Ep. #354 - The Unholy, with Gillian Flynn

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss The Unholy.

[0:03] Prequel to the movie, Holy.

[0:06] With me, Gillian Flynn, I'm back.

[0:10] I'm back.

[0:11] You couldn't get rid of me like an evil, dark, unholy pinny.

[0:14] I arise and return for shock, shock, shocktoberfest.

[0:30] Hey, everyone, and welcome to The Fluff House.

[0:44] I'm Dan McCoy.

[0:45] I'm Stuart Wellington.

[0:47] I'm Elliot Kalin.

[0:49] And with us tonight, you have probably heard her in the intro.

[0:52] Gillian Flynn is here.

[0:53] You know her from writing books such as Dark Places, Sharp Objects, not Shark Objects,

[0:58] so that would be a great book as well.

[1:00] Shark Objects is a great title for a book, though.

[1:01] Yeah.

[1:02] Gone Girl, the film Widows, Utopia, and previous episode of The Fluff House,

[1:09] for some reason, being willing to come back and talk to us on The Fluff House.

[1:13] That's how you know her.

[1:16] Hello.

[1:16] Mostly how you know me, I think.

[1:18] I hope primarily how you know me.

[1:21] That gal from Fluff House shows up every once in a while.

[1:25] Which movie was that?

[1:26] What was the episode?

[1:28] That was Uninvited.

[1:29] It's Uninvited.

[1:30] That's why I picked Unholy this time.

[1:31] Oh, that makes sense.

[1:32] The second part of the Gillian Flynn Un trilogy.

[1:35] Yes, next year, three will be a trend, as I say.

[1:38] It'll be a movie called UnCola, and it's about a sprite that turns people to zombies.

[1:43] Oh, wow.

[1:43] Why do you think there's so many like unhorror movies?

[1:46] They're just like, oh, let's just take a good thing, I guess.

[1:49] And I guess if we have the opposite of that, it's a bad thing and thus scary.

[1:54] Yeah.

[1:54] Uninnocent.

[1:56] Yeah, you can't do everything.

[1:58] Uninnocent.

[1:58] You can't.

[1:58] That doesn't work with everything.

[1:59] The unalive.

[2:01] The ungood.

[2:02] Oh, wow, this sounds bad.

[2:04] Next year, I will not return.

[2:06] I'll be called the unback Gillian.

[2:09] Oh, no.

[2:10] Oh, no.

[2:10] So sad.

[2:11] Never.

[2:12] Oh, terrible, terrible.

[2:13] So what do we do in this podcast, Dan?

[2:14] This is a podcast where we watch a bad movie, and then we talk about it.

[2:17] And in this case, it's October.

[2:21] We branded here on the Fluff House Shocktober.

[2:24] I think we're the only people to ever say that.

[2:27] And we talk about horror movies in Shocktober.

[2:31] And this time, there are a few options.

[2:35] We offered to Gillian, and she went with The Unholy.

[2:40] Un, un, un.

[2:41] And to clarify, this isn't, there's, if you go on IMDb, there's like, I believe it's a

[2:47] metric fuckton of movies called The Unholy.

[2:49] That's true.

[2:50] This is 2021.

[2:52] This is the new one.

[2:54] I hope we all watch the right one.

[2:56] I don't know.

[2:57] Watch the right one in.

[2:58] This is the one, the one with the criminally underused Cary Elwes.

[3:04] I never know.

[3:04] Cary Elwes.

[3:05] Cary Elwes, who last appeared on the Fluff House as the character of Bobby Wobbly in

[3:10] the Oogie Loves movie, right?

[3:13] I mean, we were going to, I'm sure we were going to get around to it at some point.

[3:16] But I want to ask you guys, is Cary Elwes good at acting or bad at acting?

[3:20] Because I love him in The Princess Bride.

[3:23] I think he's a lot of fun on Stranger Things recently as like the sort of callow mayor

[3:29] character.

[3:30] And then I see him in a lot of things, including this one that confused me.

[3:34] I would suggest filtering it through a Gen Xer who was maybe 13 at the time The Princess

[3:40] Bride came out.

[3:42] And I can say greatest actor in the world, no matter what.

[3:45] Okay.

[3:47] Even with a shaky Boston accent.

[3:48] Also needs some better roles.

[3:51] Well, that's the thing is Cary Elwes is one of those performers who was born in the wrong

[3:57] time.

[3:57] Like, to me, his best roles to me are The Princess Bride and Robin Hood Men in Tights.

[4:02] And it's like, yeah, he should be doing Errol Flynn type roles.

[4:05] He should be doing Errol Flynn movies.

[4:07] I completely agree.

[4:08] Yeah, they don't make those movies anymore, which is terrible because he should be like,

[4:12] if he's the guy who, like they should have made Pirates of the Caribbean when he was

[4:16] younger and he should have done like the Orlando Bloom character.

[4:19] He would have been great.

[4:20] Yeah, great.

[4:21] I mean, the moments in this movie where he is best is when he gets to be a little bit

[4:27] bigger and he gets to be like, what accent shall I be doing?

[4:32] Let me open up the voice box and see what I pull out.

[4:38] We will get into that at some point.

[4:39] But I wanted to say real quick that I showed my son both the Errol Flynn, Robin Hood, and

[4:47] then he decided that his favorite actor was, quote, Claude Rains.

[4:52] So we are a popular family at the school with like, I picture him wandering onto the playground

[4:59] going like, hey, anyone want to talk Invisible Man with me?

[5:02] 1938 edition.

[5:06] I mean, great choice, but yes, it's a child out of time.

[5:10] I feel like he's got to hang out with my kids because my kids are always like, do your Peter

[5:13] Lurie voice, Daddy.

[5:14] Do Peter Lurie.

[5:16] Where's Vincent Price?

[5:17] That's what he recognized from Thriller the other day on the costume store.

[5:20] It's Vincent Price, my other favorite actor.

[5:24] You guys can cut all this.

[5:25] But no, no, no, this is gold meat.

[5:28] This is meat that's been painted gold meat.

[5:30] Now, I had a question.

[5:31] Well, it's cold meat.

[5:32] It's OK.

[5:34] I had a question.

[5:35] It's the golden calf from the Bible.

[5:37] They butchered it and it's gold.

[5:38] Gold, old, cold meat.

[5:40] Um, the so this book movie is based on a novel called Shrine by an author named James Herbert.

[5:47] I've never read any of his books.

[5:48] Have you guys read?

[5:49] I've I've read, of course, Frank Herbert's books, according including Tom Brokaw's favorite

[5:54] Dune to be a major motion picture.

[5:56] But are you guys familiar with this this book or any of the books that that guy wrote?

[6:00] No, no, I did.

[6:02] No, I was like, I was going to say something, but it's not that interesting.

[6:07] Have you read it?

[6:08] I have not.

[6:09] During my extensive research on this show, I meant to look I meant to look it up and

[6:14] dabble, at least dabble a little bit.

[6:16] But I never I never made it to that.

[6:19] This I looked it up on Cliff Notes.

[6:21] I couldn't find a clip.

[6:24] Yeah.

[6:24] What about a spark notes?

[6:26] Do they have any spark notes of it?

[6:27] I didn't look, you know, I put that much work on this, which is the notes that sparks made

[6:33] about it, which is I mean, sounds amazing.

[6:36] I love it.

[6:36] But you can't really understand what they're saying.

[6:38] You know?

[6:38] Yeah, I watching this movie.

[6:41] I'm like, OK, this I can see how this premise would be a pretty good horror book premise.

[6:49] And I think it is executed in a very soporific way.

[6:53] But we'll get into it.

[6:54] Something we'll get into that premise being like, I it's a there's a long, long premise.

[7:01] It's like which mask, which burn, which dunk, which tree, soul tree, doll, Mary tree, Dale

[7:08] doll to tree.

[7:10] And that's like the first 10 minutes.

[7:11] So I fall of journalism, clickbait.

[7:16] Yeah, it's a movie that it goes to chew a lot and yet somehow is consistently feels

[7:22] very empty.

[7:23] And I think like there's a lot of scenes where you're like, OK, like that was they got across

[7:28] something.

[7:28] But yeah, what I didn't realize until after I'd watch it was that so this was shot during

[7:34] the covid lockdown.

[7:35] They had to stop and they restarted.

[7:36] And according to Wikipedia, it says there could be no more than 10 background actors

[7:40] on set together at once.

[7:41] And that's why it feels like like they're in Halloween town for Nightmare Before Christmas.

[7:45] There's like 20 residents of this town and you just see the same ones all the time.

[7:51] So let's get it.

[7:52] Oh, I feel like I feel like once I learned that, I was like, OK, I feel like I you crack

[7:57] the code.

[7:58] This movie is now grading it on a curve, you know, much more forgiving.

[8:02] Yeah, yeah.

[8:02] Yes.

[8:03] Yeah, exactly.

[8:04] So let's talk about what happens in this movie.

[8:06] OK, we open it's 1845.

[8:08] That's right, everybody.

[8:10] It's it's that antebellum period that so many people in the country seem to want to go back

[8:14] to.

[8:14] And I don't know why.

[8:15] And we're in a woman's POV.

[8:18] We're looking through her eyes as something's nailed to something wet and squishy.

[8:23] And then she's burned alive and her soul seems to be trapped in a doll.

[8:27] Yeah, this priest holds up a really cool looking doll.

[8:30] And you're like, the doll's rad.

[8:32] Yeah.

[8:32] And here's the thing about this.

[8:33] 1845 is pretty late for them to be burning a witch.

[8:36] That was for witch burnings back then, right?

[8:38] No, by that point, they were with ironically, by that point, they were well onto hating

[8:42] Catholics, which are otherwise the characters in the movie.

[8:45] We're talking about early Americans, but OK.

[8:46] Well, also, I mean, just, you know, along with the anachronism, I just like this is

[8:51] another one of those horror movies that's like, no, actually, they were right to burn

[8:54] those witches because they were evil.

[8:57] Like the scary thing about the witch trials was that there were no witches and they were

[9:00] hanging innocent, mostly hanging in the United States, innocent women.

[9:03] But yeah, you have to you always it was the same way that like people who consider themselves

[9:07] witches like go to Salem and they walk around in their dark clothes.

[9:10] And it's like, no, guys, you're in the wrong.

[9:12] Yeah, there were no actual witches.

[9:14] Bewitched statue in Salem.

[9:16] Yeah, well, that was that.

[9:18] Yeah, there's a lot of reasons why that's wrong.

[9:21] TV.

[9:22] Yeah, yeah.

[9:22] It takes us back to that terrible time when men were actually threatened by women's

[9:27] sexuality.

[9:28] Is that weird?

[9:29] Thank God we've passed that.

[9:31] As opposed to now.

[9:32] Right.

[9:33] Anyway, so we got cut to Boston modern day.

[9:37] We meet Jeffrey Dean Morgan as Jerry Fenn.

[9:40] He's a down on his luck reporter who he's he used to be a big shot.

[9:44] But as we learn later, he seems to have made up some stories, classic shattered glass style

[9:49] and has fallen into scandal.

[9:52] And now he's he's taken one hundred and fifty dollars to drive out to some small town called

[9:56] Banfield and investigate a reported cattle mutilation.

[10:00] Some kind of website that reports on cattle relations.

[10:03] I got to pump the brakes.

[10:05] Now, you brought up Shatterglass.

[10:08] How much better would this movie be

[10:09] if it was Hayden Christensen as Jeffrey Dean Morgan?

[10:13] I don't know, actually.

[10:14] How much better?

[10:15] Well, the thing is, Jeffrey Dean Morgan is so calm

[10:18] and so controlled throughout the movie

[10:20] that I never really feel like he has a problem,

[10:23] whereas Hayden Christensen always seems like

[10:25] he's about to just snap at any moment.

[10:29] Yeah, that's great.

[10:31] Gillian, you seem to have some feelings

[10:32] about this man's journalism career.

[10:34] I do as well, but what did you want to say?

[10:39] Multiple things.

[10:40] I was gonna say multiple things, but...

[10:41] Start with one and then do the rest of them.

[10:43] The point two, exactly.

[10:44] I think, as someone who had been a journalist for 10 years,

[10:49] I was stopped cold in my tracks

[10:52] that there are actually multiple clickbait outfits

[10:56] about supernatural cow possessions these days.

[10:59] I mean, they're not in the clickbait era anymore,

[11:01] and then later on, he actually gets scooped by the rifle.

[11:05] Cow supernatural, and he's like,

[11:06] gah, I'm down 150 bucks.

[11:09] And in the meantime, I was kinda doing my math,

[11:11] and it was sorta like, okay, gotta get drunk

[11:14] so I can buy all my liquor.

[11:17] I go, I smash a doll, I almost run over someone.

[11:21] I end up in a motel.

[11:22] It was like, by the end, it's he owes the site money,

[11:24] I think, and so I'm like,

[11:26] I'll give you $500 for doing this story.

[11:28] You know that he's doing the math in his head

[11:31] the whole drive there,

[11:32] whether he's actually making a profit on the gas

[11:34] that he had to pay to get out to Banfield.

[11:38] They should've showed him in a bus,

[11:40] being like, all right, gotta maximize.

[11:42] They could've hired a Photoshop guy for much less

[11:45] and not have to pay for the gas money

[11:47] to get out there and take these photos.

[11:48] It's certainly not worth his time.

[11:50] At the same time, I'm amazed that any web outlet

[11:54] is paying $150 for a cattle mutilation story.

[11:58] Well, yeah, we're living in this beautiful time

[12:01] in the 21st century where people are overpaying for crap

[12:04] but still not paying enough for regular people

[12:06] to live off of, so nobody's happy.

[12:09] I do wanna say that Jeffrey Dean Morgan

[12:11] does not look like the kind of guy

[12:13] who is ever going to FaceTime somebody,

[12:16] but every time he talks to his editor,

[12:17] he's always on FaceTime.

[12:18] I'm like, get the fuck outta here.

[12:21] It does seem, too, that when I watch it,

[12:23] I'm like, this seems like his whole journalism career now.

[12:26] He has totally pivoted into supernatural journalist,

[12:31] which is like, well, I don't know.

[12:33] He's gone from the dizzying heights

[12:35] of I think somewhere in New York, possibly,

[12:38] where the fancy people live, I'm told,

[12:41] and he discusses later on, he'll discuss

[12:44] why he made up the stories and says,

[12:46] my God, the lights, the fame, people screaming your name.

[12:50] I was like, I don't think that has ever been the case.

[12:55] Having, again, been a working journalist,

[12:56] I did not experience paparazzi following me

[12:59] as I got my tuna salad sandwich.

[13:01] How ironic that a lot of watchers

[13:03] would be watching The Watchers at that point, yeah.

[13:05] It's like maybe this takes place in that alternate universe

[13:08] where Studio 60 took place, where the headliners

[13:11] of comedy shows hold press conferences when they're hired,

[13:14] and the same universe is in Roadhouse

[13:16] where there are famous bouncers,

[13:17] and when they roll into town, people are like,

[13:19] he's here, what, this is amazing.

[13:22] Yeah, there's, I've been watching The Morning Show,

[13:24] and I feel like there's times where The Morning Show

[13:26] is like the most important thing in the universe

[13:28] is The Morning Show, and I'm like,

[13:30] oh, I don't know if people would care that much.

[13:32] A different show would come on, it's okay.

[13:34] Yes, it is.

[13:36] You can find your news from a computer.

[13:39] I wish, I haven't seen The Morning Show,

[13:41] but I assume it's told from the point of view

[13:42] of the Kathie Lee type person

[13:44] who handles the last hour of the show

[13:46] and is drunk most of the time,

[13:47] and she's watching all the events that are happening?

[13:50] Yeah, yeah, it's all, it's actually all just after,

[13:53] it's told by somebody 400 years in the future.

[13:56] Oh, wow.

[13:57] They have found a DVD of The Morning Show TV show,

[14:00] and they're just, yeah.

[14:01] And it's just them to camera explaining what they saw.

[14:06] But they don't know the words.

[14:06] And then Reese Witherspoon comes on,

[14:07] or someone who looks very similar.

[14:12] So they're casting actresses in their memory,

[14:16] and that's what those actresses are.

[14:17] Uh-huh, yeah, exactly.

[14:19] I thought I explained it pretty clearly.

[14:21] I'm Ms. Crystal.

[14:24] So Jeopardy Morgan, he's gotta cover the story.

[14:28] The reporter who is famous for making things up

[14:30] decided he's gotta get the details

[14:31] of the cattle mutilation story right.

[14:33] He can't make that up.

[14:34] And so he goes out, it turns out a teen

[14:37] just shaved an M into a cow's butt hair.

[14:40] And he says to the farmer,

[14:41] you ever heard of the van Metallica?

[14:43] But it doesn't really look like the Metallica M.

[14:45] It looks like some approximation.

[14:47] All right, well, Ellie, you go out

[14:48] and try and shave a Metallica M into a cow.

[14:49] That's actually a good point, Ellie.

