Ep. #281 - The Nutcracker and the Four Realms

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss The Nutcracker and The Four Realms.

[0:05] Based on the ballet of the same name, except for the Four Realms part, which is admittedly a kind of unnecessary piece of world-building when you already have the rich world of ballet.

[0:30] Hey everyone, and welcome to the Flop House. I'm Dan McCoy.

[0:44] Hey Dan, I'm Stuart Wellington.

[0:47] Hey guys, Elliot Kalin coming at you live from LA, California. That's right, Los Strangelies, Hollyweird, where America makes its movies and moves its makeys. Guys, how are you?

[0:59] Makeys, the Tony Millionaire comic?

[1:03] Yeah, it moves them to what? Greenlight Books? What's the?

[1:07] What are we doing? We're shipping them on a truck?

[1:10] Yeah, we are. It's a new printing and we got to move it out of here.

[1:14] Well, that joke was for a very small subset of the audience, I'm pretty sure, although a larger subset than for most things. This is a podcast.

[1:22] You're right. Probably we have more listeners who are aware of Tony Millionaire than say like the Big Bang Theory has viewers who are aware of Tony Millionaire.

[1:30] But that being said, this is a podcast and you know what?

[1:36] What?

[1:38] This sounds like a very natural segue.

[1:41] This podcast is supported by listeners.

[1:44] Yeah. This is our second Max Fun Drive episode asking you to become a supporter of Maximum Fun.

[1:51] I believe you already are, but I'm already a supporter and my wife is also a supporter.

[1:56] Hey, but you guys could also both upgrade your supporterships by advancing to another level of support.

[2:02] Dan, talk a little bit about Max Fun. What is it? What does it do? Why are we driving it? Where are we driving it to?

[2:07] OK, well, is it is that what we're driving all these Maki's books around with?

[2:12] Maximum Fun is a podcasting network with TK shows on it.

[2:18] I think around 40. I'm not really sure how many, but I tried to count them up, but there's some of them are defunct.

[2:23] So it's a hard thing to figure out, but there's a lot of them.

[2:26] Seems like again, let's steer back onto the main drive.

[2:29] No, no, no, no. Let's get in the weeds and work this out.

[2:33] But it's a great network. It's helped us.

[2:35] I feel like we were about to get on the highway and then Dan immediately just like cut the wheel over onto a dirt road going to maybe an abandoned farmhouse in the distance.

[2:46] Like, oh, we're going to make it. We're going to go to Legoland.

[2:49] Wait, let's go see if Jeepers Creepers is around.

[2:52] I certainly hope not. I don't care for those movies.

[2:56] Look, it's a great network. Its motto, comedy and culture, is a true thing.

[3:03] It brings you lots of comedy, brings you lots of culture.

[3:05] Yep, you're right.

[3:06] Brings lots of culture me, lots of calmer.

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[3:59] Yeah.

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[4:09] Yeah, and I like to think of the listeners more as silent partners in this organization.

[4:16] Our listeners really feel differently, Dan.

[4:18] They prefer to be quite vocal, and I appreciate them that way.

[4:21] You know what?

[4:22] Be vocal with your free speech, and according to the Supreme Court, money is a form of free speech.

[4:26] And so why not become a supporter to the Max Fund Drive and to this very podcast, the Flophouse podcast?

[4:32] Hey, there's a lot of great donor gifts you get from donating with a $5 monthly membership.

[4:38] You get access to all of the exclusive bonus content.

[4:43] Something that is too hot for TV.

[4:46] Yeah, there's a secret bonus feed with bonus content from all of the shows.

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[5:06] It looks like Archie.

[5:07] It looks more like my dead cat Lulu, but thanks for bringing that up, Elliot.

[5:12] I don't believe I did, Dan.

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[5:48] Listen, there's higher levels that we don't want to ignore because we would love you to give more money if you feel like you can.

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[5:59] Hey, why not just contribute?

[6:03] Why not?

[6:05] How's that for a pitch?

[6:06] Hey, why not?

[6:07] Because it's there.

[6:09] So why not go to MaximumFund.org and do that?

[6:14] Okay, Dan, but this is not a donation podcast, right?

[6:18] What do we do on this podcast normally?

[6:20] Let's take the hat that we had passed around for donations, put it back on our heads.

[6:25] All the money falls out onto the floor.

[6:27] Let's pick it up and put it in our pockets.

[6:30] This is a podcast, I said it before, where we watch a bad movie and then we talk about it.

[6:36] Okay, this time around, Elliot chose the movie, and I am dying to understand why he picked this one.

[6:43] Elliot Kaelin, original nutty buddy.

[6:46] Okay, that's what it says on my business card and also in my government file, original nutty buddy.

[6:53] Elliot picked a movie that slid off my brain as I was watching it, so I'm curious to hear what he has to say about it.

[6:59] So maybe this movie – so this was The Nutcracker and the Four Realms.

[7:03] Maybe this movie – I think I have two reasons, Dan, why it stuck in my mind as existing.

[7:07] I think I had to repeatedly tell Dan beforehand that this was a movie, and he kept saying,

[7:11] yeah, I'd never heard of it.

[7:12] I'm like, that's fine.

[7:13] That's cool, but why don't we watch it?

[7:15] Yeah, I'm just saying I'd never heard of it.

[7:16] I didn't know it existed.

[7:17] I know, Dan.

[7:18] That's great.

[7:19] I know you're too hip to know about ballet movies.

[7:20] I get it.

[7:21] You're so cool.

[7:22] You don't know that stuff.

[7:23] I think my argument is more that I'm pretty plugged into movies, so if anyone should have known that ballet existed.

[7:29] Dan is extremely online.

[7:33] That's true.

[7:37] I'm a tastemaker and an influencer, Elliot.

[7:40] You're both of those things?

[7:41] Yeah.

[7:42] I'm also a freshmaker.

[7:43] I was just about to ask if you're a freshmaker also.

[7:46] Now, Dan, are you brisk?

[7:50] Damn it.

[7:51] All right.

[7:52] You're starting to make me spit out my drinks.

[7:54] Dan did a spit take.

[7:56] Okay, so Nutcracker and the Four Realms.

[7:58] I think there are two reasons it stuck in my mind.

[8:00] One, Dan, Stu, you guys don't have kids.

[8:02] I'm exposed to a lot more children's entertainment than you are, and this seemed to be advertised all over the place.

[8:09] And number two, I am, as Stuart said, an original Nutty Buddy.

[8:12] When I was a kid, my grandmother would take my family to see the Nutcracker at the New York Ballet every year around holiday time.

[8:19] That was the big Hanukkah present for my family was to go see a Christmas-themed ballet.

[8:25] But I really loved it.

[8:26] I've always really loved the Nutcracker.

[8:28] At a certain point, my cousins and my siblings said, are we really going to see the Nutcracker every year?

[8:33] And they made my grandmother start taking us to other things, but I've always loved the Nutcracker.

[8:37] And so when I saw that they were making what was basically like what seemed to be an epic fantasy quest battle movie out of the Nutcracker, I was like, I've got to take a stand.

[8:47] This is ridiculous, the same way that I regret we didn't cover the Alice in Wonderland movies when those came out because the idea of Alice in Wonderland being repurposed as a Lord of the Rings-type story really offends me in a certain way.

[8:58] It's just so outside the – the same way that anytime that there's a gritty, violent version of Alice in Wonderland where it's like Alice is in an insane asylum and all the characters are assassins.

[9:08] I don't like that stuff either.

[9:09] So I was like, the Nutcracker, they're going to do that to the Nutcracker.

[9:13] Sorry. I've got to write these notes down real quick.

[9:15] Assassins, mental hospital, 13 ghosts.

[9:21] Okay.

[9:22] I don't remember saying anything about the number of ghosts.

[9:26] 13 is a serious number of ghosts.

[9:28] So when I saw –

[9:29] I mean if you're going to have a collection of ghosts, you could have 12, but then why not just add another fucking –

[9:34] Wouldn't 14 ghosts be scarier because it's one more ghost?

[9:40] No. I mean there's a diminishing returns kind of thing that goes on.

[9:43] No.

[9:44] I didn't think about that, but I do think 14 is probably scarier than 13.

[9:50] It's not like –

[9:51] Thank you.

[9:53] If it was like 14,000, yeah, that's just a wall of ghosts.

[9:57] You can't see the forest or the ghosts at that point.

[9:59] Yeah, yeah.

[10:00] At that point, you're like, how many ghosts are there?

[10:02] Can everyone please be quiet so I can count the ghosts?

[10:04] You want enough ghosts that you can kind of count them

[10:06] and maybe one or two passes, right?

[10:08] Yeah.

[10:09] The other thing though is there's only 13

[10:10] really scary ghosts in the world.

[10:13] Okay, name them.

[10:13] Hitler, what, John Wilkes Booth?

[10:16] Yeah.

[10:18] What, Jeffrey Dahmer, Jack the Ripper, who else?

[10:22] Mr. Rogers, there are things about him that you do not know.

[10:24] Oh, wow, that is not gonna win you any money.

[10:27] I literally yesterday just finished reading

[10:30] The Good Neighbor, the biography of Fred Rogers.

[10:32] There is nothing about him that I didn't,

[10:34] that I was unhappy to learn about.

[10:37] Okay, good.

[10:37] Except one thing.

[10:40] One terrifying thing.

[10:45] What were we saying about the nutcracker?

[10:47] Anyway, so the nutcracker.

[10:48] So I was like, I gotta see what they do with this story,

[10:51] how they screw it up by making it into like a fantasy quest.

[10:54] So that's why I wanted to do it

[10:56] because I have a special place in my heart

[10:58] for the nutcracker.

[10:59] I listen to it's music fairly frequently.

[11:02] I like to sing the music along to my kids

[11:04] and it really irritates them.

[11:05] I'll just go.

[11:06] But, but, but, but, but, but, but, but, da, da, da, da, da,

[11:09] da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da, da!

[11:16] I'll do, I went through that period

[11:18] that everyone goes through when you're a nutty buddy

[11:20] where you find the Arabian dance to be very boring as a kid.

[11:23] And then as an adult, you're like,

[11:24] oh, this is maybe the most beautiful song

[11:26] in the entire show.

[11:27] You know, all that stuff.

[11:28] So anyway, The Nutcracker and the Four Realms.

[11:29] Should we talk about what happens in it?

[11:32] Please.

[11:33] I mean, we get some time to kill, right?

[11:34] Are you guys familiar with the original story

[11:35] of the nutcracker in the original ballet?

[11:38] So like this kid gets a nutcracker, right?

[11:42] Yes.

[11:43] And she goes to bed and the nutcracker comes alive.

[11:49] Well, her like little brother breaks that shit, right?

[11:51] Yeah.

[11:52] Her little brother breaks it.

[11:53] And there's a rat king that they fight.

[11:57] Yeah, good enough.

[11:58] Okay.

[11:59] Keep going.

[12:02] And the whole second act actually happens

[12:04] after they defeat the rat king or something like that.

[12:06] It's like a weirdly unbalanced ballet

[12:09] because then they just celebrate for a long time.

