Ep. #362 - Dungeons & Dragons, with Adam Rex

[0:00] this episode we discuss Dungeons and Dragons the movie not to be confused

[0:06] with Dungeons and Dragons the food

[0:30] hey everyone welcome to the Flophouse I'm Dan McCoy oh hey it's me Stuart

[0:50] Wellington and hey this is Elliot Kalin I should warn everybody I'm battling a

[0:54] cold as you can tell from my sexy Kathleen Turner voice but don't worry my

[0:58] voice will be back to its non-sexy Elliot Kalin version in time for our

[1:01] upcoming virtual live show on March 19th when we'll be talking about Masters of

[1:05] the Universe more about that upcoming virtual live show on March 19th later in

[1:09] the episode but first I'd love to introduce our guest for today very

[1:12] excited about this guest he's someone whose work is very celebrated in the

[1:17] Kalin household and hopefully households across the country his name is Adam Rex

[1:21] if you don't know him he's an incredibly versatile author and artist he's got

[1:24] roughly 70 hundred children's books under his belt that's right some

[1:28] personal favorites yep some personal favorites in our house are the his two

[1:31] books of monster poetry Frankenstein Makes a Sandwich and Frankenstein Takes

[1:35] the Cake schools for stay of school which he wrote is a big one here and of

[1:39] course nothing rhymes with orange which I think is is maybe my favorite picture

[1:43] book of all time and he's the illustrator of a new book that's out now

[1:45] called Gladys the Magic Chicken and Adam Rex is our guest today thank you so much

[1:50] for joining us and thank you so much for having me and I should warn you that my

[1:53] voice always sounds bad oh okay warning received yeah

[2:00] short guy he's putting it in my pocket yeah and his warning Rolodex whenever he

[2:07] gets a warning he writes it down on a Rolodex page puts it in his Rolodex and

[2:10] he just kind of secretes it into a pocket that's bigger on the inside than

[2:13] the outside which is how he avoids bulges by putting a Rolodex in his

[2:16] pocket mm-hmm cuz I don't wanna if I go out into public and I have unsightly

[2:22] bulges I gotta tell you people don't like it yeah I get negative reviews

[2:27] down votes how many sightly bulges you have like three roughly yeah I mean wait

[2:33] milk milk I was under what are they making around the corner wait let me

[2:43] check mm-hmm is that wait you know it looks like fudge so wait wait I'm

[2:49] remembering from I'm remembering from Jared Leto and House of Gucci we should

[2:52] not we should not not confuse two different things chocolate and another

[2:57] thing so yeah Stuart fortunately for Elliot's voice you seemed like the

[3:03] proper man to talk to do the synopsis for a Dungeons & Dragons movie hell yeah

[3:08] cuz today on this bad movie podcast where we watch a bad movie and talk

[3:11] about it we're gonna be talking about 2000s Dungeons and Dragons now this was

[3:17] a movie that was that was suggested by our guest mr. X why why Dungeons &

[3:23] Dragons well I'm you know despite your nice introduction I'm keenly aware that

[3:28] probably most of your listeners don't know who I am and I feel like they're

[3:32] probably wondering why does he get to guest on his favorite podcast I don't

[3:35] get to guest on my favorite podcast so I wanted to pick a movie that would kind

[3:39] of justify I mean the weird thing is the person the person thinking that is Paula

[3:42] Tompkins who does get to guest on all of his favorite podcast it's really unfair

[3:46] and I wanted to pick a movie that would seem to sort of justify my presence and

[3:51] before I got into children's books which I consider to be my life's work I made

[3:58] my living for years illustrating fantasy role-playing games and collectible card

[4:03] games Magic the Gathering and Dungeons & Dragons and stuff for White Wolf and I

[4:08] did just hundreds oh yeah yeah White Wolf I did Changeling did you ever play

[4:13] Changeling hell yeah I mean I played it like once or twice but the books are

[4:16] gorgeous well probably not because of any of my work I did a tremendous amount

[4:20] of really bad work back then for Changeling and as long as nobody takes

[4:24] that information and goes out and tries to find any of it I'm comfortable with

[4:27] you knowing that but but I did I did a lot of good and bad stuff for for D&D

[4:33] just hundreds of illustrations over the years and and so I thought maybe that

[4:39] will translate to expertise so I think so that at least people would hear that

[4:45] about me and think okay that makes sense so when you're illustrating did you

[4:49] mostly did you mostly specialize in dungeons or in dragons I was more of a

[4:52] dragon guy than a dungeon guy but but yeah you gotta you gotta take what you

[4:57] get yeah they have two stables they have a stable for dungeon guys and a stable

[5:02] for dragon guys and they let them out of their stables to draw pictures and then

[5:05] they make them go back and this is why I never made it as a I never made it as

[5:10] a D&D artist because I misunderstood the concept and I sent them so many

[5:13] pictures of Dungeness crabs and they just accepted none of them yeah yeah

[5:18] Stuart I was wondering did you know this about our guest because I was trying to

[5:21] read your face assuming that your eyes would bulge out of your head and you

[5:26] start drooling and then pop out of the eyelids and dangle down my face well so

[5:33] a steam whistle would blow and then your eyes would turn into dice they would

[5:37] roll themselves and then the critical hit would appear in a neon sign over

[5:41] your head and then you stuff those dice back into your eyes yeah unfortunately

[5:47] that didn't happen but you know you can listeners at home Alex throw in a sound

[5:51] effect people know what just happened yeah you know I I feel like when we when

[5:59] because Adam you did a you did a limited t-shirt for us right yeah that's right

[6:03] mm-hmm and I feel like when Elliot suggested that you were up for doing a

[6:09] shirt for us hopefully I'm not misrepresenting Elliot I feel like we I

[6:15] looked you up and I'm like oh shit he did all this art that I love because you

[6:19] know I'm not always the best person at actually researching who does all the

[6:22] art in the the library of role-playing game tomes outside of my play you

[6:29] you assume their photographs of the real beasts and monsters that's the thing

[6:33] that I'm assuming that's what happened drawn from life from a photograph yeah

[6:38] in a Pickman's model scenario it's been reproduced you know so what before we

[6:46] get into this what I need to ask ask you Adam is did you do any of the art that

[6:51] graces the pages of these sewers of wait wait I gotta it's called these sewers of

[6:58] some doll which is the I'm think I think I'm saying it right yeah sewers of

[7:03] some doll the role-playing adventure that Wizards of the Coast made to I

[7:08] think it was Wizards of the Coast made to go along with the DVD of this movie

[7:13] yeah I I overlapped I did I actually worked for TSR and then you know later

[7:20] for Wizards after they acquired it and no I had nothing to do with the tie-in

[7:25] adventure it's sewers of some doors of some doll I wonder who did that actually

[7:30] it's like must have they must have commissioned some art for it I mean take

[7:34] this as constructive criticism you would be a better guest if you had oh yeah

[7:38] you're still gonna be a great guest still gonna be a great guest actually I

[7:41] think that leads me to the next point since you're not familiar with the book

[7:45] I say instead of doing this dumb fucking podcast we just play this fucking

[7:48] now it says you just need this booklet some d6s and three friends I got three

[7:58] friends oh it's really fun because you get to play through the events of the

[8:01] movie well a like a weird version of the events because there's a zombie zoo

[8:06] which I don't remember being in the movie oh man that would have made it so

[8:09] much better and you get to play as as our four main characters who will learn

[8:13] about more and more detail later Ridley emails Elwood and correct me if I'm

[8:21] wrong about this Elwood is never named in the movie is he hmm I don't believe

[8:26] so the only reason I know his name is because a caption came up on screen when

[8:30] I had the captions on because he's loud that's an Elwood with his dialogue and I

[8:33] was like and I so from that point on I was like I wonder when they're gonna

[8:36] name this character and I don't think they ever did

[8:41] the battleaxe who as we'll see joins the joins the party because they woke him up

[8:45] sleeping on the street and then he's just with them for no reason yeah like I

[8:49] looked at a little bit of the behind-the-scenes stuff and that the

[8:52] dwarf you know like is played by a man of average height who okay had to sort

[8:59] of hunch and just sort of walk to use Dan are you telling me they'd use movie

[9:04] magic no but but not really movie magic they just had him sort of crouch as he

[9:09] that's the thing about magic tan is it's always disappointing how they did it

[9:15] it's the art of illusion and distraction and that's how they get you

[9:20] yeah of course he didn't really make the Statue of Liberty disappear right he

[9:25] just pointed the cameras away from the Statue of Liberty like you get that

[9:27] right Cloverfield yeah David Cloverfield the magician who made the

[9:35] Statue of Liberty's head come off it was all done with mirrors it was all

[9:40] mirrors okay so well this movie came out in the year 2000 and what is it two

[9:49] years later I'm trying to remember is that one year two years later this movie

[9:53] was produced by New Line Cinema who a few years later produced another

[9:58] fantasy film you may have heard of it

[10:00] It's called the Fellowship of the Ring

[10:02] And I think you're gonna see some similarities between both these movies dwarves elves and a couple of weird media specific

[10:10] We have points

[10:12] That's true, that's in there. So do you guys want to get into this movie real quick? Okay, let's do it. Yeah, okay

[10:19] That's what we're here for. Let me put away the adventure that you guys don't want to play

[10:24] I mean, I couldn't wait. It's a sewer adventure. So I assume we meet the Ninja Turtles at some point

[10:28] So maybe we can play it another time. I don't know how you guys watch this movie

[10:31] But we actually rented it from like Tucson's last remaining video rental store

[10:38] Wow

[10:40] Casa video and it was I mean, I can't blame Casa video

[10:45] I imagine this is a DVD that was made 22 years ago because there was never another edition that was necessary

[10:51] but it the whole thing looked like a poorly compressed JPEG the

[10:57] The menu looked like a CD-ROM game from 1993 it and if ever there was a movie that

[11:05] Should be watched on a 12-inch television with a built-in VCR. It was this one

[11:11] It's it's convenient that some of the special effects also look like they're from a CD-ROM game from 1990. Oh boy. Yeah

[11:18] Okay, so the movie opens as I mentioned new lines in the logo all still gets me pumped

[11:23] We get narration, yeah, cuz you think you think that that uh, what Freddy is gonna show up Freddy or a later Jason

[11:31] So we get some narration. We learned that they're the Empire of Izmir is

[11:37] Kind of a majocracy that's ruled by a council of mages plus an empress

[11:43] And the young Empress wants to balance the power to share it between the commoners and the mages

[11:49] But the leader of the mages a dude named profion is like, uh-uh. So that's all we need to know

[11:55] That's all the world we're getting

[11:57] We get a little and obviously already everybody's really excited because that's how you get pumped. Is he here a little bit of backstory?

[12:03] Yeah, and I want to say these two characters that we've met

[12:07] Well, we've heard their names

[12:09] Represent the I think the highest and the lowest of the acting in this like I do

[12:15] I'm usually pretty easy on actors and I don't really blame the actors in this because everyone in it

[12:20] I think it's bad other than Jeremy Irons who is

[12:24] Always electric. I like Richard O'Brien as well. Yeah, Richard. He's great in it, too

[12:30] If you're not if you're not a if you're not a melodramatic Englishman in this then you're you're in trouble

[12:35] Yes, no, they know what to do with this kind of material. Where's your birch is the princess and a

[12:42] An actor I've enjoyed very much in other movies, but seems totally lost here

[12:47] Well, I like she's reading off of cue cards or something for much of it is it is the flattest

[12:54] Princess Empress performance in a science fiction fantasy epic and that speaking as someone who recently rewatched the prequels

[13:01] That like it's flatter than the Ami doll performance, but I I'm gonna give her

[13:06] the benefit of the doubt that like

[13:08] The this was a first-time director. She was working with

[13:11] Who is the his name is Courtney Solomon? Not the first flop house movie we've done by him

[13:16] He directed getaway with Ethan Hawke, which we did years ago

[13:19] Right, and she apparently she probably shot where Ethan Hawke just drives a car around Eastern Europe, right?

[13:24] Yes, very much so and she apparently did this right after she shot American Beauty, but before it was released

[13:30] so and it sounds like she was just so emotionally drained from the American Beauty performance that I don't think she

[13:35] necessarily had it in her to provide the

[13:38] Necessary stuff. Yes, and since you've already brought him up

[13:42] I just wanted to say that the story behind the making of this movie seems a lot more interesting

[13:46] Than anything else because it's Courtney Solomon who wrote and directed bought the rights to Dungeons and Dragons when he was 19

[13:54] and then spent like 10 years putting together funding and

[13:58] Originally was just gonna produce it. They like we're gonna get big-name directors for it

[14:02] But there were a lot of different things that happened as alluded to before Dungeons and Dragons the game

[14:09] traded companies the rights to that like and so

[14:13] Eventually he wound up making a major motion picture for his very first film

[14:19] which is probably why all of the acting and this is

[14:25] uniformly pretty terrible because I imagined that first-time

[14:28] Director it was out to sea and especially a movie a first-time director on a movie with a lot of effects

[14:32] They're shooting it in Eastern Europe

[14:34] And they didn't have as much money as they thought they're supposed to have everyone knows you need to direct one

[14:39] Small indie movie, then you direct a major

[14:43] 100 to 200 million dollar a big-budget franchise. Yes

[14:47] Allowed to direct the the action parts of the hat. That'll be pretty no. No, they hire professionals to do that. Yeah. Yeah

[14:54] But yeah, so so but Jeremy Irons is I wonder to behold it's like every

[14:59] Face get every muscle in his face to get his own credit

[15:02] Like they're all working doing separately and at high intensity and just each eyebrow is is doing different things, you know, amazing

[15:10] Yeah, and and at this time Dungeons and Dragons was obviously an established property

[15:15] But I don't think it was its stock wasn't as high as it is say like now for instance

[15:20] You mean that that Saturday morning cartoon had a rocket in it?

[15:24] So that well it but and then it had dipped again Dan. This was years after the Saturday morning cartoon. This was this was a

[15:31] BN WC which is before nerd world conquest

[15:34] so

[15:35] 2000 nerds were still in the process of conquering the world

[15:37] Not like today when nerds do conquer the world and have become bullies and control all of popular culture entertainment

[15:45] Yeah, it's a real shame. Uh, so

[15:47] So

[15:49] We we have an opening sequence where we are flying around

[15:55] The of what is it some some doll some I think it's some doll which is the capital city of Izmir

[16:02] It's a really cool

[16:04] CGI cutscene and then we we fly around the city and then immediately plunge into a sewer awesome

[16:11] It does feel a little bit like the like the opening of like a like a horror movie logo like a production company logo

[16:19] But we'll get to that later. Yeah, we are in a dungeon where profion played again by

[16:24] the lovely Jeremy Irons and his

[16:28] Damodar played by

[16:30] Of the the bald guy. Yeah, damn it. Are those pain who was going away with the blue lips?

[16:37] Yeah, he's got the blue lips. I don't know if he's a

[16:40] Warlock, of course

[16:41] He I gotta say I really like his look. He looks like he's just trying to be Rob Halford

[16:45] He's got this big metal armor and leather armor. He's bald. He's English

[16:49] He's Rob Halford when I can't not like that

[16:51] So they're hanging out in a dungeon while profion shoots lightning bolts at a scepter and then he caresses that scepter

[16:56] And you're like that scepters got to be important

[16:59] And then he lets out a really cool red dragon and he tries to control it using the scepter

[17:04] It works for a second and then it does

[17:08] The door

[17:09] Yeah

[17:11] So the the dragon gets a little bit out of control

[17:14] So their only option of course drop that poor call us on a kit and kill the dragon. Yeah

[17:19] Now I am assuming that a lot of the people that are watching the movie are already established fans of Dungeons & Dragons

[17:26] At that point they're probably wondering

[17:28] How did a door kill a dragon?

[17:32] Those things have so many fucking hit boys. Yeah, the dragons in this movie are basically just dinosaurs. They are not

[17:40] intelligent they

[17:41] you know like a

[17:42] gold dragon just to put my second pair of glasses on right now a gold dragon should be supremely intelligent and

[17:49] and a powerful magic user in its own right and

[17:53] So my wife really appreciated me pausing the movie to tell her this

[17:57] Exactly

[18:01] So and then you ran to IMDb to put it in the goof section, right

[18:09] So he explains that he wants the scepter of Izmir

[18:14] Which is would allow him to control all the gold dragons. Unfortunately, that is in the possession of the Empress now the Empress is

[18:22] Is played by Thora Birch

[18:24] She I think as an attempt to kind of make her a little more

[18:28] Involved in her performance or to like wake her up from whatever stupor spells been cast on her

[18:32] They put this weird headdress on that has these like little dangling balls. I think it's supposed to look like dragon heads

[18:38] I can't tell but it is very distracting and it seems like I don't know. It seems like an odd choice

[18:43] It certainly does not look like the crown of a really kind of a disco inspired look for much of the movie. I think yes

[18:50] Okay, so the Empress learns from this old wizard like Valdem Valdir or something that

[18:57] If she if she can control or find the scepter

[19:00] No, she already has a scepter of Izmir

[19:02] But she learns that there is another thing the rod of Sevriel which would allow you to control all the red dragons

[19:09] So she's already got dragons in one hand. What if she had the rod with all the red dragon?

[19:14] I have already reached my fill

[19:17] It's super awesome, however

[19:19] Unfortunately, this conversation is being spied on magically by profion and profion is like, haha. I'm gonna go get that rod of Sevriel

[19:27] Very cool. Okay. He's got his little his own little salacious crumb

[19:32] There's just like a little tittering dragon man that it flies around. It just listens and

[19:37] flies, okay

[19:40] You times when the movie actually uses something kind of correctly from the monster manual so it's an app I mean

[19:49] How about later when a beholder shows up and it just floats around it doesn't do much of anything that be a holder is basically

[19:53] Just like a magical Rottweiler, you know

[19:58] And then runs off after a

[20:00] I know enough about, you know, your classic Dungeons and Dragons creatures that I, too,

[20:08] was able to annoy my wife by saying, oh, that's a beholder.

[20:12] But then she's like, what does it do?

[20:14] And I looked it up.

[20:15] Oh, man.

[20:16] Well, no, the thing was like, I was The defeated male leaves the tribe.

[20:21] I assumed that it was kind of as as shown in this movie, because my my other biggest

[20:30] association with Boulder is when like a beholder ask creature shows up in big trouble, a little

[20:35] China and both times they went to a kind of a holder.

[20:39] So, yeah.

[20:40] Yeah.

[20:41] That's not necessarily the magic to ever do it.

[20:44] I'm not going to take a look at this or the tattoo on my arm.

[20:47] Yeah.

[20:48] I just assumed it was kind of a guard dog.

[20:52] And then I looked it up.

[20:53] I'm like, oh, Boulder has all these magics in their different eyes.

[20:56] Exactly.

[20:57] Yeah.

[20:58] It's dope.

[20:59] My wife actually walked into the room while I was watching this scene.

[21:02] And I'm like, look, sure, there's a beholder.

[21:03] And she goes, did they get enough eyes on it?

[21:06] And then I immediately had to pause the movie so we could have sex like, stop flirting with

[21:13] me.

