The Flop House: Episode #157 - The Legend of Hercules

Dan McCoy

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss the legend of Hercules. It's the one without the rock.

[0:30] Hey, everyone. Welcome to the Flophouse. I'm Dan McCoy. Hey!

[0:36] Are you going to say your name? Oh, you asshole. Hey! I'm Stuart Wellington.

Elliott Kalan

[0:42] And I'm Elliot Kalin. No prompt needed to get me to say my name. Elliot Kalin, I'll say whatever. Elliot Kalin.

Dan McCoy

[0:52] So out there in the audience. Elliot Kalin. Yeah?

[0:57] It's like we never left, but it's been a while since we've all been together.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01] Yeah, we set up some episodes so that they could be released while we were on Vacation.

[1:07] Yeah.

[1:08] As I think the Germans say. Is that Japanese?

Dan McCoy

[1:11] Yeah, ancient Greek. Vacationese, they called it.

[1:14] Elliot was in California. I was in England. Not a competition, but I won.

Elliott Kalan

[1:19] Yeah, because the weather in England was much better than it was in California.

Dan McCoy

[1:22] And the weather is all you care about? This guy. Culture.

[1:26] Yeah.

[1:26] Come on.

Elliott Kalan

[1:28] Shakespeare.

[1:29] I got you guys.

[1:29] Yeah, Calumbo done.

[1:30] Shakespeare of California.

[1:32] Guys, I got you.

[1:32] Romeo and Juliet.

[1:33] I got you some gifts.

Dan McCoy

[1:34] Oh, that's nice. You didn't do that to him.

[1:36] For you, Elliot, I got you the inexplicable British Cartoon Magazine viz.

[1:43] Thanks, I guess.

[1:45] Trying to figure out what's going on in these British comics.

Elliott Kalan

[1:48] Well, I know it involves all my favorite characters, according to the cover. Roger Mellie, 8 Ace, George Beastiel. That doesn't sound very good. And other characters I've never heard of. Fat Slags is also named here.

Dan McCoy

[1:59] And for Stuart, a copy of the Lad Mag Zoo. Oh man, Zoo.

[2:05] The Lad Mag Zoo advertises unbelievably busty brunettes.

[2:08] Okay.

[2:09] Well, I'm up for that.

[2:10] Dan, I also have accepted busty brunettes.

[2:13] Oh, I know some of these.

[2:14] Well, England is the only nation whose lust for busty women.

[2:17] Stuart, you know we're being recorded, right?

Stuart Wellington

[2:19] Well, I recognize these cleavages.

[2:22] There's been a big hole in my life ever since Nuts Magazine.

[2:27] My favorite British Lad's Mag just ended its run and featured a crying Lucy Pinder on its final cover.

Dan McCoy

[2:36] How could you do that to Lucy?

[2:37] I know.

[2:38] Thanks, Dan. This is a great gift.

[2:40] So, Dan, is this a gift-giving podcast?

[2:42] It's a gift-giving podcast, and I can't help but see that neither of you have gotten me anything.

Elliott Kalan

[2:47] Well, I would have gotten you something from California, but apparently you think it's terrible.

Dan McCoy

[2:50] Wait. Hold on. You predicted that I would think that?

Elliott Kalan

[2:53] Yeah, because I know you.

Dan McCoy

[2:55] No, I love California.

[2:57] I just, you know.

Stuart Wellington

[2:58] Dan loves all the states.

[3:00] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[3:00] Except for Montana. It knows what it did.

[3:04] But this is a movie podcast primarily.

[3:07] It's a time-killing podcast.

[3:08] We're not going to talk about our vacation some more. I didn't go on one, so.

[3:11] We're just trying to irritate that guy who was annoyed that we spent 15 minutes before we got into Upside Down.

Stuart Wellington

[3:16] That comment really took you.

Dan McCoy

[3:18] Got under your skin.

[3:19] Yeah.

[3:21] Stuck in the old craw.

[3:23] You're going to have to see a craw specialist take that removed.

[3:25] How is old craw, by the way?

Elliott Kalan

[3:27] Well, I'm right here, Dan. Ask me to my face.