[12:11] The second act is literally just them sitting

[12:13] and watching dances for a long time.

[12:17] Okay, so how are they going to turn that

[12:18] into a fantasy quest movie?

[12:19] Let's find out.

[12:20] Nutcracker and the Four Realms.

[12:21] It's Christmas in 19th century CGI London.

[12:24] It's not a CGI movie, but we have one of those flybys

[12:27] of a city where it's all computer graphic.

[12:29] Like everything looks very computery.

[12:31] But everyone is frolicking.

[12:33] Christmas in London.

[12:34] Oh, what a joyous time.

[12:35] It couldn't be better, right guys?

[12:37] No, it couldn't be.

[12:38] Sure, I guess.

[12:39] Except there is a dead mom.

[12:41] We'll get to that in a second.

[12:43] We'll get to that.

[12:43] We're introduced to Clara,

[12:44] who's a girl who loves contraptions.

[12:46] She loves steampunk cogs and gears.

[12:50] And here's the thing.

[12:51] She's like a Saruman.

[12:54] I don't know about that.

[12:55] She's like a regular Saruman, yeah.

[12:57] Normally in this, I'd be like, ugh, enough of this.

[13:00] But there's actually, the original Nutcracker story

[13:02] is all about automatons and things like that.

[13:04] So it fits, okay.

[13:07] So Clara, she and her brother make a mousetrap,

[13:10] like a Rube Goldberg type mousetrap

[13:12] that actually ends the way the mousetrap ends

[13:14] in the game mousetrap with Annette descending onto the mouse.

[13:17] And I'm like, wait a minute.

[13:18] So is it implied that they invented the game mousetrap?

[13:21] That's a different movie.

[13:22] Suddenly, it's like that Greg Kinnear movie

[13:24] where he invents the windshield wiper or whatever.

[13:26] And I'm like, am I supposed to care about this?

[13:27] Is that called Stroke of Genius or something like that?

[13:30] Yeah, it's called Scrotum Genius.

[13:31] It's about.

[13:34] About what?

[13:35] About how he was smudging his scrotum down one day.

[13:39] And he's like, oh, I wonder what a good way

[13:41] to dry my scrotum would be.

[13:42] So he invents a scrotum dryer,

[13:44] but then he realizes it would work much better on cars.

[13:47] Yeah, I mean.

[13:49] Yeah, probably.

[13:50] Wait, do you think a windshield wiper dries?

[13:53] I don't think a windshield doesn't dry,

[13:55] but it whisks away moisture.

[13:58] So you're saying that he was going

[14:00] through the methodical process all us men know

[14:02] of drying your scrotum.

[14:03] It takes forever.

[14:04] And he said, there's got to be a better, quicker way.

[14:06] And he invented a kind of little wick,

[14:08] like a little John Wick that he could use.

[14:13] You just squeegee it off is what I'm saying.

[14:15] Yeah, I mean, a scrotum is very,

[14:20] I feel like the natural cleaning product

[14:22] would be a long piece of flat rubber.

[14:26] Well, what is this?

[14:27] He took a regular straight razor or safety razor.

[14:31] What?

[14:31] He took the blade out and put rubber on the end of it.

[14:34] And he turned it into like this little squeegee, yeah.

[14:36] Okay.

[14:37] So that's Greg Kinnear, scrotum genius.

[14:39] Anyway, so Clara has a brother, a sister, and a dead mom.

[14:43] And their dad, they're all sad.

[14:45] And their dad gives them their mother's

[14:46] final Christmas gifts to them.

[14:48] Clara gets a metal egg that has a keyhole in it,

[14:51] but no key.

[14:52] It's locked.

[14:53] What is she going to do?

[14:54] And now-

[14:55] Her little brother gets some toy soldiers.

[14:59] And that kid fucking whips those out

[15:02] and starts battling right away.

[15:03] I mean-

[15:04] Instantly.

[15:05] Right after, a kid after my own heart, you know.

[15:06] He's like, toy soldiers, cool.

[15:08] They've surrounded us.

[15:09] Ah, ah, get them.

[15:10] Bah, bah, bah.

[15:11] And I'm like, how did they even get into this battle?

[15:12] Where is he fighting?

[15:13] What's going on?

[15:14] Yeah, you got to set the scene, dude.

[15:16] And the older sister gets her mom's favorite dress.

[15:19] And there's this very creepy moment where she puts it on

[15:22] and she goes, how do I look to the dad?

[15:23] And the dad is like, great.

[15:25] And it's just a very weird moment.

[15:27] Yeah.

[15:28] Before he starts demanding dances.

[15:31] So the father's mad because Clara is too sad

[15:34] to keep up appearances

[15:35] at the Christmas Eve ball they're going to.

[15:37] He wants to have a dance with each of his daughters.

[15:39] And Clara is like, mm, I don't want to dance.

[15:42] It's just like that song Fred Astaire sang

[15:44] about how he's not going to dance.

[15:45] Anyway, so they go where,

[15:48] let's talk about the Christmas Eve parties

[15:50] at their godfather's house.

[15:51] Their godfather is Drosselmeyer.

[15:54] Uh-oh.

[15:54] He is.

[15:55] Describe him, Stuart,

[15:56] because I'm sure you thought he was pretty cool.

[15:58] Yeah, he's like a cool old wizard played by Morgan Freeman

[16:01] with an owl friend like David Bowie in Labyrinth.

[16:04] And he's got a bunch of fucking toys in his basement.

[16:08] And sure, what's he wear over-

[16:09] Like the opposite of an Aerosmith album.

[16:11] And he-

[16:13] Because the toys, because they're not in the attic?

[16:15] Yeah, or would it be,

[16:18] would it be, what's the opposite of a toy?

[16:20] Like math?

[16:22] Like a tool?

[16:23] I don't know.

[16:25] I don't know.

[16:25] We'll work it out.

[16:26] I like the idea that you're like,

[16:28] he's the opposite of an Aerosmith album

[16:30] and that he wears an eyepatch,

[16:31] whereas Aerosmith does not wear eyepatches.

[16:33] And also he doesn't sing about love in an elevator,

[16:36] whereas Aerosmith does sing about love in an elevator.

[16:38] It's a binary system.

[16:40] We're given no evidence to believe

[16:42] that he has a drug habit of any kind,

[16:43] whereas the Aerosmith members had very bad drug habits.

[16:47] Although his workshop is filled with things

[16:50] that are crazy, amazing, and afterwards I was crying.

[16:55] But all of his microphone stands have no scarves on them.

[16:58] So this is like a spot the difference game

[17:02] you would play at the bar.

[17:03] Yeah, and Drosselmeyer is a kindly old godfather

[17:07] who cares about his charges,

[17:09] as opposed to Steven Tyler, who is a monster,

[17:12] who did terrible things to a young woman

[17:14] when he was at the height of his fame.

[17:16] So, just, let's not talk about that.

[17:20] Look, I just don't want to let Steven Tyler

[17:22] be a subject of fun without pointing out

[17:23] that he's a major criminal creep.

[17:25] Anyway, so Drosselmeyer, he's an inventor.

[17:28] He's got all this stuff.

[17:29] It turns out that he raised Clara's mom

[17:31] when Clara's mom was a girl,

[17:32] because I guess her parents died,

[17:34] because in worlds of fantasy and whimsy,

[17:36] parents are always dying.

[17:38] There's no way to get around it.

[17:40] I'm sure there's been like some horrible story

[17:42] in a movie where like a kid watches all these videos,

[17:45] like sees all these movies about like orphans

[17:49] having an amazing life,

[17:50] and then just like kills their parents.

[17:52] That's got to be a horror movie somewhere, right?

[17:55] Yeah, yeah, I think it's called

[17:58] Kill Your Parents, the movie.

[17:59] Sure.

[18:01] Wow.

[18:02] Solid improv from all of us.

[18:04] Anyway.

[18:05] I just got through the studio system, but go on.

[18:08] Yeah, it was made in 1943.

[18:09] That's the weird thing.

[18:11] And it stars Joan Fontaine.

[18:13] And so Drosselmeyer, he made that egg for Clara's mom,

[18:17] and he says, oh, you need a key for it.

[18:19] It's a very complicated lock,

[18:20] which Clara already knew,

[18:21] because Clara does machines just like Donatello.

[18:25] And now here's the thing.

[18:27] He doesn't say, oh yeah, I made that egg.

[18:29] I can tell you what's inside it.

[18:30] He goes, oh, I made that for her.

[18:31] I guess you'll need the key to figure out the mystery.

[18:34] It's like, just tell her what's in the egg.

[18:36] Come on.

[18:37] He tasks his owl with keeping an eye on Clara

[18:40] while Clara goes to find this key.

[18:42] Father's mad Clara's not dancing with him.

[18:44] Then it's gift time.

[18:45] Drosselmeyer gives Fritz a nutcracker soldier,

[18:48] and Clara follows a string past owl wallpaper

[18:51] and turns into rat wallpaper,

[18:53] and then back into owl wallpaper.

[18:54] Long, dark hallways that lead to a spooky tunnel.

[18:57] And this string leads her

[18:59] into a Narnia-like winter wonderland.

[19:01] Yeah, I like it.

[19:01] Like a weird anus in the wall, right?

[19:04] That turns into a tree.

[19:06] I guess.

[19:07] I mean, from the inside,

[19:08] it does look kind of like a pebbly anus, I guess.

[19:10] Yeah, sure.

[19:11] It's revealed to be a overturned tree trunk.

[19:13] But yeah, I guess the first thing you would assume

[19:15] is a giant anus.

[19:17] I guess that she's somehow crawling

[19:18] out of the back end of the sarlacc

[19:20] to get her Christmas present.

[19:23] Now guys, this movie we should mention,

[19:26] it was co-directed by two people,

[19:28] Lassie Hallstrom, who you may remember

[19:30] as the director of like the Cider House Rules

[19:33] and What's Eating Gilbert Grape.

[19:34] And also, apparently,

[19:35] I didn't realize this until I learned today,

[19:37] almost all the ABBA music videos.

[19:39] So I don't know why he did,

[19:41] he should have directed Mamma Mia.

[19:43] And Mamma Mia, Here I Go Again.

[19:45] Are you saying, why are you saying it Mamma Mia?

[19:48] Because he thinks it's about a mummy

[19:50] that like has three male suitors.

[19:53] I mean, mummies are usually like ridiculously wealthy, right?

[19:58] I guess.

[20:00] You can't like being buried with a bunch of, of, uh,

[20:05] I mean, usually it's rare that poor people are buried with a lot of gold and

[20:08] servants. So yes, I think mummies are wealthy.

[20:10] So I can see why, why a mummy would have multiple suitors is what I'm trying to

[20:14] say.

[20:15] And it was co-directed with him and Joe Johnston, who I guess they decided,

[20:18] we want you to bring the same level of excitement you brought to the rocketeering

[20:21] Captain America to this ballet movie. Uh, it's an interesting combination.

[20:25] And through much of the movie, I was trying to figure out who directed what.