[21:14] You had sex while locking eyes with the paused image of the beholder on screen.

[21:20] Yeah.

[21:21] Yeah.

[21:22] Yeah.

[21:23] Of course.

[21:24] I'm whispering.

[21:25] This is for you.

[21:26] Yum.

[21:27] Yum.

[21:28] Yum.

[21:29] OK.

[21:30] So meanwhile, Marina, who is a student of Val Valdin, Valdir, the wizard, is I think

[21:36] his name is Vildan, Vildan, whatever she she's she's trying to help him find the scroll.

[21:44] So they can find the Rod of Sevriel and they find the scroll, but it's like, you know,

[21:48] it's enchanted.

[21:49] He can't figure it out.

[21:51] OK, now let's cut to let's get to the real story, guys, because we see we're introduced

[21:56] to a couple of plucky young adventurers who witnessed the results of that dragon dying

[22:01] because the dragon blood set the whole river on fire.

[22:06] Dragon blood.

[22:07] CGI dragon blood sets the whole river on fire.

[22:10] So our two our two would be rogues, Ridley and Snails, decide to use that distraction

[22:17] to break into the magic school.

[22:19] Let's talk about these two gentlemen now.

[22:21] Ridley and Snails.

[22:22] Yeah.

[22:23] Ridley is played by an actor that I yeah, I mostly know him for the guy who took over

[22:29] as Andy in Child's Play three.

[22:31] And I know as he was he was Jimmy Olsen in The New Adventures of Lois and Clark.

[22:36] OK.

[22:37] Here in this movie, I texted both of you to say I hate this lead because he must have

[22:43] put all of his points in stealth and none for charisma because dexterity.

[22:50] This guy, I just felt like everything he seems to be trying to do, like, you know, roguish

[22:56] patter throughout the movie.

[22:57] And he always just comes off as a creep to me.

[23:00] And meanwhile, Snails is played by Marlon Wayans in a performance that even at the time

[23:06] when I saw this video seemed regressive to me like I do not blame him for taking the

[23:12] part, but it is written as a caricature of like, I don't know, is it like from a from

[23:18] an earlier era of a scared, dumb black dude?

[23:22] And it was kind of unpleasant.

[23:24] Well, I wonder if that's one of those things where if it's if the part was written as a

[23:28] scared young black, a scared, dumb black guy or is just a scared, dumb guy.

[23:33] And by casting Marlon Wayans in the role, they're playing into bad stereotypes.

[23:36] It becomes a bad stereotype.

[23:37] Yeah.

[23:38] Well, he would have from what I was reading.

[23:40] He did a lot of ad libbing.

[23:42] And apparently the the rule was he got to ad lib three lines for every three lines of

[23:46] the script that he said as written.

[23:48] So.

[23:49] So it's hard to know where the blame falls, but he does.

[23:51] He does come off as a stereotyped caricature character, for sure.

[23:55] From what I read, he was simultaneously shooting Requiem for a Dream during this, which is

[24:01] terrific.

[24:03] Yeah.

[24:04] Which is so confusing.

[24:05] I have not seen that movie, I have to admit, but I am under the impression it is a a good

[24:10] prestige short sort of movie and and he just yeah, Marlon Wayans just kind of squeals his

[24:17] way through every scene that he's in, like five seagulls wearing a human suit.

[24:23] Yeah.

[24:24] Well, I mean, of those two movies, one is a harrowing experience, making you question

[24:28] why you're spending your time watching it.

[24:30] The other is Requiem for a Dream.

[24:32] BOOM!

[24:33] BOOM!

[24:34] BOOM!

[24:35] BOOM!

[24:36] BOOM!

[24:37] BOOM!

[24:38] BOOM!

[24:39] BOOM!

[24:40] BOOM!

[24:41] Textbook!

[24:42] Textbook!

[24:43] Airhorns!

[24:44] Airhorns!

[24:45] Confetti!

[24:46] Confetti!

[24:47] Holy Grail!

[24:48] Holy Grail!

[24:49] So they are breaking into the wizard or the magic school when they are confronted by Marina,

[24:52] who uses some magic to bind them up.

[24:56] And then she's going to show them off to Vildan, only to find out that Damodar and

[25:02] his Crimson Brigade have already arrived.

[25:06] And they want that scroll.

[25:07] Every time I hear another one of these names, my brain starts shutting down.

[25:11] Would you rather their names were like Joe, Stephanie, like stuff like that?

[25:15] It wouldn't work.

[25:16] No, I understand.

[25:17] Knuckles.

[25:18] Sonic.

[25:19] Tails.

[25:20] I just might.

[25:21] Oh no, Richard and his Crimson Brigade are here.

[25:24] I just have a hard time.

[25:27] I think my memory rejects what any of it means.

[25:30] Yeah, you have to take this over to the wizard Gary.

[25:33] Only he can help you.

[25:34] I would know who Gary was, like, oh, that's Gary.

[25:37] So Damodar kills Vildan, Marina grabs the scroll, and uses some magic dust to make a

[25:43] portal to escape, and in the process she drags along our two would-be thieves.

[25:52] Damodar and his Crimson Brigade quickly follow, and we have a brief chase through the streets

[25:56] of some doll, and it leads them down an alleyway, where in a big pile of trash, they bump into

[26:06] Elwood the Dwarf, and now we have an adventuring party, guys.

[26:10] And he just kind of, I don't know, he seems to just join them because he doesn't have

[26:13] much else to do.

[26:14] Yeah, Elwood is the character where I felt, watching this movie, I felt a lot like when

[26:19] we watched Super Mario Bros., where it was like, the movie just is like, okay, and go,

[26:24] as long as we keep moving fast.

[26:25] Nobody's going to ask us any questions, and we don't have to answer them.

[26:28] And when Elwood joins, it was like, the movie was like, you knew they were going to get

[26:31] some more people.

[26:32] Like, so he just comes along with them.

[26:33] Like, he doesn't need a reason, he doesn't need a character.

[26:35] You know, so, because they wake him up, he fights Damodar for a second, then runs away

[26:39] with them, and the next scene, he's just creeping around town with them in a cloak, and it's

[26:43] like, well, why did he stick with them?

[26:45] I don't know, like, if you are ever, if you're ever in a situation where you are just walking

[26:49] around on the street, and you get in an argument with somebody, and then a passerby just happens

[26:54] to be there.

[26:55] He doesn't then become part of your family, that just goes with you to whatever you're

[26:58] doing next.

[26:59] Like, and it's, I found it very, really funny.

[27:01] Yeah, normally you have to complete some kind of, like, sub-quest or something to get them

[27:05] to join your party.

[27:06] I gotta say.

[27:07] And then you can start leveling them up, and then, if you're lucky, you can do a romance

[27:10] plot with them.

[27:11] That's kind of what I was...

[27:12] And, and, what do you say, Dan?

[27:14] No, just that this, like, in a weird way, feels like the most realistic to Dungeons

[27:18] and Dragons part to me, though, where, like, you know, it seems like so many campaigns

[27:23] start with just people being like, uh, we're all in a tavern, and, like, we're kind of

[27:27] like, yeah, we're adventurers, so we'll join this thing, you know.

[27:31] But think about it.

[27:32] I guess so.

[27:33] But it's like, let's take a good movie.

[27:34] It's called Star Wars.

[27:35] I don't know if you guys have seen it.

[27:36] It's called Star Wars Episode 4, A New Hope.

[27:37] Yep.

[27:38] No, I saw it.

[27:39] So, so this, this, this young farmer dressed as a karate guy, and this, and this old wizard

[27:43] who lives in the desert, they go to a bar, and they're like, we gotta get off the planet.

[27:47] I thought I saw it.

[27:48] Okay, well, let me, I just said the scene.

[27:51] They go, and they talk to a space bear and a pirate in a vest, and they're like, hey,

[27:56] can you join us to get off the planet?

[27:58] Help us get off the planet.

[27:59] And he goes, can you pay me for it?

[28:01] Yeah.

[28:02] And he goes, we gotta rescue a princess.

[28:03] We'll pay you if you do it.

[28:04] Okay.

[28:05] It's as if, in that movie, they had gotten into a fight, Han Solo saw the flight, the

[28:10] fight, and said, hey.

[28:11] And then the next scene, they're on Han Solo's spaceship, and he's like, let's go, boys.

[28:14] And it's like, wait, when did you meet each other?

[28:17] When did you agree to be part of this adventure, you know?

[28:20] I do feel like, yeah, the whole middle section of this movie is when I really kind of started

[28:25] to lose interest, and I think you've put your finger on a big part of why, whereas, at the

[28:30] beginning, the lead characters are framed for murder, and I feel like they have a personal

[28:38] stake in things beyond just kind of a generalized, let's stop this war, which is a great, don't

[28:46] get me wrong.

[28:47] Let's stop this war is a great motivation.

[28:49] But maybe not for these particular characters who seem to be rogues who just like, you know,

[28:54] live off of.

[28:55] And who hate mages.

[28:56] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[28:57] Ridley has an inborn hatred of mages because they rule and he drools.

[28:59] Yes, exactly.

[29:00] So, in the middle, I'm like, why do I, why do these characters care about anything they're

[29:04] doing?

[29:05] I do think this movie really was trying to be Star Wars, though, right?

[29:09] Oh, for sure.

[29:10] I mean, they have a cantina scene.

[29:12] Yeah.

[29:13] They have a cantina scene.

[29:14] They have an emperor type character who shoots lightning out of his fingers and chews the

[29:19] scenery of every scene that he's in.

[29:20] They have a Darth Vader, black armored character.

[29:23] They I feel like Ridley is basically just Luke and Han smushed together.

[29:29] And Snails is basically C-3PO and Marina is a haughty Princess Leia type, except unfortunately

[29:37] nowhere near as competent as Princess Leia was at any point.

[29:41] I have to stress like nine times out of ten, they try and smush the Luke Skywalker and

[29:47] the Han Solo character together and it almost always never works.

[29:52] Like part of what makes those characters fun is that they are different.

[29:56] Yeah.

[29:57] I don't know.

[29:58] Yeah.

[29:59] I'm just.

[30:00] I am just complaining about stuff. Let's get back to Dungeons and Dragons. So they uh they uh they

[30:08] enlist the aid of an irascible dwarf and escape through the sewers. I mean we assume they enlist

[30:13] his aid. They have never talked about it. It's just there's no deal laid out. They draft him in

[30:18] you know. His name is never spoken in this movie. There's almost they almost never address him

[30:22] directly. I'm not sure they know he's with them for a lot of them. At one point they ask are you

[30:27] going to come with us and he says I guess I have no choice but then he asks for payment which is a

[30:33] terrible negotiating tactic. Yeah yeah. No you you always want to start from a position of weakness

[30:41] when I whenever I go in for you. Whenever I go to negotiations I go let me just put one

[30:46] thing on the table. I have no leverage and I need you much more than you need me. So

[30:51] let's start the bidding. Just just to let you know I would do anything to write for the movies

[30:56] or tv. I do not even need payment. How much do you want to pay me? Okay so uh our adventuring party

[31:04] uh then is relaxing in a tavern. As you guys mentioned they have now been framed for murder.

[31:10] Uh the murder of Vildan and uh Ridley and Marina start to argue and they're reading the scroll

[31:19] and then somehow they read it correctly and then they both get sucked into the scroll.

[31:23] Somehow somehow uh Marina no matter how her her boss Vildan couldn't get the scroll to work and

[31:28] Ridley is like well when my dad used to fix wagons he'd put his hand here and his hand here and it

[31:34] works. So this scroll which is keeping the most powerful rod in the universe uh secure it somehow

[31:41] works under the same powerful rod. One of the most powerful. It works under the same mechanics as a

[31:45] wagon which is which is just a funny thing that like. Well also like how do you figure out like

[31:51] what part of a wagon corresponds to a scroll? Like oh this is a very good question.

[31:58] Okay counterpoint from Adam. Very obvious. Okay no further questions. At this point now we're left

[32:05] with Snails and Elwood just hanging out and you're probably like okay I wonder if they have a lot of

[32:09] cool stuff to talk about. They don't particularly have cool stuff to talk about. An elf tracker

[32:13] shows up who's looking for them. Snails immediately is uh is lovestruck. He will do anything he can to

[32:20] sleep with this elf. Elwood however is explaining no no no he is not sexually attracted to an elf.

[32:25] It's hilarious. Um so uh shortly after the elf shows up Damodar and the Crimson Brigade show up

[32:33] and a brawl starts. Perfect time for Snails and Elwood to sneak the fuck out. What? I had a

[32:39] question for you. So so before this cantina according to my notes is when Profion implants

[32:44] some kind of a monster into Damodar's Damodar's head. Yeah yeah Damodar fucked up. He fucked up

[32:49] one too many times and he now gets a monster stuck in his head. And what was that monster? Is

[32:53] that a real thing from the game? I know this uh because thanks to the fact that I did rent the DVD

[32:58] I listened to the director's commentary. Oh wow. Wow you really went above and beyond. This is

[33:05] well okay so you should be hosting this show. I watched this movie three times. One time and then

[33:13] my wife and I thought maybe we should watch it again. Maybe you'll you'll think of something

[33:16] else interesting to say. So I watched it a second time and then I was like feels like you just want

[33:20] to watch it again. I should have listened to the director's commentary so today we actually put it

[33:25] on for about an hour with the director's commentary. Wow. That's what you've turned me into.

[33:30] But well that's what I turned myself into. This was my idea. But anyway uh in the director's

[33:35] commentary they refer to this thing as a mind flayer which obviously is bullshit. But a mind

[33:43] flayer in the game being a humanoid with a basically a cephalopod head that can use his

[33:49] tentacles to like suck your brains out. But they refer to this as their version of a mind flayer.

[33:56] So it has no real analog. That's super lame. Illithids are cool. You'd like them Elliot

[34:02] because they're kind of like purple Cthulhu's and they have powerful psionics. I love tentacles. I

[34:07] love psionics. I love psionics the hedgehog. I love psionic the uh the hamburger place. Is it

[34:13] all drive-thru? I think it is yeah. I love psionic youth uh and uh Dan give me some more. What other

[34:19] ones? The Seattle psionics uh what what other what other things are that have sonic in them that I

[34:24] can replace with psionic? Booms? Dan this is what? Yep yeah that's that's what Guile says when he

[34:31] throws his attack at you. He says psionic boom which actually wouldn't make sense because it's

[34:37] an attack. It doesn't matter. Um okay so it wouldn't make sense that he's actually a powerful

[34:41] psionic because that would allow him to do such powerful attacks. Uh attacks that a normal human

[34:47] could never do. I love that you told yourself it didn't matter. Good stuff. So uh snails and

[34:56] Elwood sneak off into the woods. They open up that scroll and then Marina and Ridley pop out of it.

[35:04] Where do they kind of explain where they were? I don't know. They basically just argued the whole

[35:09] time. My guess is that this is a show of the either the budget for the movie or something

[35:16] in the editing that I have to assume there was supposed to be some kind of at least scene in

[35:20] that map world or adventure that they have and it just doesn't happen and they learned some kind of

[35:25] information from it right but we never see any of it and that that's my guess is that either something

[35:29] was scripted and they couldn't afford to do it or they did it and it was just worked so poorly or

[35:33] the movie was too long and they just cut it out yeah that's my guess so yeah as they said we can

[35:37] cut out this adventure that explains what was going on on the map or we can cut the conversation

[35:41] about what kind of what kind of mythical creatures snails and Elwood each prefer to have sex with

[35:46] they said well you can't cut that that's gold that's what people want from James yeah it's in

[35:50] both their contracts um yeah so we they learned that in order to get the rod they first need to

[35:56] get the eye of the dragon which is a giant ruby and they have to go to Antaeus where it is held

[36:01] by Grandmaster Xylus the leader of the local thieves guild so that's great they go to Antaeus

[36:08] they go to a market uh snails is stealing everything that isn't uh nailed down or snailed

[36:14] down like a candelabra he like takes a candelabra and a dead cat and he's not even sneaky about it

[36:22] i mean at that point he's not thieving for economic reasons it's just a compulsion at

[36:25] that love of the game that's a compulsion good thieves because earlier when they're like

[36:30] plundering the the mage place like they pick up just a uh a wooden cage with a mouse in it

[36:37] is one of the things they're stealing that they go to they go to rob them the magic school and

[36:42] they don't steal everything that snails picks up really goes no no not that and it's like so what

[36:46] are you going to take like what are you what are you what are you looking for every time these

[36:51] thieves go into a new room they basically treat it like it's a fucking escape room where they like

[36:55] pick everything up see if there's a fucking combination written on the bottom while i'm

[37:00] in the background trying to drink from a flask they needed to lean into the dnd of it and have

[37:05] these to be different classes like why are they both thieves there could be the yeah the ridley

[37:11] competent thief character and then like a comic relief terrible bard or something like marlon

[37:19] trying to compose songs heroic songs about that what they were doing or anything else because

[37:24] he's obviously a terrible thief from the moment that he shows up i mean i hadn't thought about

[37:30] it before but snails and scales are very similar very similar he could have been a dragonborn bard

[37:35] who is perhaps always singing about how he's blue

[37:40] want to know what that means uh become a max fund member and i think i think those are actually uh

[37:46] those are in the adventure zone feed so if you want to listen to a good podcast and that will

[37:50] be occasionally broken up by us doing a podcast yeah yeah go over and check out the adventures

[37:54] that often i will say uh listeners of those episodes where we did the adventure zone stuff

[37:59] will know that i was singing that i'm blue song a lot it is now infected the other members of

[38:03] my family and my older son will sammy will just yell at me i'm blue and i have to respond with

[38:08] dabu di dabu die dabu di and then they'll join in and my wife hates it and we took some time

[38:14] a couple weeks ago and we i was like let's watch the video for that song he's like that's a real

[38:18] song i was like yeah that's a real song let me show you and watch the video for it and i forgot

[38:22] how ludicrously stupid it is like i knew and how the verses of the song are like here's a story

[38:28] guy who's blue and all his clothes are blue too and his house is also blue and my son was like

[38:34] did you write this song yeah i was hoping that the the punchline of that would be like so we

[38:41] watched the song and sammy the video and sam was like i don't like this song anymore oh no he still

[38:46] loves it love the video love the song but he it was very similar to the songs i make up that are

[38:52] dumb so anyway so in the in the market they trail a uh blue guy purple a purple guy with

[39:00] an eye in the middle of his head uh adam uh what uh what race is this guy i'm pretty sure they just

[39:06] made this up i wonder if they just had a like characters are made up okay well fair but it was

[39:13] not brought up in the director's commentary i i sort of came to it to think that maybe they just

[39:19] had a creature design sitting on the shelf already and slapped it on there very possible it

[39:24] is it is very jarring too because there's not that many non-human characters in the movie and

[39:31] i can't think of any others that are as non-human as as that guy yeah every once in a while and like

[39:37] go on no no what were you gonna say every once in a while i was gonna say every once in a while

[39:41] in like the tavern or in oh that's right that market you'll see like an orc walking around

[39:46] that kind of looks like a turtle uh i'm kind of into it because it is it feels like it's it feels

[39:52] like it's a puppet almost like the whole thing's a puppet i thought that those were kappas i thought

[39:56] they went to japan got a kappa cast him in the

[40:00] background role. But among the, you're right, in the backgrounds every now and then you'll

[40:04] see like a monster person. But this is the only one who's like a speaking part character

[40:09] who's wearing like a heavy latex mask. And it felt very, I was like either do it or don't

[40:13] do it. Don't have one dude be the one with an alien face. Like have a bunch of them,

[40:17] you know.

