Ep. #211 - Godzilla (1998)

Dan McCoy

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss Godzilla, 1998.

[0:06] Da-da-da-da-da, Godzilla!

Stuart Wellington

[0:09] Well, I can't do better than that.

[0:12] That's that Blue Oyster Cult song.

[0:30] Hey, everyone, and welcome to the Flophouse.

Dan McCoy

[0:43] I'm Dan McCoy.

Stuart Wellington

[0:44] I've got to say, that was a great opening, Dan.

[0:45] Thanks.

[0:46] As you know, I'm Stu, the Stu Man Wellington.

Elliott Kalan

[0:50] And a classic pass from Dan to Stu, and then on to Elliot Kalin.

[0:55] This is shaping up to be a textbook Flophouse.

[0:58] Back to you, Dan.

Dan McCoy

[0:59] Thanks.

[1:01] So, this is a podcast.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03] Oh, and a stumble right out of the opening gates.

[1:07] What looked to be a classic game.

[1:09] I think you can save it, Elliot.

[1:10] It looks like, nope, that's enough of a point loss that we're not going to get a medal.

[1:14] You know sports so well.

Dan McCoy

[1:15] I wanted to, in case someone was confused, they were going through the stuff on their iPhone

[1:21] or their...

[1:22] Zoom.

[1:23] Whatever they use.

[1:23] Yeah.

[1:24] And thought, like, maybe this is that YouTube album that got put on everything.

[1:28] Maybe that's what I'm listening to.

[1:30] Yeah.

[1:30] Real topical, Dan.

[1:32] That was, what, like, four years ago?

[1:33] I'm just trying to figure out a thing that people might have on their phones.

[1:36] Oh, okay.

[1:36] Sure.

[1:37] But instead, they're listening to a podcast.

[1:39] A McAfee virus screening?

[1:43] No.

[1:44] Why are you making fun of him as viciously as you made fun of me?

Elliott Kalan

[1:47] Dan, it's the soft bigotry of low expectations.

[1:51] Because we each play a part in this podcast.

[1:54] I'm the guy who busts your balls.

[1:55] Okay.

[1:56] You are the guy who's supposed to be in charge, but you're always goofing up.

[1:58] And Stuart is the goof up who's always goofing up.

[2:01] I'm the moon boy.

[2:03] Okay.

[2:03] Like Devil Dinosaur and Moon Boy?

Stuart Wellington

[2:05] Yeah.

[2:06] Or, uh, no, from Song, Ice, and Fire.

[2:11] Oh, okay.

[2:12] Which, oh, right, right, right.

Elliott Kalan

[2:13] The Jester type character.

Dan McCoy

[2:15] There's so many characters in those books.

[2:16] I can't keep them straight.

Stuart Wellington

[2:17] I'm too busy.

[2:18] Yep, you're too busy learning about actual history.

[2:21] That's exactly what I was going to say.

Elliott Kalan

[2:22] Exactly what I was going to say.

Dan McCoy

[2:24] I thought it was just because you were mooning us right now that you said that.

[2:26] Mm-hmm.

[2:27] And I'm making jokes with my butt crack like a Jim Carrey type.

[2:31] Just a regular.

[2:32] I don't know why the microphone is picking up what you're saying with your butt up to it like that.

Stuart Wellington

[2:35] Well, once you practice your Jim Carrey impression long enough, you can get some really interesting butt sounds out.

Dan McCoy

[2:40] A regular Asmantora.

[2:41] Anyway, Dan?

[2:43] Again, this is a podcast where we watch a bad movie and then we talk about it.

[2:47] And tonight was a night where we did a contest winner.

[2:53] What contest was this?

[2:55] And who won the contest?

[2:56] This was the...

Elliott Kalan

[2:56] Try to answer it without looking at your phone right now.

[2:58] Nope, I can't.

[2:59] Okay, I admire your honesty.

Dan McCoy

[3:00] So this was the contest, the charity contest that we did where we were raising money for suicide prevention.

[3:09] And everyone who donated got entered into a lottery and they could pick out a movie.

[3:15] Like one random person got to pick out a movie.

[3:17] Okay.

[3:18] That we watched.

[3:18] What movie did they pick?

[3:19] Well, the winner, who I just snapped out on my phone.

[3:22] Okay.

[3:23] His name is Eric North.

Elliott Kalan

[3:25] Oh, the Eric North?

[3:27] From the film North.

Dan McCoy

[3:28] Yeah, that's right.

[3:29] Mm-hmm.

[3:30] Elijah Wood's biggest hit.

[3:31] And Bruce Willis' biggest hit.

[3:33] The movie that Roger hated, hated, hated, hated it.

[3:37] I gotta say, watched it as a kid.

[3:39] I thought it was fine.

[3:40] Yeah.

[3:40] Uh-huh.

Stuart Wellington

[3:42] Now, toys.

[3:43] I watched that as a kid.

[3:44] Didn't care for it.

Elliott Kalan

[3:46] Even as a kid, I was like, who is this for?

[3:49] I don't understand who this is for.

[3:51] The movie Toys or North?

[3:52] Kind of both, but more toys.

[3:54] The part where they pretend to be doing an MTV music video in order to break into the toy building.

Dan McCoy

[4:00] What was that all about?

[4:01] Now, Dangerous Liaisons, I watched that as a kid.

[4:04] Wasn't supposed to.

[4:05] Shouldn't have.

[4:06] Really like that part where Uma Thurman took her top off, though.

[4:10] I thought we were just talking about the thing we saw as a kid.

Elliott Kalan

[4:12] I guess that's what this podcast is about now.

[4:15] Welcome to the KidCast.

[4:16] This is a No Adults Allowed podcast about movies for kids.

[4:20] So, Dan, you were talking about Dangerous Liaisons?

[4:22] That's right.

Dan McCoy

[4:23] John Bungabich is a real kid.

[4:25] It's based on the book, Liaisons Dangerous.

[4:29] Let's just call it Dangerous Liaisons.

[4:31] It's a Stephen Freer's joint.

[4:33] Uh-huh.

[4:34] Star Jeremy's Iron.

Stuart Wellington

[4:36] It was the...

Elliott Kalan

[4:38] That didn't happen.

[4:40] So it sounds like a real action thriller.

Dan McCoy

[4:43] Oh, yeah.

[4:44] It was the Dangerous Steed.

[4:47] It had Keanu Reeves, action hero.

[4:50] Okay.

[4:51] Extraordinaire.

[4:51] Sure.

[4:52] There was a sword fight with him.

[4:53] Star of Chain Reaction with Morgan Freeman, his biggest role.

[4:56] It was an action movie in that there was a lot of action between the characters.

[5:01] Like car chases and shoot-em-ups?

Elliott Kalan

[5:03] No.

[5:04] It's an action.

[5:05] People got a lot of action.

[5:06] Did anyone pick up like a steampunk time bomb and go like, he's gonna blow and then throw

[5:11] it at Napoleon?

[5:12] And he was like, Zoot Allors!

[5:13] And then he exploded.

[5:15] Yes.

[5:15] And his guts were everywhere.

[5:16] Yeah.

[5:17] And they were like, we're having Italian food for dinner.

[5:21] Mm-hmm.

[5:22] And they're like, well, technically he's Corsican.

Dan McCoy

Elliott Kalan

[5:26] That was the nerd character, of course.

[5:28] Yeah, yeah.

[5:28] Because there's a nerd character in that movie.

[5:30] Yeah.

[5:30] Played by, oh, why can't I remember his name?

[5:33] The guy who plays nerds and everything.

[5:34] Eddie Deason.

[5:34] Thank you.

[5:35] Eddie Deason.

[5:35] Beatles expert Eddie Deason.

Dan McCoy

[5:38] Eddie Deason, God bless you, wherever you are.

Elliott Kalan

[5:41] Don't you hate it when you need to fill up your car with regular in, but all they have

[5:44] is Deason?

[5:47] Do hate it.

[5:47] So, Dan, this contest when Eric Moore...

[5:49] And your muffler goes, hee, hee, hee, hee.

[5:51] Yep, classic.

[5:52] You drive around.

[5:53] That's a good Eddie Deason.

[5:54] Thanks.

[5:55] Now, let's hear Arvid.

[5:56] Do all the famous nerds.

[5:58] I don't remember Arvid from Head of the Class.

[6:01] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[6:02] What about the other Arvids, you know?

Dan McCoy

[6:07] I'm just clarifying.

[6:09] Yeah, yeah.

[6:09] I remember that he was on Head of the Class.

[6:11] I don't remember anything else about him.

Stuart Wellington

[6:13] Then do your Howard Hessman impression.

[6:16] That's pretty good.

[6:17] Hey, it's me, Dr. Johnny Fever.

[6:19] That's pretty good.

[6:20] What about Billy Connolly?

[6:22] This should be super fucking easy now, dude.

[6:25] Come on.

Dan McCoy

[6:25] Hey, it's me, Dr. Johnny Fever.

Elliott Kalan

[6:28] No, why is he...

[6:29] Is he a vampire?

Stuart Wellington

[6:30] No, and why is he also Johnny Fever?

Elliott Kalan

[6:33] Dan, this Billy Connolly impression has raised way more questions than it answered.

[6:38] Put on a pot of coffee, Stuart.

[6:40] We're not going to bed until we put you this out.

Stuart Wellington

[6:43] So, Dan...

[6:43] So, wait.

[6:43] Why did he say it the same way as the other guy said it, Elliot?

[6:47] Why did he say, hey?

[6:49] Let me look at...

[6:50] Come over here.

[6:50] We're trying to get our attention.

[6:51] We're already listening.

Elliott Kalan

[6:52] Look at this board of pictures with string connecting them that I put up.

[6:56] You'll see that it all happened on the same night.

[6:59] Tonight.

[7:00] What could it mean?

[7:02] So, Dan, Eric North, he chose a movie for us to watch.

[7:05] And what movie...

[7:05] Yeah.

[7:06] Was it a good movie?

[7:07] Perhaps he sought to spare us and showed us The Devil and Daniel Webster.

Dan McCoy

[7:11] He did claim that he was going to try and break our brains by recommending that we watch either Castle Freak, Taking a Pelham 1, 2, 3, or His Girl Friday.

[7:24] And we would have...

[7:25] Give those as his choices.

Elliott Kalan

[7:27] Break our brains.

[7:28] I mean, that's what we watch for pleasure.

Dan McCoy

[7:29] Yeah.

[7:30] But instead, he gave us negative choices, bad choices, and out of those, we ended up watching...

[7:38] In the sphere of the podcast, yeah.

[7:40] And we selected one of those choices.

Elliott Kalan

[7:43] Stuart can't see that I'm doing the stretch for time motion to Dan.

[7:48] We gotta fill this podcast.

Dan McCoy

[7:51] See above.

[7:54] R.E.

[7:55] Ray, our mission statement.

[7:57] We watched Godzilla, the Matthew Broderick version.

Elliott Kalan

[8:01] Now, here's the thing I'm gonna warn you guys.

[8:03] This podcast may go four or five hours.

[8:05] Oh, no.

[8:05] Because I have so many memories associated with this movie.

[8:08] Uh-huh.

[8:09] And when it came out from...

[8:10] You lost your virginity to this movie, right?

Stuart Wellington

[8:13] I mean...

[8:14] Almost like...

[8:14] Yes, but that's not what I was gonna talk about.

[8:16] Almost like, uh...

[8:17] What was that?

[8:18] The Empire State Building and Godzilla later on?

[8:20] Yeah, when Godzilla totally is having sex in that building.

Elliott Kalan

[8:23] Now, Godzilla, after tricking the military and destroying other landmark buildings...

[8:28] Oh, my God.

Stuart Wellington

[8:28] That was my favorite scene in the whole fucking movie.

[8:30] When Godzilla jumps onto a building, turns around, and gives the fucking helicopters a look like,

[8:36] Uh-oh, are you gonna shoot me?

[8:38] And then they try and shoot him, and he just fucking jumps out of the way.

Elliott Kalan

[8:41] Those missiles hit the Chrysler Building, and Godzilla celebrates by penetrating the Empire State Building.

[8:46] Yeah, yeah.

[8:47] He clutches it in an embrace and just arches his back in ecstasy and just roars to the skies

[8:51] as he experiences some kind of gargantuan reptile orgasm.

[8:55] Apparently he...

[8:56] Flooding the interiors of the Empire State Building.

[8:58] Now, once again, the tallest building...

[9:00] Well, briefly, again, the tallest building in New York, with his radioactive semen, I can only assume.

Dan McCoy

[9:04] He's a very confused, you know, lizard.

[9:06] He reproduces asexually.

[9:08] He's apparently a male that lays eggs.

Elliott Kalan

[9:10] Well, here's the thing.

[9:11] They keep calling him he, and that's sexist.

[9:13] Because back then, people were like,

[9:15] You can't have a girl Godzilla.

[9:17] That would ruin my childhood.

[9:18] Godzilla's a man, aren't we?

[9:20] So they keep calling him he.

Dan McCoy

[9:21] And Kate McKinnon came along and proved that she could be a great Godzilla.

Elliott Kalan

[9:25] She would be a great Godzilla.

[9:26] She could do anything.

[9:27] Yeah.

[9:28] That's why they call doing anything McKinnoning.

[9:32] McKinnoning.

[9:32] Now, when this movie came out, and still, I was a big Godzilla fan.

[9:37] Yep.

[9:38] Back then, I was reading G-Fan magazine.

[9:40] This is what?

[9:40] 90...

[9:41] This is 1998, as Dan has said a couple times.

[9:44] Okay.

[9:44] I was 16 years old.

[9:46] Yep.

[9:46] Big Godzilla fan.

[9:47] I had seen all the Japanese originals many times.

[9:49] I hadn't seen all of the newer Japanese movies that were, what are they called?

[9:53] The Heisei?

[9:54] No, the Millennium series, I guess.

[9:56] But what are you going to do?

[9:57] Anyway, and I remember reading an article in G-Fan magazine that was like rumors about,

[10:03] that had leaked about this new Godzilla movie and how terrible it was going to be, and leaked

[10:06] designs of the monster, and that Sony then was like, no, no, no, none of that stuff is

[10:12] true.

[10:12] And then it all turned out to be exactly true.

Stuart Wellington

[10:14] I can only imagine that you were, you told your parents all about this article over dinner

[10:19] one night.

[10:20] Probably.

[10:21] I mean, if I talked to them about anything.

Dan McCoy

[10:23] But then I remember...

[10:23] It's funny to me in this era that print is, when print is dead, that there was once able

[10:29] to support something called G-Fan magazine.

[10:32] Well, it was a very...

[10:32] That still exists, right?

Elliott Kalan

[10:33] It's still around, yeah.

[10:34] Yeah.

[10:34] I mean, it's a pretty...

[10:36] I mean, back when I was reading it, it was on like kind of the cheapest newsprint,

[10:39] and I think it's only marginally better paper now.

[10:42] It's always fan art covers and stuff like that.

[10:44] It's not...

[10:45] I mean, this is not a Time...

[10:47] This is not like a Time magazine publication.

[10:49] This is not from...

[10:51] What's that big magazine publisher that does like Vanity Fair and stuff?

[10:56] Condé Nast.

[10:56] Condé Nast, thank you.

[10:58] It's more Condé Nasty.

[11:00] In that it's down and dirty, but there was a...

[11:05] It's a...

[11:06] It was always kind of like a publication by fans for fans, I assume.

[11:10] But...

Stuart Wellington

[11:11] I don't know.

[11:12] I thought it was a publication by fans for, I don't know, the intellectual elite.

[11:18] The casual Godzilla movies.

Dan McCoy

[11:20] It was amazing.

[11:21] For people in the Godzilla industry.

[11:23] It was an industry magazine.

Elliott Kalan

[11:25] But I remember seeing the movie and being like, all the stuff that was in those rumors were

[11:29] true and feeling like I had achieved a victory of some kind, and only now am I like, oh,

[11:34] but my money went to the people who made this movie, so why am I acting like I did something

[11:38] really good?

[11:39] Or like that was a victory that these rumors turned out to be true.

Stuart Wellington

[11:43] But I remember the whole...

[11:44] I mean, I guess it just renewed your faith in the journalistic integrity of G-Fan Magazine.

[11:48] Yeah, I'm like, these guys know what they're talking about.

Elliott Kalan

[11:50] This was the water gate of Godzilla, and they totally got the story right.

Stuart Wellington

[11:54] That's not like, at the time, fucking, what was that, Ain't It Cool News?

[12:00] When they're like, we saw an early version, we saw an early print of Phantom Menace, and

[12:03] that shit was amazing.

[12:05] Best movie of all time, dude.

[12:07] Look...

[12:07] No, but they famously did that with fucking Godzilla.

[12:09] Oh, they did?

Elliott Kalan

[12:10] Was Ain't It Cool around at the time?

[12:12] Yeah.

[12:12] I'd say it was pretty early.

Dan McCoy

[12:13] This was like a big thing, like Harry Knowles or Knowles or whatever the fuck.

Elliott Kalan

[12:16] Harry Knowles.

[12:18] All the best.

Stuart Wellington

[12:23] Call me the Big Easy.

[12:24] I'm easy on movies that aren't very good, as long as they're genre pictures.

[12:28] If you invite me down to your set to hang out for a day, I'll say it's the best movie

Elliott Kalan

[12:31] ever.

[12:31] Yeah, like, yeah!

Dan McCoy

[12:32] Flown out to the premiere, and they had it on the deck of the Intrepid or something

[12:36] like that, and he's like...

