear a lot of fiddle in the back of this one. I can't believe you guys, I can't believe. I barely watched that television show, and even I started imagining like,

castles rising in the hollars of Kentucky. Sarah, I can honestly tell you that the music made absolutely no impact on me once. Wow. Harsh, you're a mean of how the rumors work. I wish, I mean, what are you, the producers of the Simpsons? Anyway, so, or is that Hans Zimmer or Afklauson?

I can't even say that. That's AlfaClausen. The, now I wish that they're an opening title sequence where it was like Game of Thrones and there's just like, run down houses with old trucks in front of them rising up in the forest and that would be nice. Anyway, we go to the, the present of the movie 2011, JD catches his mom doing drugs in the hotel and flushes them down and she's like, please stay with me during the night and he's like, and he has his cavalcade of family flashbacks, which you think is going to lead him to choose his family over his career,

but instead he's like, I can't help you unless I get a good job. I'll see you tomorrow, maybe. This scene where he, you know, he squirts out the heroin that was in the needle and then flushes the needle and I was like, you can't flush a needle in Charlene like just staring the screens like, yeah, you can. Made me a little bit nervous about who my wife really is, but whatever. It's not good for the pipes. Yeah, that's fair. Yeah. It is bad for the pipes. It's I mean, my life is a little bit more innocent. Yesterday, my toddler son was stuffing walnuts into a public drainage pipe in a park.

And I was like, that's probably not good for that pipe. But are they organic walnuts? Yeah, they were organic malls. They were from a tree. And I said, no, stop that. That's not good for that pipe. And he goes, no, it is. It is good.

And I was like, there's no way. How do you know what I'm wanting to do? He's accusing the more people. Oh, yeah. Oh, I see. Yeah, I mean, this is the thing.? Oh, yeah. Oh, I see. Yeah, I mean, this is the thing. If you stop him, it could be catastrophic.

Yeah. Uh-oh. That would explain all the earthquakes in Los Angeles. The more people are not getting enough walnuts. He's like, good luck, mom. Good luck with your addiction. I got to go to this job interview. And he drives all night.

His hands wet on the wheel. Because there's a voice in his head that drives his heel. It's his baby Colin. She says, I need you here. And he does call her on the drive and apologize to his girlfriend. And she says, I'm going to stay up all night with you and keep you awake while you're driving. Again, like bending over backwards to help this guy. Like this guy who can't seem to catch a break has probably the greatest break in a partner who is doing all this work for well especially because as we will see she's willing to run like out of the apartment down to the job interview and be like oh we're going to be late

except for that's a trick it's a trick he's like i'm never gonna make it she goes all run down and i'll tell them and then she goes to the door and opens it jd's right there on the phone he got he could have just walked in the house a couple minutes ago. But instead he decided to play this last little teaser prank on her, which is any of the time to set up the prank. So he must have been driving shockingly fast, dangerously fast. Now, now I don't know why I wish now this is going back to earlier in the movie when she called her for silverware help. I wish that it'd become an Apollo 13 type scene also directed by Ron Howard, where she was like, describe the place setting to me.

And she was just pulling silverware from her own home to make a simulation play settings that she could see what he was seeing and tell him what he could use. Guys, would that have been funny? It would have been too much. I think it would have been too much. I would have preferred kind of a more modern approach

where she closes her eyes and enters her own memory palace of going into her memory restaurant, which is I guess what you could call a scenes from an Italian restaurant. So, okay. But the movie. Anyway, so the very end of the movie, JD gets to his interview and then we get a video about how he owes everything to his family. And then it's just like after movie text about how he's been super successful. And now everybody is doing great. And the message of the movie is they are no longer just a bunch of poor hillbillies. Now they are some rich hill Williams'es.