[40:18] We'll say he's probably a tiefling. Okay. Um, so they eventually get taken before the

[40:23] leader of the Thieves Guild, Grandmaster Xylus, who is played, uh, large.

[40:29] Well, that's Richard O'Brien, writer of Rocky Horror Show. He played Riff Raff in Rocky

[40:35] Horror Show. And like, he, I love his performance though. He's playing it. He's a big decadent,

[40:40] like, uh, you know, sly Englishman.

[40:43] He is the best special effect in the movie.

[40:46] Well, immediately you want more of this guy. Apparently like this is, you know, behind

[40:51] the scenes, I read that this is like a kind of a goof on a role that he played on television.

[40:58] Like there was like, uh, uh, some sort of, yeah, I think it was called like the Crystal

[41:04] Maze. Yeah, that sounds right. And so it's a reference to something that like, I can't

[41:11] imagine. I can't imagine that many people saw this and were like, oh, that's Richard

[41:16] O'Brien.

[41:17] I alone realized what it was a joke on, but it's in and of itself, it's fun.

[41:23] Similar another parallel to Fellowship of the Ring. It's like when, uh, Boromir played

[41:27] by Sean Bean picks up the shards of Narsil and he cuts his thumb on the blade and he

[41:32] says still sharp, which is both a reference to him playing, uh, obviously Richard Sharp

[41:37] from the Sharps Rifles. And also because he was in a series of, uh, razor commercials

[41:42] where he would nick himself and say, still sharp.

[41:45] Oh, that is such a like Looney Tunes level of, of cultural reference where it's like

[41:51] it expires almost instantly. And 70 years from now, people will be watching, uh, Lord

[41:57] of the Rings and be like, why'd they make a point of doing that? And then someone will

[42:00] look it up on a website.

[42:01] Stewart will pop up out of the grave.

[42:04] Yeah. The same way that I would look up on Looney Tunes, I would look up like, why does

[42:08] it, why do they say this in Looney Tunes? Oh, cartoons. Oh, that's a reference to a

[42:10] radio show from 1942.

[42:12] Yeah. You know, I guess the thing is, I like it, but, uh, so grandmasters, I was like,

[42:21] yeah, that was the original brand's greatness. I liked him the whole time. Yeah. He's great.

[42:25] He brings a lot of energy. He's fun. And he does. He explains that of course, if they

[42:30] want the eye, the only way is they have to go to through this deadly maze that no one

[42:34] has ever survived.

[42:36] And then of course, so yeah, we're, we're at a dungeon. So of course the first thing

[42:40] this movie does, which there's multiple dungeons in this movie and every single time the same

[42:44] thing happens, Ridley goes in by himself, which the first rule in D and D is you don't

[42:50] split the party. That's one thing you learned. You like, what's the point of having a group

[42:54] of characters with a bunch of different skills that help the complimentary skills. You want

[42:59] them all together, but instead, no, let's just have Ridley the boring is to do the whole

[43:03] adventure by himself.

[43:04] I think you're right. That's the big, one of the things that I'm always amazed by when

[43:08] we watch video game movies is how they try or don't try to include the mechanics of the

[43:13] game into the movie. Like with mortal combat, where it was like, we're going to come up

[43:17] with a reason why it's a bunch of one-on-one fights in different levels, you like different

[43:21] locations. Um, but you were in this one, it feels like they were running away from the

[43:25] game mechanics rather than embracing it. And it is weaker as a result that like Ridley

[43:29] is the only one who really does much of anything throughout like Marina does occasionally,

[43:34] but it'd be more fun to see a group of them, like you're saying, using their different

[43:37] skills and playing off each other in that way. And instead they're falling back instead

[43:41] on the like, there's a single hero. It's gotta be the white guy. He just is naturally the

[43:47] leader and naturally the one heroic one. And so he's the one who's going to end by the

[43:52] end of the movie. He's like, um, you know, he's the hero of the empire, spoiler alert.

[43:57] And it's, but you're like, I don't really know what he, what was it about him that made

[44:00] him do this?

[44:01] Okay. So he has to go through the maze. Uh, the maze involves him, uh, avoiding a bunch

[44:11] of traps. There's one where things swing at him. He dodges it. There's one where flame

[44:16] shoots all the walls. He doesn't get flamed and jumps through a hole. It's really exciting

[44:21] because once, once he figured out how to time one jump in the swinging thing, he was basically

[44:26] fine and it was, and it went from dangerous to totally doable. And I just, it was very

[44:30] funny watching him still jump over each single one. And I'm like, even American Ninja warrior

[44:34] knows when to fucking fast forward. All they do is cut away. But instead we got to watch

[44:39] him go through what is no longer a danger to him anymore. Well, while Richard O'Brien

[44:43] looks on going, Hmm, there was the room where he had to only step on the red painted tiles.

[44:52] And yeah, like the only wrinkle at any point was at one point, like one of the red tiles

[44:56] like flips over to yellow. But I was watching it like, what is, so I guess he made this

[45:03] murder like maze, but also made it, you know, gentlemanly, it follows the rules. Like once

[45:10] you figure out that you can step on the red ones, it's fine. Like it was, it was like,

[45:14] why would you like, why would you design traps where there's a key to it? Like that's very

[45:20] easy to figure out. Yeah. I mean, I think the reason why is because he wants to entertain

[45:26] his friends. He's, he's a guy with a lot of friends. He wants to show off his cool

[45:30] trap maze. I think it's in the eye before we first see, uh, Ridley's sword as well.

[45:35] And that sort is way too nice. I, Ridley's, Ridley's whole deal just looks way too good.

[45:41] I feel like we were supposed to, we're supposed to understand he's very poor. The, the narration

[45:45] at the beginning of the movie says that people who aren't majors are essentially slaves.

[45:50] And Ridley has a really nice looking sword, which is a really bad decision since he's

[45:54] given what we're supposed to understand is the nice sword later. Like they really, and

[46:00] it looks the same. Yeah. They should have highlighted how crappy it was and, or had

[46:04] it like break while he's doing these stupid traps or cool traps, devious traps. It would

[46:10] have been funny if he's, he's Richard O'Brien's like, he's never, no one's ever survived this

[46:14] maze. And while he's going through it, he's just besting obstacle to obstacle. And Richard

[46:17] O'Brien's like, did we forget to drug him before we went into the maze? And he just

[46:22] looks over and sees an uneaten cupcake on a tray. He goes, Oh, damn. Yeah. So of course,

[46:28] uh, Ridley retrieves the eye and Zylus is like, actually, I'm going to break our deal,

[46:34] which is the first of many deals that are broken in this movie until the very end when

[46:37] a profi on actually upholds a deal, which I was shocked by. Um, so, uh, Zylus decides

[46:44] to break the deal. Just then the, the Crimson Brigade barge in led by who? Damodar. That's

[46:51] right. Damodar. Uh, of course a brawl breaks out. Uh, Damodar manages to capture the scroll

[47:00] and Marina and get out of there. So our heroes are down one scroll and down one wizard friend.

[47:07] Uh, so they're on the run. They bump into Norda, the elf tracker from before. Uh, they

[47:15] all decide to join forces. Marina tries to convince Marina in, uh, is in a dungeon, uh,

[47:23] Damodar's dungeon. TM, uh, tries to convince Damodar. Damodar's dungeon was also his family

[47:28] restaurant. Yeah. Uh, dine in or dine out. Um, okay. Uh, I feel like kids eat their weight

[47:37] on Saturdays at Damodar's dungeon. See, I feel like Damodar's dungeon would be one of

[47:42] the games in the list of war games. Like, Oh, what do I want to play? Thermonuclear war,

[47:47] Damodar's dungeon. And the computer goes, uh, let's not play that one. It's not that good.

[47:58] Okay. Joshua, whatever you say. So we get a little bit of body horror here because Marina

[48:02] tries to convince Damodar to let her, let her go. And for a second, you think she might actually

[48:07] convince him. And then these weird worm things shoot out of his ears and attached to her temples.

[48:13] And I'm like, I wouldn't even put somebody else's earbuds in. I wouldn't want that dude putting

[48:19] those things on my forehead. Well, she doesn't really have much of a choice in the matter.

[48:23] I have to say. Okay. Yeah. I guess that's one way to read the scene.

[48:29] It's not like he goes, you can tell me, or you can use my weird, my mind flayer ear tentacles.

[48:34] And she goes, I want to do it that way. Yeah. Yeah. Try anything once. I mean,

[48:41] when am I going to get the opportunity to do it again?

[48:45] Obviously if you're in her position, you say, I'm just going to tell you,

[48:48] but can you tell everyone else you had to use the tentacles? Yeah. That's a good point.

[48:54] I want to tell your friend to use the tentacles. It's fine. It's cool. I'll back you up. Yeah.

[48:58] That's probably what happened in real life, you know, but the movie had to print the legend.

[49:01] Oh, so you're saying since this is dungeons and dragons based on the autobiography of Marina,

[49:06] you're saying that she was talking to a ghost writer. She said, oh no,

[49:08] no, no. He totally used the tentacles. I would never give up Ridley. Never, never. Yeah.

[49:12] So, uh, the tentacles actually allow him to read her memories and he figures out exactly what's

[49:18] going on. Um, the good guys decide that they're going to try and infiltrate this camp. This like,

[49:24] uh, Damodar's dungeon, as we mentioned, uh, it's in an old fortress.

[49:28] Yeah. Yeah. There's a basketball. Damodar's dungeon, a full arcade. Yeah.

[49:33] The, the, the crimson guard, all the football games were on the big TV where they have the

[49:38] three color projector. Uh-huh. And if you get enough tickets, you can get the eye of the dragon

[49:45] Ruby or your tickets. You need a lot of tickets. Yeah. You're going there every weekend.

[49:51] Yeah. They serve the pizza on, on tin plates.

[49:57] Uh, they look like, look like little shields.

[50:00] Yes, at Damodar's dungeon, each table gets complimentary popcorn baskets.

[50:05] Uh, Damodar, are they bottomless popcorn baskets?

[50:08] Well, the baskets have bottoms where the popcorn would spill.

[50:10] But yes, you do get free unlimited refills.

[50:14] Damodar's got a little bit of humor.

[50:15] Yeah, Damodar's like the host.

[50:16] Look at this guy.

[50:17] Does he wait all the tables?

[50:20] It's his place and he likes to drop in and like kind of mingle with the crowd and play with the kids.

[50:24] That makes sense.

[50:24] Like, COVID's so hard right now.

[50:26] It's so hard to find staff.

[50:27] It makes sense that Damodar is doing all the work.

[50:29] The weird thing is that he wants people like, that's Damodar.

[50:32] He owns the place.

[50:32] But at the front, instead of a celebrity picture, he has his headshot signed and it says,

[50:37] I love my restaurant, Damodar.

[50:39] And it's like, it's not that impressive to get your own picture on there.

[50:42] Yeah.

[50:42] And everyone's like, he doesn't even have a picture of Profion.

[50:45] And like, because Profion didn't give him one.

[50:47] Profion's never been there.

[50:48] No.

[50:48] And Damodar will tell you that he didn't ask.

[50:50] But you know he asked and Profion just didn't.

[50:52] Of course he didn't.

[50:53] Yeah.

[50:54] Um, okay.

[50:55] So, uh, the Crimson Brigade here are backed up by a few beholders who kind of are like

[51:00] floating watchdogs.

[51:04] And they never, but they never fight the heroes, which I kept waiting for it.

[51:07] They never fight the heroes.

[51:08] So Snails and Ridley sneak in and Elwood's like, fuck yeah, let's get in there.

[51:13] And Norda's like, nope.

[51:15] For whatever reason, this is their quest by themselves.

[51:20] Again, very strange choice.

[51:22] Uh, okay.

[51:23] They explore the dungeons.

[51:25] Uh, Snails gets caught in a rug quicksand trap and is attacked by Damodar.

[51:30] I thought this was cool.

[51:31] This was a cool practical effect.

[51:36] That pit that they made was actually full of oatmeal.

[51:40] Yeah, it was delicious.

[51:41] Well, they used oatmeal and then they, uh, they flocked to the top of it.

[51:45] And then I guess, uh, like airbrushed it.

[51:47] Now, now, Adam, if you, if you expected that, uh, my eyes would pop out of my head and my,

[51:54] my steam would shoot out of my ears at that revelation, uh, you would be correct because

[51:58] while this, this effect, I agree, it looks cool at the beginning when they step into

[52:02] a thing that looks like a rug by the end, you can tell that Marlon Wayans is floating

[52:06] in a bunch of oatmeal.

[52:08] Well, what happened was Dan was, Dan was eating a bowl of oatmeal while watching the scene

[52:12] and he kept looking down and looking at a spoon and he's like, son of a bitch.

[52:18] And then Dan couldn't, Dan pushed away.

[52:20] He goes, what if there's a tiny Marlon Wayans in there?

[52:22] And he pushes it away, pushes it for a dream.

[52:32] I can't, but Wayans brothers were already a limited resource as it is.

[52:36] I can't endanger it further.

[52:38] There's a new generation.

[52:40] That's true.

[52:41] Uh, Marlon does, he does get to spend a lot of time wandering around picking up props

[52:45] and riffing on them.

[52:46] And it is, it goes on for a while.

[52:49] It goes on forever.

[52:50] And this is the scene too, where, when Damodar comes in, he delivers my favorite line.

[52:55] I had to write it down.

[52:57] Just like you thieves, always taking things that don't belong to you.

[53:03] Yep.

[53:04] That's what a thief is.

[53:05] Yeah.

[53:06] Web just defines you as.

[53:07] No shit.

[53:08] Well, there are a lot of very dumb lines in this.

[53:12] I, I, I, you're making me recall earlier when they're going through the maze

[53:16] and people are like betting on them.

[53:18] And like Marina's like, I can't believe they're betting.

[53:21] Like they're betting on how long they'll stay alive.

[53:25] And he goes, no, my dear, they're betting on how long it will take him to die.

[53:29] And I'm like, those are the same thing in this scenario.

[53:32] It's a real glass half full glass.

[53:34] I've empty type type situation.

[53:35] Yeah.

[53:36] There's a certain pessimism that infuses the thieves guild of Antaeus.

[53:39] Um, okay.

[53:40] So, uh, meanwhile, Ridley finds Marina and they fight their way through some guards.

[53:47] Ridley does a lot of spinning around, swinging that beautiful sword.

[53:50] We mentioned before, uh, Marina hits dudes with a, uh, a flaming brand.

[53:56] And then, uh, he gets in a fight with one bigger guard, the normal, uh, snails, uh,

[54:02] managed to briefly escape from Damodar.

[54:04] He goes running outside.

[54:05] Perfect place for a little wrestling match, uh, where they, uh, basically Damodar doesn't

[54:11] really have a weapon for a while.

[54:13] He just kind of like bats in the side with, uh, his, his like, his like styrofoam armor

[54:20] Ridley and Marina show up just in time for Damodar to best snails.

[54:24] And they try and do what they try and do an exchange snails throws them the scroll and

[54:30] get stabbed in the back and then thrown off the top of the tower.

[54:33] So snails X'd out.

[54:34] He's dead.

[54:35] Unless somebody's got a wish spell.

[54:39] Uh, Ridley briefly fights Damodar.

[54:42] It was a real, it was a real snail fail when he tried to go after Damodar.

[54:46] Yeah.

[54:48] That's what the DVD chapter title was.

[54:54] Oh, that was, that's a job that I wish it, there was this brief shining moment when it

[55:00] was someone's job to name the chapters of movies for the DVDs.

[55:04] And I always wondered who did that.

[55:05] Was it just somebody who was working on the box?

[55:07] Did they go to the director or the screenwriter and say, look, I know it's weird for you to

[55:11] think of every scene in this as having its own title, but can you do that right now?

[55:15] And now it doesn't exist anymore because people don't use, they don't make, you know,

[55:18] they don't make TVs at the same volume that they once did, you know?

[55:23] Okay.

[55:23] Uh, so Damodar as a bested, uh, Damodar manages to get, uh, he stabs Ridley.

[55:30] Guys, why do you think they, why do you think they started titling the chapters when they

[55:34] could have just had numbers?

[55:35] Cause no one expects the parts of a movie to have titles.

[55:38] Like, I mean, it gives you some indicate, it gives you some indication where you left

[55:42] off.

[55:42] You know, you can skip to the thing you like, you know, you can skip to the part you want.

[55:47] You can skip to the part where Dalton explains, you know, be nice.

[55:50] Yeah.

[55:50] That's the chapter title.

[55:52] It's also so that like, like when you're, uh, when you're, when you're flipping through

[55:57] the menu with your friends and you see a scene that you remember, you're like, Oh,

[56:01] that's what they named it.

[56:02] They named it snail fail.

[56:04] They did it.

[56:04] It's like they, but it's like, they thought they were like, okay, from now on movies are

[56:07] like songs.

[56:08] We're not watching the whole thing all the way through.

[56:10] We're just going to our favorite scenes and we make and make a playlist of scenes from

[56:14] different movies.

[56:15] Yeah.

[56:16] Let me just put my DVD player on shovel and see what scenes pop up.

[56:19] Oh yeah.

[56:20] Kid, isn't that the way your kids watch movies anyway?

[56:23] That yeah, my, my kid only just watches the same scene over and over again.

[56:27] There's a lot of watching over and over again.

[56:29] Skipping between.

[56:36] Just to watch the first 13 minutes of the same scenes over and over again.

[56:40] Never gets the ending though.

[56:42] Yeah.

[56:43] Stuart watches the first like six minutes and he knows that minutes seven through 30

[56:47] are pretty much the same thing in different positions.

[56:49] And then he watched the skip button.

[56:52] So he just, yeah.

[56:52] Until he gets to the last, like 45 seconds.

[56:56] Mainly because I like the funny faces.

[56:59] And that movie we're talking about is of course breakfast at Tiffany's.

[57:03] Now let's move on.

[57:03] So Damodar is super excited.

[57:06] He's managed to save the day.

[57:08] But before he can kill Ridley, he gets blasted by some wizard powder from Marina.

[57:13] So he just opens a portal and he bounces.

[57:16] He's super excited.

[57:18] Okay.

[57:18] Marina and Ridley escape using another batch of portal dust.

[57:22] Uh, we get a, a fun zoom in on snails, dead body lying in ruins at the bottom of a cliff.

[57:30] Uh, for a second, I thought he was going to get up, but now he's, he's dead.

[57:34] Um, it's really just a hammer that home.

[57:36] Maybe that was the zombie zoo part.

[57:38] They got, yeah, that would make sense.

[57:40] Cause the snail is an animal.