Stuart Wellington

[12:37] Oh, hey, that's where the Daily Show last episode party was.

[12:40] Oh, you guys might have been in the same fucking spot as Matthew Broderick and Harry

[12:44] Knowles.

Elliott Kalan

[12:44] Oh, if only in Hank Azaria, and Devlin and Emmerich.

Dan McCoy

[12:49] And whoever the woman who was who was in this movie who we'd never seen before.

Elliott Kalan

[12:52] But so, I didn't realize that about Harry Knowles.

[12:54] Is that site still around?

Dan McCoy

[12:55] Yeah, it still looks exactly like it did back in that day.

Elliott Kalan

[12:57] That's the best thing about it.

[12:59] There's a reason that that year's gulitzer for Godzilla reporting didn't go to Any Cool

[13:03] News and instead went to GFAN again.

[13:06] But, like, I'm sure you guys remember the ad campaign where, unlike buses, it would be

[13:10] like, his foot is bigger than this bus.

[13:12] And on the sides of buildings, like, he's taller than this building.

[13:15] And they're trying to create mystery around Godzilla, a character who had been around

[13:19] at that point for 44 years.

[13:21] Like, he was going to look different.

[13:23] Were you living in New York at the time?

[13:25] I was living in New Jersey still, but I was in New York a bit.

[13:29] I mean, that was what the age when I was taking, on the weekends, I would take the train and

[13:33] just kind of walk around New York.

[13:34] You were taking Callum 1, 2, 3.

Stuart Wellington

[13:35] All the time, yeah.

[13:36] I was still in Indiana.

[13:38] And the big thing I remember about this movie was that it was kind of like, at least that

[13:43] I can remember one of the last big gasps of, like, a big budget summer movie having, like,

[13:49] fast food tie-ins with a ton of commercials related to it.

[13:52] Yeah, Taco Bell had a big campaign.

[13:53] It was Taco Bell, man.

[13:54] I didn't see this movie in the theater, but I remember that, like, shitty poster so well.

Elliott Kalan

[13:59] This was back when I would go see movies in the theater I didn't think I was going to

[14:03] like because I wanted to support that type of movie, like seeing Spawn in the theater.

[14:07] I don't give a shit about Spawn.

[14:09] I've never liked that comic.

[14:10] Don't like the character.

[14:11] But it was like-

[14:12] But what about the Violator character?

[14:14] He's kind of like the Joker if the Joker was also a demon.

[14:16] Now, it's like if the Joker was a demon and pulled people's hearts out, but he also,

[14:21] I mean, wasn't very funny.

[14:23] Well-

[14:24] But there's a scene in the Spawn movie, actually, where the Violator is talking to Spawn's daughter,

[14:29] and if I'm remembering correctly, he's holding a balloon in his hand, and his head deflates

[14:33] and the balloon inflates and vice versa, and the daughter is just like, Mom, there's a

[14:37] clown at the door, and no one questions that he's doing something supernatural with his

[14:41] head.

[14:42] But anyway, I went to see Spawn because it was like, they may never make another superhero

[14:46] movie based on a comic book if Spawn doesn't do well.

[14:50] And now, of course, I'm missing superhero movies left and right.

[14:52] There are too many.

Stuart Wellington

[14:52] I've definitely talked to people, like guys who grew up with the Spawn movie, and to this

[14:57] day are like, the cape special effects are amazing.

[15:01] Like, you gotta admit that, bro.

[15:03] And I'm like, I don't remember, but I guess, fine, I'll admit it.

[15:06] My journalistic integrity in this case is on the line.

[15:09] I agree.

Dan McCoy

[15:10] If by amazing you mean that they look as crazy and fake as Rob, or as Todd McFarlane's.

Elliott Kalan

[15:15] You were about to say Rob Liefeld.

[15:16] No, but I knew that was wrong.

[15:17] You moron.

[15:17] I knew that was wrong, which is why I stopped.

[15:19] Oh, that's a good point.

[15:20] It was Todd McFarlane.

[15:21] I saw this movie.

[15:22] Creator of Todd Toys.

[15:25] They actually had to change the name.

[15:27] It was Todd Toys, and then he was sued by whoever makes Barbie, Mattel or something, because

[15:30] they had a toy named Todd.

[15:32] Oh.

[15:33] Tom McFarlane has a bad history with being sued about names.

[15:36] Okay.

[15:37] Like, he named that gangster Tony Twist, and he got sued by that hockey player.

Stuart Wellington

[15:41] Oh, what about, uh, what about...

[15:43] Sorry, the hockey player's name is Tony Twist.

[15:45] He got sued by Twister.

Elliott Kalan

[15:45] He named a gangster Tony Twist-O-Reilly, and he was sued by the hockey player and lost,

[15:49] I think.

Stuart Wellington

[15:49] Now, what about, uh, Rob Layfield naming a character Bedrock?

[15:53] And he had to got sued...

[15:54] Which is insane.

[15:54] And he had to change it to Bedrock.

[15:55] Why would you ever do that?

Elliott Kalan

[15:56] Well, he also, he was originally going to name the character Fred Flintstone's copyright

[15:59] Haya-Barbera.

[16:03] He was originally going to name the character Mickey Mouse Hey Jude.

[16:06] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[16:07] You saw what?

[16:08] I saw this movie, of all places, in a movie class.

[16:13] Like...

[16:14] What?

[16:14] In college, there was a...

[16:16] What college did he go to?

[16:17] There was a Mayterm movie class where, like, the...

[16:19] I mean, like, I got introduced to, like, a lot of interesting movies through this class.

[16:23] Like, in class, we watched...

Elliott Kalan

[16:25] Godzilla, The Peacemaker, Broken Arrow.

[16:28] We watched...

[16:29] Lots of huge movies.

Dan McCoy

[16:30] We watched Simple Men, the Howe Hartley movie.

[16:32] We watched, like, Seven Beauties.

[16:34] We watched interesting...

[16:35] Like, we watched...

[16:36] Oh, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[16:36] Those movies and Godzilla, they're all the same.

[16:39] But, like, the teacher just loved movies so much, he's like, let's all go see a movie

Dan McCoy

[16:43] as a class.

[16:43] Oh, okay.

[16:44] That's nice.

[16:45] Let's go see Godzilla.

[16:46] He's like, that's what's out.

[16:47] And so he's, like...

[16:48] He kept looking over him, and he was just, like, cackling at it, like, at every point.

Elliott Kalan

[16:51] He's like, yeah, this is great.

[16:54] Movies!

[16:55] It reminds me, because I thought that class was the class equivalent of your video collection

[17:00] when you include the things your relatives give you as gifts.

[17:04] Yeah.

[17:04] Where it's like, all right, I've got this Akira Kurosawa set and this Imar Bergman set,

[17:08] and then I've got...

[17:09] And then I've got Jingle All the Way.

Stuart Wellington

[17:12] Your relatives are like, you like movies.

[17:14] You like this.

[17:14] There is nothing better than going to an old person's house and seeing their VHS collection

[17:19] of, like, five tapes, and you're like, you know one of them shits is going to be Mrs.

[17:23] Doubtfire.

[17:24] No fucking question.

Elliott Kalan

[17:25] My wife and I stay in a lot of Airbnbs, and I love to look at the DVD selections that

[17:30] people have.

[17:30] Oh, that shit's awesome.

[17:31] Because they're crazy.

Dan McCoy

[17:34] Volunteers with Tom Hanks and John Candy?

Elliott Kalan

[17:36] No one even remembered this movie existed.

[17:38] Why do you have a copy of White Nights starring Billy Crystal and Gregory Hines?

[17:42] Because it's great.

Stuart Wellington

[17:44] Or, like, The Net.

[17:45] Like, of course old people are scared of The Net.

Elliott Kalan

[17:50] So this movie, Godzilla, so those were a lot of reminiscences about when it came out.

[17:53] Suffice to say, this movie was a big deal for me as a kid, because it's the first time

[17:58] I think I remember knowing a movie was going to be crappy ahead of time, and then seeing

[18:03] it and being like, that was garbage.

[18:05] I feel validated, even though I just spent money on this.

Dan McCoy

[18:09] So you were like an internet person way before the internet was a thing.

Elliott Kalan

[18:13] And this was back when the most internet I was doing was occasionally IMing with my friends

[18:18] on America Online sometimes.

[18:19] and trying to download porn without anyone finding out.

Dan McCoy

[18:23] Downloading that one picture of Terry Hatcher naked beneath a blanket.

Elliott Kalan

[18:28] Sure, yeah, which showed nothing.

[18:29] Yeah, exactly.

[18:30] For some reason everyone was downloading it.

Stuart Wellington

[18:31] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[18:31] It's in a news group, after all.

Elliott Kalan

[18:34] This is news.

[18:35] That's why it's in a news group.

[18:37] Mother, I'm just learning the news.

[18:39] News.

[18:40] Woman under blanket.

[18:42] I'm just downloading the news about AsianNurse.org.

[18:47] I didn't think they had .org back then.

[18:50] Anyway, so Godzilla, should we talk briefly?

[18:51] It would be AltRec.AsianNerds.

[18:56] They call them otaku, Asian nerds.

[18:59] Anyway, Asian nurses, I don't know what they call them.

[19:01] Yeah.

[19:02] So let's talk briefly about the movies.

[19:04] We don't need to go through the whole plot in detail, because it's just a big, stupid movie.

[19:07] It's a Godzilla movie.

[19:08] But it's so...

[19:09] Lizards Attacks Town, film at 11.

[19:11] That you just became the game Rampage for a second.

[19:17] So we open with a title credit sequence that's not that different from the Godzilla from a couple years ago title credit sequence.

[19:23] Yeah.

[19:23] Except it's just stock footage of lizards, and then stock footage of atomic explosions.

[19:29] Yeah, well, like stock footage of old-timey nuclear tests, right?

[19:33] Yeah, yeah.

[19:33] But with overlaid footage of iguanas and Komodo dragons.

[19:38] And it's like the movie is like, this plus this equals Godzilla.

[19:42] Get it, stupid?

[19:44] That's movie math.

Stuart Wellington

[19:45] Yeah, like it expects you to be watching and be like, oh my god, those innocent lizards are so close to that explosion.

Elliott Kalan

[19:51] Somebody save them.

[19:53] And now a train is coming at us.

[19:55] Ah!

[19:56] Oh, we're fine.

[19:57] A cowboy is firing out of the screen at us.

[19:59] Ah!

[20:00] Duck up your chairs.

Dan McCoy

[20:00] Workers are leaving a factory.

[20:02] Ah!

Elliott Kalan

[20:03] A kiss!

[20:04] Ah!

Stuart Wellington

[20:05] It's like every single movie is last action hero.

[20:08] In a way it is.

[20:10] So, Godzilla.

Elliott Kalan

[20:12] So, Godzilla.

[20:13] So, there's a Japanese fishing trawler.

[20:15] It gets destroyed by some mysterious beast.

[20:18] Cut to, there's some, cut to Matthew Broderick is digging up worms in Chernobyl.

[20:24] He's a researcher who is investigating how radioactivity makes worms a little bit bigger than they normally are.

[20:30] The State Department lands a helicopter in the Chernobyl radiation fields and takes them away to an island.

Stuart Wellington

[20:39] That's a mighty good crop of radiation we're growing here in Chernobyl.

Elliott Kalan

[20:42] Ah, I got a 40 head of radiation worms.

[20:47] Chernobyl Farms remembers.

[20:49] Anyway, they take him to an island where there's a bunch of Godzilla footprints and they say, we want you to investigate this thing.

[20:55] He says, I think this is a lizard made big from radiation.

[20:59] And everyone's like, what?

[21:00] Come on.

[21:00] And I think as Dan pointed out, maybe Stuart.

Dan McCoy

[21:03] Why did they get the guy who was an expert on things getting bigger by radiation if they didn't think that this thing was a thing that got bigger by radiation?

Elliott Kalan

[21:11] I mean, maybe he just knew the right people.

[21:14] Nepotism.

[21:15] He wore a pretty cool hat for a while.

Stuart Wellington

[21:17] He had like an early primitive version of a Kangol hat.

[21:20] Uh-huh.

[21:21] Well, I think weren't Kangol's popular in the 70s, Elliot?

Elliott Kalan

[21:25] I wasn't alive then.

[21:26] Okay.

[21:28] Here's what was popular in the 70s.

[21:30] Disco, whipping inflation now, and wars in the stars.

[21:37] Yeah.

[21:37] Not in Vietnam, though.

[21:39] That was not popular.

Dan McCoy

[21:39] And waterbeds.

Elliott Kalan

[21:41] And water gates.

[21:41] Lots of waterbeds.

[21:42] And if that waterbed could spin around like it was round, go for it.

[21:47] Just do it.

[21:47] Because you know what I like while I'm having sex?

[21:49] To be super dizzy.

[21:51] And seasick.

[21:51] It keeps me from ejaculating too soon because I'm vomiting.

[21:56] Uh-huh.

Dan McCoy

[21:56] Your ejaculate actually goes back up inside of you because you're so nauseous.

Elliott Kalan

[22:00] And it's a tripital force.

[22:01] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[22:01] And then we got another junior situation on our hands.

Elliott Kalan

[22:05] Oh, now I'm pregnant myself.

[22:08] Anyway, so this is going to have an explicit adults-only tag in iTunes, right?

[22:14] It always does.

[22:14] It tones, as I just called it.

[22:15] It tones.

[22:17] Your a cappella group.

[22:19] That just sings about podcasts and downloadable songs.

[22:22] Uh-huh.

[22:22] And the iTunes users agreement.

[22:24] Now, long story short, it's Godzilla.

[22:27] It attacks an American fishing boat and then it heads to New York City because it's a lizard

[22:32] with a dream to make it on the great white way of Broadway.

[22:37] To be on the stage in front of them all.

[22:40] Their upturned faces looking at me as big as a tree.

[22:45] A really big tree because I'm Godzilla.

[22:48] They'll have to open up the theater roof.

[22:52] Only do day shows.

[22:53] It's had them narrower than usual.

[22:53] Maybe at night, but not if it's raining, which might be a problem because it's raining in

[22:58] every New York scene in this movie.

Stuart Wellington

[23:00] Every scene in the entire movie, it's raining.

[23:02] The whole movie.

[23:03] I mean, not in the tropical areas.

Elliott Kalan

[23:05] Which is where it normally rains all the time.

[23:07] That's true, except actually when they're on-

Dan McCoy

[23:09] It was raining at the beginning when they're in the tropics, when he's getting the worms,

[23:14] but then like-

[23:15] Oh, when he's getting the worms, that's Russia.

[23:16] That's not the tropics.

[23:18] I mean, that's a pretty loose definition of the tropics.

Elliott Kalan

[23:20] I think it's- Chernobyl is the tropics in the same way that all people are brothers.

[23:27] We're not really.

Dan McCoy

[23:28] Well, it's because it looked exactly like the next scene where they were supposed to be

[23:32] in the tropics.

Elliott Kalan

[23:32] That's true, but it's raining everywhere.

[23:34] And I think, Stuart, were you saying that you thought it'd be funny if one of Godzilla's

[23:37] powers is that he makes it rain everywhere he is?

Stuart Wellington

[23:39] I assume that was one of his powers, yeah.

[23:41] He's like Aurora Monroe, Storm of the X-Men.

[23:43] Mm-hmm.

[23:44] When you know Aurora Monroe means fucking business, it starts storming, her eyes cloud up, and

[23:48] you're like, uh-oh.

[23:50] Hey, you know what's happening?

[23:51] I'm gonna go work on the Blackbird.

Dan McCoy

[23:53] I'm Forge.

[23:54] I don't need to deal with this.

[23:55] I thought you just made it rain like, you know, dollar-dollar bills, y'all.

Stuart Wellington

[23:59] That's Godzilla's power is that this movie is so successful that he just throws money at

Elliott Kalan

[24:03] everybody, right?

[24:04] Yeah, yeah.

[24:05] He loses money from bad investments, bad spending.

[24:07] Godzilla will just walk up to you in front of your house and be like, what's the most expensive

[24:10] thing you own?

[24:11] I wanna buy it from you.

[24:12] Just to show that he can.

[24:14] Yeah.

[24:14] Just to show that he's worth more than you and the things that you most value are nothing

[24:18] to him.

[24:19] Mm-hmm.

[24:19] They're literally things he could just buy whenever he wants and throw them away.

[24:21] Yeah, he burns them in front of you.

Stuart Wellington

[24:22] Yeah, yeah.

[24:23] Sometimes it's your children.

[24:25] Mm-hmm.

[24:26] So the trick is you give him something that you want him to burn.

[24:29] Mm-hmm.

[24:29] Like this giant thing of weed, dude.

[24:31] Toke Toke 420.

[24:32] Mm-hmm.

Elliott Kalan

[24:34] More like a big bag of dog poop.

[24:36] And then when it's on fire, he's like, ah, I gotta put this out.

[24:38] And he gets dog poop all over his feet.

[24:40] And he doesn't even wear shoes.

[24:41] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[24:42] Because if he burned them, you're the winner.

[24:44] You've won over Godzilla.

[24:46] Yep.

[24:47] How's that feel?

[24:47] Mm-hmm.

[24:48] Turn the tables.

[24:49] In your face, you big dumb lizard man.

[24:51] Looks like the monster has become the monstie.

Stuart Wellington

[24:53] So, smash cut to New York City.

[24:55] We're introduced to Matthew Broderick's love interest, a former flame now working at a

[25:00] news place.