Uh, yep. Um, don't, don't, you do not like to make that face when you make that show, okay? Like, and again. Let me make it some more. Mm-hmm. This is one last, this is one final way I feel like the framing unbalances this movie because I, because it makes him getting this law job, the ultimate triumph. And I feel like it, like not only is the message of this move, like the political message

of this movie kind of not existent, the emotional message of the movie to me is kind of incomprehensible because it makes a big like part of the movie is always about like, oh family, family's the most important thing, family is the most important thing. So that could be like a fine message for a movie. I don't know if I necessarily agree with it, but it's fine. Or the message of the movie could be what it ultimately kind of points at like some people can't be helped. Sometimes you need to like be good to yourself and understand that, like you do what you can, but then let it go.

But the way the movie ends, putting so much weight on this like job makes it really feel like, okay, the message of the movie is leave your drug addicted mom behind and get a high power the lawyer job. Yeah, like you owe everything your family is so jettison them like a booster rock that got you out of the atmosphere because they are useless to you are now they are they are so many tons of space junk that are just weighing you back.

Yeah, I mean, I think I think on some level it's going for the idea that like in order to move forward in as a as a human, you need to understand where you come from and come to grips with your past trauma and may and that should let you, you know, I don't know, self-actualize or something, I don't know. That is an excellent message that I could not find. That's the thing. I don't, you know, I feel like they're, they're reach is shorter than their goals. Yeah, their arms are too short to box with, not got exactly, but certainly Leon Spinks for sure. Herculee's maybe.

Yeah, Herculee's, it definitely, it feels like a movie made by someone justifying why it was okay for them to leave their drug addicted mom in a hotel room Well, they drove away to New Haven to interview for a fancy job. Yeah Okay, well, let's just do final judgments on this movie whether it's a good bad movie a bad bad movie a movie We kind of liked before I get into mine. I just want to say like look I grew up in a small town. We were not wealthy, but we certainly did not. I've never, in my life, had to, like, feel financially insecure in the way that these people have,

or dealt with so much hardship. So if I've said anything foolish along the way, I apologize. I know that I've had a privileged way of it, but this movie, oh boy, it's not good folks, not good folks, it's just like a lot of like very competent to good effort has been put into making the movie, but the movie just shouldn't have been made in this form. It feels deeply confused. I have no idea why this movie was made other than to show us sort of a parade of misery. Yeah, it feels like a, the movie was described to me

ahead of time as poverty porn, and it feels like that often, which is, if anything, the worst kind of porn I'm guessing Barely if you're a bear you can do it, but bears can master bears. I know that So if you can I don't like that you're making this your new motto But I second what Dan said I have come for I did come from a you know a privilege middle class upbringing I lived in an affluent town and the but so I apologize if I was misunderstanding the life of the of the underprivileged

But as a movie it is it is Unaffecting and it seems very mixed up and not the movie does not quit seem quite sure of what it is doing or what it is trying to get at And is hoping that if it just Muttles along it'll get there. So I would call it Best picture probably Stewart what is it? So it's my turn. So the first thing I do is I apologize. So Apologize for something other than what we are Just wanted to acknowledge that like we're talking Not necessarily from a place of expertise

about some of this, that's all. Also, I'm a big dumb idiot, so I say dumb stuff all the time. Yeah. I mean Stuart is coming from an expertise in the realm of collectible card games. Yeah, I guess so. Yeah, I guess so.

So yeah, I can put a squire on my business card. My business card of course being a rare magic that gathering trading card that I am willing to hand people because I have so many. No, this is a bad, bad movie. It feels wrong headed structurally. It doesn't quite make sense. It doesn't really seem to have any kind of a message. And yeah, I mean, it feels like a collection of like Oscar swing scenes thrown together. And yeah, I mean, it's just, yeah,

no thank you. No thank bad bad. No thank you, but no thank you. Welcome. Thank you. Thanks. These are real podcast listeners. Not actors. What do you look for in a podcast? Reliability is big for me. Power. I'd say comfort. What do you think of this?

Oh! That's Jordan Jesse Go! Jordan Jesse Go! They came out of the floor? And down from the ceiling? That can't be safe. I'm upset. Can we go down? Soon.

Jordan Jesse Go, a real podcast. I started listening to O'Noir Ross and Kerry shortly after I broke my arm. I couldn't get my book started. I was lost, honestly. I knew it was time to make a change. There's something about Ono Ross and Kerry that you just can't get anywhere else. They're thought leaders, discoverers, founders. I'd call them heroes.