[20:28] Yeah. Uh, I'm guessing Joe Johnston directed the effects parts.

[20:32] I gotta say like, uh, maybe this is the right time to say it.

[20:34] Like the look of this movie I feel is not bad. Like I,

[20:38] it looks much better than I thought it was going to.

[20:40] Like there's all these sort of generic, uh,

[20:43] fantasy movies out there that rely heavily on CGI and such.

[20:47] And a lot of this seems to be done with more like elaborate sets.

[20:52] And when it is CGI, it's not gaudy CGI. Like it's a, it's a pretty movie.

[20:57] I found it very dull, but like the look of it is, is, is nice.

[21:00] Yeah. I feel like they, they don't too often throw.

[21:05] I mean, I, I could be wrong. Maybe I was looking at my phone,

[21:08] but I don't think too often they like throw big CGI scenes in your face.

[21:13] And they're like,

[21:14] expect the audience to just sit there and like in like amazement at the thing

[21:20] playing out before their eyes, which is one of those,

[21:23] which is all too common where you're like, no, I get it.

[21:26] You can do that with computers now. It's a big deal.

[21:29] Like it's not like you're showing me Mad Max Fury Road or something.

[21:33] Uh, now here's the thing I'm going to,

[21:34] here's the thing I'm going to say that might seem a little weird.

[21:36] I actually found the colors in the movie to be much more coherent than in a lot

[21:42] of movies I've seen lately where it's like a lot of movies lately,

[21:45] I feel like I've been in that same,

[21:47] what's that color palette that everybody uses now where it's like cyan and

[21:51] orange or something like that. Where it's the, uh, it, I don't remember.

[21:55] I got, I'm sure I got it wrong. Tweet at me at Elliot Kalin,

[21:58] correct me about the colors, but the colors in this, it was like, Oh,

[22:01] these feel like bright,

[22:02] like bold living colors as opposed to just like here are four different colors

[22:07] and we're just going to slather them everywhere or like we're going to make it

[22:09] look really gloomy and dark. Like it's a color, it's like a,

[22:12] it is a pretty movie. So especially when it goes into this Narnia,

[22:14] like Winter Wonderland, I was like, Oh,

[22:16] this actually looks like a pleasant place to spend a movie as opposed to like,

[22:21] you know, uh, it doesn't look like it's made out of CGI candy or something like

[22:25] that. Okay. Anyway, she gets the key to this thing, but a mouse steals it.

[22:28] She chases the mouse until she finds a living nutcracker soldier guarding the

[22:32] bridge to the fourth realm, which is at war with the other three realms.

[22:36] And at this point it's like, hold on, you're,

[22:38] you're loading a lot of world building on me at this moment.

[22:41] I guess I'll get out my source book on the four realms.

[22:46] The captain's name is Hoffman, a nice little Easter egg. Yeah.

[22:50] He's been named after Philip Seymour Hoffman. Uh, it's probably,

[22:53] I assume it's a tip of the hat to ETA Hoffman,

[22:56] the man who created the original short story about the nutcracker.

[22:59] I think it's a reference to Philip Seymour Hoffman. And I mean,

[23:02] his name is the nutcracker a lot to eat nuts because his name is Philip Hoffman,

[23:08] right? Yeah. Yeah. Uh, she, he says, Oh, you're a princess.

[23:13] Also I have a horse named jingles.

[23:14] This horse is not given the personality you'd expect a horse named jingles to

[23:18] have. It never talks and never dances. They just kind of,

[23:22] there's a part where it runs off and he goes coward.

[23:24] And then the horse comes back and I'm like,

[23:25] is that all we're going to get out of horse named jingles? Like you,

[23:28] you're writing checks. Your body can't cash by naming this horse jingles.

[23:32] I'm sorry. Expecting a lot more. They chase after the mouse.

[23:35] The mouse joins a big cloud of mice that form into a giant mouse King. Uh,

[23:39] and, and then, and they run away from that too.

[23:41] Yeah. And the giant mouse King is like a massive collection of mouse bodies,

[23:46] like in that Clyde Barker short story in the hills, the cities,

[23:49] or when squirrel girl makes squirrel armor out of a bunch of squirrels.

[23:53] Yeah, exactly. Uh, and it's a play, I guess, on the idea of a rat King.

[23:56] I mean the mouse King in the nutcracker often has multiple heads because it's

[24:00] playing off the idea of a rat King, which is you guys know, right? When a,

[24:03] when a bunch of rats get their tails all tangled together and they merge into

[24:06] one organism. Yeah. It's Dennis Duffy, dummy. Yeah. Is that a,

[24:10] is that an actual thing? Cause I only learned about it.

[24:13] It is. It is one of the, it is one of the less impressive cryptids.

[24:17] It's like cryptozoology. It's like Bigfoot, Loch Ness monster, Jersey devil,

[24:22] leather man. Yeah. And then you've got a bunch of rats got tied up together.

[24:30] Okay. What are we going to go out and look for today?

[24:32] Are we going out for the Yeti or we're going out for the, um, the, uh,

[24:35] for champ, the Creek, the beast of champ, the of Lake Champlain. Uh,

[24:39] we're going to look for a bunch of rats that got tied together by accident.

[24:42] I mean, it's a lot easier for carnival carnivals though.

[24:44] They can just like catch three rats and like, get,

[24:46] get like the horse face boy to tie their tails together.

[24:49] And then you got a rat boy. Hold on. Are you talking about jingles?

[24:52] Cause that was a horse, Dan.

[24:54] Do you think, uh,

[24:55] do you think every time Xander cannons were whipping up a new, uh,

[24:59] issue of Kaiju max, he's going through his big book of cryptids.

[25:02] He gets to the wrecking pages and just flips real quick.

[25:06] Yeah. He's just, he has so many pages on rat Kings.

[25:09] There's so just rats tied together. Although here's the thing,

[25:12] you know, who tied those rats together?

[25:14] Go on man. Okay. The mothman. Oh, okay. Yeah.

[25:17] He was like, I prophecy that these rats will get tied together.

[25:20] And then he did it to himself. The, you know, he, he,

[25:22] what time together and, uh, somebody was like, mothman,

[25:25] it doesn't count as a prophecy. If you just do it afterwards.

[25:27] Like that's called a promise.

[25:29] And then he goes, I prophesize my fist in your face. Do you think,

[25:32] do you think there's a time where Richard gear would walk down the street and

[25:35] people would be like, Hey, mothman.

[25:38] And he's like, understandable mistake. I'm not actually the mothman.

[25:42] I'm the man searching for the mothman. Hey, you played mothman.

[25:46] Didn't you? Uh, like most of America, I guess you didn't see that movie.

[25:50] It's not about a superhero. Yeah. Mothman.

[25:54] He's got the power to eat sweaters. Nope. That's not,

[25:57] that's a power we all have. If we try hard enough,

[26:00] allow me to demonstrate.

[26:02] And he dips a sweater into like tomato sauce and just slurps it down.

[26:06] It's like so much. Cause Dan, when you think about it,

[26:09] isn't a sweater, just a bunch of spaghetti tied together like a rat king.

[26:12] And that's, that's, that's absolutely true.

[26:14] I'm glad he chose tomatoes like tomato sauce instead of soup,

[26:18] because that would be the domain of the broth man.

[26:24] I refuse.

[26:27] Okay. So, uh, they escaped from the mouse king. Uh,

[26:29] they encounter mother ginger,

[26:31] which at this point seems to be a huge clockwork lady. Now, mother ginger,

[26:35] as you guys remember from the ballet, right?

[26:38] She has a giant skirt and her children live inside her skirt.

[26:41] So they made her an actual giant thing for this moment in the movie.

[26:45] And it's a huge, everybody loves it.

[26:47] Every time you see the ballet when she opens her skirt and all the kids run out

[26:51] and dance and then they run back into her skirt and then she walks off again.

[26:54] Huge applause moment, guys. It's an iconic ballet moment.

[26:58] So I'm sure you were like, Oh, that's how they're doing mother ginger.

[27:00] Yeah. I would like them to, uh, when I, when I saw it,

[27:03] I'm like glad they turned it into like a space or gargant mech that is like

[27:08] stomping around and shit.

[27:10] Yeah. Uh, so they go to the,

[27:13] I guess the first realm or it's like the castle where all the realms are ruled

[27:16] by, I don't know. And she's greeted by as a princess.

[27:19] Once she's introduced to the two comedy relief gatekeepers who the less said,

[27:23] the better, but they're kind of the, uh, C3PO and R2D2 of the movie and that they,

[27:27] uh, uh, are, I don't know, vaguely robots. I guess they're not. Anyway,

[27:34] he threw that away awfully quick.

[27:36] She's into cause there's really no, they're not comparable at all.

[27:38] R2D2 and C3PO are lovable, iconic characters and you've just kind of two like

[27:42] doofs. Uh, she's introduced and everybody has like weird hair and,

[27:46] and mustaches.

[27:47] Like they're in the Capitol in a hunger games or then the Emerald city or

[27:51] something. It's when you go to a fantasy world, rule number one,

[27:54] everyone's going to have weird facial hair. It just happens.

[27:58] Yeah. I mean, that's the ultimate fantasy.

[28:01] Mm hmm. Well, I mean, it sort of is in a way I was thinking, like,

[28:05] I saw like an old man on the, uh, on like the TV recently. Like he was like a news,

[28:10] and a news report. He's just one of those guys you see in the back of a news

[28:13] report. You're like, I'd rather know what's going on with that guy.

[28:16] Cause look at his facial hair. And I'm like, man,

[28:19] I can't wait till I'm an old guy so I can have crazy facial hair.

[28:22] I mean, you could do that now, Dan,

[28:23] you just have to wear suspenders and be a mixologist.

[28:26] Yeah. That's the problem. I don't want to be that guy.

[28:27] I want to be the old guy with the facial hair.

[28:30] Are you sure? Are you sure that old guy wasn't just David Crosby?

[28:35] I think you're, you're a friend, Dan. I think you're talking about the,

[28:37] the classic song old man, look at my facial hair. I'm a lot like you. Yeah.

[28:42] I mean, if you look at history books, man,

[28:44] if you see all these pictures of the old fuckers and they're,

[28:47] they're all over the place, man, it's crazy.

[28:49] One of my favorite history books is old volume one through 10.

[28:54] No, I mean, I am currently, I've been working on this for a long time.

[28:57] I'm still working on my screenplay about Chester Arthur and every time I'm like

[29:01] flagging on it, I look at his facial hair and I'm like,

[29:03] I got to do this for you. I got to do it for you. Yeah. Uh, okay. So, uh,

[29:08] they entered, they're introduced to the regions of the other realms.

[29:10] There's the regions of the realm of region of flowers,

[29:14] region of ice and region of sweets.

[29:17] We got some star power at this point.

[29:18] Oh yeah. Richard E. Grant is the region of ice, right?

[29:21] And Keira Knightley is the richer region of sweets and I don't know who played

[29:25] the flowers. Uh, it's what's, uh, it's, what's his name? That guy from, uh,

[29:29] the remake of overboard. I feel like I had, it's been a ton of shit. Um,

[29:33] is it Eugenio? It's a, yeah. Eugenio Derbez. Yeah. Yeah.

