The Flop House - Episode #391 - Critters, with Steven Kostanski

Episode Date: March 11, 2023

The listener who entered our Sexy Xenomorph contest under the name "Do Critters Next" asked us to "Do Critters next," so we did Critters next, which has ceased to become "next" and is now now. And who better to join us for this slice of silly 80s monster horror than a man whose own films bear the influence of that horror decade, Stephen Kostanski, the director of Psycho Goreman, the movie that turned Stuart Wellington into a brain in a tube.Wikipedia page for CrittersMovies recommended in this episode:Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (1992)Before Sunrise (1995)Girlfriends (1978)Ghoulies 3: Ghoulies Go To College (1991)Ever tried Microdosing? Visit Microdose.com and use FLOP for 30% off + Free Shipping.  

On this episode we discuss... Critters! The second best movie featuring... Critters! Hey, everyone, and welcome to the flop house. I'm Dan McCoy. Hey, me, Stuart Wellington. Oh, okay, that's who that was. I'm Elliot Klen, no jokes. And we are joined by very special guest today. I'm so excited that he's here. Let me lay out these credits, writer director of Psycho Goreman and Manborg, co-writer co-director of The Void and Father's Day, director of Leprechaun Returns.

And he's the FX artist who melted Nicholas Cage's face in Mandy. And he's also a buddy of mine. That's the best credit you can ever have. Steve Custand. He's true. Thank you. Hey guys, thanks for having me. I don't know why for having me. It's an honor, honor to be here. I mean, I don't know why you said, aww, when you said that's the best credit you could ever have because really when you think about it, he's got a bit of himself.

I don't know. I feel like friendship is the greatest gift of all, and I appreciate it. That's why we're friends. Specifically, his friendship is the greatest gift of all. That's what Stu says, yeah. Hey, what Stu says goes. Yeah, it's Stu's rules. And my therapist is all about helping me establish Stoos rules, aka boundaries, aka Stoos. Stoos, yeah.

What's healthy in Stoos? Stoos, Stoos, yeah. Cool. Stoos, Stoos, they're healthy, they're firm, but not too firm. It's everything you need in a stool. Stoos, Stoos, Stoos. They're perfectly long. Slide out easy.

Find them in school. Oh wow, so what are we doing in this here? That's just, Dan. This is mostly a devil on Tondra podcast, but it's also a podcast. How has there never been a James Bond, a James Bond lady named double on Tondra? How is that not in the name of a character? I mean, it must have been on the fucking whiteboard for one of the awesome powers sequels, right? Yeah, you're right, probably, probably. And they just didn't get to it. they're like, fuck, okay, next one for Austin Power was

the next one. They were going to be right. They're going to, it's going to get a reboot. Yeah, like a legacy wall where it's like not a sequel of the second or third one, but the first one only. Now, so they can bring back Liz Hurley. No, they're going to do the thing. First they're going to do the thing where it's's Austin Powers Jr. and it's a kid,

like a kid prequel character. People are gonna fucking be together. Yeah, a real James Bond Jr. scenario. Exactly, James Bond Jr. of course was James Bond's nephew. So the junior aspect is a strange thing. Yeah, it's a mystery. Yeah, it's because James Bond famously was celibate, right? James Bond's brothers.

James Bond's brother's wife is like, I would like to name our son James Bond famously was celibate, right? James Bond's brothers. James Bond's brother's wife is like, I would like to name our son James Bond Jr. and husband's like, I don't feel comfortable with that. I'm not sure I understand what's going on. Just go with it. And the kid had a drinking problem too, right? Yeah. In James Bond Jr. Yeah, yeah, he also had a drinking problem. Yeah, and he was horrified by the things he'd seen and the things he'd done. Well, I was about to explain the show and none of these things are related really to the, well, they're supposed to get James Bond Jr. kind of retconned podcast.

We're doing a really reboot of James Bond Jr. Just a, I guess, deep dive into James Bond Jr. Yeah. That's what I came. We are more of a digression podcast into the things. Yeah. You know, we sort of remember now. Here's the only reason I was James Bond junior had been more successful because then it could have got silly. We'd have gotten happy. Happy bond. The old man James Bond who had tagged on a 10 log of adventures. Yeah. It was not a secret agent. He would just go with them on

adventures. That's my guess. But we never got to see that. Yeah. And then there'd be like I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like,

I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like,

I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like,

I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like, I was like was so to hydrate it was like a little raisin That's that Raisins up is it like all the pool though so That male anatomy is like one of those like water snake tubes that kids can play with yes I mean I guess it's certain since it's true, since it's filled with bladders of liquid, that will be blood.

Not blood. Not blood. That's what you're bladders in the show. A bladder is a term that can be used for, like, you know, you use a bladder and like special effects for us. No, no, I know. I know. I know.

I know. I know. This is special effects. I'm going to hear Dan Dings playing special effects to Steve because Dan's key a little bit more. There's not key bladders in the... Anyway. Oh, that's how they work. Well, we've gotten...

Dan, Dan, tell them what a squib is. Make sure he knows what a squib is. Yeah. I wasn't telling him what it was. I was telling you, who seemed to be confused about my usage of the word bladder. Mm-hmm. Anyway.

You know that sometimes the blood in movies is fake. Uh-huh. That's only sometimes. It's only sometimes. It's only some. Yeah, like the old time fake blood it was made out of Robert. It was Robert Carrows syrup. That's Carrows syrup made out of the blood Robert Carrows. Yeah. Robert Carrows. Of course, from America's great bag rivers. Thank you for giving us.

Do respect to the end of that. I didn't want him to get mad. And so he'd be yelling at his wife, Ina, Ina, I need to write a angry letter to the flop hours. Robert. He's got a heavy accent. And get back to writing about LBJ. He don't waste time with us. Please. So what do we do on this podcast, Dan? I just want to say if Robert Kara, if you are listening, please stop listening and finish that last book on LBJ. I want to read it so badly, and I want you to finish it before you can no longer write books.

Dan, what do we do on this podcast? It's due set. Uh, this is a podcast where, well, normally we watch a bad movie and then we talk about it in this case. We watch a movie that I think, I think it's fair to say ahead of time, I don't know where everyone's going to land on this reviewing, but we all have affection for this movie of some kind. It's called Critters. If we're watching it because of a contest winner who has been tweeting at us under the

handle, do Critters next for years. And finally got their dream by winning a flop house contest and forcing our hand, forcing us to do Critters next, which is now. This Twitter critter finally got their dream by winning a flop house contest and forcing our hand, forcing us to do critters next, which is now. Yeah, this Twitter critter probably finally got their dream. Yeah. I can only assume this Twitter critter also used the same handle for his only fans account that he messaged his various performers. So yeah, we watched the movie critters from the 80s.

Yeah. From 1986, specifically, let's narrow it down. It did get released every year. First time in the 80s. Yeah. From 1986, specifically, let's narrow it down. It didn't get released every year. I got a kid who became Scott Grimes. Wait, wait, wait, the way you said that Dan makes it sound like D Wallace was the kid who became Scott. Those are two separate people. This is D Wallace, D Wallace continuing her screen queen. Screen queen and like, just like Scott A.D.'s mom. Kind of like, kind of like,

the mom performances. That's what I say like, screen mom. Yeah, screen mom style of character. Yeah. What a good idea for TV show. Screen queen. Yeah. So we mentioned that this movie came out in 1986

and it's time for Stewart to make a little bit of online on air apology because a few episodes ago, I mentioned that the Iron Maiden album somewhere in time came out in 1987 and actually came out in 1986 as some very, let's say, helpful people on the internet were reminding me to leak cool dudes, everybody's cool. Still not annoying. To be fair to them, Stu, you did a great, a unique injustice in the world, a huge injustice

fight, misnumbering the year of that Iron Maiden album, yeah. Uh, yeah, well, they were all very cool, chill about it, cool dudes. Okay. Uh, of course. Now, I want to say something about critters to return to these subjects. Wait, before we do that, I also, I also- Oh, dude, just pulled out his phone, so buckle up. I also apologize for an Iron Maiden related mistake.

I made on a different podcast on our sister maximum fun podcast, be potting you. I mentioned that Iron Maiden had written a song about the TV show, The Prisoner, as a genuinely helpful person on Twitter, who was very polite about it, reminded me they had two songs, at least about The Prisoner, The TV show. Wait, there's two.

There's The Prisoner and there's Back in the Village. And I had forgotten the prison. I only I don't remember it back in the village. Anyway, inside us all there, two iron major songs about the prismar. One good. They're both pretty good, actually. Yeah. No, I just wanted to say that this the director of critters, Stephen Harrick, has kind of an interesting career because came out of the gate strong with critters. Yeah. Bill and Ted's excellent adventure. Don't tell mom the baby's babysitter's dead. Wow.

Can you weaker, but often still, fucking, still memorable. Still look like that. I don't know if I'd say classic, but I can't stress this enough. And don't tell mom the babysitter's dead. That babysitter dies in like the first five minutes. That's incredible. That's the chase and the chase being the chase across the river sticks. I don't know.

Anyway, is I really appreciate what a movie does that. For instance, while watching Critters, I was like, and we'll get this one time on the movie, they spend a lot of time hiding what the critters look like when the poster just shows a critter standing right there. That was a weird move. It's an edging dude. And I just love that. And don't tell them on the baby's, they're like, you know the baby's, and there's going

to die. Let's just get it over with yeah I can drive my car this dude's in a car like immediately boom sorry quickly wrap up the filmography portion as in golden I James Bond just shoved that gold right in his eye in the first game uh the mighty ducks a big hit uh the Disney chrysodonal three musketeers, lesser.

Okay. But then a bid for respectability with Mr. Holland's Opus. A lot of people fond of that. I mean, that's a big, that's a big, that's a big hit. That's a big hit. Yeah, these are two, two of

done critters and Mr. Holland's Opus in one career. It's kind of like Wes Craven. Yeah. Doing Nightmare on Elm Street and also that a violin of the heart movie or whatever, it's called Music of the Heart, you know, the one I'm talking about, the violins.

You're, uh, Freddy's in that one, right? But that's about, it's called, that was the title. And it's got shocker in it too. That sort of when, post 101 Dalmatians, a bit of a downturn, you got a holy man, rockstar, and a man of the house all one after another. So that kind of team to have killed off his sort of major motion picture career, but you know, still. And unfortunately rock star, I think killed off for a while, at least the chance of getting

a real biopic about Judas Priest, which is too bad because that's something I'd love to see. Now, yeah, I mean, I feel like this, well, as we go through the movie, I'm sure we'll mention some of the cast. I mean, we got Billy Z, well, as we go through the movie, I'm sure we'll mention some of the cast. I mean, we got Billy Zane. We have Lynn Shea, who's been in like, I think she's been in the most movies out of anyone in this movie. Well, because it's a new line cinema movie.

So obviously Bob Shea is going to put her in there. And the thing is, you know, it's a new line cinema movie because at least the version I watched, you get both new line logos then. Yeah, the old one. Yeah, that was nice. It's the one I watched just had the old one. Oh, okay. Oh, I love that. Because you're watching my cookie. You're watching like a like a steelbook or something, right?

You're watching like, no, I got my friend Pierce to stream it last night. So we go and chat while watching it. So I guess he found a copy of those just the original logo, which is the best new line logo. Now Steve, before we get into the plot of the movie, do you have any particular attachment to critters? Do you have all the, did you have critters, dolls growing up? What's up? I mean, it's the same attachment that I have to like any other small monster movie from that era. I mean, it came out the year I was born. So I wasn't like,

Boulie's, Munchies, Gremlin. Yeah, all that stuff. It all was just kind of like orbiting around me in the video store growing up as a kid. I remember my friend Curen pushing it on me and being like, oh, you're gonna love this movie. And like, he was really hyping up the like, bounty hunters,

like subplot, you know, that's something you'd be into. And yeah, I just remember as a kid watching it and being really confused why they're leaning so hard into that one song for like the first half of the movie. And I can't, what is the power of the night? Power of the night? Yeah, power of the night. And upon rewatch, still kind of a baffling joy.