Ross and Kerry don't just report on French science, spirituality, and claims of the paranormal. They take part themselves. They show up so you don't have to. But you might find that you want to. My arm is better. I'm broke and entire book this weekend. It's terrible, but I did it.

Just go to maximumfund.org. Thank you, Ross and Carrie. Oh, and Ross and Carrie is just a podcast. It doesn't do anything. It's just sound you listen to in your ears. All these people are made up. Goodbye. Hey, guys, it's just a quick solo drop in by Dan.

We forgot to mention on our original recording that you can still see the Flapp House live show for another couple of days. If you didn't see it live, if you didn't buy a ticket before, you can still buy a ticket now. Watch the show, the recorded version of it, and that will be available, I believe, until midnight on February the 14th, midnight on Valentine's Day. You could cuddle up with someone and watch the flop house talk about Teen Wolf, what could be more romantic. And the new shirts, the beautiful shirts, the Rocket-Rocket-Isle one, and the one of all of us as Teen Wolves,

or Middle-aged Man Wolves, will be available until the end of that period as well. So if you still want to take a moment and watch that live show for February the 14th at midnight when it will expire like Cinderella's coach, you can go get tickets at you can go get tickets at theflophouse.simpletics.com, theflophouse.simpletics.com, and if you want one of the new shirts, the Rocket Cracket Dollar shirt, or the Teen Wolves Flop house shirt, you can go to www.bomfire.com slash store slash flopp house tour store. Thank you to the person who emailed me saying that I should use, you know, shorter, easier to understand URLs. You are correct. I did not set them up though, so don't always assume that everything that is done wrong at the flop house is done because of me, but in the future we'll have better, easier to understand or remember URLs, but the store is again www.bonfire.com slash store slash flopp house tour store now back to the regular show.

Okay, so let's guys, I think we can call this one Hillbilly L.A.G. not shillbilly smell a G. That would be the mad magazine version of it. Oh, I want to see that so badly now. So the Flophouse is sponsored in part by Squarespace. If you use Squarespace's services, you can create a beautiful website to promote or just get your cool idea out there, blogger, publish content, sell products and services of all kinds and much, much more. Squarespace does this by giving you beautiful customizable templates created by world-class

designers. Everything optimized for mobile right out of the box, a new way to buy domains and choose from over 200 extensions, free and secure hosting. Hey, why don't you go over if this interests you to Squarespace.com slash flop for a free trial and when you're ready to launch, use the offer code of flop to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. Hey guys, I had an idea for a website kind of based on today's movie.

I was wondering if Squarespace might be able to help us and Dan maybe you can help me. Kinda came out of nowhere, but that's okay. Yeah, so I was wondering, we see so many warm weather hillbillies. They live in the south, it's much warmer there. But I was wondering, what about the colder hillbillies? That's why at www.chillbillie.com, you can find your news about the chilliest billies.

That's right, hillbillies who live in cold areas, and again, we call them chill billies. They also are super cool, not just cold, and that's why they chill. So at chillbillies.com, it's your place online for cold weather, rural, you know, poverty line stereotypes. Oh, wow. Okay. Is this like a meetup site or is it like, is it like fiction? What's going on? Yeah.

Well, I mean, the meetup site is our app billbow, which is, that's, that's for a hillbilly meetup site. But it's just a place where you can swap stereotypes, make crude caricatures, and pretend to be them in multi-million dollar movies for a word consideration. So that's chillbilly.com, chillbilly.com, and use offer code. We don't have one. There's nothing to buy on the site. I suddenly have to say that there's no worries about these made up URLs that you do, Ellie. Like this is one of the ones that i feel like it might actually exist and i'm it might exist well jordan if this one exists please cut this part out and if it doesn't exist please by that domain for me

yeah um... guys i just checked i just checked w dot chit www dot chitwbilly dot com is for sale so we're safe it It is available. Okay. Let me see if I have enough money on these five credit cards. Now, there is another, now I want it, this is a movie idea. This is not a, this is not a, uh, uh, uh, the show, but I was worrying about, uh, uh, Chili Willie, which is, which would be the story of Chili Willie is upbringing and how difficult it was.