Dan McCoy

[3:30] How's your corner, old craw?

Elliott Kalan

[3:32] It's kind of a private question, but which one?

[3:35] The neck one.

[3:36] Oh, well, it's coming along quite nicely. It's almost ripe enough to pop.

[3:41] Do you mind if we stick some things in you?

Stuart Wellington

[3:43] Well, that's what old craw is here for.

[3:46] Stick them in.

[3:47] I have some cocktail toothpicks.

[3:48] Look like a little sword.

[3:49] Sure, I have some space left in my arm.

[3:51] I have an actual sword. How about that?

[3:53] Maybe put that in somewhere to find something else.

[3:56] Well, thanks for stopping by, old craw.

Elliott Kalan

[3:57] No, I can stick around.

Stuart Wellington

[3:59] Old craw does now a lot of friends.

[4:00] How about some corn on the cob holders that look like old corns on the cob?

Elliott Kalan

[4:04] You got to, they come with corn. Old craw's a little hungry.

[4:07] No, no, no.

[4:08] It's been a long time since old craw could afford a hot meal.

[4:12] I'm what you call a non-volunteering freegan.

Stuart Wellington

[4:18] Do a lot of garbage scavenging.

Dan McCoy

[4:20] This character is like one of those characters from lore where you invoke their name and then they won't leave.

Elliott Kalan

[4:28] That's right. Give me your firstborn. Stick it in me.

[4:30] Oh, craw! Now, which of you has a wish I may grant?

[4:37] Keep in mind, craw.

[4:38] At least he grants wishes.

[4:40] Calling for an old craw can have very dangerous consequences.

Stuart Wellington

[4:45] Quick, Dan, we got to smear yogurt on the floor as we leave.

[4:47] That's the only way to appease me.

[4:50] Make sure it's low-fat Greek yogurt.

[4:53] Getting to the point. Greek stuff.

[4:55] Greek stuff, huh?

[4:56] Greek movies.

Elliott Kalan

[4:57] Well, I don't think he's a Greek movie.

[5:00] We watched an American movie tonight.

[5:02] So, Dan, this podcast, we watch a bad movie and then we talk about it.

[5:05] The movie we watched tonight, The Legend of Hercules, directed by one Reynolds Harlan.

[5:11] Now, the last Rennie Harlan movie you forced us to watch was a total boring piece of junk.

[5:16] You know what, that Devil's Pass or something?

[5:18] So it could only go up from there.

[5:20] Yes, and boy did it ever for much of this movie.

[5:23] Here's a movie that I was expecting to be dumb.

[5:26] I didn't expect how dumb it would be.

[5:28] And let's just say one thing.

[5:30] Any movie that manages to give Hercules some kind of lightning whip with which he can slash at his enemies,

[5:37] I'm okay with that movie to a certain extent.

[5:41] Should we talk about this very loose rendition of the Hercules myths?

Dan McCoy

[5:44] Yeah, and you guys are going to have to fill in the actual Hercules Greek mythology stuff.

[5:50] You're not going to be our expert on Hercules tonight?

Elliott Kalan

[5:52] Yeah, Dan doesn't really know much about Hercules.

[5:54] You were saying you don't like Greek myths.

[5:55] You find them stupid?

Dan McCoy

[5:57] I don't find them stupid.

[5:58] You're the people who like them stupider.

[6:00] I really want to like them.

[6:02] They're just so, and this makes sense based on how they sort of came about and were passed down,

[6:07] but they're so disjointed that I can't enjoy them as narrative, I feel like.

[6:11] But I understand that many people, including yourselves, love both of us.

Stuart Wellington

[6:15] You like something a little more linear, a little easier to follow.

[6:18] Yeah, like Naked Lunch.

[6:19] Ugly Betty.

Elliott Kalan

[6:21] Those are the two choices you have.

[6:23] Either the Greek myths or Ugly Betty.

[6:25] That was the choice they had in Ancient Greece, too.

[6:28] They could have worshipped Zeus or Betty.

Stuart Wellington

[6:31] Yep, that's a desert island choice.