So I can't get enough. That seems like they're trying very hard to make a hit song out of this, out of this movie. But what's crazy though is that they push it so hard for the first like 30 minutes where it's even to the point where D. Wallace is watching the music video on the TV. They building it up like he is the Johnny Steel is the biggest star in the world and then nobody recognizes him until the kid. And it's like, well, what was the point of that even then? Yeah. And then also they drop it and then pick up the actual like critter's theme partway through the movie.

Yeah. And then the movie ends with that. So it's almost like they had like a falling out with that power of the night song partway through. You know what? We're not even going to put you in the credits because we don't like you anymore. It's a very weird choice. It's a light motif for when the bounty hunters leave, they no longer play power the night because that is the, that song represents the bounty hunter. Oh, yeah, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very's very funny that, so like, this movie came out two years after Gremlins. Everyone is like, this is a rip off of Gremlins, and the makers of the film are like, we had the script before Gremlins came out, but the script is essentially,

it's basically the story of what ET was originally going to be when it was still called Watch the Skies, so the D-Wallus connection is very funny to me there because it's like, it's more a rip off of the unproduced script for the early version of ET than then it is a grandma's fault. Yeah. Well, and they've also used that excuse for goolees as well,

because I believe did that come out like around the same time as grandma's or maybe just after, but people label it as a rip off, but actually it was written before. But it's also one of those things that such, it's not a real excuse because it's not like when a movie is released, that's the first time anyone hears about it. Like movie makers, no kinds of movies are being made.

And if they know a big company is making a movie about a certain topic, they may suddenly take interest in a script that maybe they weren't interested in. Well, that's the other thing. Like, it may not have been a rip off, but it can still be a cash in if they're like, oh, we have this unproduced script that is a bunch of little monsters in a small town. Speaking of which. Now, little monsters, ironically, the monsters are not that little. No, no, they're human size.

Human size. The human size monsters. They're how he manned else size. They're taller than the human character who's a child. I just wanted to say because Munchies has been invoked twice, I found that the daughter character, the teen daughter of that actress was also in Munchies. So she has two, you know, two of these small moms. Yeah, she's under her belt's pro. Yeah, she was in Munchies the month that or Munchie. So two different. Yeah, because they're very different. I think Munchies, Munchie is the cute one, right? I mean, is it an interesting way to describe it? He flies around how it's so cute. He flies around on a pizza.

It's pretty cute. Munchies the one with, it's what, Dom Delewee is doing the voice. Yeah. Yeah. Oh yeah. Yeah. So she's the Harvey Korman one.

Yeah, the one where it's the little monster's looking up a lady skirt. Yeah. The monster. The monster. The monsters in these posters, they're always doing things that are, except for Gremlins, that the Gremlins do amazing stuff. The monsters are always doing things that are so much more goofy and movement-based than they actually do in the films. Except for critters, which is just, he's just like

doing a, like a star pose, right? He's just standing there looking amazing. He's just like I'm a critter. Got a lovely lady. You get to, yeah, you see every inch of him as amazing. Talking about the look of the critters, I just want to say, is it Steven, maybe you know, is it Chioto Brothers? How is that pronounced? I believe it's Chioto Brothers. Yeah. Yeah.

So they, you know, known amongst film favorites for Killer Clowns from Outer Space, but they designed the critters, the crates. And supposedly they're supposed to be like the Tasmanian devil from Loon Tunes is kind of the inspiration for the lures. I mean I will. I will give them a lot of credit for their kind of like in-world way of making them move with them balling up and like basically turning into a sonic ball and ripping around because it's such an easy way to just get them from point A to point B, literally just throwing

a fur ball. Yes. Like down all way. And such a brilliant production solution, yeah, that you don't have to try to make a puppet walk anywhere. It is very hard to make a puppet walk and not look like Tilda Swinton and Old Man make-up in some spirit. Yeah.

It's a funny coincidence that we're talking about this movie right now because I am literally in the thick of building so many puppets and trying to figure out this exact thing. And so watching critters last night, I was like, oh yeah, they just really don't want balls. Yeah, I was thinking like maybe I'll make the guys ball up and shoot around.

Cause yeah, making a puppet walk is It is a very frustrating thing. You're working on a pop-als movie, right? So they should just ball up into little balls, you know, you would think that. Yeah, but We're talking about these low aliens. Sorry to cut you off Steve But I think we need to go into outer space. Yes, this movie begins and outer I guess I guess we go that was a very important entry into the summary segment. Oh, Stuart was tired of all our shenanigans. Too many shenanigans, not enough plot. That's what, that's what I always say.

So we walked out of so many Terence Malik movies. Too many shenanigans. Too many shenanigans, yep. Yeah, so we open on a maximum security prison asteroid. We overhear communications, that there are some new prisoners being transferred. It is eight crites, who immediately cause an explosion and they escape. I'd like to take them on, but we just say they're supposed to be 10 crites,

but apparently they just killed too along the way because they were eating too much stuff, which is interesting to me in this like intergalactic prison system where I guess you're just a little out. It's still a terrible prison system. Yeah, it's really an asteroid. The big question of the whole movie is, why are they bothering to take the critters to a prison?

Because the solution to the rest of it is just to blow them up. Yeah, it seems to be treated more like invasive like pests than- Yeah, the mythos around them is very hazy, where sometimes they seem to have personality and are treated like sentient beings, and then yeah, other times they're like bugs that need to be exterminated. I mean, they get subtitles so they can talk to someone else. So I guess, yeah, so anyway, I don't know whatever this interglacing federation is, but they also seem to be criminals in my moral.

Yeah, sure. And they hire bounty hunters. They have, they don't seem to have actual guards or a police force. It's just, that was their first solution was bringing the bounty hunters. In the bounty hunters. So I want to admit something that I, this movie, it's been so long since I saw as a kid that I might as well not even seen it I remember it so I remember it so little and so I had no memory of the prison warden and how

Bonkers that costume yes, and how great it looks and I was like hold on a second. I forgot this was in here Oh, yeah this whole opening to me I just want to say is like probably the my favorite part of the movie Yeah, probably the best executed sequence in the movie. It really starts strong and it checks all the boxes of things that I want in a movie, which is like weird, intergalactic, like universe building. Like, we're coming into a story, like partway through where they're escaping. We don't really see like how they get there.

And also having an establishing shot of the asteroid with a really cartoony, like prison door shuttings sound, over top. Like basically that happened. I was like, okay, you have my attention critters. Here we go. And then when the word comes out and it's like a, I would say like a, it's like Mojo with that legs. Yeah, like Mojo, like a, like a, like an embryonic dolphin man and a chair and the chair is part of its body.

Like it's, yeah, it's a fantastic design. Uh, yeah, so, and here's the thing. Wait, I should point this out. The critters, super hairy. This guy, super smooth and hairless. That's called, that's called dynamics. That's when you jump suppose two different textures. Yeah, that's just beautifully done. Hair is chaos and smoothness is justice. That's what the movie is saying. The, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text,

text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text,

text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, text, extensive normally graffiti is just like one word, all crazy stuff. Okay. Just bubble letters. Yeah, but they've got a whole ideology behind this graffiti. Yeah. So the warden who we've already talked about who looks amazing brings in a pair of bounty hunters and these bounty hunters look super cool. They got like cool leather dusters and these weird long extendo guns that hang from their hips and they are like weird blanks like like their faces are like, like blank rubber masks

because they're sort of blank men. Yeah, because they're shaped. Yeah. Wait a minute. They're, because they're shape shifters. They're like, what's a no-face indic tracy? Exactly, like no-face indic tracy. Thank you, but they also like glow a little bit, which is cool, I like that effect.

And they are given the mission to kill the crates before the crates can feed in spread. And we, we later on see these, they get the bounty hunters have their own ship. And the warden is like, oh, yeah, one thing I forgot to tell you, don't cause much destruction is last time. And they're heading to this planet Earth. Here, you can learn about it. And so the bounty hunters watch footage of Earth and one of them happens upon the music video by popular recording artist Johnny Steele. Really? The power of the night. The fixates. And then we had this great sequence of the the bounty hunter transforming his face like melting and reforming to form

an exact likeness of Johnny steel played by an actor who I only know him from what like he was like Michael Douglas's major domo in the movie Corusline. And yeah, he's got that like that like like, hair metal kind of femme energy that, but he's also like the baddest dude in the universe, which I really like, I really key into, it's probably why I like anime so much. So that's an actor. It's like a real sepharoth guy.

Oh yeah, he's got anime hair for sure. Yeah. So that's Terrence Mann, and he's mostly a Broadway performer. Like he played Rum Tum Tugger and Katz on Broadway. Oh well. He said that he would grow up. I mean, I guess he's mostly a Broadway performer. Like he played Rumtum Tugger in Cats on Broadway. Oh, well, I mean, I guess he's not reason to have it. The Adam's Family Broadway show and he's been a lot of Broadway shows. Yeah.

And he's also been a big top pee-wee. So like, there's that too, but you know. So show him some goddamn. I think he's great. I like him a lot. Oh, right. And I forgot. I'm looking up now.

I forgot. He was in Solar Babies also. There you go. Okay, so we get this amazing title card of like a neon critters logo with like bites or claw marks on it. It's great. I feel like so many like retro nostalgic attempts to like capture this vibe. Do not capture correctly.

This is perfect. I love it. Great title card. Yeah. Meanwhile, on Earth, we're in Grover's Bend, Kansas, where things move a little bit slower. And people with a dance background think a little bit better. But let me tell you about the honey we make. Your Clover Honey made from the Clover's outens old Mrs. Anson's farm.

Uh-huh. Here at Grover's Bens, we believe that honey is a way of life and to bring our damn bees back, we have to murder you. No, no, the bees killing people bring back your damn honey. You can taste all the murder in every bite. Oh, actually, you know what? Now that I'm dead, the murder in everybody. You know what? Now that I'm dead, the honey is better. Yeah.

Yeah. So we are introduced to the Brown family. The father is Jay's traditional farmer, kind of an asshole, kind of a jerk to everybody. Helen is the housewife. That's Dee Wallace, right? The eldest daughter is April. She's a bit boy-crazy and recently started dating Steve, the dork from New York, played by Billie Zane. Yeah.

Billie Zane, really. Shockingly small part. And this in this film, you know, but pretty charming for the little bit that he's in it. I think he's, he's like, well, to this movie. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, that's a weird wild. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So that's a weird back tail thing on the back. And as a bald man now, do you think he looks back on that wild hair fondly and wishes?

Oh, I thought you were going to say that he looks back and be like, when I had it, I wasted it. Oh, I didn't know what I had. I didn't use it properly. He doesn't get too much to do in this, which is weird because so, he plays her like boyfriend and she is, she really wants to sleep with him and he's a little like anxious about it. But it feels like knowing Billy Zane's persona as an actor, not in real life, I assume, but he like, he should be a creepy guy who's trying to like seduce her with his fancy New York

car and everything, right? But instead, and that gives us a reason to root when the critters bite his fingers off. But instead, they like, he's just kind of a, he's just kind of a almost realistically anxious and uncertain of himself guy. And there's a part where he's sitting eating dinner with the family and he's like, oh, well, this is the best food I've ever tasted. And it's so funny to me because it's like, it's such an over-the-toply insincere compliment. And you can tell he's not being smarmy or slimy about it.

He just has no idea what to say in this moment. It goes to a compliment that is just way too big. Yeah, this corn on the cob you served me in this farmhouse in Kansas. This has got to be one of the best foods in the history of the world. So you just stand brozure, better fit for the gods of Olympus, ma'am. Well, it's weird that they even push it as far as to have that little beat where he's in the barn. And he was like climbing up to that like top level

in the barn and he sneezes. And then announces like, oh, I'm allergic to hate. Like it's just such a like weird, like added bit of character to him that you wouldn't expect that makes him seem vulnerable. Yeah, in a way that that character should not be. wouldn't expect that makes him seem vulnerable. Yeah, you would expect that. You would expect that hay fever to pay off in the end with it like protecting him from the crates.