Elliott Kalan

[25:01] Her name is Audrey, and she's played by an actress that none of us recognized.

[25:05] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[25:05] In a movie, like, Roland Emmerich movies are kind of fun because they usually have interesting

[25:10] casting compared to other action movies.

[25:12] They don't just, like, have, like, action stars.

[25:14] They're like...

Elliott Kalan

[25:14] Yeah, I mean, there were a ton of minorities in this movie, right?

Dan McCoy

[25:17] Well, okay.

[25:18] Maybe not that.

[25:19] But they just...

[25:20] Like, it's not like I'm gonna just put, you know, Action Star X in this movie.

[25:26] It's like, this movie's gonna star Matthew Broderick and Jean Reno.

Elliott Kalan

[25:31] Action Star X was when Malcolm X made that one action movie.

Dan McCoy

[25:34] Yeah.

[25:36] And this movie has, like, Harry Shearer in it and Hank Azaria.

Elliott Kalan

[25:41] And Nancy Cartwright in a small role.

[25:43] It's a Simpsons reunion.

Dan McCoy

[25:44] Yeah.

[25:44] And all these character actors show up, and then, meanwhile, the lead lady...

[25:50] Jean Reno, right?

[25:50] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[25:51] This was from the time when Jean Reno was in every fucking movie.

[25:54] Mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[25:55] And then the leading lady is someone that we don't know who she is.

[25:57] Yeah.

[25:59] I'm sure the internet will be like, dummies.

Elliott Kalan

[26:03] She's famous.

[26:04] She's in this, this, and this.

[26:05] Well, our brains only can contain so much information.

[26:08] And you know what?

[26:08] If we knew everything, we'd have no impetus to keep learning, and at that point, we might

[26:12] as well be dead.

[26:12] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[26:13] Because learning is living, friends.

[26:15] So who's the dummies now?

[26:16] Learning is living.

[26:16] Exactly.

[26:17] Dummy.

Elliott Kalan

[26:19] What a dummy.

[26:19] The syndicated TV show about a dummy that talks.

[26:24] You guys remember that show?

[26:25] No, I don't.

[26:26] It was on, it was up on like Channel 9 in the New Jersey, New York area.

[26:30] It was one of these shows that was in syndication only, like Out of This World.

[26:35] And you were like, does this show even...

Stuart Wellington

[26:37] Out of This World that was on before My Secret Identity?

Elliott Kalan

[26:41] It was the one with the girl whose dad's an alien, right?

Stuart Wellington

[26:44] Yeah, yeah.

[26:44] That was the one where on her 16th birthday, she got a second magic power, and she tried

[26:49] them all out and then decided, she's good.

[26:50] She doesn't need to be able to fucking fly or something stupid.

[26:53] I guess so.

Elliott Kalan

[26:54] But like a show produced for syndication.

[26:56] And I remember being like, this is a dumb show.

[26:58] Does this show actually exist?

[27:00] And then we went, my family, to Universal Studios Hollywood.

[27:03] Actually, although it was in Orlando.

[27:05] And then Larger Than Life on one of the fake studio soundstages is a big What a Dummy poster.

[27:10] Like those enormous banner posters.

[27:12] And I remember there was a poster for that and a poster for Army of Darkness.

[27:16] And I was like, well, I know which of these I want to watch.

[27:19] As a kid, I had not seen the Evil Dead movies.

[27:21] And so Army of Darkness was like, just seeing the poster, it was like, what the hell is this?

Stuart Wellington

[27:25] I know, dude.

[27:26] I remember seeing that poster in like a fucking Sam Goody or something and being like, how

[27:31] can I not be experiencing this right now?

[27:33] What is this?

Elliott Kalan

[27:34] Just stick it in my eyes right now.

[27:36] So there's interesting character actors, et cetera, et cetera.

[27:39] His ex-flame is a reporter.

[27:41] She works for Harry Shearer, who is like a real full-of-himself anchor who hits on her,

[27:48] even though he's married.

[27:50] And Hank Azaria is this cameraman named Animal who's like, hey, a real New York guy.

[27:55] Hey, he talks like this.

[27:56] Oh, my God.

Stuart Wellington

[27:56] He does the best over-the-top New York performance.

[28:02] Smash cut, too.

[28:02] That's something so 90s about this, too.

[28:04] Like, it calls up into being a New York that I don't think has existed since the 70s, maybe.

[28:10] Well, it's like, no, no.

[28:12] It was like Roland Emmerich's like, no, no, no.

Elliott Kalan

[28:15] More New York, please.

[28:17] It's the same way that in Superman Returns, there's that cabbie who's like, hey, there's

[28:21] a Superman in the sky.

[28:22] Well, what's this all about?

[28:23] And it's like, come on, dude.

[28:25] Like, that cabbie died 30 years ago.

[28:28] Yeah.

[28:28] It's this special New York of the 90s.

Dan McCoy

[28:31] Where's the West Indian cabbie who does not care about what's happening?

Stuart Wellington

[28:36] He's got a lot of fucking, he's spent a lot of plates here.

[28:40] He won't get off his damn phone the whole ride.

Elliott Kalan

[28:42] Oh, I didn't say that.

[28:46] But the, this is the, this is a, I mean, this, I'm going to get serious for a moment, guys.

[28:50] Sure, okay.

Dan McCoy

[28:51] This is a, this is a very specific New York.

Elliott Kalan

[28:53] And this is the, the post Giuliani safe, but not sure exactly how to deal with that.

[28:59] How is it safe?

Stuart Wellington

[29:00] There's a fucking giant lizard around E-Man?

Elliott Kalan

[29:03] I guess so.

[29:03] Safe, but pre 9-11 New York.

[29:05] And like, this is the New York that, that like, this is the, again, like I said, this is

[29:11] the New York I used to go into as a high schooler just by myself.

[29:14] And my parents were like, yeah, that's fine.

[29:15] You can walk around New York by yourself.

[29:17] That's okay.

[29:18] Whereas when I was a kid, I don't think they would have felt that way in the 80s.

[29:21] But it's before, like, there was this feeling of like, New York, whatever.

[29:26] Everything's great all the time.

[29:27] There was still that attitude.

[29:28] But it was before September 11th, which happened when I was at NYU when I was a junior, I guess.

[29:35] So like, this New York that I very briefly knew as a young adult, which was like, our problems

[29:41] are over.

[29:42] Except the big problem is that things aren't as gritty as they used to be.

[29:46] What happened to being afraid in New York?

[29:47] And then suddenly, like, that New York went away.

[29:49] And a much scarier, in a lot of ways, New York suddenly happened.

Dan McCoy

[29:53] And everyone was like, oh, whatever happened to that New York from the 90s where everything

[29:58] was okay all the time?

Elliott Kalan

[29:59] Like, Godzilla exists in that New York.

[30:02] Like, the idea of, they mentioned the World Trade Center bombing in it.

[30:06] Which happened when, like, six or seven years before?

[30:10] Yeah.

[30:10] Or, I don't remember what year that was.

[30:12] But like, it felt very like, watching the movie now, it's, I would say it's slightly less

[30:19] fun to see New York buildings get destroyed.

[30:21] Yeah.

[30:21] Except that's totally not true.

[30:22] It's slightly less fun, but it's still pretty fun at times.

Stuart Wellington

[30:26] I mean, it's less fun because it isn't done interestingly or in any way that doesn't look

[30:31] like the helicopters are doing a fucking trench run on the Death Star.

[30:35] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[30:36] So these buildings that I guess are about 10 feet apart.

[30:39] Yeah.

[30:39] Like, the street, like, it does at times make it look like New York is, like, Dark City.

[30:44] Yeah.

[30:44] Just this, like, labyrinth of skyscrapers.

[30:45] Not as good looking as Dark City.

[30:47] No, not at all.

[30:47] Or, like, all the streets are, like, old European goat paths that have been built up and there's

[30:52] no space between the buildings.

[30:53] You can just run your laundry line between these midtown skyscrapers.

[30:57] But it feels very weird watching it and being like, come on, guys.

[31:01] Like, let's not pretend this giant lizard running around is going to be that big a problem.

[31:05] Like, there's really bad stuff that's going to happen.

[31:08] And I don't know exactly where, like, I wasn't going in very specific with that.

[31:11] But it's, like, it's this mythical New York that, like, just existed for a moment.

[31:15] And they're still throwing in old-timey New York.

Stuart Wellington

[31:18] Yeah, like the old guy on the pier who's fishing.

[31:21] And you're like, oh, man, this guy's going to catch Godzilla.

[31:24] And no shit, he totally catches Godzilla.

Elliott Kalan

[31:26] Well, here's when Godzilla makes his appearance in New York.

[31:27] Exactly.

[31:28] Is that an old man waddles down the dock.

[31:30] Here's the thing about this movie.

[31:32] It is so, for a movie made in 1998, this is, I feel like, this is a movie that's, like,

[31:38] BM.

[31:39] Like, before Matrix.

[31:40] Also, it's a piece of shit.

[31:41] But, like, it's, like, I feel like the Matrix, after that, it was harder to do a movie that

[31:46] was so, like, goofy old-fashioned in that it's, like, everything's moving fast.

[31:52] Here's a joke.

[31:52] Scene.

[31:53] Joke.

[31:53] Scene.

[31:53] Joke.

[31:53] Scene.

[31:54] Joke.

[31:54] Uh-oh.

[31:55] This cute old man's going to go down at the end of the dock and start fishing.

[31:59] And these two bums are like, you'll never catch anything.

[32:01] Ha, ha, ha.

[32:02] And he throws his lure in and the bobber or whatever the thing is.

[32:07] Like, two seconds later.

[32:08] Two seconds later, it gets pulled from him.

[32:10] And he's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

[32:11] And this line snaps.

[32:13] And then a monster comes out.

Stuart Wellington

[32:13] First off, don't portray fishing unrealistically, dude.

[32:17] It takes fucking forever.

[32:18] It's a lot of sitting around.

[32:19] Pretty boring.

[32:20] If the first time I threw my lure in, I caught a fucking Zilla right away, I'd be doing that

[32:25] shit every day, man.

Elliott Kalan

[32:26] And here's the other thing, though.

[32:27] It's raining all the time.

[32:29] That guy is a moron.

[32:29] It's raining men.

[32:30] Hallelujah.

[32:31] Hallelujah.

[32:32] For going out in the rain to fish.

Stuart Wellington

[32:34] But like, that this, he can't.

[32:36] His wife probably passed away.

[32:38] He's just trying to find a way to, like, to fill his days.

[32:40] His only friends are the drunks down at the dock who are making fun of him.

Elliott Kalan

[32:44] He's just waiting for the day when he falls and breaks his hip and he knows it's time for

[32:47] him to go, you know.

[32:49] And he can just get into that bright white light.

[32:51] Because otherwise, he's got to take his own life.

[32:53] And he's a Catholic.

[32:54] He's not going to do that.

[32:54] That's a moral sin.

Stuart Wellington

[32:55] He's kind of hoping one of these fish will, like, pull him into the water and then he'll

[32:58] slowly drift away.

[33:00] And it's kind of like falling asleep.

[33:02] And going home.

[33:04] Yeah.

[33:04] You know, he'll feel the weed on his hands as he returns to his family farm.

Elliott Kalan

[33:10] He's walking down that dock just hoping he's going to slip and hit his head.

[33:13] And then it's just, that's it.

[33:14] Loses consciousness.

[33:16] Wakes up in heaven.

[33:17] His wife is there.

[33:18] It may be his son who died in the first Gulf War.

[33:21] And then.

[33:21] Oh, boy.

[33:22] Do you not like how dark life has gotten for this comedy character?

[33:27] But it's a dumb, it's the kind of dumb movie where Godzilla makes his appearance on New

[33:32] York soil by biting a fishing lure and, like, doing a gag about a fishing pole.

[33:37] He's really coy.

Dan McCoy

[33:39] He, like, knows how to, yeah.

[33:40] Like a fish?

[33:41] Like a coy fish.

[33:44] He knows how to make an entrance.

Stuart Wellington

[33:45] He's a diva.

Elliott Kalan

[33:47] And then he walks up and he's just throwing things around.

Stuart Wellington

[33:49] I can only assume there's a scene on the cutting room floor moments after the dock explodes

[33:56] and they just threw a bunch of fake wood at those bums that are waiting off to the side

[34:00] that there was an extra scene of them, like, looking at their liquor bottles and throwing

[34:04] them away.

[34:05] Yep.

Elliott Kalan

[34:05] Never again.

[34:06] Stuart was pointing out we were watching how many styrofoam bricks were thrown at people

[34:09] throughout the movie, too.

Stuart Wellington

[34:10] Because there's so much of this movie is, like, they obviously have a huge effects budget

[34:15] for the time, but it's still only so big.

[34:18] So, so much of the scenes are, like, a shitty shot of Godzilla legs running by and then it'll

[34:24] cut to real people with, like, fake stuff flying at them to make them think, make us feel like,

[34:30] oh, wow, they're in the action.

Elliott Kalan

[34:31] They're also, even when Godzilla has reached land, they don't want to reveal what he looks

[34:36] like.

[34:36] They're working towards this mythical, amazing debut of the new Godzilla design, which is

[34:42] not going to happen because this Godzilla design looks terrible.

[34:44] Let's just say it.

[34:45] Like, he looks really bad.

Stuart Wellington

[34:48] Well, he's just really fucking scrawny and cut up, dude.

[34:51] He's, like, super muscly.

[34:52] He's super brawny.

Elliott Kalan

[34:54] But at the same, but he's got this huge head that looks like a, uh.

[34:57] Like Fin Fang Foom.

Dan McCoy

[34:58] Without a mustache.

[34:59] Fin Fang Foom without a mustache and the tiny purple shorts.

[35:01] Well, he looks more like a lizard man than, like, a giant lizard.

Stuart Wellington

[35:04] Yeah.

[35:05] And with a head.

[35:05] And a lizard man who, like, you know that guy goes to the gym and lifts, man.

Elliott Kalan

[35:09] Oh, yeah.

[35:09] Yeah.

[35:09] And his head is kind of shaped like the barrel of a handgun, like, or a stapler.

[35:13] No.

[35:14] His head looks like a stapler.

[35:15] That's part of the problem.

[35:17] And he looks like a lizard man.

[35:18] Exactly.

[35:19] And so, and he's got the smarts of one.

[35:21] He's constantly outwitting the military.

Stuart Wellington

[35:22] I don't know about you dudes, but I love a big-ass fat Godzilla.

[35:26] Like, I want one that looks like he just pounds the food all the time.

Dan McCoy

[35:30] Some junk in that trunk.

Stuart Wellington

[35:32] Like a guy that I, like, I, like, I could be that guy.

[35:35] Like, you know what they're saying?

Elliott Kalan

[35:36] He doesn't have body shame me.

[35:37] What they say, the bigger the cushion, the sweeter the pushing over buildings.

[35:41] Oh, yep.

[35:42] They do say that.

[35:43] Yeah.

[35:44] And Godzilla makes landfall.

[35:46] And the movie plays the same cards over and over again.

[35:49] We see Godzilla attack two different fishing boats.

[35:52] It's, neither is so spectacular that they needed to heighten it or even show us another one.

[35:56] And we see so many times people hearing.

[36:00] Wait, but I don't get it from the first one.

[36:02] Does Godzilla like to attack fishing boats?

[36:04] I mean, they're establishing that Godzilla likes to eat fish.

[36:06] You know what?

[36:07] I'm just going to take that on credit.

[36:09] You don't have to explain to me that a big animal likes eating fish.

Stuart Wellington

[36:12] Nope.

[36:13] We need, uh, we need to establish a pattern.

[36:15] That's how the human brain works, Elliot.

[36:17] The human brain seeks to find some sort of a pattern in the randomness of events around it.

Elliott Kalan

[36:23] It's like if in Big Night they showed someone eating and then they followed that person to the bathroom and showed them pooping.

[36:28] And they're like, now you understand how the system works?

[36:31] Is that the one with Keith Ledger?

Stuart Wellington

[36:32] That's where the food went.

[36:33] No.

[36:33] And, uh, and Jeffrey Chaucer.

[36:36] No.

Elliott Kalan

[36:37] Yeah.

[36:37] Different person.

[36:39] I forgot that one exists.

[36:43] Except that, is that one called First Night also?

[36:45] I thought Sean Connery was in First Night.

[36:46] That's certainly called.

Stuart Wellington

[36:47] Sean Connery and Richard Gere in First Night.

[36:49] I wish that was called Big Night, though, because, uh, Heath Ledger is such a big night.

Elliott Kalan

[36:55] Uh, so what were we, oh yeah, so they keep showing people, like, hearing Godzilla's footsteps and being like, what's that?

[37:01] And then Godzilla shows up.

[37:03] A couple times.

[37:04] As if the people watching the movie are resetting their brains with each scene and forgetting what happened before.

[37:10] Well, you guys are pointing out how New Yorkers are so caught up in the old rat race, dude.

[37:14] And they do that a couple times, a scene where someone's so busy on the phone or listening to their headphones, they don't even notice Godzilla.

Stuart Wellington

[37:20] They can't see the giant green screens behind them.

Elliott Kalan

[37:22] Like, the movie is just, it's like the movie keeps hitting a skip and showing you the same thing over and over again.

[37:28] Anyway, Matthew Broderick gets brought in.

[37:30] The army gets brought in.

[37:31] Manhattan gets evacuated.

[37:33] Manhattan is consistently called New York throughout the movie.