[6:33] That desert island being what, Crete?

[6:35] Yeah, I guess so, or Minos.

Elliott Kalan

[6:38] Home of the Minos birds.

[6:40] Home of the Minos burger.

[6:44] Mmm, that's good beef.

[6:46] It's half man, half beef, but still.

Stuart Wellington

[6:47] Big surprise, it has tzatziki sauce on it.

Elliott Kalan

[6:50] That's the, shh, don't tell anyone our secret.

[6:53] It's tzatziki.

[6:54] We all know it, and it's served on a pita bread instead of a bun.

[6:58] Everyone knows your secret Minos burger.

[7:01] Yes, it was secret Minos spices.

[7:04] No, you don't.

[7:04] It's just olives.

[7:05] It's a pita cheese.

[7:06] I get it.

[7:06] It's a pita cheese knowledge.

[7:07] Mostly oregano.

[7:08] Yeah, and olive oil.

[7:10] Okay, well, anyway.

[7:11] But we serve it to you nude.

[7:13] Oh, okay, well, that's different.

[7:14] You're going to suvlaiki the prices.

[7:18] A Minos burger, based on a stereotype.

[7:21] Now, in the ancient Greek myths, just to cue anybody else in, Hercules, or as the Greeks

[7:27] called him, Heracles.

[7:28] Heracles, yeah.

[7:29] And Stuart and I will talk a little bit about this, just because both of us went through

[7:32] Greek myth phases when we were under it, and still have affection for them.

Stuart Wellington

[7:35] Yeah, it was kind of like comic books, but before I started reading comic books.

Elliott Kalan

[7:39] Exactly.

[7:40] Hercules, or Heracles, is a demigod, the son of Zeus.

[7:44] I'm going to say that every time he says Hercules.

[7:47] Hercules is monster, I should say.

[7:50] He's a demigod, the son of Zeus, and a mortal woman who has super strength, and he mainly

[7:55] fights monsters.

[7:56] Yeah.

[7:57] And, of course, he was in a fit of rage induced by Hera, who was always trying to kill

[8:01] him, Zeus' wife.

Stuart Wellington

[8:03] She's jealous that he's better than any of her children.

Elliott Kalan

[8:05] And she doesn't like that Zeus was not faithful to her.

Stuart Wellington

[8:08] And Zeus, in a way, loved his half-human, half-godson more than the children he had with her.

Elliott Kalan

[8:15] Because we love our children for their flaws.

[8:18] Sure.

Dan McCoy

[8:19] Now, Dwayne the Rock Johnson has told me he's the world's first superhero.

[8:22] Is that correct?

[8:23] No, actually, Superman is the world's first superhero.

[8:26] I thought Apocalypse was.

Elliott Kalan

[8:28] Well, are we going through real-world chronology or Apocalypse?

[8:32] Or comic book chronology?

[8:34] Apocalypse was the first mutant, of course.

[8:36] And Savonur, they called him in ancient Egypt.

[8:39] So are we telling his story now?

[8:40] Are we still telling Harry Gleeson?

[8:41] I mean, we should start at the beginning, right?

[8:43] Yeah.

[8:44] So anyway, in the beginning, there was a universe before our own.

[8:47] Galen, a scientist, survived the collapse of that one, being transformed into Galactus,

[8:52] the world devourer.

[8:54] Flash forward to 1961, when a ragtag group of scientists went up into the air, into space,

[9:00] and was hit with radiation, just turning them into the Beatles.

[9:09] This mott-top foursome of Liverpoolians set the nation on fire on the Ed Sullivan show.

[9:14] The world on fire.

[9:15] Or as it was known in ancient Greece, Edus Sullivanocalypse's tragedy forum.

[9:21] Now anyway, Hercules, his story is mainly about him killing people and monsters.

[9:26] He gets driven mad by Hera, kills his family, and as a result, to atone, becomes the slave

[9:31] of this king, and the king sends him on the Twelve Labors.

[9:34] Yep.

[9:34] And anyway, that's Hercules for you in a nutshell.

[9:37] And try to put Hercules in a nutshell.