[14:50] That's a good point.

[14:51] Dare, dare, dare.

[14:53] I don't know, I saw Aerosmith tattooed

[14:55] on a cow's udder once, and it looked really good.

[14:58] So that's not that difficult.

[15:01] But while he's there, his attention,

[15:03] of course, as it would be, is drawn to a single tree.

[15:06] I love this.

[15:07] That has one raven in it.

[15:09] Even this feels super budget,

[15:11] where it's like we got the money

[15:12] for one raven and one tree.

[15:13] That's the smoothest forest.

[15:14] It's like the tree is the one element in the background,

[15:17] and then underneath it is like a blinking thing

[15:19] to indicate there's an item for you to pick up

[15:22] in a video game.

[15:23] It's crazy.

[15:24] Yes, it's the Looney Tunes version

[15:26] of the hole in the opening of the tree.

[15:29] And, yes.

[15:31] I guess there's, oh, sorry.

[15:33] Oh, I would just like to mark,

[15:35] I think it's important that we note

[15:36] that at minute three is the first use of the word wicked,

[15:40] so that we know we're in Massachusetts.

[15:42] That's right.

[15:43] I was just curious.

[15:44] I am not from the New England area,

[15:46] so do people still use the word wicked?

[15:48] Because this, I was just there last weekend,

[15:51] and all I could see for miles around

[15:53] were t-shirts that either said mass hole

[15:56] or dim apples or whatever,

[15:59] and then wicked, wicked, wicked.

[16:02] And I was like, is that a thing?

[16:04] Or is that like, I'm from Kansas City.

[16:07] Whenever you go home, it's sort of like

[16:08] it has the Wizard of Oz jokes.

[16:12] But we don't walk around each other like, ah, you know.

[16:16] I was curious.

[16:18] I think, well, they say it less ever since,

[16:20] this was a big disaster about 10 years ago,

[16:23] when the musical Wicked opened in Boston,

[16:25] and opening night numbers were enormous.

[16:28] So many pre-sale tickets, and then they found out

[16:30] it was not about lit life in Boston,

[16:33] but instead the story, the Wicked Witch of the West story.

[16:35] And I remember the headline in the Boston Globe

[16:39] the next day, defying gravity, question mark,

[16:42] Wicked fails to impress Beantown audiences.

[16:45] And ever since, they've decided not to use the word.

[16:47] It's just a stain for them, you know?

[16:49] Yeah, because they saw the green used in the poster,

[16:51] and they're like, that's the color of the Celtics jerseys.

[16:53] It's got to be about Boston, right?

[16:54] Yep, exactly.

[16:55] That's what they said.

[16:56] Thousands of little girls, like, so excited

[16:58] to see the story of the Boston Celtics.

[17:01] And we just put to music, thrilled and thrilled.

[17:05] Not since the film Bird opened in Boston,

[17:08] and everyone thought it was about Larry Bird,

[17:10] and they all went to go see it.

[17:11] Such a disappointment.

[17:13] Or the band Boston, and everybody in Boston was like,

[17:15] we get to play?

[17:16] Wonderful!

[17:17] And they crowded the stage.

[17:18] It was a stampede.

[17:19] It was horrible, so many people trampled.

[17:21] Yeah, it sent Ben Affleck

[17:22] into one of his spirals again, you know?

[17:24] Yeah, yeah.

[17:25] I feel so bad for Ben Affleck,

[17:26] seeing him in one of those online sports betting commercials,

[17:30] and I'm like, oh shit, he's on a downswing again.

[17:33] I mean, there's no one I feel worse for than Regina King.

[17:35] She keeps getting locked out of her house,

[17:37] and it's just lucky she has that credit card

[17:39] so she can pass the time.

[17:40] How many times is she gonna forget her keys,

[17:42] get locked out of her house?

[17:43] It's like, come on, Regina King.

[17:44] Oh, I always thought that was a car commercial.

[17:46] Am I?

[17:49] I've got the volume down, but she looks great.

[17:52] Yeah, she's fantastic.

[17:54] So, Jeopardy! Morgan, he hears some sinister whispers.

[17:57] That's what brings him to the tree.

[17:58] Great title for something, Sinister Whispers.

[18:00] And he sees something glinting inside.

[18:02] It's a doll.

[18:04] It's the doll we saw in the opening.

[18:05] And he decides he's gonna make a story

[18:08] by pretending that the farmer found the doll

[18:10] and that the doll was broken

[18:12] and somehow that's connected to the cat emulations,

[18:13] and the farmer's like, that doll's not broken,

[18:16] so he breaks it.

[18:17] And so, it's like, it's such a dumb decision

[18:20] for him to make that he has to do that.

[18:22] It's like, my readers know a croon doll must be broken

[18:25] in order to release the spirit within.

[18:28] Have a ghost hit a tree and pretend to be the Virgin Mary.

[18:30] We are stomping this doll.

[18:32] We gotta break it.

[18:33] That night, he's driving at night,

[18:34] he's cursing himself for wrecking his career.

[18:36] He sees a woman in the road

[18:37] and swerves and crashes in the woods.

[18:39] We never find out what he does with it.

[18:40] That's his first good decision of the day.

[18:42] He didn't run the woman over.

[18:43] That's true.

[18:44] Because he was drinking, yeah.

[18:46] And his car seems to be fine.

[18:47] We never see him bringing it to the garage

[18:50] or he just abandons it.

[18:52] This woman, she's in a white gown.

[18:54] He finds her kneeling at the tree,

[18:56] mumbling to herself, and then she passes out.

[18:58] And he carries her to the closest house,

[19:00] which is at the local priest,

[19:02] played by William Sadler.

[19:03] That's right, the Grim Reaper himself.

[19:06] Reunited with Jeffrey Dean Morgan.

[19:07] I don't think they've ever worked together before,

[19:08] but I'm still calling it a reunion, you know?

[19:11] Oh man, William Sadler is one of those character actors

[19:13] that anytime he shows up, I'm like,

[19:15] at least I'm gonna get something out of this.

[19:17] Well, that was, yeah.

[19:18] I mean, I have nostalgia for the early parts

[19:22] of watching this movie when I thought,

[19:24] oh, there's potential here.

[19:25] Look, William Sadler just showed up.

[19:27] And then it all dripped away over time.

[19:30] There's no sad in Sadler.

[19:33] Oh, is there?

[19:34] Damn it.

[19:37] I wanna see a movie that's-

[19:37] It should've been named William Gladler.

[19:39] I think we'd all agree.

[19:41] The unsadler.

[19:42] Dumb and Dumber was a big hit.

[19:43] We have William Sadler under contract.

[19:45] We'll do Sad and Sadler.

[19:46] It's about two guys who are super sad.

[19:53] It's basically Withnail and I, right?

[19:55] Yeah, I guess.

[19:57] Look, Dumb and Dumber was a huge hit.

[19:59] We've got the rights.

[20:00] Do an American remake of Withnail and I for some reason.

[20:02] I don't know why we bought those.

[20:03] Let's just use them.

[20:04] Come on.

[20:07] So he takes a local priest, William Sadler, Father Hagen,

[20:11] and he goes, oh, this is my niece, Alice.

[20:15] And he says, oh, I heard her talking in the tree.

[20:19] And the priest, and there's a doctor who shows up,

[20:21] Dr. Gates, played by Katie Aselton.

[20:24] And she says, you couldn't have heard her talk.

[20:26] She's unable to hear or talk ever since birth.

[20:30] Bum, bum, bum.

[20:31] But we heard it, right?

[20:32] Right, guys?

[20:33] She was mumbling to herself something.

[20:34] The next day, Alice, she kneels and she prays

[20:37] and she hears a high-pitched noise.

[20:39] And she can hear, she can hear.

[20:41] This is amazing.

[20:42] She's done it.

[20:43] It's a miracle.

[20:44] And Jeremy Dean Morgan, he calls up,

[20:45] he FaceTimes with his editor at the Creepy Gazette online.

[20:49] And he's like.

[20:51] He says, forget cows.

[20:53] Cows are out.

[20:54] I got the new thing for you.

[20:55] He gets in touch with his editor at Spooky Chive.

[20:57] And he says, this is the new story.

[20:59] It's a miracle.

[21:00] And he's like, $150, you do it.

[21:02] That's our standard rate, no matter what the story is.

[21:05] And you gotta know, then, he's FaceTiming

[21:07] with Woodward after that.

[21:09] And Woodward's like, I have proof

[21:10] that Donald Trump is a zombie.

[21:11] $150, that's all we pay.

[21:16] And Fenn, the reporter, he goes to church.

[21:19] The doctor's there.

[21:21] And Alice, she starts hearing a woman whispering her name.

[21:24] And she follows it to that tree outside.

[21:26] She just gets up and walks out while her uncle,

[21:29] who raised her, is doing the sermon.

[21:31] Very, very disrespectful.

[21:33] Everyone follows her, because they're like,

[21:36] a girl getting up and walking out of church?

[21:37] This I gotta see.

[21:39] That was the part of the movie where I was like,

[21:41] you know, I was like, well, I was talking to myself.

[21:43] You know, Dan, you aren't paying

[21:45] that much attention to this movie.

[21:46] It's perfectly possible you missed something.

[21:48] But it's good to know that, yes, I'm not wrong.

[21:52] It's strange that everyone left at that point.

[21:55] I kind of felt like the girls,

[21:57] like, because first it was the line of girls following her.

[21:59] So I thought they were doing some sort of Salem witchy,

[22:02] Arthur Miller-y sort of thing.

[22:04] But I might have been thinking too hard.

[22:07] But all I know is that there's always something about,

[22:11] if you are a young girl who's afflicted with anything

[22:15] in a movie, that you have to wear

[22:18] some sort of cashmere, sensible twin set.

[22:22] That's very, like, and even more so if you become possessed.

[22:27] It's like, you just do not, it's like, no, no, no.

[22:29] Back to the cardigans, back to the cardigans.

[22:31] That was, I don't.

[22:33] And in which country, you can find those anywhere.

[22:35] Like, you go to any store, any truck stop,

[22:38] they have those available, just because they're so in demand.

[22:40] Yeah.

[22:41] Sensible New England, sick and or possessed girls.

[22:45] I remember when I was, very clearly,

[22:48] when I was a young man in my 20s,

[22:50] and I said to my friend Ariel, I said,

[22:53] Ariel, your skirt matches your cardigan.

[22:59] And she goes, yes, Dan, it's called a twin set.

[23:03] And I'm like, great.

[23:05] I mean, like, these things that I would not know, but.

[23:09] Dan's coming of age story, I feel like we're getting to here.

[23:12] Yeah, I mean, that's the kind of prequel explanation

[23:15] that we need more of in today's media.

[23:18] Yeah, well, now you know my,

[23:19] you understand my fascination with twin sets now.

[23:21] Yeah.

[23:22] It explains a lot, actually.

[23:23] Yeah, Dan's always had a fantasy about twin sets.

[23:25] So, anyway, Alice, she sees a vision

[23:30] of a woman made out of light, and she's like,

[23:31] oh, the lady has an urgent message for all of us.

[23:34] And everyone's like.

[23:35] Come back tomorrow.

[23:36] Come back tomorrow.

[23:37] Her urgent message is, come back tomorrow to see more,

[23:40] which is.

[23:41] Fucking teaser culture.

[23:42] It's less urgent, it's not, that's not urgent.

[23:44] Is she, like, is she washing her hair, or?

[23:46] She's like.

[23:47] The tree is not, the tree's a mess.

[23:50] The tree's not ready.

[23:51] Come tomorrow.

[23:52] She's got an urgent message

[23:54] that the trailer drops tomorrow.

[23:56] So this is so, and everyone goes,

[23:58] they're like, I can't wait to find it.

[23:59] She hasn't talked before.

[24:00] I can't wait to find out what this message is from the lady.

[24:02] And let me just tell you, I'm just gonna,

[24:04] here's a spoiler alert, there's a witch named Mary in this.

[24:06] That witch is so lucky her name was Mary,

[24:09] because it means Alice can keep saying,

[24:10] Mary told me this, and everyone goes,

[24:12] gotta be the Virgin Mary.

[24:13] Only one Mary who talks to girls.

[24:14] It's like the case of the mix-up name, it's so funny.

[24:17] It's, if that witch had been named, like, Betty,

[24:21] it would not have worked.

[24:21] It'd be like, Betty told me we all have to worship her,

[24:24] and people would be like, no, thank you.

[24:26] Betty White, maybe, she's a national treasure, but still.

[24:28] That old busybody?

[24:29] No.

[24:31] So the reporter, he's like,

[24:34] this is a bigger story than I ever thought.

[24:36] This girl, she can talk, she can hear.

[24:38] This is amazing news.

[24:39] Splattered on the front page.

[24:41] Girl talks and hears now.

[24:42] She's seeing visions of the Virgin Mary,

[24:44] and he calls up his old boss at a big paper,

[24:46] and pitches the story, and she says,

[24:48] don't call me again, you're a liar,

[24:50] which is a totally, I don't know why she took his call,

[24:52] to be honest.

[24:53] And that night, he dreams of a creepy,

[24:56] kind of crawling, hooded figure emerging from a creek.

[24:59] That's right, a creepy, crawly creaker,

[25:01] a creepy, crawly creek creature,

[25:03] and he turns out his ceiling is leaking water on him.

[25:06] And here's this, so we're gonna-

[25:08] I missed that.

[25:09] It's just a weird dream.

[25:10] It just happens when the water's leaking in your face.

[25:12] And so, but here's the,

[25:13] so there's a couple times here

[25:14] where the movie seems like it's fainting

[25:16] in the direction of,

[25:17] maybe there isn't something going on here,

[25:19] but it doesn't last that way for long.

[25:21] But here's, we're being introduced

[25:23] to two different villain sides of the same character.

[25:26] One can talk, and present herself

[25:29] as the Virgin Mary, and think,

[25:30] and the other one is just a kind of gremlin-y creature

[25:33] that crawls around, and has claws, and goes,

[25:35] and I couldn't, it was hard for me

[25:37] to believe these were the same creature,

[25:38] and I was wondering maybe they were just working together.

[25:40] Guys, what do you think?

[25:43] I had the same question, too,

[25:45] because I also sometimes does the whole,

[25:48] I'm moving like a cricket backwards thing.

[25:50] Yeah.

[25:51] It's very popular.

[25:52] That kind of like the ring version of that,

[25:54] and sometimes then I feel like

[25:55] it looks like Gollum slash Smeagol,

[25:57] and I think we're gonna have some interesting origin story.

[26:00] So I'm all for, I mean, I'm all for creature evolution.

[26:04] I saw Alien back in the day.

[26:07] I get it, I get it.

[26:09] I'm cool.

[26:10] Hey, kid, fellow kids, let's talk about Alien, come on.

[26:14] And or Vincent Price, I'm all for either, pals of mine.

[26:20] But yeah, I kept waiting for any,

[26:23] the linking thread about what all this was,

[26:26] and the last thing you want when you're,

[26:27] and this creature pops up a lot,

[26:29] and the last thing you want your audience to be is like,

[26:33] ugh, that guy, like, it's back.

[26:37] And then I thought, but then I thought, actually,

[26:40] for a while, it wasn't really doing anything,

[26:42] so it'd kind of show up,

[26:43] and I felt like it was kind of like,

[26:45] maybe it just couldn't talk, much like our protagonist,

[26:49] and so it was sort of like actually a friendly creature

[26:51] who was sort of like, you know, like, knock, knock.

[26:55] Who's there?

[26:55] Damn apples, or something.

[26:58] Yeah, Massachusetts, yeah.

[26:59] Trying to ask about antiquing or something.

[27:01] It's like, we don't know, but then.

[27:03] Well, this, it's one of those movies where the,

[27:05] the monster pops up to scare people,

[27:08] and then it's like, see you again tomorrow,

[27:09] and then leaves the room, and I'm always,

[27:11] I couldn't, I couldn't figure out,

[27:13] why is this monster just not doing very much?

[27:15] Well, to be honest.

[27:17] Why is this monster acting like the VeggieTales

[27:19] and being pirates who don't do very much?

[27:21] It pops up with a string set,

[27:23] and then goes away again, which I thought was thoughtful.

[27:28] Now, Dan, you're a monsterologist, what do you think?

[27:31] Well, the only way I can make this work is,

[27:33] spoiler alert, the end of the movie, you know,

[27:36] places this in a world where God does intervene on behalf.

[27:40] Reluctantly.

[27:41] Yeah, after a long time, he waited,

[27:43] it took a sweet time, but, so if there is a God,

[27:46] maybe these are just.

[27:47] You like a miracle?

[27:48] Check back tomorrow.

[27:49] Maybe these dreams.

[27:50] God has a sign next to the gates of heaven that says.

[27:53] Don't push it.

[27:53] That says, I only gave myself enough time on Earth

[27:56] to handle one person's problem at a time.

[27:58] Today is not your day.

[28:00] Tomorrow's not looking too good either.