[37:35] The Muppets take Manhattan, briefly.

[37:37] Briefly, and then Godzilla crushes them.

[37:39] Yeah.

[37:39] I, as a Brooklyn resident, become offended that New York apparently is just Manhattan and the outer boroughs are meaningless to this film.

[37:47] You know what?

[37:47] Without Manhattan, we'd do just fine.

[37:49] Brooklyn was its own city once.

[37:51] It can be its own city again.

[37:52] Anyway.

Dan McCoy

[37:53] Isn't it now the second biggest city in the world?

[37:56] It's, but it's the first best.

[37:58] Mm-hmm.

[37:59] So Godzilla, you can keep your Manhattan high-rise baby.

Stuart Wellington

[38:02] Or third.

Elliott Kalan

[38:04] But you know, you just know that Godzilla and his babies, they're going to be like, oh, I have a family now.

[38:09] I've got to go where it's safer and it's a little cuter.

[38:11] And they're going to come and raise our rents.

[38:13] Yeah.

[38:13] Because suddenly there's these rich monsters moving in.

[38:16] I'm tired of monstrification ruining neighborhoods.

Dan McCoy

[38:21] And I'm tired of the monster fact.

[38:24] Wait.

[38:24] Hold on.

[38:25] Monster.

[38:26] Yep.

[38:26] You're doing it?

[38:27] I don't even know where you're going.

[38:28] I think you're on to something.

[38:29] Monster vision.

[38:30] Monster vision.

[38:30] Okay.

[38:31] Coming into television and ruining.

Stuart Wellington

[38:34] No, I'm right with you.

[38:35] Television.

[38:36] Oh, that's great.

[38:37] Wait.

[38:38] Oh, great stuff.

[38:38] Hold on.

Elliott Kalan

[38:39] So Godzilla's stomping around.

[38:41] The army's trying to stop him.

[38:41] He's going fucking crazy, dude.

[38:43] They can't stop.

[38:43] Matthew Broderick's full of good ideas.

[38:45] Put a big pile of fish over here and then shoot him a bunch of times.

[38:47] Well, that didn't work.

[38:48] And the helicopters blew up a lot of buildings.

[38:50] Can I wait?

[38:50] Shoot the fish?

[38:51] You would think?

[38:52] Good point.

[38:53] I was not clear.

[38:54] Put a pile of fish together to lure Godzilla over it.

[38:57] Shoot Godzilla.

[38:58] Shooting the fish will make you feel good for a minute.

[39:01] Yeah, yeah.

[39:01] But then it's like...

Dan McCoy

[39:01] It builds up your confidence.

[39:03] It'd be pretty funny.

[39:05] Just think about building up a pile of fish and just shooting at it.

Stuart Wellington

[39:08] And then you're like, it's like shooting fish in a pile.

[39:10] Yeah.

[39:12] It's even easier than shooting them in a barrel because the barrel's not getting in your way.

[39:15] Now, talking about technology in 1998.

[39:18] Okay, let's talk about it.

[39:19] Okay.

[39:19] We've all agreed that the CGI does not age well.

[39:24] The special effects, for the most part, look like shit.

[39:26] There are some practical effects in it that look great.

[39:28] Yeah.

[39:28] But the CGI looks very bad.

[39:30] But weirdly enough, the army also suffers from some technological problems, Elliot.

[39:34] Because you would think with a giant-ass lizard running around, they'd be able to fucking

[39:38] see that thing with their heat vision goggles.

Elliott Kalan

[39:41] No, it turns out because Godzilla is cold-blooded that he does not show up on infrared.

[39:48] And also, heat-seeking missiles don't seek him.

[39:50] They seek everything else.

[39:52] At one point, they go, ah, his temperature is colder than the environment around him.

[39:56] Now, maybe this is because of the urban...

Stuart Wellington

[39:58] Are heat-seeking missiles?

[39:59] We'll just strike that Sabaretz cart and blow up all the dogs.

Elliott Kalan

[40:03] Ah, I escaped my native country's repression for this.

[40:07] And that's the owner of the Sabaretz cart.

Dan McCoy

[40:10] Now...

[40:10] Well, they'll just hit Cleveland because I hear it's hot there.

Elliott Kalan

[40:13] Okay.

[40:13] It is hot in Cleveland, yeah.

[40:15] Because of all the...

[40:16] Because of Betsy White.

[40:17] Betsy White.

[40:18] Betsy White.

[40:19] And Wendy Malams.

[40:20] And Daphne's.

[40:22] Okay.

[40:22] Who's the other woman on that?

[40:24] Is there more than three?

[40:26] I've never seen it.

[40:27] Bronson Pinchot.

[40:27] That's not a woman.

[40:29] And he wants you to know that.

[40:31] Ding dong, he's right outside.

[40:32] What?

[40:33] He says that you calling him a woman is ridiculous.

[40:35] Okay.

[40:36] Thanks, Bronson.

[40:37] Thanks for stopping by.

[40:38] Now, what if Bronson, the movie with Tom Hardy, was about Bronson Pinchot?

Stuart Wellington

[40:42] There's gotta be a fucking meme somewhere, that shit.

[40:45] Tom Hardy had to do a Balky Bartakamoose impression.

[40:48] He gets all greased up and naked and then he does his Balky Bartakamoose.

[40:52] Now.

[40:53] Come at me, Cuisin Larry.

Elliott Kalan

[40:55] Now, I was thinking about this.

[40:56] And maybe it's the urban heat island effect that urban areas tend to trap heat and it

[41:02] gets hotter around them because there's just so much energy and activity and so forth

[41:06] going on.

[41:06] It is raining like a mofo, though.

[41:07] You'd think the rain, yeah, would tamp down the temperature.

[41:10] Temperature, if you will.

[41:11] And so it just doesn't square.

Stuart Wellington

[41:13] I mean, he's eating all this fucking fish.

[41:16] His body converts that delicious fish into energy.

[41:19] That energy's heat, baby.

Elliott Kalan

[41:21] Well, also, he's running around like crazy.

[41:23] He's burning energy.

[41:24] Fast.

[41:25] So, I mean, one, that's why he stays so cut.

[41:28] He's always, he's always, it's like constant P90X.

Stuart Wellington

[41:32] Do you see that, like, V right around his hips?

[41:35] See it?

[41:35] How could I not look at it?

[41:36] Yeah.

[41:37] Right up.

[41:37] It follows a belt, it's called.

[41:38] Yep.

[41:39] I think it's called something else.

[41:40] I'm not familiar with it.

[41:42] I don't like it.

Elliott Kalan

[41:42] Let's look on Urban Dictionary.

[41:43] I don't think you do.

[41:44] Let's look on Keith Urban Dictionary.

[41:47] It's called American Pride.

[41:49] Anyway.

[41:51] So, moving along.

[41:53] Matthew Broderick's full of good ideas, but they just can't stop this Godzilla.

[41:56] And so, one thing leads to another.

[41:59] They blow it up with a bunch of submarine missiles, and they think it's dead, dead, dead.

[42:03] Meanwhile, Matthew Broderick has fallen into disrepute, because he says, this thing is pregnant.

[42:09] I took some pregnancy tests from a drugstore that's somehow still open, and I tested its

[42:15] blood, I guess.

[42:17] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[42:17] I mean, this is the thing.

[42:18] Like, he, like, the only sample you see him taking is, like, of some, like, pink goo, but

[42:23] then later on, he seems to have just, like, a vial of Godzilla urine.

[42:26] You gotta believe that, that Godzilla, after swimming through all that water, Godzilla must

[42:30] have swallowed a lot.

[42:30] It's peeing like a racehorse.

[42:31] No, it's peeing like crazy, but how did, like, how did Matthew Broderick get that Godzilla

[42:36] pee?

[42:37] Maybe he ordered it through the mail.

[42:37] Yeah, deleted scenes.

[42:39] Yeah.

[42:40] Deleted scenes.

[42:41] Of him milking out some pee out of him.

[42:42] Of him sneaking up to Godzilla with a flask.

[42:43] Of him sneaking up to Godzilla in a urinal costume.

Elliott Kalan

[42:48] Godzilla's like, oh good, I gotta go.

[42:51] Zip.

Stuart Wellington

[42:53] And so.

[42:54] Matthew Broderick looks at the camera, says, it's a living, and then the scene ends.

[42:58] Yep.

[42:58] Winks at it.

[42:59] Big laughs.

[43:00] Movie over.

[43:01] Whoa.

[43:02] It's an interesting end of the movie.

[43:04] I hope there's a post-credit sequence that clears up a lot of shows.

[43:08] What is the Takeshi Miike film?

[43:09] What's going on?

Elliott Kalan

[43:11] I would love to see.

[43:12] I guess Takeshi Miike's kind of done his Godzilla-ish type stuff.

[43:15] He did a giant monster movie, didn't he?

[43:17] I think so.

[43:19] He did kind of an Ultraman type movie, I thought.

[43:21] I mean.

[43:22] And there's also, what's, Big Man Japan is not him, but it's kind of what he might do

[43:26] with a giant monster movie.

[43:28] But, uh, anywho, he tells the army, Godzilla's a hermaphrodite.

[43:34] He reproduces.

[43:35] And the army's like, you just ruined my childhood, dude.

[43:37] Reproduces asexually, and he's got a ton of babies somewhere that he's laid the eggs for

[43:41] that's where he's collecting all this first.

[43:43] And we gotta stop him.

[43:44] And they're like, hey, did you leak a tape to your ex-girlfriend reporter of Godzilla footage?

[43:50] And he's like, uh, by accident maybe?

[43:52] And they fire him.

[43:54] Luckily, Jean Reno has been watching everything throughout the whole movie with a mysterious-

[43:57] Crafty Frenchman Jean Reno.

[43:59] A mysterious band of Frenchmen.

[44:00] And here's another way that you can tell this is a pre-9-11 movie, is that the American military

[44:04] is portrayed terribly.

[44:07] Incredibly incompetent.

[44:08] Yeah, super bumbling.

[44:09] Can't get its shit together.

[44:10] Super bumbling.

[44:11] Whereas the French secret intelligence agency-

Stuart Wellington

[44:13] They are about as bumbling as the American military would be if this was a Japanese-made movie.

Elliott Kalan

[44:18] I would just say, step aside, bumblebees, because someone else deserves the title of Bumble.

[44:25] It's the American military in Godzilla.

[44:27] You know what you're now called?

[44:28] Not as Bumbly Bee.

[44:30] Mm-hmm.

[44:31] Well, I'm-

[44:32] You're talking about the transforming robot or the animal?

[44:35] Both.

[44:35] Watch out, Bumble and Bumble, which I think is what, a haircutting place?

Dan McCoy

[44:38] Yeah, it's a hair treatment.

[44:41] It's like creams and such.

[44:43] You put cream in your hair?

[44:45] Yeah.

[44:46] I mean, not like cream that you get for your kitty cat.

[44:50] Your kitty cat.

Elliott Kalan

[44:51] Don't say it that way.

[44:52] It's creepy.

Dan McCoy

[44:53] Kitty cat.

Elliott Kalan

[44:54] Stop doing that.

[44:55] I don't like it.

Dan McCoy

[44:56] But cream that you put in your hair.

[44:57] Okay.

[44:57] Hair cream.

Elliott Kalan

[44:58] Well, anyway, now you're called-

Stuart Wellington

[44:59] Yeah, both comes out of a cow's dick or something.

[45:01] Yeah, that's right.

Elliott Kalan

[45:03] Anyway.

Stuart Wellington

[45:04] You squeeze a cow.

Elliott Kalan

[45:05] I see why Stuart lost that contract doing the educational film strips for grade schools.

[45:12] Anyway, where's your milk come from?

[45:13] A cow's dick or something?

[45:15] It's down there.

[45:16] Just squeeze it a bunch.

[45:18] Yeah.

[45:18] Fire safety.

[45:19] Get away from that fire, dudes.

Dan McCoy

[45:24] Anyway, so-

[45:26] This is like driver's ed films.

[45:27] Like, check out these accidents, man.

[45:29] Check them out.

[45:30] Slow your car down and look at them.

Elliott Kalan

[45:34] The part-

[45:35] Look, if it's got a dead man's curve, speed the hell up.

[45:38] I want to see that dead man.

[45:40] Is it like in Phantasm?

Stuart Wellington

[45:41] Yep.

[45:42] Is there-

[45:43] That's a dead-on impression of me, guys.

[45:44] Yeah.

[45:45] Classic.

Elliott Kalan

[45:46] It's like listening to a mirror.

[45:48] But in this movie, the French intelligence service is amazingly great at everything.

[45:54] They're the best.

[45:55] Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[45:55] And five of them, led by Jean Reno, can do better than the entire U.S. military.

[45:59] So, Matthew Broderick hooks up with them.

[46:01] They ask for his help finding the nest of these Godzilla monsters.

[46:05] And they find it.

Stuart Wellington

[46:06] Because at this point, Normal Godzilla's been roasted underwater.

Elliott Kalan

[46:09] As far as they know, Normal Godzilla is dead in the water.

[46:13] Literally.

[46:14] Mm-hmm.

[46:14] And they have to find the babies.

[46:16] They find them.

[46:17] Where else?

[46:18] MSG.

[46:19] Madison Square Garden.

[46:21] The building built on the ruins of the most beautiful building in the city, which was destroyed, sadly.

[46:27] Upkeep was a real problem.

[46:29] But anyway, I'm talking about the old Penn Station, everybody.

[46:31] Yeah, no, yeah.

[46:32] So-

[46:33] It's a real tragedy.

Dan McCoy

[46:34] Yeah.

[46:34] Architectural tragedy.

Elliott Kalan

[46:35] It is.

[46:36] Now, they find all these Godzilla eggs, and they're like, we gotta blow them up.

[46:40] Uh-oh.

[46:40] They start hatching.

[46:41] Because here's the thing about Matthew Broderick.

[46:43] He's always around where Godzilla is gonna be.

[46:45] Mm-hmm.

[46:45] Also, we've established at this point that Godzilla, despite being enormous,

[46:49] can somehow comfortably creep through the subway tunnels, an area that I find cramped and uncomfortable.

[46:54] Mm-hmm.

[46:55] And I'm a smaller-than-normal man.

[46:57] I am in no way a giant lizard.

[46:58] No.

[46:59] Despite what you may have read.

[46:59] And he kind of does like a whole wormy thing.

[47:01] I mean, you're in some ways a giant lizard.

[47:03] Let's be honest.

[47:04] And only in that I'm larger-than-normal lizard, but I still bask on a rock for most of the day.

[47:09] And kind of blink in a way that implies that I don't understand my surroundings.

[47:12] Mm-hmm.

[47:13] And if a snake bites my tail, I can just lose it.

[47:16] Mm-hmm.

[47:16] And race off and grow like a stumpier new tail.

[47:19] Yeah.

[47:20] But otherwise, you're nothing like a lizard.

[47:22] Nothing like a lizard otherwise.

[47:23] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[47:24] So-

[47:25] Oh, and also I rhyme with a lizard.

[47:26] If I saw you in a lineup with a lizard, there's like a 50% chance I'd pick you to not be the lizard.

[47:32] Yeah, yeah.

[47:32] I think that's fair.

Elliott Kalan

[47:33] And then I'd get off the crime of being a lizard.

[47:34] Yeah.

[47:36] So they find this egg nest.

[47:38] So they go to Madison Square Garden.

[47:39] Oh, wherever Matthew Broderick is, Godzilla is sure to follow.

[47:42] I would think maybe they're in cahoots.

[47:44] And he's already- Matthew Broderick has already had-

Stuart Wellington

[47:46] If J. Jonah Jameson was in this movie, he would assume they were in cahoots.

Elliott Kalan

[47:50] Yeah.

[47:50] Matthew Broderick has already had a moment of-

[47:52] Matthew Broderick's a menace.

[47:54] He killed those two people in Ireland.

[47:56] Oh, come on.

Dan McCoy

[47:59] You gotta get photos of that.

Elliott Kalan

[48:01] Parker.

[48:02] Parker.

[48:02] Where is that blasted Parker when you need him?

[48:05] Right here, Chief.

[48:06] I got-

[48:06] No, I don't call you Chief.

[48:07] I guess that's what Jimmy Olsen calls Perry White.

[48:10] They win.

[48:10] But I call you JJJ.

[48:12] What-

[48:12] JJ, anyway, I got these pictures of Spider-Man.

[48:14] Spider-Man's old news.

[48:15] No one cares.

[48:16] I want this Broderick fella and this Godzilla.

[48:18] I hear they're an item.

[48:19] Brodzilla.

[48:20] That's the celebrity name.

[48:21] It's going on the front page.

[48:23] Really?

[48:23] The front page?

[48:24] Because the U.S. and Iran just signed a really major nuclear deal.

[48:26] No, no, no.

[48:27] Front page.

[48:28] Brodzilla.

[48:29] Is the star-

[48:30] Is Ferris Bueller dating a giant lizard?

[48:32] Run with it.

[48:32] Stop the presses.

[48:34] Wait, but you just told us to run with it.

[48:36] Are we stopping the presses now?

[48:38] I got them up with a better story.

[48:39] Anyway.

[48:40] Okay.

[48:40] They split up.

[48:41] I haven't seen them together.

[48:43] Probably it's a big divorce case.

[48:44] Who cheated on who?

[48:45] Was Godzilla banging King Kong?

[48:47] Or was Matthew Broderick doing it with, I don't know, King Kong?

[48:50] Run with it.

[48:50] That's the story.

[48:51] Stop the presses.