[9:39] He's not going to fit.

[9:40] He's a big, strong man wearing a lion skin.

[9:42] It depends on the nut.

Stuart Wellington

[9:43] If it's like the type of nut that would feed a rock bird.

Elliott Kalan

[9:46] Yeah, that's true.

[9:47] It could be big, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[9:47] And the nut's from that mysterious island from Journey 2.

[9:51] The mysterious island.

Elliott Kalan

[9:53] That's a movie of the rock.

[9:54] And it's not really what the mysterious island is from originally.

[9:56] You know that, right?

Dan McCoy

[9:57] I just think there was a bunch of big stuff on that island.

[9:59] It was called Wrong Size Animal Island.

[10:02] It was called Big Island.

Elliott Kalan

[10:03] But this movie, so...

[10:04] People with big dreams.

[10:05] But the Greek myths are basically about a world in which the gods exist.

[10:09] They are super powerful, but they aren't particularly more moral than humans.

[10:15] They are powerful beings that you can curry favor with.

[10:18] And to have their own petty passions and tempers and lusts.

[10:22] And this movie, in trying to make a new Hercules legend,

[10:26] transforms them into more of a Christ liberator figure.

[10:29] Yeah.

[10:29] In a way that is not totally successful.

[10:32] And by not totally, I mean not at all successful.

[10:35] But let's tell the story.

[10:37] So King Amphitrion of Tyrese is invading Argos.

[10:42] And he challenges the King of Argos to single combat.

[10:45] Why should we let our armies kill each other when we can settle this and save hundreds,

[10:50] if not thousands, if not millions of lives?

[10:52] So he's actually a pretty good king.

[10:54] In a way he's a good king here.

Stuart Wellington

[10:55] He wins and...

[10:57] We're taken to this battle through a slow zoom that takes us almost like Normandy storming-like

[11:04] through a beach invasion.

Elliott Kalan

[11:06] Yeah.

[11:07] That gets to the heart of the town.

[11:09] This movie opens as if it is a first-person spear thrower, where you are a Greek soldier,

[11:15] which is a great...

[11:17] Frankly, is a great idea for a video game.

Dan McCoy

[11:20] You know?

[11:20] Well, now I'm imagining like...

[11:21] Call it like Call of Hoplite or something like that, you know?

[11:24] You find like more powerful spears as you're walking around.

[11:27] It's like, oh, well, here's the semi-automatic spear that I've got.

[11:30] Yeah.

[11:30] Yeah, exactly.

[11:31] Power-ups.

[11:32] My basic spear.

[11:33] Throw that down.

Elliott Kalan

[11:33] Speaking of power-ups, Hercules gets a pretty bitchin' power-up later when Zeus throws

[11:38] some lightning into his sword and it turns into an electric whip.

[11:40] Hold on there.

[11:41] But we'll get there, slowly, because this is the Flophouse and we're killing a lot of

[11:45] time.

[11:46] Much like Hercules slew the Nemean Lion and the Hydra.

Stuart Wellington

[11:50] But super fast, which is the opposite of what we do.

Elliott Kalan

[11:52] Now, let's also say about this movie, Hercules is confronted with very few challenges

[11:56] that he doesn't defeat in about 30 seconds, and there's a lot of unnecessary slow-mo.

[12:00] It's like Rennie Harlan had someone describe the movie 300 to him and the movie Gladiator,

[12:06] and he was like, and the movie Braveheart, and he was like, I can turn those into a movie.

Dan McCoy

[12:10] I'll have it star Hercules.

[12:11] I like that.

[12:12] He's like, I can turn those into a movie.

[12:14] Well, Rennie, those are worth movies.

Elliott Kalan

[12:15] There are already three hit movies.

[12:17] I'll make them a movie, though.

[12:19] But no, Rennie.

[12:20] Give me enough money that you would give to like, give me the budget of two sci-fi channel

[12:24] original movies and enough CGI that I can always have confetti in the air in every

[12:29] scene.

Stuart Wellington

[12:29] And then I will create you a demigod baby of a movie.

Dan McCoy

[12:32] Yeah.

