Ep #268 - Truth or Dare

Stuart Wellington

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss truth or dare.

[0:04] Okay, I choose dare.

[0:06] Okay, watch this movie.

[0:08] No!

[0:30] Hey, everyone.

Dan McCoy

[0:36] Welcome to the Flophouse.

[0:37] I'm Dan McCoy.

[0:38] Hey, I'm Stuart Wellingtown.

Elliott Kalan

[0:40] I'm Elliot Kalin, pronouncing my name the way I usually do.

Dan McCoy

[0:44] Elliot was so taken aback by that.

[0:46] He had to take a breath.

Stuart Wellington

[0:48] So, welcome to the Flophouse.

[0:50] If you're just joining us, if this is your first time listening,

[0:54] kind of like a little primer,

[0:57] if we, each of us, were lettuces,

[1:00] okay, hear me out, hear me out, guys.

[1:02] I think we have no other choice but to hear you out, yeah.

[1:06] Elliot would be arugula, right?

[1:08] Because he's spicy and a little intelligent.

[1:11] Uh-huh.

[1:12] A little intelligent.

[1:13] Yeah, I don't know.

[1:15] I mean, I guess I was more qualifying arugula

[1:17] as being slightly more intelligent than all the other lettuces.

[1:20] Yeah, I appreciate that.

[1:22] Dan, you would be iceberg.

[1:26] Oh, yes, standard.

[1:27] Because deep down,

[1:29] I think everybody just wants an iceberg wedge, you know?

[1:32] Okay.

[1:33] And me, I don't know,

[1:35] I'd be like a crumbled up bag of Doritos

[1:37] that you put on your salad.

Elliott Kalan

[1:39] Stuart, you know what kind of lettuce you would be.

[1:41] Foxy brand lettuce.

[1:43] Because, oh boy, have you got it going on.

[1:46] Hey, you've been working out.

[1:47] What's going on, babe?

[1:48] Oh, thanks, guys.

[1:49] You doing anything after the show?

Stuart Wellington

[1:50] We all complimented each other.

[1:53] Kind of.

Elliott Kalan

[1:56] So, that's been the Flophouse,

[1:58] the podcast where we rate each other on a scale of lettuce.

[2:03] Tune in.

[2:04] Tune in next episode.

[2:04] Next week, I guess.

Dan McCoy

[2:05] What are we going to rate ourselves on next time?

[2:09] Types of radishes.

Elliott Kalan

[2:11] Oh, boy.

[2:12] I got to do some research.

[2:13] You got to look it up.

Stuart Wellington

[2:16] Known vegetable fan, Elliot.

[2:18] We'll have to do research.

Elliott Kalan

[2:20] I like plenty of vegetables.

[2:21] Thank you.

[2:22] Uh-huh.

[2:23] You like mozzarella sticks?

[2:25] Yep.

[2:26] Yeah, yeah.

[2:26] You mentioned Doritos.

[2:28] That's another favorite of mine.

[2:29] Hot dogs?

[2:30] Let's not forget those.

[2:31] Yep.

Dan McCoy

[2:32] Guys, can we just call this podcast The Sleep House and take a little nap?

[2:36] Nope.

[2:36] We cannot do that.

[2:37] Guys, okay.

[2:39] Think how peaceful it would be for the listeners.

Elliott Kalan

[2:40] Audience, I'm going to pull back the curtain.

[2:42] And by which I mean pull back the curtain over the window so the light comes in and wakes Dan out of his stupor.

[2:47] Dan is very tired.

[2:49] I'm also a little tired.

[2:50] I was up very early this morning with a baby that would not sleep.

[2:54] And Dan is tired because he was at a horror movie marathon.

[2:58] And so it's a real goofus and gallant type scenario where we both knew that we were recording earlier than usual the next day.

Dan McCoy

[3:05] Oh, Elliot, you're too hard on yourself.

[3:07] You're not a goofus.

Elliott Kalan

[3:08] Oh!

[3:09] Yeah, I made the mistake.

[3:11] Goofus makes the mistake of having a child.

[3:13] Gallant does not have a child and can do whatever he wants with his schedule.

[3:18] Wow, that sounds great.

[3:19] Yeah, that's highlights for adults.

[3:21] Fun without a purpose.

[3:23] Uh-huh.

Dan McCoy

[3:24] You find it in the, I guess, the geriatric part of the hospital or waiting room?

[3:30] Oh, you mean the hospital.

[3:30] Highlights for adults?

[3:32] Hospital, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[3:33] No, by geriatric part of the hospital, you just mean hospital.

[3:38] Oh, I get it.

[3:39] Unless this is one of those future worlds where they sequester old people away so that nobody has to see them and be reminded of their own mortality.

Stuart Wellington

[3:47] I mean, what about that part of the hospital where you get to go up and look through the window and you see all the little babies in the bins?

Elliott Kalan

[3:54] Oh, it's sometimes full of babies, but sometimes it's just full of old people lying in those little bins.

[3:59] And you can go, oh, that's my old person.

[4:01] See, that's my grandpa in there.

Dan McCoy

[4:03] How does that work?

[4:05] Is that a take a baby, leave a baby situation?

[4:07] Exactly, yes.

Elliott Kalan

[4:08] Yeah, if you need a baby, you can just take one.

[4:11] And if you happen to have an extra baby, just be nice.

[4:13] You know, baby it forward.

[4:14] Leave a baby for somebody else to use.

Stuart Wellington

[4:16] And Elliot, I believe the scenario you described of babies are old persons was a cut sequence from the Metallica Enter Sandman video.

Dan McCoy

[4:26] I think so.

[4:27] So what do we do on this podcast for reals, Dan?

[4:30] So what do we do here, dude?

[4:31] This is a podcast where we watch a bad movie and then we talk about it.

[4:35] And oh boy, is it the most wonderful time of the year?

[4:39] Oh yeah, okay.

[4:40] Shocktober.

[4:41] Whoa.

[4:41] We'll watch horror movies.

[4:43] Because we want to be totally spookified for the season.

[4:47] Oh no.

[4:47] Well, as...

[4:48] Oh wow.

[4:49] Oh, sorry, were you going to say this, Stuart?

Stuart Wellington

[4:50] I was just saying the evil grin that Dan was giving me was giving me flashbacks of the movie we watched.

Elliott Kalan

[4:57] Yep.

[4:57] Oh, because there's a lot of evil grinning in it.

[4:59] Hey, do you guys like the Black Hole Sun video?

[5:01] Because then you might like the special effects in Truth or Dare.

[5:04] But let's explain Shocktober for a moment.

[5:06] I mean, that was a super popular video.

[5:08] It was huge.

[5:09] Yeah, people loved it.

[5:11] It was everywhere.

[5:11] So October, as we know, ends in Halloween or All Hallows Eve, the period when the veil between our world and the world of the spirits is the thinnest.

[5:22] Much as a woman's cervix thins to the point of imperceptibility as a baby is arriving so that the child may pass through.

[5:31] Throughout October, the veil between our world and that of the dead gets thinner and thinner.

[5:36] Or as a mystic from an ethnic tribe in a Richard Bachman-based movie might say, thinner, thinner.

[5:46] You can't see the hand motion I'm doing, but I'm making it thinner.

[5:49] Anyway, so we like to get people ready for that time at the end of October by talking about scary movies.

[5:55] Because you know who likes scary movies?

[5:58] Who?

[5:59] Everybody.

[6:00] Oh, okay.

[6:01] I don't know if that's actually correct.

[6:03] So, what were you saying about cervixes?

[6:08] Stuart, it may surprise you to know that a woman's body is not just always ready for a baby to just drop right out of that thing.

[6:16] It's got to be prepared over the course of a process called labor.

[6:20] Now, if you look at this chart, you'll see that this part of the body is where the baby is.

Stuart Wellington

[6:25] Did you draw that whole chart just now?

Elliott Kalan

[6:29] Yeah, I did.

[6:29] I did it very quickly from memory because the experience of watching this happen scars you greatly.

[6:35] And I see it even when I close my eyes.

[6:37] Much like the scary movies we watch in Shocktober.

[6:40] Now, Dan, if I like to ask you a question.

[6:42] We all know Stuart loves scary movies because they remind him that the only truly scary thing in life is not having lived fully.

[6:48] But, Dan, why do you like scary movies?

Dan McCoy

[6:53] Well, I probably actually like them because of my fear of death.

[6:59] And by going through sort of a kabuki of experiencing that fear of death through watching film, I can overcome it in my real life.

Elliott Kalan

[7:10] Sort of a catharsis that becomes therapeutic, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[7:13] So, if that was your joke answer, what was your real answer?

[7:16] No, that was my real answer.

Elliott Kalan

[7:18] And then Dan's like, my real answer is I love blood and boobs.

[7:21] Whoa!

[7:22] No, that's my...

Dan McCoy

[7:24] Well, that would be my joke answer, actually.

[7:25] But it's also real.

[7:27] Because every joke has just a little truth in it, you know?

Elliott Kalan

[7:29] Yeah.

[7:29] Yeah, so that chicken really did cross the road is what you're saying?

Dan McCoy

[7:34] I'm...

[7:34] Yeah, at one point.

[7:36] What is going on upstairs?

[7:37] There's a lot of banging going on in my apartment.

[7:40] I apologize if it's coming over.

[7:41] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[7:41] It's like somebody is just playing the chainsaw part from that jackal song.

Dan McCoy

[7:46] I think maybe they have like a rowing machine or something.

[7:49] I don't know what it is.

Elliott Kalan

[7:51] Well, guys, that's been The Flophouse, the show where we talk about what's going on above Dan's apartment and try to guess what it is.

[7:58] Join us next week when Dan's neighbors are clearly having sex, but Dan is so disgusted by it he doesn't want to say that's what's happening.

[8:07] And he comes up with a lot of other explanations.

[8:09] A handball court in their apartment?

[8:11] Sure, why not?

Stuart Wellington

[8:14] I mean, I feel like Dan investigating the dangerous liaisons going up in the apartment above him sounds like a pretty good idea for a podcast.

[8:25] Yeah, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[8:25] You might even call it dangerous liaisons.

[8:28] Oh, I mean, I kind of already said that, but okay.

[8:32] Okay, so Dan, what movie did we watch?

[8:34] As if the audience didn't know because we announced at the very beginning of the show.

Dan McCoy

[8:38] We watched Truth or Dare, a.k.a. Blumhouse's Truth or Dare.

Stuart Wellington

[8:42] Is that how you pronounce it? Not Blumhouse?

[8:44] Blumhouse? I don't know.

[8:45] Somebody call up Judy Blum and find out.

Elliott Kalan

[8:48] Judy, what do you call your house?

[8:52] Now, they called it that, I assume, because there's like three or four other movies called Truth or Dare, a couple of which just came out in the last few years.

Stuart Wellington

[9:00] And when we all collectively watched this movie on our own, we had to do a lot of double-checking that we were watching the right one.

Elliott Kalan

[9:09] Yeah, we wanted to let the right one in to our eyeballs.

Stuart Wellington

[9:13] Yeah, I was like halfway through the Madonna's Truth or Dare before you guys stopped me.

Elliott Kalan

[9:17] Oh boy, what a mistake.

[9:19] And you're like, this is scary, but for different reasons.

[9:20] This is great.

[9:24] So did we all watch the right one?

[9:26] We all watched the one with the weird smiles on their faces, right?

[9:30] Yeah.

[9:31] Yeah, I think so.

[9:32] Okay.

[9:32] Should we talk about what happens in this movie?

Dan McCoy

[9:34] It's good that we're figuring this out now.

Stuart Wellington

[9:35] And we watched the theatrical cut, right?

[9:37] You guys didn't watch the special edition?

Dan McCoy

[9:39] I actually watched the special edition because that was what was available on iTunes, which is what I was in.

[9:45] So if there's something that I saw that you guys didn't see, like it's not because I was on ayahuasca or something and hallucinated it.

[9:53] That was the first guess I was going to have, yeah.

[9:55] Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[9:56] Director's vision.

Elliott Kalan

[9:57] We'll see if it affects our ratings.

[10:00] So Dan, if there's anything that you saw in the director's cut, which includes deleted scenes that were too hot for TV, you tell us, okay?

[10:09] All right.

[10:11] Shall we begin the story of Truth or Dare, a terrifying tale of truth, dares, and truth or dares?

[10:21] I was really hoping the title had three things in it, but it only had two things.

Stuart Wellington

[10:25] It took you a little while to figure that one out.

Elliott Kalan

[10:27] Our story begins near the Mexican border where a young woman stops into a gas station to buy cigarellos until a sinister voice seemingly out of nowhere, although it appears to be coming off the phone, says,

[10:41] Truth or Dare.

[10:42] And she's like, no, I don't want to play anymore.

[10:44] It says, Truth or Dare.

[10:45] And she says, Dare.

[10:46] And then she lights a woman on fire.

[10:49] Cut to.

[10:50] We're at college.

[10:51] Hey, everybody.

Stuart Wellington

[10:52] I mean, at this point we know this isn't your daddy's game of Truth or Dare, right?

Elliott Kalan

[10:57] No, because my daddy's game of Truth or Dare, it would be like, Dare, I dare you to enlist in the army and go fight in Vietnam.

[11:03] And then he would have to do that.

[11:05] Yeah, that's true.

[11:06] But that was when my dad was a young buck who would play Truth or Dare.

[11:10] Although, to be honest, not to say too much about my dad now, I could totally see him playing a game of Truth or Dare now with his grown-up older friends in his 60s and getting into trouble for it and me having to get him out of that trouble.

Stuart Wellington

[11:22] Hopefully that won't happen.

[11:24] It's a real shameless situation.

Elliott Kalan

[11:26] Cut to.

[11:27] We're at college.

[11:28] And there's six friends who are going to go on spring break to Mexico.

[11:33] It's their last spring break before they graduate.

[11:35] You want me to run down these friends?

[11:36] Because at first I had a lot of trouble telling them apart and I had to work very hard to get them down.

[11:42] So I'd lay out our cast of characters.

Dan McCoy

[11:44] What are you talking about?

[11:44] They each have like one individual characteristic.

Elliott Kalan

[11:47] Yeah, yeah.

[11:47] Except for the one girl, Penelope, who has no individual characteristics.

[11:50] Oh, that's true.

[11:52] Her boyfriend's a jerk.

[11:53] Yeah, her boyfriend's a jerk.

[11:54] That's true.

[11:55] You also have three male main characters in this movie who all look kind of the same and they don't even have different color hair.

[12:02] But anyway, the women, thankfully, have mostly different color hair so we can tell them apart.

[12:06] And they're strong, of course, very detailed and nuanced personalities.

[12:09] You've got Marky, the blonde party girl, who's always cheating on her boyfriend.

[12:13] Yeah, she's named after the television song, right?

[12:16] Yeah, she's named after Marquis Moon.

[12:19] Yeah.

[12:20] You have her best friend, Olivia, who's a brunette.

[12:23] And you know Olivia's like the good girl to Marky's bad girl because Olivia doesn't want to go to Mexico.

[12:27] She wants to volunteer with Habitat for Humanity, but they won't let her.

[12:31] It's time for them to spend their last spring break together.

[12:33] And there's their other friend, Penelope, who is also there.

[12:37] Like, I don't know.

[12:38] She doesn't really have a personality.

[12:39] Then you've got the three dudes.

[12:42] There's, what, Lucas, who I think is Marky's boyfriend.

[12:46] But he has feelings for Olivia.

[12:48] You've got Tyson, who is Penelope's boyfriend.

[12:51] And he's a bad boy.

[12:52] He's real sarcastic.

[12:53] Yeah, he's a real jerk.

[12:54] And he writes fraudulent prescriptions that he sells to freshmen for pills.

[12:58] And then you've got third guy who is gay and Asian, but I didn't catch his name.

[13:05] So he has the most going on of all the characters, and I don't know what his name is.

[13:09] Like George or Oscar or something like that?

Stuart Wellington

[13:12] Yeah, yeah.

[13:12] Donald.

[13:13] Let's find out.

[13:14] I'm checking it right now.

[13:16] All right.

Dan McCoy

[13:16] Stewart's on the case.

[13:17] Look up his name.

[13:18] Detective Google is...

Stuart Wellington

[13:19] Who is Young Sheldon on Young Sheldon?

[13:23] No, no.

Elliott Kalan

[13:24] No, no.

[13:24] This is Detective Google in every case.

[13:27] They go, Detective Google, my father was murdered.

[13:30] Can you help me?

[13:31] What did your father's feet look like?

[13:34] I don't see how that's relevant to this, Detective Google.

[13:37] Trust me.

[13:38] First thing I need to know about anybody.

[13:40] What was their feet?

Stuart Wellington

[13:44] So, guys, his name is Brad.

[13:46] Brad.

[13:47] Brad.

Elliott Kalan

[13:48] Yeah.

[13:48] Very memorable.

[13:49] Okay.

[13:50] So they go down to Mexico.

[13:51] We see an opening credits montage entirely made up of, like, Snapchat videos and pictures

[13:56] that just shows us, I guess, why we want them to die.

[13:58] Because they're irritating Americans just getting drunk and making out in Mexico.

[14:03] Now, guys, I never went on, like, a spring break trip.

[14:06] Did you guys?

[14:06] Is this what it's really like?

[14:07] Or is this just what the movies make it look like?

Dan McCoy

[14:10] The only, quote, unquote, spring break trip I went on was not a spring break trip.

[14:14] It was a trip that was on spring break, which was, I was in London.

Elliott Kalan

[14:18] All right, Mr. Semantics, let's split some more hairs, why don't we?

Dan McCoy

[14:22] I was in London for a semester and everyone traveled over spring break.

[14:26] And so I went up to the party town of Edinburgh and Aberdeen.

[14:31] Oh, those are great towns.

Stuart Wellington

[14:34] Dan's dragging some towns.

Dan McCoy

[14:35] No, they're fantastic towns.

[14:36] Well, I mean, Aberdeen's not so great.

[14:38] It's kind of like just a bunch of cement buildings.

[14:40] Fun fact about Aberdeen.

[14:41] Edinburgh is beautiful, though.

[14:43] Aberdeen was the name of one of my first cats.

[14:46] Oh.

[14:47] That is a fun fact about Aberdeen.

[14:48] That's a fun fact.

[14:49] I mean, it's more a fun fact about your cat than the city, but.