Oh, yeah, he sneezes and it blows a crite away or gives away or they're hiding from the crates and he sneezes and it gives away their location. But instead, it's just a really one off job. And it's like, you didn't believe it, just to add, live that on set, possibly. Probably. Yeah, makes sense. Well, I like that's one of the things I like about this off job. And it's like, did Billy say just ad live that on set? Possibly. Yeah, makes sense. Well, I like, that's one of the things I like about this movie though, it's like, it's mean spirited in one way in the sense that it has a lot of fun unleashing, you know, evil little critters on the small town.

But it's not mean spirited in any other way, you know, like it's, like only a couple of people end up dying in this movie. It's mostly just, you know, it's like, it's a retro end up dying in this movie. It's mostly just, you know, it's like, it's a retro throwback in a similar way. I mean, I can see why I mean, it's not even a retro throwback. It just is beyond. Yeah. It's just from the time it was made. Well, but no, no, I mean, like beyond the small monster similarities to Grimmlands, it has that same feeling of like drawing on older horror traditions, like a creature feature from like the 50s or something. I mean, I'd even go as far

as say that Gremlins is a more mean spirited movie than this, which was not gone at the time, although I love Gremlins, obviously, it's, I mean, obviously because it's fantastic, but like, Gremlins feels harsher than Critters does, which is weird, that the big budget version is kind of rough. Where's that whole Santa Claus story? That's the same. And there's nothing as when they're destroying the Critters, there's nothing as gruesome as the microwave

seen in Gremlins, like mixer scene, or whatever's blender in Gremlins, like when you see Stripe melting at the end and you're like, whoa, what the fuck? Like this is disgusting. Like is this? Is that what happens to me when I die? No. I have to stay inside all the time and just play video games and never see the sunlight.

That's an inside of it anyway. Yeah. Critters is like weirdly tame. Yeah. Yeah. Like as a kid, I remember being more intense, but watching it this time is like, I don't really, isn't like, like, there's no big show piece of like Gore effects or anything. It's like just a little bit of blood and not much else. They save that for the sequel. I think the sequel has more excitement

and invention. In a strange way, the glorious scene and it is when the bounty hunter's face is turning into Johnny Steele's because his face essentially melt down to the skull and then fill with muscle group and things like that. That's the, I'm surprised I didn't remember that from a kid, from a kid, because I could have seen that really horrifying me as a kid when the rest of the movie is just not that rough in a good way. Mm-hmm.

Horrifying you because you're like, I'll never make anything as awesome as this sequence. Yeah. I'm like, wait, this is what plastic surgery has signed me up. Yeah, melt my whole face off and then put it in. And so the, and then the, the youngest child in the Brown family is Brad. He's a real goony. Uh, you know, he makes his own fireworks. He doesn't, uh, he doesn't want to go to school.

That sort of thing. And of course, my favorite member of the family is Chewie the Cat. Um, Chewie the Cat who they put in peril a lot and then repeatedly remind the audience, no, no, chewy's okay. Chewy. I think I counted three instances of there being concerned about chewy and then having, making a point of showing like somebody pick up chewing, be a chewy's fine, guys, it's okay.

It works. I appreciated that as a cat owner, a cat lover, I was like, I can't remember critters, is the cat gonna have something bad happen to it. I don't like it. I don't like it. It's, look, I get it guys. Don't tweeted me about how I should be upset about all the humans that die in horror movies and like, do people tweet about you?

Be upset about all the humans that die in real life. Don't worry about the horror movie humans. Well, yeah. It's really like any time that anyone expresses a sensitivity to like animal cruelty in a film or television show, someone always shows up to be like, but humans are like, you don't have problems. It's all fake. And I'm like, yeah, I know whatever.

Like, don't tell me how to feel. What triggers me? Like, what's the problem? You really took down that straw man, Dan. I'm proud of you. You gave him a shot. like don't tell me how to feel. Like what triggers me? Like what's the problem? You really took down that straw man, Dan. I'm proud of you. You gave him a shot. I mean, he's gonna shit out of there.

I would say a straw man would fly. You said how about a fire scare crow in the New York City? I would say the straw man would imply an entirely made up person that I'm bidding for the sake of winning an argument, whereas this is just a composite scare. He's not the New York Times, if you will. This is not the case. Look, he just claimed we're in the end of winning an argument, whereas this is just a composite. He's not the New York Times. If you will. Look, he just claimed we're in the end of a biopic. You know, this is like a lot of people mixed together.

It's a composite. Now, if it helps at all to take some of the heat off of Dan, people dying in a movie, that affects me. Yeah. Animals dying. Sure. But if someone leaves a faucet running in a movie, I can not deal with it. I am sorry. That you that are cut to another scene because I cannot be there while wateret running in a movie, I do not deal with it. I am sorry.

That are cut to another scene because I cannot be there while water is running in the background. There's that shot where Timothy Shalamet in Call Me By Your Name opens up the fridge and then partially closes it and the shot just lingers on this open door and I'm like, what is going on? That triggers me. That triggers me deeply, yeah. Yeah, because you're dead.

Yeah, okay. Okay. And there's this kind of real life situation I've got to do with every damn day. Yeah, yeah. Wow, Elliot's getting up. Elliot's leaving. Elliot came back. Okay, we're podcasting again.

That was a quick change from. So we have, and then we also have kind of another like de facto member of the family, and that's Charlie, who's kind of like a local drunk who works as a farm hand for the Browns. And we that morning he is waking up, sleeping off a drunk in the drunk tank in the local police station. And who's the sheriff who plays the sheriff? Is it what? What? Emette Walsh. Emette Walsh, who is clearly like the biggest star in the movie. He's not a lot and they save him for kind of big moments.

And it's just very exciting to see a movie where M M at Walsh is like the big name that they have to really like shepherd and ration how they're going to use him, you know. Do you think when he showed up on set, he's like, so am I going to be playing one of the critters and they're like, no. But it's really practicing getting into one of those crank costumes. I just took a, took a, like a big, a big comforter, like a big furry comforter off of my bed. And I just racked it up and he had practiced rolling around on the floor.

I'm not going to have to do that a lot. I got a little bruise, but I'm, I'm game for it. I mean, we don't know. He could have been in that big gritter suit at the end, spoiler alert. There's a big gritter. Yeah, yeah. It's, it's a little lower again to tell us when being the old man. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It doesn't really need to be. Yeah, exactly. Okay. They asked if they could make a big critter. They didn't ask if they

should make a big. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So yeah, the that night, I mean, we get a bunch of, you know, character establishing stuff. Well, we also get a very, sorry, that's a cut job, but I want to point out there's a very stressful moment of them blowing up a y-wing spray painted silver. Then I did not enjoy water. That's a classic. I'm going there, explain. Yeah, exactly. I just wanted to play with that y-wing.

And we learned something. Did you port the same way about the stuff to ET doll that gets ripped up later on or no? A little less. I thought it was more about the y-wing. I can, ET, I can take it or leave it to be honest. Hot take on ET from Steve. Wow.

Wow. Yeah. So we learned that Charlie is a drinking problem because he thinks that aliens are invading. He also is a former was going to be a major league pitcher. Luckily, both drinking and pitching pay off in the end for him. And just for Ted Danson and Cheers. Yeah, exactly. It wasn't a pitcher in that, I guess, but I was a relief pitcher. He was a pitcher. He also, he's been driven to drink because he gets messages through his tooth fillings that he thinks are aliens talking to him, right?

So my question is, why did the dad hire him as like a farmhand? Was there, I wanted there to be some moment that explained like an obligation to hire him, but I think he just wanted to be in a general general pity, except for he also doesn't seem to really like Charlie. Well, he doesn't like anyone. He doesn't like the Charlie, like when we, like, you know, see him messing around, like blow and shit up, it's like, I don't know, it seems like a pretty useless guy to have around your farm. I like.

Especially considering he's effectively like the hero of the critters series, the franchise, like he shows up in the other movies. Well, that's a redemption arc. It's, you know, it's like f�us franchise, like he shows up in the other movies. Well, that's a redemption arc. It's like Hoosiers, like he overcomes. Yeah. What kind of monsters were Hoosiers? What kind of little monster? Oh, man.

That's someone. I'll try to call Hoosiers. I prefer you to guard your tongue, sir. I think that Charlie is hired because they need a farm hand and also the farmer wants better for his kids than he had. He doesn't want them to grow up to be farmers. Right. And you know, the more round is a, like a bad example.

Exactly. You want someone to look down on. Yes. Like it's better than this. You're better than this. Expect more. Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. That tracks. Yeah. So the, yeah, we get a little bit of character stuff. And then that night, the critters land their spaceship in the pasture behind the Browns farm. They eat one of the cows and then they also eat a passing police patrolman and drag them under his car.

No, there's still at this point we have not seen the critters. We have not seen critters. And that happens about a half hour into the movie. Like it's that they really set up the family in a wonder, a wonderfully long, point we have not seen the critters. I mean, not seen critters. And that happens about a half hour into the movie. Like it's that they really set up the family for a while. In a wonderfully long 85 minute movie. Yeah. It is.

We're almost half way through the movie before the critters have done much of an event. Yeah. Yeah. No, I looked at, I looked at, I think that the first time we see it get a good look at a critter is something like 36 minutes in, which yeah, it's less than 90 minutes. So that's like over a third of the way through before our titular monster. Unless of course you walked into the theater or looked at the VHS box, in which case you

saw the critter immediately before the movie started. Yeah, yeah. Let's see. I mean, it was something that I clocked this time and have realized every time I watch this movie, I drift, like, partway through where my mind wanders because it is such a weirdly structured movie. Like, on this rewatch, I was comparing it to Halloween and how that has, you know, it's like two parallel

storylines that ultimately collide at the end. You've got like, you know, Laurie and her story and then Dr. Loomis and Myers and it all like meets and all works together. But in critters, I feel like the bounty hunters kind of just messing around doing their own thing and the family on their own doing their own thing. Like there's like the siege sequence in the house.

And then we're cutting to the bounty hunters, like messing things up. Yeah. Almost more of a comedy runner than they are an actual sub-class. Yeah. And I really hope in a place and go, give us the crates. Don't explain what a crite is. Blow things up and then leave multiple. Well, they show up and they look comedic for these small town yoga types.

Oh, yeah. Halloween, they say that, which I'm like, oh, thank goodness. But the line you have to have. But I realize like, when the kid hops into the car with them, like later in the movie and they're like, gonna go after the crates, like, at that moment, it really felt like, oh, this is like the movie that I want to watch. And it's like, why didn't that happen like 25, 30 minutes into the movie where it's like, oh, this is like the movie that I want to watch. And it's like, why didn't that happen? Like 25, 30 minutes into the movie,

where it's like, we have our stories meet up and that's the central conceit, or push it all back and have them not meet till like the very, very end. It's just, I've really bumped on the structuring of this. I think that, because people, people peg like blockbusters, the beginning of the big blockbusters to the late 70s and into the 80s, I think it's always a surprise to me when I go back and watch those movies, kind of how slowly pace they are compared to, just how much spacers between

lines of dialogue, how much time they take unfolding plots. And it reminds me of like the last time I watched Carrie with somebody where they're like, oh, there's not a lot of like horror stuff in this movie because it because most of the movie is just the just high school stuff until the problem at the end. And it feels like when that works really well, like in a movie like Carrie, I feel like it gives you this rich kind of like character world that gets torn apart. But in critters, they're trying for it, but it's like not, they do have okay Java, but they don't quite quite get all the way there to where I'm loving being with these characters. So that's why I mean, that's like, come on, look at the brownie hunters in here, like

look at the critters, come on, let's go. Yeah, I don't feel like it's rock, raffeting up the tension really in any way. Either like where it's something like Carrie, I feel like it is like slowly building and building to a big climax. Where is this? Yeah, I just kept hitting these moments where I was like, what is it? What are they even doing right now? Like what is yeah? What's the driving force in the story at this moment? I definitely had trouble keeping track of where everybody in the critters were and what they were doing at certain certain points. Yeah.