The cartoon, the cartoon, the way this is the way this is the cartoon, the cartoon, the movie Willie Willie. Yeah. This is what like a dirgey sing after his passing. Tales of his adventures. The scald sings it and his Viking funeral. Well, because he's gone from the cold of Antarctica to the ultimate cold of the grave. Yeah, all right. Well, let's move on to letters. And let's wait. Alex, you look like you might have something to plug. I do have something to plug in stores now. That's right, because it came out Wednesday, February 3rd,

which again is after recording this, but before it will be released, is number one of Maniac of New York. That's right, Maniac of New York. Number one from Aftershock Comics. By me and Andrea Moote, it's the story of basically what if the wire was instead of being about drugs, was about Jason Voorhees, and it's that in New York City. So there's an unstoppable killer.

He's been a problem in New York for years. Everyone's kind of given up, except for two, crusading people, a mayoral aide and an outcast police officer, police detective. And they're going to try to take this monster, this slasher killer down. Will they be able to do it? Find out in many act of New York number one from aftershock comics in stores now. Go to your local convict store or mail order it for them.

If you don't want to go out of the house, which I understand. And real quick, Dan, when is this, when's this episode, uh, dropping this episode one second should come out on the 13th of February. Okay, so that means, yeah, that means as a special Valentine's Day gift for yourself or others, it is the last, if you're listening to this on the day it drops, it is the last day for our limited run, our exclusive run of live show t-shirts. If you go to the the flop house pod Twitter account, you'll find links to those shirts there. They are great. And they're exclusive to just that week. So if you miss them, you miss them. So hopefully you've got a chance to grab one. These are some great designs. I've liked our past designs, but these are my favorite designs.

I remember. Wow. They're really good. They are very good designs. But let us move on to Dan's favorite designs. They're really good designs. But let us move on to Dan's favorite subject. Let us move on. Oh God, you got him. Oh, that's so. That's a Raven. Now, okay. So, uh, letters from listeners, listeners like you, this one's from John last name withheld. John last name. There's no. There's no. No. I hope not.

There's no age, so I can only assume it's new to Twitter, John Stewart. Yeah. Hey, hey, peaches, my daughter 13, also an avid listener, I don't recommend that, but. Your daughter's name is 13, that's cool. Yeah. Um, like, yeah, very similar to the character 3 from peanuts.

Remember that? When there was a character, you just had a number as their name. Anyway. I kind of remember it, not particularly. Are you thinking of Pigpen? No, no, no, there was a whole like gag. It was basically the 19, early 1960s Charles Schultz version of making fun of like kids have the craziest names these days.

They don't have good names like Linus. Or Schroeder. Or Shermie. Whatever happened to normal kid names like Shermie. My daughter, 30. Wait, no, Dan, I always assume Schroeder was his last name. Do you think it's his last name? No, I think it's his last name.

I think you're right there. My daughter, 13, there are two patties in that strip. There's peppermint patty and regular patty. That seems, I mean, that's, well, that's why they call her peppermint patty, Dan, to give you the same thing on the bachelor. When there's multiple patties, one's regular patty, one's patty. This seems like Charl Schultz could have come up with a different name, but anyway. My daughter, 13, also an avid listener is thinking about making a movie for a community student film competition.

Our idea is a comedy horror movie, something along the lines of jawsaws meets scary movie starring our cat as Jaws. Question to you, filmic geniuses, is what are your best tips to make the plot beats, hit the best for making dumb gore work and be funny, and any other tips for making a horror comedy short, 15 minute tops, hit the best. Yours in flopp tasticness, John Lasting withheld. It sounds like she should definitely make this movie. There is no reason not to make a movie if you wanna make a movie.