Elliott Kalan

[14:52] No, no, Dan.

[14:53] I don't know.

[14:54] I mean.

[14:55] It's on the website for the city.

[14:56] It's pretty big there.

[14:58] The Aberdeen Chamber of Commerce put that up there?

Stuart Wellington

[15:01] Yeah.

[15:01] The Aberdeen Chamber of Commerce.

[15:04] Okay.

[15:05] So, Stuart, what about you?

[15:06] No, in high school, I went on a spring break road trip where we piled into a big old Oldsmobile

[15:14] and drove down to St. Petersburg, Florida, a place that had more old people than I expected.

[15:23] There was a Salvador Dali museum.

[15:27] Oh, I've been to that museum.

[15:28] And when we would hang out on the beach at night, there would be clusters of angry drunk guys looking at any other guys who would walk by as if they were potential threats to their precious supply of ladies.

[15:45] It was kind of a weird experience.

Elliott Kalan

[15:48] So, you guys are saying I didn't miss out on much by spending most of my spring breaks, I think just going to the movies a lot.

Stuart Wellington

[15:55] I mean, I think that probably prepared you better for a life of bad movie podcasting and writing for Mystery Science Theater 3000.

Elliott Kalan

[16:03] I mean, there was that one spring break where me and my bikini-clad friends got into trouble with a drug dealer played by James Franco.

[16:11] And I think we had to break her or something.

[16:14] I don't remember it that well because I've never seen it.

[16:16] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[16:18] I was waiting for you to...

[16:19] I was like, this joke based entirely on parts of the trailer, Elliot saw.

[16:23] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[16:25] It's almost, it's even more than that.

[16:27] It's like joke based on the poster.

[16:29] But, okay.

[16:31] So, long story short, they go to a big dance party.

[16:35] Olivia stops Marquis from just cheating on her boyfriend right there in front of everybody.

[16:39] And Olivia hits it off.

Stuart Wellington

[16:41] And at that point, I'm concerned that Marquis has, the Marquis has a serious problem.

[16:47] Like, because her boyfriend is sitting five feet away.

[16:51] Yeah.

[16:51] Like, at that point, I feel like she, it's more than just like she's drunk.

[16:56] Like, she has some kind of deep psychological issue that needs to be dealt with.

[17:00] And I think the only way you can deal with that is by playing a supernatural game of truth or dare.

[17:05] But we'll see.

Elliott Kalan

[17:06] We'll see.

[17:06] I mean, she does have that deep issue.

[17:08] Stuart, you're psychologizing.

[17:09] Your armchair psychologizing is dead on.

[17:11] Because when a kind of weirdo guy who Olivia, for some reason, does not see a mile away is a creep.

[17:18] Even though he has stubble, the movie sign for creepy guy.

Stuart Wellington

[17:22] He says...

[17:22] Well, he does protect her from my favorite character of the movie, Ron Ron.

[17:27] Tell us about Ron Ron.

[17:29] Ron Ron, I believe, is a guy who goes to the same college?

[17:33] Yeah.

[17:33] They're in college.

[17:34] They're college students.

[17:34] They go to College State University.

[17:37] So Ron Ron is this, like, the most broadly drawn horndog character who just the mere concept of two girls sharing a chaste kiss drives him into paroxysms of ecstasy.

Elliott Kalan

[17:51] He's playing...

[17:52] Everyone else is playing their characters like they're in a horror movie.

[17:54] And he's playing his character like he's in a snobs versus slobs, like, frat movie.

[17:59] And I actually...

[17:59] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[17:59] I really admire that.

Stuart Wellington

[18:00] Like a direct-to-video American Pie sequel.

[18:02] He's like, from now on, Ron Ron will be the new McLovin.

Elliott Kalan

[18:09] So this guy says, hey, the party's dying down here.

[18:13] You want to have some more fun?

[18:14] He takes them to an abandoned church where Olivia finds...

[18:17] Olivia's one of these millennials.

[18:18] She takes pictures of everything.

[18:20] So, of course, she's digging through the crap on the floor of this abandoned church.

[18:23] And there's burned photos.

[18:24] And there's a jar of something that smells bad, which is our first clue, other than the fact that a creepy guy took them to an abandoned church, that maybe this wasn't a great place to be.

[18:33] And Carter says, hey, let's play Truth or Dare.

[18:36] They do.

[18:36] They do all your classic Truth or Dare stuff.

[18:38] Someone has to streak.

[18:40] Someone reveals a secret.

[18:42] Tyson is like, hey, Marky, do you know Olivia loves your boyfriend?

Stuart Wellington

[18:45] And it's like, oh, oh.

[18:47] Yeah, that dude goes from zero to 60 super quickly.

Dan McCoy

[18:53] Well, he's mad that they're in this church.

[18:55] And that is to my point, which is that this is where I texted you guys watching the movie and was like, no teens have ever acted this way.

[19:05] Because they're already partied out and they're at the end of the night at a bar.

[19:11] And then the guy's like, let's take a big hike to an abandoned thing way out on the coast.

Elliott Kalan

[19:16] Well, also, every character at that point, except for Ron Ron, sadly, he's wandered away after Carter made him feel bad.

[19:24] Carter is the creepy guy.

[19:25] Every character has someone they can pair up with and go off and have sex with.

[19:30] Yeah.

[19:30] It makes no sense that, yeah, at that time of night, they wouldn't be like, all right, so I guess we're all just going to go back to our rooms and do it because that's what we really are here for.

[19:39] Yeah.

[19:40] Instead, yeah, they go, let's take a hike and sneak under some fencing so we can go to an abandoned church.

[19:45] Wonderful.

[19:45] And let's play Truth or Dare.

Dan McCoy

[19:48] Like, the fact that they, I mean, the fact that they're so easily convinced to play Truth or Dare as, like, a bunch of, like, I don't know, horny college kids.

[19:56] I mean, is that a thing that people still do?

[19:58] I don't know.

Elliott Kalan

[19:58] Well, even in the movie, they're like, they're like, come on, what is this, a slumber party?

[20:03] Okay, sure, great.

Stuart Wellington

[20:05] We'll have to, we're doing a show at a college pretty soon, so we'll just poll the audience on this one.

[20:08] Yeah, let's say, who listened to our show?

[20:11] Do you guys do that?

[20:12] Can we go?

[20:15] Whoa, whoa, whoa, not so fast.

[20:17] Why are you trying to get us invited to a Truth or Dare game?

[20:20] Because.

[20:20] College kids.

Elliott Kalan

[20:21] I want to get Dan to do a bunch of crazy dares.

[20:24] Oh, okay.

[20:25] And maybe the legendary Double Dare.

[20:29] Oh, man.

Stuart Wellington

[20:30] Yeah.

[20:31] Oh, no.

[20:31] So we're going to have to climb through a giant thing of building?

Dan McCoy

[20:34] I'm going to have to find a flag and a big nose.

Elliott Kalan

[20:36] That's exactly what I want you to do, Dan.

[20:37] Reach inside a big nose full of Gak and just pull that flag out.

Stuart Wellington

[20:41] I feel like that giant nose has led me to some interesting fetishes.

Elliott Kalan

[20:47] There must be some kid that Double Dare just imprinted on them in just the right moment, and they have like a green slime and reach and trying to find a flag fetish.

Stuart Wellington

[20:57] Yeah, yeah.

[20:58] So this is a guy who like turned into, you know, after school, he opened up his own startup.

[21:03] He's a tech mogul.

[21:04] And he brings a girl home.

[21:07] Oh, he's a millionaire now.

[21:08] He opens up his red room.

[21:09] Yeah, he opens up his red room.

[21:10] Red, because that's the official color of Double Dare.

[21:13] And he's like, my interests are different.

[21:19] And he turns on the light, and it's just a giant nose filled with big boogers.

Elliott Kalan

[21:24] I happen to be involved in some unorthodox erotic play.

[21:29] And she's like, oh, really?

[21:30] And he's like, you got 60 seconds to find that flag inside that nose.

[21:35] And in a corner tied to a chair is Mark Summers, who hates messes.

[21:40] So he's like, ah, I don't like this at all.

[21:41] You stay there, Mark Summers.

[21:44] I'll unwrap you later.

[21:46] Because you also hosted the show Unwrapped on the Food Network.

[21:49] And Mark Summers is like, stop telling me things that I did.

Stuart Wellington

[21:53] Yeah, that's his torture for the rest of his life, is being told things he did.

[22:00] So guys, just a little bit of feedback.

[22:02] I will say, in my experience as a bar owner, I find it not uncommon for couples who long should have gone to someplace private,

[22:12] will still remain in a public setting, and hang out and make out.

[22:19] And you're like, why are you still here?

[22:20] Get out of my bar.

[22:22] Get out of the back room of my bar.

[22:23] Get out of here, you crazy kids.

[22:25] That's what you say.

[22:27] They're rarely kids.

[22:28] They're usually older people.

[22:29] And you have a broom that you're just poking them with.

[22:31] But maybe part of it is, maybe for our Truth or Dare playing college kids, maybe part of it is the excitement of being in public and playing this game.

[22:44] Dan, what do you think?

Dan McCoy

[22:44] Oh, maybe, yeah.

[22:46] Okay, so it's a warriorism, exhibitionism thing.

Stuart Wellington

[22:50] That's what I'm trying to say.

[22:51] So, I mean, that's what Truth or Dare is all about, right?

Elliott Kalan

[22:54] Stuart, your multiple slips of the tongue have led me to the idea, why hasn't someone done a horror movie version of Double Dare?

Stuart Wellington

[23:02] I mean, the sequel to Blue Mouse's Truth or Dare is Truth or Double Dare, right?

Elliott Kalan

[23:07] And then, of course, the third one, Truth or Double Dog Dare.

[23:10] That's when it's actually dogs that talk.

[23:13] Uh-huh, and it features Three Dog Night.

[23:16] Okay, guys, let's keep moving forward with this movie.

[23:18] So, they ask Truth or Dare to Carter, the creepy guy, and he says, oh, I lured you here to save myself because once you're in this game, you've got to play or you die.

[23:26] And then he leaves, and they go to college, they go back home, and—

[23:31] And they're like, what a weirdo.

[23:32] They're like, this is crazy.

[23:35] And Olivia finds that the words Truth or Dare have been written all over the place, on her desk, on a flyer that a creepy homeless man gives her, and on her car.

[23:44] They've been keyed into a car.

[23:45] She thinks Ron Ron did it, but he didn't.

[23:47] We also find out that Mark—

[23:48] That's not Ron Ron style.

[23:50] Yeah, Ron Ron is—if he's going to do that, he's not going to do it secretly.

[23:53] He's going to do it right in front of you, going like, does this turn you on?

[23:55] You want to make out with me now?

[23:57] What about with another woman?

[23:58] Because that's Ron Ron, man.

[23:59] He knows what he wants.

[24:00] Look, Ron Ron is so purely Ron Ron that even though he's a creep, you've got to admire just how true to himself he is.

Stuart Wellington

[24:06] There's a simplicity to Ron Ron that is at least somewhat charming.

Dan McCoy

[24:11] I guess so.

[24:12] Yeah, he's the uncarved block in Taoism.

[24:14] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[24:17] Guy reads The Tao of Pooh once, and he thinks he's everything about Taoism.

[24:24] Never even got through the chia piglet.

[24:26] Didn't even want to finish it.

[24:28] Now, we also learn that Marky's dad committed suicide a while back, and she watches the final video of him cooking her a salmon steak over and over again.

[24:36] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[24:37] His name was Mark, right?

Elliott Kalan

[24:43] So, random people just start giving Olivia black hole sun CGI smiles.

[24:48] These big old grins that look ridiculous.

Stuart Wellington

[24:51] Basically, everyone turns into Apex twins, right?

[24:53] Yeah.

[24:53] Like that cover, that Apex twin thing.

Dan McCoy

[24:55] I mean, they've got like real droopy like faces.

[24:57] Yeah, they all turn into jokers.

[24:59] They're like, their smile is all droopy.

Stuart Wellington

[25:01] They all got a blast of smile-ex to the face?

[25:03] Yeah.

[25:05] And they all start saying truth or dare, truth or dare.

[25:07] Droopy doesn't smile, he's sad.

[25:09] No, I'm not saying droopy dog.

Dan McCoy

[25:11] I'm saying like the bottom of their like lips are like drooped down.

[25:15] Oh, okay.

[25:15] So it's kind of like-

[25:16] And their eyes flash red, right?

Elliott Kalan

[25:17] It's kind of like Roger Ebert's smile near the end of his life after his jaw had been removed.

[25:22] Oh, dude.

[25:23] Oh, man.

[25:24] Come on.

[25:24] I'm sorry.

[25:24] I mean, I didn't want to say it, but-

[25:25] I'm just trying to find an authentic parallel.

[25:29] And I also watched Life Itself recently.

[25:30] Very touching.

Dan McCoy

[25:32] It's a great movie.

[25:34] The thing is though, like there's the CGI-

Elliott Kalan

[25:36] Wait, we're talking about Life Itself, the Roger Ebert documentary, by the way.

[25:39] We're not talking about Life Itself, the recent release, which I really want to do in the Flophouse.

[25:43] But Dan, you're saying-

[25:43] Yeah, we'll probably do, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[25:45] The smiles that are enhanced by CGI, but sometimes the main characters are possessed by a demon or whatever, and they just like-

Elliott Kalan

[25:55] It's a demon, Dan.

[25:56] It's not whatever.

[25:58] As we'll find out, it's a demon.

Dan McCoy

[26:00] They just do their own version of a creepy smile, like it's not a CGI smile, and it's the dumbest looking face, I feel like.

[26:07] It looks really stupid.

[26:07] Every time they do it, it's just like, what is wrong with you?

[26:11] Why are you giving me that goof face?

Stuart Wellington

[26:13] Yeah, they're like doing a creepy smile, and they're like, oh, that looks terrible.

[26:17] Oh, we'll fix it in post.

[26:18] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[26:19] Like there's a thin line between creepy smile in this movie and the smile of the dancing old man from the Six Flags commercials.

[26:25] Yeah.

[26:26] Like they're basically the same smile.

[26:28] Okay, guys.

[26:28] Olivia overcomes.

[26:30] She picks truth and yells out, Marky is always cheating on her boyfriend.

[26:34] Right in front of the crowded library and Marky and her boyfriend, Lucas.

[26:38] Uh-oh.

[26:39] Who's going to believe her that it was some kind of supernatural thing that made her do it?

[26:42] Meanwhile, Ron-Ron.

Stuart Wellington

[26:43] I mean, and at that point, Lucas immediately believes her, which means I think deep down he's suspected all along.

Elliott Kalan

[26:50] Oh, yeah.

[26:50] You have to know.

[26:51] I mean, he literally saw her dancing with another guy in Mexico.

[26:55] Uh-huh.

[26:57] Yeah.

[26:58] And this wasn't a the kids are all right type scenario where he doesn't mind that she's dancing with another guy because he knows them pretty well.

[27:06] Oh, okay.

[27:07] So, Stuart, coming up next is Ron-Ron's farewell to the film.

[27:12] Would you like to describe it or shall I?

Stuart Wellington

[27:15] Yeah, so Ron-Ron is in a local bar and a lady, what, bumps into him or passes him and truth or dare's him.

Elliott Kalan

[27:23] No, no, he hits on the lady and she says no.

[27:25] And then she truth or dares.

Stuart Wellington

[27:27] Okay.

[27:27] I mean, I think memory's a weird thing, Elliot.

[27:33] So, she does a creepy face and does truth or dare.

[27:36] And while a normal person would see that creepy smile and would be like, I'm getting out of here.

[27:42] Instead, like, oh, wow.

[27:45] It's like, did he just unlock the Lamershain configuration?

[27:48] Is this a new form of pleasure he's never experienced?

[27:51] So, she dares him to show everybody his wiener and he's like, fuck yeah, I don't care.

[27:56] I'm Ron-Ron.

[27:57] And he climbs on top of the pool table.

Elliott Kalan

[28:00] He literally is like, everybody, everybody look at me.

Stuart Wellington

[28:02] Like, he starts orating to all of them.

[28:04] He is holding forth like Tom Cruise in any bar scene in Cocktail.

[28:08] And unfortunately, his ego is punctured when multiple women reveal that they have seen his penis before already and that it is unimpressive, which seems ridiculous.

[28:21] And so, Ron-Ron decides that he will not do the dare.

[28:25] And that's when the trouble starts, guys.

[28:26] Oh, because he's.

[28:27] Because his face turns into a demon face.

[28:31] And his eyes flash red.

[28:33] And you realize he's no longer in control of his bodily functions.

[28:36] In which point you're wondering, is Ron-Ron already dead?

[28:40] You know?

[28:41] So, then he almost falls on a pool cue.

[28:44] And you're like, oh, they're going to try and final destination me and give me a couple fake outs.

[28:48] And then he slips on a pool ball and immediately breaks his neck and dies.

Elliott Kalan

[28:52] Yeah.

[28:52] He falls and snaps his neck on another billiard table.

[28:54] Luckily, everyone's recording it on their phones because they really wanted to see Ron-Ron's penis and have it recorded for posterity.

[29:00] I assume to watch again later in the comfort of their own homes, they could really examine it.

[29:04] You know, computer, enhance.

[29:07] Let's take a look.

[29:08] Yep.

[29:08] Computer, use my app that measures penises from photos and video.

[29:12] Okay, great.

Dan McCoy

[29:13] They're going to upload it to the Ron-Ron section of ViewPorn.

Elliott Kalan

[29:16] It's a surprisingly well-attended section.

[29:20] Yeah.

[29:20] So, this cell phone video gets texted to all of the other players of the game.

[29:26] And Olivia's friends don't believe that they're cursed now.

[29:29] But Olivia's like...

Stuart Wellington

[29:29] And they watch the video at the exact same time.

[29:32] You're watching them watch it.

[29:34] And it's synced up perfectly.

[29:36] It's crazier.

Dan McCoy

[29:36] They all react to the death at the same point.

[29:41] My favorite part, though...

[29:42] They all started the video at different points.

Elliott Kalan

[29:42] My favorite part is they all watch it at different points, but it syncs up.

[29:46] But then when Olivia leaves, the scene ends with Tyson then replaying the video, just watching it by himself.

[29:52] And it was like, dude, you really want to see him die again?