I got respect to this movie for sort of like taking the time to try and develop things, but it is, yeah, I, you know, maybe maybe 10 minutes too much of that. Like a more ideal version of this is like 75 minutes long. Yeah. Yeah. Full load. And in fullter guys, do you get such a quick and solid feeling of like place and like this, you know, suburban cul-de-sac and I don't know,

I don't know that critters gives you all that much for the time it takes. I will say though, I do enjoy this more. Maybe it's just because it's nostalgic for me. Then what the modern version of this I assume would be would be like five minutes in everybody's dead except for the kid. He's with the bounty hunters and then the story gets incredibly complicated and huge in scale until suddenly it's like, well, the critters are they're getting into the anti-matter negatron. We've got a shutdown. The booze will work drive and you're the only one who can get to it. But meanwhile, like the way that at the end of the first black fanther movie I was like, there's too much stuff going on right now.

There's too many things going on. I can't keep track of them all. Well, and I think specifically for little monster movies, there needs to be a cozy element to it where the plot itself feels kind of small and contained. And I do think a modern version would blow out of that and go into space. That's a good point to think. Do you think that like the, because they're little, the threat has to be kind of, yeah, has to be that kind of intimate small scale as opposed to a giant monster movie.

You need it to be on a big, like Godzilla can attack a house, you know, like Godzilla has to attack a city. But like, but like, critters attack Godzilla. All right. Now we're talking. Let's see see about it. I mean, if they combine into that ball, they could. That they could do ball and do.

Part of the pleasures of what you're talking about is like they're small enough that they can like infiltrate a space. You like see a small town as it slowly like gets infiltrated by critters or Grimmlands or let's say some spiders in a rectophobia or whatever. Yeah. But. So, should we talk about the plots more? I guess so, yeah, sure, yeah.

So the bounty hunters arrive. One of the bounty hunters is having trouble morphing until he finds a dead. But everyone's morphing these. Yeah, he finds. Another day reference to a video that we used to watch in the writer's room at the daily show of an impressionist's act from 15 years ago, at least. It's just stuck in my head so much as like every time I hear the word morph, that's what I think of is that line?

Everybody's going to see a way of introducing I'm going to do some impressions now. Anyway, yeah. So this one, this one bounty hunter, he morphs into the dead policemen. He also later on morphs into a, it seems like he has no control over this morphing. Yeah. So we just go back to that dead policeman real quick. Did you guys clock that that was a neilix from Voyager? I do. I remember who was. Okay. It was his voice for me. I was like, huh, I know that I could see an annoying character in my head. I was like, I know those guys. And as he was getting dragged under the car, I was like,

all right, it's Nieluk. Of course. That's right. So, Stuart, you think he can't control it? I registered it as like maybe he was in decisive. Like he's just like, oh, okay. Oh, I like this body better. You know, like, well, they seem to be saying early on that like they's just like, oh, okay. Oh, I like this body better, you know? Yeah. Well, they seem to be saying early on that like, they had to like jive with the thing that they were morphing into. And so the first one, he just like, like Johnny Steele, yeah. Johnny Steele, he just fell to it.

He just fell to it with Johnny Steele. Yeah, he was like, oh, God, that's what I always wanted to be is Johnny Steele. And it was like this guy was, it was, a weird way of like, it's love at first sight over and over again with different forms that he can be taking. But yeah, he's like, I'm saying. And obviously, obviously fans of the second critters movie will remember the amazing morphing

scene where the bounty hunter morphs into the Playboy centerfold and classly with giant staple in in her stomach, which is hilarious, which is a good way to turn just a boob shot into a joke. Yeah, modern screen writers learn from the learn from. Turn a boob shot into a rim shot. Uh-huh. Okay. Okay. So the, let's say, the bounty hunters take over the police cruiser. Now they're tooling around town. They end up getting into chaos in various places and we'll touch on that as the movie progresses. The critters bite through the power and phone lines back at the farm, then they ambush Jay

when he goes down to the seller to check on things, ruining that bowling shirt of his. We get a lot of shots of this bowling shirt. He and his bowling team, like they make a point of saying that his bowling shirt is clean and ready. We see, we get multiple shots of his other bowling team like they make a point of saying that is bowling shirt is clean and ready. We see we get multiple shots of his other bowling team members. It's basically a ghost buster's logo, but with a pin instead of a ghost. Yep.

Which by the way, if anyone wants to buy me that, just send it to the bar. I'll wear that shit. Okay. Here's getting closer and closer to that only fan. Yeah. I'm going to except critters merchandise. Bimy critters merchandise. I'll wear it online.

You can tell me what to do with it. Yeah. Only screen you choose. I'll show you. So no, no, no, no, please. So we, yeah, we see, yeah, this is kind of the first time we really see the critters. They mainly attack by jumping in by jumping and like biting the neck and shoulder.

I think that's probably because it's easiest to hold the puppet right there. Yeah, because you could just have a guy standing behind. Yeah, and it's great. We also learned that they have a ranged attack. They can fire spines or darts that have some kind of a toxic paralytic element from their backs. That's great. It means that they can compete in a close combat phase as well as the range attack phase. It's very important. Okay. Now, what would be the, what would they have to,

what's their ability modifier for that? Well, so of course, there would be an amazing scout unit in Warhammer 40,000. They would easily have, I feel like based on their accuracy, that's at least hitting out of three plus. Okay. Close combat, they got a lot of attacks, maybe only hit on a four plus, because they miss a lot.

Don't have much of an armor save, obviously. But maybe they have some kind of like a ward save based on how quickly they can turn into a ball and roll away. They probably also had the ability to retreat and charge in the same phase. Dan, do you have any other feedback about? Yeah, Dan, I want to get your take on this. Thanks for answering, Sue. This question really

was for Dan. I went into my email and was looking at how I could pick up the pottery that Audrey and I made for our pottery class. So, three pottery class we did. Like a critter-shaped piece of pottery. Mm-hmm. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Cool. So, yeah, so the browns, the bounties boys, the bounty hunters show up at the church because of chaos. It's really funny because it's like, they just show up here. They just immediately start blowing crap up.

It's pretty awesome. And they blow up most of the church and then drive away. The brown question about the bounty hunters, their guns, those like the tubes on the end of their guns extend what, like a few inches when they get ready to shoot. What do you think that accomplishes? That's a question. I mean, that's the sort of thing that like when I was a kid and watching this movie, I'm like, oh shit, he's extended the barrel.

It's probably more powerful now. Yeah, yeah, I remember thinking that as a kid for sure, but watching this movie, I'm like, oh shit, he's extended the barrel. It's probably more powerful now. Yeah, I remember thinking that as a kid for sure, but watching it now, it's like, I guess it's just this interaction, medical. I had a bit of flair. Yeah, just a little something to make them look more outer space future. Yeah. So up in the hay loft, April and Steve a long-dill review up in the hay loft all the greats on the

favorite songs. Surely you remember whisking the milk. Horse in the stable and I got mine. And of course Bobby's got a dirty face. So, uh, none of that happens instead. What movie was that? What movie was that? Yeah, I was watching Critters' 1986. So April and Steve were getting it on in the hay loft.

Critters attack and kill Steve. And honestly, guys, you know, if I was going to go, that's how I'd want to go right in the sack and then eating by craters. Having an allergy attack to hate, yeah. Yeah, feeling unsure of myself as I potentially lose my virginity to a girl, even though I'm from the big city and I feel like I should be the experienced one. And I'm having a hate fever attack and then a monster bites off my fingers and then kills the rest of me.

Yeah, yeah, that's the way I want to go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Bites off my fingers while I am changing the cassette tape on the radio, that's set up in the hay loft. Yeah. I mean, he did just have the best meal he's ever had. Yeah. With a wonderful, delicious filling meal in my tummy as I roll around in the hay loft. Yeah. That's why the curtors go right for his tummy if you didn't notice because they're trying to get a delicious meal And he's like go for my tongue first. I don't want to taste anything else That's why I was so hesitant to have to kiss or go for go to other bases with April

Yeah, because it would have raised the taste of what were they eating for dinner? I know the corn on the cob There was something else. There was some mashed potato. I believe Yeah, I'm actually a starches. This feels like a starch heavy family Living on the farm. You need a lot of energy. There's a lot of, a lot of fun. Yeah, that's interesting. You know, understand, you get these like country breakfasts and denies or whatnot. Those people were out there in the fields, you know, working all day, like they needed

like to miss 10,000 calories. You needed all the energy to blow up those Y wings real soon. Yeah. You're going to get through the day. Yeah. Exactly. So April screams while our boyfriends being eaten and then Brad shows up and feeds one of the feeds the offending critter a like a M 80 or something, a homemade M 80 and it blows it up and it dies. And this is a silly way because it eats it and then they wait and then it goes. And it's and it's mouth kind of goes out a little bit and then smoke comes out of it and then it drops falls over

Yeah, it was silly movie I Creatored tip tipping over the way that it did. I think was my favorite Right. Yeah, yeah, it was very charming. Oh, it's just clearly a static puppet being too. I feel like that's on that That's on that it's my two favorite moments were that for genuine. And then also just for the hootspuff of it, when the critters are getting blown up and one of them says something

and the sub-toucher says, fuck, and they just start running away. Yeah, they're like, they got weapons and then we get some of the shotgun. Oh, it's great. No, I did really enjoy the understatement of this critter, critter, crit trigger being blown up. Like in a different movie, yeah, it would be a full explosion, but here's like a chemical. As later as it is, but yeah.

Of smooth. Yeah. And then they just sort of tip over. So after kind of taking stock of their situation, the Browns decide to make a run for it, but the critters have disabled all the vehicles, which is ironic since Charlie just fixed the carburetor in one of them. And they also destroy Steve's new sports car, they destroy all the vehicles. So they end up having to fight their way back to the farmhouse. This is where we see the critters method of chasing them is basically just rolling along the ground, which I got to say, I think it's pretty impressive that the movie manages to make that kind of tense, like kind of maybe scary.

It's surprisingly effective. These should not be scary monsters when you can't see their mouths full of teeth, but they do, they do manage to pull it off. I mean, the one thing that would be the scariest is if like four or five critters attacked one person at one time, they can't do this because there's only so many puppets you can hold to your body and pretend they're attacking you. But they do a good job, yeah, with making it at least up to this point, before I, before the movie started to like feel repetitive up to this point, I was like, yeah, they're doing a good job of making me

kind of, you know, this, this feels like a real menace. It feels like a threat to these people, you know. Yeah. So, Jay gets bitten again. Like he is, he's basically out action this. He's like, he's the heavy, he's the bullet spun. She's taken all the damage. He can't help him. Helen, Helen blows one of the critters away. We get, we get a bunch of laughs. It's great. They kind of barricade themselves in the farmhouse. The bounty hunters then show up at the bowling alley, which was a big bowling tournament night, I guess. Everybody's really excited. We get a bunch of laughs. There's a fight. There's a little bit of a bar fight. Charlie's there. One of the bounty hunters turns

into Charlie. It's great. Let's see, the the crites kind of lay siege to the farmhouse. They forced the family to retreat upstairs. Helen gets shot with one of those poison darts and she is not feeling good. We get a couple of gags here. We're like a ceiling fan falls and bonks. One of the critters on the head. One of them catches on fire and has to jump into a toilet thinking that's going to save him. I don't think that's going to work. My friend. Yeah. And another film. Yes. The monster would bite someone's butt. This movie. But I don't know what that is. It takes refuge in a toilet and then is immediately shot in the toilet. You think one of the bounty hunters should have gone in the house to be like, oh man,

I got to take a wicket dump. I got to lay off some prisoners off at the asteroid prison. Hold on a sec. The thing that that brings us into my mind is my friend Rich Duncan in the comedy world. You know, he went to Erlen as well, Erlen College before we're doing the show years ago. You're right. Where do you go to the college before he was in the comedy world anyway? Since he said in the comedy world, he went to Erlen College. Okay.

Anyway, the point is I mentioned critters. Look, I'm just putting Dan through my communication skills seminar. It's like much like, it's better Cluzo and Kato, I attack Dan's communication skills randomly whenever necessary. Just keep it on the toes. Yeah, well, I had tweeted about critters. It was a little critter, Twitter. And he was like, you know, is this a movie where, you know, someone gets, I avoided

it in the past, because I thought that this would be a movie where, you know, a monster hides in a toilet and bites someone's butt or something. I'm like, no, no, you got yourself a goolee there, my friend. But even in goolees, even goolees doesn't happen. It just isn't supposed to. No, because that was shot after the fact. I believe it was like, wasn't it after the initial release of Gouli's people were complaining that there wasn't a shot of a Gouli in a toilet in the movie so they went back shot and they suddenly shot of that and then dropped it in.