[48:52] Hold on.

[48:53] You're giving me-

[48:53] One, I'm just a photographer,

[48:55] so I don't really know how to, what, write a story about this?

[48:58] Or lay out the front page?

[48:59] Use the software.

[49:00] It's computers now.

[49:01] Okay.

[49:02] Is it weird?

[49:03] Anyone else said that you have a Hitler mustache?

[49:05] Whatever.

[49:05] Just get going.

[49:06] Do it.

Dan McCoy

[49:07] There's no one else at this newspaper, is what I like about this scenario.

Elliott Kalan

[49:11] Oh, well, J. Jonah Jameson is long gone insane.

[49:13] He's just imagining this conversation.

[49:15] He's just a crazy man sitting, staring at his shoes in a sanitarium,

[49:19] just yelling, stop the presses, every now and then.

[49:22] Anyway, Matthew Broderick, they get there.

[49:26] The eggs are hatching.

[49:27] Suddenly it's Jurassic Park.

[49:28] Instead of raptors, it's baby Godzilla's chasing them around MSG forever.

[49:32] This goes on forever.

Stuart Wellington

[49:33] It's the craziest, longest shit, and you're like,

[49:36] I didn't go to this fucking Godzilla movie to see baby Godzillas.

[49:39] I wanted to see big Godzilla.

[49:41] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[49:42] But that's classic Hollywood thinking.

[49:44] Why have one Godzilla when you've got to have a ton of Godzillas?

Stuart Wellington

[49:46] A ton of baby Godzillas slipping Home Alone style on some fucking gumballs and shit.

Dan McCoy

[49:50] And basketballs.

[49:51] I'll push back on this a little bit, because I think that, I mean,

[49:53] like, they're totally stealing from Jurassic Park.

[49:55] I mean, it's obvious that they're like, all right, we want the raptors.

[49:58] No, and you're right.

Stuart Wellington

[49:59] They did manage to put in a bunch of shitty CGI raptors running around.

Elliott Kalan

[50:04] So you know what?

[50:04] Yeah, give them a medal.

[50:06] They're in the Legion of Honor now.

Stuart Wellington

[50:07] I'm pushing back on you.

[50:08] There's a bunch of French Special Forces guys who needed to get murdered by Godzilla,

[50:13] so I guess this.

[50:13] Yeah, give them the Nobel Prize for garbage.

Dan McCoy

[50:16] Here's what I'll say about it, though, is like,

[50:18] having a giant monster is kind of cool.

[50:22] It's kind of majestic.

[50:23] Yeah, well, you feed them and take them a lot.

[50:25] It's not as cool as it seems.

[50:27] I've never found it that scary, like a giant monster.

[50:32] Good point.

Elliott Kalan

[50:33] It's only scary in the sense of it being completely unpredictable and uncontrollable.

[50:40] Like, the original Godzilla is scary because it feels like something that is beyond the power of men

[50:46] is just raining destruction on innocents.

Dan McCoy

[50:49] And for some reason, I find a smaller monster, like a more human-sized monster, more...

[50:55] Sometimes humans are the worst monsters, Dan.

[50:57] Yeah, I find it more frightening to deal with something on a more relatable level.

[51:03] I can understand that.

Stuart Wellington

[51:04] Yeah, like if they got into Madison Square Gardens and those fucking little eggs were birthing little Henry portrait of serial killers,

[51:10] I'd be shit in my pants.

Dan McCoy

[51:12] That would be really scary.

[51:13] Yeah, if I should Michael Rooker's runner.

[51:15] Oh my God.

Stuart Wellington

[51:16] Nuke the place.

[51:17] Just kill everything.

[51:18] Yeah, luckily he can only move in...

[51:19] That's the only way to be sure.

Elliott Kalan

[51:20] Luckily he can only move in straight lines.

[51:22] Yeah.

[51:23] Rooker.

[51:23] I don't know, that's great.

[51:24] Like a Rook, it's a chess joke.

[51:26] One night in Bangkok makes a proud man humble.

[51:29] Anyway, Dan.

[51:30] So, I get what you're saying.

[51:32] It's scarier for someone to be chased on a human scale than to have a...

[51:36] Especially, well, especially because this movie is going out of its way to have no casualties

[51:40] except for American soldiers caught in the crossfire of their own friendly fire.

[51:44] Like, a sub gets blown up, helicopters are smashing up, and also by soldiers I'm just meaning military men.

[51:51] Clearly there's also naval sailors.

Stuart Wellington

[51:53] Yeah, I mean, there's that one great scene where those three helicopters are sitting in front of a burning building

[51:58] and they're like, we got them, ha ha.

[52:00] And they're giving each other verbal high fives, only to have Godzilla burst through a building behind them

[52:05] and just beat the shit out of them.

Elliott Kalan

[52:07] And I don't like...

[52:08] Here's the thing that I don't like.

[52:09] Is Godzilla making traps and, like, catching them in traps?

[52:13] Like, missiles are chasing him.

[52:15] Uh-oh, he swerves around to lead the missiles back to the submarine.

[52:18] It's like, how does this giant radioactive lizard monster know how a missile works?

[52:22] He's wily.

[52:22] Like, that doesn't make any...

[52:24] Like, at what level of sentience is this giant lizard monster?

[52:28] I mean, his brain is huge.

[52:28] Well, Godzilla's awesome when he's this, like, unstoppable power.

[52:32] Yes, Godzilla's scariest when he's a force of nature, as opposed to, like,

[52:36] like, oh, I'm a naughty little boy who's making traps for helicopters.

[52:41] Uh-oh, you think I'm here?

[52:43] No, I'm here.

[52:44] Oh, I'm gonna have sex with your building now.

[52:45] Like, in a way, that's the...

[52:47] Ah!

Elliott Kalan

[52:47] In a way, him having sex with the Empire State Building is the scariest moment.

[52:51] Because he is...

Dan McCoy

[52:51] If Godzilla said, I'm a naughty little boy, I would find that pretty freaky.

Elliott Kalan

[52:55] I guess so, but not scary.

[52:57] Yeah.

[52:57] But him having sex with that building, which I'm just gonna assume he's doing, it is him

[53:01] dominating the human world and interacting with it in a way that is beyond our real understanding.

[53:07] In a way that is totally alien to us.

[53:09] And, like, there's something frightening in that concept.

[53:11] But, yeah, for most of this, it's the same way that, like, the Incredible Hulk in Marvel Comics

[53:15] is always knocking down buildings, but he never hurts anybody.

[53:18] They're always like, oh, thank goodness we evacuated this town right before the Hulk got here.

[53:22] It really, like, lessens the danger of that character.

[53:25] And it lessens Godzilla's danger that the body count is so low.

[53:28] But when there's, like, a raptor-sized monster chasing you, like, it's a real visceral sense

[53:32] of, like, oh, that thing could bite me and kill me.

[53:34] And they kill a bunch of characters.

[53:35] They're eating up French Special Forces guys like they were popcorn.

[53:39] Mm-hmm.

[53:40] Yeah.

[53:41] Like they were croissants.

[53:42] What's the French equivalent of popcorn?

[53:45] Do not say le popcorn.

[53:47] Do not say le popcorn.

Stuart Wellington

[53:49] Yeah, because you normally le popcorn by planting your foot on its chest and then nibbling its head off.

[53:54] You saw it on my face somehow is the funny thing about that.

Elliott Kalan

[53:57] This was one of those moments where I was in your brain.

[53:59] And I saw the, I wanted to reach out and catch the synaptic, the electricity jumping the science synapse.

[54:05] And I couldn't do it.

Stuart Wellington

[54:06] The synapses are firing like kernels popping.

[54:09] What if you had popcorn in your brain?

[54:10] That would probably make it harder to think, right?

Dan McCoy

[54:12] Like fucking oysters.

[54:13] They eat them like popcorn in France.

Elliott Kalan

[54:15] Okay, there you go.

[54:16] And Blue Oyster Cult has a Godzilla song.

[54:19] Say a song called Godzilla.

[54:20] Wheels Within Wheels, number 23.

[54:22] Anyway, so they steal a card from Gremlins 2 and they use the MSG cameras to patch into the main news feed and broadcast that they're like, send us a fucking electro gremlin stat.

[54:34] We need an electro gremlin and an old man dressed like a vampire right now.

[54:38] And they say, all these-

[54:39] Oh man, that movie's great.

[54:41] It's the best movie ever.

[54:42] Ever.

Dan McCoy

[54:43] I think they're doing another showing over this Sunday.

[54:46] At BAM?

[54:46] I think so.

[54:47] Maybe I'll-

Elliott Kalan

[54:47] Oh shit, yeah.

[54:48] I'll go with that.

[54:49] I'll be in Los Angeles.

[54:50] Oh.

[54:50] Anyway.

Stuart Wellington

[54:53] We'll just FaceTime.

[54:54] You can watch it with me.

[54:55] Yeah.

[54:56] I'll still buy a ticket though, guys.

[54:58] So chill out.

[54:59] Don't write me mean letters.

Elliott Kalan

[55:01] This is a bootlegging.

[55:02] We paid for that seat that the iPad is sitting in.

[55:05] They get a message out.

[55:07] All the Godzilla babies are in this Madison Square Garden.

[55:09] Blow it up.

Dan McCoy

[55:10] Godzilla babies will make our dreams come true.

[55:15] When you think a thing needs crushed and you wish that you were there.

[55:20] Yeah.

[55:21] Just stomp your foot and make believe and you can crush anywhere.

Elliott Kalan

[55:26] So-

[55:27] Godzilla, Godzilla, Godzilla, Godzilla.

[55:29] Babies.

[55:30] Babies, babies.

[55:32] Love you.

[55:33] True.

[55:34] I thought it was and you.

Dan McCoy

[55:35] No, I thought it was love you true.

[55:37] Love you true?

[55:39] I guess and you would probably make more sense for a kid's-

[55:41] I mean, I could be wrong.

Elliott Kalan

[55:42] Maybe it's love you true.

[55:44] Maybe they hired somebody who used to write Elvis songs to finish up the lyrics.

Dan McCoy

[55:49] Well, that's the-

[55:50] It's like this 50s pastiche, so that's why I sort of thought that that was what this-

[55:55] But that's kind of weird for a kid's show, I guess.

Stuart Wellington

[55:57] I guess.

[55:58] Yeah, yeah, because the kids are like, I only am looking for a love that's true.

[56:02] Not one of these-

[56:03] Not one of these Saturday night kids are like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.

Dan McCoy

[56:06] I thought this was a casual thing, Muppet Babies.

[56:08] No names.

Elliott Kalan

[56:09] No names, Muppet Babies.

[56:11] Only masks.

[56:12] Look, I'm Nikolai and you're Olga, okay?

[56:15] And we just met for the first time in this bar and we'll never meet again.

[56:18] We're pretending we're Russian spies for the night.

[56:20] It's our fantasy night.

[56:23] Anyway, so they blow up Madison Square Garden.

[56:26] Uh-oh, sorry David, no more sports games there.

[56:29] And you can't see Billy Joel twice a month or whatever he does there.

[56:33] Anyway, but then uh-oh, mommy Godzilla comes back.

[56:37] Because he wanted the movie to be over.

[56:39] No, it's not.

[56:40] There's a very long car chase where they're in a taxi cab, because it's New York, and Godzilla's chasing them.

[56:45] And Godzilla cannot get her shit together to catch this taxi cab.

[56:48] And I've never wanted a monster to eat a car full of the stars of a movie more than in this film.

[56:54] They bring Godzilla over to the Brooklyn Bridge.

Stuart Wellington

[56:57] This is after Godzilla, mommy Godzilla has a moment while partially submerged in the ashes of Madison Square Gardens.

[57:05] This Godzilla looks at its dead babies.

[57:08] Nudges it with its nose.

[57:09] Nudges it with its nose like it's so many dead Ewoks.

[57:13] Like so many what?

[57:14] Dead Ewoks.

[57:15] Oh, yeah, yeah, sad.

[57:18] And whereas dead Ewoks, not that sad.

[57:21] Dead Godzilla's are kind of sad.

Elliott Kalan

[57:23] Well, because you add in the element of like, this is her baby.

[57:25] Yeah.

[57:26] And whereas most reptiles do not have a family connection with their offspring.

[57:30] Just leave them to get eaten.

[57:31] Pops out your cloaca, hatches, who cares?

Stuart Wellington

[57:34] Maybe I'll eat it myself.

Elliott Kalan

[57:36] Hey, look, a snack.

[57:38] It's mine now.

[57:39] I made it, I get to eat it.

[57:40] Back in my belly where you came from.

Dan McCoy

[57:42] I'm a perpetual eating machine.

Elliott Kalan

[57:44] I was watching the show Life last night, which is one of those Earth shows where there's the really great footage of animals.

[57:51] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[57:51] Not the Amy and Lewis detective show.

[57:53] No, no.

Elliott Kalan

[57:54] The show where it's like really great HD footage of animals.

[57:57] Right.

[57:58] And there was a lizard who hatched her eggs and then just watched as a snake ate them.

[58:03] And my wife was like, I would never allow that to happen to my child.

[58:06] I could never stand by what happened.

[58:08] She put her foot down.

[58:09] Yeah.

[58:09] I was like, yeah, because you're a human being.

[58:11] That's a relief.

[58:12] Oh, boy.

[58:13] Like, yeah, you're a human being.

[58:14] You're not some dumb lizard.

[58:15] So the fact that Godzilla feels real emotions is an evolutionary leap forward.

Stuart Wellington

[58:20] In a way, we're almost like, maybe our time on this planet is done.

[58:25] Which is Matthew Broderick's message in this film and in life.

Elliott Kalan

[58:31] You've seen the PSAs, right?

[58:32] Hi, I'm Matthew Broderick.

[58:34] You may remember me from Lady Hawk.

[58:35] Now, there's something I want to let you know.

[58:38] As humans, our time on this earth is over.

[58:40] Also, by the producer's Broadway soundtrack, it's me, Matthew Broderick.

[58:46] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[58:47] So Godzilla chases after them, ends up on the Brooklyn Bridge and gets stuck in traffic.

Elliott Kalan

[58:52] No, she gets tangled in the suspension wires, which for some reason doesn't cause the bridge really to collapse.

[58:58] I don't remember.

[58:59] And the army shoots a ton of missiles at her and blows her up.

[59:03] And she dies.

[59:05] And Matthew Broderick is like, oh, you were too beautiful for this world.

[59:08] And everything is totally okay and everyone's life is better until, uh-oh, there's one egg left.

[59:14] And it's hatching.

[59:16] And it's in a locker room, which would seem like a really small space for Godzilla to shove her cloaca into and just squirt an egg out into.

[59:23] But what are you going to do?

[59:24] It's the movies.

[59:25] Anyway, getting everybody set for a sequel that didn't happen.

Dan McCoy

[59:28] That's what the fucking cartoon bird said at the end of the movie.

[59:30] It's the movie.

Elliott Kalan

[59:32] The Godzilla baby pops out the egg at the end.

[59:34] He might as well be saying, that's all, folks.

[59:36] Now, they had signed up the main cast for three movies.

[59:40] Really?

[59:40] They were preparing for a Godzilla trilogy.

[59:42] And they had signed, like, Matthew Broderick and the others to do three films.

[59:46] I believe is what you meant to say.

[59:47] I apologize.

[59:47] A trilogy, yeah.

[59:48] And the film failed to meet their high hopes.

[59:52] And those other movies were not made.

[59:54] Oh, that's too bad.

[59:55] And the only time we ever got to see this Godzilla again, aside from the Godzilla animated series based on this film, was in the great Godzilla movie, Godzilla Final Wars, which I think I may have talked about on the podcast before.

[1:00:05] I'm not sure.

[1:00:06] Probably many times.

[1:00:07] The real Godzilla, although in this case I guess it's Godzilla's son because Godzilla had been killed in Godzilla vs. Destroyah.

[1:00:15] But then Godzilla's son is also in the movie.

[1:00:18] You know what?

[1:00:18] Forget it.

[1:00:18] I'm not going to get involved in the continuity hiccups.

[1:00:21] But Godzilla Final Wars is the movie that ends with Godzilla seemingly forgiving America for dropping the atomic bomb.

[1:00:27] But, of course, he's got something to gain from it.

[1:00:29] It woke him up.

[1:00:30] But he faces the American Godzilla for, like, a 45-second fight and just destroys him instantly.

[1:00:36] That was pretty great.

[1:00:37] And when I saw it in a theater as part of the New York Asian Film Festival, the audience cheered and applauded.

[1:00:45] And it was like a cathartic moment had just taken place.

Stuart Wellington

[1:00:47] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:00:48] You left that theater brothers.

[1:00:51] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:00:52] So we should wrap up and say whether this is our final judgments on this movie.

[1:00:57] Whether it's a good-bad movie, a bad-bad movie, or a movie we kind of like.

[1:01:01] I have to admit that when I first saw it with a bunch of friends in college and a cackling film teacher, I kind of enjoyed it.

[1:01:12] And I have a kind of soft spot for Roland Emmerich and his particular flavor of stupid.

[1:01:17] Like, he usually keeps things moving pretty fast and has a bunch of character actors and tries to throw in jokes there, even if they're bad jokes, at least that they exist.

[1:01:28] But this is probably my least favorite Roland Emmerich movie upon re-watching it.

[1:01:33] And I think it was bad-bad.

[1:01:36] Bored me.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:39] Yeah, it's a perfect example of like a bad 90s derivative blockbuster, although it did feature a intentional slam against film critic Roger Ebert, which is hilarious.