[29:38] And that guy's like a huge movie star. I mean, he is. Yeah. I mean, he's not,

[29:43] he's not here at nightly. No, that's true.

[29:45] I was kind of happy to see Keira Knightley cause I felt like I haven't seen her

[29:49] in a while guys. Yeah. It's a, she's, she's been asking about what's KK been up

[29:53] to. And you know what? Richard, Richard E. Grant, man, he's just loving it.

[29:59] Oh, he's great.

[30:00] Mean in the same year that he's nominated for an Academy Award for

[30:03] What I thought was the best supporting performance of the year and can can you ever forgive me?

[30:07] He also gets to put a bunch of ice on his face and be basically Jack Frost

[30:11] Yeah, I mean, I do kind of want to check in on him because Babs just got canceled for saying that fucked up shit

[30:17] But you know

[30:19] He's probably okay, and he's a huge Babs head, but so here's the thing that here's a moment

[30:25] I had where I was like so anyway

[30:27] It was it was there was a moment. I was like oh these are big stars

[30:30] but I realized what a thin line it is between iconic fantasy character design and kind of

[30:36] Silly ridiculous fantasy character design and these designs are not bad

[30:40] They're pretty good

[30:41] But like I think in my head like there's like the scarecrow and the Tin Man from Wizard of Oz are so iconic and seems

[30:46] So perfect to me. Yeah, and yet. What is the difference between them and Richard E

[30:51] Grant with a bunch of fucking icicles hanging all over

[30:54] And

[30:56] His long icicle fingers like there's a world where that becomes an iconic character that is merchandised like crazy

[31:03] But I mean like what is so much better about a scarecrow with straw coming out of him now than an ice man with icicles

[31:08] Coming out of him Dan explain

[31:10] Well, I don't have an explanation

[31:11] But the way you're describing Richie Grant made me like to imagine that the way to make up people did it is they just like

[31:17] Sprayed a hose on Richard E. Grant. They're like go stand outside for a while Richard

[31:22] I'm a iconic character actor. I'm not gonna stand outside until icicles form on my face

[31:29] And you do it's worth your art. This is

[31:35] Nearly cold

[31:37] Joe Johnson was like don't make me get Captain America to beat you up with his shield

[31:42] Richard E. Grant's like it's a fictional character and then Chris Evans shows up with that shield and it's like no

[31:47] We've been cut we've become one. I need to I need to take you down

[31:51] Jack Frost or whatever and then it becomes the fight

[31:54] We've always wanted to see in the comics of Captain America versus Captain Cold and you're like, but he's a flash villain

[31:59] I know that's why I want to see it so badly. Yeah

[32:03] So, all right. So anyway, there's four realms. There's four realms. There's a region each room

[32:10] Candyland, there's the realm of our cheesy realm of flowers the realm of ice and part cheesy and there and the realm of amusements because it's

[32:16] Divided into the things kids love most games candy flowers and ice

[32:22] I

[32:25] Mean kids love to do love to chew on ice

[32:27] but so and mother ginger was was the regent of amusements and she tried to take over the other realms and now it's a war

[32:34] Between them and Keira Knightley's character is really scared. She doesn't want to do her name is sugar plum, right?

[32:40] Yeah, yeah, like the sugar plum fairies and time moves differently in this realm

[32:44] It moves faster so she can have this whole adventure and it's just gonna she can go back to the Christmas Eve party

[32:49] Anyway, no, that's great. It's a she get she's a princess. So she gets a makeover from sugar plum

[32:54] She has a coming-out ball and they watch a ballet starring famous ballet dancer, Misty Copeland

[33:01] about that basically tells the story of her mom's discovery of the four realms and

[33:07] Using a machine called at us. Anyway, I'll get to that

[33:10] And this is basically just

[33:12] Kind of parts of the Nutcracker in a way, but the way they do it is kind of neat

[33:15] I like the way they had the sets kind of folding out and everything like that

[33:18] Yeah, I like the I like the little stage that the the floor that she's dancing on where that you know

[33:24] Like flowers are blooming and shit. Yes, and also it's like much of the Nutcracker as we said is just them sitting and watching dances

[33:32] So it's like, okay, they managed to incorporate that and we learned how mother ginger she took on she with her clockwork mice

[33:38] That how took over the fourth realm and made everything bad happen now, here's where the movie took a turn

[33:44] I didn't care for quite as much similar to the keys turning in the back of the mice dancers

[33:50] Yeah

[33:52] Is that she then goes now all of us were toys and we were brought to life by a machine your mom invented called the engine

[33:58] And we need a special key to use the engine to make an army of soldiers to defeat mother ginger

[34:03] But mother ginger has the key because that mouse stole it and I'm like, uh, like okay too much origin

[34:08] That all sounds right. I just want a magic world where magic things happen

[34:12] Like I don't need you to explain how these characters came to life. Like come on Dan. I see you looking skeptical

[34:17] Did you like all this all this origin story stuff? It's as if you're telling him to me for the first time Elliot

[34:23] Now, I know you told me you were folding laundry. I think while you were I was you were watching this

[34:28] So tell me about the laundry that it was so engrossing that you were unable to pay attention to the movie

[34:33] It stands

[34:34] Side gig is side hustle is he folds laundry for people and his boss doesn't like him watching movies

[34:40] Why does it so I had to do it on the sly?

[34:42] Yeah, I was watching it. I was actually watching the movie on one of those laundromat

[34:47] televisions

[34:50] Every once in a while get a snatch of like score and that was all I heard so I now

[34:56] Yes, here's the thing

[34:57] Imagine you because I imagined you like you you have a you have a button-down shirt. You're like, ah

[35:01] How to fold this without wrinkles this will be a devilish dance. This will take all of my cunning in focus. I

[35:09] Have an it appears I have a nut to crack how to keep the crease perfect in these slacks. Hmm. Well, well

[35:16] I think you've met your match Dockers

[35:18] Yeah, I mean it was a combination between the laundry and the fact that it's possible. There have been few films

[35:24] We've watched that I found less interesting than this one. Okay, Dan, can I say my other thing that I thought you were gonna say?

[35:29] Yes, please. Hmm cargo shorts. Well, you will car go into the drawer. I

[35:37] Resent the implication that I have any cargo shorts. Yeah, I'm sorry. I was thinking about when my brother

[35:41] It was from that guy fiery Halloween costume you made

[35:46] Which you continue to launder and keep folded just in case

[35:51] Just a crime right breaks out and you have to go fight it as fear a guy

[35:55] I actually put those behind a glass case on the on the wall. It says in a case of emergency break glass

[36:02] Yeah, yeah case of donkey sauce break glass

[36:07] Okay

[36:10] Clara has kind of a dream memory about her mother telling her you're unique and everything you need is inside this egg

[36:16] And it's unclear to me if her mother discovered the realms or made them whatever

[36:21] She was the queen of the realms then disappeared Clara goes out

[36:24] She sees a shooting star feels a breeze and an owl hoots at her and she's like you're right

[36:29] I do need to go to the fourth realm. Thanks dead mom. I was like, okay

[36:33] So just anything that happens is a sign from your mom, I guess

[36:36] They go to the foot. She and Hoffman the Nutcracker soldier. They go to the fourth realm. It's all spooky clown statues and old carousels

[36:44] Clara gets captured and taken into the giant clockwork mother ginger Mac

[36:47] So some nested doll clowns can jump around to be all hyperactive in what I guarantee you if my son had watched the movie with

[36:53] Me would have been the scariest scene in the movie for him because it's literally these clowns are just jumping in front of the camera

[36:59] Making their face go too close to the lens and you're like, what is this the greatest showman?

[37:03] Like what's the longest creepy dancing clowns? Like what's going on?

[37:05] yeah, and I kind of like the the weird body horror stuff of the clowns being kind of like

[37:10] Russian nesting dolls and like their bodies flipping open at a hinge and other little guys jumping out of them. That was pretty cool

[37:17] yeah, it was actually kind of neat it would have been great if it was supposed to be scary, but I'm not sure it's supposed to

[37:21] and

[37:22] Clara meets the real mother ginger played by everyone's favorite Helen Mirren

[37:27] Who looks very non-plus to be in this movie?

[37:31] Yeah, she doesn't seem like she's really that excited similar to

[37:34] Morgan Freeman who is like actually I thought gives one of his more naturalistic

[37:39] Recent performances because he doesn't seem to care very much

[37:42] He doesn't pour on the full

[37:44] Andy Dufresne crawls through so many miles of shit and mud that I don't even want to think about it like that kind of stuff

[37:50] Yeah

[37:51] She's uh, she's like give me she Claire's like give me the key and mother gingers like no. No, you don't understand

[37:57] We're all in danger. But uh, Clara gets the key. She inserts it in the egg and reveals a chicken fetus

[38:03] a

[38:05] Chicken fetus that she gobbles on down and they're like, no. No, you're just supposed to eat the yolk

[38:09] The yolk is the chicken fetuses food. She's like, I don't get it. It's an egg. I don't know. I'm a kid

[38:15] I don't know about eggs

[38:16] No, what did she reveal? Sorry?

[38:18] reveals it's a music box just like in that episode of The Simpsons where Homer and Lisa go to the museum and they see that

[38:25] Egyptian egg that turns out to be a music box

[38:27] So yes, the nutcracker in the four realms is stealing plot points from episodes of The Simpsons

[38:32] Look, we've all done it and Claire's like what the fuck. It's just a fucking music box. Like what is this shit?

[38:38] Like she's really disappointed

[38:43] Big family Disney movie and then like it's been played totally straight till then and what the fuck it

[38:49] What the fuck is this? Okay, my fucking mom. What the who the shit and and you get super blue

[38:55] And and Hoffman the Nutcracker soldiers like Clara. I think we should control ourselves and she's like cram it ass-faced

[39:02] Let's get out of here jingles. You're with me. We're going back to my realm. Yeah, but anyway, so

[39:09] She's like, I don't think I could do this Hoffman gives her a pep talk and she's like, okay I can do it

[39:13] So she had her character crisis of faith in 20 seconds and it's all over

[39:17] Meanwhile, she brings the key back and sugarplum uses the key to bring a norm these big toy soldiers to life. Oh

[39:24] She takes over

[39:25] She's really the bad guy and she wanted the soldiers because she wanted to take over the realms and she had cast out mother ginger

[39:31] For wanting to stand up to her evil plans. Were you guys surprised by this amazing twist?

[39:36] I mean, I think it's I think it's a good a good lesson to teach kids about how

[39:41] You shouldn't you know with complex political structures. I'm just like jump in there and start making crazy decisions

[39:50] That's right, it's true kids should not help a coup happen

[39:57] It's a good point

[39:59] It's

[40:00] Here a nightly is a good lesson like

[40:05] Sorry, just saying it's the small folk who suffer when you play the game a game of thrones, you know, that's true

[40:10] Yeah in this case copyrights do it

[40:18] So, yeah, can you send this podcast back in time? Yeah

[40:23] Yes, I have that technology, but I'm trying to make money off of a podcast

[40:28] Watch primer a couple more times and figure that shit out. Okay?