The poster promises, as it says, they'll get you in the end and it's sticking out of a toilet. I'm sorry, maybe on the ass. It was the- And I assumed that Gouli was going to bite someone in the butt. But I'd seem like all the clues were there. Yeah, it was the Onoday armist lawsuit of its day. It went to fans. You haven't heard about this?

No, I didn't hear about that. They, people sued, which movie was it that like it had Onoday armist in the trailer. And then of course, as often happens, the trailer is not based on a final version of the film on a day arm. It's not in it. And the fans of on a day arm is sued that you, they will solve this movie under false pretenses and they won, my friend. They won, setting a wheel.

What damages? What possible damages? I don't know. They have claimed on that. Well, the damages, I guess, of buying the ticket. Buying one ticket? This is, yeah. You know, it's a, what do you call it?

A simple, like a, this becomes the, this becomes the premise of, yeah. So the Civil Action 2 on a DeArmage Rising, you know. I'm just saying, as a class action suit, I'm sure they all got five cents, Entered into this onto the armist, but you know what it's the principle of it It's a principle they've taught Hollywood that they cannot be fucked around with This is a promise of on a day armist This this that's a good precedent though. Does this mean that I can now sue for It's a renting highland or endgame because I watched the trailer and it had a bunch of wacky special effects in it that aren't in the actual movie.

It says a shot of specifically good. Yeah. My guess is that the sexual limitations is probably, it's probably run out on that one, but maybe not. Yeah. I'm gonna go for it. I've been giving me some confidence. Is that the one with Mario van Peoples in it? No, that's three.

The Sorcerer or the. Or the final dimension, the final dimension, yeah. I feel like I remember that trailer a lot, because I just remember the narration being saying, his name is Kane, and I'm like, oh, yeah. That's the one where I like yesterday. He like turns a truck, he like turns a truck invisible, or there's an illusion truck that's like,

yeah, he's a, he's a magic man. He like, it's split and half, and his bottom half runs away, and then you understand, Steve, try to understand, try to understand, try to understand, try to, he's a magic man. He like it split in half and his bottom half runs away. And then you understand Steve try to understand try to understand try to try try to understand. Mm-hmm. He's a magic. All right. Well, now that that's done it was yesterday the Danny Boyle movie about the Beatles not

being here. The movie came out yesterday. I'm the people now. How did they time to file the lawsuit if it was just yesterday? Oh boy. Wow. They were. The listener knows what I'm saying. Who was she gonna play in that movie?

I don't know. Someone who was not integral to the plot apparently. I guess. Yeah. That kind of thing. I mean, that happens. It reminds me of the story of the movie Dangerous Minds where Andy Garcia was in that movie and they just removed his plot entirely.

And he's just, I guess they did it early enough that they didn't advertise it as an Andy Garcia joint, you know, but interesting. Okay. So Jay and Helen are too injured to escape. So Brad decides to go for help. But there's a, when he goes over to his bike, there's a critter just standing there like, and then pushes his bike over. It's hilarious. And then he witnesses one of the critters is growing to a much larger size. That probably won't come into play later. And now, no reason is ever given for that, right? Or did I just miss it?

Well, they mentioned Adelaide. Yeah, they're eating a lot. That's not how eating works. I mean, maybe, maybe just for, all the critters are eating. My nutritionist would say otherwise. But you're just like, Stu, you're not eating enough to grow three more feet within minutes. Yeah, I'm sorry, we're all alien balls don't fit to your normal human logic. Right, you're right.

It's a matter of when they don't explain. Okay. So Brad runs into the street and he bumps into the bounty hunters who were riding around in a police cruiser and he convinces them to come back to the farm and help him save his family. Now this is when this is, okay, he is the first person. Now, this movie has gotten away up to this point with the fact that every species in the universe speaks English except for the critters.

That the bounty hunter speaking English, the prison warden speaks English, everyone who works the prison speaks English, that they and yet somehow when they say, I'd like to comment, they say it. It's going to go. Yeah, go to comment. Sorry. Yeah. Basic that they this, this is the first character. Brad, who recognizes that this bounty hunter looks like a famous musician or pieces together

that crits might be critters and therefore a thing that they are looking for that he can ask them questions about. And up to this moment, it's like the who's on first routine where everyone is going out of their way to avoid asking questions that might shed light on any scenario. I believe that what happens is he comes in, he's like, you know, he's like, you got to help me, he got to help me, he doesn't know that he's railing. It's like, there's all these critters. Yeah, he says critters and they go like crazy.

And they say crites, because they know, they know that like this is, they're here for the critters. So finally, there's someone who was mentioning, but I think it's also, it's the coincidence of them being called crites, which sounds like critters that breaks the illusion for me that English is galactic basic and everyone speaks it. It's just too easy for me. I don't know. Yeah, I mean, I, I think it's also to show that the kid is the real hero and that adults are dumb.

Yeah. Which as a child watching this movie, I'm like this, makes perfect sense. The one sympathetic moment really for the dad is when Brad is like, I've got to go. I've got to go help the family. And you can tell the dad is like proud of Brad for doing this. And he says, okay, do it. And he doesn't say I'm proud of you or I love you because like, that's the thing I would say I guess.

But you can tell the pride in his eyes. That's good work by Billy Greenbush in that moment. I think communicating. So the family decides to fight their way out of the barricaded bedroom. They blow up one of the critters again. It's hilarious. They take another shot of the critter and it rolls away. The critters are also incredibly, once the movie decides the critters have to go, they are incredibly easy to destroy.

Yeah, great. I love it. She takes a shot and one of the critters rolls away and she's like, the mom is like, can I have another shell and he's like, we're all out. And I'm like, you gotta come on. You have to let me know how much ammo's left. It's like I'm playing a fucking video game. So she goes or a, you know, just what they're like, I'm about to make a last stand at like the top of the stairs. There's critters coming up the stairs when the front of the house explodes. The bounty hunters have arrived. They start blowing them all away. It's great. They, the family escapes the sheriff shows up. Brad runs back inside to go save Chewy the cat, which I totally understand and I would do the same

thing. At this point, the bounty hunters are like going room to room. They go into the bathroom. They blow up the critter in the toilet. It's hilarious. Brad goes to find Chewy the cat when he's hilarious. It seems like someone's butt could get bitten or something. Yeah, let it go. Let it go. No, no, let's stay on this for at least one more minute. Is there a movie where a monster comes out of the toilet and bites a person's butt?

Like does that actually actually accomplish it? Because there's a snake that comes out of the toilet in the hard ticket to Hawaii, but I don't know. And there's a snake that comes out of a toilet in snakes and a plane, but it bites a guy's dick doesn't bite Yeah, what is he say when he realized I believe I believe I'm quoting when he says get off my dick Which is my favorite line in that home movie because it's like that is a very understated reaction to a snake fighting your penis Yeah, this guy's pretty chill, like, this is not his first time getting a snake on a penis. He is tired, he is tired, he is mother fucking snakes,

biting his mother fucking penis. This is the mummy three of snake penis bites. Now in dream catchers, do the aliens go up through the toilet in that? Am I remembering that correctly? Oh yeah, I guess I'm in the leasels. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, one does go into a guy's

and then it's trapped in the toilet. Okay. And isn't climbing into a guy's crap in the toilet. Okay. And isn't climbing into a guy's butt to control his body? Isn't that the, is that counts as biting, right? Well, let's see, there's more about the situation. I mean, I feel like if the shit weasel's on a dream catcher, that counts.

That's the same as a part of racing. He's really biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. In general biting, going on. Like whether or not biting is the main activity, there's some biting that happens in the process of getting up there. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side.

He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side.

He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side.

He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. He's certainly biting his side. I mean, that's just a dog pulling the back of a girl's bathing suit down, but it seems right here. But a dog performing some kind of assault is truly a monster. That is a bad dog. Let's just say that's a bad dog. Yeah. All dogs may go to heaven, but it's a technicality. It's only because the mystery of the Lord's forgiveness. There's nothing to do with the mask, not a dog.

Yeah. John Calvin's dog was like, I wish that God hadn't decided when you were born that you were already one of the elect because you certainly shouldn't go to heaven for pulling that bathing suit. So most of the, the bounty hunters kill off most of the critters except for a big ol' critter that beats up Brad a little bit and then gets scared off. It escapes. and in the process of running away, it manages to snare April and take April with it. Now, why is this large critter not merely eating this girl like to get even bigger with every, yeah.

Like, this is the one point at which a kid messing happens And the only reason, the only reason I can think of our upsetting reason. So I guess I shouldn't dwell on it, but it just seems odd. Sorry, I'm just quickly adding this to the goofs section of Critic IMDB page. I mean, the real reason is because this is the motivation for act three. Yeah. This is the saving of April by Brad. But I're also have like a snack later like they're about to go on a little space. He's probably full already. He's not hungry right now,

but he knows he's going to be hungry later. So he's just taking it exactly. I don't know the thing. The bigger you get the hunger, you're going to get, Elliot. It's that's how you know. So if you're the smaller, you get the less hungry, you can get. So if I'm the size of a of a thimble, I'll never have to eat again. Never have to eat again. I think they cover that in Ant-Man and Quantum Mania right now. Okay. Dan said that as if he said it very professionally. So yeah, the big critter, but just a touch of a sassy neighbor in a sit-com, just a touch. Just a little bit of distance, just a bit. So the big critter and a couple of his buddies take drag April back to the spaceship. They're going to get out of here.

They're taking too much heat from these bounty boys. So they fire up the ship. Charlie, Brad runs, runs after them. He bumps into Charlie. The two of them go find the alien ship. They climb aboard. They wake up April. They get her off.

They drop a pipe bomb, unlit on the crittership, they escape. Charlie then uses his pitching and his drunkenness to make a fire bomb that he perfectly checks through the closing hatchway, which then catches fire, sets fire to the pipe bomb, the fleeing ship then explodes. But first, but not until the ship just out of spite shoots lasers to blow up the farmhouse. Which is insane. And you can hear, am I wrong that you can hear the aliens laughing?

Right? If they did it, yeah. Yeah. Critters like it's such a part of the joy of them. It's such a throwaway gag. Then it's crazy that it's the biggest effect in the entire movie. That's the thing they commit to. It's like, yeah, just then blowing up that.

But I love that because it's the critters just doing it out of anger or just to be ducks. There's no reason for them to do it, but you're right, it's a huge explosion. They blow up the whole house. It's great. And they repurpose it a little bit when they blow up the

Crittership too. There's that first shot where it's like clearly a composite Explosion. I think it cuts to a reaction then it comes back and it's like the tail end of the house Exploding Again, like they just really wanted to get their mileage out of that house explosion. That's what they do. Do they do something similar in one of the fantasy movies where like the same house explosion is two different houses? Yeah. So that one is the same house.

They blew up once, but they had one scene playing out on one side and another scene playing out on the other side and it doubled as two houses. So they had tall man doing one thing on one side and then Mike and Reggie on the other side to get the most out of one house explosion. You got to double there. There's your fantasam facts from Stephen. The fantasam facts. I can't wait for that to be a regular part of the flop house.

Brought to you by tall boys when the tall man wants to relax, he reaches it's all boy. So the bounty hunters who are friends with the family now give Brad little space gizmo. Charlie wonders off of them. No, not from Gremlins though. No, that was from space. I mean, who knows where gizmos from? I guess we'll find out when the Gremlins TV show of engine appears on HBO Max. So the gizmos starts to bleep and Brad pushes the button and then we see the house rebuild

itself. Like it's basically just played backwards, but it's great. It's great. Now, this really doesn't make any sense because he hands the cumin says, call me, like it's a convenient thing. Then it starts beeping and when he presses it, it brings the house back together. It just, I guess it's magical realism. I guess this is when Gabriel Garcia Marquez was brought onto the set at the last of the

military rights. Yeah. Did you guys also clock how like distraught D. Wallace seemed about the house being blown up like didn't like she seemed just really torn up about it. It's like I would just be happy to be alive, I think at that point. I don't know. That's our whole house. And she's a whole new. Yeah.