[28:02] Yeah, he comes back from vacation.

[28:04] What the hell?

[28:06] No, I can only understand this maybe as like,

[28:09] premonitions because of the true nature of this monster.

[28:14] Because if it's just the monster,

[28:16] it seems like a really bad strategy on the monster's part,

[28:18] because the whole plot is like, pretending to be good,

[28:22] pretending to be miracles,

[28:24] and it seems to be really working against yourself

[28:26] if you're also simultaneously appearing

[28:28] in people's dreams being like, bleh.

[28:30] It does seem like a terrible strategy.

[28:33] Shouldn't you be like, everything's cool.

[28:35] Play it cool.

[28:38] Don't overthink it.

[28:40] It's the con man who's like, well, hello.

[28:43] I've got an excellent business opportunity.

[28:45] Give me your money.

[28:45] Here's a gun.

[28:46] I think you should invest in this one.

[28:47] Give me your money now.

[28:48] I'm gonna kill you.

[28:50] It's in a swamp.

[28:51] Here's a hint.

[28:52] Give me your money.

[28:54] So the next day, everyone's gathered outside the church.

[28:56] It's a very small town.

[28:57] There's not a lot going on.

[28:58] If a girl who doesn't talk very much

[29:00] tells you to come back at a tree,

[29:02] you're gonna go do that.

[29:03] And the priest, Father Hagen, is like,

[29:06] get out of here, get out of here.

[29:07] Alice wants to be left alone.

[29:09] Alice doesn't feel that way though,

[29:10] because Alice shows up and heals a kid in a wheelchair

[29:12] so he can walk.

[29:13] And everyone's like, it's a miracle.

[29:14] And inside the church, meanwhile,

[29:16] the Virgin Mary is crying blood,

[29:18] a statue of the Virgin Mary.

[29:19] She's not there.

[29:20] As soon as I saw that statue,

[29:21] at the beginning, early on in the movie,

[29:23] I'm like, that thing is gonna be crying like a mother.

[29:26] Yeah, I mean, she is crying like a mother,

[29:29] because her only son was murdered, you know?

[29:32] It's gonna look like a Kathy comic.

[29:34] Who did that?

[29:35] Why did they murder her son?

[29:37] Well, he was going around saying

[29:38] he was the king of kings and stuff.

[29:40] Some wild ideas, okay.

[29:41] He was going around telling people,

[29:42] I was thinking about this the other day,

[29:43] that it's a bad sign for humanity

[29:46] that every couple centuries or so,

[29:48] religions have to pop up and be like,

[29:50] you should be nice to each other.

[29:51] That's the thing, and then we forget about it

[29:53] for like 500 years, and then it has to happen again.

[29:55] It's just a bad sign for the way we do things.

[29:56] Okay, guys, we're about to get to my favorite character.

[30:00] movie, that's right, Bishop Cary Elwes, the bishop of this part of Massachusetts,

[30:04] and he's giving a slideshow on faith-healing shrines and how all these shrines mean bapho

[30:09] B.O. for the C.C., the Catholic Church.

[30:12] And when they confirm a miracle has occurred, they've got to snap up that land and make

[30:15] it a shrine.

[30:16] And the local bid, like the local business improvement district is going to make a little

[30:21] bit of cash because people come through and they've got to buy those apple cider doughnuts,

[30:24] those twin sets, all that shit.

[30:26] They've got to get that saltwater taffy, they need it, all that kettle corn and the Cape

[30:29] Cod potato chips, all that stuff.

[30:31] They need branded votive candles and branded like holy water and shit like that, right?

[30:37] Later on, that little Alice-themed craft fair pops up so fast with all the candles that

[30:42] have her face on it.

[30:43] Man, you've got to respect that hustle, right?

[30:45] Oh, you've got to.

[30:46] You have to, literally by law.

[30:47] I picture a little stand that's like, we've got dim Braeburns, dim Red Delicious, dim

[30:53] Yellow Golden, dim, like, dim whatever dim you want.

[30:58] That's what I get.

[30:59] The Vatican has sent someone to investigate that.

[31:03] It's Monsignor Delgard.

[31:04] Hell yeah, the hot priest.

[31:06] Yeah, he's a hot priest and his job is to go around fucking up people who say they have

[31:11] miracles.

[31:12] He is the official buzzkill of the Catholic Church.

[31:14] He goes and he disproves miracles left and right and to do that, he's got to show that,

[31:18] one, because there's three classifications a miracle has to abide by.

[31:23] One, it's got to be spontaneous cure.

[31:25] Two, it's got to be total.

[31:26] Three, don't feed it after midnight.

[31:28] It's going to turn into a gremlin.

[31:30] Those are the rules of a miracle.

[31:32] Now, there have been, you know, many things referring to like Catholic priests doing this,

[31:37] like this is the premise of like the show Evil, for instance, that like they have investigators

[31:42] go around basically disproving miracles most of the time.

[31:46] So because that is a common theme, I don't know anything about it, but I can only assume

[31:53] that it's based on something in real life.

[31:55] Yeah, I mean people report miracles to the church and the church wants to see if by their

[32:00] laws it's a real miracle and it distracts people from the massive criminality and immorality

[32:05] of much of the priesthood.

[32:06] So it's all around.

[32:08] Yeah.

[32:09] My point is it just seems like a bad strategy on the Catholic Church to be like, let's go

[32:14] and disprove all these miracles rather than being like, yeah, yeah, sure.

[32:16] That's a miracle too.

[32:17] They're all miracles.

[32:18] Well, I think they know a lot of these miracles are going to be disproven anyway.

[32:21] You got to get ahead of that, you know, and also if you did believe in miracles, much

[32:27] like the old question of the old song asking if you believe in magic, I don't, but some

[32:31] people do.

[32:32] If you do believe in miracles and you think that believing in the wrong miracle could

[32:35] damn your soul for eternity, you're going to want to get it right.

[32:39] Is that a rule?

[32:40] I mean, because then it because then it shades into idolatry, I assume, and things like that.

[32:46] And like that's they take that very seriously in the Catholic Church.

[32:49] Again, crimes against children not taken as seriously, but idolatry taken very seriously.

[32:54] Guys, I'm just going out on a limb here.

[32:56] I'm just saying, OK, I can do it.

[32:58] That's OK.

[32:59] I'm Jewish.

[33:00] They have no power over me.

[33:01] Whenever, whenever, whenever, whenever a priest comes to me and they're like, do this thing,

[33:03] I'm like, you, you have no power over me.

[33:05] Ellen's going to recommend Spotlight later.

[33:08] Just as a corrective to the unholy.

[33:13] I'm a lapsed Catholic.

[33:16] So maybe you and I could start a feud.

[33:18] OK, I hope I'm not an approval, unproved miracle that we do.

[33:25] Yeah, the unproven.

[33:26] I hope I'm not showing the world.

[33:31] Could be.

[33:33] I see.

[33:34] But you're right.

[33:35] Because it's like also I know the X-Files when they originally made it.

[33:38] Part of the pitch was sometimes it's going to be a real thing and sometimes it's going to be a fake thing that wins out.

[33:44] And they threw that away almost immediately.

[33:46] They're like, it's a lot more fun if it always turns out to be real ghosts and monsters as opposed to Scooby Doo.

[33:51] Creates a huge problem with the character of Scully as it goes on.

[33:55] Oh, I went after three years.

[33:56] She's like, I don't believe in aliens.

[33:58] I want to see a 10th person get abducted.

[34:01] Well, there's that character in the DC Universe, Doctor 13, who's like, there's always a rational explanation.

[34:07] I don't believe in it.

[34:08] It's like you literally live in a superhero universe.

[34:10] Like, just go with it.

[34:11] I don't understand.

[34:12] So anyway.

[34:14] So they sent this guy.

[34:15] Meanwhile, Alice is telling the press about the lady, as she calls her.

[34:18] She says, Mary wants everyone's faith.

[34:20] And they're like, go for it.

[34:21] Definitely.

[34:22] And the and Jeffrey Morgan's like says he pitches to the priests to the bishop.

[34:27] He goes, give me the exclusive on Alice.

[34:29] I'll record the investigation.

[34:31] And if Alice fails, I'll take the blame and I'll set it all up.

[34:35] And Bishop always was like, hmm, this would be a second chance for you in a way.

[34:40] And I don't really know why they agreed to this agreement.

[34:43] It seems like you have everything to lose and nothing to gain.

[34:46] Like the plot of this whole movie is like that, that Anakin and Padme meme where Anakin, in this case, would be saying, Mary wants your faith.

[34:53] And Padme is like, Mary, the mother of Christ, right?

[34:57] And then.

[35:00] Right.

[35:01] So anyway.

[35:04] Father Hagen is like, this is the most important thing to happen to the church in a millennium.

[35:09] So, you know, the best person to count on is the drunk, lying, clickbait, supernatural, doll cracking journalist.

[35:19] Maybe he's maybe he's just a really good pitch, man.

[35:21] Like maybe he's just great in the room.

[35:23] And we're not picking up on it because he rolls up his sleeves.

[35:26] He's got tattoos like he's a chef or some shit.

[35:29] He's serious.

[35:30] He's a real low energy pitcher, which works in the room because you have to because he's making the buyer provide the energy.

[35:35] Yeah, that makes sense.

[35:36] Yeah.

[35:37] And we've seen that he has that great connection and chemistry with Alice since he almost ran her down.

[35:43] But didn't.

[35:44] While he was trying.

[35:45] But did not.

[35:46] Good point.

[35:47] He does give her a mix CD.

[35:49] So they really do connect.

[35:51] There's a line later.

[35:52] I'll skip ahead.

[35:53] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[35:54] Let's go to this line.

[35:55] Wait, where he says where I have it written down.

[35:57] Hold on.

[35:58] He's giving her the CD.

[36:00] And what is it?

[36:02] What he said?

[36:03] He's like, I got something for you.

[36:05] And I said a mix CD.

[36:07] And then he pulls out a mix CD.

[36:08] He holds out a mix CD.

[36:09] And it's got he's got it's got classic rock on it.

[36:11] And he goes, it's also got, you know, the stuff kids listen to.

[36:13] Billie Eilish, Rufus Wainwright, Smashing Pumpkins.

[36:15] And I was like, hold on a second.

[36:18] One contemporary recording artist.

[36:20] And then like Smashing Pumpkins.

[36:22] They're in their fifties now.

[36:23] Like, come on, buddy.

[36:24] This is the kids are like, oh, I just can't wait to go home and

[36:27] and make a tick tock to the Rufus Wainwright album.

[36:30] I'm going to pull out melancholy and the infinite sadness CD.

[36:38] Where is the toad?

[36:39] The wet sprocket, man.

[36:40] Yeah.

[36:41] Just the idea that he gave her a gave her a mix CD.

[36:44] And she was like, what do I do with this?

[36:46] Throws it away.

[36:47] How do I stick this in my phone?

[36:51] I don't understand how to listen to these eagles of which you speak.

[36:56] But we'll get to that with it.

[36:57] So Father Hagen finds the current doll.

[37:00] He's suspicious.

[37:01] The hooded monster is about to attack him.

[37:03] But then, like, some workers walk into the church and it disappears

[37:05] because I guess it has performance anxiety.

[37:07] Like, you just can't.

[37:08] I can't kill someone with so many people watching.

[37:11] And this is this.

[37:12] There's a scene here where Alice is talking to fan about.

[37:14] I can hear music now.

[37:15] It's amazing.

[37:16] I'm mostly listening to country.

[37:17] And he's horrified by this.

[37:18] And he interviews her.

[37:19] And she says, Mary answered her prayers for a voice.

[37:22] And Mary wants her and Fenn to spread the word, her word.

[37:26] And she'll actually return Fenn to power in the journalistic world if he helps.

[37:30] So already this is this is she's presenting this as a Virgin Mary who makes deals,

[37:34] which doesn't seem to be.

[37:36] It's like that that right there should be a tip off.

[37:38] Yeah, that the good side isn't usually like, do what I say.

[37:42] And you will receive great power.

[37:44] Like, that's that's usually a bad guy.

[37:46] Bring me a zinger and.

[37:51] And Uncle Hagen, he's like, I don't like it.

[37:53] Everyone's exploiting Alice's emphysema is acting up.

[37:55] It's going terrible.

[37:56] I don't want her in the past.

[37:58] Everyone who sees a miracle ends up dying or getting locked up or going crazy.

[38:01] It's terrifying.

[38:02] I don't want that to happen to her.

[38:03] And and Jeopardy!

[38:04] Morgan does minimal research and finds out the town is an incredible history of superstitions and witch magic.

[38:09] It's like there's so many parts in this where it's like we have to find out more.

[38:13] Well, let me look at the first piece of paper lying on this desk.

[38:15] There was a witch here.

[38:17] But Alice is singing beautifully for the priest and the investigators.

[38:22] Meanwhile, they're talking while she's singing.

[38:24] It's very rude.

[38:25] And the investigators like I just proved all these cases.

[38:28] It's amazing.

[38:29] Father Hagen, suddenly he has a heart attack.

[38:31] Oh, but Alice heals him.

[38:33] And you know what?

[38:34] His emphysema is gone.

[38:35] He can breathe fine again.

[38:36] But he's a monster behind her.

[38:38] Bum, bum, bum.

[38:41] Again, popping up.

[38:42] This all seems like it's probably on the up and up.

[38:44] Just ask him for a cup of sugar.

[38:46] Yeah.

[38:47] Doesn't she ask him to like, like, you know, like devote his life to Mary or some shit or, you know, like swear, you know, swear on a stack of Mary's or something.

[38:57] Yeah, she does.

[38:58] And like it's and again, it's such dumb three's company garbage where it's like, I got a different Mary, a different Mary.

[39:05] I know.

[39:06] It's like, has he found the magic diary yet or is that later?

[39:09] No, that's a little bit.

[39:10] The sick D&D drawings.

[39:11] Yeah.

[39:12] So it's a little bit like when Prince wanted to get out of that contract.

[39:14] So he changed his name and the courts were like, nothing we can do about it.

[39:16] You made an agreement with this name, not with this person.

[39:19] It was the name making that music.

[39:21] So his lungs are completely healed.

[39:24] The tree is declared an official Catholic shrine.

[39:27] They really fast tracked that one.

[39:28] They cut through all the red tape at the Vatican.

[39:30] The news goes viral, as always happens when the Catholic Church declares a shrine.

[39:36] It is the biggest news in the world.

[39:37] And the 24 hour cable networks are all over it.

[39:40] I guess the finally the religion correspondent at CNN has it has a big beat blows up.

[39:45] You know.

[39:46] Yeah.

[39:47] And it draws tens of people to the location.

[39:49] The same tens.

[39:52] I wish I wish they had really steered into the fact that it was shot during covid and just had each of those people wearing a sign that said one hundred people on it.

[40:00] Like a game of Risk where you're like, this represents 10, this represents 10.

[40:05] They have those cutouts that they were filling stadiums with, but they just sort of like attach them

[40:10] so there's like two on each side of a person as they walk around.

[40:13] There's all these excited baseball fans who went to go see this shrine, yeah.

[40:19] Oh, that'd be so funny.

[40:21] So, Fenn is offered a spot at his old newspaper, but he's like, no, I want to be an editor on the special sections desk.

[40:27] And which, what he's provided so far does not, that doesn't seem rational,

[40:31] but the editor, his old boss is like, I'll get back to you.

[40:35] He's like, you don't get this story without me.

[40:37] And she's like, the biggest story in the world that a girl had a vision?

[40:40] And there's no other stories that big. We've got to have it.

[40:43] So Alice is leaving. She's going to live at the diocese.

[40:46] Fenn gives her that mix CD to remember him by, classic rock, plus some kid stuff, as we mentioned.

[40:51] And Alice goes, the lady is pleased with your work.

[40:54] And he's like, that doesn't sound suspicious. Great.

[40:56] That's the night when Father Hagen finds this old book.

[40:59] Stuart, please describe this old 400 year old, 200 year old notebook that was just lying around.

[41:04] So, yeah, it's in the basement of the church, I think.

[41:07] It's in the creepy basement full of mannequins with sheets on them.

[41:10] And it's stuffed in a nook between a couple of stones.

[41:14] When he finds it, he's probably thinking, yay, this is some antique pornography.

[41:17] It is not. It is a diary about, I guess, what, evil Mary, the evil witch.

[41:23] And it has some sick drawings of demons in it that are pretty cool.

[41:27] It looks like it's like a colonial teens notebook.

[41:32] Like a colonial teen boy was like, was like doodling.

[41:35] He's like, this is going to be on the cover of my mix CD.

[41:41] Goody Susan looks hot today.

[41:45] Mrs. Goodman Proctor is written over and over again.

[41:49] Yeah, I'm just working on some cover art for my for the first album for my band Hat Buckle.

[41:54] We're going to kind of like we're that New England pre-punk sound.

[41:59] So Fen goes out drinking with the doctor, Dr. Gates.

[42:03] And obviously there are going to be romantic interests, though.