[40:31] Yeah, you just all you got to do is go to like a storage locker and crawl into a box and you go back

[40:35] In time remember just like in primer

[40:37] Yeah now Stewart if you found yourself in a yesterday type scenario where you fell into a parallel universe where George RR Martin did not

[40:44] Exist, would you write those books and take all the credit? I

[40:47] Don't know. That's

[40:49] man, what an ethical

[40:51] question, I

[40:53] Think that would be better served as a plot point on NBC's The Good Place starring me now

[41:04] I mean, I think I'm pretty sure I've established. I'm more of a Jason

[41:11] Dan I see you as more of a Ted Danson demon type. No. Wow, that's very that's really charitable because I assumed he was a cheat

[41:19] Yeah, I would certainly much move. I would rather be a Ted Danson. I mean, you're you're about as buff as Chidi, right?

[41:26] You're sitting here with oh, yeah

[41:28] Yeah

[41:29] surprisingly ripped

[41:32] My pants and Elliot is

[41:42] He ripped his pants like the Incredible Hulk Dan, you're not that ripped, okay

[41:47] Is not Incredible Hulk ripped come on God, I don't know he's pretty good. Um, oh god

[41:55] He's not a Roku Saki, but he's pretty shredded

[42:01] Okay, let's continue with this so

[42:04] She said she's like lock them up to Clarence

[42:07] she also she can use the machine to turn people back into toys Oh and

[42:12] What and Clara's like, oh I have to believe in myself. My mom said everything I need is inside

[42:17] She meant inside me not inside some crazy egg and it's like yeah, of course, dude

[42:22] Like what? What did you think your mom was hiding inside this egg that she would just give it like a big sad

[42:34] Just a grenade inside

[42:36] Yeah

[42:38] So she finally figures out I need to trust in myself Clara and Hoffman they escape they're sneaking around the toy soldiers a mouse helps

[42:45] them out and

[42:46] Hoffman goes to warn mother ginger while Clara goes to the engine room via a water wheel

[42:51] Let's try to shut it down mother gingers clowns and her big Mac. They're fighting the toy soldiers

[42:56] Clara ends it manages to shut off the power to the engine and she's fighting the soldiers amazingly. Well, she's like Hannah

[43:01] She's like knows all this kung-fu and she's like, yeah, they're also super slow though. That's true

[43:08] They're not very good toy soldiers. No, like she's not like she she's hugging the body dodging around

[43:14] It's like a like a Dark Souls like just avoid the slow slashes and you'll be fine

[43:20] Mother ginger shows up to help Clara out with a whip which is not I believe part of I can't remember if there's a whip

[43:25] In the original ballet or not

[43:27] I can only assume but maybe they were thinking of the ballet Indiana Jones and the four realms

[43:33] Hoffman and the Mouse King turn up they team up together because their mother gingers mice it turns out of the good guys and

[43:40] There's like a hero mouse. It's what like mouse winks. What's his name?

[43:43] It's like it's like mouse ranks or something like yeah

[43:46] Yeah, I couldn't tell if that was the name of the my mouse or what they just called all mice in the realms

[43:51] I don't know. This guy's got some he's got some sass. Oh, yeah

[43:55] He's got real attitude and ratitude like he's a real if he was a rescue ranger. Well, he'd be he'd be Dale or chip

[44:02] he wouldn't be the mouse Monterey Jack because he's not interested. He's not a

[44:06] Pilot who eats cheese all the time. What was Monterey Jack's deal? Yeah

[44:10] Yeah, he was really into cheese. Mm-hmm

[44:13] Like zipper was his buddy, right? Like they came together. They were like, yeah, they're kind of a duo

[44:19] Yeah

[44:20] That they were lovers. Yeah all I remember about he was very loud

[44:24] I think I think if I think if there was like cheese behind a wall

[44:26] He would like break through the wall to get to it or something. That would be like a useful

[44:31] Use of his cheese fixation. Yeah. Yeah, he's like an ally in a video game where you yeah summon him

[44:37] And he'll break down walls for you

[44:39] That's all I got the girl who fixed things was she called gadget. It's called gadget. Yeah, don't don't do not do not Google

[44:46] Don't Google gadget a phrase which would to anyone living 30 years ago be the most insane gibberish

[44:55] All right

[44:57] There was a I don't know if you guys do you guys remember when uh, there was when when seesaw still existed

[45:02] I hosted a I was I did a Q&A with the McElroy brothers about their show on it

[45:07] And I asked them a question about like do you think anyone do when you hear what do you think someone will hear someone?

[45:11] I'll say have you seen my bim bam on see-saw and they'll think that they've had a stroke. I can't understand language anymore

[45:18] So anyway

[45:20] This is the point in the movie where the bad guy gets very quippy and it happens also in Tim Burton's Sleepy Hollow and in

[45:26] A bunch of other movies where suddenly the bad guy starts making like puns and you're like never been a part of their character diamond

[45:32] Were they hiding it all this time because they assumed if people knew they made puns. They'd know they were bad guys

[45:36] Yeah, what do you guys think? You're like, well, you're a cure nightly's making a meal out of this one. Yeah, I mean

[45:42] Here nightly also like she's really selling this role hard like every word gets its own inflection

[45:48] She's really embodying this evil sugarplum fairy

[45:50] I was gonna save it till final judgments

[45:52] but that's one of the things like other than the way the movie looks one of the things I liked about this movie was

[45:56] Kira Knightley cuz like she doesn't usually get to do this kind of shit

[46:00] she has to be kind of like the demure like restrained woman and like a

[46:05] Like a period piece or something like that period piece domino

[46:08] She is going totally nutso in this role and having a ball and I kind of enjoyed it

[46:13] She hasn't been able to let loose like this since she made a dangerous method where it was like, yeah, you're a you're a crazy person

[46:20] Just go nuts like go crazy. So, okay, and I know I shouldn't say crazy. That's not that's a

[46:25] great term anyway, uh, she captures ginger and

[46:30] Clara says to sugar plum fair. She's like, I know you're mad and you're sad that my mom died

[46:34] I am too, but you don't have to do this

[46:35] And then it turns out she's just distracting her because she rigged the machine to turn sugarplum back into a doll

[46:40] You don't for some reason don't think she was like giving her an out like she's like, this is your last chance before I mean

[46:46] Basically kill you that too. I think I think that's that but but she didn't take and also she's talking out her own feelings

[46:52] It's a movie for some reason when the sugarplum fairy

[46:56] Turns into a doll all the toy soldiers just stop

[46:59] When was it? It was never really established. I think that they have a psychic link with her

[47:03] It's more like the movie just needs them to be done, you know

[47:06] So they don't have to go scour the Shire of the remaining toy soldiers that are on the loose, you know

[47:13] Clara everything's okay. Now Hoffman becomes named captain of the guard now. Unfortunately, the realms are in the hands of

[47:19] Flower man and Iceman and thankfully mother ginger the only one who has her shit together is there to like keep everybody in line

[47:25] I guess Clara goes back to Christmas Eve at drosselmeyer's place and

[47:29] she tells

[47:31] She sees her dad and her dad apologizes and her dad says I'm gonna say he apologized then he's like

[47:37] Could I still get that day? Yeah before that? I forgot. She said to drosselmeyer

[47:42] Oh, I she drops him

[47:43] I was like you feeling better because of course he his owls been watching all this and she's like, yeah

[47:46] And drosselmeyer says your mom said that you were her greatest creation, which is like she has two other kids

[47:52] Kind of a shitty thing to say

[47:55] Like if I was if I should have cut to him like looking at that at the other two kids and be like fucking idiot

[48:02] Your mom had some choice words about you to dump it

[48:08] The

[48:09] And she sees her dad her dad apologizes and she apologizes and he says can I have that dance and they dance to the music?

[48:15] box egg and the other kids join and dance to and then the credits are just

[48:19] Dancing and you see Misty Copeland dancing ballet and then it's like wait a minute. This is a modern movie kids

[48:24] Don't want to see ballet. They want to see breakdancing. So it's just to the Nutcracker music

[48:29] It's a bunch of people dancing breakdancing and occasionally shots of Misty Copeland like looking on in

[48:34] Amazement at what the things their bodies can do and it's like you're one of the greatest dancers in the world

[48:38] Like why are you shocked they could do these things? I don't know

[48:41] Yeah, and yeah, the the cast is performing Volk from Suspiria

[48:49] So the Nutcracker and the four realms, yeah, that's the Nutcracker in a nutshell. I'm Ben McCoy

[49:00] Also, if you uh

[49:02] Don't if it Dan if you guys didn't like it and you didn't finish it

[49:05] You can return any unviewed realms to the to the manufacturer great partial refunds

[49:11] So that was that was great

[49:13] Let's do our final judgments whether this is a good bad movie a bad bad movie or movie kind of liked

[49:17] I've already said the two things I liked about it. Otherwise, it bored me to tears and I thought it was bad

[49:22] Hey guys

[49:23] Do you think the people of the sugar land are gonna have to elect a new leader in place of sugar plum?

[49:30] Or are they going to is it gonna be dissolved into the other realms?

[49:34] It'll dissolve just because they'll just pour water on it. It's just sugar. Oh

[49:40] You know how you get to the sugar land

[49:44] Express

[49:45] So Stuart, what did you think because I have an answer that may shock and surprise you guys, you know

[49:51] It was kind of boring

[49:53] But it looked it looked alright, and it went along pretty quickly. So I'll say

[50:00] But it's not like a fun, goofy movie that, of course, stars the character Goofy.

[50:05] And his son, yeah.

[50:09] I don't know. I guess I'd say it's like a mixed bad, bad.

[50:13] Because I don't think it's actually that bad.

[50:17] But I don't think it really fits into any of the other categories.

[50:20] I guess it's closer to like between bad, bad movie I kind of liked.

[50:24] So that's the thing. I'm going to have to say that this was, for me, a sincere movie I kind of liked.

[50:28] It wasn't great. And maybe it's because I was so ready to hate it.

[50:31] Because I was like, I was so worried that there was going to be a scene where there was like an army of sugar plum fairies and an army of mice that run at each other.

[50:40] Classic fantasy army style. And that never happened.

[50:43] But like, I thought it looked really pretty and it was not as stupid, questy as I thought it might be.

[50:49] It's a pretty short movie. And like, let me be honest with you guys.

[50:53] I love the Nutcracker. I love the Nutcracker music, like I mentioned.

[50:56] My mom went to see Bohemian Rhapsody and she's like, it's not a very good movie, but I love Queen.

[51:01] So I enjoyed it. And it's like, it's kind of hard for me to not enjoy a movie that has wall to wall soundtrack adapting the Nutcracker music.

[51:09] So like, so I genuinely kind of liked it.

[51:12] Now, would I go out and tell people to watch it?

[51:14] No, not necessarily. But it's similar to Sherlock Gnomes.

[51:19] If my son was like, I really want to see this movie, I'd be like, all right, sure.