Yeah. But like, she's been through a tough night. She's still got critter venom in her veins. Yeah, she's probably an actual emotional from the drugs, whatever those are. True. But true, okay. And that's what I think.

Yeah, Chewie gets sucked up into the house as well. And then we find Chewie is actually in the mailbox. It's adorable. And you're like, oh, at least the nightmare is over. Camera pans over to the barn. We got critter eggs and then the critters giggle, end of movie and I'm like, so question, do we set up critter eggs

at any point leading up to that moment in the movie? No, it is never mentioned that critters lay eggs. So those could be any eggs and the critters are just laughing about something else. Well, that was my thinking was, they did that shot of the eggs. They left it as isn't they realized like oh We haven't set up these eggs. Let's put a critter laugh over top. Yeah, really make sure the audience knows what we're looking at the movie

It's very likely. It's a good like summary of like my issue. I think with This movie where it's like they don't really know what they want to do with the critters specifically. And I feel like it's part of like the movie's tone issues and making the critters funny at one point and then kind of scary at another, making them capable, but then also making them like feral creatures. It just seemed like a lot of jumping around and a lot of sure is a lot of like too many cooks in the kitchen throwing ideas into a pot and being like let's just make them all the things. Well, you know what we're there already. So let's get into the final judgments of whether we thought it was a good bad movie, a bad bad movie, a movie we kind of like.

Look, I'm a simple man and if you give me, if you give me a movie with a bunch of small monster puppets running around, I'm basically going to be happy. I think that Quitters, this is a reason it has endured as much as it has. There's like, there were, you know, this kind of thing to some degree was a dime a dozen, but there were a couple that pushed through because they had a little extra charm. And I would say, Critters has a little extra charm. It is a little extra charm. Critters two is probably the stronger Critters movie. Without questions. 100%. But I mean, there's a lot, a lot is said about the work of Mick Harris because he's done a lot of up and down things, but like you can tell when he, what he, Chris, do I remember much better when I was younger and I think it's because he brings another level to it that the first critters does.

Yeah, there's a little more gleefulness and to what's going on. But anyway, I, you know, I like this movie is what I have to say. Who, who else wants to weigh in? Yeah, I mean, I, I clearly like critters. I, I don't know, there's, there's something about how this like, this movie does have a lot going on and it doesn't quite know what it wants to be. But I think that for me, as part of the charm, it's short. It feels kind of like the perfect like VHS movie, like this like short little thing. You get some little monsters, a couple of gags,

you get some, you know, like, I don't know, a lot of performers who you were like, oh yeah, I know them from something else. I don't know. Yeah, thumbs up. And all the bounty hunter crap, like I love all that stuff. I love all the monster effects. It's a lot of fun. Yeah, it's a movie I kind of like, but I have to admit, it is while watching it, and while thinking about afterwards, I just keep thinking about, even if it's not a Gremlins rip off or, you know, whatever, there's so much in it that I feel like Gremlins does better in terms of the tone of it being both funny and scary, the monsters being kind of intelligent, but also kind of beasts that are just driven by their, you know, appetites and setting up the town

and the family. Now again, this is no, it's no insult to critters to say that it is not as good as a movie that Joe Dante and Steven Spielberg worked on, you know, but that the, that and that has, I think probably still what the best puppet creatures I can think of in a movie seriously, so those in Gremlins and Gremlins too. So there's part of me that's watching it and being like, oh, this is making me really want to watch Gremlins. But that being said, I agree that it's like a really good

kind of like 80s VHS movie. Like it's a movie that if you're at that stage in your life where I was when I was renting 80s VHSs when you're like an adolescent or a teen or something. And you've already watched tremors a hundred times. You've watched tremors, you watch Grammlins for summaries and you watch Gooleys before critters, which is weird. I don't know why you would do that. That is weird. But it's, you know, it's totally fine. It's super short. I wish that they just, it's

just, there's a, there's a bunch of things in the movie I wish they did more with like the bounty hunters. I kept being like, oh boy, these bounty hunters and they just don't kind of do a lot with them. But again, critters too, kind of, it's, it's, it's, we're skipping critters to go straight to critters too, you know. Yeah, I mean, I'm realizing that I was flagging a bunch of issues with this movie as we're talking about it.

And I don't want it to seem like I don't like this movie because I do actually really enjoy it. And I have a lot of nostalgia for it. I do find it like a bit meandering at times and the like yeah I get hung up on like the logic of the critters but and like what Ellie was saying it's like it's hard not to compare it to like grandma's or better movies so that definitely like gives marks against it, but I still kind of liked it. And yeah, love watching it as a kid. The bounty hunter's kickass,

that opening scene is amazing. And it's everything I like. And the critter effects are great too. So. The movie I think in a weird way, it suffers because the opening scene promises so much. Yes, I think it over promises for sure. You think like, oh, we're going to come back to this weird smooth floating man, and this like prison asteroid, and the movie gets very small

very quickly. Do you think necessarily a bad thing? Do you think the movie would have been improved if the bounty hunters were routinely checking in with a hologram of that smooth guy? And like, they're giving him bad reports and he's getting angry or an angrier. I mean, I do like that idea. I think it would have helped. And yeah, we're basically saying the same thing

that Critters 2, I think, is this superior execution of this premise i would definitely recommend that one first but if you got a uh... of beat up old via just tape of critters to put on an old crt tb uh... that is that sounds like a good night to me i was having i was having a conversation with my wife and my older son about sequels that are better than the original movies

and i didn't bring up critters and now I'm going to have to. And then I'm going to have to explain what colors this to. Call them up right now. Okay. Call them up. Let me get them into room. Sammy, come in. Daddy has a lesson for you.

It's time for you to learn about the crates. I don't want to be about crates on the playgrounds or on the streets. I want to be the one to tell you about crates. So you know all the right words. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪ Oh, I hope they've got the bread bowl. Have you seen the bread bowl at this place?

Good evening. Welcome to Maximum Fun. Have you been here before? It's her first time. Very good. My day recommend are special. Please. Can I interest you in the Max Fun Drive?

I'm told they're cooking up something quite extraordinary this year. I've heard about this. With limited time, thank you gifts for new and upgrading members. That's right. We'll take it. How would you like your episodes? Can I get them excellent with new bokeh on the side? Oh, are there livestream events?

Absolutely. You know, if you're interested in events, meet-up day is returning. What? Oh, you're gonna love Meetup Day. It's the best. Okay, let me make sure I have everything Max von Dreibe 2023 with limited time thank you gifts, livestream events, meet-up day, excellent episodes, and of course, new bonus content. Sounds perfect. Great, we'll get it started and it'll be ready in two weeks. March 20th. Oh, can we also get a couple of waters? Of course. Where am I? On Maximum Fun. What do you want? A podcast mini-series about the prisoner. Whose side are you on? That would be telling, but okay, I'm on my own side. It's one of my favorite

ever TV shows. We want a podcast on it. A Prisoner Podcast. You won't get it. By Hooker by Crook, we will. Who are you? I'm Elliot Kaylin. Who is number one? Jesse Thorn, but you are John Hodgman. I am not a Prisoner Oh, okay. Are you all right? Okay, I'll watch it. All four episodes of V-Potting You Are Out Now. Before we move on, I just want to mention that maximum fun drive, max fun drive is coming up at the end of this month. It will be. Wait, Dan, the time when max fun listeners get to show their support for their favorite shows in the form of money.

Yeah, the money that keeps particularly me and Elliot afloat during this time, when perhaps we don't have the normal career that we have been relying on for a while. I cannot emphasize enough, you are pledged dollars keep a roof over my head. Yeah. And a song in my hearts. And that song goes, hey, get ready for Max Fun Drive. Dan's got an announcement right now. Yeah. So that'll be the last couple of weeks of March. And we're going to do a few special things for Max Fun Drive. And we'll have more announcements about that coming up. But right now, I am mentioning it to get you guys to write in to the Flop House podcast at gmail.com.

If you want us to recommend a personalized movie for you, a personalized movie recommendation from the Flop House is what is on offer. What you have to do is email the Flophouse podcast at gmail.com and just tell us a couple of what you think might be pertinent facts about yourself and your taste. Don't go overboard. Maybe try to keep it to like three to five bullet points and then we will, you know, recommend movies. We'll compete with one another.

In fact, to recommend some movies for a few of those listeners is right. And we probably can't accommodate everyone who might be interested. But this will be one of our many's. We'll do personalized recommendations for you, the listeners. Allie. And I want to say we're going to be saying this a lot during the Max Fund Drive, but thank you ahead of time to all of our pledgers. Thank you during the time because you're pledging throughout the year with your money that supports us. But thank you ahead of time for those who will be joining or

upgrading. We'll talk to you more about it during Max Fund drive and we'll be saying thank you a lot because it really means a lot to us. And while we are in large, large, large, overwhelming, low-age part supported by listeners like you. We also have a couple of sponsors, one of which, I will tell you a little bit right now. You've probably heard about microdosing, if not, just know that all sorts of people are microdosing daily to feel healthier and perform better. Our show today is sponsored by microdose companies,

microdose companies deliver perfect entry-level doses of THC that help you feel just the right amount of good. If you don't have experience with THC, sometimes edibles can be overwhelming. These are calculated to be just enough to make you feel a little looser, more pleasant, maybe chill out. I find that for me, it's good that it, yeah, I don't know, I just feel more flexible on them. I can sometimes be a guy who gets grumpy when things change and it takes me while

to turn my ship around. And yet, when I have a microdose coming, I feel just a little more open to the world. So, microtosis available nationwide to learn more about microdosing THC. Go to microtose.com and use code Flop. That's FLOP to get free shipping and 30% off your first order. Links can be found in the shows description, but again, that is microtose.com code Flop.L.

I believe you have a little more Flop has specific business for the listeners. You better believe it. Thanks for finishing that sentence. I wasn't sure if you were done yet. I can see it. We're just applause. We have a live show coming up.

I've been saying, I have so it's not going to keep saying it till it happens. Then maybe I'll keep saying it afterwards. We'll be appearing before your very eyes. If you live in Brooklyn, New York and you are at the Bellhouse in Brooklyn Sunday, April 2nd, 730 PM, you don't have to live in Brooklyn. You just have to be in Brooklyn at the Bellhouse in Brooklyn Sunday, April 2nd, 730 PM. You don't have to live in Brooklyn. You just have to be in Brooklyn at the Bellhouse when we're there. And you will see us in person. Our first live show of the year will be talking about, that's right. Battlefield Earth, a long time fan requested favor. The John Travolta, Forest Whitaker, aliens with nose

rings and red locks, epic mess that really ruined a lot of careers for a while. So that's Sunday, April 2nd, 7th, 3rd, PM at the Bellhouse in Brooklyn. It's going to be a lot of fun. We're going to be doing new PowerPoint presentations beforehand. You can come ask questions and have them answered. As always, we'll be sticking around afterwards to sign merchandise and take pictures or whatever people want to do. This is your chance to breathe the same air. And I promise we don't, we're not sick. So it's okay to breathe out there as the flop house guys and just have a good time. You know, it's time to have fun again. America fun.

Let's have fun again. Let's just have fun. We're going to have fun. We can promise you fun. We can't promise you that you will leave this show smarter or more enlightened, but we can promise the eleph had a good time. So that's Sunday, April 2nd, 7.30 pm at the Bell House. If you want to buy your tickets ahead of time and I recommend it because these shows almost

always sold out. That's the bellhouseny.com, the bellhouseny.com. We hope to do more live shows this year, but this is the only one we have in the calendar at the moment. So if you'd like to see us live, you should come to this show. And I thank you, Daniel. All right. Well, let's move on to some letters from listeners.