[29:55] Like, what are you doing?

[29:56] That's terrible.

Stuart Wellington

[29:57] Yeah.

[29:58] Well, I mean, Tyson has been revealed to be an asswipe.

[30:01] That's true.

[30:01] Yeah, and do you think it's a situation, because they all started at different times, that it's almost like performative laughter?

[30:07] Like, one person freaked out, and then everyone else is like, I guess I should freak out, too.

[30:12] Yeah.

[30:12] And one person went...

Dan McCoy

[30:13] There's one person who's dead inside and does not feel any feelings about watching someone dying.

[30:19] But they're like, I guess based on the general tone of the room...

Elliott Kalan

[30:24] It's usually there's a sociopath there who's like, I better put on the mask of sympathy that allows me to pass among others as a human with emotions.

[30:30] Exactly.

[30:31] I thought...

[30:32] I wonder if there was one person...

[30:33] They all went, oh, oh, no, Ron Ron.

S4

[30:35] And there's one person being like, I haven't gotten there yet.

[30:38] Stop.

Elliott Kalan

[30:39] Okay, now I saw it.

[30:42] Spoilers.

[30:43] No spoilies, please.

[30:45] I'm watching the Ron Ron video.

[30:48] There's one person who...

[30:49] You know what?

[30:50] Yeah, yeah.

[30:50] Ron Ron video.

[30:51] Make sure to stay to the end.

[30:52] Or whatever.

[30:53] If this was a comedy, then they'd all be disgusted, and there'd be one person who hadn't watched yet,

[30:58] and was like, his penis can't be that bad, can it?

[31:01] And then would play the video.

[31:02] So, Marky's boyfriend is next up to play the game.

[31:05] This is Lucas.

[31:06] And he starts hearing voices.

[31:08] The words truth or dare burn themselves into his arm for a moment.

[31:10] He calls Olivia and says, I have feelings for you.

[31:13] It's true.

[31:14] Because he got truth.

[31:15] Marky is next.

[31:16] She doesn't believe it.

[31:17] She chooses dare.

[31:19] And so, the dare is, break Olivia's hand.

[31:21] And she's like, I'm not going to do that.

[31:23] That's crazy.

[31:23] And Olivia's like, do it or you'll die.

[31:25] Because as Ron Ron showed, if you don't pull off the dare, you die.

[31:28] You get possessed by this demon, and it kills you in a Final Destination-y stupid way.

[31:34] So, Olivia's like, do it, do it, do it.

Stuart Wellington

[31:36] But I do want to defend Final Destination.

[31:39] Oh, no.

[31:39] Final Destination is-

[31:40] Because this is a movie that so desperately wishes it was Final Destination.

Dan McCoy

[31:43] Final Destination is the good version of that.

[31:45] This is a real Final Destination, it follows situation, but bad.

[31:49] Yeah.

[31:50] This movie.

Elliott Kalan

[31:50] This movie is a, it is like if someone took it follows, the script for it follows, and

[31:55] like, dumbed it down by like, 3,000%, you know?

[31:59] And we're like, the problem is, we don't know what the it is.

[32:03] Wouldn't it be scarier if instead of being some abstract force that we never really understand,

[32:07] but that possesses, takes the form of dead bodies, it is a demon named Calyx that was

[32:13] brought to Earth by a nun?

[32:15] And it's like, no, I don't think so.

[32:17] But we'll get to that, I guess.

Stuart Wellington

[32:17] I mean, if you're going to have an, and if you're going to have an abstract force killing

[32:20] people, like, you got to have a Tony Todd, right?

[32:24] Yeah, well, I don't know if you need a Tony-

[32:26] Where's the-

[32:27] I mean-

[32:27] I mean, to explain, you mean?

[32:29] Like a-

[32:29] Yeah, or like a guy with a lot of charisma, like Tony Todd, who can show up and tell you

[32:34] what's going on.

[32:35] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[32:35] I mean, it helps to have Tony Todd in any movie, because he's amazing, and you can't keep

[32:39] your eyes off him.

[32:40] But, so.

[32:42] Olivia tells her to do it, and it's like, and she gives her a hammer, and it's like,

[32:46] hit my hand, or you're going to die.

[32:48] And then she's like, are you a coward like your dad?

[32:50] And Marky gets mad and breaks her hand.

[32:52] She did it, now she's not going to die.

[32:54] At the hospital-

Stuart Wellington

[32:54] That was her pressure point.

[32:56] What I love about it is, as soon as she hammers her friend's hand, like, half of the friends

[33:01] just scatter.

[33:02] They're like, oh, I got a lot of homework to do.

[33:06] Leaving only a couple people to take her to the hospital.

[33:08] Like, that's wild, dude.

[33:10] Yeah.

[33:10] This movie, as I texted you, this movie should have been called Bad Friends, because it could

[33:16] have jumped onto that bad blank bandwagon that's so hot right now.

[33:20] It is one of-

[33:20] One thing that we-

Elliott Kalan

[33:22] Sorry, go on, Elliot.

[33:23] I was going to say, it is one of those movies where two characters are supposed to be best

[33:26] friends who love each other, but they're consistently shitty to each other throughout the entire

[33:29] movie, and they don't seem to like each other or like being around each other.

[33:33] Dan, what were you going to say?

[33:34] Speaking of best friends who I don't like being around, Dan, what were you going to say?

[33:38] Just kidding, Dan.

[33:39] I love you.

[33:39] I love spending time with you.

Dan McCoy

[33:41] For a movie called Truth or Dare that's about, you know, like, people being forced to sort

[33:48] of look out for themselves and put their, like, interests above other people's to keep

[33:51] themselves alive, like, this movie really, on the early scenes, ladles on with a heavy

[33:56] hand to be like, we're friends, like, I'll always put you ahead of me, like, and like,

[34:01] you know, like, in the initial Truth or Dare, there's like a moral question that kicks off

[34:08] the whole thing, which is like, would you sacrifice yourself and your friends for millions of other

[34:13] people?

Elliott Kalan

[34:13] Oh, yeah, they were like, if aliens came down, and they're either going to kill us in this

[34:17] room or everyone in Mexico, who would you choose?

[34:20] Like, it's such a ridiculously weighted moral question, where it's like, I'm kind of a dick

[34:25] if I choose the seven Americans over the millions of people who live in Mexico.

[34:29] Like, that's crazy.

[34:30] What, 150 million, 200 million people live in Mexico?

[34:33] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[34:33] Like, that's crazy.

Dan McCoy

[34:34] I'm just saying that the foreshadowing of the themes is ladled on with a heavy hand, like,

[34:40] like, cheese whiz on a nachos.

Stuart Wellington

[34:42] Yeah, and the level of, like...

[34:44] Do they usually use ladles for that?

[34:47] Yeah.

[34:47] Put the cheese whiz on?

[34:49] Yeah.

[34:49] Well, you take the can, and you spray the cheese into a ladle, right?

[34:54] And then you go out to your dinner party, and you say, I made fresh cheese.

Elliott Kalan

[34:59] The waiter at the nacho restaurant, the French waiter who has the big vat of cheese whiz,

[35:04] hello, a little more cheese whiz for the nachos, and then takes a ladle and just goops it

[35:10] on there.

[35:11] So what you're saying, something about ladles?

Stuart Wellington

[35:13] But it was, it was the, uh, the way that they make a point of telling everybody how important

[35:19] their friendship is, is not that far from, say, a fantasy movie talking about how a character

[35:25] is prophesized to be important, right?

[35:27] Yeah.

[35:28] Where you're supposed to be watching this and be like, break her hand, but they told me

[35:32] they're best friends.

Elliott Kalan

[35:33] Mm-hmm.

[35:35] Exactly.

[35:36] So, but the truth or daring is not, look, and you're saying bad friends, barely any of

[35:40] them go with their to the hospital.

[35:41] On GLOW, when someone breaks a bone, everybody goes to the hospital to keep them company,

[35:45] because they're real friends.

Stuart Wellington

[35:47] Yeah, I feel like comparing yourself to the ladies of GLOW is an unfair yardstick.

Elliott Kalan

[35:52] I guess I'd say, Blumhouse's truth or dare is no GLOW.

[35:55] It is not trying to be in order to succeed.

[35:57] Yeah.

[35:59] So at the hospital, Brad, he, uh, he has a, he has a whole wasted amount of time with a

[36:05] malfunctioning vending machine and a dead person who talks to him.

[36:08] But he gets truth or dare.

[36:09] Truth, he chooses.

[36:11] And he has to come out to his dad, which turns out fine.

[36:14] We don't see the moment of the coming out, but he seems unaffected by it, which is great.

[36:18] You know?

Stuart Wellington

[36:18] Well, I think he's more than unaffected.

[36:20] I think he has a weight lifted off his shoulders.

[36:22] It was actually, that was a moment where I'm like, oh, wow, truth or dare can be a force

[36:26] of good.

[36:27] Yeah.

[36:28] That a guy's able to come out to his perceived homophobic father and get a sense of relief

[36:33] out of it.

Elliott Kalan

[36:34] Yeah.

[36:34] And as the father says in the scene later on, you're still my son, which implies a certain

[36:38] amount of judgment about being gay, but still tolerance ultimately.

[36:43] So.

Elliott Kalan

[36:43] Yeah.

[36:44] I guess what we're all saying is, guys, if you're having trouble telling your family

[36:48] something that's very important to you, but you're worried about, get possessed by the

[36:52] demon Calyx in an abandoned Mexican church and that'll help you out.

[36:55] Okay.

[36:56] But uh-oh, things don't work out so well for Tyson, the sarcastic, drug-dealing boyfriend

[37:01] of Penelope.

[37:02] He's getting in.

[37:02] He has an interview with the dean of a med school.

[37:04] It took me a while to figure out what this interview was about.

[37:07] Was it for a job?

[37:08] Oh, he just wants to get into med school, but he's about to graduate.

[37:11] He should know what med school he's going into.

[37:13] Uh-huh.

[37:14] And the demon takes over the dean, smiley face, truth or dare, truth, whatever.

[37:19] How long have you been forging prescriptions to sell to freshmen?

[37:22] He's like, I don't do that.

[37:24] Takes his special pen that he uses to forge prescriptions, stabs himself in the head until

[37:28] he's dead.

[37:28] And his friends almost get there in time to, I don't know what.

[37:32] I don't know how they were going to stop that scenario, but they get there just as the

[37:35] blood is flowing out under the door and they're like, ah, ah.

Dan McCoy

[37:39] What are these good talks?

[37:40] Yeah, there's a lot of talk about like how we can't leave anyone alone, but it's never

[37:43] clear what the other people think they're going to be able to do.

Elliott Kalan

[37:46] Yeah.

[37:46] Other than be like super grossed out.

[37:49] Yeah.

[37:50] And Tyson has this little speech about making himself out to be like this great guy who's

[37:55] choosing medicine because he wants to help people.

[37:57] So the theme of hypocrisy is still running through the movie.

[38:01] Very subtly.

[38:03] As Dan was saying, ladle full of Cheez Whiz and all that.

[38:05] Okay.

[38:06] I think that, you know what guys, I want to introduce, I want that to be the new phrase

[38:10] for when things are just a little too heavy handed in a movie to say, then they really ladled

[38:14] on the Cheez Whiz.

Dan McCoy

[38:17] All right.

[38:18] Like years from now, that's going to be on Urban Dictionary and they're going to be like,

[38:21] scholars will have to trace it back to us.

[38:24] Yeah.

[38:24] Well, if it's on Urban Dictionary.

Stuart Wellington

[38:25] We'll get an email about possible new sponsor Cheez Whiz.

Elliott Kalan

[38:30] Uh-oh.

[38:31] If it's on Urban Dictionary, then the first definition though is going to be like, when

[38:34] you jizz all over someone's food or something like that.

[38:36] Like this.

[38:37] Urban Dictionary always has the sex one first.

Stuart Wellington

[38:40] Okay.

[38:40] Sorry guys.

[38:41] I've just been uploading a lot of fake entries into Urban Dictionary about food jizzing.

[38:47] Okay.

Elliott Kalan

[38:48] So what are the kids going to do next?

[38:50] There's only one thing you can do.

[38:51] Google Mexico truth or dare and find an article about the girl we saw in the opening who lit

[38:57] someone on fire.

[38:58] They do a little bit of Facebook detective work.

[39:00] Find her Facebook page and send her a message that says, hey, and Marky is like, Olivia, don't

[39:05] be too nice in the message.

[39:06] She writes a message that says, we saw you light that woman on fire.

[39:09] Meet with us or we'll do the same to your family.

[39:11] It's like, whoa, Marky didn't need much to push her into madness.

[39:14] It seems.

Stuart Wellington

[39:16] Yeah.

[39:17] Yeah.

[39:17] She was so hesitant to smash a hand, but as soon as her dad's brought up, as soon as her

[39:21] dad's name is invoked, she is driven to rage.

[39:24] Oh yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[39:25] Penelope is the next one to get truth or dare.

[39:27] She gets dare.

[39:29] The demon won't let her pick truth.

[39:30] What's going on?

[39:31] And she has to walk along the outside of a roof while finishing a bottle of booze.

[39:36] And for some reason she keeps walking and not drinking that much.

[39:39] She says, I have to keep walking around the roof until I finish this booze.

[39:41] It's like, so just, just drink as much as you can each time.

[39:44] Like stop taking these baby sips and then walking around.

Stuart Wellington

[39:47] I mean, it's like a whole, it's like a whole bottle of vodka though, dude.

[39:50] That's a lot to like that.

[39:52] Just on volume alone.

[39:53] It's a lot.

Elliott Kalan

[39:54] I'm just saying, this is, I'm just telling her to strategize the way I would strategize,

[39:58] which is chug that whole bottle of vodka, shimmy down the chimney back to safety.

Stuart Wellington

[40:03] Yeah.

[40:03] You're just playing Monday morning dare doer.

[40:06] I don't think that's fair.

[40:08] Okay.

[40:08] Fair point.

[40:09] I wasn't in the situation.

[40:11] The, and I mean, she's also, she's also coping with the death of her boyfriend.

[40:16] Lo, no.

[40:17] Tyson.

[40:17] Loki.

[40:17] Is that what you're going to say?

[40:18] Yeah.

[40:19] Tyson.

[40:20] Yeah.

[40:20] The mnemonic device I was using was chicken man.

[40:27] But everyone works together.

[40:30] Yeah.

[40:30] And she walks around the roof and this is the moment where it became exceedingly apparent

[40:35] that this movie was kind of like the, these sequences were bargain basement, uh, final

[40:41] destination because like that's, it seems like this, that people are going to a fucking novelty

[40:47] truth or dare horror movie.

[40:49] Like you're going for like a wacky ass dare scenario where you're like, whoop, uh, whoop,

[40:55] uh, whoop.

[40:55] Yeah.

[40:56] And you don't really get that here.

Elliott Kalan

[40:58] No.

[40:58] And even they managed to save her by, uh, use it.

[41:01] It's clear that the demon wants her to slip and fall onto some spiked, uh, fencing, but

[41:07] instead they managed to break it down with a car and then put a mattress on top of that

[41:11] car and she falls onto the mattress and she's okay for one scene because they go and meet

[41:16] Giselle, the girl from the first, uh, the opening scene.

[41:19] And the girl is like, I don't know.

[41:20] Uh, we walked into this church and my friend smashed it up and then we started playing truth

[41:23] or dare and, uh, blah, blah, blah.

[41:25] And it's my turn and my dare is to shoot Olivia.

[41:28] Penelope jumps in front of Olivia, saving her life and dying.

[41:31] And I have to imagine if, if Tyson was there, he would have been like, why did we work so

[41:35] hard to save her?

[41:36] That was a waste of time.

Stuart Wellington

[41:37] Well, I think when, I think when you're, uh, writing a story, Elliot, sometimes a character

[41:42] is more interesting when they're dead than when they're alive.

Dan McCoy

[41:44] Hmm.

Stuart Wellington

[41:45] We have never seen like the effect of her death on everyone, which is actually feels immediately

[41:51] forgotten.

Elliott Kalan

[41:52] Yeah.

[41:52] They actually, they don't, Penelope is the friend who disappears the fastest from their

[41:55] minds.

[41:56] They're like, Tyson, why not Tyson?

[41:59] Didn't Tyson have a girlfriend?

[42:00] Yeah.

[42:00] I think they broke up or something.

Dan McCoy

[42:03] And like, she's, she shows herself to be the only true friend because like, we've never

[42:07] seen anything in the movie to suggest that she would jump in front of a bullet for Olivia.

[42:11] No.

[42:11] But she does, she does just that in the film.

Elliott Kalan

[42:14] Penelope is like, Olivia, but she's the best of us.

[42:17] No.

Stuart Wellington

[42:23] And she, and she also, she also barely gets a death seat.

Dan McCoy

[42:28] We, we, uh, glazed over this, but the reason that they can't, uh, do truth all the time

[42:36] is that the, Giselle explains that they did like something called like two truths and a

[42:41] dare or something like that.

[42:42] Like after every two truths, you have to do a dare.

[42:45] So that people can't just pick truth forever.

Elliott Kalan

[42:47] And, and Calix the demon is like, Hey, you know what?

[42:51] I'm not going to break the rules.

[42:53] Yeah.

[42:54] I'm going to take this game and just anyone who gets asked any question is just going

[42:58] to be marked for death, but you kids set the rules and I'm going to live with them.

[43:02] Okay.

[43:03] So, uh, I'm going to do it.

[43:05] I'm going to follow with the two truths and a dare scheme.

[43:07] I'm not going to mess with what works.

[43:08] Hey, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

[43:10] That's what us demons say.

Stuart Wellington

[43:13] Unless the broken thing is a canopic jar that seems to hold my essence.

[43:16] In which case, leave that thing broken.

Dan McCoy

[43:18] Look, if you kids had, uh, you kids had decided to do never have I ever, I would have figured

[43:23] out a way to like make never have I ever scary, you know?

Elliott Kalan

[43:26] If you were playing the, if you're doing the hokey pokey, Simon says, it's all going to

[43:30] be bad.

[43:31] Look, I'll find a way to make it kill you.

[43:32] Actually, Simon says it'd be a better version.

[43:34] Maybe.

Stuart Wellington

[43:35] Frankly, you're lucky you didn't do Marco Polo or else he'd all be a bloated brown corpses

[43:39] by now.