[51:23] Like, it's not my first choice, but I'll allow it.

[51:26] So yeah, I guess I guess we won't watch The Master together.

[51:32] Yeah. Yeah, Sammy, I was really hoping that we that we would see Phantom Thread.

[51:39] Yeah, I know we can watch this colorful adventure movie.

[51:42] I did remember a thing I liked. I liked when they have defeated the Keira Knightley and the Nutcracker captain and the Mouse King are celebrating.

[51:53] And Captain Hoffman's like, she did it.

[51:56] She saved us. And the mice are instead throwing mouse rings up in the air like he did it like he won the day for everybody.

[52:05] It's pretty great. Yeah, OK, it's the it's the Walter getting thrown in the air of the Muppets, like what did he do?

[52:14] And speaking of throwing Walter in the air, I want to take a little second and talk about the Max Fund drive, guys.

[52:25] As I said, I only have two I only have two problems with that segway.

[52:29] Well, save it for the end. Put in the footnotes.

[52:33] We're going to. So, as I mentioned last time on the Flophouse, when talking about the Max Fund, joining the network's been a big deal for us.

[52:44] It feels like having we did this podcast for a long time.

[52:48] And it's the first time that we really felt like we were part of something kind of larger than just three weirdos sitting in Dan's apartment, stinking like Popeye's and beer.

[52:59] And now we're part of a larger family that is full of great existing shows, long running shows like ours and others.

[53:10] And also it's a place that actively goes out and develops new content that isn't just three middle aged white guys talking about pop culture like us and.

[53:24] And it's not just the same people spinning out new stuff.

[53:29] It's like they're going out to find new people who are doing like new, interesting things with podcasts and deserve a wider audience.

[53:36] Exactly. And for me, it's it's extra important because a few years ago, part of the Max Fund drive involved us doing a crossover episode where we record an episode of the Adventure Zone where we play D&D.

[53:50] And that forced me to go back and pick up a hobby that I hadn't done for a lot of years.

[53:57] And since then, not only have we recorded a bunch of extra episodes of me forcing you guys to play D&D with me or similar type role playing games, but also it's something that I've been doing more in my own life.

[54:10] So that's a personal, totally selfish reason that I like the Max Fund drive.

[54:15] It's also great for you because, you know, you get to support this great content and encourage creators that hopefully you like and give them opportunities to explore either more of what they're already doing or explore other cool stuff.

[54:31] Yeah. And it's good because we've said it before, but it bears repeating.

[54:35] Most of the money that comes in through donation goes directly to the shows that you listen to when you sign up to be a supporter, you choose the shows you listen to and the money gets funneled towards those shows.

[54:48] So so you're directly supporting art and artists you like.

[54:51] And I don't want to be a downer, but, you know, it's also like hard to do the show sometimes with three people scheduling.

[55:00] Elliot has kids.

[55:03] Stuart has business.

[55:05] I have something going on, I'm sure.

[55:08] Yeah. Laundry to hold.

[55:09] And so between all of that and like just the ravages of time, it can get hard to do the podcast.

[55:16] And I don't so I don't want to sound like what Dan's saying is we're all going to die someday.

[55:21] So in order to make it so that we spend these precious moments on a podcast, it helps that it helps us to survive.

[55:27] Yeah, I don't want to sound like force us to watch Nutcracker in the four rooms.

[55:32] I don't want to sound like I'm extorting the listeners, but it helps to get paid.

[55:37] So you are merely exhorting the listeners to go to maximum fund dot org slash donate now and not put it off any longer and help support us.

[55:45] And if you can afford to be a monthly supporter, we really appreciate it.

[55:49] And if you're already a supporter, obviously, thank you.

[55:52] Without you guys, we couldn't do this.

[55:55] And you can consider upgrading because there's a ton of really great gifts out there.

[56:01] Yeah, and we should mention we don't want to spend too much time promoting this because we want to max fund drive.

[56:08] We do have new live shows coming up.

[56:09] Go to our website and you can find them.

[56:11] Right, Dan. Yeah, I actually, for once, updated the events page.

[56:15] So all of the upcoming shows are on there.

[56:17] So that that good behavior deserves a positive reward.

[56:21] Yeah, that's right. Buy a ticket and support me being professional for once.

[56:25] Or at least just check out the page.

[56:27] OK, just send Dan a treat.

[56:29] So that's that flop house podcast dot com slash events.

[56:32] You'll you'll see that there.

[56:33] We'll tell you more about those in the next episode.

[56:35] But hey, so what do we do next on this show, guys?

[56:39] Next, we do some letters from listeners, listeners like the ones we're asking for money.

[56:45] Hey there, listeners.

[56:48] It's a very special letters song for the max fund drive.

[56:53] We're driving into the future.

[56:56] We hope we won't need too many sutures driving into that future.

[57:01] With that max fund drive.

[57:04] It's the funnest drive that I can imagine.

[57:07] Funner than driving cross country.

[57:10] Funner than driving to the moon.

[57:13] Funner than driving through time to the past.

[57:16] To nineteen fifty five where your mom wants to have sex with you.

[57:20] It was in a movie.

[57:21] I didn't make that up.

[57:22] It's from back to the future.

[57:24] And he drove in a car to the past.

[57:27] But the title of the movie says future.

[57:30] It's very, very confusing.

[57:33] So, hey, instead of using that confusing movie, why don't you go to the website

[57:39] that we mentioned before?

[57:40] Maximum fund dot org slash donate.

[57:43] It's great.

[57:44] Hey, there you can wait.

[57:45] Hold on. Wait, wait, wait.

[57:49] You can drive with us in a car called Friendship.

[57:56] Hey, Elliot, can you hear me?

[57:58] It's yes, of course.

[57:59] It's Clem Fandango.

[58:00] Yes, I can hear you, Clem Fandango.

[58:02] Did you really need that second very?

[58:06] I'll try it again. I'll try it again.

[58:09] Hey, listen, there's a very special max fund drive letters song.

[58:14] Hey, now it's the spoken word part of the song.

[58:17] OK, the spoken word.

[58:18] What are times when people need letters?

[58:22] They need to drop the fetters of the work day world and put on letters.

[58:27] That's right. Put on your letters.

[58:29] Wear them like clothes.

[58:30] Don't go outside.

[58:31] You look like a weirdo.

[58:32] People will run away and you'll have to say, hey, they're just letters

[58:37] to the flop house that I'm wearing like clothes.

[58:40] So just do it on the just do it when you're indoors.

[58:43] OK, thanks.

[58:44] So this first letter come down.

[58:48] You're very welcome.

[58:49] You're so welcome.

[58:50] You're so, so, so welcome.

[58:53] I welcome you, which is not great because Dan is a vampire.

[58:56] And I'm safe unless I welcome him in.

[58:59] But I just did it.

[59:00] Oh, no. Dan, please don't bite me in my sleep.

[59:03] OK, well, I just got an update from Max Von.

[59:06] It seems like all our donors revoked their donations.

[59:09] So, oh, was it because of my singing?

[59:13] Was it because of the bells that are ringing in your ears

[59:17] when you hear my Malifluous voice?

[59:21] Because you have a choice to buy a Rolls Royce.

[59:27] OK, no, wait, stop.

[59:31] Wait, hold on.

[59:33] I'll say another bad, bad Joyce.

[59:35] James Joyce. OK, done.

[59:37] OK, this one's from Ian.

[59:38] Last name withheld.

[59:39] OK, who writes, hey, Peaches, I've been meaning to send this guy.

[59:42] OK, I see. Uh-huh.

[59:44] Or is it OK?

[59:46] I've been meaning to send this email for a long time.

[59:48] So here I am finally doing it.

[59:49] Look at me go.

[59:50] I just wanted to say thank you on behalf of myself

[59:52] and to anyone else out there in the same situation as me.

[59:56] I struggle with depression.

[59:57] And your podcast is usually the one thing I binge when I'm Garrett.

[59:59] That's guaranteed.

[1:00:00] to make me smile when I'm having a tough day.

[1:00:02] Lately between college and school, things have been hectic and listening to you goofballs

[1:00:16] make fun of genuinely terrible movies never fails to put a smile on my face.

[1:00:19] Elliot, I'm also getting a children's book published soon and sharing in your excitement

[1:00:23] to help justify this email, here's a question.

[1:00:51] What piece of media, be it a movie?

[1:00:53] An album?

[1:00:54] A book?

[1:00:55] Or something else entirely never fails to make you smile?

[1:00:58] What's your go-to feel-good thing?

[1:01:01] Thanks again for all you've done for me and the other floppers out there fighting with

[1:01:04] mental illness.

[1:01:05] My last name withheld.

[1:01:07] Go-to happy stuff.

[1:01:09] I'll start because Stuart's on his phone and Elliot's looking off into the distance scratching

[1:01:14] his head.

[1:01:15] I apologize that I wasn't sitting here intently staring at the image on my screen of your

[1:01:26] face so totally focused and ready like a marathon runner or like a sprinter, like Usain Bolt

[1:01:33] at the starting line, just muscles tense and coiled, ready to leap into action like the

[1:01:39] spring of a watch when your mouth stopped moving.

[1:01:42] I apologize that I glanced away at the beauty of the Silver Lake Reservoir and it's a gorgeous

[1:01:48] day out and I'm stuck inside talking to you, Yahoo's.

[1:01:52] My head and an itch.

[1:01:53] I'm sorry, Dan.

[1:01:54] My head and an itch.

[1:01:55] Should I just be like a Buckingham Palace guard and not move a fucking muscle because

[1:01:59] I have to be so ready, so ready in case what?

[1:02:02] You call on me in a moment's notice so we can't have a single microsecond of dead air?

[1:02:08] I'm sorry, Dan.

[1:02:09] I'm sorry that I looked away from your beautiful face for a moment, that I wasn't so entranced

[1:02:14] by the glory of your visage that I dared to have the temerity to look at the beauty of

[1:02:19] God's nature in front of me.

[1:02:21] Admittedly, the Silver Lake Reservoir is a man-made reservoir.

[1:02:23] It's not a real natural lake, but I had the gall to briefly remove a source of physical

[1:02:30] irritation from my head by scratching an itch.

[1:02:34] Lord forgive me, Lord Dan, God above, that I was not so enamored and so concentrated

[1:02:40] on you that I could not finish my own physical needs.

[1:02:44] Okay.

[1:02:45] I apologize.

[1:02:46] Mea culpa, mea culpa.

[1:02:47] So, Dan, just for your reference, that's how you do an apology.

[1:02:53] Okay.

[1:02:54] Elliot, I just want to say thank you for the compliments about my face.

[1:02:59] I'm glad you got what I was laying down, that you picked up what I was putting down

[1:03:05] there.

[1:03:06] There are a couple of things.

[1:03:07] So, Dan, go ahead.

[1:03:08] Tell us about what makes you smile now that you have ruined my day.

[1:03:13] Well, your mock anger is one of my top things, but let's see.