Letters listeners like you. Maybe if one of these letters is from you, this one, we find out right in and tell us did Dan read one of your letters, knowing our backlog of letters, you'll find out in a few months or rather, we'll find out. You'll know right away when you hear Dan say it. But when you send the message to us, it'll take a while for us to read it online. Dan will probably see your letter, put it in a bucket somewhere on his computer, forget about it, and then pick it at the last minute before we really. Yeah, nothing could be clearer than that.

So this is from Matt last name withheld, who writes, hey floppy boys, love what you do in the pod. Been thinking recently for no reason about movie or book titles and how a bad one can distract or even detract from the overall experience. Like what's even going to be great. Live, die, repeat, slash, edge of tomorrow, take your pick or Cinderella man. I also have a few title pet peeves that are grinding my ears. Uh oh.

Specifically the use of garrons. I've got to get the ears looked at. The use of garrons as the first word. Like a garranger. Like a garranger. Like a garranger. They've got private Ryan. It's driving Miss Daisy.

Also the use of the word combo, the good in the title, i.e. the good doctor, the good wife, the good bad movie, et cetera. But not the good, the bad yugger, which is a fantastic title in a.e. The Good Doctor, The Good Wife, The Good Bad Movie, et cetera. But not the Good, The Bad, The Ugly, which is a fantastic title in a great movie. Although based on those other names, does that mean that like, because normally when they say something's the good, it's like an implication that they're actually not that good. Like a good sign. Yeah, do you think the Good, The Bad, and The Ugly, they actually mean the bad, the bad, and the ugly, or the bad, the good, and the beautiful.

Oh, interesting. Yeah. And finally, although there is a movie called The Bad and the Beautiful, is that movie mean the good and the ugly? I got to watch these movies again. Hold on. Yeah. And finally, I'm also tired of movie titles having the same titles, parts of the same franchise, IE Halloween, 79 and 2018 scream in 1996 and 2022. Texas chainsaw massacre, take your pick and even Rambo slash John Rambo or Rocky slash Rocky, but the fast and the furious and fast and furious fall under that.

I believe so. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Uh, like just put a number behind it or add the word a Requiem or some shit in the cooler title protocol. There's no, there's no, we're going to get to, I'm going to, I'm going to tell you, I guess what word I don't like in titles, but cooler title protocol. There's no, we're gonna get to, I'm gonna tell you, I guess, what word I don't like in titles, but the word Rekwee, I might always find hilarious because it never really means, like it's just to be trying to class it up in some way. Yeah, sounds fancy.

Yeah. One class of those predators. You might've also come up with all that alien versus predator overture or something like that, you know. Well, Rekweeem is a, specifically a mourning, like a song for the dead. Like, uh, but how does that play other than the fact that they kill people? How does that play?

Is it the, no, that's how it plays? That's no, it's like Requiem. Yeah. Like a referee or a dream, you know, is Requiem for, no, Requiem for a dream is a title that makes sense, Dan. No, I know, but at least in the, anyway, I don't like it either. Can we throw a cover in the different titles? It makes a little more sense than overture, which would be like, okay, this is the thing

that's going to happen before any of the story. Yeah, because it's the prologue. It's a prequel, yeah. Yeah, meet the fuckers Requiem. Did you hear about the Morgan's Requiem, yeah? One drink if you guys have any title pet peeves or bad titles for good movies that come to mind, keep up the good work. Flappley years, Matt. You know, like mine actually was said in the letter. The weird gerund thing, we didn't even talk about, you got your what,

the savings silverman and your feeling Minnesota, feeling Minnesota. What a dumb title. What does that mean that I'm feeling? I've never having seen it. I can't tell you. Is it an attitude that I have? Like I'm feeling kind of Minnesota today Or is it telling me is it about? I'm seeing the movie. Maybe it's a longer dance. Type 5 on Minnesota. It's just feeling the grant.

I mean, who's with me? Who here works out you? You look like you work out. Oh, you're not a South. The gym. There's a feeling Minnesota is always playing on this little TV's. I don't know about that. The chair and thing doesn't bother me that much. I like being John Melchovitch as a title. I like saving private Ryan as a like I like that it is what they're what they're doing is they're telling you this story. You're gonna you're gonna experience it. It isn't something that happened and it's over and it's history. This is something that is alive. This is a living thing.

You picked a couple of the better examples of it. I think that, I guess, but I guess that you do point out that the problem with something like feeling Minnesota is more the meaninglessness of it than the inherent quality of the articles of speech. Exactly. Or like finding farrester when really that movie should have been called, who's the man now, dog?

You got anything Stuart? Or I mean, I hate it any time they try and put in a name for comedic effect. Like I now pronounce you Chuck and Larry. But I guess I just hate that name because that movie sucks. I'm a big, this is after defending Jaren's, this might seem hypocritical, but I'm really, I'm tired of the word rise in movie titles. That was going to be mine. That's the standard.

I feel it's a word that's so much. Yeah, and it often means nothing. It's not really, it does not the thing. Are you telling me? Well, I'm not the rise of Taj. Yeah, Are you telling me? Well, I'm not a rise of ties. Yeah. Are you telling me, in the previous movie,

or that, or that, whenever a sequel has rise in it, and it's like, so the last time was not when they rose to probably, like that, like the dark night rises, it's not a star. I feel like that kicks it on to me. That, that, that, that,

that kicked off and that was the worst one, but like that G.I. Joe, the rise of Cobra is about the downfall of Cobra and the rise of Skywalker is a meaningless phrase. Like it's that there's only one movie where I like the title rise and that's the David Lusche hell dance documentary rise about the history of crumping where you just see a lot of crump and clown dancing. But the. I'll accept it.

I'm going to slide. I don't wait. Is that rise of the plan of the apes? That one of them. That's one of them. But'm going to slide. I don't know. Wait, is a rise of the plan of the apes, that one of them? That's one of them, but it also doesn't. When you've already had, because Dawn of the plan of the apes, I think comes before rise the plan of the apes. Yeah, which is, yeah, wait.

I thought it was rise, Dawn war. I may be able to rise. Yeah, which is kind of wild. That's a wild choice. But then in the case, Dawn would happen first. Yeah, rise should be Dawn and Dawn should be. It's just, it's a word that is used without much paying attention to the meaning of the word rise. It feels like a like last minute decision made by a bunch of studio execs sitting around a board.

Like especially dark night rises where they're like, okay, dark night we did this cool thing where we came up with a title that wasn't just Batman. And so, you know, they're all riding high on that note. Well, we need to do that again, but how do we do it? And it's like, you know, Friday at four o'clock and they got to deliver something. So they're like, well, it's just to dark night again and throw rises. Well, it's like how people gonna know it's a Batman movie if it doesn't have Batman or dark night in the title. I mean, the fact that it's the same star and the same director and he's in a bat costume. I mean, how are people going to know? Yeah. I just discovered a title from 2022, which is Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

colon the movie. What? Maybe it's on the normal, I guess. I guess there was maybe some preexisting material called Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles that they're going off of or like like I don't know, but it's also. I think part of it is it is a it is a no, the original title was just rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. So somewhere along the line, I see someone came along came. No, no, no, that's the official title. The one with the movie. I'm just saying that I'm not

arguing with you. It's okay. Some producer. I'm I'm not going to see because Anna D'Armis wasn't in the title the first time. Okay. Throw the movie in there to make it clear to everyone. Well, as we talked about in the podcast before, the same thing happened to Hot Dog. We're like, we can't have people show them with the theater expecting to buy free hot dog. Yeah, that's a restaurant. I mean, yeah, yeah. I will say that's a thing that I miss is having stuff being designated as the motion picture or the movie. I think it's, I don't know, it's just classy.

It could be more of it. Yeah, it's also funny how like the title, the numeral with a, using a Roman numeral at the end of a title, it was also a way to like, class it up. And then like, and that's, we'll just use a number. And we're not even gonna use numbers anymore. Well, maybe we'll stick the number in a word.

And it's like, you had something so beautiful. You could've used this Roman numerals forever, you know. Yeah. Phantasm 4 oblivion. With the Roman numerals. Perfect. Exactly. Superbowl understands,

they're like, how do we class up this thing? We're a bunch of guys just slam into each other and get real brain injuries that destroy their lives forever. Well, just put a Roman numeral on it. Oh, yeah, classy. Great. Now it's an American institution, yeah. I just have one more thing about that letter.

It's funny that they mentioned what's eating Gilbert great because I was just complaining about that title yesterday. I find it very annoying. I don't know why I've never seen the movie. Well, you expect it's going to be that a ghoulie is going to jump out of the toilet and take a bite on them. Yeah, exactly. And I'm sure it doesn't deliver on that.

It wasn't until years later that the full, my full hatred of the title Goodwill Hunting bloomed because at the time I just sort of accepted it and then somewhere along the line, I'm like, wait a minute, no, wait, his name is Will Hunting. And he's good. And he's good. And he's good. And he's also hunting for good will. This movie, one of fucking Oscar. For that's when the Oscar for this title. Yeah. Yeah. Well, they made the decision. And I'm fine with it. Yeah. Can I ask you a question?

It does account as a parent though. That's the thing because it's So I'm fine with it. Yeah. Can I ask you a question? Do you like apples? That's the thing, because it's his name. Oh, sorry. It's the same. I was just asking Dan if he likes apples. And then I was going to hold up a poster that says Academy Award winning for title. Goodwill. And I'd say, how do you like these apples?

And then Dan would be like, fuck. I don't. Yeah. Really like normal apples. All that much as fruit goes. No, I don't like those. I don't like those. I don't like these. I don't really like normal apples all that much as fruit goes. No, I don't like it. I don't like it. I don't like it.

I don't like it. I mean, I mean, I only want, I haven't seen Goodwill Hunting since I saw it in the theaters and it came out, but I remember it being a very good movie. Like I remember being. I like it just fine. I thought it was good. Yeah. But I just, you know, years later, I'm like what a fucking stupid title.

It's a dumb title. I mean, can you consider it was the direct world of you of Stevie Vans Ant. Like he's got this amazing career as a musician and then he decides to make a hold on. Let me do some research. Oh, never mind. Oh, never mind. And see what you're doing. Never mind.

So I spell differently and pronounce differently. Yeah. Yeah, it is. It's a totally different name. So one more letter from listeners, a specific listener. This one's all the listeners together for a class action letter named Tony, one of the spellings from Tony, Tony, Tony, I'll let you decide which one. Okay.

Missed letter from a Mr. Tony T Tiger. Tony writes, Hey, peaches, I recently discovered your podcast and have been working my way through the back catalog in between new episodes. Thank you for listening. Anywho, here's my entry for the freeform contest described in episode 20, 10,000 BC. I told my mom about the flop house and we listened to the first episode together. When I asked her what she thought, she said, I hope the levels get better because I couldn't hear that one guy.

I told her that the levels do eventually get better, but she seems skeptical. So I'm not sure that the flop has gained another loyal listener, but you can add one more listen to episode one. Thank you for your consideration, RSC came to USA. Now I can only assume that back in those days, we were encouraging people to listen to those episodes. Now I would like to discourage them. We were stupider. Elliot wasn't on the show. Yeah, which meant you guys were much stupider. Oh, boy.

The sound was like, you wouldn't have to reassure your mom that the sound would get better. If you just played her one from a recent, I mean, maybe his mom is a big fan of stealth. It's that's why we should make gender pronouns. It's such as anyway, but it is Tony with an eye. So I don't, I anyway, I solved the mystery that I said before but Tony Tony told me. Yeah. No, it's too late for me to guess and win the contest.

Yeah. Allie, if you win the contest, you can just decide what movie we cover on the fluff. Oh, wow. It's amazing. Stealth, have the flat pass. Oh, wow. This amazing stealth. Have we done that? Oh, we do. I guess I can listen to it.

You go back to that. Yeah. This is just a word advice. If you want to share the flat pass with somebody, I would say please do. Please help spread the word. You know, we've been doing this for a long time, but we're going to keep doing it. So you might as well help us out with it. But don't maybe don't go with the real history of it.

And we live in fear of it. If it's taking because but now it's an important part of our income. So very much so in our cell. What's not, let's not do. Well, yeah, okay. Yeah, it's doing is now, you know, in a real turn around. Stewart is doing my heel turn in this episode.