[12:33] There's a lot of pollen floating around in every scene.

[12:35] Constantly.

[12:35] Which didn't make sense until we remembered that this was originally a 3D movie.

[12:39] So there always has to be something floating near your nose.

[12:41] Yeah, it looks like they're walking through a fucking allergy zone.

Elliott Kalan

[12:43] It's an Allegra commercial, yeah.

[12:45] I'd like to believe that the movie was trying to escape from us and was just throwing its

[12:49] ink and dust in our face.

[12:50] I'm sure it's chaff.

[12:51] The movie was constantly throwing handfuls of sand at the audience to hide its retreat.

[12:58] But anyway, the queen who's married to the king somehow doesn't like him for some reason.

[13:05] She worships...

[13:06] Because he's like a conqueror.

[13:07] Yeah.

[13:07] And she worships the Greek gods who he does not believe in.

[13:10] So she goes to Hera and Hera says, just this once I'll let Zeus have sex with you so that

[13:16] you can have a baby who will bring peace to the kingdom.

[13:19] So there's a prophecy in this too, which of course you know I love.

[13:22] Yeah.

[13:22] I love it whenever a character is not a victim of free will, but in fact has his events predestined.

[13:28] Although that's more of a Greek thing anyway.

Dan McCoy

[13:29] And again, we flash back to the fact that there's no reason why Harry should care about

[13:33] whether there's peace in this kingdom of mortals.

[13:37] That's not a Greek god sort of thing to care about.

[13:39] No, or why the queen should care.

[13:41] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[13:41] And it's also strange that she's praying at a ruined temple because we're in ancient Greek times.

[13:47] The temples aren't ruined yet.

[13:48] They should be new.

Elliott Kalan

[13:49] Let's say that the king just pulled down the temples or something like that.

[13:52] Sure, okay.

[13:53] I don't think that's what it is.

[13:54] It's just that the filmmakers were like, ancient Greek stuff.

[13:56] Everything's broken.

[13:57] Got it.

Stuart Wellington

[13:57] So you think this is a time where they should have opened with either a crawl, like an opening

[14:02] crawl or with like text explaining what the fuck is going like.

[14:06] The time is Greece.

[14:07] The time is Greece.

Elliott Kalan

[14:07] I mean, they do that.

[14:09] The place is old.

[14:11] The olden days or whatever.

[14:12] I'm usually against those, but this might have been a good one if only to explain that this

[14:17] king is rampaging through the ancient world destroying those local cultures and religions and enslaving

[14:24] them.

Stuart Wellington

[14:24] The princess explaining, you know, my mother told me that when I was growing up, there was

[14:30] this awesome king.

[14:31] No.

[14:31] My mother always told me, never trust a demigod.

Elliott Kalan

[14:35] And you better shop around.

[14:37] For other demigods.

[14:38] Yeah.

[14:39] I think that, well, they could have shown us all this.

[14:43] They could have shown him being a bad conqueror rather than just showing him walking around.

[14:48] And being exultant in victory.

[14:50] And the wife says, you didn't do this for me.

[14:52] You did this for the gold.

[14:54] But that's all.

[14:55] We never see him being a bad king until later in the movie.

[14:58] But it's in the ancient times.

[15:00] It was all kingdoms with slaves and stuff anyway.

[15:02] It's not like there was.

[15:04] Tyranny, dude.

[15:05] They talk a lot about freedom later in the movie where Hercules is like, they've taken

[15:08] our freedom.

[15:09] It's like, I mean, that concept almost didn't exist at all at the time.

[15:14] It didn't exist for many, many, many, many years.

[15:16] Yeah.

[15:16] It's a weird, but it's them trying to make a modern version of this story.

[15:20] But anyway, so the baby is born.

[15:23] But unfortunately, the husband walks in on his wife having sex with Zeus, which is weird

[15:28] because I believe this is a story where Zeus came to her in the form of a bull, right?

[15:32] But you just see flashes of lightning and then you hear a bull while she's writhing around

[15:37] under the sheets.

Dan McCoy

[15:38] It's like that movie where the ghost rapes the lady.