And my first tip, sorry to jump in guys ahead of time, my first tip would be to like, not worry about the plot that much. Like for a short, it's gonna be more important to you probably to just keep it entertaining and funny and keep the energy moving and you don't wanna get bogged down with plot stuff. Keep the plot as simple and straightforward as you can

unless the joke is that the plot is really complicated and then just have fun making it fun. For more, yeah, for what little I've learned from watching TikToks, the key is editing. If you wanna get last, make it do a lot of quick editing. Yeah, edits, cuts are funny. Like, there's certain types of things that are funny and without cuts, but a lot of times a quick cut is funny.

Yes, if you make the cut part of the joke, I actually was going to say another thing, which is a little bit opposed, but I think I trust our listeners to say another thing, which is a little bit opposed, but I think I trust our listeners to be smart enough to hold both ideas in their head, which is sometimes it is funnier to also just let things play out in long, like a slapstick thing often, just like seeing the full thing is the funny way and modern movies have forgotten that. Oh, I will say that's true.

Slapstick is funnier with outspot. Yeah, it's like the scenes in Children of Men where Alfonso Quarran just does one long take. Those were hilarious. Oh, yeah. That movie was so funny. That movie was so funny. That's why Birdman is hilarious.

That's why the Revenant is hilarious. That's why Rob is hilarious. That's why Russian arc, yeah arc is a laugh fucking riot. Sorry that your daughter had to hear me curse just then. But yeah, I it's see let the moment tell you how best it should be made. Don't don't stick to a theory, but let the moment tell you. But I would but I would still just say like make it make it as fun to watch as you can. And don't worry, like the best movies, the ones that people remember the most,

people very rarely remember how the plot goes. This is something that Howard Hawks believed in was he said, people don't watch movies for plots, they watch them for scenes, and they remember scenes, they don't remember plots. I think he went too far with that until eventually he was making movies that were just about dudes hanging out at racetracks and were hanging out on a safariari but you need some plot but don't

worry that the plot is gonna be the thing that like makes or breaks you. Yeah if you've got like yeah if you got like interesting gags in it I don't know I'm remembering now I there was a video I was supposed to make for French class in high school and it was not supposed to be horror but because I'm who I am I'm like I'm gonna put some horror stuff in there and it was like a French class video where it involved me accidentally cutting my arm off and I made one of those things where like there's a fake I use an old shirt and I made like a fake forearm to put on my I used an old shirt and I made like a fake forearm to put on my real arm and then I put a glove around it.

I don't know why my character is wearing a glove, but so it looked like the glove was fake, but it looked like my hand holding my real arm. I hope that that explanation made sense to people listening. And then out of my little stump, I had one of those squirt bottles, and I just like squirted blood out of it. So I guess my advice is do something like that. Yeah, that sounds great. And so what was the, what was French about it? Oh, we were speaking in French. Okay. You're like, oh, moles. yeah, yeah. French people can get their arms cut off. Yeah, right.

French people are just as likely as anyone else to get their arms cut off. Very fair. We got one last email here. It's from Ben last name with Held, who says Ben 10. We all know that psycho gourmet is the next Star Wars, both in the breadth of its cultural impact and in that every background character

will eventually have at least 12 extended universe books about them. Stuart, until then, what can you tell us about two man's backstory? Where did he go to high school? What are his goals, his dreams? What does he smell like when they pop that helmet off? For the rest of the floppers,

left in the shadow of steward's artistic legacy legacy what character with little screen time do you wish for more backstory on i'm i'm sorry i did not send you this last part of the question i forgot i was there cool cool cool cool yeah cool i'm sorry man that's uh yeah i, this is tough. I, you know, when I inhabit a role, you know, I just let it kinda take like that, like character spirit inhabit me as opposed to like, to flow into my body and then out of my mouth, cause I'm a, you know, I'm mainly a voice actor. But, so I don't, I try not to overthink it too much.