[42:05] It's kind of half-baked throughout.

[42:07] And he's like, you know, I made up all these stories to stay famous.

[42:10] And she's like, let me tell you about kern dolls.

[42:12] Anyway, some of them, they were usually buried.

[42:14] Are they kern dolls or kern babies?

[42:16] They're kern.

[42:17] Are they called kern?

[42:18] I thought they were called kern babies because that's funnier.

[42:22] I mean, they were invented by Jerome Kern.

[42:27] That's all I know about.

[42:29] That's the extent of my knowledge.

[42:31] Yeah, that's the cartoon.

[42:32] Kern babies with little Jerome Kern.

[42:35] Yeah, he's just writing for Broadway, but he's a baby.

[42:41] So she's like, these kern dolls, they're mostly for good luck.

[42:43] But sometimes if they wrapped them in chains, it was because they bound a demon or a witch inside them.

[42:48] And put a fake date on them.

[42:50] That's right, because it says like February 30th, 1845 on it.

[42:54] And he was like, stupid calendar.

[42:56] Doesn't have that day.

[42:57] Smash.

[42:58] And she's like, well, they chain them up and put a fake date on it so it was like it couldn't be opened ever.

[43:03] And he's like, oh, I may have made a mistake.

[43:06] I smashed that doll because I thought it was a Pisces.

[43:10] And they stumble over to the creek from his dream.

[43:13] And he sees a scary jump scare face in the creek.

[43:16] And he's like, I've got to go talk to Father Hagen about this because there's no other people in the town.

[43:20] Of course he's going to talk to Father Hagen.

[43:22] At that point, too, he does like I like it because there's a double jump situation.

[43:26] He's looking into deep, deep, deep.

[43:28] This movie takes its time.

[43:30] I got to tell you what.

[43:31] When you're closing in and waiting for the scare, it's sort of like stretch.

[43:35] I know you're not about to look at anything, but you're going to keep doing that for a while longer.

[43:40] And it's just like water, water, water.

[43:42] And then he turns around to see his doctor of all trades friend who can read X-rays and read sign language and have access.

[43:54] She got later.

[43:55] She's she's like, let me translate this ancient this this this this old Latin was part of the basic curriculum at medical school.

[44:02] And like it is, I've never been medical school, but I've never heard another doctor say that.

[44:06] So they're like, we're going to pass this Bechdel test or die.

[44:12] Yeah.

[44:13] International Language of Science at Cornell Medical College.

[44:16] And the Latin and the Latin for to translate the double papers.

[44:21] There was that time I was on I was on a flight and they're like, is there a medical doctor on the plane?

[44:25] We need somebody to translate this.

[44:29] Is there a doctor in the house?

[44:31] I found an old rune.

[44:34] But so is it cool to break this?

[44:37] Should we do that?

[44:39] I was describing this.

[44:40] I was describing this movie to somebody recently.

[44:42] And I was like, this is a fine movie for like a 12 year old sleepover party.

[44:46] And part of that is because, like you're saying, the jump scares take so long that it's like the movie is like, OK, is everyone ready?

[44:53] A scary thing's going to jump out.

[44:55] Ready?

[44:56] You still tying your shoes.

[44:57] Hold on.

[44:58] If you don't feel comfortable.

[44:59] Five more minutes.

[45:01] Because the popcorn has to fly.

[45:03] You might as well have a countdown clock in them in the bottom of the screen.

[45:06] That's like a countdown to jump scare.

[45:08] Five, four, three.

[45:10] Pause.

[45:11] OK, just to make sure everyone's ready again.

[45:13] Yes.

[45:14] And jump scare.

[45:15] OK, we made it.

[45:16] Let's move on.

[45:17] There's a lot of that.

[45:18] So they that she he's going to talk to Hagan.

[45:21] But first, oh, Hagan, this is my favorite scene in the movie.

[45:23] This is a scene I actually really liked a lot.

[45:25] Hagan is visited in the confession booth by the evil lady, Mary, the witch.

[45:30] And you don't see her.

[45:31] She's just on the other side of the confession screen.

[45:33] But she's threatening him in very, like, graphic terms.

[45:36] And I was like and I was like, this is the one scene in the movie where I was like, if it kept going in this direction with this kind of like very straightforward, evil, sinister quality, then I could have seen it doing some interesting things.

[45:48] But if this was like the first instance of scary shit happening.

[45:53] Yeah, it would be great.

[45:55] It would be super effective.

[45:56] Like if she had been a little bit tighter on her game and hadn't let all the scary stuff slip earlier.

[46:01] If she hadn't kept letting her her evil part out without warning.

[46:06] Isn't it followed immediately by I love a good hanging.

[46:09] Like I love a good like suicide and the church sort of thing.

[46:12] So like that whole little vignette, I was.

[46:14] Plus, you had that.

[46:15] It was great.

[46:16] The Irish accent.

[46:17] And yeah, it's so.

[46:19] So he's like, I'm going to pray to Mary.

[46:21] And she's like, who's which Mary is stronger?

[46:23] My me or your Mary.

[46:25] And he apparently her because because they find her.

[46:29] Then finds him having been hung to death, hanged in the church.

[46:33] Bump, bump, bump.

[46:34] Yeah, that sequence.

[46:35] Like if that was the opening of the movie almost and then the rest of the movie was completely different.

[46:40] It would have been a different.

[46:43] And the bishop is like, there's nothing to see here.

[46:45] It's just a normal suicide.

[46:46] And it's one of those things where it's like you should.

[46:48] Well, shouldn't the bishop be curious about why one of his priests committed suicide?

[46:51] If that's actually what happens?

[46:53] Like, is that really his choice to like to proclaim that?

[46:58] Like as the vicious as the bishop, I'm going to say, don't worry about his case.

[47:04] Yeah, he's detective.

[47:05] The precepts gave this one to him.

[47:07] He was just is a descendant of Father Brown, I guess.

[47:10] It's like, yeah, he's like it's on church property.

[47:13] Therefore, American law does not apply.

[47:15] I declare this self-hanging.

[47:17] And he's like, Finn, could you keep quiet on this?

[47:20] Because we really need more shrines.

[47:21] The world's going to hell.

[47:22] And the only thing that's going to save us is shrines.

[47:24] That's going to back up our faith.

[47:26] And fans like that's OK.

[47:28] I don't know if I totally buy that logic, but he talks to Alice.

[47:31] And Alice is like, I'm sad, but I still believe in Mary.

[47:33] She's the best.

[47:34] But then, Finn, every time he goes back to his hotel, Mary is there to whisper at him.

[47:39] And like kind of hover around as a hooded spooky monster and not do anything.

[47:43] And it's like, is she also staying at that hotel?

[47:45] Is that what it is?

[47:46] Like Mary the witch is also staying at the motel and keeps bumping into him on the way to the ice machine.

[47:51] She only got paid $150 to be here.

[47:53] So what do you want?

[47:55] Speaking of pay, we're assuming he's still staying in that motel.

[47:59] He hasn't gotten paid yet.

[48:00] And yet he goes to the funeral for Father Hagen, and he's wearing different clothes.

[48:07] Like does he just keep funereal garb in the back of his car?

[48:11] Did he buy those?

[48:15] They're next to the twin set and Dim Apples T-shirt.

[48:17] Thank you.

[48:19] Aisle three.

[48:23] I like this idea, like, yeah, adventures of Massel, Father Hagen.

[48:27] Just like Carrie Ellis going around being a priest but being real Boston.

[48:32] Real super Boston-y, yeah.

[48:34] Because in Aisle it's like, someone die?

[48:36] And then arrow.

[48:38] Just eating cream pies and Yankee beans and, yeah.

[48:41] Speaking of which, speaking of someone die, I would like to mark that about at this point of which you're speaking, Elliot,

[48:47] we're like, I counted 52 minutes into the movie and no one, it was before Mr. Father Hagen died.

[48:57] And I had written in my notes, someone die with exclamation marks because I was getting so like you.

[49:04] This movie has such an incredibly low body count, which, again, if it was a real life story, good.

[49:09] I want it to be, I want every real life story to have minimal body count.

[49:12] But if it's a movie, like, come on, get some, drop some guys on the floor.

[49:17] Come on, let's do this.

[49:19] That's why Elliot's watching the Muppet movie, like, when are one of them going to die?

[49:25] Come on, you hit Gonzo's car with, you're a car.

[49:28] Someone should have perished in that crash.

[49:31] I'm like, well, at least at the end I know Kermit's legs are going to get chopped off by Doc Hopper.

[49:35] Maybe that will make up for it.

[49:36] Are you telling me that Rolf is more interesting alive than dead?

[49:39] I don't think so.

[49:42] Rolf is one of those characters I appreciate more as a grown up.

[49:45] That as a kid I was always like, enough Rolf stuff.

[49:50] Enough with Rolf.

[49:52] There's something irresistible.

[49:56] We gotta grin because the nights are long. Hit it, guys!

[50:00] I hope that something better comes along.

[50:03] Every time I'd watch The Muppet Show as a kid, and Rolf would come on and be like,

[50:07] oh god, he's gonna sing some song. It's not gonna be funny, but he's gonna waggle his eyes like he thinks it's funny.

[50:14] Anyway, but of course Jim Henson, I'm sure, was like, I love this character. He's amazing.

[50:18] Oh, he totally did. I think, yeah, I think that I had the same thing as a kid. I'm like, well,

[50:23] now there's just gonna be some piano playing, but now I love that dog so much.

[50:27] I will say, as a screenwriter, there are entire characters and character arcs that are in things

[50:34] that I do, only to amuse me. I cannot defend them. If you ask me to, I will just say,

[50:41] because that's cool. I don't know. You make me laugh. You're by yourself a long time, and you're writing, like, you just...

[50:48] So, I mean, it just worries me, because at a certain point, Jim Henson became more Rolf than man,

[50:52] and that was not good for him, you know. When his family would walk into his room,

[50:56] and they'd hear two voices, and they'd walk in, it was just Jim, and it turned out he was talking to

[51:01] himself as Rolf in the middle of the night. Very scary. Not as scary as the Unholy, though, because,

[51:05] as we'll see, checking the interview footage, thank you, uh, Fenn sees that Mary's blurry shape has

[51:12] appeared next to Alice, and then it disappears, pauses the image, and then the video, and then

[51:17] Mary keeps moving, and then disappears. Yeah, and it's like, come on, dude. Something might be going on, huh?

[51:22] Come on, dude, like, Sinister, like, I'm not a huge fan of the movie Sinister, but at least that movie

[51:27] did that shit right. Like, if you're gonna do, like, weird video shenanigans, at least do it right.

[51:32] Yeah, that's what the rave from you on the poster for Sinister says, does weird video shenanigans

[51:37] right? That's a rave. Yeah, that's right. Uh, so he goes, uh, anyway, he asks the doctor, he goes, can you show me

[51:45] the church records? And she has to, because she's the only other person in the movie, but it doesn't

[51:50] really make sense that she's the one you would go to to find them. Um, and while Hagen's funeral's

[51:55] going on, they go to that spooky basement, they find the demon diary, this is when the doctor says,

[51:59] oh, I know Latin, I learned it in medical school, and she translates that it was the hanging of the

[52:03] witch and bride of Satan, Mary Elnor, and Mary was a miracle worker who claimed to speak for the

[52:08] Virgin Mary, but she killed anyone who challenged her, and then she confessed to serving Satan,

[52:13] so they had a Virgin Mary mask nailed to her face, which seems like overkill, and then they hung her,

[52:19] burned her, and her ashes were put in that urn doll. Oh boy. Yeah, you were not messing around

[52:26] back then. Yeah. Yeah, even if this person's a demon, like, I feel like the church should have

[52:31] been like, there should have been somebody who was like, okay, I agree, we have to deal with a demon,

[52:36] do we have to nail a mask to her face? Is that part of, like, what we do as the church? Is that

[52:44] a thing? And also, does it have to sound sort of like I'm eating pickles when I nail the mask?

[52:51] I was trying to figure out what the fuck that sound was. That sound in the beginning is so funny,

[52:56] because it's like, yeah, someone's hitting a wet sock against a wall, and you're like, what? It's

[53:01] such a goofy sound. Well, I know, I have not had the fortune to be at a mask nailing ever in my

[53:08] life, so who's to say? I imagine the guy walks up with the mask and the nails, and someone's like,

[53:13] is that part of it? And he goes, it's not strictly regulation. It's not part of it.

[53:19] Do you have just a scrap that we could use instead of those things?

[53:23] They're like, we're all done here. He's like, but I brought the mask and nails. They're like,

[53:27] oh, fine. Go ahead, get it out of your system. Get a wine all night otherwise.

[53:34] So this is where they, after reading this scary story, they're like, oh, this is pretty scary.

[53:38] And then they look over, and they're like, man, was this room always filled with mannequins

[53:42] covered in fucking sheets? And they're like, I guess so. So they walk over, and they pull one

[53:47] off. Turns out it's just a very happy-looking Jesus statue. And you're like, okay, this looks

[53:51] a little weird. It looks like buddy Jesus. It does look like buddy Jesus. It's like a puffishly

[53:58] little rascal, Bob's big boy, smiling Jesus. And you understand why they threw a sheet over it.

[54:03] They were like, this is ridiculous. We can't put this in the church. It arrives there,

[54:08] and they call up the relic set, the statue manufacturer, and they're like,

[54:16] you've got to take this back. It looks ridiculous. Like that smile? What? Jesus is a happy guy. He

[54:21] died for our sins. He's in heaven now. No, no, no, no, no. This goes beyond the pale. Well,

[54:25] we have a no-returns policy. Put it in the basement. Put a sheet over it.

[54:29] So we have this fake-out scare, and then immediately a different mannequin turns out

[54:35] that it's Scary Mary, and she flies at them, and then they just fly out of the church,

[54:39] and that's the end of the scene. It's edited super weird. And then they're kind of like,

[54:44] well, that was weird. That happened. And it's like that Mary is like, they left the room.

[54:50] I'm powerless to stop them. I can't get to them anywhere else. They're trying to find a puddle

[54:55] of water to rehab them. She's going through her location card deck, and she's like, I already

[55:00] used up forest and field. What do I have left? Meanwhile, while that's happening, Alice tells

[55:07] everyone, hey, Mary wants us to hold a big event for her at the Shrine Tree tomorrow. And everyone's

[55:12] like, yeah, definitely. But we have to pretend like it wasn't Mary's idea. She wants it to be

[55:17] a surprise to everybody. And his boss calls and is like, you got the job. You can be the editor of

[55:25] your own demons and cattle section of the newspaper, whatever you want to put in it.

[55:32] I mean, this is the field that I got forced into. It's not what my passion is. I don't care. You

[55:36] want to make it about girls who used to not talk, and now they talk great. It's going to be a

[55:39] special insert every day in the paper. You got pages to fill. Let's get to it.

[55:44] I just I mean, it is a weird for someone who was ruined their career by lying. I feel like

[55:52] supernatural is a weird choice of thing to get into. Like the solid show was on for seasons and

[56:00] seasons. There's so many episodes to catch up on. That's true. Yeah. I thought it was a statement

[56:04] of the malleability of truth in today's current sociopolitical climate. I was. Oh, wow. You guys

[56:12] not catching that at all? No, it makes sense. I'm very I'm I'm pretty bright. So what is what is

[56:18] the sort of black magic that that that deals with the wills of the weak? Yeah, sure. Oh, wow. Yeah.

[56:24] I never even thought about that. I was so focused on the current babies. You made this show so much

[56:30] smarter. Usually we just talk about like butts. I mean, I've got thoughts on that, too.

[56:36] So normally when I watch a movie, I leave my third eye closed, but I guess I should have

[56:40] made it open. That was my mistake. How do you open it? What do you what do you do to open up

[56:44] that third eye? I mean, well, the first thing is you got to make sure to moisturize. OK,

[56:52] it goes in the first place. You're going to need to be pretty pliable for you. You don't want a

[56:58] dry and cracked forehead. That's obviously obviously our listeners were to a Tara's.

[57:02] That's New Zealand lizard that has a light sensitive patch of cells on the top of its

[57:05] head that might have been a third eye at one point. You don't have to listen to this. Your

[57:08] third eye is always open. That's just what you do. But most of our listeners are not to a Tara's.

[57:12] And so Stuart, what's step number two? Step number two. So you go and you you

[57:16] you go into Spotify and you queue up every single tool album and you hit shuffle.

[57:21] And you want to remove third eye blind from your from your playlist, right?

[57:24] It seems ironic, but yes, you're right. That's I mean, it's a common mistake. That's why.

[57:30] OK, that's that's more that's more of Stu Wellington's tips for living.

[57:34] You can find more of that in his website, Wellingtonworld.com.

[57:37] It's a daily feature in the paper. I got it from all my supernatural.

[57:41] I remember when you you you found that supernatural story that was a worldwide hit.

[57:44] And now you have your special lifestyle section of the newspaper.