[1:03:19] I was going to say, this sounds like log rolling for the Max Planck Network and The Drive,

[1:03:24] but certainly after my divorce, when I was feeling down, I re-listened to the entire

[1:03:30] run of My Brother, My Brother and Me and that always cheers me up, listening to those goofballs.

[1:03:36] And also, on the subject of goofballs, I enjoy taking goofballs, they make me feel better.

[1:03:51] On the subject of goofballs, I really enjoy Mark's Brothers movies.

[1:03:55] Those will always put a smile on my face no matter what's going on.

[1:03:59] You love them all, your favorites, Room Service, The Big Store, Go West, Love Happy.

[1:04:10] My son and I have been watching them all in chronological order and we just watched At

[1:04:13] the Circus and it was much funnier than I remembered it being.

[1:04:17] I forgot that it had the second inexplicable racist Harpo song where he becomes the divine

[1:04:24] Pied Piper of African Americans, but it was much funnier movie than I thought it was.

[1:04:29] Yeah, it's got its moments.

[1:04:32] Okay, so I have three songs on my Feel Good Smiley Times playlist.

[1:04:39] These are Guaranteed Smiles.

[1:04:42] We got World Destruction by TimeZone, One by One by Immortal.

[1:04:54] That one in particular, they spend like three minutes whipping your ass and then they kind

[1:05:01] of change the tempo on you and then Abath-do-Makalta, the king of the snow juggalos, he just lets

[1:05:10] out this fucking laugh and you're like, oh, man, I better buckle my seatbelt.

[1:05:14] We're going to Blashirk now, you know, Stuart is staring at me at me during this whole thing

[1:05:18] as if I know what he's talking about.

[1:05:21] And then the third one is is Terrence Trent Darby's Wishing Well.

[1:05:28] Okay, I have to say for me, the thing I go to is the movie Singing in the Rain that always

[1:05:35] makes me happy.

[1:05:36] And I return to it even just in my memories when I sometimes when I need to pick me up.

[1:05:41] It's just like a movie that is like just pure catnip to me singing in the rain.

[1:05:47] Also, you know, there's also pure catnip, pure uncut catnip, the good stuff.

[1:05:55] I was imagining Elliot with the DVD box of Singing in the Rain rubbing his face against

[1:06:01] it, rolling over so his belly is exposed, just going nuts.

[1:06:05] It's pure catnip.

[1:06:07] And this isn't exactly the same as smiles, but whenever I need a real like spirit pick

[1:06:10] me up, I often go to the sequence in The Amazing Spider-Man number 33, is it, where Spider-Man

[1:06:17] is trapped under all those machines and he has to build up the strength in himself to

[1:06:22] lift them off of him.

[1:06:23] And the way the thing that does it is remembering how much his aunt needs him and his connection

[1:06:28] to other people.

[1:06:29] And that's always something that when I'm feeling low, it doesn't necessarily it's not

[1:06:32] honestly like puts a goofy smile on my face, but it always makes me feel a little inspired.

[1:06:37] So that's a shout out to the late Stan Lee and Steve Ditko for crafting that.

[1:06:40] It always affects me.

[1:06:41] All right.

[1:06:43] So this next letter from Steven, last name withheld.

[1:06:46] Spielberg.

[1:06:47] Yeah, it's directed.

[1:06:51] Thanks for mentioning the Sugarland Express today in your podcast, guys.

[1:06:53] How do you know?

[1:06:54] It hasn't even released yet.

[1:06:55] It is a good movie.

[1:06:56] It's underrated.

[1:06:57] This is a this is directed at Elliot.

[1:07:00] It says every time Elliot mentions his new book, I reflect where he's dog available in

[1:07:05] stores now.

[1:07:06] Yeah.

[1:07:07] I reflexively think it's about a dog that is owned by someone named Horsemeat.

[1:07:12] What a terrible name for a character in a children's book, I think, before realizing

[1:07:15] my mistake.

[1:07:17] That being said, can you write a children's book called Horsemeat's Dog?

[1:07:21] It would make a perfect gift for my increasing number of friends and family that insist on

[1:07:24] procreating.

[1:07:25] Thanks.

[1:07:26] I mean, I would probably not give it that title because it'd be very easy to confuse

[1:07:29] with the book I already have out, which is called Horsemeat's Dog about a horse that

[1:07:32] meets a dog.

[1:07:33] If you're looking for gifts for small children, it can't be beat, but, you know, I'll think

[1:07:39] about it.

[1:07:40] I do.

[1:07:41] You know, I'm right now.

[1:07:42] I don't know if I'm supposed to announce the title of it, but I do have another book that's

[1:07:45] going to come out hopefully next year that you can get for kids, but it has a different

[1:07:49] title.

[1:07:50] Is it the novelization of Episode Nine of Star Wars Adventure?

[1:07:53] Yeah, it is.

[1:07:55] Is it the novel?

[1:07:56] The book I have.

[1:07:57] Is it the novelization of Horsemeat's Dog?

[1:07:59] You expanded it into a full...

[1:08:01] I expanded it into a...

[1:08:02] I did a lot of world-building.

[1:08:03] I expanded it into a volume one of what I think will be a World of Time style, a Wheel

[1:08:09] of Time style, 10-volume series, I think.

[1:08:13] Like if Wheel of Time was written by Faulkner.

[1:08:15] Yeah, exactly.

[1:08:16] Exactly.

[1:08:17] It's going to be very radical, very experimental.

[1:08:20] Okay.

[1:08:21] Moving on.

[1:08:22] This next letter is from Paul, last name withheld, who writes...

[1:08:27] He writes from Auckland, New Zealand.

[1:08:30] He writes, greeting fellow alumni of old flop U.

[1:08:34] This next question is mostly aimed at Stuart.

[1:08:36] Hey, Stu.

[1:08:37] In the hot seat.

[1:08:38] Hey, Stu.

[1:08:39] Yep.

[1:08:40] Pause for a response.

[1:08:41] What's up?

[1:08:42] So, Stu.

[1:08:43] Yep.

[1:08:44] What's going on with your hair?

[1:08:45] Pause again for a response.

[1:08:47] I mean, if the Stuart of 10 years ago...

[1:08:49] Dan, you didn't really pause for the response there.

[1:08:51] I know, but it would be weird if I...

[1:08:53] It would be weird if I read the last part of it after Stuart actually responded, so

[1:08:57] I'm rolling through.

[1:08:58] Okay.

[1:08:59] Because it kind of feels like you're screwing up a David Mamet script where it's meant to

[1:09:02] be delivered in a very specific way.

[1:09:04] Yeah.

[1:09:05] It continues.

[1:09:06] I mean, if the Stuart of 10 years ago saw a photo of Stuart from today, what do you

[1:09:10] think his response would be?

[1:09:11] Maybe thanks, Paul.

[1:09:13] Oh.

[1:09:14] Yeah, I don't know, man.

[1:09:18] I think Stuart of 10 years ago would be impressed that my hair has continued to go pretty gray.

[1:09:24] And these two jokers aren't helping.

[1:09:26] Yep.

[1:09:28] Okay.

[1:09:29] Well, guys, ready to go hit the links?

[1:09:30] Oh, my God.

[1:09:31] I think if the Stuart of 10 years ago saw you say that, he would be like, forget it.

[1:09:42] Give me a second.

[1:09:44] I don't know.

[1:09:45] I think the Stuart of 10 years ago had a lot of dumb opinions about a lot of stuff, but

[1:09:51] you know, whatever.

[1:09:54] So my hair.

[1:09:55] Yeah, I don't know.

[1:09:56] I feel like growing it out because I don't have a boss to other than Jesse.

[1:10:00] going to, you know, make to make feel good, I guess.

[1:10:06] And I think me having this luscious, long, curly hair probably makes Jesse

[1:10:12] pretty happy, right?

[1:10:13] Yeah. He's fucking comment model all the time.

[1:10:16] Yeah. When he's not hanging out with your mom, he's

[1:10:19] writing textbooks about Stewart's cool Mrs.

[1:10:21] Doubtfire look.

[1:10:23] No, no. When Jesse's hanging out with and by hanging out,

[1:10:25] we should make clear we mean sleeping with Dan's mom.

[1:10:28] He did a mostly a lot of the pillow talk is about Stewart's hair.

[1:10:31] So I just want to remind the listeners and my co-hosts that my parents

[1:10:35] listen to this podcast.

[1:10:37] Oh, I mean, I'm just trying to give you something to talk to your parents

[1:10:41] about at the holidays.

[1:10:42] OK, that's that's got to be weird.

[1:10:46] It's extremely weird.

[1:10:48] Yeah, I don't know.

[1:10:50] I'm just, you know, trying to trying to be a chilled out dude with a lot of hair.

[1:10:55] I got it. Might as well have it, you know.

[1:10:57] What that means.

[1:10:58] I know there's not like there's no tragic backstory there.

[1:11:02] It's not like like like my like my longtime barber died.

[1:11:07] And this is the only way that I can deal with my grief is by growing my hair out.

[1:11:12] Uh-huh. Or I don't know.

[1:11:15] Well, is the hair isn't the source of your strength?

[1:11:17] Yeah. Are you there was no like reverse Lex Luthor accident?

[1:11:22] I don't I don't I don't think so.

[1:11:25] Wait, are you does that mean that like all humans have reverse

[1:11:28] Lex Luthor accidents where all humans grow hair, except the ones who don't?

[1:11:32] I understand.

[1:11:34] Yeah. Yeah. So there's no there's no secret.

[1:11:37] It's just, you know, I like to look good.

[1:11:40] OK, great.

[1:11:43] Not to interrupt, not to interrupt Stewart's

[1:11:46] very elaborate monologue about his hair.

[1:11:50] And I know this is rich coming from me, the guy who rambles on.

[1:11:54] But, Dan, I want to take a moment.

[1:11:55] I regret what I said about your mom.

[1:11:57] And I want to apologize to your mom and to you, but not to Jesse,

[1:12:00] because he'd be he has a great family.

[1:12:02] But he'd be lucky to be able to land a woman like your mom, Dan.

[1:12:05] But, you know what?

[1:12:06] I should apologize.

[1:12:07] I went too far in having some fun with my bros.

[1:12:09] And I don't mean to hurt anyone's feelings. Thank you.

[1:12:12] So now we go on to the last segment.

[1:12:15] Well, not the last segment, because we're going to make one more pitch for Max Fund.

[1:12:17] But the last segment normally where we talk about movies that we saw

[1:12:23] that we liked.

[1:12:23] And I'll go quick because I don't have a lot to say.

[1:12:27] I've been very busy.

[1:12:29] Haven't seen a lot of new movies or any pretty much.

[1:12:32] So I'm picking a movie out of the air and I'm going to say,

[1:12:35] why not watch Jason and the Argonauts? It's great.

[1:12:38] Ray Harryhausen, so many great effects.

[1:12:41] And the the skeleton sword fight is justly famous.

[1:12:45] I saw it again recently and I'm like, holy shit.

[1:12:49] Just think of the logistics that went into this.

[1:12:52] Real actors interacting with model skeletons painstakingly stop motioned.

[1:12:59] It's beautiful.