[15:41] Do you know what I'm talking about?

[15:42] What?

[15:42] Ghost rape.

[15:43] Yeah.

[15:43] The movie.

[15:44] Ghost rape.

Elliott Kalan

[15:44] No, I would say it's like a lady version of Dan.

[15:46] A hollow man?

[15:46] It's like the lady version of Dan Aykroyd's ghost blowjob from Ghostbusters.

[15:50] Okay.

[15:51] Except her eyes are never crossed.

[15:52] That would have been great.

Stuart Wellington

[15:54] I actually didn't mind that style choice.

[15:56] No, no.

[15:57] I was not actually see a half man, half bull.

[16:00] That's true.

[16:01] Considering like...

[16:02] A Rosenberg movie would have been great, but...

Elliott Kalan

[16:04] But like Rosemary's Baby, which is a great movie, the one misstep is when you see like

[16:08] this kind of devil figure over Rosemary.

[16:11] It's like, okay, that's a little silly.

Dan McCoy

[16:12] When you say that, Stu, I'm imagining like a seven minute blue is the warmer's color style.

Elliott Kalan

[16:18] So many different positions between her and a bull man.

[16:22] Yeah, exactly.

Dan McCoy

[16:23] I don't even know if they do that one.

Elliott Kalan

[16:25] What's weird is the way he manifests his bull parts is that he's a regular human who has

[16:29] hoofs instead of hands and feet.

[16:31] He's just horrific.

[16:32] He's just been talking to the Indian gods.

[16:36] So anyway, she gives birth to the boy and she's told that his name will be Alcides, but secretly his name is Hercules.

[16:44] I'm not sure why they went through that.

[16:47] I think there's something in Greek myth that that's rooted in, but I don't know exactly what it is.

[16:52] Then we cut to 20 years later, Hercules slash Alcides is riding through the countryside with his love Hebe, who is not Jewish, despite being named after a slur.

[17:01] I think it's Hebe.

[17:03] Hebe, which sounds ridiculous.

Dan McCoy

[17:05] Let's say that Hercules is like a very buff, slightly balding Sean William Scott lookalike.

[17:12] He's more of a Smircules kind of a...

[17:15] Smircules.

Elliott Kalan

[17:17] The face of the guy on it, I kept thinking, he reminded me a lot of the character Grunge from the old Gen 13 comics.

[17:23] For any J. Scott Campbell fans out there.

[17:25] Are there any?

[17:26] Anyway, so, but Hercules has a brother.

Stuart Wellington

[17:29] He kind of looks like a non-clean-shaven Neil McDonough.

[17:34] You know, that actor with the really blue eyes.

[17:38] Maybe I was just thinking that later on when he's whipping chains around.

Elliott Kalan

[17:42] And so Hercules is...

[17:44] Hebe is a princess from Crete, and Hercules wins her over by riding horses with her to an isolated little pond and then rock diving off a cliff into the water after giving a little James Bond-type smirk to the camera.

[17:59] And here is where...

[18:00] This movie is pretty balls to the wall up until this point over the top, but it's almost like once Hercules enters the movie, the Hercules movie starts to get not very entertaining.

[18:08] Because Hercules himself is kind of a charisma suck.

Dan McCoy

[18:12] Well, every time there's no fight scene, it gets a lot slower and...

Elliott Kalan

[18:16] And duller.

[18:17] We don't really care about these characters.

[18:19] None of them are likable.

[18:20] He has a brother, Iphocles, who you can tell is bad because he has dark hair.

[18:25] And this is another one of those movies also where ancient Greece is represented by blonde Englishmen and English ladies who have blonde hair.

[18:32] Except for one guy.

[18:33] Except for one guy who talks with a Greek-ish accent and his curly hair, and the bad guys who are dark-haired and not Greek.

Dan McCoy

[18:39] Instead of a bunch of really Hirsute people.

[18:42] Except for Greek-looking people.

Elliott Kalan

[18:44] Curly hair, yeah, hair all over, Greek accents, olive-y skin.

[18:48] Like, it's...

[18:48] Make a movie where they look Greek, you know?