[1:01:52] I didn't even talk about that.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:53] And Gene Siskel.

Stuart Wellington

[1:01:54] And Gene Siskel.

[1:01:55] But I feel like most of that hot fire coming out of Roland Emmerich's pen is going right toward Roger Ebert by naming the mayor of the town Mayor Ebert.

[1:02:05] The town.

[1:02:05] New York City.

[1:02:07] It's the biggest little town on earth.

[1:02:09] No, that's not New York.

[1:02:10] That's Reno, I think.

[1:02:11] And it's such a funny, like, bullshit parody.

[1:02:17] Like, you half expect Mayor Ebert to talk about, like, how he can't stop shitting his pants.

[1:02:24] How small his penis is.

[1:02:25] Exactly.

[1:02:27] And they throw in a bunch of, like, dumb thumbs up, thumbs down jokes.

[1:02:31] It's so crazy.

[1:02:32] It's such, like, a crazy, like, small, petty fucking joke.

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:37] In your enormous movie.

[1:02:39] Yeah.

[1:02:39] In the movie that is the big release of the year of any studio.

Stuart Wellington

[1:02:45] Like, I wonder how many people are like, are you sure you want to do this, Rowan?

[1:02:51] And he's like, fucking positive, dude.

[1:02:54] Yeah.

[1:02:54] I got this one.

[1:02:55] It'll be hilarious.

Dan McCoy

[1:02:56] A two and a half star review for Independence Day is finally going to get paid back.

[1:02:59] Mm-hmm.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:01] That review cost us the Oscar.

[1:03:04] Yeah.

[1:03:06] So is that a...

[1:03:07] That was a bad, bad.

[1:03:09] I think, you know what I'm going to say?

[1:03:10] It's a bad, bad movie.

[1:03:11] But if you cut out the last sequence, I'd call it a good, bad movie.

[1:03:16] All right.

Stuart Wellington

[1:03:17] But you'd have to...

[1:03:18] Are you talking about the sequence where the baby Godzillas are busting through the windows

[1:03:24] and it's just a bunch of fake Godzilla puppets sticking in the windows?

[1:03:27] No.

[1:03:27] That's pretty great.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:28] Maybe my favorite.

[1:03:29] My two favorite parts in this movie are the baby Godzilla puppets, which look great.

[1:03:33] Mm-hmm.

[1:03:34] There's one that opens its mouth.

[1:03:35] And they did such good latex detailing on the inside of the throat.

[1:03:38] Mm-hmm.

[1:03:39] And there's a moment when the helicopters are chasing Godzilla through the canyons of New York

[1:03:43] that the effects are so hyperactively fake looking that it stops being an example of bad special effects

[1:03:52] and it becomes an example of really cool bad special effects.

[1:03:56] Mm-hmm.

[1:03:56] Where it's like, oh, you know what?

[1:03:57] This isn't even supposed to look real.

[1:03:58] It's just supposed to look kind of like vibrant, you know?

Stuart Wellington

[1:04:01] This is like a cutout from a sequence on The Lawnmower Man.

Elliott Kalan

[1:04:05] Yeah, or like the moment at the end of Moonrise Kingdom where they're hanging from the whatever

[1:04:12] that spire is that that lightning has hit.

[1:04:14] And it's clearly miniatures, but like it's not even supposed to look super real.

[1:04:18] Like it's more the feeling of it.

[1:04:20] So anyway, but I'm going to call this a bad bad because then there's – I was talking

[1:04:23] about the endless sequence where Godzilla's chasing them in that taxi cab and they're arguing

[1:04:28] over directions and it's like –

Dan McCoy

[1:04:30] No, it's a hilarious joke about New Yorkers and how they want to tell you how to – you

[1:04:34] know, which route is best.

[1:04:35] Oy.

[1:04:37] Funny stuff.

Stuart Wellington

[1:04:40] Okay.

[1:04:40] I guess –

[1:04:40] Three good bads, I guess.

[1:04:42] I guess our brains got broke.

S4

[1:04:51] I'm Travis.

[1:04:52] And I'm Andy.

[1:04:52] And we host Bunker Buddies, a comedy apocalypse podcast every Wednesday on MaximumFun.org.

Stuart Wellington

[1:04:57] We've got a brand new format for our podcast that we hope you want to come and check out.

S4

[1:05:01] We try out products for your go bag.

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:03] We'll try out cheddar larva and cricket bars so you don't have to.

S4

[1:05:06] We play Would You Rather and answer questions from the audience.

S5

[1:05:09] And we have great guests that pop into the bunker.

S4

[1:05:13] It's everything you love about the show and more.

[1:05:15] Come check it out every Wednesday here on MaximumFun.org.

[1:05:18] Stay safe out there.

[1:05:20] There's always hope and cheesecake.

S5

[1:05:24] New York City, listen up.

[1:05:26] Your fellow MaxFun listeners and hosts are gathering at Stuart Wellington's New Brooklyn Bar

[1:05:31] and you're invited.

[1:05:33] You probably know Stuart from his hilarious movie riffing on The Flophouse, but did you know

[1:05:38] he's also a small business owner?

[1:05:41] It's true.

[1:05:42] Join Stuart and a ton of new MaxFun friends at the Hinterlands Bar on Saturday, August 27th

[1:05:48] at 7 p.m.

[1:05:49] You can find more information at bit.ly slash maxfunhinterlands.

[1:05:55] See you there.

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:58] So what do we do after this part, Dan?

Dan McCoy

[1:06:02] That's a good question, Dan.

[1:06:03] What do we do in the next part of the podcast?

[1:06:05] Well, we have a few sponsors who help keep the lights on around Flop Central.

[1:06:12] And we need to give them their time in the sun.

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:17] It's especially weird that they keep the lights on, but when we record, we keep it real dark

[1:06:22] in here.

[1:06:23] Yep.

[1:06:24] Real sexy.

Stuart Wellington

[1:06:26] Lit only by candles made from that candle making workshop we did at that romantic retreat.

Dan McCoy

[1:06:33] And my glow-in'-the-dark skeleton PJs that I'm wearing.

[1:06:36] Mm-hmm.

[1:06:36] And the lights from beneath this heart-shaped jacuzzi we're all in.

Stuart Wellington

[1:06:40] Yep.

[1:06:41] And lights from the ground effects from this Hot Wheels car I have.

[1:06:46] Mm-hmm.

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:47] And these little, like, those glow sticks that you break, and then they light up, and there's

[1:06:52] some kind of weird chemical in there, and you don't want to drink it.

Dan McCoy

[1:06:55] Mm-hmm.

[1:06:56] Mm-hmm.

[1:06:56] And this glow-in'-the-dark condom I'm making balloon animals out of.

[1:07:00] Mm-hmm.

[1:07:01] But anyway.

[1:07:02] This one's a banana.

Stuart Wellington

[1:07:04] Okay.

Elliott Kalan

[1:07:05] This one's a snake.

[1:07:06] Not a lot of imagination.

[1:07:07] This one.

Stuart Wellington

[1:07:08] This one is a full condom.

[1:07:10] This one is a moray eel.

[1:07:13] Mm.

[1:07:14] Tell me moray.

[1:07:14] This is if spaghetti was really thick.

Dan McCoy

[1:07:18] So the Flophouse.

[1:07:20] That's us.

[1:07:21] Is sponsored in part by Blue Apron.

[1:07:25] Not all ingredients are created equal.

[1:07:27] Fresh, high-quality ingredients taste better and are better for you, so it's important to

[1:07:31] know where your food comes from.

[1:07:34] For less than $10 per meal, Blue Apron delivers seasonal recipes along with pre-portioned ingredients

[1:07:41] to make delicious home-cooked meals.

Stuart Wellington

[1:07:44] Now, do they deliver recipes?

[1:07:46] Is that a reptile recipe?

Dan McCoy

[1:07:48] Mm-hmm.

[1:07:49] I'm sure that if there was a free-range Godzilla out there, they would give you a delicious recipe

[1:07:56] for, I don't know, crispy Godzilla on top of German coleslaw.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:01] Oh, okay.

[1:08:02] Radiation to table, yeah.

[1:08:04] Yeah.

[1:08:05] But, uh...

[1:08:06] We've talked before.

[1:08:07] Blue Apron's really great.

[1:08:08] They send you good food, and you don't have to measure any stuff out because they give

[1:08:11] you all the measurements.

Stuart Wellington

[1:08:12] And you were gifted one of those after Sammy was born, and that was really helpful.

[1:08:17] Mm-hmm.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:17] So if you know somebody who's going to be in a position where they can't shop or cook for

[1:08:22] themselves too complicatedly because either they just have a new baby, they're taking care

[1:08:28] of someone who's sick, maybe they're...

[1:08:29] Maybe they don't have access to a lovely whole foods.

[1:08:32] Exactly.

[1:08:32] Or even a half foods.

[1:08:34] Mm-hmm.

[1:08:34] Get them some Blue Apron.

[1:08:35] It's a good gift.

[1:08:36] Get it for yourself.

[1:08:37] Maybe you're a lonely guy like Dan.

[1:08:39] Mm-hmm.

[1:08:39] Cooking for one, then just...

Stuart Wellington

[1:08:41] You make two meals, you eat one, the other one you leave on a plate for a guest that will

[1:08:46] never arrive.

[1:08:47] Mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:47] It just sits in the corner slowly rotting as you cry.

[1:08:51] Stinking up your house.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:53] But you don't have to waste that much food because the measurements are so precise.

[1:08:56] Mm-hmm.

[1:08:57] But it's, yeah, it's really convenient.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:59] Yeah.

[1:09:00] And I always like to read what the meals are available.

[1:09:06] I just like reading it.

[1:09:07] I think it's fun.

[1:09:08] It's like the fucking Zagat's Guide or something.

[1:09:10] In August, you got some spiced pork burgers with goat cheese and cucumber corn salad.

[1:09:17] Summer vegetable and quinoa bowl with fairy tale eggplants.

[1:09:21] What could that be?

[1:09:22] Fairy tale eggplants.

[1:09:23] Get out of here.

[1:09:24] Shishito peppers and corn.

[1:09:26] And listen to this.

[1:09:27] Chicken tinga tacos with summer squash and tomato salsa.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:31] Dan, I...

[1:09:33] Sounds delicious.

[1:09:34] It does.

Dan McCoy

[1:09:35] I don't know what it is, and it sounds delicious.

[1:09:37] So check out this week's menu and get your first three meals free with free shipping by

[1:09:42] going to blueapron.com slash flophouse.

[1:09:44] That's blueapron.com slash flophouse.

[1:09:48] Blue Apron, a better way to cook.

[1:09:49] Mm-hmm.

[1:09:50] Let's get yummy.

[1:09:52] Better slogan.

[1:09:53] Is that your new slogan?

[1:09:54] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:54] Better slogan, both for Blue Apron and you.

[1:09:56] Mm-hmm.

[1:09:57] Stuart Wellington.

[1:09:58] Let's get yummy.

[1:09:59] Stu Apron.

[1:10:01] Here's this week's meal, Castle Freak.

Dan McCoy

[1:10:05] Isn't that the same as last week?

[1:10:08] Shut up.

[1:10:10] But we're also sponsored this week by Mack Weldon.

Stuart Wellington

[1:10:13] Oh.

[1:10:14] Oh, fancy panties.

[1:10:16] They believe in...

Dan McCoy

[1:10:16] They're called underpants.

[1:10:18] Smart design, premium fabrics, and simple shopping.

[1:10:21] Fabrics?

[1:10:21] Fabrics.

[1:10:24] It's dedicated to being the most comfortable underwear, socks, shirts, undershirts, hoodies,

[1:10:29] and sweatpants you'll ever wear.

[1:10:31] I have some delightful Mack Weldon shirts, some underwear.

[1:10:36] Yeah, they're pretty delightful.

[1:10:36] Socks.

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:37] They're my favorite brand of underwear right now, and their socks are really great, and

[1:10:40] their undershirts are really great.

Stuart Wellington

[1:10:41] Now, if you're playing a special night with your dudes, your ladies, who cares?

[1:10:46] Your dailies.

[1:10:47] You guys, your lewds.

[1:10:48] Whoever.

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:49] Here's...

[1:10:49] There's two great strengths to the Mack Weldon underwear.

[1:10:53] One, they look great.

[1:10:54] One.

[1:10:55] They show off both sides of your pelvic area very nicely.

[1:10:58] Mm-hmm.

[1:10:58] Two, they're more comfortable, and they're airier, so you're going to have the confidence

[1:11:01] of knowing that those parts of your body, which, let's face it, we all want to have somebody

[1:11:06] touching at some point in the evening.

[1:11:07] Mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[1:11:07] And it's fucking August, dog.

[1:11:09] It's the dog days of summer, man.

[1:11:10] We all know those areas must smell.

[1:11:12] They...

[1:11:12] Mm-hmm.

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:13] Just by, you know, there's no way of getting around it.

[1:11:16] But if you're in Mack Weldon's, it's like, they're breathing, they don't feel swampy.

[1:11:21] It's one, I'm going to have the confidence that's going to get someone to touch that part

[1:11:25] of me, and two, when they do, they're going to be like, oh, you're not sweaty and gross.

Stuart Wellington

[1:11:28] They're not going to be sticking their hands down into a bucket full of Nickelodeon's

[1:11:32] gack.

[1:11:33] And you're going to...

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:34] Unless that's what you keep in your underpants, I don't know.

Dan McCoy

[1:11:37] And you're going to say it that way, too, right, Ellie?

[1:11:39] You're going to go, touch that part of me.

[1:11:41] Mm-hmm.

[1:11:41] I mean, if you say it right, then that's pretty romantic.

[1:11:44] It's a late soul album.

[1:11:45] Mm-hmm.

[1:11:47] Somebody mock up the cover.

[1:11:48] Touch that part of me.

[1:11:50] So, please, go to mackweldon.com and get 20% off using your promo code FLOP.

Stuart Wellington

[1:11:59] Promo code FLOP.

[1:12:00] Now, the next part of this show is the j-j-j-jumbotron.

[1:12:03] J-j-jumbotron.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:04] Jumbo-ist of Trons.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:05] Here's some other folks who are helping keep some lights on in this Flophouse of ours.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:09] You don't have to be a big company like Mack Weldon or Blue Apron to get to be a part

[1:12:14] of the Flophouse supporting community.

[1:12:16] You could be a regular Joe.

[1:12:17] You could be a regular MaxFun donor, which is amazing.

[1:12:19] And we thank all of our MaxFun pledge donors.

[1:12:21] Mm-hmm.

[1:12:21] Or you could go to the jumbotron and slash or.

[1:12:25] You can also go to the jumbotron and we'll read a special message that you've given us.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:30] Like this one.

[1:12:31] Happy birthday to my college roommate, lifelong friend, fellow educator, and fellow Flophouse

[1:12:37] listener, Carl Peardum.

[1:12:40] Peardum?

[1:12:41] Peardum?

[1:12:41] I don't know how to pronounce it.

[1:12:42] I'm a steward and I'm dumb.

[1:12:44] Uh, I know you're the owner slash operator of ivorytowertutoring.com and co-author of Barron's

[1:12:52] latest GMAT guide.

[1:12:55] But come on, can't you take at least one day off from providing top-notch LSAT, GRE, and

[1:13:02] GMAT tutoring at affordable rates in person in the Atlanta area and worldwide via Skype?

[1:13:10] It's your birthday.

[1:13:12] You should be out celebrating.

[1:13:14] Sincerely, Dr. Bowman, first name withheld.

[1:13:18] Now, that message, once again, is to celebrate Carl's birthday by giving him money to improve

[1:13:23] your LSAT, GRE, or GMAT scores.

[1:13:25] Visit www.ivorytutoring.com.

[1:13:29] Maybe if I took some of those courses, I'd know what the hell we're talking about.

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:33] I mean, maybe, hopefully.

[1:13:35] Uh, and we've got another message.

[1:13:37] This is a poissonal message from a poisson.

[1:13:39] Oh, poissonal.

[1:13:39] Because a poisson can develop a message.

[1:13:43] Guys and dolls.

[1:13:44] So, this is from, this is for Jam Master Karen from Team Memoly.

[1:13:50] Dan, can you read that first sentence up there?

[1:13:52] Happy birthday, Karen.

[1:13:54] And then I'll read the rest.

[1:13:55] Among your plethora of achievements in coding, fashion, and friendship, introducing us to

[1:13:59] the Flophouse is truly the greatest.

[1:14:01] Hope Dan's voice saying your name is the best gift you ever received, and that you're reacting

[1:14:05] to this with your signature cackle.

[1:14:08] You are the best BFF forever.

[1:14:09] What's so redundant?

[1:14:11] And a great...

Stuart Wellington

[1:14:12] I apologize.

[1:14:13] I just fucking fact-checked that jumbotron.

[1:14:15] I apologize for checking this grammatical.

[1:14:17] Wait, I'm tagging out the character limit.

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:20] You are the best BFF forever and a great terrify-a-guy colleague.

[1:14:24] Love you.

[1:14:25] So that's a message of sheer love and friendship on the birthday of Karen from Team either M.

[1:14:30] Emily or Memoly.

Dan McCoy

[1:14:32] Terrify-a-guy colleague.

[1:14:34] I'd like to know more about that.

[1:14:35] You'd like to be terrified.

[1:14:36] You're a guy.

[1:14:37] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:14:37] Godzilla didn't do it.

[1:14:39] No.

[1:14:39] Nope.