Along with the prime mode. Yeah, now the main business and thriving vice magnate, Stewart Wellington doesn't have a podcast anymore, but now that he's made a deal with the Colombians, right? Yeah, I just keep chasing my magazine dreams over here, trying to get bigger and bigger and wider. Ever since you saw Young Warrior,

you wanted to get into the publishing world, right? Yeah, that's what that movie's about, magazine dreams. Oh, okay, that's the thing we do after letters. We make recommendations. Oh, movies that we've seen. Usually recently, it doesn't have to be. I'm going to say one that I saw recently, though, I was in the, in my land. You know, sometimes when you have a flexible schedule and you live in New York, which is New York says made up of five burrows, guys. And a bunch of stories, a bunch of people whining about whenever they have to go to a different

burrow. So that's me and this story, me who lives in Brooklyn having to go into Manhattan for a couple of doctors appointments. And so I built a whole day around it, which included some free time, time to kill. Yeah, because it's going to take you a few hours on your horse to get to. Are you recommending time to kill? I'm recommending no time to die. No, I am recommending. I went to the craft house, Laura Manhattan, and I saw a rep screening of twin peaks, Fire Walk with me, a movie that I rejected. When it first was out, as many people did who wanted more of the twin peaks they'd seen on their televisions. And that is horrifying.

Sadness. Yeah, you wanted more of the James Hurley goes off on his own and gets an emergency right? Yeah, exactly. We all want it. sadness. You wanted more of the James Hurley goes off on his own and gets an emergency right? Exactly. We all want to. But it's a movie that now, I mean, certainly with the return and also just with time and knowing what to expect out of it, I don't have the same preconceived notion problems with it. And I can see it for what it is, which is a movie that I'll be honest.

Like there's stuff in it. I still am not as wild about as other Lynch movies. I think it goes a little hard into his tendency for like, let's just throw some stuff on here that's not gonna be explained at the beginning of the movie. But I did, I do think that it's a movie that really centers the character of Laura gives Cheryl Lee a lot to play. It's a very sad movie about her with the drama. The center's the character of Laura gives Cheryl Lee a lot to play.

It's a very sad movie about her with the drama. So it's not like a movie that's fun to watch, but it is interesting how it takes, you know, like this character from Twin Peaks who prior to this was just sort of a motivating factor, kind of the stereotypical like dead girl that takes everything off and puts her at the center of her own story and gives some sort of catharsis to that. And you know, there was utter silence in the theater after it had been. Which I think you're expecting people to cheer and make toss home making for any.

Yeah. Yeah. I'm very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, very, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like,

I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like,

I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like,

I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm like, I'm fair to Inland Empire, which I didn't really give a fair shake. I just kind of was like, I can't watch this and I turned it off. Maybe if I saw it in the theater, I would like it better. But I know that you love... Well, the heart. Well, the heart, I cannot get through wild at heart. I don't know.

Yeah, I mean, only one the palm door, I mean. Well, I have to agree with the can. I mean, they've never got it wrong, Dan. I mean, like to tame one the Palm door, right? And that was when that wasn't, didn't quite work for me. So I get it. No, okay. Well, I know you loved it.

I guess I'm talking to babies on this podcast. This is the segment where we shit on movies that Stewart Loves and the Can film festival also loved. Oh, God. Our guest is Owen Glyberman. And he's here to complain about bones and all. Hey, I'm going to recommend another sloppy gore fest. That's right. I'm going to recommend.

Sloppy gore fest. That's right. I'm going to recommend. Sloppy gore fest. I'm recommending a movie from 1995 titled before Sun, or before sunrise. Written, written and directed by Richard Linglater, starring either Hogan Julie Delby. Well, the wild blood, all the wild blood on that one. Sloppy, strap on your barf bags. Yeah, I assume that strap them on. Just strap them. Don't worry, we have a nurse in the lobby for tonight's screening of before sunrise.

If your hands get too weak from vomiting, you'd want them strapped on. Yeah, well, you don't want to get barbed on your hands. When your hands aren't on the inside of the bag, you'll hold the bag for a certain hour. Wait, what? Wait, you're going to have to draw your bar back your birthday for me before I back it because this is our episode of Shark 10. Oh, wow. Yeah, so I'm gonna recommend this movie.

It's a movie that I missed years ago. And I don't know why, like, I feel like Richard Linklater is one of the best at doing just like hangout movies and I feel like this is no different. It really captures the feel of being like young and in love and in Vienna, which I was living in Vienna around the time of this movie. And yeah, it's great. I loved it. Recommend if I recommend if you, you know, you're kind of a romantic or you just want to see young Ethan Hawke. Yeah. We wouldn't want to see that. I don't know. Some of the dancers need to know. I need to know. I think all these in a hawk would look at it and be like, oh, my lost youth.

That makes sense because I have pictures of young Ethan Hawke. I've just enough for every one in the United States except for one person. So I need to figure out that he's not so much. I mean, he probably already has a bunch of them too. Yeah, he probably his family has some and his, yeah, in the sense. Anyway, I'm going to recommend a movie too. I'm going to recommend another, another, another, another gross outboard fest. Slatter fest, yeah. I'm going to recommend the movie Girlfriends from 1978. This is a kind of slice of life, you know, street level view comedy drama directed by Claudia Wile, written by Vicki Plann. And there's a, it stars Melanie Mayeran as a young woman who is at that point in her life

where she needs to start kind of taking her life seriously and figuring out what she was doing. She wants to be a photographer. She's mostly a bar mitzvon wedding photographer because she can't get her career together. Her roommate has just left her in order to get married, and she has to face the fact that what does she want in her life? Does she want to be by herself?

Or does she want to be with other people? And I really like to a lot. It's a very, I was mentioning it to a friend of mine, and she described it as being kind of like Francis Ha for that time period, which I think it's very similar. It is a similar sort of episodic structure. And there's a lot of actors in small roles

that are like Eli Wallach is in it. He's really good. Young Christopher Guest and young Bob Ballaban show up. So if you ever want to see Bob Ballaban as like the hunky young husband of a character like this. I do, yeah. It's something you don't get to see too much. And I've thought it was just it's both a kind of gentle

and sweet movie but also a real feeling movie. And took me back to periods in my life when I was younger where it's like, oh yeah, when I was newly married and my friends would come over who were not married, like the kind of the awkwardness of those moments that I hadn't thought about in a long time that our lives were different now.

And it's just, it's really good. And it's on the criterion channel right now, if you're listening to this during a time when it's still on the criterion channel. So go ahead and try it out or it's also on HBO Max in their criterion section. Try it out on HBO Max so that HBO Max doesn't cut it from their service or maybe it's when you watch it, they cut it from your service because they have to pay for it. I'm not sure. Anyway, anyway who. So that's girlfriend's. Just you and Wow. Three very classy recommendations. I'm going to have to disrupt this by recommending Gouli's three. Gouli's go to college. I don't know if you guys have ever heard of 2B, but it is the ultimate streaming service that is basically a late 90s, early 2000s video store

in streaming form. So, Gullie's Go To College is readily available on there. I mean, it's definitely a movie of its time. A lot of stuff in it that probably wouldn't fly now. I mean, it's typical like college high drinks, people pulling pranks on each other though in this movie that are called Yanks. So that was a very clever bit of a world-building thing

that they do. Frank Shankt. Because that could explain why. What about Manks? What about Bernie Shankt? Is the Mank cranky inked? I think a man comes out of the toilet at one point. I mean, this is also a classy movie,

because it's got Kevin McCarthy from Invasion of the Body Stashers as the professor who brings his goolees back. Yeah, well, and he was just like the quintessential bad guy, like kind of comedy bad guy in that era, right? So like, I don't know, I just think it's a super fun movie. It's directed by John Beakler, who did Jason, there's a part seven, there's a new blood. That's what it's about.

Oh, part seven is a fave of mind. Yeah, so he's an effects artist, turn director, and yeah, I'm like really deep in the little monster genre right now because it's a movie I'm prepping. And so yeah, I've been watching basically everything that's available. And I've watched Gulu's go to college a few times now. It is thoroughly entertaining. It's a fun ride.

Lots of laughs. Lots of fun creatures. Highly recommended. Now speaking of being an effects artist director, is there anything you would like to plug before we all go away? I mean, I wouldn't mind forever. highly recommended. Now speaking of being an effects artist director, is there anything you would like to plug before we all go away? I mean, I wouldn't mind forever. I have not officially announced this movie yet. So maybe this will be like kind of a soft announcement

right here. Well, a lot of hot news for you guys. Very random. But yeah, this is like when Manwell Miranda was on my brother, my brother and me, he was like, yeah, I'm working on this thing about rap and presidents and they're like, good luck, dude. Yeah, exactly.

And so, yeah, I'm in prep right now on another feature film. It's called Frankie Frico. And it's basically, like, pinch of into you this way. Have you ever watched a late 80s, early 90s erotic thriller and thought, I wish this had more gooleys in it. And that's the best.

Yes, I can say yes. Yeah, so yeah, just described as what Dan fervently wished for as a child every night as he played to God before going to bed. So yeah, it's basically a guy. Yupi in his house being terrorized by little monsters for 80 minutes. It's very much my love letter to the exact kind of movie we've been talking about today. So yeah, this time and I think you showed me some of the,

what some of the concept work on this. Oh, yeah. Yeah, there's a looks incredible. There's some pretty wild creatures in this. There's some, yeah, full creature suits. I'm deep in teaching myself animatronics, right? That's awesome. Because how I approach making movies is I just kind of dive

in head first and I'm like, oh yeah, I'll figure this out and now I'm stuck with the task of figuring it. So yeah, we'll see how it pans out, but I'm very excited. I'm looking forward to seeing it. Go to camera April 3rd. Yeah, that's so great. Obviously, you haven't recommended you haven't plugged it, but obviously everyone should go watch Psycho Gorman, not just because Steve made it. It's great, but also because I have a very small vocal role in it. And you guys love me, right? You want to support me?

Yeah. To support me. And I mean, and like who knows maybe I'll enlist your guys vocal talents in this project. If you were a big fan. So it's for us. I, that would be amazing. OK, so the thing that's great about this podcast

that's on the Maximum Fun Network. Oh, and very soon we're going to be doing our pledge drive, the maximum drive is coming up, get excited folks because we are excited too. We got some cool stuff planned. Do we, oh yeah, obviously this show is going to be heavily edited and made perfect and great sounding by Alexander Smith. He's the best you can find him doing a variety of different things under the name Howell Tauti.

Some of them legal. Some of them legal. Some of them questionable. Yeah, I don't endorse everything he does. I for the flop house, I've been Stewart Wellington. I've been Dan McCoy happy to not be doing this part of it. I'm the rise of Elliott Kaelin. And I'm Steve Kastanski remembering to say his name at the end of the podcast. Like, you told it.

You did right. You did. Nothing but name. remembering to say his name at the end of the podcast. You can tell it by the end, right? You can't. Nothing but name. Bye. Mm. And just to let you know, Steve, we record the Zoom video as well because we use it to do promotional clips. I'm assuming you're OK with that.

Yeah, yeah. Well, I was going to ask him. I allowed to get a screenshot of that. Yeah, yeah, well, I was gonna ask him, I allowed to get a screenshot of this. Yeah, yeah. Please. You know, when times are dark, I can look at this and see you'll die. I know exactly what Ellie is gonna do. Yeah, just me and my best friends.

And Dan knows what I'm gonna say, which is, please just let us know so that, because Dan has a habit of tweeting out screenshots where I'm like this. Well, we'll hear him in Dan and store both like. And you're defense, that's kind of your face always. Okay, because I'm talking most of the time. Yeah, exactly, I'm talking most of the time. So Dan knows to take a picture from the 90% of the podcast that's me.

I remember, I've already told him several times I'm sorry and I won't do it anymore. And yet. So now I'm making sure that our guest, our esteemed guest understands that that's my writer for any photograph. Yeah. So I could just do it right now.

Yeah. Like, three, two, one. Nice. Perfect. Maximumfun.org. Comedy and culture. Artist-owned audience supported. Artist-owned audience supported.