[57:42] Uh, okay.

[57:43] You would see a snail in the zoo, depending on the zoo.

[57:47] Go to the Los Angeles zoo.

[57:48] I bet you there's at least one snail in the lair.

[57:50] That's the living, uh, was it living amphibians, invertebrates and reptiles house?

[57:59] Yeah.

[58:00] Um, yeah.

[58:00] Okay.

[58:01] So meanwhile, meanwhile, the empress is, you know, guys, let's stop and go there right now.

[58:06] You know, let's do it.

[58:07] I think it's a good idea.

[58:09] Uh, meanwhile, the empress is attempting to end the class divisions between commoners

[58:13] and mages by appealing to the council of mages.

[58:17] Seems like a bad idea, but that's Congress for you.

[58:19] Um, profile, however, just keeps showing up and pointing out and, uh, calling her an evil

[58:24] tyrant, basically being a jerk, a lot of bad faith arguments.

[58:29] Uh, and she storms off.

[58:30] And so we are left with the feeling that there is definitely going to be a civil war between

[58:34] the mages and people that are loyal to the empress.

[58:37] Luckily, the empress has gold dragons, which are unstoppable, super powerful, super smart

[58:43] wizard dragons, right?

[58:44] Adam.

[58:44] Yeah.

[58:45] In my estimation.

[58:46] Yeah.

[58:47] Okay.

[58:48] So it's going to be an easy fight.

[58:49] We'll see what happens.

[58:50] I keep talking.

[58:51] Maybe it's a show of how bad the class divisions are in the, in the world is that they keep

[58:55] talking about a civil war and it's really just a war between the like 30 mages and the

[58:59] empress and her dragons.

[59:00] And nobody else seems to be involved, except I assume they're getting crushed by dragon

[59:04] bodies as they fall from the sky and, and then they swarm.

[59:09] Yeah.

[59:09] Then they swarm the dragon body to get the delicious dragon meat.

[59:13] Okay.

[59:15] What happens in D and D if you eat a dragon?

[59:17] You become a dragon.

[59:18] Yeah.

[59:19] Really?

[59:19] Is that what happens?

[59:19] I don't know.

[59:20] I'm just making stuff up now.

[59:22] Okay.

[59:22] Nope.

[59:23] Ellie would have believed it.

[59:23] I mean, I had a new retirement plan briefly.

[59:26] And then if you ate a whole dragon, you'd probably die.

[59:31] You would never eat a whole dragon, Dan.

[59:33] That's what I'm saying.

[59:33] That's insane.

[59:34] You eat a dragon.

[59:35] Well, I don't know.

[59:36] Am I allowed to freeze it and eat it over time?

[59:39] Like a wedding cake, you can eat that for years.

[59:42] I mean, if it's blood sets things on fire, I'm guessing it's hard to get it down to freezing

[59:47] temperature.

[59:48] Yeah.

[59:48] Well, that's why you would do a kosher style.

[59:50] You drain all the blood.

[59:50] Unless you got a, unless you got a white dragon.

[59:52] Make sure Rabbi's there.

[59:53] The what?

[59:54] Unless you got a white dragon to breathe.

[59:56] It's frost breath on it.

[59:58] Okay.

[59:58] So get a white dragon.

[1:00:00] A dragon, I mean, cut out the middle man.

[1:00:02] Yeah, let's cut out the middle man.

[1:00:03] That's a very good thinking out.

[1:00:05] Okay, yeah, that's better.

[1:00:06] You'd probably need to cure it in some way.

[1:00:09] Is it sick?

[1:00:10] To preserve it back then.

[1:00:12] Yeah, well, you need a salt dragon

[1:00:14] to breathe it's salt breath.

[1:00:16] Yeah, you need a dry brine or a wet brine dragon

[1:00:19] to breathe it's brine breath all over.

[1:00:22] A Cajun spice dragon, just to.

[1:00:24] Oh, that sounds great, or like a Chipotle dragon.

[1:00:26] Oh, I guarantee that'll be delicious.

[1:00:29] So, you get a Paul Prudhomme dragon.

[1:00:33] Now, of course, they go around in those little carts,

[1:00:35] but it's the Marvel dragon.

[1:00:36] Yeah, the Paul Prudhomme dragon is the good version

[1:00:38] of the spicy dragon,

[1:00:41] whereas Dr. John would be the evil version.

[1:00:44] Don, mistakenly, don't get a Dom DeLuise dragon by mistake.

[1:00:48] They're very easy to get.

[1:00:49] Very similar.

[1:00:50] That's the Jennifer Reynolds dragon

[1:00:52] is just gonna slap it a lot of times.

[1:00:53] You don't wanna see that.

[1:00:54] That's not fun.

[1:00:55] Now, I have a question, guys.

[1:00:57] I have a question that's kind of related to this,

[1:01:00] because you mentioned Dr. John.

[1:01:00] Do you think Captain Hook and Dr. Hook still talk

[1:01:02] because they're brothers, or are they estranged?

[1:01:06] Yeah, I mean, I'm sure they talk.

[1:01:08] I bet they're, yeah, I mean,

[1:01:10] I bet there's quite a bit of rivalry

[1:01:12] because they both insist on being called by their title

[1:01:14] as opposed to their first names.

[1:01:16] Yeah, that's fair.

[1:01:16] Now, the Blues Traveler's on the hook.

[1:01:18] Which hook is that about, Captain Hook or Dr. Hook?

[1:01:22] The one that brings you back.

[1:01:25] So, which one is that?

[1:01:26] So, Captain Hook, because he has a boat.

[1:01:28] Okay.

[1:01:29] That's true, he does have a boat.

[1:01:30] Okay, so they take Ridley to the elves.

[1:01:33] He's been mortally wounded, or so you think,

[1:01:35] because the elves are going to heal him with magic.

[1:01:37] They don't use magic, no, no, no.

[1:01:39] We get a lecture on how dragons, magic, life,

[1:01:42] all that shit's connected.

[1:01:43] It binds us, it's the force, et cetera, et cetera.

[1:01:48] And did you catch who was playing that elf

[1:01:50] giving that very pretentious condescending sermon

[1:01:53] about magic?

[1:01:55] Oh, is this where- Yeah, I caught it.

[1:01:56] But what was his name?

[1:01:57] What's his fate, Dr. Who?

[1:01:58] Or the doctor? That's Tom Baker.

[1:02:00] The famous bescarved doctor from Dr. Who, Tom Baker,

[1:02:03] as a really smug elf.

[1:02:06] Just a smug old elf with his little elf ears

[1:02:09] being, we don't use spells

[1:02:10] because we're so in tune with magic.

[1:02:12] Everybody is except humans, you losers.

[1:02:14] Anyway, goodbye now.

[1:02:16] I feel like smug is part of the racial traits of elves,

[1:02:21] right?

[1:02:22] I mean, I didn't say it.

[1:02:23] I don't want to get canceled.

[1:02:24] I'm comfortable that elves can cancel me.

[1:02:27] Okay. Okay.

[1:02:28] Here's another question, Stuart.

[1:02:30] The character Smog in The Hobbit, the dragon,

[1:02:33] what if he was called Smug

[1:02:35] and instead of breathing fire,

[1:02:36] he was just kind of like a dick?

[1:02:37] He's just really full of himself.

[1:02:39] Benedict Cumberbatch, surprisingly,

[1:02:41] would be also very good at that character.

[1:02:43] Yeah, you're right.

[1:02:44] He could do that role.

[1:02:45] The way that Stuart's face perked up

[1:02:46] as soon as you introduced a question about Smog.

[1:02:49] To his credit, as soon as it was clear

[1:02:51] that it was not a genuine question about Smog,

[1:02:55] his face didn't fall.

[1:02:56] He still got to talk about Smog.

[1:02:58] Yeah, yeah.

[1:02:59] He was happy either way.

[1:03:00] Now, I do have a real question about Smog.

[1:03:01] He's got all those jewels all over his tummy

[1:03:03] and that's why that archer has to find the one spot

[1:03:05] where he doesn't have one.

[1:03:06] Did he do that on purpose?

[1:03:10] Or is it just because he's always lying

[1:03:11] on top of those jewels?

[1:03:12] He's got a bedazzler.

[1:03:14] He's got like a really big bedazzler.

[1:03:16] Oh, okay.

[1:03:16] There it is.

[1:03:17] He goes, you know how it is.

[1:03:18] You start with a little bit and you just can't stop.

[1:03:21] Well, I mean, he started with a denim jacket

[1:03:23] and then he looked at that like, that's nice.

[1:03:25] And maybe I'm just gonna go ahead and do that on my tummy.

[1:03:27] Do my skin.

[1:03:28] Why can't I be like that all the time?

[1:03:30] Uh-huh, yeah.

[1:03:31] You know, it hurts for a while, but it's worth it.

[1:03:33] I'm like, the first couple you get on Etsy,

[1:03:36] you know, it seems normal.

[1:03:37] And then after a while, you're just,

[1:03:39] you got jewels all over your face.

[1:03:41] Yeah, I might as well just de-jazzle myself.

[1:03:43] That's when a dragon puts gems all over themselves, yeah.

[1:03:47] Oh, okay.

[1:03:49] Okay.

[1:03:50] So Ridley obviously super bummed his boy Snails is dead.

[1:03:55] So Marina is like, I'm gonna lecture you a little bit,

[1:03:57] then we'll make out, which they do.

[1:04:00] Did anyone else think that the elf place,

[1:04:02] it was basically just Endor?

[1:04:04] Yeah.

[1:04:05] Yeah, it was probably Endor, right?

[1:04:06] It just looks like they took a picture

[1:04:07] of a background from Return of the Jedi

[1:04:08] and that's where they're hanging out at night

[1:04:10] when they talk.

[1:04:11] Later on, they like wander out of the elf place

[1:04:14] and we see two like elf guards

[1:04:16] that have super weird like half masks made out of bones.

[1:04:19] They look so frightening.

[1:04:20] They walk right out of yellow jackets, very weird.

[1:04:23] Yeah, it was very cool.

[1:04:25] I'm like, ooh, who's gonna play them when they're older?

[1:04:29] Okay.

[1:04:30] The same people, they live for hundreds of years.

[1:04:32] Oh, right.

[1:04:34] Just like in the yellow jackets.

[1:04:35] Okay.

[1:04:37] What if, wait, okay guys, hold on.

[1:04:39] These are two yellow jackets, hear my pitch.

[1:04:41] Yeah, there's a jump.

[1:04:43] It turns out whatever happened to them in the forest,

[1:04:45] they're immortal now.

[1:04:46] So we do jump 300 years in the future

[1:04:49] and they still haven't told anyone their secrets

[1:04:53] but they're on the run even more

[1:04:54] because now people want the secret

[1:04:57] of eternal life from them.

[1:04:58] So that's my pitch.

[1:04:59] Oh, okay, yeah.

[1:05:00] It's like a Tuck Everlasting type thing?

[1:05:02] Exactly, exactly.

[1:05:03] Tuck Everlasting, but meets yellow jackets,

[1:05:09] which is what I call it.

[1:05:10] Yeah, yeah.

[1:05:12] Yeah, no, the pitch is great, Ellie.

[1:05:14] You're doing a good job.

[1:05:16] Okay, that sounds great.

[1:05:17] Anyway, so-

[1:05:17] Okay, do I have to give you money?

[1:05:19] What are you charging?

[1:05:20] Yeah, I was gonna say,

[1:05:21] will you hire me now to do that second season

[1:05:23] in the yellow jackets?

[1:05:24] All I have so far is it's Tuck Everlasting

[1:05:26] but yellow jackets.

[1:05:27] Does that work?

[1:05:28] Now, the Tuck that died, how did that end up happening?

[1:05:35] Like, cause eventually, or-

[1:05:37] I think Christopher Lambert chopped his head off.

[1:05:39] One of them.

[1:05:40] Yeah, I think that's the only way it can happen, yeah.

[1:05:42] Or do they just leave town

[1:05:44] once it becomes clear that they're immortal?

[1:05:46] Yeah, I think that's what happens.

[1:05:47] That's Tuck Everleaving.

[1:05:48] Yeah, they bounce.

[1:05:49] Okay, cause I, cause, you know.

[1:05:50] All right, well, then I won't make a joke

[1:05:52] about the cause of death being an Everlasting Tuck Stopper.

[1:05:55] Let's move along.

[1:05:56] Okay, so as they, when they leave the,

[1:05:59] meanwhile, a-

[1:06:00] Dan, I thank you for your restraint

[1:06:02] and not making the joke.

[1:06:03] I appreciate that.

[1:06:04] When you found that it was uncalled for

[1:06:06] due to the logic of the original property,

[1:06:07] you didn't make the joke and I really, I really appreciate it.

[1:06:10] But you made sure that we knew you were,

[1:06:11] which I also appreciate.

[1:06:12] That's truth in comedy.

[1:06:13] That's integrity.

[1:06:15] That's what a comedian is for.

[1:06:17] Yeah, to tell the uncomfortable truths about Tuck.

[1:06:22] So Marina and Ridley have a little emotional argument

[1:06:26] followed by a hookup.

[1:06:28] That mischievous imp that we've come to love

[1:06:30] as watching the whole thing

[1:06:32] and he's reporting back to his boss, Damodar.

[1:06:35] So what do you think he's reporting back to Damodar?

[1:06:37] That they're macking?

[1:06:38] Like, what information does he have?

[1:06:41] He's like, you haven't crushed their spirits entirely, master.

[1:06:44] You gotta see this at Tuck.

[1:06:45] You gotta see it.

[1:06:47] Gives them a real play-by-play.

[1:06:48] And Damodar's like, Ridley and Marina?

[1:06:51] Never would've expected it. But nevertheless,

[1:06:53] this is outrageous.

[1:06:54] Tell me more.

[1:06:55] This is just because Ridley hates the situation.

[1:06:59] Okay, so-

[1:07:00] Now guys, is it offensive of me?

[1:07:03] And maybe this is something Alex should cut out,

[1:07:04] but I assumed Damodar was gay the entire time.

[1:07:07] Not in any negative way,

[1:07:09] but just maybe because he reminded me so much

[1:07:11] of Rob Halford.

[1:07:12] I just assumed his character's gay

[1:07:12] and I liked that about him.

[1:07:14] I mean, I don't know if I would say it's wrong of you,

[1:07:16] but also I can't-

[1:07:17] Yeah, it's kind of a head cannon situation.

[1:07:20] Yeah.

[1:07:20] I can't really be the-

[1:07:21] Okay, well, stick my head in that cannon

[1:07:23] and shoot it all the way to where it needs to go

[1:07:25] to make that happen, so.

[1:07:29] Okay, so we leave.

[1:07:30] Ridley gets, the elves give Ridley a new sword.

[1:07:33] We talked about, it is slightly nicer though, right?

[1:07:36] It's nicer, but I mean, his original sword

[1:07:39] should have been a real piece of shit.

[1:07:41] Yeah.

[1:07:42] It was not as big a step up as you'd think

[1:07:44] for a sword that magic elves give to him.

[1:07:46] Yeah.

[1:07:47] Now, luckily, we now have an adventuring party, right?

[1:07:50] We got a wizard, we got a rogue, we got a dwarf fighter,

[1:07:52] and we have an elf ranger.

[1:07:54] Perfect.

[1:07:55] Let's go to our first dungeon.

[1:07:56] Soon as they get there, only Ridley's able to go.

[1:07:59] There's a wall of force preventing the others.

[1:08:01] It's pretty weird.

[1:08:03] I guess we'll roll with it.

[1:08:04] Again, we split the party.

[1:08:06] Ridley wanders around for a little bit

[1:08:08] before going down a slide and coming to a cool dragon door.

[1:08:10] He sticks the eye of the dragon in the door.

[1:08:12] The door opens, hooray.

[1:08:14] He goes in there again, filled with treasure.

[1:08:16] He thinks about stealing it for a second

[1:08:18] to honor his boy, Snails, but then he decides,

[1:08:19] you know what, I'm gonna leave this shit.

[1:08:22] Over in the corner, there's a skeleton holding the,

[1:08:24] what is that, the Rod of Sevriel?

[1:08:26] Hell yeah, it is.

[1:08:27] That skeleton starts talking to him.

[1:08:28] Turns out that skeleton is Sevriel.

[1:08:29] And he's like, yo, whoever uses this thing,

[1:08:32] bad shit's gonna happen to him.

[1:08:34] And I love this skeleton,

[1:08:35] because this skeleton is just like a puppet

[1:08:37] that talks to this man.

[1:08:39] And then as soon as he imparts as much exposition

[1:08:42] about this rod as he needs to,

[1:08:45] his head just sort of like slows down,

[1:08:47] like the puppeteer has really dropped the head.

[1:08:50] This is a Pirates of the Caribbean,

[1:08:52] the ride level talking skeleton.

[1:08:54] And he's maybe my third favorite character in the movie.

[1:08:58] After, I think, after Zylus and Damodar, I think.

[1:09:02] Oh no, Profion's on there too.

[1:09:04] Look, okay, let's just say.

[1:09:05] You can have four favorites.

[1:09:07] Yeah, well, I mean, at number one,

[1:09:09] let's just say overdramatic Englishman.

[1:09:11] That's just number one at the top.

[1:09:13] And then number two will be this skeleton.

[1:09:15] And then number three would be, I guess, the imp

[1:09:17] that's always laughing,

[1:09:18] because at least he's enjoying it.

[1:09:19] He's having a good time.

[1:09:20] Adam, who are your three favorite characters

[1:09:22] in the movie at this point?

[1:09:23] I mean, definitely, I'm not even gonna say Profion,

[1:09:26] because I'm not even 100% sure that I have his name right.

[1:09:28] But Jeremy Irons is my favorite character in the movie.

[1:09:32] And I liked Zylus.

[1:09:36] Yeah, the movie didn't give me a whole lot more to work with.

[1:09:39] I'm gonna say Elwood, of course,

[1:09:40] because Elwood's a dwarf.

[1:09:42] I like Nordic, because Nord is an elf.

[1:09:44] And I like Snails, because he's dead.

[1:09:48] And when characters are dead,

[1:09:49] they loom larger in your imagination.

[1:09:51] That's true, yeah, like Uncle Ben, yeah, sure.

[1:09:54] The Uncle Ben from Spider-Man,

[1:09:55] not Uncle Ben, the rice mascot,

[1:09:57] who lives in the heart of pots everywhere.

[1:10:00] I mean, antipods, not like rice pots, antipods.

[1:10:02] And Dan, what about you?

[1:10:04] Three favorite characters?

[1:10:05] I think that this guy's my favorite.

[1:10:06] Later on, there's a, there's sort of like a skeleton,

[1:10:12] a baby skeleton dragon who like jumps onto Thorbirch

[1:10:16] and it's like CGI, and it's clearly just like a loop

[1:10:20] of the same CGI movements.

[1:10:21] Dan, are you describing the thing

[1:10:24] that Wikipedia defines as powerful magics?

[1:10:28] Yeah, it could be, in the plot description, yeah.

[1:10:32] So, in summary, all of the skeletons,

[1:10:39] and of two of the people asked this question,

[1:10:41] who are your three favorite characters?