[43:41] What?

[43:41] Cause they just drowned?

[43:43] Yeah, probably.

[43:46] Uh, so we were playing ghosts in the graveyard.

[43:48] Oh, you guys would still be in that graveyard.

Elliott Kalan

[43:50] If you guys were playing werewolf or mafia, pretty much the same game.

[43:53] Assassin, they also call it.

[43:55] Uh, you'd all be really killing each other.

[43:57] Anyway, you get the drift.

[43:58] I'm a demon.

[43:59] Uh, so guys, what if this was called Blumhouse's Simon Says?

[44:02] How would the game be different?

[44:03] And how would the movie be different?

[44:04] Dan, pitch it to me.

Dan McCoy

[44:07] Uh, well, everyone would just be told Simon Says, stab that person.

[44:12] And it would happen in, I don't know, like 10 minutes the movie would be over.

Stuart Wellington

[44:16] Okay, wow.

[44:17] So it's like, uh, that would be in the shorts category of the Academy Awards.

Elliott Kalan

[44:21] And I assume at the end, the demon would say, you win, you're free to go, leave.

[44:26] And they'd start leaving and it would go, it would smile and then go, I didn't say, Simon

[44:29] Says.

[44:30] Yeah.

[44:30] And just, they'd all explode in hellfire.

[44:33] Mm-hmm.

[44:33] Awesome.

[44:34] Okay, so, uh, Penelope, dead.

[44:37] They get over it.

[44:37] Giselle, she didn't pull off her dare, so she smiles and shoots herself in the head.

[44:42] Uh, our teens investigate the church where the game took place and they find there was

[44:46] a massacre there.

[44:46] Only one nun survived.

[44:48] Olivia gets truth or dared, dared to sleep with Lucas, Marky's boyfriend.

[44:53] And in the middle of sex, Olivia smiles.

[44:55] And I got to imagine, I have to give Lucas credit for maintaining an erection when Olivia

[44:59] makes that face in the middle of their sexual act.

[45:02] I don't know if I would have been able to do it.

Stuart Wellington

[45:03] I think that says more about Lucas's personality at this point.

[45:07] Uh, yeah, this, like, this big twist them up is at this point, like, they know that death

[45:12] is on the line.

[45:13] Like, multiple friends are dead.

[45:15] Shouldn't they just be happy that any of them can find any weird moments of joy?

[45:20] Whether or not that would be a joyful, uh, coupling?

[45:23] Question mark.

Elliott Kalan

[45:23] Who knows?

[45:24] Well, this is, because Marky is the one who, who still doesn't quite believe it.

[45:28] She thinks that this is, I guess, all just a series of coincidences.

[45:31] And so, when, when, uh, she's, uh, Olivia's like, my dear was to sleep with Lucas.

[45:36] And Marky's like, yeah, that sounds right.

[45:38] Sure.

[45:38] And Marky's really mad.

[45:40] But yeah, if you, if it's like, look, yes, I have some kinds of feelings for your boyfriend,

[45:44] but if I don't sleep with him, I'm going to die.

[45:46] Would you rather I die?

[45:47] And if Marky's like, let me think about it.

[45:50] Then again, not your best friend, not a great friend act, you know?

[45:54] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[45:55] Uh, so, uh, so yeah, that, that happens.

[45:58] Everybody's upset.

Elliott Kalan

[45:59] In the middle of sex, Olivia, truth or dare's Lucas, the question is, who do you love?

[46:04] But she doesn't do it the fun way.

[46:05] She doesn't go, who do you love?

[46:08] Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun.

[46:09] Who do you love?

[46:10] I think you're being charitable there.

[46:12] I mean, it's more fun than the movie.

[46:14] It's not that fun, but, uh, and, and Lucas admits that he has feelings for Olivia, but

[46:20] he loves Marky, which I think is supposed to come across as like sweet in a way, but it's

[46:25] really gross.

[46:25] Cause it's like, I've got feelings for you, but I love Marky.

[46:29] It's like, dude, in this society, you don't get to have more than one.

[46:32] Just like, come on.

[46:33] I mean, I mean, I'm not fair to have like, I'm not going, I'm not going to be overly

Stuart Wellington

[46:38] judgmental about people's like feelings or their lifestyles or whatever.

[46:42] I will be.

[46:43] Uh, but it is at this point, like that shouldn't be that huge of a shocker.

[46:47] They're like being forced into having sex by a demon.

[46:51] Like just, just at this point it's, it's just survival.

[46:54] Right.

Elliott Kalan

[46:55] Well, I think Olivia still, there's a certain part of her that was like, oh, I want him

[46:58] to be doing this with me for me and not just to save my life, but because he also likes

[47:02] me, you know?

Dan McCoy

[47:03] But also like had the demon not intervened, like he would have had feelings for Olivia, but

[47:08] he would have kept them quiet and he would have been in love with Marky.

[47:11] Like the only gross thing about it is that like he's having sex with her at the time

[47:15] that he's forced to be like, uh, I just kind of like you.

Stuart Wellington

[47:20] Sorry.

[47:21] Yeah.

[47:22] Uh, meanwhile, Marky.

[47:23] I guess it's different levels of emotion involved.

Elliott Kalan

[47:25] Yeah.

[47:25] I guess that's fair.

[47:26] You know what?

[47:26] It's a rich tapestry.

[47:27] It's a layer cake.

Stuart Wellington

[47:28] This thing.

Elliott Kalan

[47:29] This movie is like an onion.

[47:30] You just keep peeling the layers and it makes you cry because it's so true.

Stuart Wellington

[47:33] Uh, cause this movie is not like a layer cake because there's no Daniel Craig.

[47:39] What would it be like if Daniel Craig was in it?

[47:42] He would say.

[47:43] Truth or dare.

[47:44] Allow, allow.

[47:46] Right.

[47:47] Right.

[47:48] Right.

[47:49] Anything else?

[47:50] He would say, Jim Jiminy true.

[47:53] He would zip up the chimney.

[47:55] Yeah.

[47:56] Well, that's the demon making him do that.

[47:58] Okay.

[47:59] I know for a second you thought that I was being Daniel Craig doing Daniel Craig, but in this

[48:03] case, I was being Daniel Craig doing Kallax the demon.

[48:06] I see.

Elliott Kalan

[48:06] I thought you'd be Daniel Craig doing Dick Van Dyke from Mary Poppins.

Stuart Wellington

[48:11] Uh, I don't know that reference, Elliot.

[48:12] I thought that was, I just made that up whole clock.

Elliott Kalan

[48:15] Uh, so Marky takes solace the only way she can by watching the video of her dad again.

[48:20] And her dad starts talking to her.

[48:22] The demon's inside her phone.

[48:23] Ah, but really, Dan, when you think about it, is the demon inside all of our phones since

[48:27] we're addicted to these phones?

Stuart Wellington

[48:29] Oh, man.

[48:31] Men, women, and children was a good movie.

Elliott Kalan

[48:34] Iron Man demon in a bottle, more like demon in a phone.

[48:37] Ah, I can't stop looking at Twitter.

[48:40] Okay, so, uh, Olivia and Lucas, what else are they going to do?

[48:43] They go to Tijuana to find that nun who survived the massacre years ago, but she hasn't spoken

[48:48] in 50 years.

[48:49] So she writes them a letter in English, which they read aloud, about how there was a priest

[48:53] that was abusing the nuns there until one of the young nuns cast a spell to summon a

[48:57] demon, Kallax, who possessed their truth or, who possessed their game.

[49:01] It's never clear if they were playing truth or dare, right?

[49:04] They were just playing some kind of game.

Stuart Wellington

[49:06] Yeah, they were probably playing like, I don't know, like, uh, like trolls and dungeons

[49:12] or something.

Elliott Kalan

[49:13] Uh, is that just a version of truth or dare?

[49:16] What is that?

[49:17] It's like a game.

[49:17] It's like shoots and ladders.

[49:20] It's like, that's the, that's the bootleg version of Dungeons and Dragons.

[49:24] They're like, look, we can't afford dragons.

[49:26] We have trolls.

[49:26] And the dungeons are not quite as good.

[49:28] So we're going to lower them in the billing somewhat.

[49:30] They're not going to get top billing.

[49:32] Trolls and dungeons.

[49:33] Sometimes you're going to go to a dungeon.

[49:35] It's not even going to have a troll in it.

[49:36] Let's just be honest.

[49:37] This version of dungeons, it's just, it's not the threat.

[49:39] And in fact.

Stuart Wellington

[49:40] And you're like, and you're like, did I, did I waste my time coming here?

[49:43] There's not even a troll.

[49:44] What's going on?

Elliott Kalan

[49:45] And you're like, this is the worst role-playing game I've played since Dungeon, Dungeoness

[49:48] and Dragons.

[49:49] When you're either a dragon or a Dungeoness crab.

Stuart Wellington

[49:53] Yeah.

[49:53] And I think, I think the, uh, the table is weighted toward rolling crab, right?

Elliott Kalan

[49:57] Oh yeah.

[49:58] Always.

[49:58] Yeah.

[49:58] You have to roll it.

[49:59] Uh, you have to get a perfect 20 to become a dragon.

[50:02] Oh wow.

[50:02] Otherwise it's all crabs.

Stuart Wellington

[50:04] And it's on two six-sided dice.

Elliott Kalan

[50:05] So like, that's impossible, right?

[50:08] So good luck rolling a 20, dudes.

[50:11] Uh, okay.

[50:11] So Ina is the nun.

[50:13] She, she reveals that she was the one who summoned the demon.

[50:17] And the only way to get rid of it was to say this one, uh, the person who called up the

[50:21] demon has to say a spell seven times and then make a sacrifice in a little pot with a skull

[50:26] painted on it.

[50:27] And that sacrifice is their own tongue.

[50:30] And then Inaz opens her mouth and goes, and shows you the stump of her tongue that she

[50:34] cut out.

[50:35] And, uh, let's just say compared to the scene in the dentist starring Corbin Bernson, where

[50:40] someone has their tongue cut out.

[50:42] Not as gross.

[50:43] I'm just going to say it.

[50:43] Not as effectively gross.

Stuart Wellington

[50:45] Yeah.

[50:45] I feel like, I do feel like after a certain point in time, uh, not to make light of people

[50:50] who have lost their tongues, but if I had had my, if I had to remove my own tongue for

[50:54] a ritual years down the road, if a bunch of young sassy teens showed up, I think I'd have

[51:01] to do a tongue waggle.

[51:02] Oh, of course.

[51:03] Yeah.

[51:03] You got to make it worth it a while.

[51:05] It's like, from my understanding, the only reason you have children is so you can embarrass

[51:08] them as teenagers in front of their friends.

Dan McCoy

[51:10] I mean, clearly she's been waiting for this moment because like, she doesn't have her

[51:14] caretaker tell the kids like, oh, she doesn't have a tongue, so she can't talk.

[51:18] She's just like, tell them that I won't talk to them.

[51:21] Well, I mean, she wrote that down.

Elliott Kalan

[51:23] Uh, she says she hasn't said a word in 50 years.

[51:27] Exactly.

[51:27] And they look at her and they go, okay, vow of silence.

[51:30] What are you going to do?

[51:30] Okay, sure.

Stuart Wellington

[51:32] And her caretakers are like, you're going to large marge them?

[51:35] And she nods and smiles.

Elliott Kalan

[51:38] And, uh, and, uh, and, uh, Harold Pinter is like, this is a very loose version of my play,

[51:45] The Caretaker.

[51:45] And I don't appreciate what you've done with it.

[51:50] Uh, so, uh, that, that play, The Caretaker, I got to see it with Jonathan Price in it.

[51:55] He was amazing.

[51:56] So, guys, Jonathan Price, great actor.

Stuart Wellington

[51:58] Yeah, star of, uh, G.I. Joe, Cobra's Revenge, or whatever.

Elliott Kalan

[52:02] G.I. Joe, here comes Cobra again.

[52:06] G.I. Joe 3, oh, here he comes.

[52:08] He's a Cobra.

[52:10] Starring Hall and Oates.

[52:11] Here comes Honey Cobra.

Dan McCoy

[52:12] What?

[52:13] Go on.

[52:14] I said, here comes Honey Cobra.

Elliott Kalan

[52:16] Here comes Honey Cobra.

[52:20] Because it's time for Cobra to redneck-ignize what's going on here.

[52:23] Yeah, exactly.

[52:25] So, anyway, they need to find the guy who put the spell on them, and, uh, which I guess

[52:29] is Screamin' Jay Hawkins, because they're his, and get him to say this spell and cut out

[52:35] his tongue.

[52:35] And they have to put it in a little jar that, uh, I guess Inez made that has, like, Evil Ernie

[52:41] painted on it.

[52:42] It's some kind of grinning, like, 90s skull.

Stuart Wellington

[52:45] I'm into it.

[52:46] Yeah, it looks, it looks like a, uh, like a failed Monster Energy drink logo.

[52:50] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[52:53] Brad's with his dad when he gets Truth or Dare.

[52:55] His dad is a cop.

[52:56] And the Truth or Dare says, steal your dad's pistol and make him beg for his life.

[53:01] And rather than Brad being like, Dad, and Brad's dad has been, okay, is there anything going

[53:06] on here with all your friends dying that we should know about?

[53:08] Anything.

[53:09] And for some reason, none of these college kids, when they're talked to by policemen,

[53:13] even tries to tell the story of what's going on.

[53:16] And you'd expect in a movie like this, they'd be like, it's a demon.

[53:18] And they'd be like, sure, sure it is.

[53:20] We'll get to the bottom of this.

[53:21] But they don't even try.

[53:22] And they never say, like, I can't tell him.

[53:24] He'll think I'm crazy.

[53:25] They just don't bother.

[53:26] And it's one of these things where I'm like, is this movie really about the generation gap

[53:30] and how hard it is for young people to communicate with their elders?

[53:33] Dan Stewart, let's open a symposium here.

[53:35] What do you think?

Stuart Wellington

[53:36] Yeah, I mean, I do like how our teens are better crime solvers than the police.

[53:44] I think that's kind of a harsh indictment of the police system that we have, right?

[53:50] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[53:51] I mean, to be fair, they're not cooperating with the police force, which would give them

[53:53] needed information like the reason why this is all happening.

[53:58] But the police do seem to mostly...

Stuart Wellington

[54:00] Maybe they're trying to save the adults in their lives from being trapped in their own

[54:07] truth or dare game.

[54:07] Oh, that's a fair point.

[54:08] Because as you're an adult, those truths get harder.

Elliott Kalan

[54:11] I mean, I for one am glad that the movie...

[54:12] And so do the dares.

Stuart Wellington

Elliott Kalan

[54:16] I mean, I get dared multiple times a day to wipe human shit off of a person's butt.

[54:23] Multiple times a day.

Stuart Wellington

[54:25] And that's good.

[54:26] Danielle is like, I dare you to do it.

[54:28] And you're like, you're fucking nasty.

[54:31] She's like, hell yeah, I am.

[54:33] Just wipe that butt.

[54:34] I dare you.

[54:35] She's like, truth or dare.

Elliott Kalan

[54:36] Okay, dare.

[54:37] Clean that baby's diaper.

S4

[54:38] Oh, man.

[54:39] I fell for it again.

Elliott Kalan

[54:41] But Dan, you were going to say something about babies and diapers?

[54:44] It wasn't that important.

[54:45] Oh, another role-playing...

[54:47] Wait, another role-playing game that's not what I was playing.

[54:48] Wait, you asked me what I was going to say, and then you interrupt me immediately.

[54:52] Guys, never play Dungeons and Diapers.

[54:53] That's also not a good role-playing game.

[54:55] It's very different.

[54:57] Very different.

[54:58] And if you're into it, that's totally cool.

[55:00] I'm not going to judge you, but I am not into Dungeons and Diapers.

[55:02] Dan, you were going to say?

[55:03] Hey, guys.

Stuart Wellington

[55:04] It doesn't matter.

[55:05] Talk about...

[55:06] Let me put my sunglasses on.

[55:07] Yeah, go on.

[55:09] Shitty game.

[55:11] Okay.

[55:12] Yeah.

[55:12] Ow!

Elliott Kalan

[55:13] Dead, dead, dead, dead.

[55:15] CSI Flophouse.

[55:16] Dan, you were going to say?

Dan McCoy

[55:17] No, all I meant to say was like, I, for one, am glad that there was not a scene where

[55:23] they tried to convince the police that there was a demon involved.

[55:26] Just because it's going to be another one of those scenes where like, yeah, sure, there's

[55:29] a demon involved.

[55:30] We suspect you all the more now because you're making these crazy claims.

Elliott Kalan

[55:34] But instead, we get scenes where this one cop who never seems to leave his office calls

[55:38] Olivia in and is like, seems like a lot of people are dying.

[55:41] Can you tell me why?

[55:42] No, I don't know.

[55:44] Okay, well, let me give you a piece of information then.

[55:46] This is the guy who seems to have caused it all.

[55:48] Does that jog your memory?

[55:50] No, it doesn't.

[55:51] Okay, well, I'm going to go get you a glass of water while you take a picture of all this

[55:55] confidential police paperwork.

[55:57] Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do.

[55:58] Are you done taking the picture?

[55:59] No.

[56:00] Okay, I'll keep my back turned.

[56:01] Da-da-ba-ba-ba-da-da-da-da-da-da-da.

[56:03] Okay, I'm done.

[56:04] Great.

[56:04] Okay, so anything else you want to tell me?

[56:06] No.

[56:07] All right, then.

[56:07] See you in Mexico.

[56:09] Like, that's basically each one of those scenes.

[56:11] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[56:12] Well, it reminds me of that famous episode of Homicide Life on the Streets, The Box, where

[56:17] they have that guy, and they're trying to pin the crime on him, and he's like, a demon did

[56:23] it.

[56:24] Is he?

[56:25] No, I'm making that all up.

[56:26] Okay.

[56:26] I wonder how often IRL, we'll have to, if you're a police officer, just write into the

[56:33] show and tell us how often suspects blame it on, like, a demon truth or dare game.

Elliott Kalan

[56:39] Or actually don't, because that'll make me sad.

[56:41] Yeah.

[56:41] Well, there's a, the guy that the show Mindhunters is based off of, who was an expert consultant

[56:49] on Silence of the Lambs.