[57:48] Yeah, I'm in charge. I run the twin set section.

[57:53] Very specific newspaper. Always news and twin sets. Yeah.

[57:57] Yeah. I let you handle cattle tattooing.

[58:00] Yeah, that's I mean, I've been how long I've been on the cattle tattooing beat.

[58:04] I can't you know, jaded, jaded. I don't know.

[58:06] A little bit. I feel like I've seen it all. But every now and then I kind of come across

[58:10] cattle tattoo that really blows my mind. And I'm like, no, there's something new here.

[58:14] There's something still new to be done. Yeah, I still feel something in here.

[58:17] You think? Yeah. Yeah.

[58:19] Tattooed cattle. Rare. And I see that that cow and there's a tattoo on the back of a grateful

[58:26] dead skeleton with roses all over it all around. I'm like, you know what? Yes, there is.

[58:29] There is a reason to keep getting up in the morning. Sure. Yeah.

[58:32] Like Angel is my centerfold. I don't know.

[58:37] That was that was a reach. But let's go into placebo effects.

[58:42] OK. OK, so then he's like, I'm going to turn his old boss down. He tries to win the bishop.

[58:48] But the bishop is like, yeah, I knew about that witch, Mary Elnor, who gives a shit.

[58:52] I don't care. He's like, it really is.

[58:56] He's like, you bore me like I don't get I don't.

[58:59] Doesn't matter. Then he goes and he realizes he does some more research in the dark.

[59:04] He reads a microfilm and he finds out that Mary had a son who is Alice's ancestor.

[59:09] She's going to live again through Alice.

[59:11] She can only come back to life through her descendants.

[59:14] The microfilm burns up. There's a statue explodes.

[59:17] There's monster in there. Anyway, the investigator comes in and saves him.

[59:21] He's reading all these prayers to stop the evil Mary.

[59:25] And then this was kind of a cool thing where

[59:27] Mary does some magic and the ink in his in his prayer book,

[59:31] just the letters turned back to ink and run off.

[59:33] If it wasn't CGI, it would have looked cool.

[59:35] It's quite a comment on print media, you know?

[59:38] Yeah. Yeah.

[59:39] And it's a sewer now.

[59:42] Oh, wow. I guess it is a rich text.

[59:44] You're right. You're thinking.

[59:46] Yeah. Now, I think we can we can all agree that Mary's got a lot of fucking powers, right?

[59:51] It's not just when people are like, fuck, I'm going to turn and run the other way.

[59:55] And then she's immediately there. She does that all the time in this.

[59:58] But she could also, like, make sure.

[1:00:00] explode, make ink melt, uh, everything, uh,

[1:00:04] bleed in Jesus, bleed in Jesus' eyes, bleed in Jesus' eyes.

[1:00:09] That's what like Robin, I think Batman and Robin is like, bleed in Jesus' eyes!

[1:00:14] And like the person who cleans the church is like, aww.

[1:00:18] That'd be good too, yeah. Yeah, so yeah, Mary's got a lot of powers, none of them

[1:00:22] are that helpful really, because the

[1:00:25] investigator still prays her away. He's like, prayer, prayer, prayer, prayer,

[1:00:28] and she leaves, and they're like, everyone at the service is in danger.

[1:00:31] She's going to ask them to, uh, to give their faith, their faith is empowering

[1:00:35] the evil, and she's going to ask them to give

[1:00:37] their faith in Mary three times, and if they say yes three times,

[1:00:40] by the third time, their souls are damned forever, which seems like a bad,

[1:00:45] like, if that's the game you're playing. I have a question, Lee, is that true?

[1:00:48] That was, I miss that, I miss that part. I haven't done the research, they do say that,

[1:00:53] they're like, because they're like, and then they have, they do it twice, and

[1:00:57] and the evil Mary is like, this is it, and it's one of those things where it's

[1:01:01] like, oh, there was a time period in, um, in

[1:01:04] Russia, in like the 18th century, I think it was,

[1:01:07] where there was a big argument over, do you cross yourself with two fingers or

[1:01:11] with three fingers? And it was, and people were like, I got

[1:01:14] to do this the right way, because if I do it the wrong way, I'm going to go to hell

[1:01:17] forever, and I wonder how many people have managed to get the point of like,

[1:01:21] why is it so important to God whether I do this with two fingers or three fingers?

[1:01:24] I don't get, and so with here, the idea that like, that God would be like,

[1:01:28] look, I know you, it was under false pretenses that you were pledging

[1:01:31] uh, to my mom, Mary, and not this evil witch, but you did it three times, my

[1:01:35] hands are tied, I'm sorry, there's nothing I can do about it, you know?

[1:01:38] It'd be really funny to find out that God's really into numerology, and you're

[1:01:41] like, God, you're in control of all this, like,

[1:01:44] why, why are you into this thing? Like, I don't know, it just works. Yeah, because

[1:01:47] you're God! Three is a power number, everyone.

[1:01:52] That God is just doing his, looking up his horoscope every day, he's like, maybe

[1:01:55] today's a good day to get a new job, hold on. Yeah, it's like, I'm in this

[1:01:59] fucking Mercury retrograde, he's killing me.

[1:02:02] I wish there was something I could do about it. Uh, so we see all the Alice

[1:02:06] merch being sold outside the shrine, I don't know where they got the licenses

[1:02:09] to set up these, these merch tables, but I guess that's

[1:02:12] something that will, that they just do. Oh God.

[1:02:14] And the bishop tells the security guys, or yeah, the bishop tells the security

[1:02:18] guys, keep Fenn out of here, we don't not, we don't need him, just send him away.

[1:02:21] He's, like, showing them pictures on his phone, right? It's great.

[1:02:24] Yeah, he shows a picture of Fenn on his Wikipedia page.

[1:02:28] Uh, and the bishop, carry all ways, he starts the service, and the investigator

[1:02:31] is blessing some stuff for Fenn to use in the fight. I don't even remember what

[1:02:36] he blesses, because I don't think they use any of it.

[1:02:38] Because evil man, because he's like, now I light, this is, this is a part that

[1:02:41] could have been so Abbott and Costello, and it kind of was, he was like,

[1:02:44] now I just gotta light a match, and light this candle, and we'll be all

[1:02:47] blessed. And he lights the match, and the wind blows it out.

[1:02:50] Oh, okay, let me just do one more. Lights the match, wind blows it out,

[1:02:54] and it's Mary creating winds. And, but it's so funny, because he's like,

[1:02:57] Mary will appear behind him, pull out the match, and then she disappears,

[1:03:02] and you're like, and she does a little laugh like the dog in Duck Hunt,

[1:03:07] when you miss both of the ducks, and then ducks back down.

[1:03:12] Anyway, uh, evil Mary, she causes a big crucifix to light on fire,

[1:03:16] and then the crucifix falls on top of Monsignor and kills him,

[1:03:20] and it was like, movie, you're trying hard, but you're not making up for the

[1:03:24] lack of death until this point. That one was good, I like that one.

[1:03:27] Statues of crying blood, Fanny, it's also one of those moments where you're like,

[1:03:31] why was this Monsignor character in the movie? He kind of didn't really

[1:03:34] investigate very much, and he was totally ineffectual here.

[1:03:38] I guess they just needed a body, so Fanny's like, doubt, doubt's the only

[1:03:42] thing that fights faith, just like in the movie of the same name.

[1:03:45] We need to make them based on the hit play. We need to make them doubt Mary.

[1:03:48] How are we going to do it? And Alice is having everyone hail her,

[1:03:52] they're calling her Mary of Banfield, because Banfield is the town,

[1:03:54] and suddenly Alice starts getting demonized, which should have been a real

[1:03:58] sign to the people in the front row, at least, that this wasn't going great.

[1:04:01] And Fenn walks in, and he starts shouting, I faked it all, I faked the miracles,

[1:04:06] I faked it, and meanwhile the doctor-

[1:04:07] He's not even, he's not even miked up, like, they wouldn't hear his ass.

[1:04:11] Well, they're kind of ignoring him for a while, and the doctor walks in and goes,

[1:04:14] Alice, Mary's evil, she's using you, she's lying to you, and what's funny is that

[1:04:20] no one seems to know, Alice sees the doctor and hears her,

[1:04:23] no one else in the room seems to notice the doctor yelling these things at all.

[1:04:26] They're having a private conversation at either end of a crowded tent.

[1:04:30] Well, Alice is on stage, it's like, it's, there's a lot going on in the room,

[1:04:34] and the bishop eventually is like-

[1:04:35] Also, I'm not really sure what, you know, he thinks he's going to do by saying that he

[1:04:42] faked it all, when she's clearly, like, on stage, able to, like, talk and hear, like,

[1:04:49] I, I don't know, like, this is like, this is a very weird strategy when there's, uh,

[1:04:54] empirical evidence that something did happen, whether or not it was a miracle, like,

[1:04:58] just being like, I faked it.

[1:05:00] Well, it's, it reminds me a little bit, there's the, there's the French lady who was the longest

[1:05:04] recorded living person, she lived like 125 years old, and people are like, it's a fake.

[1:05:10] When her daughter was in her 30s, and she was in her 50s, she switched places with her daughter,

[1:05:15] and that's, and she's been living under her daughter's name.

[1:05:17] And I'm like, and it's like, but you would have to know, for that plan to work, you'd have to

[1:05:22] know that you would live to be, like, 100 years old, like, it doesn't, it doesn't really make

[1:05:25] sense as a plan.

[1:05:27] I guess, I guess that recent human history, uh, should prove to me that, like, evidence

[1:05:33] is not worth anything when it comes to people-

[1:05:35] Of course not, Dan.

[1:05:36] Well, the way that, like, every, every video that goes up on TikTok, people are like,

[1:05:40] let's look a little deeper and see what the conspiracy is behind this one.

[1:05:44] I don't know, I think the guy just didn't notice his girlfriend walked into the room,

[1:05:46] and that's why it took him a minute to recognize her.

[1:05:48] Like, no, no, no, no.

[1:05:50] Well, you have to look at what happened here.

[1:05:51] Like, the three ladies and the baby ghost.

[1:05:54] Mmm, three ladies and the baby ghost.

[1:05:58] Gotta, you gotta get in there, it's Halloween time.

[1:06:01] I, well, I was also researching, I have this weird thing, like, now that I've, like, done,

[1:06:08] well, I love props, I love props on movies, and I love how much commitment there is, like,

[1:06:12] the things that are coming to the side of the scene, it's so cool.

[1:06:15] I would come back as a props master in my next, next life, but, so I was, I'm, I was

[1:06:20] watching, this one had great, like, commentary on the scroll line as the, it's doing the

[1:06:25] live screen, as everyone thinks Mary is, you know, coming back to the earth, and it's like,

[1:06:30] is Mary, is Alice vegan?

[1:06:32] Is Alice, you know, all these great, like, I was like, great little questions.

[1:06:36] Then I had watched Brahms' The Boy Too, and his list was saying, it was the possessed

[1:06:42] doll, and he was saying, you know, Edwin says, never leave Edwin alone.

[1:06:47] Edwin says, never leave him, he always has to be a part of the family.

[1:06:52] Edwin likes to be nattily dressed and look very good.

[1:06:56] And then you scroll down further, and it says, never eat in the freezer!

[1:07:01] And all exclamation marks, and I wouldn't, I deeply, now I'm obsessed with why Edwin

[1:07:08] does or does not want to eat in the freezer.

[1:07:10] Please, anyone listening to this, if this has not been edited, which I hope it has been,

[1:07:14] but, you know, send my Twitter feed.

[1:07:16] Is there a backstory that Edwin does not like to eat in a freezer, and also, how does one

[1:07:21] do that?

[1:07:21] Yeah, Edwin, if you're listening.

[1:07:22] And this is from Brahms' The Boy Too, right?

[1:07:24] This is Brahms' The Boy Too, and the list that Edwin creates.

[1:07:27] All right, well, she opened up a case file for this.

[1:07:30] He just looks like an Edwin.

[1:07:32] I don't know if that's his name.

[1:07:34] He could be a Charlie.

[1:07:37] Charlie, Edwin.

[1:07:38] I like the idea of assigning names to characters in movies when you don't remember what their

[1:07:42] name is.

[1:07:44] Then there's this part in Casablanca where Stephen is talking to Rachel, and he's just

[1:07:48] like, ah, why'd you have to walk into my bar, Rachel?

[1:07:51] Oh, Cody.

[1:07:53] So, Cody, that's at the end when Cody says to Madison, this is the beginning of a beautiful

[1:08:00] friendship.

[1:08:02] And so the bishop is like, eh, you know what, security, I know I told you to keep Fen out,

[1:08:06] just let him talk, why not?

[1:08:08] And Fen is like, I made the whole story up.

[1:08:10] And Doctor's like, Alice, fight Mary.

[1:08:12] And there are two stories, really, at cross purposes, that Fen is like, there was no Mary,

[1:08:17] I made it up.

[1:08:18] And the Doctor is feet away yelling, Alice, fight Mary, she's trying to take over your

[1:08:23] body.

[1:08:23] They've got to get their story straight.

[1:08:25] It's confusing.

[1:08:26] But, and Mary tells Alice, without their souls, I'll never let you speak again.

[1:08:32] And that's when Alice tells the crowd, Mary's not real, we made it all up, we made it all

[1:08:36] up.

[1:08:36] And the crowd is instantly like, boo, we don't like you, boo, you lying girl, boo.

[1:08:42] And then Mary's like, I tried to do this the easy way, and then cracks her super long,

[1:08:46] scary knuckles and jumps out of a burning tree.

[1:08:48] Yeah, the tree lights on fire, everyone runs out, and the kid, Alice, healed, his legs

[1:08:53] stop working.

[1:08:54] So the Doctor has to carry him, because his parents, I guess, abandoned him in the burning

[1:08:58] room when the minute the trouble started.

[1:09:01] It was a real force majeure moment for that kid.

[1:09:04] Also, because Katie Azleton, God bless her, who I love, was criminally underused and was

[1:09:13] assigned only to explain certain, anything Doctor related, and or to run errands.

[1:09:19] Because remember, at one point, they're like, running to the hospital to save the day, and

[1:09:23] he's like, you go that way.

[1:09:24] And he's like, she sends her completely off screen.

[1:09:28] And then this is like, you scoop the boy.

[1:09:30] She seems to be given a series of semi-pointless errands.

[1:09:35] Yeah, a very nothing part, but she made enough of an impression that I looked her up.

[1:09:41] I didn't realize that she among...

[1:09:42] She was on The League.

[1:09:44] I love The League so much.

[1:09:45] Well, and along with being an actor, she directed Black Rock, which was a horror movie I enjoyed

[1:09:51] with Lake Bell and K-Pop.

[1:09:53] I didn't know that.

[1:09:54] That's a great movie.

[1:09:55] All right, well, you threw her more, dang it.

[1:09:58] I say.

[1:10:00] Dr. Gates spin-off in the next one, The Unholy Two, which is about two unholy people.

[1:10:06] Unholy-er.

[1:10:07] You know what?

[1:10:09] And then...

[1:10:10] Unholy-er is pretty good, too.

[1:10:11] The Unholy Three is a movie.

[1:10:12] That's a movie that exists already.

[1:10:13] So maybe they're tied in.

[1:10:16] Don't eat in the freezer, Unholy Three.

[1:10:20] We'll reboot that.

[1:10:21] Yeah.

[1:10:22] Who owns the estate of Todd Browning?

[1:10:23] I think it was thrown away, to be honest.

[1:10:24] But yeah, The Unholy Three, yeah, yeah.

[1:10:32] And he did two different versions of it, right?

[1:10:33] The silent version and the sound version of The Unholy Three.

[1:10:37] Both of them good.

[1:10:38] Both of them involve the main character.

[1:10:39] Unholy Six now.

[1:10:40] But yeah, both of them involve the main male villain dressing up as an old lady for kind

[1:10:45] of unnecessary reasons.

[1:10:48] So yeah, Mary emerges from that flaming tree.

[1:10:51] It was to spend more time with his kids, right?

[1:10:54] Because his ex-wife is dating Pierce Brosnan, right?

[1:10:58] Yeah, his ex-wife is dating James Bond.

[1:11:01] So all he can do is...

[1:11:03] I wonder if maybe there's a world where...

[1:11:06] I'm making this an official, unofficial movie crossover.

[1:11:08] Mrs. Doubtfire is now a sequel to The Long Good Friday.

[1:11:12] And Pierce Brosnan, who Sally Field is dating, is the same character who's like a young gangster

[1:11:16] assassin in The Long Good Friday.

[1:11:18] So you know what?

[1:11:20] It's the same universe.

[1:11:21] Prove me wrong.

[1:11:22] You can't.

[1:11:23] Okay.

[1:11:24] You can't.

[1:11:25] Wouldn't want to.

[1:11:26] I haven't shown my kids Mrs. Doubtfire yet.

[1:11:27] What do you guys think?

[1:11:28] Should I?

[1:11:29] Is it okay to show or not in today's world?