[1:10:42] Two of them could only mention two characters.

[1:10:44] They failed to even come up with three

[1:10:45] that reached the list, so, yeah.

[1:10:47] So, he gets the Rod of Sevril, it looks pretty cool.

[1:10:51] I wanna talk about how this rod looks.

[1:10:55] What are your thoughts about the look

[1:10:56] of the Rod of Sevril?

[1:10:57] I think it looks like H.R. Giger designed a back massager.

[1:11:01] It does look like that.

[1:11:02] I mean, that only sounds good to me.

[1:11:04] I can't, I imagine it would pummel my back

[1:11:06] into relaxation with kind of mechanoid penises.

[1:11:09] The various rods in this movie all kind of look similar

[1:11:13] to what Loki carries around in the Avengers,

[1:11:17] but obviously on a Dungeons and Dragons movie budget.

[1:11:23] Yeah, this one, I have to say, this Rod of Sevril,

[1:11:26] I imagine something more rod-like.

[1:11:28] Yeah, yeah, yeah, more like a bad dragon sex toy.

[1:11:32] Yeah, more like a batleth.

[1:11:33] You know what, it looks like a combination

[1:11:35] of a Klingon batleth and that blade codpiece from Seven

[1:11:40] that Kevin Spacey has commissioned,

[1:11:43] because of course they don't mass-produce those,

[1:11:45] and then, of course, there's someone to use.

[1:11:46] And then strapped on the poor Leland Orser.

[1:11:48] Yeah, yeah, and it's, so when it showed up,

[1:11:50] they were like, the Rod of Sevril,

[1:11:52] and I'm like, is that really a rod?

[1:11:54] I don't know if I'd call that a rod.

[1:11:55] It's like, maybe it's not even really a staff.

[1:11:58] Like, it was, I got thrown off by that.

[1:11:59] It's poor terminology, in my opinion.

[1:12:03] Earlier on, there was like a line that's,

[1:12:07] you know, I saw it in the closed caption,

[1:12:08] because I, too, have old ears,

[1:12:11] and put the closed captioning on,

[1:12:12] and it said, like, what does this rod do?

[1:12:15] And I just find it very, I was laughing at it,

[1:12:17] and Audrey's like, what are you laughing at?

[1:12:18] I found it very hard to explain,

[1:12:20] because it's not really that funny,

[1:12:22] but something about this fantasy world

[1:12:25] putting so much weight on the word rod.

[1:12:30] It just seems like the most low-rent way to describe it.

[1:12:34] Yeah, yeah.

[1:12:34] Staff would have been nice.

[1:12:36] Yeah, yeah.

[1:12:37] Yeah, considering everyone else

[1:12:39] gets kind of a silly fantasy name

[1:12:41] that this is just a rod is, yeah, is a bit much.

[1:12:44] A rod that looks like it could go in the dishwasher

[1:12:46] if it gets dirty.

[1:12:47] Yeah, it looks, I mean, top shelf.

[1:12:51] It looks like it'd go in the top rack.

[1:12:53] Bottom rack might be a little dangerous for it, but yeah.

[1:12:56] Okay, so.

[1:12:56] So, Dan, what would you have called it?

[1:12:58] Let's play the game that I like to call

[1:13:00] Dan on the Spot Improv.

[1:13:02] Dan, what would you have called,

[1:13:03] it's also, the name of the segment

[1:13:05] is also Dr. Dan Movie Fixer.

[1:13:07] Dan, what would you prescribe, Dr. Dan,

[1:13:10] as a new name for the Rod of Surreal?

[1:13:13] Well, Staff would have been acceptable,

[1:13:15] but also, like, why don't you do, like,

[1:13:17] a Scepter of Surreal?

[1:13:19] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[1:13:21] Scepter of Red Dragon Control, yeah.

[1:13:24] Yeah.

[1:13:25] Okay, so, Ridley takes,

[1:13:28] despite the warnings of the skeleton,

[1:13:30] he takes the rod, and then he looks over

[1:13:33] and he sees a pretty bad-ass painting on the wall.

[1:13:36] Adam, you're a professional artist.

[1:13:38] How would you describe the bad-ass mural

[1:13:41] that's been painted on the wall of this treasure room?

[1:13:44] I guess I would lose the ass part of it

[1:13:46] and just refer to the painting as kind of bad.

[1:13:48] Oh, is it because

[1:13:50] some of the dragons look like they have six-packs?

[1:13:52] I'm kind of into that.

[1:13:54] There were so many D&D artists in 2000

[1:13:58] that would have made you an amazing mural,

[1:14:01] probably for free,

[1:14:02] because even though, I mean,

[1:14:05] doing art for D&D and Dungeons and Magic the Gathering

[1:14:08] and stuff like that, I always enjoyed it,

[1:14:09] but there was always a sense in my mind

[1:14:12] that, like, okay, this is what I'm doing

[1:14:13] for a living right now,

[1:14:14] until I can get to write and illustrate children's books,

[1:14:17] which I can't seem to break into.

[1:14:19] It took me several years.

[1:14:20] Until I could get into fine art dragon painting.

[1:14:24] Right.

[1:14:26] Yeah, to get a commission from the Medicis

[1:14:28] to paint the portrait of their dragon, yeah.

[1:14:30] But being in that world

[1:14:31] and knowing a lot of D&D artists,

[1:14:33] I knew that a lot of them were doing

[1:14:35] what they had dreamed that they would do

[1:14:37] since they were five years old.

[1:14:39] And so I was a little offended

[1:14:42] that they hadn't gotten just the top-of-the-line

[1:14:45] D&D illustrator at the time

[1:14:47] to just really do it up for them.

[1:14:49] The mural kind of looks like the mural

[1:14:50] that the owner of an Italian restaurant

[1:14:52] would get their, like, nephew to paint,

[1:14:54] where they're like,

[1:14:55] I want Tony Soprano, the Joker, Scarface.

[1:15:00] I want all of them hanging out at a table together.

[1:15:04] Put a second Joker in there,

[1:15:06] but not the Jared Leto one.

[1:15:08] No, no, no.

[1:15:10] And choose your two favorite Jokers.

[1:15:11] They gotta be having a fucking ball.

[1:15:13] And you know, up in the clouds,

[1:15:15] there's angels looking down,

[1:15:16] and those are my kids' faces on the angels.

[1:15:19] I know it implies that my kids are dead,

[1:15:20] but it's not.

[1:15:21] It's because I love them so much

[1:15:22] that they're angels, yeah.

[1:15:24] Okay, so.

[1:15:26] And then, of course, I want,

[1:15:27] and then A-Rod as a centaur.

[1:15:30] You gotta have that in there also.

[1:15:32] Yeah, you gotta get Derek Jeter in there.

[1:15:34] He's kind of mid-swing.

[1:15:36] Yeah, yeah, exactly, yeah.

[1:15:38] Because they looked in the rule book

[1:15:39] and they said, no,

[1:15:40] that says a centaur can't play.

[1:15:41] Now, Dan, you've gone on the record

[1:15:44] as disliking the word Rod.

[1:15:46] What would you call A-Rod then?

[1:15:47] A-Snap, A-Scepter, it doesn't make sense.

[1:15:49] It seems like Alex Staff-Riguez, you know.

[1:15:52] So what are you gonna do?

[1:15:53] I don't think that this,

[1:15:56] I don't think I said that this is a rule

[1:15:58] that has to be applied equally across all media

[1:16:02] and types of people.

[1:16:04] Although the word Rod,

[1:16:06] I think that a big part of my problem with it

[1:16:09] is it always reminds me of the Simpsons

[1:16:11] in not one, but two ways.

[1:16:12] Number one, the inanimate carbon rod,

[1:16:14] and number two, Rod of Rod and Todd.

[1:16:18] Because I kept thinking of Rowdy Roddy Piper

[1:16:20] and started thinking about

[1:16:21] what would a Rowdy Roddy Piper have control over?

[1:16:24] What kind of dragons?

[1:16:25] And it would have made even more sense

[1:16:26] that there were zombies,

[1:16:27] since in They Live, the aliens look like zombies.

[1:16:29] But, you know, it didn't happen, I guess.

[1:16:31] Okay, so after staring at this harrowing scene

[1:16:35] painted across the treasure room wall,

[1:16:37] we cut back to-

[1:16:38] What was the trying to communicate?

[1:16:39] Just that dragons are trouble?

[1:16:41] Yeah.

[1:16:42] Okay.

[1:16:43] We cut to the skies above Sumdall

[1:16:46] where a civil war is raging

[1:16:47] between Thora Birch's army of gold dragons

[1:16:51] and the Council of Mages

[1:16:52] who are atop the, what, Tower of Mages?

[1:16:55] Wizard Tower?

[1:16:56] I don't remember what it's called.

[1:16:57] Yeah.

[1:16:57] And there's a lot of, like, fire blasts-

[1:16:58] It's the Mage Business Center.

[1:17:00] Mage International Business Center.

[1:17:01] Yeah.

[1:17:02] They fire a giant ballista bolt

[1:17:04] through one of the gold dragons

[1:17:05] who falls and then gets,

[1:17:07] after getting shot,

[1:17:08] falls and gets speared through its stomach

[1:17:10] by the, what, the peak of a building.

[1:17:14] It's fire.

[1:17:15] And she rides a dragon around, right?

[1:17:16] Would you call her a mother of dragons, Stuart?

[1:17:19] Yeah, I would say so.

[1:17:20] I mean, she does have,

[1:17:21] she does do this cool thing

[1:17:23] similar to that one J-Lo look

[1:17:25] from the Met Gala

[1:17:27] where she has, like, a chainmail coif over her head.

[1:17:31] Yeah, yeah.

[1:17:32] It's dope.

[1:17:32] Because it kind of makes it look like her hair is armor.

[1:17:34] It's really sick.

[1:17:36] But she doesn't ride a dragon yet.

[1:17:37] She waits till things get a little bit hairier.

[1:17:40] And Jeremy Irons right now is fucking,

[1:17:43] he's flipping out.

[1:17:44] He's having a great time.

[1:17:46] I was worried he was going to give himself a stroke

[1:17:47] or an aneurysm or something.

[1:17:49] He is projecting so, so hard through his face.

[1:17:53] I mean, the level of professionalism

[1:17:56] that the man brings to this thing,

[1:17:58] which he must've sensed

[1:18:01] as being Jeremy Irons was a disaster,

[1:18:04] is admirable.

[1:18:05] Because he's, you know,

[1:18:06] like, he only is in a few scenes,

[1:18:08] but he is really doing primo villain yelling.

[1:18:12] I assume that he signed on

[1:18:16] because he thought they were adapting

[1:18:17] Jane Austen's Dungeons and Dragons.

[1:18:19] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[1:18:21] But then later I learned that it was actually

[1:18:23] because he had just recently bought a castle

[1:18:25] and really, really needed money.

[1:18:27] Yeah, that was his quote on it.

[1:18:29] He was like, I just bought a castle.

[1:18:31] I better get some experience with dungeons

[1:18:33] before I move in.

[1:18:34] I'll take this role.

[1:18:36] And who knows, once you get a castle,

[1:18:38] the dragons just start showing up at your door.

[1:18:41] I mean, the real trouble was he thought he bought a castle

[1:18:43] and when he went, it was just a DVD box set of castles

[1:18:46] starring Nathan Fillion.

[1:18:47] And he was like, I can't live in this.

[1:18:49] I sold my house.

[1:18:50] I can't move into a DVD set.

[1:18:52] Yeah, he was like, this is likable, but yeah.

[1:18:56] Well, he tried to make a little hut out of the DVD boxes

[1:18:58] and he would lull himself to sleep

[1:19:00] by looking up at them and reading the chapter titles

[1:19:02] for each of the episodes.

[1:19:04] And he later referred to it as

[1:19:06] maybe the best time of his life, you know,

[1:19:08] because he really figured out what he needed in his life,

[1:19:10] which was shelter, that would be like a house.

[1:19:16] I always wonder with roles like this,

[1:19:18] is an actor like Jeremy Irons enjoying it?

[1:19:21] Like, I feel like if you're doing this role,

[1:19:23] you're being an evil wizard in a kind of a garbagey movie.

[1:19:26] You have as much, I assume the fun part would be

[1:19:28] to do it as big as possible.

[1:19:30] But I was wondering if it's like, is he enjoying doing that?

[1:19:32] If you asked him afterwards, would he be like,

[1:19:34] hehehehe, or would he be like,

[1:19:36] oh, oh, I'm just trying to keep it alive, you know?

[1:19:39] Years ago, when this movie first came out on DVD,

[1:19:42] I remember renting it and watching all the special features.

[1:19:45] And there's definitely like a making of featurette

[1:19:47] where you see Jeremy Irons doing one of these big scenes.

[1:19:51] And then literally as soon as they cut,

[1:19:53] he like drops entirely and storms off.

[1:19:56] It's amazing.

[1:19:58] I guess that answers that question.

[1:20:00] So you don't have one of those interviews where he's like,

[1:20:02] Profion is a character who is drawn to power.

[1:20:06] Like, I always love when you watch the interviews of people.

[1:20:08] I don't see Profion as a villain, no.

[1:20:10] No, from Profion's point of view,

[1:20:13] Izmir needs order and needs a hierarchy.

[1:20:17] Whenever, I've talked about this in the podcast before,

[1:20:19] that my favorite thing when they make a comic movie

[1:20:21] is watching the interviews where actors

[1:20:23] who are not familiar with the comic books

[1:20:25] until they read them to prepare for this role

[1:20:27] have to talk about their understanding of who Rogue is.

[1:20:33] Storm is a powerful character.

[1:20:35] She's one with the elements.

[1:20:36] I always think that's really funny.

[1:20:38] So anyway.

[1:20:39] Okay, so back to Ridley.

[1:20:42] He leaves the dungeon only to find that Damodar has arrived

[1:20:45] thanks to his mischievous little imp friend.

[1:20:49] And Damodar has captured the adventuring party

[1:20:52] and they make yet another deal for stuff.

[1:20:58] He gives Damodar the Rod of Sevriel.

[1:21:02] Damodar bounces.

[1:21:03] We get a brief brawl where our heroes

[1:21:06] do some flipping and kicking.

[1:21:08] Norda in particular seems very good at doing those things.

[1:21:11] She should be involved in more of the fights.

[1:21:13] Not gonna happen.

[1:21:15] Okay, so Damodar goes through a portal,

[1:21:18] quickly followed by Ridley.

[1:21:20] Okay, we're in the end game here, guys.

[1:21:22] Meanwhile, Thora Birch is now riding

[1:21:25] on the back of a gold dragon

[1:21:27] and Profion uses the Rod given to him by Damodar

[1:21:30] to summon his own army of red dragons.

[1:21:33] So now gold dragons are like the good version of red dragons.

[1:21:35] Gold dragons breathe fire.

[1:21:37] So do red dragons.

[1:21:38] Just to clear that up in case you guys weren't familiar.

[1:21:41] Wait, I don't understand how that makes gold dragons

[1:21:43] the good version that they both breathe fire.

[1:21:46] But they're like, if you use an ability,

[1:21:50] like maybe you're a cleric or something

[1:21:51] and it gave you the ability to detect alignment,

[1:21:54] the alignment of the gold dragon would be good.

[1:21:57] It would be evil.

[1:21:58] As it breathes fire on you, you could be like,

[1:22:00] oh, they must have a good reason for that.

[1:22:02] Yeah, you know what?

[1:22:03] He's in the right here.

[1:22:04] Maybe I'm the baddie, yeah.

[1:22:06] I just, I thought it was strange the way you said it.

[1:22:08] It was like if you were like sharks,

[1:22:10] you said dolphins are the good version of whales,

[1:22:12] they both have blowholes.

[1:22:13] And I'd be like, well, just because they share a feature

[1:22:16] doesn't mean one is good and one is evil.

[1:22:18] It's not a quality, it's more of an ethical thing.

[1:22:22] Yeah, okay.

[1:22:25] Now, both possums and koalas are marsupials.

[1:22:29] Koalas, of course, are the good and possums are the evil.

[1:22:32] Yeah.

[1:22:33] I mean, that's arguably not wrong.

[1:22:36] Like if you look at those creatures, okay.

[1:22:39] No, no, here's the thing.

[1:22:40] Koalas, this is the classic story

[1:22:42] because koalas look cute, but they are jerks.

[1:22:44] Whereas possums look like horrible little rat monsters

[1:22:46] and they're very loving.

[1:22:48] Okay, cool.

[1:22:50] So if there's any possums listening, Elliot's down.

[1:22:55] Um, okay.

[1:22:55] I thought you were going to apologize.

[1:22:56] No, I'm not going to apologize.

[1:22:59] Fuck that.

[1:23:01] If there are any possums listening, go to Elliot

[1:23:06] because Stuart doesn't give a shit.

[1:23:10] The doctor is out.

[1:23:12] Okay, so...

[1:23:13] But those possums need medicine, Stuart.

[1:23:16] Nope.

[1:23:17] I do want to point out that when Damodar has our heroes captured

[1:23:23] and he requires Ridley to give him the rod,

[1:23:26] as soon as he gets the rod, he's like,

[1:23:29] fuck it, kill them all.

[1:23:30] You know, he breaks the deal.

[1:23:31] There's been a lot of deal breaking.

[1:23:33] So that when Damodar then goes to see Profion

[1:23:36] and he's like, I found you the rod master.

[1:23:37] Now take this thing out of my head.

[1:23:39] I was like, 100% sure Profion was going to be like,

[1:23:42] look that dork.

[1:23:44] But instead, Profion's like, no, okay, that's cool.

[1:23:46] That's fair.

[1:23:47] Hey, I'm lawful evil.

[1:23:48] I'm not chaotic evil.

[1:23:49] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:23:50] So he removes the thing from Damodar's head,

[1:23:53] which is great because Ridley shows up.

[1:23:54] He and Damodar have a great sword fight, okay?

[1:23:58] And that's when we get to see that elf sword at work

[1:24:00] because when he swings it,

[1:24:01] we get a little bit of extra special effects,

[1:24:03] like a little bit of extra lasers and stuff.

[1:24:05] And I really enjoyed seeing Jeremy Irons beat up our lead

[1:24:10] because again, in terms of charisma,

[1:24:14] Irons is a much more charismatic performer

[1:24:16] and as we just saw, keeps his promises.

[1:24:19] So, you know.

[1:24:20] Yes, exactly.

[1:24:21] At one point, Jeremy Irons casts a spell

[1:24:23] by just like blowing on one of the heroes

[1:24:26] and I'm like, that's showmanship.

[1:24:28] Okay, so Ridley fights Damodar.

[1:24:32] This fight goes a little bit differently than the last one

[1:24:34] because as I mentioned before,

[1:24:35] he does a flip, stabs Damodar in the back,

[1:24:38] pushes him off the tower

[1:24:39] where we watch him fall to his death.

[1:24:42] Then he gets in a fight with Profion.

[1:24:45] In the, as the scuffle goes on,

[1:24:48] our other heroes show up to try and stop Profion.

[1:24:51] He can, he beats them all.