[56:51] I read all his books when I was a teenager, and he talks about talking to David Berkowitz,

[56:55] the son of Sam Killer, and how David Berkowitz was like, oh yeah, demon and my dog told me

[56:59] to do it.

[57:00] And he was like, bullshit, don't give me that.

[57:01] And that David Berkowitz was like, oh, you got me.

[57:04] That like, that was one case where a guy said, oh, a demon told me to do it.

[57:08] And it wasn't really the case.

[57:10] They were like, you're just trying to make us think you're crazy.

[57:13] You're right, I'm not crazy.

[57:14] Are you 100% sure?

[57:14] I get sexual pleasure from murdering people.

[57:16] Yeah, you're not crazy.

[57:17] What?

Stuart Wellington

[57:17] Are you 100% sure there wasn't a demon in that dog?

Elliott Kalan

[57:22] I mean, we can never be totally sure.

[57:24] Every demon has a dog, especially delicious devil dogs.

Stuart Wellington

[57:29] Yeah, do you think devil dogs tried to rebrand themselves after that?

Elliott Kalan

[57:34] Well, they were trying to figure out if they should get in touch with him as an endorser,

[57:37] or just change the name.

Stuart Wellington

[57:41] Oh man, we can just cut this out and use this as our promo so people think we're like a true

[57:45] crime podcast.

[57:47] That deals with the death of real people kind of lightly.

[57:50] Yeah.

[57:51] Isn't that fun, guys?

[57:52] Don't we love that?

Elliott Kalan

[57:53] Yeah, I love to trivialize real horror that happens to people in tragic ways.

[57:57] Hey guys, that was a real hot take on true crime we just did.

[58:01] And it means we don't have time for the skit I was going to act out about the guy who was

[58:05] selling devil dogs door to door, who was like, things have never been better.

[58:08] I can finally get out of debt, afford that new car, really show my family the life that

[58:12] they deserve.

[58:13] And then he turns on the TV and it goes, son of Sam killer says a devil dog told him to

[58:17] kill these people.

[58:18] And he just goes, oh no.

[58:20] And picks up the phone and goes, honey, I got some bad news.

Dan McCoy

[58:23] I was going to think it just cuts to him in a hobo outfit riding the rails.

[58:27] That really happened fast.

Stuart Wellington

[58:29] Yeah.

[58:30] And when he's watching the TV, he looks over in the corner and there's just stacks and

[58:33] stacks of devil dog boxes.

Elliott Kalan

[58:35] And he's got to eat them all now so they don't go to waste.

[58:38] He's riding the rails and he's like, I was the king of the hostess snack cakes.

[58:41] Yeah, yeah, we heard it.

[58:43] We heard it.

[58:45] So anyway, back to the movie.

[58:47] Brad, the devil tells him, take your dad's gun and make him beg for his life.

[58:51] And he takes his dad's gun and his dad just does not get it.

[58:54] His dad's like, Brad, whatever's going on, I'll help you.

[58:57] I love you.

[58:57] You're my son.

[58:58] He's like, get down and beg for your life.

[58:59] Trust me.

[59:00] Just do it.

[59:00] You've got to do it.

[59:01] I'll explain it later.

[59:02] And the dad's like, no, come on.

[59:03] Let's talk this out.

[59:04] Let's hug it out.

[59:05] He just won't play along and he can't get it done.

[59:08] So what happens?

[59:08] Another cop shoots Brad in the back.

Stuart Wellington

[59:11] Oh.

[59:11] And Brad's dad is, that is textbook way to keep a subject, a suspect talking.

[59:17] Oh.

[59:18] So you think it was all planned.

[59:20] He's like, I had backup coming the whole time.

Elliott Kalan

[59:23] So he was stalling his son to get this so the other guy could get into position.

[59:27] At the police station, now it's Olivia's turn.

[59:29] She chooses Dare and she gets Dare to tell Marky her deepest secret that she could never

[59:33] tell Marky.

[59:34] And she tells Marky.

[59:35] So isn't that kind of a truth?

Dan McCoy

[59:38] Yes, it is a truth.

[59:39] And she came away trying to get truth out.

[59:42] Like, we had previously learned that Olivia doesn't want to choose truth because she has a truth

[59:46] that she doesn't want to tell Marky.

Elliott Kalan

[59:48] Yeah.

[59:48] It would destroy Marky.

[59:50] And so she gets Dare to tell the truth.

[59:51] It's a weird loophole here.

[59:53] And she's like, you got me, Calix.

[59:55] Oh, boy.

[59:56] So she tells him, she tells Marky, he tells her, the night your dad killed himself, I was there.

[1:00:02] And I went over there and he got drunk and he tried to have sex with me and I said no.

[1:00:07] And he wouldn't stop so I left.

[1:00:09] And that's why he killed.

[1:00:10] And I said, you should die.

[1:00:11] And he killed himself.

[1:00:12] So it's like a very messy situation.

[1:00:15] It's not really that funny.

[1:00:17] And Marky is understandably more distraught.

Dan McCoy

[1:00:20] This is the point of the movie where I texted you guys and I was like, this movie is very cruel to its characters.

[1:00:27] Oh, yeah.

[1:00:27] Very much so.

[1:00:27] Aside from being like malistic in its design where like people can't escape any of this shit.

[1:00:33] Like, it's just, there's just mean stuff that happens in it that for a light teen horror movie seems weird to me.

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:42] It's a movie that thinks that it's funny games every now and then when you're like, I want to see people get like their fingers cut off and stuff like that.

[1:00:49] I don't want to see them having to recognize that what crime their dad committed in the final moments before he committed suicide.

[1:00:55] Like, this is too much Blumhouse.

Stuart Wellington

[1:00:59] Yeah.

[1:01:00] And I mean, not to play Monday Morning Movie Maker again, the 4Ms.

[1:01:04] But, I mean, if you're making, once again, a novelty horror movie, people are coming in there to, it should be fun and it should be like gross and maybe a little scary.

[1:01:18] But it's not, it shouldn't be serious.

[1:01:19] It's not like people are like, oh, this is a serious examination of the way truths and dares affect us.

[1:01:25] Like, you should make the dare sequences super wacky and crazy and bloody.

[1:01:29] And then you should make the, like, make sure everybody has like really bitchy backstories so that when the truths come out, it just heightens everything else.

[1:01:37] And it shouldn't heighten them in a weird way like this where like, you feel, you shouldn't feel bad that, I don't know, you shouldn't feel bad that the character, that this is all happening to the characters.

[1:01:46] No.

[1:01:46] You should take some kind of pleasure that bad people have bad things happening to them.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:50] I feel like the tone, the tone should be closer to another Blumhouse film, Happy Death Day, which I enjoyed very much, which was another very gimmicky movie.

[1:01:58] But it was just fun.

[1:01:59] It was like a silly horror movie.

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:01] Now, not to play Kallax's advocate here, but isn't there something to be said for a movie that presents itself as if it's going to be a wacky romp, but then actually makes the audience question why they would go to see such a movie since it's not that fun to see people really being hurt emotionally?

Stuart Wellington

[1:02:19] Isn't there some, I mean, they don't do it well here.

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:21] I mean, you're describing funny games there.

Stuart Wellington

[1:02:23] Yeah, you're basically just saying like, that would be if I bought a ticket to see Blumhouse's Truth or Dare, and when I sat down, they just started playing funny games.

[1:02:34] I'm saying they don't do it well here.

[1:02:37] And there's a person standing at the front of the theater saying, I think this is the movie you really wanted to see.

[1:02:43] And then they turn into, I don't know, a bunch of critters and roll out of the theater.

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:49] Wow.

[1:02:50] That's an elaborate way to get out of a movie theater.

[1:02:54] I'm just saying, they don't do it well here, but there's something to really shocking an audience that way that would have been very memorable and very affecting.

[1:03:02] And I guess you're right.

[1:03:03] That's basically funny games, but still.

[1:03:06] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[1:03:07] But you also should make it shocking.

[1:03:09] Like there's no, other than this horrible reveal about a father's suicide, there's nothing else that's really shocking in the movie.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:17] Yeah, which is unearned and crass.

[1:03:19] I guess what I'm saying is, in a way, I'm kind of defending Mother, I guess, which was presented as if it was a creepy house and some strangers come in and cause trouble movie.

[1:03:28] But in actuality, it was something much more challenging and strange that made people really uncomfortable to the point that they got mad at it.

[1:03:35] But you're right.

[1:03:37] That's not what this movie is attempting to do.

[1:03:39] It's attempting to be a sleepover horror movie, and instead they're throwing in like really rough things that, in a tasteless way, you know, that are unearned.

[1:03:48] Yeah.

[1:03:49] Okay.

[1:03:49] So that's fair.

[1:03:50] You know what?

[1:03:50] I retract my case.

[1:03:52] You guys win.

[1:03:53] I accept the charges.

[1:03:55] Truth or dare, please.

[1:03:56] Take him away, boys.

[1:03:58] Take it to movie jail.

[1:03:59] Okay.

[1:04:00] So, Olivia discovers who the guy was who caused all this.

[1:04:04] It was Giselle's friend Sam, a.k.a.

[1:04:05] Carter, the creepy guy, who got them.

[1:04:08] They go to get Marky.

[1:04:10] Marky's just about to shoot herself.

[1:04:11] Oh, no.

[1:04:11] And Olivia talks her out of it because they love each other.

[1:04:14] They're best friends, as has been seen so many times throughout the movie.

[1:04:16] They're devoted to each other, and they really enjoy spending time together.

[1:04:19] They go to Sam's apartment where he has sequestered himself mainly by just covering the windows with tinfoil.

[1:04:24] I guess in case the sun tells him to truth or dare or the man in the moon starts talking to him.

[1:04:31] If he sees a cloud that looks like a smiley face.

[1:04:34] Yeah, Mac tonight is like, hey, everybody, have some burgers for dinner.

[1:04:37] Truth or dare.

[1:04:39] I dare you to eat a McDonald's hamburger.

[1:04:41] And he's like, no, no, it's made of worms.

[1:04:44] And they're like, please, worms would be too expensive.

[1:04:47] We get cheaper stuff to make our burgers out of.

Dan McCoy

[1:04:50] Yeah, this is one of the places where I'm like, I'm clear about the rules.

[1:04:53] Because I'm like, really, can you really avoid getting dared by sequestering yourself like this?

[1:04:57] Because like before people's truth or dare would get like burned into their arms, the words truth or dare.

[1:05:03] So it doesn't seem like this should be effective.

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:04] Yeah, maybe when that happened, if that happened to him, he'd be like, hell yeah.

[1:05:09] I've been meaning to get this ink done.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:12] It's also, this led me to one of those things where I'm-

[1:05:14] And then he took a quick Instagram of it and posted it.

[1:05:18] It's one of those movies too-

[1:05:19] Hashtag Inktober.

[1:05:20] This is a demon from Mexico.

[1:05:22] I mean, the demons are from hell.

[1:05:23] They're not from Mexico.

[1:05:24] But it's one of those things where I always wonder if demons just speak every language automatically.

[1:05:29] Because what if it was like truth or dare to someone who didn't speak English and they're like, no se, okay?

[1:05:34] No se?

[1:05:35] Truth or dare?

[1:05:37] No, I don't, no, no, no.

[1:05:38] And like, no, and they-

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:40] Elliot's bit requires you to understand he's shrugging.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:43] Okay, yeah.

[1:05:43] So what is, like, what does the demon do in that scenario?

[1:05:46] Does he give up?

[1:05:47] Or does the demon go get Rosetta Stone and learn the language that he needs to speak?

[1:05:51] Like what?

[1:05:51] I'm glad that this all-powerful demon is limited in that specific capacity, Elliot.

[1:05:56] I'm just wondering, it seems unrealistic to me that this demon suddenly speaks every single language.

[1:06:01] Like, what about Basque?

[1:06:03] Nobody speaks Basque.

[1:06:04] What about Magyar?

[1:06:05] It's a very difficult language.

Stuart Wellington

[1:06:08] Yeah, what if a person only was raised in like a weird, like, dog tooth scenario?

[1:06:13] Yeah, exactly.

[1:06:14] And only reads wingdings?

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:18] What a cruel trick to play on a child to teach them wingdings like it was the alphabet.

Dan McCoy

[1:06:24] Now, how do you pronounce wingdings?

[1:06:26] Oh, Dan.

[1:06:27] Okay.

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:29] I mean, to be honest, Dan, the sounds that are attributed to letters are arbitrary.

[1:06:34] You know.

[1:06:34] All right, sure.

[1:06:35] We invented that.

[1:06:36] It's not like an L naturally makes that sound.

[1:06:38] Like, somebody made that decision.

[1:06:41] You mean they're not all onomatopoeias?

[1:06:43] But even an onomatopoeia is made of letters that are sound-

[1:06:46] Oh, boy.

[1:06:46] Never mind.

[1:06:47] Okay, so.

[1:06:49] They go to his apartment and they beat him up until he-

[1:06:52] And take him at gunpoint to the church.

[1:06:54] They make him repeat the magic spell and the church starts shaking.

[1:06:58] Ah!

[1:06:58] It's like a love shack when they're dancing in it.

[1:07:00] Like, and the whole place starts shaking.

[1:07:02] So, Lucas gets dared to kill either Olivia or Marky.

[1:07:06] And he won't do it.

[1:07:07] So, he gets possessed and then stabs Sam as Sam is saying the spells.

[1:07:12] And then himself.

[1:07:13] Sam didn't finish cutting his own tongue out.

[1:07:15] There's a moment where Olivia's like, okay, Sam.

[1:07:17] This is the hard part.

[1:07:18] I need you to cut your own tongue out and put it in this jar.

[1:07:20] And he's like, what?

[1:07:21] And she's like, do it.

[1:07:22] And it takes two or three back and forth.

[1:07:24] And he's finally like, I can't believe I'm doing this.

[1:07:26] And takes a knife and starts cutting at his tongue.

[1:07:28] And it's the fact that he takes the moment to say, I can't believe I'm doing this.

Stuart Wellington

[1:07:32] Yeah, he's like, long time reader, first time cutter.

Elliott Kalan

[1:07:36] That's what people say when it's like, I need you to go out there.

[1:07:40] The rock star who's supposed to be here tonight, they're not here.

[1:07:43] I need you to put on their costume and makeup and put on a show for these people.

[1:07:46] I can't believe I'm doing this, but okay.

[1:07:49] Like, for that, but instead he's cutting out.

Stuart Wellington

[1:07:50] Jean-Claude Van Damme, the only way you can stop these terrorists is by playing goalie in this hockey match.

[1:07:56] This is another part where I'm like, I'm not really clear on the rules of this game.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:02] Because you say the demon is adhering to the rules, but apparently just because the demon has possessed Lucas,

[1:08:11] that means that he can take a little moment to kill Sam before he kills himself.

[1:08:14] Yeah.

[1:08:15] Which seems unfair to me.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:16] I mean, demons do cheat.

[1:08:18] It's one of those things where like, they're like, those stories where it's like, Satan is the lord of lies.

[1:08:23] You have to beat him by his own rules.

[1:08:25] And then Satan's like, ah, you got me.

[1:08:27] But it's like, if he's the lord of lies, he could just do whatever.

[1:08:29] Like, why does he care about not breaking rules?

[1:08:31] Like, who's the Satan police that's going to put him in jail for this?

[1:08:36] Like, are you going to sue him?

[1:08:37] John Constantine.

[1:08:40] Satan police.

[1:08:41] Yeah, the Hellblazer.

[1:08:43] So, it's too late.

[1:08:44] Ah, Sam didn't finish it.

[1:08:45] It's Marky's turn.

[1:08:47] And Olivia tells her, pick dare, pick dare.

[1:08:49] And she's like, if you trust me, pick dare.

[1:08:51] The dare is to shoot Olivia.

[1:08:53] And Olivia's big plan is to move slightly so that she gets shot in the arm.

[1:08:58] Yeah, yeah.

[1:08:59] She, she matrixes out of the way.

[1:09:00] And now it's Olivia's turn.

[1:09:02] And Olivia goes, Calyx, I truth or dare you.

[1:09:05] And the demon is like, oh, what?

[1:09:07] And he goes, you're here.

[1:09:08] I'm going to make you part of the game.

[1:09:10] And this is, this should be a very stupid loophole that she uses to stop him.

[1:09:15] But instead, Calyx goes, no.

[1:09:18] She goes, oh, she goes, she goes, Calyx goes, okay, truth.

[1:09:20] And she goes, tell us how to survive the game, how to win it.

[1:09:23] And he goes, you can't.

[1:09:25] It's like, okay, I guess you're being truthful.

[1:09:27] But like, what was the point of that whole scene?

[1:09:29] It was almost like somebody wrote a version of the script.

[1:09:33] And they were like, this is a clever way to get out of this.

[1:09:35] I'll have them make Calyx play truth or dare and tell them how to defeat him.

[1:09:38] But then another screenwriter came on and was like, nah, we're not doing that.

[1:09:41] But they left the scene in.

[1:09:42] So they just had Calyx go like, you can't, everybody dies.

[1:09:45] And so there's only one way to do this.

[1:09:48] To save Marky, Olivia sends out a web video.

[1:09:51] We saw her earlier recording a web video about how important it is to do Habitat for Humanity stuff.

[1:09:56] Because she was working for a different devil, Jimmy Carter.

[1:10:00] But this time, she sends out a web video telling their story.

[1:10:05] And she says, everyone who sees this video, truth or dare.

[1:10:09] Ah, it goes viral.

[1:10:10] We see people all over the world watching this video.

[1:10:12] And now they're all playing the game.

[1:10:14] And suddenly, someone goes smiley.

[1:10:17] And the game is spread.

[1:10:18] It's the exact same ending as the movie rings.

[1:10:21] The exact same ending.

[1:10:24] So, guys.

[1:10:25] Dan, Stuart, tell me about your thoughts about the ending.

Stuart Wellington

[1:10:29] I can't wait for Truth or Double Dare, where it's set in like a post-apocalyptic wasteland,

[1:10:34] where civilization has been destroyed by Calyx's Truth or Dare game.

[1:10:37] Yeah.

[1:10:38] And there's small disparate groups of survivors that, I don't know, live in houses that are all,

[1:10:44] with all the windows taped up.

[1:10:45] So, they can't see Mac tonight, Truth or Dare, even.