[1:14:40] Only the baby Godzillas did it for Dan.

[1:14:42] Now, just to point out, in addition to that sort of thing, we also, at the end of this

[1:14:46] month, this is August, on August 27th, there's going to be...

[1:14:50] If you're listening to this later than August of 2016...

[1:14:52] Just rip the earbuds out of your ear and throw yourself down a flight of stairs.

[1:14:56] Whoa!

[1:14:57] Not what I was getting in.

[1:14:59] Well, if they already ripped the earbuds out, they didn't hear that part.

[1:15:01] And they're not hearing this part.

[1:15:03] Now we're back in.

[1:15:06] There's going to be a meetup for listeners of the MaxFun podcast.

[1:15:11] That's the network that this podcast is a part of, maximumfun.com.

[1:15:16] Dot org.

[1:15:17] Dot org.

[1:15:17] Thank you.

[1:15:17] I'm an idiot.

[1:15:18] But there's going to be a big meetup for MaxFun listeners at Hinterland's Bar in Brooklyn,

[1:15:24] New York.

[1:15:25] That's your bar, Stuart.

[1:15:26] That is my bar.

Dan McCoy

[1:15:28] Someone's digging from the trough at both ends.

Stuart Wellington

[1:15:30] Yep.

[1:15:31] I like...

[1:15:31] Well, it's sweet at the front, but that's even sweeter at the back end of that trough.

[1:15:35] So there's going to be a meetup, including many Maximum Fun personalities, or at least

[1:15:42] some.

Stuart Wellington

[1:15:42] The same ones you love listening to.

[1:15:43] And yeah, so if you're around, come by August 27th, Hinterland's Bar.

[1:15:48] 7 p.m.

[1:15:49] Till, I think, 11 p.m.?

[1:15:51] What's the address for that bar?

[1:15:52] Uh, 739 Church Avenue.

[1:15:54] Brooklyn.

[1:15:55] New York.

[1:15:56] In...

Stuart Wellington

[1:15:56] USA.

[1:15:57] USA.

Elliott Kalan

[1:15:58] Earth.

[1:15:58] The Milky Way.

[1:16:00] Universe.

[1:16:00] Keep going.

[1:16:01] Multiverse.

[1:16:02] Mm-hmm.

[1:16:03] Creation.

[1:16:05] Um...

[1:16:06] But now...

[1:16:08] Oh, you know what?

[1:16:09] I want one more thing I wanted to say.

[1:16:10] I wanted to thank all the people who came out to our Washington, D.C. live show, which we

[1:16:14] did recently.

[1:16:15] Yeah.

[1:16:15] Uh, at the Black Cat Club.

[1:16:18] I don't know what you would call it.

[1:16:19] Uh-huh.

[1:16:19] Bar space, performance space in Washington, D.C.

[1:16:22] Uh, it was a really fun show.

[1:16:24] The audience was really great.

[1:16:25] We had some amazing questions in the question and answer session.

[1:16:28] Yeah.

[1:16:28] People laughed at our dumb jokes.

[1:16:30] They laughed at it.

[1:16:30] Unfortunately, our recorder did not work properly.

[1:16:33] Yeah.

[1:16:34] So, those 500 people shared a very special experience of a Flophouse show that no one else will

[1:16:40] get to hear but them.

[1:16:41] So, thanks for coming, guys.

[1:16:43] And it's a real motivation.

[1:16:45] If you ever want to go to a Flophouse live show, go to it because...

[1:16:48] You never know.

[1:16:48] We may not know how to work the recorder.

[1:16:50] Uh-huh.

[1:16:50] And you may not get the chance.

[1:16:52] You may screw the fuck up.

Stuart Wellington

[1:16:53] But it was a great audience.

[1:16:54] Yeah, I've listened to past episodes where our sound quality is, let's say, suspect.

[1:17:00] Yeah.

[1:17:00] Uh, is any indication?

[1:17:01] Yeah.

[1:17:02] We can't really be trusted to handle things on our end.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:04] We don't know how the machine thingamabob divisors work.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:07] Yeah.

[1:17:07] So...

[1:17:07] So, this is the magic of live theater.

[1:17:09] It's an ephemeral experience.

[1:17:11] Yeah.

[1:17:12] It happens once and then it disappears into the ether.

[1:17:15] It was a real Flophouse pop-up show.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:16] Yeah.

[1:17:17] So, thank you, everyone, for coming out.

[1:17:19] You were really welcoming.

[1:17:20] And for our first show outside of the New York area, it was a real success.

[1:17:24] And we had a fun time.

[1:17:25] So, thanks very much.

[1:17:26] Yeah.

[1:17:26] We'll probably have to do more of those.

[1:17:28] Right, Elliot?

Stuart Wellington

[1:17:29] Yeah.

[1:17:30] I mean, why...

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:30] So, when are we doing our next one?

[1:17:32] Um, tomorrow?

[1:17:33] I don't know.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:34] Oh, wow.

[1:17:35] You pushed them too far in the other direction.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:38] We're going to be in San Francisco tomorrow at, what, the Fillmore?

[1:17:41] I don't know.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:42] You heard it here first, guys.

[1:17:45] But now, it's time to talk about letters.

[1:17:50] Okay.

[1:17:51] And by talk about, I mean read letters that come from listeners like you.

[1:17:55] Movie mailbag.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:56] Now, I sang a song earlier in the show.

[1:17:59] Does that mean I won't sing a song right now?

[1:18:02] Well, we're going long.

[1:18:04] There's no time for a song.

[1:18:05] But I'm singing one anyway because you only live life once.

[1:18:10] Only live life once in this world.

[1:18:13] Unless you believe in reincarnation and soul transmigration and other things ending in Asian.

[1:18:21] Perhaps you're Haitian.

[1:18:23] It's really irrelevant.

[1:18:25] Letters.

Dan McCoy

[1:18:27] Thanks, Elliot.

[1:18:28] Um, so this first letter I'm reading mostly because, uh, I was looking through our backlog of letters and this one came up.

[1:18:37] And it was particularly...

[1:18:38] What an origin story.

[1:18:40] Wow.

[1:18:41] It was, uh, particularly timely given that we finally released the Fantastic Four live show last week.

[1:18:50] Who do you think is going to win the 2012 presidential election?

[1:18:53] And it goes like this.

Elliott Kalan

[1:18:54] Yours, John McCain, last name with help.

Dan McCoy

[1:18:57] I went up to see the second...

[1:18:58] It wasn't even running in that.

[1:18:59] I went up to see the second show, Fantastic Four, with my friend and co-worker Gigi, all the way from Orlando, Florida.

[1:19:07] It was one of the most fun nights of my life.

[1:19:09] I don't know if that makes it sound epic or it makes me sound pathetic.

[1:19:13] Probably both are true.

[1:19:14] Pathetic.

[1:19:15] It was certainly one of the most drunken nights of my life, which I think helped.

[1:19:20] But more than that, I got to connect with other flop fans who were all great.

[1:19:24] I even met three guys from Central Florida.

[1:19:26] Turns out I've met them before at Bar Trivia right here in Orlando.

[1:19:29] The world can be crazy small sometimes.

[1:19:32] I was surprised that we get to have conversations with Dan and Stuart.

[1:19:35] You both were so kind.

[1:19:36] Almost the same word.

[1:19:51] Except for that O.

[1:19:53] Causing trouble.

[1:20:05] All the best.

[1:20:07] Megan, last name withheld.

[1:20:08] And I know there's not a lot to respond to in that letter.

[1:20:11] It was very nice.

[1:20:12] I just thought it was nice.

[1:20:13] And I like the message of going out there.

[1:20:15] You have to be open and talk to folks.

[1:20:16] Being open to life.

[1:20:17] Being open to people.

[1:20:17] Yeah, don't be afraid.

[1:20:18] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:20:19] But be open and talk to folks.

Elliott Kalan

[1:20:21] The only...

[1:20:22] We've talked about, to get more serious on this, that we've talked about on this show before,

[1:20:27] that if you're in a place where you're feeling alone, the only cure for that is to go out and meet people.

[1:20:32] And it's hard, but it's worth doing.

[1:20:36] Yeah.

[1:20:37] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:20:38] And go to Flophouse live shows, of course.

[1:20:40] Yep.

[1:20:41] I mean, Stuart is wearing a shirt that says, my best friend is Jesus right now, so...

Elliott Kalan

[1:20:45] Maybe you'll meet Jesus while you're out?

[1:20:46] Yeah, I don't know what you mean by that.

[1:20:48] What's the connection here?

[1:20:49] It's about friendship.

[1:20:50] Yeah, yeah, I guess.

[1:20:51] I guess so.

[1:20:51] I mean, that's a different kind of friendship.

[1:20:55] You're not going to, like, go hang out with him.

[1:20:57] Well...

[1:20:57] I don't know.

Dan McCoy

[1:20:58] I mean, that's good.

[1:20:59] I wouldn't know.

[1:21:01] Go out and make some friends.

[1:21:02] He might like playing some Mario Kart.

[1:21:04] You don't know.

[1:21:05] He contains multitudes, probably, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:07] Yeah, I mean, he's probably really good on the Rainbow Road.

Elliott Kalan

[1:21:10] I mean, his father's house has...

[1:21:12] His mansion has many rooms or whatever.

[1:21:14] His house has many mansions.

[1:21:15] So, you know, one of them's got to have an N64 in there.

[1:21:17] One of them's got to be a maniac mansion.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:17] I think we've thoroughly ruined the lovely message from this letter.

[1:21:22] No, that was...

[1:21:22] Well, then we're free to move on again.

Elliott Kalan

[1:21:23] That was a very sweet letter.

Dan McCoy

[1:21:28] This letter goes like this.

[1:21:30] Dear House of the Rising Flop,

[1:21:32] your recent impression of a vampire, Werner Herzog, inspired a question.

[1:21:36] If you had to turn a director into a vampire so they can continue making movies forever,

[1:21:40] but could never again work in sunlight or with real garlic,

[1:21:43] which director would you choose?

[1:21:44] John Carpenter.

[1:21:46] Thanks, and keep up the great work.

[1:21:48] Sam, last name with Held Esquire.

[1:21:49] Oh, no.

[1:21:50] Maybe Guy Madden.

[1:21:53] Okay, that's an interesting choice.

[1:21:55] Yeah, I would go with the Coen brothers myself.

[1:21:57] Although, it couldn't work in sunlight.

[1:22:01] So, maybe...

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:03] Yeah, because they've never done anything with noir shadows.

Dan McCoy

[1:22:06] Maybe I would pick someone who's only done movies in the dark.

[1:22:11] Who do I want to curse with the gift of immortality?

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:15] And also, it would turn out to be a horrible curse.

[1:22:18] Mm-hmm.

Stuart Wellington

[1:22:19] But I think John Carpenter would take it in stride.

[1:22:21] He'd just make a shell out of dope synth music.

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:23] He's pretty laid back.

[1:22:25] Yeah, I mean, he's pretty chill.

[1:22:27] I mean, I think Guy Madden would probably appreciate it the most.

[1:22:31] But this gift of eternal life and eternal darkness.

[1:22:34] Yeah.

[1:22:34] But, I mean, the Coen brothers are probably my favorite filmmakers of all time, I think.

[1:22:39] Like, they have a few clunkers, but their average is incredibly high.

[1:22:44] Even their...

[1:22:44] Yeah, like Stuart Gordon.

Dan McCoy

[1:22:46] Even their bad films have redeeming qualities, which...

[1:22:49] Mostly.

[1:22:50] Well, what would...

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:52] I just don't like intolerable cruelty.

Dan McCoy

[1:22:55] I know...

[1:22:56] I think you watched it again and you liked it, right?

[1:22:58] I watched it again and I was like, okay, as soon as I stopped thinking about this as a Coen brothers movie, it is...

[1:23:04] It has its enjoyable points.

Elliott Kalan

[1:23:06] Because even, like, the Lady Killers, which is not a good movie, has, like, elements about it...

[1:23:10] Yeah.

[1:23:10] ...that are not bad.

Dan McCoy

[1:23:12] I think that it...

[1:23:13] No, I think that that movie definitely, if you...

[1:23:16] Like, that one I like better than intolerable cruelty.

[1:23:18] I know that that's an unpopular opinion, but if you take that outside of the Coen brothers world, like, there's some really funny stuff in that.

[1:23:26] Like, I really like Tom Hanks' weird performance in that movie.

Elliott Kalan

[1:23:29] Yeah, it's alright.

[1:23:30] The soundtrack is a good soundtrack, for the most part.

[1:23:33] Yeah.

[1:23:33] But, uh, look, we don't have to like the same things all the time, but, uh, Hail Caesar, I loved.

[1:23:39] You thought it was okay.

[1:23:40] Yeah.

[1:23:42] Second tier Coen brothers.

[1:23:43] Look, we both agree they should be vampires, okay?

[1:23:46] Okay.

[1:23:46] Yep.

Dan McCoy

[1:23:47] And they should feed off of each other forever.

[1:23:49] No, that does not know how vampires are.

[1:23:50] Oh, man, that sounds awesome.

[1:23:52] That's gross.

[1:23:53] Sounds pretty hot.

[1:23:54] Mm-hmm.

[1:23:56] After dark.

[1:23:57] Mm-hmm.

[1:23:58] Yeah, because they're vampires.

[1:24:00] Uh, this letter reads...

[1:24:03] I noticed during your latest episode, Jim and the Holograms, so you can date...

[1:24:08] Jim and the Holograms.

[1:24:10] Jim and the Holograms.

[1:24:12] That Dan struggled...

Elliott Kalan

[1:24:13] Hey, Jim, can you clean up your holograms?

Dan McCoy

[1:24:16] That Dan struggled to describe the dot over the lowercase i when referencing the Deke logo.

[1:24:22] Gentlemen, as a graphic designer and lover of adolescent humor, I'm delighted to inform you that there is, in fact, an official term for that dot, and that term is...

[1:24:31] Tittle.

[1:24:33] This just seemed like important information that you all needed to know.

[1:24:46] Plus, anytime you're feeling blue, ba-da-dee, ba-da-die, you can just say it.

[1:24:52] Tittle.

[1:24:52] And it's guaranteed to bring a smile to your face.

[1:24:55] Pressing all my buttons.

[1:24:56] As well as confused looks from anyone in your vicinity.

[1:25:00] Thanks so much for the great podcast.

[1:25:02] I look forward to it every weekend.

[1:25:03] Well, you shouldn't look forward to it every weekend, because it only comes out bi-monthly.

[1:25:07] You show him.

[1:25:08] Giggles.

[1:25:08] Dan?

[1:25:09] Giggles and tittles.

[1:25:10] Lee, first and last name withheld.

Elliott Kalan

[1:25:12] I want to end every letter I write for the rest of my life, giggles and tittles.

[1:25:18] Again, not a lot to respond to in that letter.

[1:25:20] You can easily do that, Elliot.

[1:25:21] Dear son, if you're reading this, then I've passed.

[1:25:24] I have some important news for you, et cetera, et cetera.

[1:25:26] Giggles and tittles, your late father.

[1:25:31] Sorry, you were saying?

Stuart Wellington

[1:25:32] No, I'm saying you could easily handle that with your, what, Gmail settings or whatever?

[1:25:37] Yeah, you're right.

Elliott Kalan

[1:25:38] I could make that what I sign off as.

[1:25:40] Maybe I will.

Stuart Wellington

[1:25:41] So when you're sending out your resume, because, you know, for jobs you're looking for, I don't

[1:25:46] know how your work works.

Dan McCoy

[1:25:49] Giggles and tittles sounds like a collection of, like, late 70s Swedish porn movies.

[1:25:55] Erotica, yeah.

[1:25:55] Like erotica.

Stuart Wellington

[1:25:56] Yeah, I could see that.

[1:25:58] Like it's been packaged up.

[1:26:00] Yeah, like how National Lampoon used to be all about, like, naked chicks and, like, weird

[1:26:05] jokes.

[1:26:05] Mm-hmm.

[1:26:07] And now they're all about, what, like?

[1:26:09] I don't know, like Van Wilder or something?

[1:26:12] They're all about Van Wilders.

Dan McCoy

[1:26:15] I don't know what National Lampoon is.

[1:26:18] This last letter goes as such.

[1:26:24] I was at a pottery fair in Cincinnati and saw a guy wearing an RIPD shirt.

[1:26:29] I was baffled at not only the existence of the shirt, but also the fact that the world's

[1:26:33] only RIPD superfan lives in Cincinnati.

Elliott Kalan

[1:26:36] I thought this letter started as if they were throwing darts at just a magnetic poetry kit.

[1:26:41] Pottery fair, Cincinnati, RIPD t-shirt.

[1:26:44] Mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[1:26:45] This made me wonder what shirts the original Peaches would wear if you could each own a

[1:26:49] shirt featuring a movie that you flopped.

[1:26:52] A Bratz tank top?

[1:26:53] A Fateful Findings hoodie?

[1:26:55] A talking cat long-sleeved tee?

[1:26:57] Flop-on.

[1:26:58] Jimothy.

Stuart Wellington

[1:27:00] I mean, I would totally wear a Fateful Findings shirt.

Dan McCoy

[1:27:03] Yeah.

[1:27:03] Yeah, for sure.

[1:27:04] That's a great question.

[1:27:05] I almost wish that you hadn't suggested it because then the very suggestion of it makes

[1:27:11] that the obvious choice.

[1:27:12] Yeah.

[1:27:13] I want like Benjamin Mara to design a fucking Fateful Findings shirt.