[1:24:53] Unfortunately, in the process of beating up

[1:24:56] all of our heroes,

[1:24:57] he has lost the scepter or the rod.

[1:24:59] Scepter, I'm confusing it.

[1:25:01] It's a, it's a rods too.

[1:25:03] Let's be honest with ourselves,

[1:25:05] which it's never going to be more than a rod.

[1:25:07] He loses the rod,

[1:25:08] which means that the child will be spoiled

[1:25:10] because he will be spared.

[1:25:12] So Ridley picks up that rod

[1:25:14] and he shatters it with his sword,

[1:25:16] which I feel like he should have done that

[1:25:18] as soon as they found it.

[1:25:20] But he shatters it,

[1:25:21] which disrupts the army of red dragons

[1:25:24] and allows Thora Birch to land at the council of,

[1:25:27] at the tower of mages.

[1:25:30] What, what, the, what if it,

[1:25:32] instead of controlling red dragons,

[1:25:34] it just controlled the rights

[1:25:35] to the Thomas Harris novel, Red Dragon.

[1:25:37] And so Profion's like, finally,

[1:25:42] I can do the job.

[1:25:43] Brett Ratner screwed up man.

[1:25:45] Hunter is good,

[1:25:46] but they didn't really have the resources.

[1:25:47] They need to do it justice.

[1:25:49] And it's like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:25:53] But they stretched it out too long.

[1:25:55] They stretched it out too long.

[1:25:56] Anyway, like I'm saying,

[1:25:57] I'm going to do the definitive adaptation of red dragon.

[1:26:00] Now that I have the rod of severe.

[1:26:03] So the empress shows up and at first we're like,

[1:26:07] Oh, now he's going to get it.

[1:26:08] But instead Profion uses powerful magics,

[1:26:11] which is displayed by a computer generated

[1:26:15] skeleton dragon that like,

[1:26:17] I guess starts like wrestling with Thora Birch.

[1:26:20] It's pretty cool.

[1:26:21] Jumps on like, like it wants a piggyback ride.

[1:26:24] Yeah, I actually, I thought it was,

[1:26:26] I was one of those where I was like,

[1:26:27] that wasn't what I expected.

[1:26:28] So I thought that looked kind of cool.

[1:26:30] That not, not the magic I expected him to use.

[1:26:33] And then despite being bedeviled by magic skeletons,

[1:26:36] a gold dragon arrives to help

[1:26:38] and chomps down on Profion and our heroes win the day.

[1:26:42] They get cool level up outfits.

[1:26:46] They are standing at the grave of snails,

[1:26:49] which is a beautiful monument.

[1:26:51] It's just, it's just a, it's just a easily toppled cairn.

[1:26:55] It's a very strange monument.

[1:26:56] We hear Thora Birch being like,

[1:26:59] now I pronounce everyone equal,

[1:27:01] which I laughed at because I get why as a political leader,

[1:27:06] you have to make like an official pronouncement

[1:27:09] to try and usher in a more equitable society.

[1:27:14] But at the same time,

[1:27:17] the line makes it sound like,

[1:27:19] well, everything's good now.

[1:27:21] And I'm like, would that it were that easy?

[1:27:23] I don't think that an equitable society

[1:27:26] can just be wished into existence, Thora Birch.

[1:27:28] But, but if anyone's bad,

[1:27:31] she'll just have the gold dragons eat them down.

[1:27:33] I guess so.

[1:27:34] It's one of several moments near the end of the movie

[1:27:36] where you wonder why they didn't just get to it.

[1:27:38] Like, Ridley shows up.

[1:27:40] Profion is clearly the boss bad guy

[1:27:42] and he is busy controlling these dragons.

[1:27:44] And Ridley goes, Damodar!

[1:27:46] And he starts fighting him.

[1:27:47] It's like, let's go after Profion.

[1:27:49] Damodar is small fish.

[1:27:50] You only need him to get to the big fish.

[1:27:51] Damodar killed his friend snails, dude.

[1:27:54] It's true.

[1:27:54] Yeah, but you could deal with that afterwards.

[1:27:56] And then when the, when the dragon eats Profion,

[1:27:58] it's like, this could have happened 15 minutes ago.

[1:28:01] I don't know why this, you know,

[1:28:03] he hasn't had those red dragons for a while now.

[1:28:05] Just eat them, you know.

[1:28:06] But we gotta get to the great last scene,

[1:28:08] the scene that had me going, what?

[1:28:10] Yeah, so they're, they're standing in the graveyard.

[1:28:13] They're standing before, again, this,

[1:28:15] this beautiful tombstone made for snails.

[1:28:18] Just a pile of rocks.

[1:28:19] They're all in new upgraded outfits.

[1:28:22] They've clearly gotten to another level.

[1:28:26] Oh.

[1:28:26] Yep. Okay.

[1:28:27] And Ridley is about to be knighted, he says.

[1:28:30] Ridley's about to be knighted.

[1:28:32] Uh, he places, uh, the eye of the dragon Ruby

[1:28:38] onto the cairn of stones.

[1:28:40] And he's like, makes a wish or some shit.

[1:28:43] And then a little bit of magic happens

[1:28:45] and snail, snail's name falls from the monument.

[1:28:48] And they're like, what?

[1:28:50] And the Norda, the elf is like,

[1:28:52] yeah, your friend's alive now.

[1:28:54] And so they all hold hands and then they turn into dust.

[1:28:57] And that's the end of the movie.

[1:28:59] Norda literally tells, tells Ridley

[1:29:02] and the audience not to question it.

[1:29:05] I feel like her, her skill in the movie is hand-waving.

[1:29:07] She tells Elwood earlier that, no, you can't go in.

[1:29:10] This is something they must do on their own.

[1:29:13] And then later on, it's like this,

[1:29:15] don't, do not question this gift.

[1:29:17] Just accept it.

[1:29:19] The movie's over now.

[1:29:21] This is a setup for, it was intended to be a trilogy,

[1:29:25] a trilogy that will never be realized.

[1:29:27] Dungeons and Dragons 2, The Search for Snails.

[1:29:30] Did you guys know there were sequels?

[1:29:32] Oh, right, right.

[1:29:32] I knew there was a, there was a,

[1:29:34] like a direct to DVD one, right?

[1:29:35] There was a direct to TV sci-fi sequel.

[1:29:40] And then I think a third one

[1:29:43] that might've been direct to DVD.

[1:29:45] But the only reoccurring character

[1:29:47] in the second one is Damodar.

[1:29:50] Even though he was killed in this one.

[1:29:52] It's revealed that Profion

[1:29:55] made him an undying

[1:30:00] No slave to him of some kind and so it a Damodar cannot die and is is there in the second body now

[1:30:07] I've never saw the sequels my friend Greg kept swearing to me

[1:30:11] He's like the first one was a good second was actually really good, dude. You should check it out

[1:30:14] I never got around to it Adam. I'm assuming based on the level of professionalism

[1:30:19] You've already displayed. You've already watched these movies

[1:30:22] I had to obviously in order to be able to do illustrations for Dungeons and Dragons

[1:30:30] Everything I watched the old cartoon. I watched the sequels

[1:30:34] Yeah, I mean even the even the character design doesn't look of a piece with the Wizards of the Coast

[1:30:42] Dungeons and Dragons stuff

[1:30:44] I feel like even by then like

[1:30:46] People like Wayne Reynolds had done so much of the character design work that this doesn't look like that. This looks like I

[1:30:55] Feel like it looks like an earlier time of D&D

[1:30:58] But not it was not of a piece of what they were putting out in the year 2000

[1:31:03] Which was kind of I guess that was sort of my high time for when I was working

[1:31:08] With them and they had a big old

[1:31:10] style guide at times hundreds of pages to showing you

[1:31:14] Really like intricate details about how elf fashion should look different from human fashion should look different from dwarf fashion

[1:31:21] And and it was all very thought-out stuff that did not find its way into this movie at all

[1:31:27] Yeah, that's that's kind of what I was wondering from your standpoint like when you're watching something like this

[1:31:32] Is it hard for you not to try and break it down and be like I would have designed this differently

[1:31:37] I mean, obviously you're gonna say you'd design all this stuff differently except maybe Thor Burch's cool little thing. It's I like

[1:31:43] But yeah, I feel like it would be hard as an artist not to be like, why did they do it this way?

[1:31:48] Well, I mean as an artist to pretty much every shot. I was like, hmm that they should have composed that differently

[1:31:54] They should have composed that differently. Yeah, so should have fit more magic items into that shot

[1:31:58] It's the aesthetic of the movie. I think I would describe as Halloween adventure

[1:32:03] Like there's not that much. I feel like you couldn't get by just going to a pop-up Halloween store and just

[1:32:09] You know loading up on their fantasy costume. So they definitely visited a spirit Halloween store at the beginning when they apparently just were tossing

[1:32:17] skulls into

[1:32:19] every corner of

[1:32:21] profion's lair

[1:32:23] And I'm not even talking about the the set like also where he did we didn't mention that right?

[1:32:28] Oh, yeah that it was that part of it was shot in a real ossuary. That's tech raises skills and skeletons everywhere in the Czech

[1:32:34] Republic. Yeah, I do want to say that like it's a the movie's aesthetic is a weird

[1:32:39] Mix though in in the sense of like all the effects definitely look janky like the practical effects look silly

[1:32:46] The CGI looks silly in the way that you know early CGI where you did not have a lot of resources

[1:32:52] Looks

[1:32:53] Goofy, but at the same time like this was in effect an independent movie the guy who directed

[1:33:01] yeah, and wrote it like threw together all this funding and made special deals with

[1:33:07] you know the effects people to to do things on a budget and so it's got this weird combo of like

[1:33:14] Well, it doesn't look good. It all looks dumb

[1:33:17] But at the same time it all looks more impressive than you would expect

[1:33:21] for the budget that they had like like there's a lot of

[1:33:25] It is a ambitious

[1:33:28] failure, I guess is the best way of putting it and I

[1:33:33] Think maybe some of it would have looked better if the director knew what he was doing

[1:33:37] Lighting wise like there were scenes in it. Why did you do it this way? We're like, I remember there's a scene where

[1:33:43] Marlon Wayans like

[1:33:45] You know

[1:33:46] Finds his mark to like pick up an important piece of things and see him walking

[1:33:51] Directly into a shadow that covers his face rather than like maybe walking from the shadows to have his face illuminated

[1:33:58] I mean, it's a small thing

[1:33:59] but all of this like really cheap stuff also looked I

[1:34:03] Assume all the worse because they didn't know how to hide how cheap it was

[1:34:07] It's funny that you mentioned lighting because having watched the director commentary I can tell you that it is

[1:34:13] 90% talking about how each scene was difficult to light

[1:34:18] Yeah

[1:34:19] What are some of the reasons that it was difficult to like was it I mean probably because it was his first movie I imagine

[1:34:24] Well, I don't know if it was the director of photography's first movie. I haven't looked at oh, yeah, but the director's maybe not

[1:34:30] It's not the cruise. Yeah some of it

[1:34:32] From what I I gleaned was that you know, some of the practical like the real-world

[1:34:39] Settings that they were using in different parts of Prague

[1:34:42] We're just so large, you know, like they the Wizards Council scenes are set in an actual opera house. That was difficult to

[1:34:52] to light apparently just because it was so big and had such intensely high ceilings and

[1:34:57] the there was a lot of talk about just the library and different places that they had found in Prague that were

[1:35:06] Difficult to to make look good

[1:35:08] I wonder if you go to an opera if there's like a little like plaque somewhere that's like as seen in the movie Dungeons & Dragons

[1:35:15] Yeah

[1:35:17] It seems like maybe the the key mistake was

[1:35:21] That he used all of those resources to try and do something epic rather than just to be like, okay

[1:35:28] what's a smaller version of a Dungeons & Dragons movie I can make and like

[1:35:32] Scrounge and like make do it the smartest way like and but with like a smaller scale

[1:35:37] Yeah, I mean, I think he had it sounds like he had had this story or something like it in his head for a long

[1:35:43] Time, although I remember reading somewhere that he had written another script that was more budget conscious

[1:35:48] But the producers wanted him to use an earlier script or something. It was a lawsuit or something

[1:35:53] I read this to that

[1:35:54] I don't understand law enough to to understand why a lawsuit would require you to use an earlier

[1:36:00] Draft of the script, but that is what I read

[1:36:03] At one point. I think they were gonna sort of turn it into a like a television thing

[1:36:08] and but there was a provision that it was supposed to be an actual movie movie and that may have been why it had to

[1:36:17] Inflate it does look like a television thing. Yeah, it does and then and but if you're right

[1:36:22] They could have done a Dungeons & Dragons movie. That is not epic in scope

[1:36:26] But it's about like an adventure party going through a dungeon going through it. Yeah, I really wanted to I mean

[1:36:33] This kept on making me just wonder what a D&D movie what makes that movie a D&D movie and like what could it be?

[1:36:39] and what should it be and

[1:36:41] you know

[1:36:43] Did they need to like Jumanji this up that?

[1:36:48] The world or I don't know what do you think I I think that the I mean part of it

[1:36:53] it is hard because I was thinking about this was watching that like D&D is not a property that has like

[1:36:59] Beloved characters necessarily or like beloved storylines

[1:37:02] It's a world that you create your story and characters for so it feels like you kind of want to I guess like I was saying

[1:37:08] Earlier like incorporate some kind of plot that resembles the game mechanics

[1:37:12] So it feels like an adaptation of what it's like to play the game

[1:37:15] I mean kids get people getting players being sucked into the game is essentially what the TV show was the old car

[1:37:21] And the like Kieran Gillan comic die is basically the same shit

[1:37:25] Yeah, and that Tom Hanks made for TV movie where he gets driven insane by role-playing games

[1:37:32] from the 1980s

[1:37:34] Amazing monsters. Yeah, but I think like if you there are so many kind of like old

[1:37:39] Not good

[1:37:41] Barbarian movies where there's like a part that are very D&D type where it's like a barbarian going through

[1:37:47] Dimly lit passageways fighting monsters, and there's usually like a girl

[1:37:52] He has to save and a treasure of some kind or a evil wizard to fight. Yeah, if you do wizard played by a caridin

[1:37:58] Yes, probably

[1:38:00] that was part of Italian law that you needed to get a caridin to do it the it feels like there's a

[1:38:06] There's a like a higher budget version of that and it was only while

[1:38:10] Researching this movie after watching it that I found out that there is a new Dungeons & Dragons movie coming out

[1:38:16] Like this year, I think and so our next year, so it's we'll find out I guess what a Joe Mancinello in this one

[1:38:22] I really hope so that guy loves D&D so much

[1:38:25] What what I read was that he was apparently a big force in trying to get it off the ground

[1:38:29] But I don't know if he's actually in it

[1:38:31] Chris Pine is listed as the Chris Pine and Michelle Rodriguez run it Hugh Grant is listed as a star in it

[1:38:36] You know, he's gonna play an evil wizard like that. He's gonna be perfect. I assume you know

[1:38:41] Hot Paddington too, I mean he's perfect. Yeah, maybe Paddington will be in this movie

[1:38:46] Maybe there'll be a Paddington D&D crossover, but I think there's talking bears in the D&D world right another owl bears, right?

[1:38:52] Mm-hmm owl bears. I don't think talk though unless you speak owl bear. All right, I don't

[1:39:00] Did your neighbor back into your car bring that case to judge Judy think the mailman might be the real father give that one

[1:39:08] to Judge Mathis

[1:39:09] But does your mom want you to flush her ashes down the toilet at Disney World when she passes away now?

[1:39:17] That's my jurisdiction

[1:39:19] Welcome to the court of Judge John Hodgman where the people are real the disputes are real and the stakes are often

[1:39:25] Unusual if I got arrested for dumping your ashes in the jungle cruise, it would be an honor

[1:39:30] I don't want to be part of somebody getting a super yacht

[1:39:33] I don't know at what point you want to go into this

[1:39:35] But we've had a worm bin before available free right now at maximum fun org judge

[1:39:41] John Hodgman the court of last resort when your wife won't stop pretending to be a cat and knocking the clean laundry over. Hey kid

[1:39:49] Your dad tell you about the time. He broke Stephen Dorff's nose that the kids choice Awards

[1:39:54] In Dead Pilots Society scripts that were developed by studios and networks, but were never produced

[1:40:00] are given the table reads they deserve.

[1:40:03] When I was a kid, I had to spend my Christmas break filming a PSA about angel dust.

[1:40:07] So, yeah, being a kid sucks sometimes.

[1:40:10] Presented by Andrew Reich and Ben Blacker.

[1:40:13] Dead Pilots Society, twice a month on MaximumFun.org.

[1:40:18] You know, the show you like, that hobo with the scarf who lives in a magic dumpster.

[1:40:21] Laughter.

[1:40:25] Doctor Who.

[1:40:26] Laughter.

[1:40:29] The Flophouse is supported by listeners like you.

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[1:43:13] That's B-E-T-T-E-R-H-E-L-P.com slash flop, F-L-O-P, baby.

[1:43:25] But baby is not part of the URL, right?

[1:43:28] No, don't put the baby in.

[1:43:30] Don't put it in a corner.

[1:43:34] Nobody should do that.

[1:43:35] All things.

[1:43:37] PSA.

[1:43:38] Nobody should put a baby in the corner.

[1:43:40] And hey, we're also sponsored by ourselves.

[1:43:43] What do you mean by that?

[1:43:44] Well, I'll tell you.

[1:43:45] We've got another Flophouse live show.

[1:43:47] Remember that show I mentioned at the top of the show?

[1:43:49] I'm mentioning it again.

[1:43:50] That's right.

[1:43:51] March 19th at 9 p.m.

[1:43:52] Eastern, 6 p.m.

[1:43:53] Pacific.

[1:43:54] We're going to be appearing live on your computer screen if you log in.

[1:43:58] Unfortunately, we can't lawnmower man our way onto your screen and just take over.

[1:44:03] Or lawnmower our way on.

[1:44:05] Or a lawnmower will not help you with a computer.

[1:44:08] That Lawnmower Man movie, it really created an incorrect notion in a lot of people's minds

[1:44:13] that lawnmowers could get you onto the internet.

[1:44:15] It's not how it works.

[1:44:16] Not what the title means.

[1:44:17] Yeah, I mean I keep showing up to Apple stores and I'm like, hey, where are all your lawnmowers, man?

[1:44:24] They love that.

[1:44:25] Yeah, they love it.

[1:44:26] Yeah, so anyway, Saturday, March 19th at 9 p.m.

[1:44:29] Eastern, 6 p.m.

[1:44:30] Pacific.

[1:44:31] We're going to be live online.

[1:44:32] We're talking about the movie Masters of the Universe.

[1:44:35] That's right.

[1:44:36] For our first live show in several months, many months, we're going to be talking about a movie that I know I saw in the theaters but have not seen since.

[1:44:45] We're going to talk probably about our memories of the He-Man characters.

[1:44:48] Again, a show I watched religiously as a kid that I have very few memories of.

[1:44:52] So I'm excited to watch this movie and see if it actually turns out to be great.