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:48] Or there's one city left that's run by, like, the President of Calyx or something.

[1:10:53] The United States of Calyx.

[1:10:54] And they have a sacrifice every night of someone who's going to play the game.

[1:10:57] Oh, yeah.

[1:10:58] That's better than my idea.

[1:10:59] And there's a crowd of people chanting, Truth or Dare.

[1:11:02] Truth or Dare.

[1:11:03] That kind of stuff.

[1:11:04] So, guys.

[1:11:04] This is a pretty smart ending, right?

[1:11:06] And Mark Summers will play the President of Calyx.

[1:11:09] Oh, yeah.

[1:11:09] Mark Summers plays the, and he goes, Physical challenge.

[1:11:13] Ah!

[1:11:15] So, and as we've seen, so Olivia has failed.

[1:11:18] Earlier, she said, of course I would sacrifice my friends to save everyone in Mexico.

[1:11:22] But now she's failed that challenge.

[1:11:24] And she sacrificed everyone on Earth to save Marky, of all people.

[1:11:29] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:11:30] So, the thought here is that it's just creating such a big pool of players that it's going to take forever for the turn to come back around to her, I guess.

[1:11:40] Yes.

[1:11:41] Yeah.

[1:11:41] That's the thinking.

[1:11:42] Just to clarify the stupidness of this.

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:46] I mean, frankly, it is the way to win that game in a way.

[1:11:49] Yes.

[1:11:50] Because it's much the way that health insurance works, where you spread out the risk, the financial risk, over lots and lots of people.

[1:11:56] So that when someone needs catastrophic help, the money is there.

[1:11:59] Except, in this way, it's guaranteed that someone's going to, like, it's like every now and then someone just lights somebody else on fire from a dare.

[1:12:05] Because they're still playing two truths and a dare.

[1:12:07] Somebody somewhere is going to get dare.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:10] But think of all the good that'll come from, you know, society having to reveal their truths.

[1:12:16] Yeah, that's fair.

[1:12:17] Right, guys?

Dan McCoy

[1:12:19] Sure.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:21] Dan, why is your face morphing into a weird smile face?

[1:12:25] Truth or dare, Stu.

[1:12:27] Oh, and the great, so there's a song that plays over the credits that's wacky and talks about silk panties at auntie's house or something.

[1:12:35] And then the end of the, the very end of the movie, as right before the whole thing cuts to black, we hear Calyx's voice one more time say,

[1:12:43] truth or dare, demonic laughter.

[1:12:46] Now it says demonic laughter?

[1:12:48] I mean, it said it in the closed captioning.

[1:12:50] Oh, I see.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:52] Now let me say this about this movie, guys.

[1:12:54] I will say this.

[1:12:56] Except for the moments where the characters revealed uncomfortable things to each other that were unearned, this movie is dull, but it goes down smooth.

[1:13:03] I didn't have to think very much, and I was kind of surprised.

[1:13:07] Usually I'm like, oh, it's taking forever.

[1:13:08] But this movie, I was like, oh, this movie seems to go by pretty fast.

[1:13:11] Not because it's good, but it just slips by.

Dan McCoy

[1:13:14] Well, we're in final judgments territory, so let's just make it official.

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:17] Is this totally terrifying?

[1:13:20] Sorry, we're in final judgments territory.

[1:13:22] We've got to walk softly or else the final judgment will find us.

Dan McCoy

[1:13:27] Where we decide whether this movie was totally scarifying, totally snorifying, or frighteningly funny.

[1:13:33] Oh, you remembered them.

[1:13:35] Etched into my brains, too.

[1:13:38] And so it sounds like you're saying, Elliot, that it was snorifying, but you did not snore.

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:44] It was totally snorifying, but it wasn't snorifying to the point where I was like, ugh.

[1:13:48] Instead it was just like, okay, this is happening.

[1:13:51] It was so like, it felt, aside from the fact that there was, I think, swearing sometimes.

[1:13:56] Maybe there even wasn't.

[1:13:57] It felt like a TV movie, to be honest, to me.

[1:14:00] And so it had that kind of like, there's something about a TV movie where no matter how dumb it is, you're like, okay, whatever.

[1:14:06] Like, you're just watching it, you know.

[1:14:08] And this is what that felt like to me.

Dan McCoy

[1:14:10] Yeah, I had the same experience as you.

[1:14:13] I think it was not a good movie, but it went down smooth, as you say.

[1:14:18] Like, it was stupid, but I felt like it moved along quickly, and I was, I hesitate to say entertained, but I was diverted.

[1:14:28] Like, I didn't lose track of what was going on or want to fall asleep or any of that stuff that sometimes happens when I'm watching a truly bad film.

Stuart Wellington

[1:14:37] I, yeah, I mean, I'm with you guys.

[1:14:39] It's snorifying with light on the snores.

[1:14:43] It, unlike the last movie we watched where every, let's say, two minutes, I was checking to see how much time was left in the movie.

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:53] That's because it was presenting you with unholy visions no man should ever lay eyes upon.

Stuart Wellington

[1:15:00] Yeah, this one, this one moved along in a pretty good clip.

[1:15:04] And despite the, the early death of my boy Ron Ron, and the, the bet money I had to pay you guys that I thought he was going to be the one survivor.

[1:15:16] Other than that, uh, yeah, it was fine.

Dan McCoy

[1:15:24] I listen to reading glasses because Bria and Mallory have great tips.

[1:15:28] My suggestion for book festivals is just go for one day.

Stuart Wellington

[1:15:31] I listen for the author interviews.

Dan McCoy

[1:15:33] I was a huge Goosebumps fan.

[1:15:36] Oh, yes.

[1:15:38] R.L. Stine was totally my jam.

[1:15:41] I don't even read. I just like their chemistry together.

Elliott Kalan

[1:15:43] Literally, if on the back it said, like, this book made me shit my pants, I'd be like, that's, I'm buying this book.

[1:15:47] Like, like, I think the problem with blurbs a lot of times.

[1:15:50] I like that we both want to crap ourselves over books.

[1:15:53] I'm Bria Grant.

[1:15:54] And I'm Mallory O'Meara.

Dan McCoy

[1:15:55] We're reading glasses and we solve all your bookish problems every Thursday on Maximum Fun.

S4

[1:16:02] Shirts, stickers, patches, posters, tote bags, aprons.

[1:16:06] Sure, you might have some of these things already, but do they rep your favorite MaxFun shows?

[1:16:11] We've got brand new items in stock at MaxFunStore.com.

[1:16:15] So why not stock up on gear that shows off the podcasts you love?

[1:16:19] MaxFunStore.com.

[1:16:20] It's good stuff.

[1:16:22] We swear.

Dan McCoy

[1:16:25] So we should move on, though, to our sponsors, our beloved sponsors.

Elliott Kalan

[1:16:30] We do beloved them.

[1:16:31] Yeah.

[1:16:32] Our first sponsor is the movie and book Beloved.

[1:16:35] Tony Morrison's Immortal Story.

Dan McCoy

[1:16:38] No, our first sponsor is ZipRecruiter.

[1:16:43] ZipRecruiter sends you to, sends your job to over 100 of the web's leading job boards.

[1:16:49] My job?

[1:16:51] Your job?

[1:16:52] Yeah.

[1:16:52] I'm sorry, Stu, that you, we didn't tell you.

[1:16:54] You're getting let go.

Stuart Wellington

[1:16:56] I mean, I should have seen the writing on the wall and said, truth or dare.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:02] But ZipRecruiter doesn't stop there.

[1:17:04] With their powerful recruiting matching technology, ZipRecruiter scans thousands of resumes.

[1:17:10] And resumes.

[1:17:11] Sure.

[1:17:11] To find people with the right experience and invite them to apply to your job.

[1:17:17] ZipRecruiter is so effective that 80% of employers who post on ZipRecruiter get a quality candidate through the site within the first day.

[1:17:26] And right now, our listeners can try ZipRecruiter for free at this exclusive web address, ziprecruiter.com slash flophouse.

[1:17:35] That's ziprecruiter.com slash flophouse.

[1:17:38] ZipRecruiter, the smartest way to hire.

Stuart Wellington

[1:17:43] Yeah, we did it.

[1:17:45] Yeah.

[1:17:46] So do I just pack my stuff up?

[1:17:49] Are you going to mail it to me?

Dan McCoy

[1:17:50] No, we're going to have security escort you out, I'm afraid.

Stuart Wellington

[1:17:53] Okay, that's cool.

[1:17:55] Okay, Archie, Sergeant Archie, the police cat.

[1:17:59] You don't have to touch me.

[1:18:01] I'll go on my own.

[1:18:03] Stop touching me.

Elliott Kalan

[1:18:04] Ow!

[1:18:05] Ow!

[1:18:05] Come on, Stuart.

[1:18:06] Keep it meowing.

[1:18:07] Keep meowing along.

Dan McCoy

[1:18:11] But we also, thank you for ZipRecruiter.

[1:18:13] We also are sponsored in part by Squarespace.

[1:18:17] Squarespace.

[1:18:18] It's the web design service that allows you to turn your cool idea into a new website to showcase your work.

[1:18:25] Or perhaps announce an upcoming event or special project.

[1:18:29] Or use its powerful e-commerce functionality to sell anything online.

Elliott Kalan

[1:18:33] Hey, Dan, that reminds me.

[1:18:34] So e-commerce functionality, I had an idea for a website that I came up with while we were talking on the show.

[1:18:40] I was talking about a couple of different role-playing games, and they reminded me that I have a business I've been thinking about.

[1:18:45] And so I wanted to start a site called www.dungenessanddiapers.com, and we sell diapers for crabs.

[1:18:52] Let's just be honest.

[1:18:52] Okay.

[1:18:53] If you have a pet crab, and I know I do, crabs poop everywhere.

[1:18:56] Very hard to potty train them.

[1:18:58] They can't use the toilet because they'll fall in and drown.

[1:19:01] Crabs hate water.

Stuart Wellington

[1:19:02] Yeah.

[1:19:02] Every time I try to teach my crab the difference between just pooping all over the place or pooping in a toilet, it just looks at me with that terrifying set of eyes and mouth.

Elliott Kalan

[1:19:11] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:19:12] With those beady little eyes and that mouth that shouldn't exist.

[1:19:15] It looks so weird.

[1:19:15] Yeah.

[1:19:16] A blank stare that says, if I was small enough, it would just devour me.

[1:19:21] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:19:22] And so crabs already have diapers.

[1:19:25] They're called shells.

[1:19:26] But those diapers protect their body.

[1:19:27] It's time for a diaper that protects your carpet from the poop that comes out of a crab.

[1:19:31] So this would be a crab-sized and shaped diaper.

[1:19:35] We have both disposable and reusable.

[1:19:38] And they'd be available on dungenessanddiapers.com.

[1:19:42] They aren't just for dungeness crabs, Alaskan King, Alt Fiddler, Alt Hermit, all those kinds you can get diapers for.

[1:19:50] The Hermit crab already has a shell on its back, so it kind of poops into that.

[1:19:53] You just need to take it out, clean the poop out every now and then.

[1:19:55] It's not as much of a worry, but you can still get a diaper.

[1:19:57] They look adorable.

[1:19:58] There's a lot of different designs.

[1:19:59] And I was wondering if Squarespace would be able to help me with that site with selling these diapers for crabs.

Dan McCoy

[1:20:05] It certainly can.

[1:20:06] Because Squarespace helps you by giving you beautiful templates created by world-class designers, free and secure hosting, and nothing to patch or upgrade ever.

[1:20:18] Ever, Elliot.

Elliott Kalan

[1:20:19] So I don't – hold on.

[1:20:21] Let me get this straight.

[1:20:21] No patches and no upgrades because I do have to patch the diapers sometime because crab bodies are very sharp.

[1:20:27] And they will poke through those diapers.

[1:20:29] And so I'm trying to find a way to get better patches for them.

Stuart Wellington

[1:20:33] Now, Elliot, are you nervous about the competition you're going to be having with crab, crab, caps?

[1:20:38] The place where you put caps on all the crab crap?

Elliott Kalan

[1:20:41] Yeah.

[1:20:42] That's – I mean we're hoping that we can maybe coexist in the same ecosystem much the same way that many different types of crab will share an ocean.

[1:20:51] But that's always a question.

[1:20:52] That's always a thing.

[1:20:53] I mean I think what sets us apart, and I think you guys have guessed it already, our diapers have six holes for all the legs.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:02] Oh, that is good.

[1:21:03] As I mentioned, Andy Capp's crab caps.

[1:21:09] It has the powerful branding of Andy Capp.

[1:21:13] You might know him from his hot thighs.

Elliott Kalan

[1:21:16] Well, we've been trying to get a Brenda Starr endorsement to make it Brenda Starr's crab diapers.

[1:21:22] But it's been difficult.

[1:21:23] It's been very difficult.

[1:21:24] The Brenda Starr people do not want to play ball.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:26] And people assume Starr is starfish, you know, like –

[1:21:28] Exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[1:21:29] It's not a crab.

[1:21:30] I'm sorry, guys.

[1:21:31] For that, you have to go to – you've got to go to Starrponds who make tampons for sea stars.

[1:21:36] But anyway, Dan, I'm sorry.

[1:21:38] You were talking about Squarespace.

Dan McCoy

[1:21:40] Well, the one thing I wanted to say to end this baton death march of an advertisement is to go to squarespace.com slash flop for a free trial.

[1:21:51] And when you're ready to launch, use the offer code flop to save 10% off of your first purchase of a website or domain.

[1:22:00] So that's all we have in terms of sponsors this week.

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:04] Cool.

[1:22:04] Oh, wait.

[1:22:04] But we've got a couple things that we should talk about that we're sponsoring ourselves.

[1:22:09] All right.

[1:22:09] So we've got two live shows coming up.

[1:22:12] Oh, yeah.

[1:22:13] One in November.

[1:22:14] That's right.

[1:22:14] It's Old Homes Week as Dan and Stu return to the place where they went from boys to men.

[1:22:20] Motown Philly.

[1:22:22] Nope.

[1:22:22] Just kidding.

[1:22:23] Richmond, Indiana, where we're going to be at Earlham College Saturday, November 3rd.

[1:22:27] It's part of their artist lecture series.

[1:22:30] We're just going to be – but we're not lecturing.

[1:22:31] We're just doing a show.

[1:22:32] And we're going to talk about Jurassic World's Fallen Kingdom.

[1:22:35] And it's going to be super fun.

Stuart Wellington

[1:22:38] We're not going to be the only dinosaurs.

[1:22:41] Oh.

[1:22:42] Oh.

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:44] And now you guys are going to show up wearing your like straw boaters, raccoon coats, your

[1:22:48] little pennants that say Earlham, all that stuff.

Stuart Wellington

[1:22:51] I mean, I think our friend Stefan dresses like that normally.

Dan McCoy

[1:22:54] Yeah, it's true.

[1:22:56] That's a joke for no one who listens to the show.

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:59] Us.

[1:23:00] So if you live in the Indiana area, come on by and see us.

[1:23:02] That's Saturday, November 3rd.

[1:23:03] But then in January, oh boy, we're going to be at University of Wisconsin-Madison.

[1:23:09] Let's go, Badgers, and see us.

[1:23:11] January 26th, 2019.

[1:23:13] We don't know what movie we're going to do yet.

[1:23:14] We haven't decided.

[1:23:15] It's far enough in advance.

[1:23:16] So let's just say it's going to be really funny.

[1:23:18] And everybody should come see us.

[1:23:19] Right, guys?

Dan McCoy

[1:23:20] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:23:21] I'm all for that.

Elliott Kalan

[1:23:23] And I got one more thing to mention, just a personal thing.

[1:23:27] It's Shocktober, guys.

[1:23:28] And you know what people love in Shocktober?

[1:23:30] Children's books.

[1:23:31] Hey!

[1:23:32] So on Shocktober 30th, why don't you go down to your local independent bookstore and pick

[1:23:35] up Horse Meets Dog by me, Ellie Kalen, and illustrated by Tim Miller.

[1:23:39] It's the story of a horse and a dog, and they meet, and they do not agree on something.

[1:23:42] It's pretty funny.

[1:23:44] And I'm going to be doing a bunch of live appearances at schools in early November.

[1:23:50] I would advertise them, but it would be weird for Flophouse fans to just suddenly show up

[1:23:55] at schools.

[1:23:55] But I'm going to see if I have any store appearances, and maybe I'll mention them next time on the

[1:24:00] Flophouse.

[1:24:00] Good night, everybody.

Dan McCoy

[1:24:02] Okay, bye.

[1:24:03] Okay, well, I guess the show's over.

[1:24:06] I mean, just because Ellie left, we can still talk to him.

[1:24:08] What's new with you, Baby Blue?

[1:24:10] Baby?

[1:24:11] Do you call me Baby Blue?

Stuart Wellington

[1:24:12] Yeah, I call you Baby Blue.

[1:24:14] I don't know.

[1:24:16] I'm just trying to come up with material, you know?

[1:24:19] I'm just trying to come up with, like, stuff.

Dan McCoy

[1:24:22] Yeah, stuff to talk about.

Stuart Wellington

[1:24:24] Yeah.

[1:24:25] So, what do we do next on the show, Dan?

Dan McCoy

[1:24:29] Traditionally, this is the point in the show where we answer a few letters from listeners,

[1:24:34] folks who have taken their sweet time to write in.

[1:24:37] And I don't say taking their sweet time in the sense they took a long time.

[1:24:40] That's certainly what it sounded like you were saying.

[1:24:42] Their time is sweet.

[1:24:44] Oh, okay.

[1:24:45] You know, it's...

[1:24:46] It's limited.

[1:24:47] It's limited on this earth.

[1:24:48] Yeah.

[1:24:48] So, each moment is sweet.

[1:24:49] And they have wasted some of it talking to us.

[1:24:52] Yeah.

[1:24:53] So, anyway.

[1:24:55] That clarification having been made, I'll move on to the letters.

Elliott Kalan

[1:25:02] Nice save.

[1:25:03] Nice save.

[1:25:04] It's like, I don't want it to sound like they are lazy.

[1:25:06] So, instead, I'll remind them that they're dying.

Dan McCoy

[1:25:11] Yeah.

[1:25:12] This first letter is from Amy, last name withheld.

[1:25:15] Adams.

[1:25:15] Winehouse.

[1:25:17] Who writes...