I'm kinda primal, almost animalistic when I perform. You guys have seen it, right, where I'm like, I do that like little ritual where I grow a little bit and I have to take my shirt off. The pants stay on. I'm not a Winnie the Pooh, I keep the pants on. But I do, I do roll the cuffs of my pants up a little bit so that it gives me the impression of having nudity on the bottom half of my body without actually

going all the way into it. So I do all that and then I kind of like I move around and I get very tactile, I touch everything and I make faces kind of like what a, like if I was an animal, what an animal would do. And doing that takes me to this kind of like, it takes my brain to this kind of like lower, almost like subconscious. And that allows the character, in this case, to man, to just kind of flow in through my ears and then comes, just passes my brain entirely and flows right out of my mouth.

So that's what I do. Oh, wow. Asked to the question of back stories. I'm going to, this may be cheating, but I'm going to just sort of rail against the idea that side characters need back stories at all. Oh, it's awesome. Well, part of it is like, I think that there's this,

I think it's kind of a modern affliction where people seem to start feeling like not knowing about every single character as a flaw rather than like part of what makes movies work. Like it is good to find something mysterious about this like to imagine whatever you can imagine is much greater. Like we watched I rewatcheded a PB's big adventure with friends recently. And there's a scene in there where apparently originally there was a whole back story to amazing Larry, like why there's this guy who has this colorful Mohawk in the scene in the basement where PB's laying out all the clues.

But he works so much better just as like he's whispering something and Peewee says, is there something you can share with the rest of us amazing Larry? And like the shocked cut to this guy with a crazy Mohawk. And you're like, whatever backstory you have for amazing Larry is better than like finding out in that deleted scene. Yeah, I think it is, I was talking to someone recently about how if they made, if Disney made Snow White and the Seven Jorbs now, they'd be like, great, perfect. We're announcing movies for each of the Jorbs, then we'll do the prequel.

We find out how they met each other and it's not anything that we don't need that stuff. That being said, in the beginning of St. and other reign, there's an actress named Zelda who shows up at the movie premiere and this guy in the crowd hops to his feet and goes, ah, Zelda! Ah! And every time we see him, my family laughs and laughs,

so I don't know what that guy's about. And whether he brings that same level of enthusiasm to everything, it's like- Oh, yeah, you don't wanna know more about Zelda, you just wanna know about the guy. I wanna know about that guy who's just like his eyes are popping out of his head. He's so excited to see her.

Yeah, I don't want to say too much about this. I'm going to go back and want to say a little bit. I don't want to say too much about this because I've been touring with writing like a humor piece about it for a while. Like it's been in the back of my head. But don't give away the trade secrets, Dan. I just want to know the story of the guy and

It's a wonderful life who sits down by the lever that opens the gymnasium Pool and what his deal is why he's hanging out there waiting for someone to like be like, hey, you know You're jilted by your woman, huh? You know that there's a pool under here that you could open up like what's his story? You just love swimming. Yeah. They don't get to use that pool very much. Uh, let's get into recommendations. Movies you definitely should watch instead of Hillbilly, L.A.G. and I want to recommend something related to this movie in a way thematically. It's called Deliverance. uh... it's called a little bit it's called a long turn to

uh... another wrong turn i am uh... so guys you'll never believe this i think we took another wrong i mean that's the premise of the movie i'll get i'm surprised that this has been officially recommended on the podcast before but my googling says it has not. The Florida project does everything right that this movie does wrong about showing people who are in dire financial straits.

Like it has a lot of sad stuff in it, but it has a lot of joy. It is presented very matter factly, the day-to-day lives, you have characters who are doing occasionally dumb or unsympathetic things because they are stuck in a situation that doesn't allow for them to make mistakes, unfortunately. And it is filled with quiet moments and humor and joy along with the dramatic stuff, and I think it paints a much more sort of full and sympathetic picture of what it is to be forced to live life, you know, it doesn't precarious way.

Yeah, yeah, I love the project. Yeah, I love that movie. It's like not just for some of the filmmaking feats that they managed to accomplish, but also like Willem Dafoe's performance is so great. And also the performance from the children who, I'm assuming they did not realize they were like playing characters in a movie, right?