[1:44:56] I mentioned on Twitter the only thing I remember about the movie is that at one point they eat chicken.

[1:45:00] So we'll see if that scene is as important as it looms in my imagination and my memory.

[1:45:05] So, Dan, are you going to cosplay as everyone's favorite character, He-Dan, or are you going to be Danny Faces or Ram-Dan?

[1:45:15] Or Moss-Dan?

[1:45:18] Yeah.

[1:45:19] You know what?

[1:45:20] Beast-Dan?

[1:45:21] You're really making a meal out of the fact that my name rhymes with man.

[1:45:24] Or Dan-ator?

[1:45:25] Yeah.

[1:45:26] Skele-Dan?

[1:45:28] Well, I can't do like –

[1:45:29] If you've seen –

[1:45:30] Like I can't change Tila to Stula, right?

[1:45:33] That's crazy.

[1:45:34] You can do whatever you want, man.

[1:45:35] You can be Stula-tor.

[1:45:36] I believe you.

[1:45:37] Oh, Stula-tor.

[1:45:39] Or Horde-Dan and his amazing horde or whatever the guy's name was called.

[1:45:43] He was more of a She-Ra villain, I guess.

[1:45:45] So if you've seen our previous live shows, you know there's going to be an opening PowerPoint presentation from each of us.

[1:45:50] That's going to be really funny.

[1:45:52] We're going to do a Q&A chat with the audience at the end of it.

[1:45:54] There will be some kind of funny bit in the middle, TBD.

[1:45:57] And most importantly of all, you'll get our honest, unvarnished opinions of the 1987 Masters of the Universe.

[1:46:05] Taking on the relevant issues of the day.

[1:46:08] We don't care whose toes we step on.

[1:46:11] In today's world, there's nothing more relevant, nothing more important than the 1987 film Masters of the Universe.

[1:46:17] So you want to buy tickets?

[1:46:18] Go to theflophouse.simpletix.com.

[1:46:21] That's theflophouse.simpletix.com.

[1:46:25] If you can't make it on March 19th, don't worry.

[1:46:28] Buy your ticket, and it will get you access to a week's worth of time with the recording of the show.

[1:46:35] I don't think the purchase of the ticket buys you the time, per se.

[1:46:40] It will give you an extra week of life.

[1:46:43] When you buy the ticket, you will have access for one week afterwards to a recording of the show.

[1:46:47] So you can see it after the fact.

[1:46:49] After that week, the recording will disappear into the ether, never to be seen again.

[1:46:53] Nothing but a memory like tears in the rain, just dripping away and evaporating.

[1:46:58] And once everyone who's seen the show dies, there will be no record of it ever again.

[1:47:03] And so make yourself one of those people who sees it and will someday die.

[1:47:07] Saturday, March 19th, 9 p.m. Eastern, 6 p.m. Pacific, Masters of the Universe, The Flophouse style.

[1:47:12] Again, that's theflophouse.simpletix.com.

[1:47:16] Go buy your ticket today.

[1:47:17] You're going to regret not doing it if you don't do it.

[1:47:20] Yes, and we have no Jumbotrons this week, but if you want to get up on the Jumbotron,

[1:47:25] remember you can do so by visiting MaximumFun.org.

[1:47:30] Where you can purchase a personal message for $100 or a promotional one for $200 before we do the ads at the end.

[1:47:39] So before we let Elliot go, rest his voice.

[1:47:43] Do you guys have anything to plug?

[1:47:45] I'll continue to plug my current comic book series, Maniac of New York, The Bronx is Burning, from Aftershock Comics.

[1:47:50] It's on store shelves now.

[1:47:52] Pick up the trade paperback of the first series, Maniac of New York, The Death Train,

[1:47:56] and then pick up the new issues of Maniac of New York, The Bronx is Burning as we record this.

[1:48:01] Well, issue 3 will be released, I think, the week before this comes out.

[1:48:06] So if you hear this episode, run to your comic store, put on a mask, go in masked,

[1:48:12] and buy issue 3 of Maniac of New York, The Bronx is Burning.

[1:48:15] It's a four-issue limited series coming out now from Aftershock Comics.

[1:48:19] Yeah, and I just want to do a little quick promotion plug for The Flophouse podcast.

[1:48:25] It's just three dudes being silly buns.

[1:48:28] That's fun.

[1:48:34] I think it's time to do our final judgment on Dungeons & Dragons.

[1:48:39] Whether this is a good, bad movie, a bad, bad movie, or a movie you kind of liked personally,

[1:48:45] I will go and I will say that I, for like the first half an hour, I was like,

[1:48:51] oh, maybe this is going to be a good, bad movie.

[1:48:54] Like, I have affection for the type of thing this is trying to do,

[1:49:00] and I definitely have affection for low-budget special effects of the period.

[1:49:09] But it gets so bogged down and boring for me in the middle that I wanted to, you know, find it funny.

[1:49:19] I would say it's bad, bad with the proviso that, like, go on YouTube and maybe look at some highlights of the movie,

[1:49:26] and you'd have fun.

[1:49:27] Highlights for kids.

[1:49:28] But what do you say, Stu?

[1:49:30] I'm going to say I think this is, for me, this is a good, bad movie.

[1:49:35] If you have an affection for kind of, you know, like kind of poor special effects

[1:49:43] and, like, cheesy fantasy adventure movies in the pre-Lord of the Rings era,

[1:49:50] I would say that there's enough funny stuff and dumb stuff that it's worth checking out.

[1:49:57] I'm going to agree with Stuart.

[1:49:58] I think it's a good, bad movie.

[1:50:00] I feel like the older I get and the farther we get

[1:50:02] from when these movies like this came out,

[1:50:04] the more nostalgic I am for this kind of junk,

[1:50:08] just because it's different than the junk we get now.

[1:50:10] So yeah, I'd say if you were like, if you're our age,

[1:50:15] go ahead and watch this as a good, bad movie.

[1:50:16] I don't know how it will work with people

[1:50:18] who are not of our generation.

[1:50:20] Adam, what do you think?

[1:50:21] You saw it the most times.

[1:50:22] Yeah, I feel like it wore me down.

[1:50:24] I think if you had asked me after the first viewing,

[1:50:26] I would have said bad, bad.

[1:50:28] I, my wife tells me that this movie has a 10%

[1:50:31] on rotten tomatoes.

[1:50:33] So that's a one in 10 chance that it is a good movie.

[1:50:36] Ooh, not a lot of tomatoes.

[1:50:38] I have my 10 sided die.

[1:50:42] I'm gonna roll my 10 sided die

[1:50:44] and see if this is a movie I kind of liked

[1:50:46] or merely a good, bad movie.

[1:50:47] If I get a zero, then it's a movie I kind of liked.

[1:50:51] And that's a red 10 sider.

[1:50:53] That's probably from your Changeling, The Dreaming Days.

[1:50:58] I'm afraid I got a six.

[1:50:59] I got a six.

[1:51:00] So this is merely a good, bad movie.

[1:51:01] Okay.

[1:51:03] Okay, okay.

[1:51:04] That's fair.

[1:51:05] We left it up to the fates and they decided.

[1:51:08] The gods, who are not really talked about

[1:51:10] in this Dungeons and Dragons movie,

[1:51:11] but are a big part of Dungeons and Dragons.

[1:51:14] Indeed.

[1:51:16] Dan, you said indeed, like that was something you knew,

[1:51:19] but I don't really, I think you were just gonna

[1:51:21] jump in on the bandwagon.

[1:51:22] I don't even know what I said indeed to, honestly.

[1:51:25] I was already looking at the next thing

[1:51:28] that we do on the podcast, which is letters.

[1:51:33] Letters from listeners.

[1:51:36] Sorry, I'm trying to find the letters

[1:51:38] that I sent to myself, I swear.

[1:51:40] But now I'm having trouble discovering them in my email.

[1:51:46] So why don't you guys chat amongst yourselves?

[1:51:48] Alex, do you wanna keep this part in

[1:51:49] or do you wanna take it out?

[1:51:50] I leave it up to you.

[1:51:51] Yeah, Alex, maybe we'll just chat about stuff.

[1:51:55] Oh, oh, no, that's not it.

[1:51:59] Wow, so Adam, you didn't watch this movie with your kids?

[1:52:01] No, that's weird, right?

[1:52:04] I guess maybe my nine-year-old

[1:52:05] would have had some interest in it,

[1:52:08] but to be honest, he prefers his stories grounded.

[1:52:13] Oh, wow, really?

[1:52:13] Yeah, I mean, I can't get him into superhero stuff either,

[1:52:18] which is like the great stupid tragedy of my life

[1:52:21] that I'm such a Marvel person

[1:52:22] and he doesn't really wanna watch

[1:52:24] Marvel movies most of the time.

[1:52:26] So he would rather watch an adaptation of Ramona and Beezus

[1:52:31] than an adaptation of Dungeons and Dragons.

[1:52:33] I mean, that's still quality source material, right?

[1:52:37] Yeah, I mean, absolutely, but more than Marvel.

[1:52:43] Yeah, you're like, don't you wanna watch Avengers?

[1:52:45] And he's like, can't we watch Topsy-Turvy again?

[1:52:48] Yeah.

[1:52:54] Can we watch Squid and the Whale, Dad?

[1:52:55] Okay.

[1:52:58] Mystery solved, this wound up in the trash for some reason.

[1:53:04] Oh, wow.

[1:53:05] I don't know why circular filing cabinet email

[1:53:08] that I sent to myself wound up there,

[1:53:11] but I have found the letters.

[1:53:12] I mean, it speaks volumes about your self-esteem

[1:53:14] right now, Tan.

[1:53:14] You know that you're great, right?

[1:53:16] You're not trash.

[1:53:17] When you send things to yourself, it shouldn't go there.

[1:53:19] Yeah, yeah, yeah, great.

[1:53:21] This first letter is from Claire, last name withheld.

[1:53:26] It's titled, The Star Wars Pete and Tree Saga.

[1:53:30] Hey, Peaches, I bet you thought you were done

[1:53:32] with this particular saga.

[1:53:33] Guess again, it's coming back for another installment.

[1:53:36] Yay.

[1:53:37] A few episodes back, Elway, Elliot, Elway.

[1:53:40] I called you that.

[1:53:41] Elway, John Elway, football legend.

[1:53:44] I couldn't think of anyone more different than Elliot.

[1:53:50] If you look at the spectrum of human men,

[1:53:54] it is probably John Elway on one end and me at the other.

[1:53:57] Yeah.

[1:53:58] A few episodes back, Elliot made a throwaway comment

[1:54:01] in which he implied that the back half

[1:54:03] of Star Wars, A New Hope took place over a single day.

[1:54:06] Then in a later episode,

[1:54:07] you received an email correcting Elliot's quote, mistake.

[1:54:11] But as soon as you started reading it,

[1:54:12] I immediately noticed a major problem.

[1:54:15] This correction was completely wrong.

[1:54:18] Elliot got it right the first time.

[1:54:21] In a scene toward the end of the film,

[1:54:23] Darth Vader says to Grand Moff Tarkin,

[1:54:25] quote, this will be a day long remembered.

[1:54:28] It has seen the end of Kenobi

[1:54:30] and will soon see the end of the rebellion.

[1:54:33] Implying that the death of Obi-Wan Kenobi

[1:54:35] and the Battle of Yavin take place in the same day.

[1:54:38] I thought of emailing a correction

[1:54:40] to defend Elliot's honor,

[1:54:41] but then I decided against it.

[1:54:43] I didn't want to be the person who sent an email

[1:54:44] because someone on the internet was wrong about Star Wars.

[1:54:48] And besides, I figured you would get

[1:54:49] a veritable deluge of emails about this

[1:54:52] and I didn't want to toss another one on the pile.

[1:54:54] But then weeks passed and no mention of it.

[1:54:57] Then in a recent episode,

[1:54:59] Elliot made a self-deprecating joke

[1:55:01] implying that he still believes

[1:55:02] that he was wrong about Star Wars

[1:55:04] and this listener corrected him correctly.

[1:55:07] I just couldn't take it anymore.

[1:55:09] I had to write it.

[1:55:10] Driven to madness.

[1:55:12] Saw the injustice and spoke out.

[1:55:14] I appreciate that.

[1:55:14] Elliot, fear not.

[1:55:16] You are wonderful and brilliant

[1:55:17] and you know an excessive amount about Star Wars.

[1:55:20] And to the dude who wrote in previously,

[1:55:22] if you're gonna waste the floppers time

[1:55:24] with Star Wars pedantry,

[1:55:25] at least get your facts straight.

[1:55:27] Claire, last name withheld.

[1:55:29] So Claire's out there defending your honor.

[1:55:32] Claire, thank you for being the hero I need

[1:55:34] even though I don't necessarily,

[1:55:35] if you're not necessarily the hero I deserve.

[1:55:37] I really appreciate it, yeah.

[1:55:38] Feels good to be vindicated.

[1:55:40] There are certain things that haunt you

[1:55:42] and this is one of them.

[1:55:43] Did you throw that email in the trash

[1:55:44] because it was making Elliot feel good?

[1:55:47] I think so.

[1:55:48] Subconsciously, you've been like,

[1:55:49] well, drag this to where it belongs.

[1:55:52] First, Dan did his normal search

[1:55:54] through the emails for the phrases

[1:55:55] Dan sexy, Dan great, and Dan love.

[1:55:58] Didn't find those.

[1:55:59] Found that email and said,

[1:56:00] we can't let Elliot see this.

[1:56:01] No, no, no, no, no, no.

[1:56:03] And spirited it away.

[1:56:05] Okay, well.

[1:56:06] Well, if it was spirited away,

[1:56:08] I'd have to like figure out

[1:56:09] which pigs are my parents, you know?

[1:56:11] And you know, it would be,

[1:56:12] that's a whole other kettle of fish.

[1:56:13] But in the end, everybody's friends,

[1:56:14] so it's okay.

[1:56:15] Yeah, I do love in that movie

[1:56:17] when she picks the,

[1:56:18] she chooses it right, spoiler,

[1:56:20] and everyone goes, yay, you did it.

[1:56:22] Like, oh yeah, they're pulling for her.

[1:56:24] Yeah.

[1:56:26] There's one more letter.

[1:56:28] It goes like this.

[1:56:29] What am I right about this time, Dan?

[1:56:31] No, it goes, dear peaches,

[1:56:34] light syrup or heavy syrup?

[1:56:36] Let's go round robin starting now

[1:56:38] with the most captivating

[1:56:39] of the big three, Dan McCoy.

[1:56:41] I assume this is referring to which,

[1:56:44] what kind of peach packaging there is,

[1:56:47] whether we're peaches and light syrup.

[1:56:48] Wow, that's a logical leap.

[1:56:50] I wasn't expecting it.

[1:56:51] You know, I didn't get it

[1:56:53] until this time reading the email.

[1:56:54] I think that the proximity of peaches and light syrup.

[1:56:56] And yet you chose to ask this email.

[1:56:57] You chose to read this email

[1:56:58] and ask the question,

[1:56:59] not really understanding what it was.

[1:57:00] Just like syrup preferences in general.

[1:57:04] Dan, syrup is not necessarily light or heavy.

[1:57:07] It's on a specific grade system.

[1:57:09] The grade recognizing both flavor and color.

[1:57:12] Well, that's why I think

[1:57:13] that it must be about the peaches

[1:57:14] because you do hear peaches and light or heavy syrup.

[1:57:18] Whereas like, yeah, maple syrup would be like grade,

[1:57:22] amber grade or whatever, you know.

[1:57:23] It's really fascinating to be part of your process like this.

[1:57:26] This is great.

[1:57:28] I am a syrup detective.

[1:57:31] Alex, make sure to leave all this in

[1:57:33] and add some more if you can.

[1:57:35] Sure, if you can loop it for a while.

[1:57:37] Adam, you're experiencing the moment

[1:57:38] I think every guest experiences when they,

[1:57:40] this is the moment when their excitement in the show

[1:57:42] has already been downgraded to interest,

[1:57:45] is now downgraded to when does the show end?

[1:57:48] When do I get out of here?

[1:57:49] No.

[1:57:50] I have family I should be.

[1:57:52] What monkey's paw did I wish to be a Flophouse guest on?

[1:57:57] You know what, I'll skip the syrup talk.

[1:57:59] I'll go to the second question in here.

[1:58:02] That's good because I had a nightmare last night

[1:58:05] about peaches.

[1:58:06] Millions of peaches, peaches for free.

[1:58:08] And it was millions of peaches and I just,

[1:58:11] it was too many.

[1:58:11] Don't do this.

[1:58:12] Yeah, well, I mean, you don't live in the country

[1:58:14] so it's not an issue you're gonna have to deal with.

[1:58:18] Turning to Elliot, what do you think are the chances

[1:58:20] we'll see a Ray Dennis Steckler biopic

[1:58:23] in Stewart's lifetime?

[1:58:24] I feel like it'd be super easy to get Ray Dennis

[1:58:27] to look like Nick Cage to play Cash Flag himself

[1:58:29] on account of all his castle bills.

[1:58:31] Faithful years, first name withheld, a boo-boo.

[1:58:34] So what do you think, Elliot?

[1:58:36] Unfortunately, the problem is Nicholas Cage

[1:58:37] would have been a perfect Ray Dennis Steckler

[1:58:39] but he's a little old for the part now

[1:58:40] unless it's an older Ray Dennis Steckler

[1:58:42] but you wanna see him when he was younger,

[1:58:44] when he was making incredibly strange creatures

[1:58:46] and stuff like that and he really had no idea

[1:58:49] what he was doing.

[1:58:50] But I'm curious why it was in Stu's lifetime

[1:58:53] that they were asking since.

[1:58:55] It's probably shorter.

[1:58:57] I don't know, you take better care of yourself.

[1:58:59] Yeah, I would assume that you might be the most long-lived.

[1:59:01] I mean, physically, I'm an Adonis

[1:59:04] but mentally, you know, I'm a mess.

[1:59:06] I mean, the thing is also that like, yeah.

[1:59:09] It rots from within, you know?

[1:59:10] Oh.

[1:59:12] Yeah, that's life.

[1:59:12] Well, that's bleak.

[1:59:16] But not as bleak as the prospects

[1:59:17] of a Ray Dennis Steckler movie

[1:59:19] because it's like the, yeah, I don't know.

[1:59:22] I don't know enough about his life story

[1:59:23] to know if it has the character interests

[1:59:26] that say Ed Wood did because that's the closest parallel.

[1:59:29] Ed Wood and Dolomite are basically

[1:59:30] the closest parallels you would get.

[1:59:31] For those who may not know Ray Dennis Steckler,

[1:59:34] of course, the director of such films as Rat Thinkabooboo,

[1:59:37] The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living

[1:59:39] and Became Mix-Up Zombies and others.

[1:59:42] He did Bloodsucking Freaks, right, also?

[1:59:44] Which, I think he did Bloodsucking Freaks

[1:59:47] where I think it's on the poster there where it says,

[1:59:48] warning, this movie features freaks who suck blood

[1:59:51] which I think is the funniest message

[1:59:53] you can have on the poster.

[1:59:54] It's just telling you don't,

[1:59:56] look, the title is true in this.