[1:25:18] That is spooky.

[1:25:20] So, as a child, my favorite movie was Napoleon.

[1:25:24] A charming little number about a puppy walking through the Australian outback and meeting a

[1:25:28] cast of various wild animals.

[1:25:30] It was super charming and everything child me loved.

[1:25:34] The problem is, anytime I brought it up by name, people assumed I meant Napoleon Dynamite.

[1:25:40] Mm-hmm.

[1:25:40] A movie that, frankly, I've never really understood the appeal of.

[1:25:43] My question is this.

[1:25:45] Not that many animals.

[1:25:46] Are there any movies you like but have difficulty expressing fondness for because they're overshadowed

[1:25:51] in some way by a better known movie?

[1:25:53] That's Amy, last name withheld.

Elliott Kalan

[1:25:55] I will say this, Amy, I thought you meant Napoleon by Abel Gantz, the silent epic about

[1:26:00] the life of Napoleon.

[1:26:01] I was like, this kid has some, like, pretty high-grow tastes.

[1:26:05] Like, I'm impressed.

[1:26:06] Mm-hmm.

[1:26:06] And you were like, that movie has so many animals.

Stuart Wellington

[1:26:10] Yeah, there's tons of animals.

[1:26:11] I feel like that's a dangerous thing to get a kid excited about is wandering the Australian

[1:26:16] outback meeting animals.

[1:26:18] A land known for having deadly critters.

[1:26:20] Yeah.

[1:26:20] Not critters from outer space.

[1:26:22] No, no, no.

[1:26:23] Just real animals.

[1:26:23] Well, they're not crites.

[1:26:24] Yeah, crites.

Elliott Kalan

[1:26:26] Now, my brother, I remember him coming home from school one day.

[1:26:29] This is my brother who's three and a half years younger than me.

[1:26:30] And they had watched some of Walkabout in a class, which is also about wandering the Australian.

[1:26:35] And I was like, and he was describing this movie to me.

[1:26:37] And I was like, this sounds crazy.

[1:26:38] Did you make this up?

[1:26:39] He's like, this guy takes his kids out to the desert and then he tries to kill them

[1:26:43] and then he kills himself.

[1:26:44] And this other kid is walking around with them and they didn't have any clothes on.

[1:26:48] And I was like, there's no way they showed you this.

[1:26:49] And then years later I saw Walkabout and I was like, why was he watching this at school?

[1:26:53] This is crazy.

Dan McCoy

[1:26:53] They're showing like, there's like an extended nude swimming scene in Walkabout.

[1:26:57] Did they watch the whole fucking thing?

Elliott Kalan

[1:26:59] Featuring the mother superior from Call the Midwife of all people.

[1:27:04] It's insane.

Dan McCoy

[1:27:06] Stuart pretending to know what you guys are talking about.

[1:27:09] I like to think of her more as the love interest from American Werewolf in London, but yes.

[1:27:14] Is that the same person?

[1:27:16] Didn't I got her?

[1:27:17] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:27:18] Oh, I didn't realize that was her in American Werewolf in London.

Dan McCoy

[1:27:21] Yeah.

[1:27:22] So we all learned something today.

[1:27:23] I hope that answers your question.

Elliott Kalan

[1:27:25] Answering Amy's question.

Stuart Wellington

[1:27:27] Have you guys had that situation?

[1:27:28] This isn't exactly the same, but like anytime I am telling somebody about how much I like the British comedy show, The League of Gentlemen, people are like, oh, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen.

[1:27:41] And I'm like, no, not the movie, although the comic book's pretty good.

[1:27:46] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:27:47] I don't think I've actually like had this experience in conversation, but I always do get annoyed when a movie has the same title as a previous movie that I've liked.

[1:27:58] Just anticipating the possible annoyance of it.

[1:28:02] Yeah.

[1:28:02] Like when that Will Ferrell soccer comedy.

Elliott Kalan

[1:28:09] When Crash came out, you were like, this movie's not supposed to be about racism.

[1:28:12] It's supposed to be about people orgasming during car crashes.

[1:28:15] How dare they?

Dan McCoy

[1:28:17] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:28:18] No, I was going to say, you know, there's that Noah Baumbach movie, Kicking and Screaming, comedy about college students like kind of not knowing what they're going to do.

Stuart Wellington

[1:28:28] I feel like comedy is being too nice to them.

Dan McCoy

[1:28:30] I find that movie very funny, actually.

[1:28:31] But then there's a Will Ferrell family, quote unquote, comedy, where I will not use the word comedy for that movie about being a soccer coach.

[1:28:45] And it's also called Kicking and Screaming.

[1:28:48] One of them has an ampersand, one of them does not.

[1:28:50] But you can't make that clarification in the course of talking.

Elliott Kalan

[1:28:54] Do you say Kicking and Screaming, you sound like a jerk.

Stuart Wellington

[1:28:56] Sorry, Stuart, what you were saying.

[1:28:57] Yeah, you think Ladybugs with Ronnie Dangerfield and Jonathan Brandis was originally called Kicking and Screaming?

[1:29:04] I have to assume so.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:05] Well, that eliminates the entire cross-dressing portion of the movie.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:09] Yeah, what about She's the Man Starring Amanda Bynes?

[1:29:12] Was that originally called Kicking and Screaming?

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:14] What about First Kid?

[1:29:15] Was that originally called Kicking and Screaming?

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:19] Dan was First Kid originally called Kicking and Screaming?

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:23] Yes.

[1:29:23] I mean, to be fair, the Karate Kid could have been called Kicking and Screaming.

[1:29:27] He kicks and he screams.

[1:29:28] Guys, is every movie called Kicking and Screaming?

[1:29:31] I think they might be.

[1:29:34] Except Sidekicks, ironically, with Chuck Norris and Jonathan Brandis.

[1:29:37] Back to Jonathan Brandis again.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:39] So the next letter is from Taylor, last name withheld.

[1:29:43] Swift.

[1:29:44] Who writes...

[1:29:44] Splift?

[1:29:46] Who has...

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:47] Wait, is that the High Times parody of Taylor Swift?

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:50] I think I stole that joke from The Good Place, actually.

[1:29:54] So I guess I'll give them 10 cents.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:58] So this Taylor has four questions.

[1:30:01] They're all sort of related.

[1:30:04] Number one, why don't you talk about Terry Garr more often?

[1:30:08] Number two, what are your picks for Terry Garr's best and worst movies?

[1:30:12] Number three, who was the best reoccurring guest on Letterman in the 80s?

[1:30:16] That's a rhetorical question.

[1:30:17] It was Terry Garr.

[1:30:18] Number four, is Dan's whole mildly depressed, exasperated manager shtick really just a brilliant

[1:30:23] long-form homage to Dave Foley's performance as Dave Nelson in News Radio?

[1:30:27] Thanks for all the laughs.

[1:30:29] Taylor.

[1:30:30] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[1:30:31] We got a lot of meat in that sandwich.

[1:30:33] So let's start chewing.

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:34] Terry Garr is, I think, officially retired.

[1:30:37] So that's one of the reasons I think we don't talk about her that much.

[1:30:39] She's great.

[1:30:40] I love her.

[1:30:41] She's wonderful.

Stuart Wellington

[1:30:43] Did somebody pull up her complete filmography so we can rate them from best to

[1:30:48] second best?

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:49] I've decided that her...

Stuart Wellington

[1:30:50] I don't mean to say that as in she's only been in two movies.

[1:30:53] I'm just saying they're all probably pretty good.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:55] I've decided her worst performance is in Aloha Scooby-Doo.

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:59] Oh, okay.

[1:31:00] Okay, Dan, truth or dare?

[1:31:02] Did you really see Aloha Scooby-Doo?

Dan McCoy

[1:31:04] No, I've never seen Aloha Scooby-Doo.

Stuart Wellington

[1:31:07] Oh, the truth comes out.

[1:31:08] This game is good.

Dan McCoy

[1:31:09] Everything I've seen Terry Garr in, she's been delightful.

[1:31:12] So I had to look on IMDb for something that I would assume was not so pleasant to watch.

Stuart Wellington

[1:31:16] I think the movie with Terry Garr that I have seen the most is Mr. Mom.

[1:31:23] Okay.

[1:31:25] A movie that, for whatever reason, is very important to me.

[1:31:28] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:28] That is a movie that...

[1:31:29] Well, as a father.

[1:31:31] As a father yourself, Stuart.

[1:31:33] Yeah, as a real-life Mr. Mom.

Stuart Wellington

[1:31:35] That's one of those movies that...

[1:31:37] It does make me view washing machines as a potential foe.

[1:31:42] That's why my clothes are always dirty.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:48] For her best movie, she's not the star of it, but if you're just looking at movies,

[1:31:52] I think her best movie has probably got to be The Conversation,

[1:31:55] and she does a lot with a supporting part in that.

[1:32:00] And her worst performance is probably as a Gar or a Gariel,

[1:32:06] which is kind of a thin-snouted crocodilian native to the subcontinent of India.

[1:32:12] And whenever I see them at the zoo, they're just laying about doing a lot of nothing,

[1:32:16] and they look super cool, so they should be doing fun stuff.

Stuart Wellington

[1:32:20] Yeah.

[1:32:20] They have those long needle knight-like snouts, right?

[1:32:23] Exactly, yeah.

[1:32:24] Perfect for digging into the body of a dead...

[1:32:27] I don't know, like...

[1:32:29] Elk?

[1:32:31] Yeah, yeah, probably.

Elliott Kalan

[1:32:33] Yeah, like a reindeer, maybe a...

[1:32:35] Yeah.

[1:32:37] Yeah, maybe a buffalo.

Dan McCoy

[1:32:39] I can't let this go by without mentioning, of course, she was great in Young Frankenstein.

[1:32:45] I don't know if I've seen that movie.

[1:32:46] Really?

[1:32:47] Not familiar.

[1:32:47] I'm fucking with you.

[1:32:48] I don't know.

Elliott Kalan

[1:32:49] She's not in Young Einstein.

[1:32:50] What are you talking about?

[1:32:51] That's a Yahoo series movie.

[1:32:53] Everyone's Australian.

Dan McCoy

[1:32:55] Fuck off, guys.

[1:32:56] And also, honorable mention...

Stuart Wellington

[1:32:59] Although, that was an easy way to get truth out of me, Dan, without even asking me truth

[1:33:03] or dare.

Dan McCoy

[1:33:03] She has a relatively small part in After Hours, which is also very good.

Elliott Kalan

[1:33:07] I thought you were going to mention After Hours.

[1:33:08] I also like that movie a lot.

[1:33:10] And I was like, hmm, what's the most stop-making sense-y of all the movies that Terry Garr made?

[1:33:15] After Hours.

Dan McCoy

[1:33:16] Oh, I love After Hours.

[1:33:17] It captures something about 1980s, the feel of...

[1:33:22] I mean, I wasn't in New York, but I just feel like I know it based on that movie.

[1:33:28] The feel is so great.

Elliott Kalan

[1:33:30] There's just one thing I don't like in that movie.

[1:33:32] It's when he's on his way to the date, and he takes out the $120 bill in his pocket and

[1:33:37] decides to put it on the armrest of the door inside the cab, and then it flies out the window.

[1:33:42] And he's like, oh, no, my money!

[1:33:43] And it's like, why would you do that, dude?

[1:33:45] Take it out of your pocket, count it, put it back in your pocket.

[1:33:47] Like, what are you doing?

[1:33:48] Come on.

Stuart Wellington

[1:33:50] I actually have never seen After Hours, so maybe I'll watch it.

Dan McCoy

[1:33:53] Oh, I think you'll like it a lot.

[1:33:54] It's a fun movie.

[1:33:56] And as to whether my persona is a brilliant tribute to Dave from NewsRadio...

[1:34:01] Yeah, truth or dare.

[1:34:02] Let's just say, sure.

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:05] Okay, cool.

[1:34:06] Let's say yes.

[1:34:06] Can you say that in truth or dare?

[1:34:08] Just sure?

[1:34:10] Sure.

[1:34:10] If it's truth or dare and the answer is, why not?

Dan McCoy

[1:34:12] Yeah, sure.

[1:34:15] Why not?

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:16] Now, this is a tribute to John Lovitz as the liar, right?

[1:34:20] Mm-hmm.

[1:34:21] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:34:25] This next is from Carrie or Kari.

[1:34:29] I'm sorry for not knowing exactly which one it is.

[1:34:34] But she writes...

[1:34:35] And this is late, too.

[1:34:37] By the time we give her this advice, it's not going to be worth anything to her, unfortunately.

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:43] Okay, so let's just move along with this question.

[1:34:45] Great, yeah.

[1:34:46] That's the Flophouse promise.

[1:34:47] It's like, can you wish a birthday for my friend?

[1:34:50] Their birthday was in July.

[1:34:51] Oh, it's February of the next year.

Dan McCoy

[1:34:56] So, Carrie or Kari writes, I just found out that I'm going to be directing my first feature film this summer.

[1:35:02] Oh, cool.

[1:35:02] Which is absolutely bonkers and I'm super excited.

[1:35:05] It's an indie production with a small cast and we have a pretty solid above-the-line crew lined up.

[1:35:10] My main concern is this.

[1:35:12] It's a comedy.

[1:35:14] While I'm a huge longtime fan of comedies of all sorts and I've been wanting to get involved in it for as long as I can remember,

[1:35:19] I've never actually worked on any sort of legitimate comedy projects.

[1:35:23] Do you have any advice for someone working on their first comedy?

[1:35:26] Such as what common mistakes can be avoided, how to dodge negative stereotypes, or any good reading material to study.

[1:35:32] Thanks for your help in the hours of entertainment.

[1:35:34] Carrie, a.k.a. Kari.

Stuart Wellington

[1:35:36] Yeah, you guys are both experienced directors of comedy.

[1:35:40] Oh, yeah.

[1:35:40] Work in feature films all the time.

[1:35:44] But seriously, you guys are actual comedians.

[1:35:47] So, what's your advice?

Dan McCoy

[1:35:49] Yeah, I figured Elliot would have some strong feelings about this.

[1:35:52] So, that's the main reason I bought this.

Elliott Kalan

[1:35:54] Oh, okay.

[1:35:55] I've got a couple pieces of advice I would give.

[1:35:58] Take them with a grain of salt because you need salt in your diet a certain amount.

[1:36:02] Too much is not good for you, obviously.

[1:36:04] Blood pressure and all that.

[1:36:05] You need a little bit of salt.

[1:36:06] That's why elephants are always going into caves and just licking salt blocks.

[1:36:09] You need it in your body.

[1:36:10] So, guys, that's my advice.

[1:36:12] Salt.

[1:36:14] Starring Angelina Jolie.

[1:36:16] I would say a few things.

[1:36:18] One is look at a comedy that you like and see how they do things and kind of take it apart.

[1:36:24] Look at it scene by scene.

[1:36:25] Look at it moment by moment.

[1:36:26] And just kind of analyze and study it the way you would analyze anything that you're trying to figure out.

[1:36:31] Like as if you're taking a clock apart.

[1:36:33] I do this a lot with stuff where I'll look at something and I will literally dissect it minute by minute to see how they're using their time and also moment by moment to see how scenes are built so I can get a better idea of how to do it.

[1:36:46] That being said, don't be a slave to any kind of like rules and things.

[1:36:51] You want to keep things loose and funny.

[1:36:54] If something doesn't seem funny to you when you're making it, it's probably not that funny.

[1:36:57] The thing you hear a lot about the movie 1941 is people being like, we had all these hilarious people working on it.

[1:37:03] No one really thought it was that funny while they were making it, but they figured it would all cut together funny in the studio or in the afterwards.

[1:37:09] It didn't.

[1:37:10] So if you don't find it funny, then like maybe figure out how you want to find it funny and keep things loose so that you can keep that kind of comic energy, but not so loose that you end up with a bunch of Judd Apatow scenes where it's just people rambling on about whatever.

[1:37:25] And it doesn't make sense from scene to scene as a movie.

[1:37:28] There was a story that was in an interview I read where Seth Rogen and Judd Apatow were talking about Knocked Up and Seth Rogen was saying how.

Stuart Wellington

[1:37:37] Is this the one where Seth Rogen was talking about explaining internet pornography to Tom Cruise?

[1:37:41] No, that's a different story.

Elliott Kalan

[1:37:44] That's a good story too.

[1:37:45] Is that Jonah Hill was like, so in this scene where I'm your best friend and you tell me that you just impregnated a woman, what's my feeling about this?

[1:37:53] How do I react to it?

[1:37:54] And he's like, let's try it both ways.

[1:37:55] Let's try it that you like it and let's try it that you don't like it.

[1:37:57] Let's just be loose with it.

[1:37:58] And it's like at that point, you don't really have a character or a scene, it seems to me.

[1:38:03] I could be wrong.

[1:38:03] It was a super successful movie.

[1:38:05] People love it.

[1:38:05] But like if you don't know how the main character's best friend is going to react to this life-changing news, then you might not have a firm grasp on what's going on in your movie.

[1:38:14] And the last thing I'm going to say is if you have any very elaborate big moments that require a lot of production, they will probably be the least funny part of your movie.

[1:38:25] I call this the Caddyshack rule.

[1:38:27] Now, do I love Caddyshack?

[1:38:29] No.

[1:38:30] To be honest, it just doesn't really do it for me.

[1:38:32] But there are parts of it that are fun.

[1:38:33] I find Caddyshack to be the story of a bunch of assholes who just asshole around being jerks.

[1:38:38] And it doesn't really do it for me.

[1:38:39] But the funniest parts of Caddyshack are very clearly the parts that Bill Murray made up on the spot.

[1:38:45] And the least funny part of Caddyshack is the big boat scene where the boats are all crashing into each other, which I have to assume was the hardest scene to shoot at the production.

[1:38:54] Probably cost the most amount of money.

[1:38:56] And if you cut that scene out of the movie, it makes it a better movie.

[1:38:59] So if there's a big, big, big thing that involves a lot of like money and work and like the timing being just right, just take a look and see.

[1:39:08] Is this really going to be that funny when it's put together if we do it right?

[1:39:12] Because we might be able to save ourselves a lot of trouble and we'll just put in a scene that's a lot funnier of characters interacting with each other.

[1:39:18] Because what's funnier than characters interacting with each other?

[1:39:21] Nothing.