[1:11:32] I believe...

[1:11:33] I watched...

[1:11:34] I think I watched the end of it while on a cruise ship a few years ago.

[1:11:38] Okay.

[1:11:39] And I remember it being less cool than I thought it was.

[1:11:42] Okay.

[1:11:43] Because when you were a kid, you were like...

[1:11:44] You went Doubtfire crazy.

[1:11:45] You just thought it was the coolest.

[1:11:46] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:11:47] You started dressing like Mrs. Doubtfire.

[1:11:48] There's no doubt.

[1:11:50] You started Doubtfire.

[1:11:53] There's no doubt this movie is fire.

[1:11:55] Because I have been...

[1:11:57] My kids have been watching Aladdin a lot recently, and it's a movie that I get a lot of joy out

[1:12:01] of, but it is like...

[1:12:02] The original animated one.

[1:12:03] But it is like a deeply offensive movie.

[1:12:05] Like everything about it is ridiculously stereotyped.

[1:12:09] So maybe I shouldn't show them Mrs. Doubtfire 2.

[1:12:11] And whatever you do, do not read them the actual correct Little Mermaid after they've

[1:12:16] seen the Disney because it involves her.

[1:12:19] She can't speak.

[1:12:21] Every step feels like razors and knives going into her feet.

[1:12:25] The boy ends up marrying someone else.

[1:12:27] She is assigned by, I think, some sort of sea witch to assassinate his wife.

[1:12:32] And while standing over him, she loses her last challenge, which is do this all before

[1:12:37] sunrise.

[1:12:38] And she turns into sea foam and is gone and floats on the cold sea forever.

[1:12:44] So there's no Kiss the Girls, not in that.

[1:12:47] It's weird they changed the story.

[1:12:50] So Kiss the Girls...

[1:12:51] Well, what about Under the Sea?

[1:12:53] Do they sing Under the Sea?

[1:12:54] Yes, that's in there.

[1:12:55] Yeah, that's all.

[1:12:56] Okay.

[1:12:57] They sing the song On the Surface of the Sea.

[1:12:59] That's what the sea foam sings at the end.

[1:13:01] Yeah.

[1:13:02] Kiss the Girls in there is Along Came a Spider.

[1:13:05] Yeah, it's full of James Patterson novels.

[1:13:09] Yeah.

[1:13:10] That'd be so funny if James Patterson...

[1:13:13] He was inspired because he saw The Little Mermaid in the theater, and he was like, Kiss

[1:13:16] the Girl.

[1:13:17] What if it was more than one girl and a murderer?

[1:13:22] There's something here.

[1:13:24] He does.

[1:13:25] I don't know if he still does.

[1:13:26] You guys live in the New York area.

[1:13:27] Does he still do his TV commercials where he advertises his own books?

[1:13:30] Yes, every once in a while.

[1:13:31] Yeah.

[1:13:32] I love those.

[1:13:33] They're so funny.

[1:13:34] I remember the one for Jack and Jill, where it's just him holding the book and he goes,

[1:13:39] Jack and Jill, Jack and Jill, my new novel.

[1:13:44] And it was like, okay, it's just...

[1:13:46] Now, Gillian, as a novelist, would you ever consider doing an advertisement like this?

[1:13:50] You got it.

[1:13:51] You got to do...

[1:13:52] Gone and Girl.

[1:13:54] You're just like, I'm going, going, gone girl.

[1:13:59] Jaren's are hot.

[1:14:02] I know.

[1:14:03] Going girl.

[1:14:05] What if objects were sharp?

[1:14:09] You couldn't take them on planes anymore.

[1:14:15] Wait, they're going to hurt my sails.

[1:14:19] But you can't...

[1:14:20] And then you go, but you can take my book on planes, please.

[1:14:22] Seriously, you continue to take my books on planes.

[1:14:23] Please do.

[1:14:24] I'm serious, people.

[1:14:25] Yeah, this is one sharp object you can take anywhere.

[1:14:27] Anyway, Mary emerges from that flaming tree.

[1:14:29] She takes off her mask to reveal her skull face.

[1:14:31] Gross.

[1:14:32] Pretty cool.

[1:14:33] And the bishop is like, God help me.

[1:14:35] He doesn't.

[1:14:36] Mary vaporizes him and he just dissolves into dust.

[1:14:39] And she's like teleporting around, shrieking at Fen and Alice.

[1:14:42] It feels like Fen is really the guy she should be mad at.

[1:14:45] But instead, she's really doing her best to not kill him for a while.

[1:14:48] For some reason, she decides to crawl around all scary creepy-like, like the ring girl.

[1:14:52] Cricket creep.

[1:14:53] Yeah, the cricket creep.

[1:14:54] And then she's trying to kill Fen, but Alice jumps in front and I guess blocks the magic with her own body.

[1:14:59] Catches the hyperblast right in the chest.

[1:15:03] Immediately killing Mary, and Mary looks at the camera and explodes.

[1:15:08] Yeah, because she's destroyed – killed her only descendant, so now she's gone forever.

[1:15:13] The skull – I thought the skull looked pretty good.

[1:15:17] Yeah, yeah.

[1:15:18] I thought it was pretty cool.

[1:15:19] I was enjoying that.

[1:15:20] It was a cool monster face.

[1:15:21] She had a cool monster face, yeah.

[1:15:22] Her MF was a cool one.

[1:15:24] That means monster face.

[1:15:26] So the – that's why when people are like MF-er, you're like, you mean monster facer.

[1:15:32] I will take that all day long.

[1:15:34] What's the name, Stuart, of the makeup show where they make the monster faces?

[1:15:37] Oh, Face Off.

[1:15:39] Face Off, that's what it is.

[1:15:40] Yeah, yeah.

[1:15:41] It's great.

[1:15:42] I did not – on what – where?

[1:15:44] It was on the Sci-Fi Channel.

[1:15:46] It's a reality competition show between –

[1:15:48] Jillian got such a dreamy, far-away look in her eye when she heard this existed.

[1:15:53] Yeah, it's probably my favorite of the reality competition shows because it's like –

[1:15:56] it's all makeup artists and they – like everybody helps each other and they're all like so excited.

[1:16:01] And then like there was one episode – I mentioned this on the show before but it's still worth it –

[1:16:06] where they like teased who the special guest was and all you saw was a silvery white ponytail.

[1:16:11] And I was like, is that Jillian fucking Sands?

[1:16:14] And I said that out loud to my wife and she's like, what are you talking about?

[1:16:17] And then, no, it was Rick Baker who is also fucking sweet.

[1:16:20] Yeah.

[1:16:21] And then they had like –

[1:16:22] It would make more sense.

[1:16:23] And they had like Todd McFarlane on one time as a guest and I'm like, Charlene, this is really cool.

[1:16:30] Like Charlene, he owns two baseballs that used to be very valuable.

[1:16:37] And so Ben is like – he has a very low-energy prayer to God where he's like,

[1:16:42] God, I don't know, whatever I'm supposed to do, please save Alice.

[1:16:45] And Alice wakes up.

[1:16:46] She's alive again but she is once again deaf and mute.

[1:16:49] The miracles have been rescinded, which means they were not real miracles.

[1:16:52] Sometime later, it's unclear how much time, Alice and Gates and Fenn meet up at Hagen's grave and the local paper is hiring.

[1:17:01] And Dr. Gates really wants Fenn to take that job so he can live in town and she can domesticate him I guess.

[1:17:06] And Fenn is like, I believe in miracles now because Alice's revival was a miracle.

[1:17:11] And they're like, yeah, maybe there are miracles.

[1:17:13] And then we see another statue of the Virgin Mary crying blood.

[1:17:16] Wait a minute.

[1:17:18] What?

[1:17:19] Hold on.

[1:17:20] Because her ancestor is still alive.

[1:17:23] I just don't know.

[1:17:25] Like at that point, like Mary – what?

[1:17:28] Well, Mary can come back because her ancestor is still alive.

[1:17:31] So you think Mary was like, no, wait, I'm back.

[1:17:34] Like she was being dissolved into nothingness and then kind of pulled herself back.

[1:17:38] And it carries along the theme that with every miracle, there's something dark nearby.

[1:17:44] Like the devil builds a house next door.

[1:17:46] They say a couple times.

[1:17:47] Martin Luther.

[1:17:48] Martin Luther said the devil builds a house next to every church, which you got to assume that there's probably a zoning law about that somewhere.

[1:17:55] You can't open a bar in your church, but the devil can build a house?

[1:17:58] That seems crazy.

[1:17:59] And didn't Fenn – didn't he get a job working at the local newspaper?

[1:18:02] And I'm like, how big is this town?

[1:18:04] I've only seen like five people.

[1:18:06] Well, my newspaper is really more of a mimeographed flyer that they paste on the village bulletin board.

[1:18:12] Yeah, it's the menu for the local diner with all the ads.

[1:18:17] When I say the local paper is hiring, I meant the menu.

[1:18:20] They need someone to type it up.

[1:18:22] You know when you're eating at a place that has like a local menu that has local ads, you're like the food here is going to be fucking amazing.

[1:18:29] There's nothing that says success to me more than when I go to a diner, I sit down and there's a placemat.

[1:18:35] And outside the diner has the logo of the restaurant in the middle.

[1:18:38] And outside the border edge is just ads for local businesses.

[1:18:42] I'm going to eat something great.

[1:18:43] I'm getting the fucking pork roll.

[1:18:45] This is going to be fire.

[1:18:47] No doubt.

[1:18:48] There's going to be a salad on this menu that has more meat than vegetables in it.

[1:18:52] It's going to be great.

[1:18:53] It always has like everything.

[1:18:54] That's when you know you're at a good place.

[1:18:55] Where it's like, do I want the Greek salad or do I want the mashed potatoes?

[1:18:59] Lobster Thermidor.

[1:19:01] Do I want the lasagna or the sushi or the hamburger or the souvlaki?

[1:19:07] Or the beef tartare.

[1:19:09] How's the naan at this place?

[1:19:12] Tell me.

[1:19:13] How's the bulgogi at this place?

[1:19:16] Should I get the Impossible Burger that's written into the margins?

[1:19:20] Do I want Ethiopian food or just like a big slice of chocolate cake?

[1:19:24] There's just so many options.

[1:19:26] I like when a local ad has just like a caricature of the guy who owns the business.

[1:19:32] Because everyone around town is like, yeah, that's him.

[1:19:35] That's him, yeah.

[1:19:37] As our journalists could tell you, fame is seductive.

[1:19:42] And the hubris of it.

[1:19:44] Because like if that guy ever commits a crime, everyone knows what he looks like now.

[1:19:48] That's a good idea.

[1:19:49] He's just setting himself up.

[1:19:51] As we have discovered, this little town does not breed very intelligent villains.

[1:20:00] Like, hey, I'm bad, take this money I'm giving you.

[1:20:03] Also, they need to have a fire sale on all those items

[1:20:06] about with Mary, about the miracle.

[1:20:09] I don't know what they're gonna do with all those.

[1:20:10] Someone's like, the personalized candle store was like,

[1:20:15] we gotta close down, no business, ring, ring.

[1:20:18] A thousand candles with Alice's face on them, certainly.

[1:20:21] And then, guys, put it into production.

[1:20:24] We're coming back, reopen the factory.

[1:20:26] And then a couple days later, like, I got some bad news.

[1:20:29] The boom has ended, it's a bust now.

[1:20:31] The Alice candle bubble has popped.

[1:20:33] Fire sale, fire sale.

[1:20:35] I mean, I feel like you just immediately sell it all

[1:20:37] to the, like, I don't know,

[1:20:38] Morbid Anatomy Museum or something.

[1:20:40] They closed, Stuart.

[1:20:42] They do a pop-up at the Bell House every once in a while.

[1:20:44] Oh, okay, okay, then, yeah, that's fair.

[1:20:45] ♪♪

[1:20:50] Hey, there, I'm Ellen Weatherford.

[1:20:51] And I'm Christian Weatherford.

[1:20:53] And we've got big feelings about animals

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[1:21:20] So if you or your kids have ever wondered

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[1:21:27] find out with us every Wednesday on Just the Zoo of Us,

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[1:21:35] Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

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[1:22:06] From Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Jeffrey McGivern.

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[1:23:31] Type in for search, you can find it.

[1:23:33] So if you're interested.

[1:23:35] What, who?

[1:23:36] Dan, what did you type in to find the shot

[1:23:38] of slices of ham on a plate that you used?

[1:23:41] I think I just typed ham in

[1:23:43] and there were many different options

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[1:24:02] The Flop House is also sponsored in part by Smalls.

[1:24:06] Give your feline friend protein packed meals

[1:24:09] they'll crave with Smalls.

[1:24:11] Smalls is fresh human grade food for cats

[1:24:14] delivered right to your doorstep.

[1:24:15] All cats are obligate carnivores.

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[1:24:43] Since switching to Smalls,

[1:24:44] cats have experienced improved digestion

[1:24:46] and a less smelly litter box, Dan.

[1:24:50] Softer, shinier coats.

[1:24:51] I haven't been pooping in the litter box.

[1:24:52] I don't know why you said it that way.

[1:24:53] Maybe it's time for you to start

[1:24:55] because someone's got to make up for that lessened smell.

[1:24:58] Plus better breath.

[1:25:00] I have a couple of picky kitties at home

[1:25:02] and one of the nice things with Smalls,

[1:25:05] they give you a little guide on how to slowly

[1:25:07] introduce Smalls into their dietary regimen

[1:25:10] and it seems to be working,

[1:25:11] particularly for one of my cats that has a tooth problem.

[1:25:15] Obviously, send your best wishes to me on Twitter.

[1:25:17] Meatball's having a little bit of a tooth issue,

[1:25:19] but I think he'll be okay in the long run.

[1:25:21] Read them all to Meatball, I assume.

[1:25:22] So you can go over and take a short quiz

[1:25:25] on smalls.com slash flop

[1:25:30] to customize your sampler

[1:25:32] and then use the code FLOP

[1:25:34] for a total of 30% off your first order.

[1:25:37] That's right, that's smalls.com slash flop.

[1:25:41] Code FLOP.

[1:25:43] Do either of you have stuff to plug?

[1:25:46] Always.

[1:25:47] I own a couple of small businesses.

[1:25:49] There are bars in New York City,

[1:25:51] Brooklyn to be specific,

[1:25:52] and you know what?

[1:25:52] We'd love you to come by and say hi.

[1:25:55] Interlands Bar in Kensington

[1:25:56] or Minnie's Bar in Sunset Park.

[1:25:58] Just come on by and say hi.

[1:25:59] Why not?

[1:26:00] And in time for Shocktober, that's right.

[1:26:03] I'll have a new collection of my comic book

[1:26:06] Maniac of New York coming out in early November,

[1:26:09] it turns out.

[1:26:09] So just when you're all scared out from Halloween,

[1:26:13] keep that scare going

[1:26:14] because I think it comes out the first week of November,

[1:26:16] the collected trade of the first five issues

[1:26:19] of Maniac of New York from Aftershock Comics.

[1:26:21] It's the story that asks,

[1:26:23] what if Jason Takes Manhattan was good?

[1:26:26] Oh, no.

[1:26:28] Boom, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam,

[1:26:29] shots fired, shots fired.

[1:26:30] And took place primarily in Manhattan.

[1:26:32] Yes, it actually took place in Manhattan, yeah.

[1:26:34] And there'll be a second Maniac of New York series

[1:26:37] starting at the beginning of next year,

[1:26:39] but the issues are starting to be available for pre-order.

[1:26:41] Go to your local comic book store,

[1:26:43] tell them I want the Maniac of New York trade paperback

[1:26:46] and I want to start getting the issues

[1:26:47] for Maniac of New York, volume two, The Bronx is Burning.

[1:26:50] The first one's called Maniac of New York,

[1:26:52] volume one, The Death Train.

[1:26:54] And yeah, get ready to buy them.

[1:26:56] Go to your comic book store and pre-order them.

[1:26:57] Tell them to order them for you

[1:26:58] so that you can just go in and pick them up.

[1:26:59] Make my Maniac of New York.

[1:27:01] Yeah, thank you.

[1:27:02] Thank you, yeah.

[1:27:03] Merry Maniac Marching Society say make my Maniac.

[1:27:06] Face front, true believers, excelsi-scare.

[1:27:10] Cancel.

[1:27:12] Well, I guess on that note,

[1:27:15] we'll get back to the meat of the show.

[1:27:19] What? Gross.

[1:27:20] I don't know why I said it that way.

[1:27:21] Disgusting.

[1:27:26] Let us do a final judgments.

[1:27:29] Okay.

[1:27:30] A Shocktober final judgments about this.

[1:27:31] I get, if you want, sure.

[1:27:33] Thank you for the validation.

[1:27:37] Is this movie totally scarify, totally snorify,

[1:27:42] or frighteningly funny?

[1:27:43] I'm gonna say.

[1:27:44] Why not?

[1:27:45] I'm gonna go and I'm gonna say it's snorify.