[1:13:00] Is there that I can't remember?

[1:13:01] Is there a post-credit sequence where his wife kills his children

[1:13:05] and flies off in a chariot into the sky?

[1:13:09] I think they were leaving it for the sequel. Yeah.

[1:13:13] I'm going to recommend a movie that I'm going to snatch it

[1:13:16] before anyone else can recommend it.

[1:13:18] But this is a strange time for me where I've actually seen a movie

[1:13:20] that came out this weekend.

[1:13:22] And I'm going to recommend Jordan Peele's Us, which I don't know if you

[1:13:25] if you've seen that story.

[1:13:26] No, I've seen it this week.

[1:13:28] What? I'm seeing it later in the week.

[1:13:30] OK, I saw it last night and or was it?

[1:13:33] Yeah. No, the night before last. I'm sorry.

[1:13:35] It was Friday night. The moon was right.

[1:13:36] I had some fun. Show them how it's done.

[1:13:38] TGIF. And I don't know what I mean is, thank God it's funny.

[1:13:42] I can't believe that your hero is daring to defy.

[1:13:44] I was going to make it.

[1:13:45] I was going to make fun of you for caring enough to tell the people

[1:13:49] on the podcast the exact night you saw it.

[1:13:51] But then it led to that great Friday night thing.

[1:13:53] So, yeah, it was hilarious.

[1:13:56] So us, it was more that I had this weird moment of like, wait, what day is it?

[1:14:00] And I had to figure that for myself.

[1:14:02] But thank you.

[1:14:03] Us, what's to say about it?

[1:14:05] If you like to get out, you'll probably like us, too.

[1:14:07] It's a real solid horror movie.

[1:14:08] It's got some laughs. We've got some scares.

[1:14:10] It's already an us, too.

[1:14:13] And it may just may make you think as as I was walking out,

[1:14:17] I was talking about the sequel us to them, which would be about the other uses.

[1:14:21] But it's already a bunch of good.

[1:14:22] I recommend it. Yeah.

[1:14:24] The what? There's already a bunch of horror movies called them and their home.

[1:14:28] Yeah, I know. There's the one about big ants. Yeah.

[1:14:33] I am going to recommend a movie that I watched a couple of weeks ago

[1:14:36] for the first time for my birthday.

[1:14:39] Thank you. Thank you.

[1:14:39] I'm I'm thirty nine years old now, guys.

[1:14:42] I was nine years young, Stu.

[1:14:44] Oh, thanks. That's what I tell everybody.

[1:14:47] I watched A Bigger Splash, directed by Luca Guadagnino.

[1:14:53] And oh, man, what's his I can't remember his writing partner,

[1:14:56] but it's it's the same screenwriter who worked with him on

[1:15:01] Call Me By Your Name and Suspiria.

[1:15:04] Those were both movies that I loved.

[1:15:05] So I decided to go back and check out his filmography.

[1:15:09] A Bigger Splash is about a rock star played by Tilda Swinton,

[1:15:14] who is recovering from vocal surgery.

[1:15:16] So she goes on a vacation to an island off the coast of Italy,

[1:15:20] I believe, with her boyfriend and a ex ex friend and lover,

[1:15:26] played by Ray Fens and his daughter, played by Dakota Johnson,

[1:15:31] show up and show up and kind of

[1:15:35] disrupt their idyllic vacation.

[1:15:38] And it's I don't know, it's it's a really tense movie.

[1:15:43] It plays out into a kind of horrific tragedy.

[1:15:47] Spoiler alert.

[1:15:50] And but the way that the movies may just like builds this world

[1:15:56] that similar to his other movies, Guadagnino builds a world that like

[1:16:01] I just I get so absorbed in.

[1:16:03] And even if it like it, it clearly goes, it goes slowly.

[1:16:07] My wife fell asleep like five minutes in.

[1:16:11] And it I don't know, there's just something about the world that he creates.

[1:16:16] And yeah, I found it totally engrossing.

[1:16:21] A Bigger Splash.

[1:16:24] All right. Three movies, they are.

[1:16:27] Elliot, anything you want to say?

[1:16:30] I wanted to take a brief mention before we leave about just one more

[1:16:34] cue up the band final moment.

[1:16:35] It's the end of another Max FunDrive episode, guys.

[1:16:38] And with that comes the Flophouse's contribution to the Max FunDrive.

[1:16:42] And, you know, let's have a little Saturday Night Live

[1:16:44] end of the episode moment.

[1:16:45] The band is playing, but I'm

[1:16:48] that we're all going to hug each other

[1:16:51] and make the audience feel like they're part of some amazing party

[1:16:54] they've just enjoyed for an hour and a half before we go out to our party

[1:16:58] that we do at the end of every episode.

[1:16:59] Whether it was a good episode or not.

[1:17:00] Anyway, enough SNL bashing usually because that's what entertainment should be.

[1:17:04] It should feel like a private party that the people involved in are enjoying.

[1:17:08] And you are just kind of watching from the outside and being like, OK.

[1:17:12] And the Flophouse is the opposite of that.

[1:17:14] We're a party that everyone should feel a part of, especially

[1:17:17] Maximum Fun members and supporters, because if you're part of Maximum Fun,

[1:17:20] you are at that party.

[1:17:21] You're actually being part of the process and you're actually

[1:17:25] being someone that we need and rely on.

[1:17:27] There's a reason that they're called supporters.

[1:17:29] It's because we rely on you for support.

[1:17:31] It's because you're supporting us and you're keeping us up now.

[1:17:34] And I don't mean keeping us up in the bad way of your baby's crying at night.

[1:17:38] I mean, in the good way of like, like it's keeping up a beautiful building.

[1:17:42] Atlas holding the world on his shoulders.

[1:17:45] Exactly.

[1:17:46] So I don't like to talk about this aspect of it too much

[1:17:50] because I feel it feels a little bit too much like a heartstring tugging or.

[1:17:54] And also, I don't know.

[1:17:57] It feels like I'm crying for when I should not be because I am a very lucky person

[1:18:02] and I feel like I'm I can support my family and that's great.

[1:18:05] But I've come to really rely on the money from the Max Fund drive

[1:18:10] to help me out to make sure that I can

[1:18:14] support that family while also making the career choices that I hope to make.

[1:18:17] And so by being a Max Fund supporter, you are supporting both this podcast

[1:18:21] and also in a very selfish way.

[1:18:23] You are supporting me and making the creative choices that I hope to make

[1:18:27] and creating the kind of work that I hope to make outside of this podcast.

[1:18:30] And hopefully that's work that supports this podcast.

[1:18:33] Also, enjoy.

[1:18:33] So I hope you feel like you're getting two benefits out of it, this podcast

[1:18:36] and also the other things that I can do

[1:18:39] that I can use the income from this to support me on.

[1:18:43] So anyway, if you want to.

[1:18:45] So I guess what I'm saying is if you want to keep food in my children's mouths,

[1:18:48] then please. Wow.

[1:18:50] Now, that's the that's the way I don't like a lot of pressure.

[1:18:53] But doing the podcast is something that I always enjoy doing.

[1:18:57] It's great to be with Dan and Stuart and have a reason to talk with them regularly

[1:19:01] because I miss them very much.

[1:19:02] And doing the podcast and getting paid to do it is even more amazing.

[1:19:07] This can be something that I consider what I do professionally is amazing.

[1:19:12] And it's all because of supporters like you, supporters who join up.

[1:19:16] If you haven't supporters who upgrade their monthly

[1:19:20] levels to help us get even more support.

[1:19:22] It's something that like I cannot overstate what it means to me.

[1:19:26] And I'm sure these guys feel the same way.

[1:19:28] So please, if you can support us, go to maximumfund.org donate.

[1:19:31] If you feel like you just can't afford it, that's totally cool.

[1:19:34] And I totally accept that. And it's totally fine.

[1:19:37] Do not feel that pressure.

[1:19:38] But if you're like, hey, you know what?

[1:19:40] I'm feeling a little flush these days and I want to pay for the content

[1:19:44] that I enjoy because content doesn't want to be free.

[1:19:46] Unlike what Wired magazine might say or whatever,

[1:19:50] then we'd really appreciate it.

[1:19:52] And I will thank you personally right now.

[1:19:55] Thank you. Insert your name here for supporting Maximum Fund.

[1:19:59] So I hope you.

[1:20:00] that personal thank you that was just for you.

[1:20:02] Maximum Fund supporter name here.

[1:20:05] Yeah, so that's your three favorite guys,

[1:20:08] Steely Dan, Deacon Stu, and I don't know, Kid Calamine.

[1:20:14] Okay, sure, yeah, Kid Calamine.

[1:20:16] Okay, I guess that's our sign off now.

[1:20:21] Go to maximumfund.org, check out the other shows.

[1:20:24] We've been talking a lot about the network

[1:20:26] and thanks for supporting us

[1:20:28] or even thanks for just listening.

[1:20:31] Thanks for just, yeah, just the most,

[1:20:32] the biggest support you can give us even beyond this

[1:20:35] is giving us your ears

[1:20:37] so that we're not just shouting into the void.

[1:20:39] We have no mouths, yet we must scream

[1:20:42] and we're the monsters that shout love

[1:20:43] at the heart of the world.

[1:20:44] And other Harlan Ellison references.

[1:20:48] Good night, everyone.

[1:20:49] Wait, wait, wait, Dan, we should also say

[1:20:52] if you'd also like to support us,

[1:20:53] give us a review on iTunes or whatever

[1:20:56] and tweet about us.

[1:20:57] We should say that.

[1:20:58] Okay.

[1:20:59] Dan, should he say that?

[1:21:00] No, I, no.

[1:21:01] Okay.

[1:21:02] I refuse.

[1:21:03] Okay, Dan's vetoed it, nevermind.

[1:21:04] Cool, okay, so for The Flop House,

[1:21:06] I've been Stuart Wellington.

[1:21:07] I've been Dan McCoy.

[1:21:08] And I'm Kid Calamine, what's my name now?

[1:21:11] Yeah, yeah, Calamine.

[1:21:13] It's like Charlamagne, but with your name.

[1:21:15] Yeah, but you eat a lot of kale.

[1:21:16] All right, good night, everyone.

[1:21:17] Bye-bye.

[1:21:19] I don't know why I'm singing like an old Jewish man.

[1:21:25] I mean, I am a not yet middle-aged Jewish man.

[1:21:28] I mean, if this was the middle ages,

[1:21:30] you'd be like, you'd be totally grown,

[1:21:34] as they say, right?

[1:21:35] Yeah, good point, good point.

[1:21:36] If this was.

[1:21:37] Totally grown.

[1:21:38] If it was, if this was centuries ago.

[1:21:41] Yeah.

[1:21:43] Which is what inspired the musical of your life.

[1:21:46] So, oh, okay.

[1:21:49] All right, guys.

[1:21:51] Let's get down to brass tacks.

[1:21:53] Yeah. Okay.

[1:21:54] Let's do this thing.

[1:21:55] The best kind of tacks.

Ep. #281 - The Nutcracker and the Four Realms

Transcript

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