[1:39:22] And they know that at USA where characters are welcome and at TBS, very funny.

[1:39:26] But not at TNT where they only know drama.

Stuart Wellington

[1:39:30] That was a pretty concise answer.

[1:39:33] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:39:33] Not at all.

[1:39:34] Sorry, guys.

[1:39:35] Do you have anything you wanted to add, Dan?

Dan McCoy

[1:39:38] I mean, this is kind of going off of what you were saying.

[1:39:41] Like, I feel like every comedy these days has like one or two big set piece moments.

[1:39:48] And I think that that's because that's the way that comedies are sold these days.

[1:39:54] Like, studios want that sort of thing.

Elliott Kalan

[1:39:56] I mean, even old comedies have big set piece moments.

[1:39:58] Like, there's the giant pie fight or the big car chase or going back.

[1:40:02] Yeah.

[1:40:02] And I think you're right that that's the scene that you sell.

[1:40:05] Like, this is going to be in the trailer or something like that.

[1:40:07] And it never really works.

Dan McCoy

[1:40:09] Yeah.

[1:40:09] I mean, I would say I would not advise you not to include that just because I think that it's expected.

[1:40:17] But I will say work to make the entire movie funny.

[1:40:21] Not just like these set pieces.

[1:40:23] Don't coast on the idea of set pieces.

[1:40:25] The ideal comedies for me are things like, if you look at the things that Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright wrote together, they have all these things that pay off in the second half.

[1:40:37] But they're built on jokes that work as jokes in the first half.

[1:40:42] Like, you see these things in the first half and you don't think, like, oh, that's just something that's going to pay off later.

[1:40:46] You think, that's funny.

[1:40:48] And then you're secondarily delighted, like doubly delighted when it comes up again.

[1:40:53] And it's a funny conclusion to that joke.

Elliott Kalan

[1:40:57] Some of this advice is like storytelling advice and more on the writing side and less directing.

[1:41:02] But it's like, I think the, it's, I guess, not making people tense is a big part of it.

[1:41:10] It's hard to get funny stuff out of people when they're super tense.

[1:41:12] Unless the joke is that they're tense, I guess.

[1:41:15] Like, I make Dan tense all the time because I think it's very funny.

[1:41:18] But if I was making a movie with him, I'd be like, hey, Dan, what's wrong?

[1:41:20] Let's ease up.

[1:41:22] Let's relax.

Dan McCoy

[1:41:23] Yeah.

[1:41:25] I, for the directing side of stuff, I mean, I'm not a director, but I do feel like a lot of comedies are just sort of directed flat.

[1:41:34] You know, I mean, like, there's not much thought into how the direction can enhance the comedy.

[1:41:40] Like, where camera placement and editing can juice up things.

[1:41:48] You know, like, a lot of the comedies seem to be like, let's just point cameras at funny people and then it'll be fine.

[1:41:58] And so it's not a specific note.

[1:41:59] And so it's not a specific note.

[1:42:01] But as far as anyone can think, like, how can I use the elements of storytelling through direction to add to the humor?

[1:42:10] That's always appreciated.

Elliott Kalan

[1:42:13] And also, this is, and this is like, this is something you've probably already heard, which is like old, old stuff.

[1:42:18] But that people have said that kind of comedy exists in, this is kind of against what Dan was just saying.

[1:42:27] But that comedy exists in kind of longer takes and, you know, shots where you can see things, you know, that like, you could kill a joke by cutting it up too much.

[1:42:40] There's always like a...

Dan McCoy

[1:42:41] Oh, I'm not advocating for editing.

[1:42:43] I'm just advocating to like, make sure that the choices you make are, as a director, are like, yeah, comic choices rather than just like, I don't know, shooting it like any other damn thing.

Elliott Kalan

[1:42:55] Not being afraid to make comic choices for fear of wrecking the comedy.

[1:43:00] But it's like, if someone falls down on camera, it can be very funny.

[1:43:05] And there's nothing funnier.

[1:43:06] There's nothing, no worse version of that than when there's a lot of cuts.

[1:43:09] Like, the least funny thing you can do in a movie is to cut in a close-up of someone going, oh, as they're falling down or something like that.

[1:43:16] So don't do that.

[1:43:17] Just have things happen.

Dan McCoy

[1:43:19] Yes.

[1:43:19] Like, there's a lot.

[1:43:21] I think that there's like, in every frame of painting, that web series thing on this about using direction for comedy.

[1:43:29] And like, a lot of that is talking about slapstick and about how like, slapstick is best shot like it's a dance sequence.

[1:43:36] You know, just like mount the camera like far enough away so you can see the action and sort of let it go loose.

[1:43:43] Lots of auto-tuning.

[1:43:45] Yeah, exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[1:43:47] Yeah, everyone should be wearing laser gloves.

Dan McCoy

[1:43:52] I don't know how funny any of this is, so we should just ask, you know, like, say that we hope the best for this project.

[1:44:00] That already happened.

[1:44:01] We hope it went well.

[1:44:01] That already happened.

[1:44:03] Yeah, we hope it went well.

[1:44:04] Write in and tell us what it is.

[1:44:06] I'd be curious to know.

Elliott Kalan

[1:44:07] And maybe we'll talk about it on a future episode of The Flopass.

[1:44:11] Right, Dan?

Dan McCoy

[1:44:12] I hope not.

[1:44:14] That would be a sad ending to the story.

Elliott Kalan

[1:44:17] Now that we're done acting like we know what we're doing, what do we do next, Dan?

[1:44:22] We're done telling people what to do.

[1:44:23] We're done saying to people, here, do this thing because we think it's the right thing to do.

[1:44:27] We're done recommending things to people.

[1:44:29] So what do we do next on the show, Dan?

Dan McCoy

[1:44:31] We recommend things to people.

Elliott Kalan

[1:44:33] Oh, no.

[1:44:35] Oh, boy.

[1:44:36] Go.

Dan McCoy

[1:44:39] Specifically movies that we've seen that we think people should watch, probably instead of the one that we watched.

[1:44:45] Mm-hmm.

[1:44:46] I'm looking at my list of movies I've seen because I can't think of one right now.

[1:44:51] Cool, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:44:52] Well, I have one queued up.

[1:44:53] Stuart, do you want to go first or should I?

[1:44:55] I don't care, man.

[1:44:57] Okay, well, I'll just say that I finally got around to watching The Duelists, Ridley Scott's first movie with Keith Carradine and Harvey Keitel.

[1:45:06] Gesundheit, which is the story of two officers in Napoleon's army who become somewhat obsessed with dueling each other.

[1:45:13] And it starts off as a duel over a stupid thing that one of them calls the other on.

[1:45:17] And then over years and years, their whole lives are kind of centered around this series of duels where they're each trying to kill each other for reasons that have become cloudier and cloudier as time goes on.

[1:45:29] And it's a really beautiful-looking movie.

[1:45:30] It's really well done.

[1:45:31] I liked it a lot.

[1:45:33] And it was nice to see a movie that is, in theory, it's a movie about sword fighting and dueling, but felt like it was about these two characters and their relationship and how complicated that could be.

[1:45:43] And I really liked it a lot.

[1:45:44] So The Duelists.

[1:45:45] If you haven't seen it, I recommend it.

[1:45:47] If you have seen it, why not watch it again?

[1:45:48] If you're Ridley Scott, good job.

Stuart Wellington

[1:45:52] Yeah, I recently saw A Simple Favor, which I liked a lot.

[1:45:59] So I'm going to, I guess I'll, I don't want to talk about it too much because I think talking about it kind of ruins some of the fun of the movie.

[1:46:06] So I'd recommend going in as cold as you can.

[1:46:09] Anna Kendrick is great in it.

[1:46:10] Blake Lively is amazing.

[1:46:12] It's awesome.

[1:46:13] And it prominently features Blake Lively's husband's brand of gin.

[1:46:20] So that's cool.

[1:46:24] But the movie I'm going to recommend is, so you know how, you know how like we all have blind spots when it comes to classic movies like foundational films or various genres.

[1:46:38] You know, like I'm sure there's classic movies that you've never seen.

[1:46:42] I think we probably talked about this on episodes of the Flophouse.

[1:46:45] So I have to admit that I finally got around to watching Undisputed 3 Redemption.

[1:46:55] The Scott Adkins MMA movie set in a prison where the worst prisoners around the world compete in a martial arts competition for big bucks.

[1:47:08] And it's really great.

[1:47:10] You don't need to see Undisputed 1 or 2, but those are also good.

[1:47:13] But Undisputed 3 is great because it takes the villain from the second movie and makes him the hero, played by Scott Adkins, his character Boyka.

[1:47:21] And Scott Adkins has an ability like for a guy who is basically like, I guess, the modern Jean-Claude Van Damme.

[1:47:28] He has an ability to play these like grumpy, brooding characters that in no way are like fun.

[1:47:38] But there's like a charm to a guy who is like just an asshole jerk who is also very good at kickboxing.

[1:47:47] And it also manages to work pretty well as a love story between his character Boyka and the American competitor Turbo.

[1:47:56] It's a they seem to share like a friendship that borders on love affair that never actually is consummated or addressed in any way.

[1:48:03] But it like it really feels like it's there, you know, and it's kind of great.

[1:48:08] So, yeah, like I feel like at the end Boyka's learned to love a little bit as well as learned how to beat the shit out of a dude.

[1:48:17] So, I mean, I guess he already knew that.

[1:48:19] But yeah, so Undisputed 3 Redemption.

[1:48:21] I feel like I'm probably late, late to the game here, guys.

Dan McCoy

[1:48:29] Because it is Shocktober, I'm going to recommend a horror movie.

[1:48:32] It's sort of a limited recommendation, but I did enjoy it.

[1:48:36] It's called What Keeps You Alive?

[1:48:37] And it's streaming right now.

[1:48:39] It's about this married couple of women go to a cabin out in the woods.

[1:48:50] I saw that movie.

[1:48:51] It's called Cabin in the Woods.

[1:48:53] Pacific.

[1:48:55] Dan, there weren't tarps involved.

[1:48:57] There are no sex tarps, Stuart.

[1:48:59] It's not that kind of movie.

[1:49:00] It's just I don't want to talk about it because there's betrayal and there's like it's all about how unknowable your partner is.

[1:49:09] You know how there's you can't always be 100 percent sure about anyone else and whether they might wish you harm or not.

Stuart Wellington

[1:49:17] It's kind of like V where you can't you never know if somebody actually is like a lizard person who eats rats or whatever.

Elliott Kalan

[1:49:25] It's like a movie version of Billy Joel's The Stranger.

Stuart Wellington

[1:49:27] Yeah.

[1:49:28] Yeah.

[1:49:30] And that's what inspired that book, right?

[1:49:33] Le Tranchet.

Elliott Kalan

[1:49:35] Yeah.

[1:49:35] Camus was like, it's true.

[1:49:37] We all wear a mask.

[1:49:38] Some is silk and some are leather.

Dan McCoy

[1:49:41] It's one of these movies where like to some degree you have you get you lose sympathy for the hero because they make some dumb choices in the movie and you're like, come on.

[1:49:54] Like it's hard in horror movies.

[1:49:55] Sometimes you're like, that's you're just.

Stuart Wellington

[1:49:58] And are they like dumb choices where you're like, like, you know, drinking too much the night before a big project is going to make you feel bad.

[1:50:06] Exactly.

[1:50:06] You're not going to be top of your game.

[1:50:07] Or is it like, like, don't open that door because you shouldn't look in the basement because children shouldn't play with dead things.

Dan McCoy

[1:50:17] Yeah.

[1:50:18] Children shouldn't play with dead things.

[1:50:20] Certainly.

[1:50:21] I was trying to think of another like weird title to a horror movie.

[1:50:26] Like the only thing I came up with was who slew Auntie Rue.

Elliott Kalan

[1:50:30] That's a horror movie?

[1:50:31] Oh, I've seen that movie.

[1:50:32] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:50:33] What's wrong with Helen?

[1:50:34] That's another one like that.

[1:50:35] It's not an imperative statement.

[1:50:38] No, that's true.

[1:50:39] Get out.

Elliott Kalan

[1:50:41] Has anyone used that for a movie title?

Dan McCoy

[1:50:43] Yeah, there you go.

[1:50:44] What about Don't Breathe?

[1:50:45] But what keeps you alive?

[1:50:47] What keeps you alive is very stylish.

[1:50:49] So that speaks well to it.

[1:50:52] It's got a lot of beautiful shots.

[1:50:54] So that's kind of what it coasts along on a little bit.

[1:50:57] But if you're looking for a horror movie, you could do worse.

[1:51:00] It's streaming right now.

[1:51:01] The thing that I saw recently.

[1:51:02] You could do worse.

Stuart Wellington

[1:51:03] Raves Dan McCoy.

Dan McCoy

[1:51:04] Well, the thing that I saw recently that I really loved is outside of our purview.

[1:51:08] I went and saw My Fair Lady at Ligon Sitter with Lauren Ambrose, who will be in the role until the end of October.

[1:51:16] So if you live in the New York area and you want to really enjoy yourself, go out and see that.

[1:51:21] Buckle your seatbelts.

Stuart Wellington

[1:51:22] It's a scarifying adventure.

[1:51:24] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:51:25] Oh, boy.

[1:51:26] It's the story of one woman being terrorized by her vocal feature.

[1:51:32] Yep.

[1:51:34] But anyway, that was a delight.

[1:51:39] Cool.

[1:51:39] My Fair Lady is my recommendation.

[1:51:41] Okay.

Elliott Kalan

[1:51:42] So Dan's October recommendation, a stage production of My Fair Lady.

[1:51:48] I guess run, don't walk to the airport to get to New York City to see My Fair Lady.

Stuart Wellington

[1:51:55] And if you're listening to this after the run has ended, you snoozed and you loosed.

Elliott Kalan

[1:52:00] You snossed and you lost.

[1:52:01] That's the way it works.

[1:52:02] That's the way the cookie crumbles.

[1:52:04] I'm E.L. Pillsbury.

[1:52:05] Good night, everybody.

Dan McCoy

[1:52:08] So what do we do now, boy?

[1:52:10] Speaking of good night, everybody, we should sign off.

[1:52:15] Hey.

[1:52:16] Yep.

[1:52:17] This is a.

Stuart Wellington

[1:52:18] Hey, this is a MaxFun production over at MaxFun Studios.

[1:52:21] So listen to some MaxFun podcasts.

[1:52:22] That's what I was exactly going to say.

Elliott Kalan

[1:52:24] There's a lot of great MaxFun podcasts out there.

[1:52:26] Listen to them.

[1:52:26] Find the ones you like and subscribe to them.

[1:52:28] And then maybe review them on iTunes.

[1:52:29] Review us on iTunes or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

[1:52:32] Tweet about us.

[1:52:33] Use the hashtag Flophouse.

[1:52:34] All those things.

[1:52:35] Dan, what were you going to say?

Stuart Wellington

[1:52:36] Yeah.

[1:52:36] If you like movies and podcasts, there's a ton of great movie related content on MaxFun,

[1:52:40] like Switchblade Sisters.

[1:52:41] Who shot you?

[1:52:43] Who shot you?

[1:52:44] What's Ben and John?

[1:52:47] I don't care.

[1:52:48] What I was going to plug was that.

Dan McCoy

[1:52:50] Friendly fire.

[1:52:51] Fire is what it's called.

[1:52:52] Yeah, it's not important.

Elliott Kalan

[1:52:55] Speaking of MaxFun podcasts.

[1:52:55] Or maybe you just want straight up comedy.

[1:52:57] Beef and Dairy Network.

[1:52:58] Lots of great MaxFun podcasts out there.

[1:52:59] Dan, what were you going to say?

[1:53:00] Oh, for fuck's sake.

Dan McCoy

[1:53:02] Speaking of MaxFun podcasts, if you like this one, Elliot and I were on Jordan Jesse Go just

[1:53:07] recently.

[1:53:08] That's true.

[1:53:08] Why not look that up?

Elliott Kalan

[1:53:10] I think the episode is entitled Fart Me to the Moon.

[1:53:13] Yeah.

[1:53:14] So you know what you're getting.

[1:53:17] Exactly.

Stuart Wellington

[1:53:18] But, well.

[1:53:19] People made a point to tell me how great that episode was and how great you were on it.

[1:53:23] I'm like, yeah, they're usually better when they have comedy guys.

[1:53:27] Oh, no.

[1:53:28] Stuart.

[1:53:28] I don't know about that.

[1:53:29] I get it, okay?

[1:53:30] No, no.

[1:53:30] And then I just start drinking and I never stopped.

Dan McCoy

[1:53:36] It's true.

[1:53:36] Stuart has one of those beer hats on, but it's just two bottles of tequila.

[1:53:40] Mm-hmm.

[1:53:42] Anyway, Stuart just agreed with that.

[1:53:44] Mm-hmm.

[1:53:44] So we should move on.

[1:53:46] Thank you for explaining what mm-hmm means.

Stuart Wellington

[1:53:47] It's my extensive improv training here.

Elliott Kalan

[1:53:52] It's not so much yes and as mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[1:53:55] Oh, it's the Dan McCoy method.

[1:53:57] Anyway, we should sign off and say we are having a lovely Shocktober.

[1:54:03] We look forward to another Shocktober episode next time.

[1:54:06] But for now, I've been Dan McCoy.

[1:54:09] I'm Stuart Wellingtown.

Elliott Kalan

[1:54:10] And I'm Elliot Kalin, author of Horse Meets Dog, October 30th.

[1:54:13] Buy it at your local bookstore.

Stuart Wellington

[1:54:15] Bye.

[1:54:16] See ya.

Elliott Kalan

[1:54:23] Nine.

[1:54:23] ABC, always be counting.

[1:54:25] Mm-hmm.

[1:54:27] IBS, irritable bowel syndrome.

[1:54:29] Okay.

[1:54:30] You got any more?

[1:54:31] ABC, already been chewed.

[1:54:33] Mm-hmm.

[1:54:34] Yep.

[1:54:35] TBS, America Superstation.

[1:54:38] Yeah.

[1:54:41] PYT, pretty young thing.

[1:54:45] Maximumfun.org.

[1:54:46] Comedy and culture.

[1:54:47] Artist owned.

[1:54:48] Listener supported.

[1:54:49] Listener supported.

Ep #268 - Truth or Dare

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