[1:59:58] Maybe?

[1:59:59] I'm looking at it now.

[2:00:00] You know what, I don't think he did Blood, Sweat, and Fears that one, but he did...

[2:00:02] Yeah, I think I would've.

[2:00:04] Yeah, but yeah, he did do, um,

[2:00:06] Rat, Fink, a Boo-Boo, which is

[2:00:08] nearly unwatchable. Have you guys ever seen it?

[2:00:10] I mean, it is unwatchable. No! It's...

[2:00:12] It is so boring, and the...

[2:00:14] There's so much of it that is just

[2:00:16] the camera following this one woman's

[2:00:18] butt as she walks down the street in

[2:00:20] kind of tight 60's pants, and you're like...

[2:00:22] It goes from titillating

[2:00:24] to incredibly boring so fast.

[2:00:26] And you're like, when does Rat Fink come out?

[2:00:28] And the story about this,

[2:00:30] I don't know whether it's

[2:00:32] true or not right, though, is that

[2:00:34] it was supposed to be called Rat Fink

[2:00:36] and Boo-Boo, but they didn't correct it.

[2:00:38] Yes, the title came out

[2:00:40] wrong, and it was too expensive,

[2:00:42] so they didn't fix it.

[2:00:44] Yeah, so just Rat Fink a Boo-Boo,

[2:00:46] which means nothing.

[2:00:48] The other thing also means nothing,

[2:00:50] but it is easier to understand.

[2:00:52] You're like, oh, there must be a person called Rat Fink

[2:00:54] and a person called Boo-Boo, which is correct.

[2:00:56] It's part of the movie, not even

[2:00:58] the whole movie, which is the strange thing. Part of the movie

[2:01:00] is a parody of Batman and Robin.

[2:01:02] So once you see that they're superheroes

[2:01:04] and it's called Rat Fink and Boo-Boo, you're like,

[2:01:06] I get it, it's like Batman and Robin, but

[2:01:08] Rat Fink a Boo-Boo sounds like a dish

[2:01:10] you would get in a foreign restaurant.

[2:01:12] You don't know what it is.

[2:01:14] I thought it was some kind of dance.

[2:01:16] I'm having

[2:01:18] Rat Fink prepared in the style of

[2:01:20] Boo-Boo? I don't know what this...

[2:01:22] Or it's like, Rat Fink is a thing

[2:01:24] that you're supposed to do to

[2:01:26] a Boo-Boo, like one of the

[2:01:28] bears from...

[2:01:30] If there are multiple Boo-Boos, perhaps.

[2:01:32] Look, go Rat Fink a Boo-Boo.

[2:01:34] Yeah.

[2:01:36] I'm looking up his credits now. This is one I have not seen,

[2:01:38] but he did make a movie called The Mad Love

[2:01:40] Life of a Hot Vampire, which is

[2:01:42] a funny name.

[2:01:44] It's a pornographic horror film, apparently, according to Wikipedia.

[2:01:46] It is a funny name.

[2:01:48] He was a master of titles.

[2:01:50] I mean, his movie

[2:01:52] The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed-Up

[2:01:54] Zombies is mostly made up of local

[2:01:56] cabaret footage.

[2:01:58] He does have one of

[2:02:00] the strengths of low-budget filmmaking of that

[2:02:02] time, which is that you get to see a lot of

[2:02:04] interesting shots of what L.A. looked like in the mid-60s.

[2:02:06] You know, because he couldn't afford

[2:02:08] to shoot it anywhere but the streets

[2:02:10] of the city he lived in.

[2:02:12] Anyway, I'd be curious

[2:02:14] to see that movie, but I don't think it's likely

[2:02:16] that it's going to happen.

[2:02:18] Certainly not in my lifetime.

[2:02:20] We'll flip the mailbag and move on

[2:02:22] to the final

[2:02:24] portion of the show, which is where we recommend

[2:02:26] movies that could be

[2:02:28] a better use of your time than

[2:02:30] Dungeons & Dragons.

[2:02:32] Or Red Pinkaboo-Boo.

[2:02:34] I'm going to recommend.

[2:02:36] I recently re-watched

[2:02:38] P.T. Anderson's Inherent Vice,

[2:02:40] which is a movie that I saw when it came out

[2:02:42] and I thought

[2:02:44] I could see where it was

[2:02:46] good,

[2:02:48] but I didn't connect with it

[2:02:50] at all. I mean, it was a very hard

[2:02:52] movie to follow intentionally.

[2:02:54] Not made any easier

[2:02:56] that, you know, Joaquin

[2:02:58] Phoenix, who is a very mumbly man

[2:03:00] in most roles, is

[2:03:02] mumbling it up even more so

[2:03:04] as the stoned protagonist

[2:03:06] of the movie.

[2:03:08] Just throw on the captions, dude.

[2:03:10] But this time, re-watching it,

[2:03:12] it

[2:03:14] unlocked for me in a way.

[2:03:16] I realized that a lot

[2:03:18] of the sort of confusion

[2:03:20] of the movie was meant to

[2:03:22] mirror his sort of stoned

[2:03:24] haze that he lives life in

[2:03:26] and that part of the joke of the film

[2:03:28] is that there's a

[2:03:30] big conspiracy

[2:03:32] that would be

[2:03:34] easily dismissed as

[2:03:36] you know, marijuana

[2:03:38] paranoia, except for the fact

[2:03:40] that it is real

[2:03:42] stuff that is happening

[2:03:44] and it is sort of about how

[2:03:46] there are all of these

[2:03:48] real, terrible

[2:03:50] things

[2:03:52] being put in place because

[2:03:54] of money and power

[2:03:56] at all times that

[2:03:58] can easily be

[2:04:00] dismissed as paranoia, but

[2:04:02] are happening

[2:04:04] in the midst of that.

[2:04:06] You know, like,

[2:04:08] all that can be done is

[2:04:10] this man does what he can

[2:04:12] to at least eek out

[2:04:14] the smallest, you know, personal

[2:04:16] victory

[2:04:18] while all this crazy stuff is going on

[2:04:20] and I found it a lot funnier

[2:04:22] than I had before

[2:04:24] I understood enough

[2:04:26] of the plot the second time around

[2:04:28] to kind of

[2:04:30] be able to be cool with the stuff

[2:04:32] that I didn't understand

[2:04:34] going on. Anyway, like, it was just a movie that

[2:04:36] you know, sometimes

[2:04:38] if a movie is

[2:04:40] complex but you

[2:04:42] sense that there's

[2:04:44] something there, like, obviously

[2:04:46] any other work of art

[2:04:48] returning to it, letting it open up

[2:04:50] you know

[2:04:52] seeing it at a different

[2:04:54] time in your life

[2:04:56] can be a great thing and I really

[2:04:58] liked it a lot more

[2:05:00] this time around. So

[2:05:02] Inherent Vice is my

[2:05:04] recommendation.

[2:05:06] Inherent Vice, Stuart?

[2:05:08] Okay, I'll recommend

[2:05:10] a movie that's available currently

[2:05:12] on HBO Max. I'm going to recommend

[2:05:14] Ridley Scott's little

[2:05:16] movie, The Last

[2:05:18] Duel. It is a

[2:05:20] historical sword and

[2:05:22] sorcery epic.

[2:05:26] It's a movie that

[2:05:28] fucking rocks. It's got swords,

[2:05:30] Dan. The death part was true.

[2:05:32] Yep. We got

[2:05:34] and we have the movie Magic of Matt Damon

[2:05:36] and Adam Driver

[2:05:38] and Ben Affleck.

[2:05:40] Matt Damon plays Jean de Carouge,

[2:05:42] a prickly

[2:05:44] squire and

[2:05:46] Adam Driver plays Jacques Legree,

[2:05:48] his buddy who fancies

[2:05:50] himself a womanizer.

[2:05:52] And Ben Affleck

[2:05:54] is kind of like the

[2:05:56] duke that's above them

[2:05:58] and Matt Damon's wife

[2:06:00] is played by Jodie Comer and

[2:06:02] the movie is a collection of

[2:06:04] tellings of a specific event

[2:06:06] where Matt

[2:06:08] Damon's character's wife,

[2:06:10] played by Jodie Comer,

[2:06:12] claims that she has been sexually assaulted

[2:06:14] by Adam Driver's character and

[2:06:16] we get tellings of this

[2:06:18] story

[2:06:20] from the different characters.

[2:06:22] It's great. The performances are

[2:06:24] all super fun and

[2:06:26] the duel at the end is

[2:06:28] fucking wild and Ben Affleck

[2:06:30] delivers one of his best

[2:06:32] performances of all time. It's great.

[2:06:34] Movie rocks. Ridley Scott was right.

[2:06:36] We were wrong. We should have seen that shit in the theater.

[2:06:38] It's great. Check that shit out.

[2:06:40] I don't think it was a case of right or wrong.

[2:06:42] No, he's right, dude. You're wrong.

[2:06:44] It was a pandemic.

[2:06:46] You're either wrong or you're Ridley.

[2:06:48] There's reasons not to go

[2:06:50] out of the world.

[2:06:52] It was especially fun to watch after watching

[2:06:54] House of Gucci because House of Gucci, we kind of

[2:06:56] talked about one of its flaws being

[2:06:58] that Ridley Scott might not have been the best

[2:07:00] director suited for this material, but he is

[2:07:02] like it. Last Duel is

[2:07:04] great. It is a great movie and he is

[2:07:06] great with that type of shit.

[2:07:08] I'm looking forward to watching it. I haven't seen it yet

[2:07:10] and I'm hoping too soon. Thumbs up. It's great.

[2:07:12] What movies have I been

[2:07:14] interested in watching? Well, here's one that I watched recently

[2:07:16] that was very depressing

[2:07:18] but a very good movie. I watched recently

[2:07:20] the movie Mr. Klein or as it's known in its

[2:07:22] original France, Monsieur Klein

[2:07:24] which is a movie from 1976

[2:07:26] starring Alain Delon

[2:07:28] who is, he plays

[2:07:30] an art dealer in 1942

[2:07:32] in France. His name is Robert

[2:07:34] Klein and he has

[2:07:36] started as a specialty now of

[2:07:38] basically taking advantage of Jews

[2:07:40] who are fleeing the country and have to sell off

[2:07:42] their art collections cheap and then

[2:07:44] he makes a big profit off of it

[2:07:46] due to a, what seems like it could

[2:07:48] be a misunderstanding of identity involving

[2:07:50] a piece of mail or it could be a

[2:07:52] plot against him. He doesn't know why. He starts

[2:07:54] getting confused with a different Robert Klein

[2:07:56] who is Jewish and who the French police

[2:07:58] are looking for because they're preparing to

[2:08:00] round up all the Jews to ship

[2:08:02] them to the camps and

[2:08:04] Klein becomes so obsessed with

[2:08:06] finding this other Robert Klein

[2:08:08] and at first proving that

[2:08:10] he himself is not Jewish, that he'll be saved

[2:08:12] and then eventually he becomes more

[2:08:14] obsessed with finding this man and he keeps

[2:08:16] seems to keep always just

[2:08:18] missing discovering his true identity

[2:08:20] or why he seems to have trapped him into this

[2:08:22] and he becomes so paranoid and obsessive

[2:08:24] that by the end of it, he is

[2:08:26] racing headlong into his own

[2:08:28] destruction and completely

[2:08:30] ignoring any chance of escape

[2:08:32] or getting out of what is becoming a more

[2:08:34] and more dangerous situation as

[2:08:36] Paris becomes a more and more dangerous

[2:08:38] place to live and

[2:08:40] it's a really chilling movie

[2:08:42] it is super

[2:08:44] kind of depressing and bleak

[2:08:46] but I thought it was

[2:08:48] really good and really well made and

[2:08:50] just the dread and the

[2:08:52] almost

[2:08:54] inevitable doom that he is

[2:08:56] chasing throughout the movie because he just

[2:08:58] has to know who this other person

[2:09:00] is and he can't let go of it

[2:09:02] becomes very

[2:09:04] it really drew me

[2:09:06] in so that's

[2:09:08] Mr. Klein, I would recommend it

[2:09:10] just don't expect to have a

[2:09:12] good time when it's over

[2:09:14] it's a super bleak movie

[2:09:16] What about Robert Klein's stand-up set in the middle of it?

[2:09:18] That's the weird thing is that this movie

[2:09:20] came out when Robert Klein I guess was

[2:09:22] performing but was not yet a huge star

[2:09:24] or maybe he just wasn't well known in France

[2:09:26] so for a while during the movie I was like

[2:09:28] yeah, Robert Klein, look him up, he's probably

[2:09:30] performing in L.A. right now, go see him

[2:09:32] but if you

[2:09:34] can ignore that, the same way that

[2:09:36] the novel

[2:09:38] Day of the Locust, the main character is named

[2:09:40] Homer Simpson and it's hard to

[2:09:42] read it now and not imagine Homer

[2:09:44] Simpson from the show

[2:09:46] drifting through L.A.

[2:09:48] as a man with no point

[2:09:50] to his life, eventually leading to tragedy

[2:09:52] Elliot, real quick

[2:09:54] I kind of zoned out during your description

[2:09:56] Is Mr. Klein a biopic about

[2:09:58] actor Chris Klein, star of Chun-Li?

[2:10:00] Street Fighter movie? It is not at all it is it came out before I believe he was

[2:10:04] born. Okay. So yeah. Adam, do you have a recommendation? I'm gonna recommend

[2:10:14] the movie that I watched immediately after Dungeons & Dragons or which I guess

[2:10:19] technically that was Dungeons & Dragons because I watched it a second time and

[2:10:22] then the third but but then after that just last night I watched a movie that I

[2:10:28] know the three of you have probably already talked about before The Green

[2:10:32] Knight and yes it seemed you know appropriate just because obviously

[2:10:38] they're both medieval fantasies but you know just the first minute of The Green

[2:10:43] Knight it's such an intense scene set sort of in symbolic scene in which Dev

[2:10:51] Patel's Gawain as King is seated in a throne he's holding his symbols of power

[2:10:57] there's this very forceful and kind of sinister sounding voiceover overlaid on

[2:11:03] top of it and we watch as Dev Patel's head bursts into flames and at that

[2:11:11] moment I was just like I think I would rather watch the first minute of this

[2:11:14] movie a hundred and twenty times in a row then have to watch Dungeons & Dragons

[2:11:18] for a fourth time I just I just got word you have to watch it oh sorry it's

[2:11:29] out of my hands I'm just I'm just the messenger on this one I spoke earlier

[2:11:32] about how I just from an artist perspective I just felt like so many of

[2:11:37] the scenes and shots were just kind of poorly composed they weren't composed

[2:11:41] the way that an illustrator would compose them and almost every frame of

[2:11:45] The Green Knight is a painting you know it it's exquisitely chosen colors and

[2:11:51] it's it's perfectly aligned and and the values are are really thoughtfully set

[2:11:59] against each other the values of light to dark I mean and and just a lot of

[2:12:05] times during the movie I just thought oh geez that that assemblage of children

[2:12:10] watching a puppet show looks like an odd nerd room painting or that approach

[2:12:15] to the Green Chapel looks like a Friedrich painting you know it yeah it's

[2:12:20] over and over again I just felt like I was getting an art history lesson

[2:12:23] watching yeah and it's not a jizz dripping down a belt okay yeah my not my

[2:12:30] favorite shot there but it was it was just so beautiful and you know jizz and

[2:12:37] all and I I just was really in awe I think a lot of people thought it was

[2:12:42] slow I I liked the the pace of it I liked the mood of it I liked the way

[2:12:49] that I just couldn't stop thinking about it for a long time afterwards so The

[2:12:53] Green Knight rented at Casa Video in Tucson I feel like and I feel like The

[2:12:59] Green Knight specifically like it leaves you like it it ends so strong

[2:13:05] that it kind of leaves you thinking about it like yeah yeah it's stuck in my

[2:13:09] head for a couple of days afterwards yeah I think it's probably my favorite

[2:13:13] movie of last year so I Wow on board with that well and thank you so much for

[2:13:22] being with us as our guests it was nice to have someone with some insider

[2:13:27] knowledge and who did so much homework is there anything that you want to plug

[2:13:31] before we go oh you know I think Elliot kind of plugged everything at the

[2:13:36] beginning I write and illustrate kids books my most recent is Gladys the Magic

[2:13:40] Chicken written by Adam Rubin actually I didn't write this one I illustrated it

[2:13:45] it's about a chicken who may or may not be magic who goes on an epic adventure

[2:13:50] that she largely does not notice that sounds great I mean the title kind of

[2:13:54] gives away that she's magic yeah it's up to you the reader Elliot yeah like

[2:14:01] that but if you read the title it's kind of right there

[2:14:05] like I said I did not write this one and I want to say that the all of Adams

[2:14:15] books are I'm talking about Adam Rex right now Adam Rubin creature but I'm

[2:14:18] now I'm at Adam Rex I've been a big fan of his work for such a long time and you

[2:14:23] will not go wrong with pretty much any book with his name on it that you can

[2:14:27] pick up there are ones that are favorites of mine but there are none

[2:14:30] where if you asked me if you should get it I would say no get anything you see

[2:14:33] with his name on it pick it up you won't regret it you'll love it and then you

[2:14:36] get the other ones thank you that's why I'm putting his name on my book when it

[2:14:41] comes out yeah that's a theoretical book so thank you listeners if you have a

[2:14:50] moment you go to iTunes and leave us review to help spread word about the

[2:14:53] show you can follow the flop house pod on Twitter you can follow the flop house

[2:14:58] podcast on Instagram and if you enjoy YouTube I like that streamline branding

[2:15:05] it's just across all platforms too late now youtube.com the flop house podcast

[2:15:11] is where you can find some videos of our stuff if you want to go to the flop

[2:15:17] house podcast calm you can click on the merch tab if you want a flop house merch

[2:15:22] like t-shirts and such posters we are a member of maximum fun podcasting network

[2:15:28] that is located at maximum fun org you can check out all of the great podcasts

[2:15:33] on the network I'm almost at the end of the spiel and that means I'm gonna thank

[2:15:38] our producer Alex Smith who is at how old Dottie on Twitter yep you can see

[2:15:43] what he's up to thank you for listening but until next time I have been Dan

[2:15:49] McCoy I'm Stuart Wellington I'm Elliot Kalin and I'm Adam Rex

[2:15:58] see now we have an outback now we have a steakhouse from the land down finally

[2:16:08] got a place for me to put all these onions that keep blooming guys I try to

[2:16:12] get to the onions before they bloom and I can't it's just I'm always late I'll

[2:16:16] set an onion down on a plate I'll turn away I'll turn back it's bloomed I don't

[2:16:21] understand it yeah I feel like somebody's gaslighting you at this point

[2:16:24] like Danielle has a big stack of bloomed onions and she's just waiting for you to

[2:16:30] put one down so she could swap it so she can go your inheritance it's gonna be

[2:16:34] sounds like something that the dad in My Fair Lady would say maximum fun org

[2:16:42] comedy and culture artists owned audience supported

Ep. #362 - Dungeons & Dragons, with Adam Rex

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