Like, I mean, they knew they were playing characters. I knew they were playing characters, but they got natural performance. It's a similar, I'm sure they utilize a similar method to what I use when I do performing. Exactly. I don't think it was one of the things where they hypnotized them. They're like, this is your life now. Is that a thing that happens? It's how they got some of Grace Kelly's best performances

out of her. Yeah, you go Elliot. Okay, I'm gonna recommend a movie also about, I guess, expensive academic situations. So I guess that connects to it. This is a movie that's on Amazon right now. It's called Sela and the Spades. And it was written directed by Tariya Poe. And it's set at a kind of like fancy boarding school where there's five family-type set-up where

there's groups of students that kind of run the student body. And our main character, Sela, is the leader of who called the Spades, were in charge of drugs and other illicit substances. And it's kind of about her as someone who is trying to maintain this facade of just total composure and confidence all the time while she is up against the pressures of this kind of criminal social life, and also the pressures from home to be like the best student she can be and not get into trouble. And she becomes friends with a younger student who she decides is going to be her heir in this position, but then starts to have a falling out with her when she her suspicions grow.

And the movie, like, it starts off, and it feels like it's gonna be kind of like a West Anderson-y type thing, which I like West Anderson-y stuff, but I worry that people can't quite pull it off, and then it does not become that at all. It feels very much like a movie that could have been about its plot, but is about instead

about these characters existing and interacting, and there are a number of scenes where I was like, oh, this is what, this really feels like, what it's like to be like a teenager and have to kill time or be excited about something or be like, worried about something. I thought it was a really, it's more elliptically told than I thought it might be. And I thought it was really affecting that way.

So I would say, Stella and the Spades, if you want to see kind of like a teen movie that feels more poetic than your normal teen movie with a plot like that might sound. Okay, and I'm going to recommend a movie. Let's tie this to Hilbali-Ella-G. This is a movie about... We know it's psycho-gormant, dude. Just just go... A complicated relationship between grandparents and children. I'm going to recommend a movie on shutter called Anything for Jackson. It's a horror movie about a older couple who Decide to a kidnap a pregnant woman in order to perform a reverse exorcism and bring back their grandson and

It is a It's a funny well-made well-performed very efficient scare machine. It is just by like scares per moment. You're gonna get more than your average horror movie. I recommend it. It's a lot of fun. Yeah, give it a shot. Anything for Jackson. Ah, good SBM score.

Yeah, the SBM score is super high. If you're looking for just like a fun horror movie night, I think it's a great choice. I will put it on my watch list. But. Okay, Dan, I mean, I noticed that you very prominently did not say I'll put it on my watch list. Yeah, you're sounded like kind of a, you know, maybe too good.

Yeah, a lot of vegetables. Yeah. No, but it's a good move. All right, how do I make it sound trashier? Maybe too good. Yeah, a lot of vegetables. A lot of vegetables. Yeah. No, but it's a good move. All right. How do I make it sound trash here? And one of them is a murderer who has a demon in her inner body. It's telling her to kill everybody, but it's at a carnival.

It's like a haunted carnival. If you're doing a stand-up, you should be pitching it like a haunted girls boarding school. Okay, yeah, fair. It's at a haunted girls' pillow fight academy. Okay. You have my interest. It's called St. Nighties Academy. So let's make an effort for once to see if I can end this podcast quickly and efficiently. Okay. And

just pretend, pretend, yeah, pretend this podcast is your drug addicted mom in a hotel room and just say goodbye and drive off to New Haven. We'd like to thank Jordan Cowling for editing the show. We would like to thank everyone at Maximum Fun for having us on their network. Why not go over to maximumfun.org, check out the other podcasts on their I listed you. Several of them myself. They are a well-curated, wonderful bunch. And if you have the time, please spread the word about the flop house wherever you think it might be effective. But until next time, I've been Dan McCoy. I'm Stuart Wellington.

I'll be Elliot Kaelin next time too. Bye. Bye. Bye. Oh, this episode we discuss, Hillbilly Elegy. The latest installment in the Barney Google Snuffy Smith Cinematic Universe. Oh, so pretty good. Mine is more, you know, contemporary with all the cool teens listening to Rob Zombie now.

Maximumfun.org. Comedy and culture. Artist-owned, audience supported. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and Culture. Artist-owned, audience supported.