[1:27:46] Give it to us, sure.

[1:27:47] I, the thing about this movie.

[1:27:49] All right, sure.

[1:27:51] In the mini we released last week,

[1:27:55] we talked a bit about Midnight Mass

[1:27:57] and I was thinking about how like,

[1:28:00] the, I guess slight thematic spoilers for Midnight Mass,

[1:28:04] but like the notion that appealed to me about that show

[1:28:08] was that, you know, these characters could go through

[1:28:13] this like horrifying experience

[1:28:16] and because they're seeing it through the lens of religion,

[1:28:20] misinterpret it as being, you know, a miracle, a blessing,

[1:28:26] and like the tragedy of it is, you know,

[1:28:30] a genuinely good man of God, like making that mistake.

[1:28:36] And this movie has a lot of the same ideas, you know,

[1:28:41] it's like, oh, what if like we misinterpret

[1:28:44] these miracles as being good,

[1:28:47] but just does it in such a just slow way.

[1:28:51] Like the only way you're gonna get scared

[1:28:53] watching this movie is if you fall asleep

[1:28:55] and have a nightmare during the span.

[1:28:57] I mean, like, you get an email that has bad news

[1:29:00] about your car insurance.

[1:29:03] So anyway.

[1:29:04] Dan, you're saying that what Puck says

[1:29:05] at the end of Midnight's,

[1:29:07] Midnight, A Midsummer's Night's Dream

[1:29:08] is what you're hoping for with this movie,

[1:29:10] that you fall asleep and you enjoy something, yeah.

[1:29:12] Yeah, this movie was, yeah, totally snorefying.

[1:29:16] Yeah, I feel like to draw comparisons to another,

[1:29:21] another thing that is another Netflix property,

[1:29:24] the Fear Street series,

[1:29:26] I feel like dealt with a similar type of like

[1:29:29] evil spooky thing from the past in a much more fun way.

[1:29:33] So watch that instead.

[1:29:34] This was snorefying, no thank you.

[1:29:36] I'm also gonna say snorefying.

[1:29:39] I think there was, when it first started up,

[1:29:42] I was ready to give it the benefit of the doubt

[1:29:43] because it was like, it was okay.

[1:29:45] Like, oh, it starts out okay.

[1:29:46] And then it just kind of treads water

[1:29:48] for most of the movie.

[1:29:50] But like I said, I think it's snorefying,

[1:29:51] but like I said, if you are trying to introduce

[1:29:53] the idea of horror movies to like a kid,

[1:29:55] like an adolescent, this might not be the worst one

[1:29:58] because it's not really that scary.

[1:30:00] It kind of gets the idea across what a scary movie is like as opposed like when I was a kid

[1:30:04] I jumped into the deep end way too quickly

[1:30:06] And I didn't watch horror movies for a while after that because they were too much for me

[1:30:09] But if I had seen something like this, I would have been like, okay. Yeah, I can watch horror movies

[1:30:12] So it's like a training wheels or it's like a like a baby's first horror movie, you know

[1:30:16] Which is horrifying to someone like me who's seen it all and needs increasingly extreme

[1:30:22] Do you just get my fear boner up, you know?

[1:30:25] Yeah

[1:30:27] Yeah, you're like centibites is that all you got give me more please and like exactly this so he's got pins in his head big

[1:30:34] Well, okay fish hooks through my eyes. Oh, ho-hum who cares?

[1:30:39] But doing what do you think I

[1:30:42] would say

[1:30:45] You know it huge points for

[1:30:48] Getting this done during kovat. I sure the fuck didn't get anything done during kovat

[1:30:53] And I would also

[1:30:56] Note that as someone who has written and done

[1:31:00] movies and TV

[1:31:01] I

[1:31:02] would like to invite anyone involved with this with this project to make fun of me and they can come on my

[1:31:08] Guest Twitter and we will they can mock anything they want. So I would like to offer that no one else

[1:31:14] Anyone involved with the production of the unholy, it's a free pass

[1:31:20] We might remade on you know, if you guys can turn over the

[1:31:24] World's most exciting podcast for you. They come back and people just take hits. But um

[1:31:29] So yeah, no it it I agree with you kind of la it that it was sort of it gives you it has all the rhythms

[1:31:36] There but I you know, I felt like no one's heart was maybe entirely in it sort of like

[1:31:40] Make this thing I can only assume budgetary constraints. Yeah, I think it was it would be interesting to see what is the version of this that

[1:31:49] Isn't because I who knows how much they had to rewrite possibly to get around what they what the constraints were and you know

[1:31:56] Again by that time it starts getting like like an Edward

[1:32:00] Yeah, he's just like let's make this fucker

[1:32:04] Yeah, I'm like I'm tempted now to to read the Wikipedia summary of the novel maybe maybe that's more interesting

[1:32:10] Or you could read the novels do I mean like?

[1:32:14] Yeah, yeah, you're like I kind of have some more hammer books to reread

[1:32:19] Some more hammer rules manuals to read yeah

[1:32:23] Yeah, I mean, yeah, I mean it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's it's

[1:32:29] That's some more hammer rules manuals to read yeah

[1:32:33] So you you read that and then you report back to us the even more condensed version

[1:32:38] Uh-huh

[1:32:41] Okay, cool, I love it

[1:32:43] I love it. Okay

[1:32:45] Let us what's the next section of this podcast letters. Why not? That's usually what happens if you want to letters

[1:32:51] Why not? I mean, I thought maybe today's gonna be the day when we took an abrupt left turn and just started

[1:32:55] Nope, I don't know reviewing pastas, but okay. Yeah, we we could do letters too. Sure pretty good. All right

[1:33:01] Bucatini is a good one. Anyway, uh, I found nothing silly about fuseli. It takes its job seriously, and it does it well four stars

[1:33:09] Let me tell you something about cavatelli. It's delicious

[1:33:15] Run run don't walk to get some spaghetti

[1:33:20] It's my pasta pick of the day

[1:33:23] Wait, wait, I want to go I want to go. Yeah. Yeah. Come on. Join in join in make damn man

[1:33:28] Let's pin a review of this pin. Hey

[1:33:33] Yeah a little obvious but you know

[1:33:36] Get in your rav4 and pick up some ravioli down at the local

[1:33:41] They may be named after little ears, but there's nothing gross

[1:33:45] About orecchiette

[1:33:46] You want to pop this ziti into your mouth?

[1:33:49] Oh, you look you look fetting genie tonight

[1:33:57] Dan come on. Don't fight it. You probably know more pastas than the rest of us put together

[1:34:06] Uh, I think you took the good ones anyway, um

[1:34:09] This letter is from it's a shell of a good pasta. That's for shell pasta. Yeah jack

[1:34:15] Jackie last name with hell writes

[1:34:18] Hiya fellas a few years ago the british charity comic comic relief

[1:34:23] Produced a mini sequel to the bafflingly enduring and creepy christmas movie love actually

[1:34:29] The 15-minute film had no real plot

[1:34:31] But was a series of vignettes that updated the viewer on the original characters current lives and it weirdly works

[1:34:38] obviously, there's not much there's not there's not more story that needs to be told in the

[1:34:43] sexist transphobic fat-shaming boundaries ignoring universe of love actually

[1:34:47] This movie does not need a full-length sequel but getting to take a tiny glimpse of popular and beloved characters is intriguing

[1:34:55] What movie would you like to see a mini sequel of?

[1:34:59] One that you were very satisfied with its conclusion

[1:35:02] But wouldn't mind having a little check-in with your favorite movie pals

[1:35:06] Thank you much. Jackie last name withheld. How about this one?

[1:35:11] Feeling formal. Why don't you dress up your dinner with some bow tie pasta?

[1:35:17] Okay

[1:35:20] How about that one

[1:35:23] I far fell for far

[1:35:25] folly

[1:35:29] Okay sequels like even a little short check-in sequel to movies we love

[1:35:33] Uh movies where we just get to hang out with our friends. Obviously i'm going to say suspiria

[1:35:40] Just want to see what's going on in that dance studio, man. It's so much fun. I love how did they come back from that?

[1:35:45] Yeah, maybe uh, maybe fast forward a couple years see what life's like in uh, germany then who knows I love the idea of it's

[1:35:51] Like a meeting of the board of the dance academy and then they bring in the new dance head and she's like I know

[1:35:56] We have a lot of baggage to get through

[1:35:59] We got to bring we got to bring back the name of this dance to you

[1:36:01] But I think we could do it this academy. Yeah

[1:36:05] um

[1:36:06] I I'm one of my

[1:36:10] So wait, so dan you were admonishing us to pay it to be good

[1:36:15] It all just seemed really fun. Now. He's googling pauses and

[1:36:18] Licking his lips. Yeah, i'm just and i'm just hungry

[1:36:26] Dan dan slow evolution into garfield continues the pace as he becomes obsessed with pasta. Yeah, sure

[1:36:32] I just I just want to see uh, yeah, I want to see I just want I mean

[1:36:36] I would want a full sequel to the guest I guess if I but

[1:36:40] But it would be fine if it was just kind of like we got to see dan stevens walk around a little bit more and there'd

[1:36:45] Be some cool like synth wave on the soundtrack and some old old, uh, deep cuts from the 80s

[1:36:51] Yeah, I mean I feel like something like uh, I wouldn't mind. Uh, like a little check-in with uh,

[1:36:57] The characters from hot fuzz even if it's a short one because I love those guys

[1:37:01] I feel like edgar wright is pretty good at like doing stuff like that

[1:37:05] I know on the like the dvd box of spaced they did like a very brief like

[1:37:09] Hint at where those characters might be years down the line. Do you have anything guys?

[1:37:15] I recently watched never too young to die

[1:37:18] Little john stamos gene simmons. Uh, yeah with the young john stamos as a

[1:37:24] gymnast, uh, I wouldn't mind continuing that track because those two

[1:37:29] were thrilling on screen and

[1:37:31] Among I think similar to the I

[1:37:35] I was always I I mean, it's satisfying to get it wraps up, but I always hated that

[1:37:40] question mark at the end of flash gordon

[1:37:42] as a kid because I was like

[1:37:44] There's so much more to explore there. I want those care

[1:37:47] I'm like, I mean like I did think that that was a totally viable alter universe that I would like to stay in and

[1:37:53] Yeah, hang out and see more about like what happened like being the merciless and camera's daughter's name, but obviously dale arden

[1:38:00] um

[1:38:02] There's more adventure to be had there. I say, uh, I um

[1:38:06] I'm curious about what happened to the characters in my second favorite movie of all time. That's right shadow of a doubt

[1:38:11] Uh, you found out your uncle was a murderer. He died on a train while trying to kill you

[1:38:16] How do you deal with that? What's what how you and now there's this cop that is clearly a lunkhead

[1:38:21] Uh who is on the case is in love with you and you got to figure out how to put him down easily, you know gently

[1:38:26] Um, so I kind of want to know what what happens to young charlie at the you know after that movie

[1:38:31] Um, but otherwise I started thinking I was like I started thinking about gremlins and like I would want to see where gizmo's at

[1:38:36] Now wait, but I would want a whole sequel of that. I don't want to

[1:38:40] Yeah

[1:38:41] so

[1:38:42] It'd be interesting to see

[1:38:44] Like the gang from pretty and pink together now being like wow

[1:38:47] We were said awful awful things back then and just having a full reckoning of like should maybe cancel

[1:38:54] I don't know

[1:38:55] We're like, uh the the cast of the big chill and they're all like trump voters now like they've they've gone over there

[1:39:00] They just reached that point and they're like, but they still listen to motown music like I can't be racist

[1:39:05] I listen to this music all the time, you know

[1:39:08] And a baby that kevin klein was supposed to impregnate is 40 now

[1:39:12] Yeah, that would be crazy

[1:39:14] Yeah, well, what about three men and a baby? Where's that? Where's that little lady now, you know?

[1:39:20] Where's uh, we're

[1:39:22] Yeah, we got to make that sequel soon, I mean all the all the three men are still with us we got a

[1:39:28] Iron's hot. Yeah. Yeah, dan. You and I were talking about our gutenberg love

[1:39:32] I I'd watch a sequel to the diner again. See like what those guys are doing. I don't feel like well

[1:39:40] I mean i'd love to see like big truck like the characters from big trouble in lol

[1:39:44] China getting another adventure in a like a different sort of situation

[1:39:48] How about reno williams the adventure begins which never

[1:39:57] Doesn't age super well

[1:40:00] Super-events of at the time, but yeah, everything else of Joel Grey's performance is the like martial arts master

[1:40:13] Make it Dan. I guarantee you someone is pitching three old men and a baby right now where it's the same three men

[1:40:18] But they're old now, but they got to take care of like their daughter's baby

[1:40:24] Totally right. Yeah, and it's gonna be in part of the Ghostbusters universe or something. I don't know. Yes

[1:40:30] It's gonna be munchers gonna show up three ancient

[1:40:38] Yep production, that's their job

[1:40:40] Yeah

[1:40:41] It opens it opens with Ernie Hudson walking on he goes the Ghostbusters just loved this story so much that we had to put our

[1:40:47] Weight behind it and we just want to make sure to bring it to you a wider audience that might otherwise see it and so

[1:40:52] Enjoy three old three

[1:40:55] We want to make it clear to you there are no ghosts in this movie

[1:40:58] I'm like the original three men and a baby which famously had a ghost in one scene. There are no ghosts in this story

[1:41:10] I've been hearing early reports from about the new Ghostbusters movie that a deceased actor shows up as a ghost and I'm so

[1:41:17] Fucking bombed. Yeah, like

[1:41:20] No, stop it. Just stop it

[1:41:25] Doesn't mean you should which way is it Richard Widmark?

[1:41:33] I'm trying to think I was trying to think I was like, it's not gonna be Elisha Cook jr. But maybe Richard Widmark

[1:41:37] Yeah, I'm all the deceased actors. Yeah

[1:41:41] One more letter. This is from Selena last name withheld who writes

[1:41:47] I'm a librarian and cataloger by day and I guess that's about it. Okay. Well, I was

[1:41:54] asleep, I

[1:41:56] Decided to check in to see if our favorite peaches had entries on Library of Congress in the industry

[1:42:02] If you do you've made it

[1:42:04] Imagine my surprise to see all three flop house boys with their very own name

[1:42:10] Authorities and to had not just their name but something you're known for

[1:42:14] For Dan, it's McCoy comma Dan

[1:42:18] Parentheses comic book writer because out of the entire bunch you're best known for writing comics

[1:42:24] for Elliot seems inaccurate

[1:42:28] Dan remind me again. How many comics you've written was it one?

[1:42:31] Well, we wrote a couple for the flop house

[1:42:38] For for Elliot, he's Kalen comma Elliot 1981 dash

[1:42:44] As we all know

[1:42:50] As we all know Elliot is best known for being born, but then we reach Wellington

[1:42:56] Wait, so it doesn't even say like author or anything like that. It just okay

[1:43:01] Then we reach Wellington the comma Stuart who is bereft of a title by which we can differentiate him

[1:43:08] From all the other Stuart well, it's so mysterious. My question for you is what should Stewart's Library of Congress?

[1:43:16] Dollar sign C

[1:43:19] Parentheses titles and words associated with a name

[1:43:23] Never stop flopping Selena last name withheld. I think I think it should just say hashtag blessed

[1:43:32] Man slash myth slash legend castle freak booster true

[1:43:38] Can't argue with that. Yeah, it should say Stuart is who Wellington comma Stuart Prince is equally funny close parentheses

[1:43:46] That's enough for me

[1:43:50] I'm just happy. I'm just happy to be involved

[1:43:57] Future generations who are just scrolling through the Library of Congress nameless things would be like who was he what did he do?