[1:27:20] It's Neil Breen.

[1:27:22] Yeah, yeah.

[1:27:23] Surrounded by three laptops.

[1:27:24] With no shirt on.

[1:27:26] What's that like?

Elliott Kalan

[1:27:27] He's got those multiple laptops.

[1:27:29] I forgot about that.

[1:27:30] Oh my God, I'm so sorry.

[1:27:31] Stuart dropped something.

[1:27:32] Yeah, I forgot he had those non-working turned off laptops that even then sweep off his desk.

[1:27:38] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:27:39] Oh, what an amazing movie.

[1:27:42] I'm thinking of actually doing a showing of Fateful Findings just because...

[1:27:45] You should.

[1:27:46] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:27:47] Now I'm actually thinking about contacting Benjamin Mara and seeing if I can convince him

[1:27:52] to design and commission him to draw a Fateful Findings poster.

[1:27:56] That I can turn into a cool tank top to wear at the beach.

[1:27:58] Sure, yeah.

[1:28:00] Mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[1:28:01] And people will be like, what's that?

[1:28:03] You're like, you're not a brainiac?

[1:28:04] Yep.

Stuart Wellington

[1:28:05] I'll get really intense and in their face about it.

[1:28:09] Get with the fucking program, dude.

[1:28:11] Now normally I should just be excited that somebody's having a chat with me when I'm hanging

[1:28:15] out at the beach.

[1:28:16] Yeah.

[1:28:17] As we're saying just like, sir, you can't sit there.

[1:28:20] Sir, your testicles are showing through your shorts.

Dan McCoy

[1:28:23] All right, I'll tell you where to get a Neil Breen shirt to.

[1:28:26] That's not what I...

Stuart Wellington

[1:28:27] Sir, this isn't a nude beach.

[1:28:29] It is now.

[1:28:31] Hey, bottoms only, dude.

[1:28:33] Bottoms can be nude.

[1:28:34] There's no law saying you can't be nude on the bottom.

[1:28:36] What?

[1:28:42] That's not like a Porky Pig law.

[1:28:45] Wait, what?

Elliott Kalan

[1:28:48] Now I want you to go outside wearing just a suit jacket and a bow tie and get arrested and

[1:28:54] be like, oh, so a pig can do it, but I can't?

[1:28:57] I thought I had rights, judge.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:00] Officer, this is a double standard.

[1:29:01] You have a big glossy photo of Porky Pig with you, just as an example.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:08] Well, in case their memory needs a little jogging after they've been distracted by my lower body.

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:13] You're chanting, this is what democracy looks like.

[1:29:16] Mm-hmm.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:18] And luckily in this age of cell phones, somebody would take that interaction down on video.

[1:29:23] Oh, sure.

[1:29:23] Yeah, and then you...

[1:29:25] And I would finally be vindicated, and the officer would look the fool.

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:29] This man went outside without pants on, and you'll never guess what happened next.

[1:29:34] And what happened next will change the way you think about pig.

[1:29:37] R.I.P.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:37] This man wearing a shirt is everything.

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:42] Flophouse host wins the everything and all the cools for eternity awesomes.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:48] This man's testicles will give you all the feels.

[1:29:51] Yep.

[1:29:51] I'm so tired of that stuff.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:52] Man wearing shirt and no pants is woke AF.

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:58] So much testicle.

[1:30:00] So many good peen, or something like that.

[1:30:02] What does that dog say?

[1:30:03] I don't know.

[1:30:04] What other memes are there, Dan?

[1:30:06] Keyboard cat.

[1:30:07] That frog on the unicycle.

[1:30:09] Yeah, yeah.

[1:30:10] He's like 14 years old or something.

[1:30:11] That boy.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:13] And...

[1:30:13] The fucking sunglasses.

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:15] Yeah, and the honey badger.

[1:30:18] Oh, wow, we did it all.

[1:30:19] So many memes.

[1:30:21] And Stuart won them all.

[1:30:22] Various basketball players crying.

[1:30:22] I guess this is our audition tape for fucking At Midnight or something.

[1:30:27] Wait, basketball players mean what?

[1:30:28] Various basketball players crying.

[1:30:30] Oh, and like Kermit and Willy Wonka are both not interested in what you're telling them?

[1:30:34] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:36] Minions.

[1:30:37] Just a bunch of shit ton of minions.

[1:30:39] Oh, you love those.

[1:30:40] Oh, can't get enough of them.

[1:30:43] Can't get enough.

[1:30:44] Like French minion soup over here.

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:48] So...

[1:30:48] Nice.

[1:30:49] Nice.

[1:30:49] Nice to meet me a minute.

[1:30:50] That's a good soup, though.

[1:30:51] They got bread in it.

[1:30:57] French onion soup, y'all.

[1:31:00] I'm Elliot Kalin for French onion soup.

[1:31:03] Not like no normal soup.

[1:31:07] There's cheese in this soup.

[1:31:09] That's crazy.

[1:31:11] So, Dan, what else do we do on this podcast?

[1:31:13] We just lose our minds?

Dan McCoy

[1:31:14] We do one last thing in this hot, hot room that we're recording.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:18] Why are we going so long on a movie that's been out for 20 years in a room that's so hot?

Dan McCoy

[1:31:24] And that is we recommend a movie that we saw, that we actually enjoyed.

[1:31:29] That's what we have to.

[1:31:30] Instead of Godzilla.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:33] Well, I'll go first, gents.

[1:31:34] How about that?

[1:31:34] I'll speed it up.

[1:31:35] Sure.

[1:31:35] I'm going to recommend a documentary movie.

[1:31:37] It's kind of the opposite of Godzilla.

[1:31:39] Uh-huh.

[1:31:39] It's called Harlan County, USA.

[1:31:41] Oh, that's a good one.

[1:31:41] And it's directed by Barbara Koppel.

[1:31:43] I'm pulling an Elliot where I'm just like, oh, that's a good one.

[1:31:45] Now, you have credit for this one.

[1:31:48] It's a documentary from 1976 about a coal mine strike in Harlan County in Kentucky where,

[1:31:54] I guess, what, Justified is set.

[1:31:56] Yep.

[1:31:56] And it's a really great movie and really gives you a sense of how dangerous and difficult

[1:32:02] those types of strikes can be and how life or death they can really be.

[1:32:07] Yeah, whose side are you on?

[1:32:09] I mean, I'm on the workers' side.

[1:32:10] But, I mean, I don't know.

[1:32:11] Maybe other people are not.

[1:32:13] They're wrong.

Stuart Wellington

[1:32:13] Isn't that the call to action for the workers?

[1:32:16] Whose side are you on?

Elliott Kalan

[1:32:17] Oh, I thought you were just asking me.

Stuart Wellington

[1:32:18] Yeah, no.

[1:32:19] I mean, I'm assuming you're with big business.

[1:32:21] Yeah, oh, no.

Elliott Kalan

[1:32:22] I love big coal.

[1:32:24] Because, you know why?

[1:32:25] There's a lot of naughty kids out there and they need to know they've been naughty in their

[1:32:28] stocking in the morning.

[1:32:30] Mm-hmm.

[1:32:30] Where are we going to get it except from the coal mines?

[1:32:32] But you're right.

[1:32:32] There's a lot of great music in it that is performed by just regular people.

[1:32:37] And they do an especially good job of showing the importance of not just the workers themselves,

[1:32:42] but also the women who are parts of the lives of the workers and the important part they play in the strike.

[1:32:47] And it's just a really good movie.

[1:32:48] So, Harlan County, USA.

Dan McCoy

[1:32:52] I've got some qualified recommendations.

[1:32:55] So, I figure, like, maybe if I double up on two middling recommendations, does that equal one recommendation?

[1:33:03] A Dan McCoy special.

Elliott Kalan

[1:33:04] So, what plane did you see these on?

Dan McCoy

[1:33:05] No, I saw these both.

[1:33:07] I saw one...

[1:33:08] On a train.

[1:33:08] I saw one on...

[1:33:10] On your iPhone.

[1:33:12] While you were going to...

[1:33:13] One is on premium cable right now.

[1:33:15] For two hours.

[1:33:16] One I saw at Videology in Williamsburg, but they're both documentaries.

[1:33:22] The one I saw at Videology is called Tickled.

[1:33:24] It's about a guy who sees online an ad for competitive endurance tickling.

[1:33:31] That sounds like a nightmare.

[1:33:33] Which has these gentlemen tickling each other while one of them is tied down.

[1:33:41] And he decides that he's going to look further into it.

[1:33:43] And almost immediately gets dramatic pushback from the tickling people.

[1:33:50] And he's like, what's the problem here?

[1:33:53] Why am I getting such pushback?

[1:33:56] Why do they care that I'm looking into this?

[1:33:58] And several shoes drop in terms of why this tickling thing is happening and who the people behind it are.

[1:34:07] I don't want to get into it too much because that's pretty much the story of the documentary.

[1:34:12] But it's 90 minutes.

[1:34:16] It's fairly entertaining.

[1:34:18] Fairly entertaining.

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:20] Raves Dan McCoy.

Dan McCoy

[1:34:21] I only said it's a middling recommendation.

Elliott Kalan

[1:34:22] I want them to put that on the box.

Dan McCoy

[1:34:27] I can't get into it without expressing the surprises.

[1:34:31] I kind of wanted there to be a few more surprises than there were.

[1:34:37] I kind of could see where the arc of the documentary was heading.

[1:34:42] Justice.

[1:34:43] Yeah.

[1:34:44] It bends towards justice.

[1:34:45] But it's still worth seeing?

[1:34:47] It's still worth seeing.

[1:34:47] And then I watched Hitchcock Truffaut based on the book of the same name.

[1:34:54] They're cops.

[1:34:56] Where Francois Truffaut.

[1:34:59] Hitchcock's a dog.

[1:35:00] Interviewed Alfred Hitchcock.

[1:35:01] Truffaut's a cat.

Elliott Kalan

[1:35:04] Somehow they're both bullies officers.

[1:35:05] They'll catch the bad guys if they're not too busy catching each other.

Dan McCoy

[1:35:09] If you've read Hitchcock slash Truffaut, you know it's one of the best books on making movies that there is.

[1:35:16] It's really entertaining to watch one great filmmaker interview another.

[1:35:21] The movie is kind of an adaptation of the book.

[1:35:25] It's kind of about Truffaut and his relationship with Hitchcock.

[1:35:30] It's also kind of just a typical talking head documentary where modern directors talk about Hitchcock.

[1:35:37] As such, it kind of feels like a really good DVD extra sometimes.

[1:35:43] But it's still entertaining and it made me want to watch Hitchcock movies.

[1:35:47] I went back and I re-watched...

[1:35:49] And previously you've had no interest in it.

[1:35:51] No, obviously I love Hitchcock.

[1:35:53] But I re-watched a middling Hitchcock movie.

[1:35:57] A movie that doesn't get a lot of attention.

[1:35:58] The remake of The Man Who Knew Too Much.

[1:36:01] Which is...

[1:36:01] I mean, it introduced the song Que Sera Sera, which is a huge international hit.

[1:36:05] Yeah, it won the Academy Award, I believe, for a song.

[1:36:08] I think so, yeah.

[1:36:09] Don't quote me on that.

[1:36:11] Quote Dan on that.

[1:36:12] It's not Top Hitchcock, though.

[1:36:13] But it's a fun movie.

[1:36:14] And I enjoyed being inspired to re-watch it.

[1:36:17] So if you like movies, if you like Hitchcock movies, Hitchcock slash Truffaut.

[1:36:22] So it's not slash fiction about Hitchcock and Truffaut doing it.

[1:36:28] Yeah.

[1:36:29] Oh, Mr. Hitchcock.

[1:36:31] Place that cigar gently between my clans.

Elliott Kalan

[1:36:34] No, stop, stop, stop, stop.

[1:36:35] Don't go any further.

[1:36:37] Stuart?

[1:36:38] Can you erase that image from my mind?

Stuart Wellington

[1:36:40] Yeah, so I'm going to recommend the movie that I recommended in our famous now live Lost episode.

[1:36:47] I'm going to recommend Richard Linklater's Everybody Wants Some.

[1:36:51] Because there's exclamation points in it.

Dan McCoy

[1:36:53] It's based on that sequence in Better Off Dead where that hamburger plays guitar.

Stuart Wellington

[1:36:58] Mm-hmm.

[1:36:59] And invented the band Van Halen with that guitar lick.

[1:37:03] So it is a spirit.

[1:37:06] It's kind of pitched as a spiritual sequel to Days Confused.

[1:37:11] It's a Richard Linklater kind of lazy hangout movie.

[1:37:17] And in this time, it's a group of college baseball players in the days leading up to the first day of class.

[1:37:25] And at first, it felt like super bro-y.

[1:37:30] And over time, these characters become much more charming and endearing.

[1:37:36] Now, granted, I am a straight white man.

[1:37:39] So maybe it's just pitched at me.

[1:37:41] Pitch is a pun, of course, because they're baseball players.

[1:37:44] Classic.

[1:37:45] But I feel like Richard Linklater is going back and showing how that he can do a movie like Days Confused again and make it just as charming.

[1:37:57] And by the end of the movie, I kind of could see myself returning to it as a movie that I would just have on in the background.

[1:38:08] And kind of live in this world over and over.

[1:38:13] So, yeah.

[1:38:14] It's not very heavy on plot.

[1:38:17] So much so that after about 30 minutes, my wife wanted to stop watching.

[1:38:22] Because nothing was happening.

[1:38:25] And everybody wants some plot.

[1:38:27] Exactly.

Dan McCoy

[1:38:28] But it's good.

[1:38:29] I really liked it.

[1:38:31] Yeah.

[1:38:31] It just seemed like you're ending that recommendation on...

Stuart Wellington

[1:38:34] On a down note.

[1:38:34] Yeah, well, it's a...

[1:38:35] Not everybody will like it, but he liked it.

[1:38:37] It's a qualified recommendation for something that has everybody in the title.

[1:38:42] I don't know if it is necessarily for everybody, but it is for me.

[1:38:46] And I shake my head a little bit.

[1:38:48] Yeah, you're a little sassy smirk.

Elliott Kalan

[1:38:50] Yeah, the audience can't see the sass that was in that.

Dan McCoy

[1:38:53] Okay, guys.

[1:38:54] Well, I don't know how we managed to talk this long.

[1:38:58] I do.

Stuart Wellington

[1:38:59] Yep.

[1:39:00] Because we haven't seen each other for a long time.

Elliott Kalan

[1:39:01] And we're buddies.

[1:39:03] And also, it seems like the later and the hotter it is, the longer we do this for some reason.

[1:39:09] So, let's keep it going, guys.

[1:39:11] What are your plans for the next few weeks?

[1:39:13] Let's do it all night.

Stuart Wellington

[1:39:14] Well, I'm going to MaxFunCon.

[1:39:16] I have this dope MaxFun meetup.

Elliott Kalan

[1:39:17] Anyway, my name is Elliot Kalin.

Dan McCoy

[1:39:19] Whose name is...

[1:39:21] Stuart Wellington.

[1:39:23] My name is Dan McCoy.

[1:39:24] Good night, everyone.

[1:39:25] Done.

Stuart Wellington

[1:39:28] I don't know if you guys follow me on Twitter.

[1:39:33] I do follow you on Twitter.

[1:39:34] I was...

[1:39:35] This weekend, I was at the lake.

[1:39:37] And I was...

[1:39:37] Took a dip in the old swimming hole.

[1:39:40] Okay.

[1:39:40] And I was resting on the dock.

[1:39:43] You know, having a chat with my lady and my buds.

[1:39:47] And...

[1:39:48] It was like you were in a beer commercial.

[1:39:49] Yeah.

[1:39:49] And something fucking bit me on the nipple, dude.

[1:39:53] I think it was a fish or maybe a toidal.

[1:39:57] The reason I think it might have been...

[1:39:58] Now, so I'm swimming around and I freak out, of course, because something's fucking nibbling

Elliott Kalan

[1:40:02] on my nip.

[1:40:03] You said you were laying on the dock.

Stuart Wellington

[1:40:05] No, no, no.

[1:40:05] I was resting on it because it was like a kayak launch.

[1:40:09] So part of it was kind of in the water.

[1:40:11] I get you.

[1:40:12] And...

Elliott Kalan

[1:40:13] Objection overruled.

Stuart Wellington

[1:40:16] Retracted.

[1:40:16] So I'm assuming that the reason it...

[1:40:20] At first, I'm like, this has got to be a fish that's nibbling on my nip.

[1:40:23] And...

[1:40:23] But I think it also could be a turtle.

[1:40:25] A common American nip nibbler.

[1:40:27] It could be a turtle because my nips look a little bit like little worms.

[1:40:31] Or pizza.

[1:40:32] Or pizzas.

[1:40:33] Your nips do look like pizza.

[1:40:35] Little pepperonis.

[1:40:36] Yeah.

[1:40:38] And so...

[1:40:39] So I climbed out of the water and, yes, in fact, my little nipple was bleeding.

[1:40:43] Oh.

[1:40:44] And have you turned into a fish or a turtle or do we have to wait for a full moon?

[1:40:47] I don't know.

[1:40:48] If you want, we can go to the bathroom.

[1:40:50] You can check me all out.

Elliott Kalan

[1:40:52] That was the weirdest, longest come on I've ever heard.

[1:40:56] Yeah.

[1:40:57] Yep.

Dan McCoy

[1:40:59] Maximumfun.org.

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Ep. #211 - Godzilla (1998)

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