[1:44:04] That's pretty cool

[1:44:06] All right. Well, let's

[1:44:09] Put a cherry on this flop house Sunday of Shocktober. I don't know

[1:44:14] Really having a clear idea of where it was

[1:44:20] Doing recommendations, okay. Let me let me back up the sewer truck

[1:44:29] Let me turn on my robot voice

[1:44:33] Yeah

[1:44:37] For us, but I'm assuming yeah, I mean pretty real body national and international audience. I want them to have that. Yeah

[1:44:47] Love robots, uh

[1:44:54] That song was about robots

[1:44:58] You guys got to think open your third eye

[1:45:04] Um

[1:45:06] Recommendations I'm gonna recommend

[1:45:08] Usually this is the part of the show where we recommend

[1:45:12] Good movies to watch. I am going to go the opposite direction and recommend a bad movie

[1:45:18] But a bad movie that while I'm like Zorro just showed up. I'm like

[1:45:27] Unlike the unholy you will have a good time watching this

[1:45:32] Last night I had a small gathering of folks for a Halloween thing

[1:45:38] All vaccinated. We're all doing just fine

[1:45:41] and I

[1:45:43] Noticed my invitation never arrived

[1:45:46] Live in Los Angeles, which is

[1:45:50] The other coast

[1:45:52] Sorry that you did not get an invite, but we watched Stuart was here. We watched grizzly to the revenge

[1:45:58] which

[1:46:00] Was very good

[1:46:03] Interrupt and tell us what you're gonna say

[1:46:06] I have so much to say to you about this offline including

[1:46:10] My best friend who you're supposed to be best friends with who wrote a big long article about it recently that you will love

[1:46:16] Okay, great. Yeah, I'll channel offline. But yes, I totally agree with you. I would throw in

[1:46:23] Which most horror films probably or fans probably know about but I had not seen which is dead and buried the 1981

[1:46:30] kind of amazing

[1:46:32] film

[1:46:33] not

[1:46:34] Imperfect, but not that and perfect with Melody Anderson, which is I guess why I had Flash Gordon on my mind and most importantly

[1:46:42] Grandpa Joe from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory as

[1:46:47] serious and possibly menacing

[1:46:49] Figure and this town in which people make it dead and very Oh

[1:46:55] Screenplay by Dan O'Bannon. Yeah, I have a cover. I remember I've never seen it though

[1:47:00] I put this on my want-to-see during the Halloween movie season sort of

[1:47:06] Letterboxd a list and I I started watching it, but I haven't a chance to finish it. I heard only good things about this movie

[1:47:13] dead and buried

[1:47:15] Perfect, but very eerie and cool and definitely very cool and with

[1:47:20] Although with the mystifyingly just awful cop as its lead just absolutely bumbling but sexy

[1:47:29] Before before we move along entirely though, I do want to say about

[1:47:33] Grizzly to the beautiful thing about it is it got it started shooting in 83

[1:47:37] then they finished it last year with a bunch of like stock footage of bears basically and

[1:47:44] And some concert goers. It is an object lesson in trying to solve

[1:47:49] Like save an unfinished movie with editing and failing

[1:47:54] Totally like it is 74 minutes. They just like dragged it over the finish line. It's really funny

[1:48:00] How silly it is and I mean the start like the star power involved in it, Dan

[1:48:05] Yeah, we have a scene with Charlie Sheen George Clooney Laura Dern and then later on

[1:48:11] Gimli himself

[1:48:12] Jonathan Reese Davies shows. Yeah

[1:48:15] Yeah, it's pretty great

[1:48:17] Stu do you wanna hell? Yeah, I want to go. I'm gonna recommend a movie. That's not a horror movie

[1:48:21] What I'm gonna recommend a movie called pig starring Nicolas Cage. It's a movie about a hermit

[1:48:27] Who is a truffle hunter?

[1:48:30] No, not a Kermit

[1:48:32] It's a hermit and he's a truffle hunter and he has a truffle hunting pig and then some fucking ass wipes steal his pig and

[1:48:38] He's got to get that shit back. It is easily my favorite John wick movie. I love it

[1:48:42] It's very much a Pacific Northwest movie. It's beautiful

[1:48:45] It has a really great performance from Alex Wolfe who you would know as the sad kid from Hereditary and apparently a sad kid

[1:48:52] From old but I've not seen it yet

[1:48:54] And it also has a really great performance from Adam Arkin

[1:48:58] It is great. I totally recommend it

[1:49:02] Yep, check it out. So Stuart I have seen I've seen the previous for it and been quite interested

[1:49:07] but they I feel like they're almost deliberately marketing it as a

[1:49:11] Haha laugh at this movie, but it's it's it is not like great. It's legit. Great. Yeah

[1:49:17] Yeah, it is not it. It is not a tongue-in-cheek. It is

[1:49:21] Like Wacka Wacka Birdemic part 2. No, it's it's a great movie. It's fun

[1:49:27] It's it's one of my favorites of the year easily. No question

[1:49:30] Do they play the overkill song pig?

[1:49:34] Yep, the whole time that's the really weird choice. Yeah constantly you can't hear

[1:49:39] Yeah, it seems like a big mistake

[1:49:44] I'm gonna recommend a movie that I'm surprised you guys hadn't were make it recommended up till now since it's Shocktober and we're doing

[1:49:49] Horror movies then I'm gonna recommend malignant the James Wan movie from like a month ago or so. I guess

[1:49:56] It is it's a it's also great. That's a great movie. What?

[1:50:00] And it's a movie that, if I was gonna explain it best,

[1:50:03] it would be like, here's a premise

[1:50:05] that David Cronenberg would have done

[1:50:07] in like the early 80s or mid 80s,

[1:50:10] but they're gonna do it, not tongue in cheek,

[1:50:13] but kind of like as style out as they can,

[1:50:17] like kind of as unnatural style as they can

[1:50:20] in a lot of ways.

[1:50:20] But then it's gonna get it filtered

[1:50:22] kind of through the kind of action you expect to see

[1:50:24] in a superhero movie at a certain point.

[1:50:26] So it's a movie that has a kind of slow burn-ish open,

[1:50:31] or a slow burn-ish first hour,

[1:50:32] where you're kind of like, I see where this movie is going.

[1:50:35] And plot-wise, I saw where it was going,

[1:50:36] but I did not expect where it was gonna go gore-wise,

[1:50:39] where it just went, like it just,

[1:50:41] the body count on it by the end

[1:50:42] was the exact opposite of the unholy.

[1:50:44] I was like, there's a lot of people

[1:50:45] dying in this movie, in this thing.

[1:50:47] But it was a-

[1:50:48] And there's a scene where the bad guy

[1:50:49] throws a chair across the screen,

[1:50:51] and it smashes somebody, and it's so fucking funny.

[1:50:54] Yeah, and it's a movie that is like,

[1:50:57] I mean this in the best possible way,

[1:50:59] is like high-gloss trash, you know?

[1:51:01] Like it's not, it is not trying to elevate the horror movie

[1:51:06] except in just doing this type of movie

[1:51:08] at a high level of production, you know?

[1:51:10] But it feels like a very fun kind of mash

[1:51:15] of modern horror style,

[1:51:16] and that kind of 80s horror style

[1:51:19] where everything was about medical experiments gone wrong,

[1:51:24] or like, there was always, there was somebody,

[1:51:26] always a doctor taking notes on videotape

[1:51:29] about some strange case that they're dealing with.

[1:51:32] Like, so it's a, I really enjoyed it though.

[1:51:34] I know a bunch of people talk to me,

[1:51:36] they're like, I didn't like it, it was too crazy.

[1:51:38] And I watched it, and I was like,

[1:51:39] well, this is just the movie that I wanted it to be.

[1:51:40] Yeah, sure.

[1:51:41] So, that's malignant, malignant.

[1:51:44] Malignant.

[1:51:46] I find that less and less you do,

[1:51:48] you get those movies that are just like,

[1:51:50] we're gonna be a very fun B to B plus movie,

[1:51:55] that's all we're trying to be, we're gonna entertain you.

[1:51:58] Like, put yourself in our hands, you're in, you're out.

[1:52:01] And because it's just, it feels like it's either

[1:52:03] these kind of spiritless, you know,

[1:52:06] by the books or so over the top

[1:52:09] that there's way too much at stake

[1:52:11] and then they ruin it by formulaic.

[1:52:14] I just like those ones that feel like they're,

[1:52:15] they just came from someone's head.

[1:52:17] Like, where you can feel that person's personality

[1:52:20] and you're like.

[1:52:20] Choice of words for this movie.

[1:52:21] Yeah, especially.

[1:52:22] Yeah.

[1:52:23] But yeah, there's a, like, the last movie we did

[1:52:27] on the Flophouse was an adaptation of Turn of the Screw,

[1:52:30] which felt like it was so bending over backwards

[1:52:33] to be respectable, you know?

[1:52:36] That it was never kind of like scary

[1:52:38] or cool or gross or anything like that.

[1:52:41] But then, yeah, there's, I,

[1:52:43] the movies that are kind of like,

[1:52:45] have you ever seen someone's face

[1:52:47] get mashed with a brick into a car

[1:52:50] while a dog's attacking them?

[1:52:51] Uh-oh!

[1:52:52] And then like, and then somebody makes a joke about it.

[1:52:54] Like, that's not, I don't want to see that either.

[1:52:56] Like, I want the characters in the movie at least

[1:52:58] to be affected by what's going on, you know?

[1:53:00] Yes.

[1:53:01] Yeah, the, yeah, and the, I feel like it's so,

[1:53:04] I mean, it's so common for horror movies

[1:53:08] to be either what you just described

[1:53:10] or like drenched in like sparse strings

[1:53:14] and like creepy doll houses in the background.

[1:53:18] And like, it's like, no, it can be,

[1:53:20] it can be a little fun too.

[1:53:21] Like, like being scared is fun.

[1:53:24] That's why people are here.

[1:53:24] They don't want to like be depressed for two hours.

[1:53:27] That's why they watch something else.

[1:53:28] And you only get two cheap jump scares per movie.

[1:53:33] Yeah.

[1:53:33] That is it.

[1:53:34] Any more, you're done.

[1:53:35] Yeah.

[1:53:36] Well, it's like, I feel like you could do-

[1:53:37] You go to jail.

[1:53:38] After a certain amount of jump, yeah, jump scare jail

[1:53:41] where they keep jumping at you.

[1:53:42] Huh?

[1:53:43] God, this sounds awful.

[1:53:44] There's like a cat in a cabinet

[1:53:46] and then around the corner, you trip over something.

[1:53:49] Every time you lift up the toilet seat,

[1:53:51] there's like a, like a lizard jumps out at you.

[1:53:54] There's a meter that you smudge through

[1:53:56] and it's like, oh, it goes behind me.

[1:53:58] You always got to shake out,

[1:54:00] got to shake out your shoes every morning.

[1:54:02] Got to shake out your shoes

[1:54:03] in case there's like a Venus fly trap or something

[1:54:04] and it's going to jump out and snap at you.

[1:54:06] Yeah.

[1:54:07] Every time you wake up, you're like,

[1:54:08] oh, is that a scary guy?

[1:54:09] Oh no, that's just a hat rack with a coat on it.

[1:54:11] I'm being suffocated.

[1:54:14] Oh, it's a blanket.

[1:54:15] Oh, nevermind.

[1:54:16] Nevermind.

[1:54:17] Oh, I'm blind.

[1:54:18] Oh, my eyes are just closed.

[1:54:19] I mean, I guess that is the guy in the Sandman comic

[1:54:23] who gets punished by constantly waking up to nightmares

[1:54:27] and then waking up from them to new nightmares.

[1:54:29] You know, like that's kind of that.

[1:54:30] Wes Craven's new nightmare?

[1:54:32] Yeah, yeah.

[1:54:32] He keeps waking up to the movie Wes Craven's new nightmare.

[1:54:34] Yeah, and he's like, why can't I just finish it?

[1:54:36] I keep waking up after the first half hour.

[1:54:39] But it's, yeah, to see a movie that,

[1:54:42] I feel like you can justify a couple of jump scares

[1:54:45] if you then pay off with real scares.

[1:54:47] And this is a movie where it's like,

[1:54:49] here's some real crazy stuff for you.

[1:54:51] There's one scene later on that was a little too much for me

[1:54:53] where a character is in a jail cell

[1:54:55] and she is surrounded by the most cartoonishly

[1:54:58] kind of like stereotyped people you would see

[1:55:01] in a ladies jail cell.

[1:55:02] And I was like, movie, you're not trying very hard.

[1:55:04] Including veteran stunt woman, Zoey Bell.

[1:55:06] I mean, everybody in the room,

[1:55:07] everyone on screen does fine.

[1:55:10] Just the fact that there's like,

[1:55:11] they're all dressed up like you would see

[1:55:13] in a cautionary tale about life in the big city

[1:55:15] in the 70s.

[1:55:16] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:55:17] Or like a Streets of Rage level.

[1:55:18] Or that they're about to go before Judge Harry

[1:55:23] on Night Court or something.

[1:55:24] Yeah, exactly.

[1:55:25] I mean, what, okay, there's your horror reboot.

[1:55:29] You do a horror reboot of Night Court

[1:55:30] where there's, I don't know,

[1:55:31] like one of the hookers they bring in

[1:55:33] is a vampire or something.

[1:55:34] Could you imagine if like,

[1:55:34] Bull showed up at that fucking jail cell later.

[1:55:37] And he's like, ladies, it's time to, oh my God.

[1:55:40] But if you want a fun, horror-y, over-the-top movie,

[1:55:46] this is a good one for you, yeah.

[1:55:49] Gillian was dead and buried, your official recommendation?

[1:55:52] Or did you have something else?

[1:55:52] Yes, that was my official.

[1:55:55] Well, in that case.

[1:55:56] Count it.

[1:55:57] That's four.

[1:55:57] We didn't put any recommendations.

[1:55:59] I don't know, is there anything you'd like

[1:56:01] our tiny audience compared to your large audience

[1:56:04] to know, anything you want to plug?

[1:56:06] Just that I'm happy to be here.

[1:56:10] And yes, I'm working on the next novel.

[1:56:12] That's what I get.

[1:56:13] Whenever I go on Twitter, that's all I get.

[1:56:14] I can post anything about, you know,

[1:56:16] like Biden has taken over the world and is awesome.

[1:56:19] And people will be like,

[1:56:20] when's your next novel?

[1:56:21] Get back to work.

[1:56:23] I had a good day, you know.

[1:56:24] It was really good for my mental health.

[1:56:26] They're like, mm, that's really nice.

[1:56:27] I hope that helps you write more.

[1:56:29] Yeah.

[1:56:30] I can't read your good day at home.

[1:56:31] Create more content.

[1:56:32] Yeah, we'll take it.

[1:56:33] Let us take some of your heat.

[1:56:35] Because I was, we were texting

[1:56:37] and you were saying that you watched, you know,

[1:56:39] the first half in the background

[1:56:41] of all of the movies we suggested

[1:56:44] you could possibly do.

[1:56:46] And I was like, oh, that's a lot of time to spend on this.

[1:56:49] And you're like, well, you know, like I'm writing.

[1:56:52] I've been writing today.

[1:56:54] But let's, we can take the heat by saying,

[1:56:57] like, we're preventing Gillian Flynn

[1:57:00] from finishing her next book

[1:57:01] by having her watch the first half of a bunch of movies.

[1:57:05] Luckily, it'll be different with next week's guest,

[1:57:07] George R. R. Martin.

[1:57:08] Uh-oh.

[1:57:09] Oh, no.

[1:57:10] Oh.

[1:57:11] Oh.

[1:57:11] I actually have the same editor as George, so.

[1:57:15] Oh, man.

[1:57:16] Talk about a cushy job.

[1:57:18] Throw it her way.

[1:57:19] Just sit around, wait all day

[1:57:20] for books that don't come in.

[1:57:21] Amazing.

[1:57:22] Wow.

[1:57:25] Well, okay.

[1:57:26] It has been an absolute delight, you guys,

[1:57:29] as I have me back for the Easter Passover episode.

[1:57:35] Sure, sure.

[1:57:36] I mean, we should do that.

[1:57:37] Arbor Day, whatever you got.

[1:57:40] I got lots of tree movies to discuss.

[1:57:42] Holiday Gillian, we'll call.

[1:57:46] But, well, before we go,

[1:57:48] just quick thanks to our editor, Alex Smith,

[1:57:52] and producer, who makes us sound okay, passable.

[1:57:57] Like a robot.

[1:57:59] Any problems in the recording are our fault

[1:58:03] and not Alex, who does amazing work.

[1:58:05] Thank you to Maximum Fun, our network.

[1:58:09] Go check out MaximumFun.org for other podcasts.

[1:58:13] But for The Flop House, I've been Dan McCloy.

[1:58:17] I am Stuart Wellington.

[1:58:19] I'm Elliot Kalin, and we've been joined by.

[1:58:23] Me, Gillian Flynn.

[1:58:25] Thank you so much.

[1:58:26] Bye.

[1:58:27] Bye.

[1:58:28] Bye.

[1:58:29] Bye.

[1:58:30] It's recording.

[1:58:33] Okay, and we'll just assume you don't sound like a robot.

[1:58:35] That'll be.

[1:58:36] It is a robot.

[1:58:38] It would be so funny if, as a joke,

[1:58:40] you did it as a robot without telling us,

[1:58:42] and we look back and we're like.

[1:58:43] I swear.

[1:58:44] That's why she kept mentioning robots

[1:58:46] during the whole thing,

[1:58:47] saying her batteries were low.

[1:58:48] Trying to see if anyone was paying attention.

[1:58:51] She was the girl from Small Wonder, all grown up.

[1:58:54] But she didn't talk like a robot, really?

[1:58:56] She doesn't grow up, Dan.

[1:58:57] She's a robot.

[1:58:58] That's the whole thing.

[1:58:59] She's always gonna be a Small Wonder.

[1:59:01] Aw.

[1:59:02] He did get you on that one, Dan.

[1:59:04] He did get you on that one.

[1:59:06] Maximumfun.org, comedy and culture.

[1:59:09] Artist-owned, audience-supported.

Ep. #354 - The Unholy, with Gillian Flynn

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