[18:50] But anyway, Iphocles was sent to find Hebe, because they ran off together, Hebe and Hercules.

[18:58] And Iphocles wants to marry her.

[19:01] He is the heir to the kingdom, so he's going to.

[19:04] But she's in love with Hercules.

[19:06] And while Hercules and his brother are just kind of wandering around, they run into the Nemean lion.

[19:11] Hercules kills him quickly by strangling him.

[19:14] And then, this is the first scene where...

[19:16] That's one labor taken care of already.

[19:18] Right off the bat.

[19:18] Yeah.

[19:19] He's banking it.

[19:20] If you're wondering when he's going to take care of you, he's like, boom, checklist early.

[19:24] This will save me some time later on.

[19:26] Sure, sure.

[19:27] He's getting these credits out of the way.

[19:29] When later, it's like, I have 12 labors for you.

[19:30] He'll be like, eh-eh, 11, dude.

[19:33] Check the fucking list.

[19:35] Isn't it me and lion on there?

[19:36] Done it.

Stuart Wellington

[19:38] Let me see.

[19:39] Janice.

[19:39] Oh, he allows it.

[19:40] It's okay.

[19:41] Janice.

Elliott Kalan

[19:42] Yeah, Janice, the two-faced god has to look into it.

[19:45] Or it's just his assistant, Janice, who I assume is played by Annie Potts.

[19:51] Then he kills the Nemean lion and she goes, we got one.

[19:55] And they cross it off on the big black one.

[19:58] Real bad labor in a big, great local town.

[20:02] Cleaning up the stables.

[20:05] Now, if you're wondering when he's going to deal with the other labors in this movie, do not.

[20:09] He doesn't touch any of them.

[20:12] That was just a...

[20:12] Much in the way that in Marvel movies, suddenly, like, Carol Danvers will walk on screen for a second.

[20:19] As a little tip of the hat to the readers.

[20:21] Here, it's like they threw in the Nemean lion just as a, like, wink to the Hercules fans in the audience.

[20:26] But here's the first scene where I really didn't understand what's happening.

[20:29] We've just seen Hercules kill the Nemean lion.

[20:32] Into the castle struts Hercules and Iphicles.

[20:36] Iphicles is wearing the lion skin and starts bragging about how he killed the lion.

[20:40] He did it.

[20:41] And Hercules just kind of smiling and watching him.

[20:44] And at no point takes credit for it.

[20:47] And then when the king is like, you're going to marry Princess Hebe.

[20:50] Hercules is just like, mmm.

[20:52] But doesn't, doesn't, doesn't like object.

[20:55] It's weird.

[20:56] Hercules is such a boastful, cocksure person in the myths.

[20:59] And humility isn't a thing that, like, Greek myths celebrate.

[21:03] Like, humility in front of the gods, maybe.

[21:05] But not to other humans.

[21:07] But that's the thing.

[21:07] Even the heroes who show hubris are more gloried and celebrated than anyone who's actually humble.

[21:13] Like, in Greek myths, it's like, you're going to screw up.

[21:17] You're destined to be destroyed.

[21:19] So I'm going to admire you for the bravery and courage it took to do the things that were going to destroy you,

[21:24] even though you knew it.

[21:25] So, like.

[21:25] So YOLO is what you're saying.

[21:27] They invented YOLO.

[21:28] They kind of did invent YOLO.

[21:29] Except that they called it Yolopolis.

[21:31] But the idea that Hercules is like, I'll let him take the cred for this one.

[21:36] You know what, man?

[21:37] It's your moment.

[21:38] You own it.

[21:39] Take it.

[21:41] Hercules has got plenty to be happy about.

[21:45] Time for Ificles to have a chance in the spotlight.

[21:47] Treat yourself, fella.

[21:48] But anyway, the news has announced that Ificles is going to marry Hebe.

[21:52] The lovers, as Wikipedia says, are devastated.

[21:55] And they run off together, but they are captured.

[21:58] Hebe almost drowns.

[22:00] Hercules saves her.

[22:01] And Hercules is taken back and exiled.

[22:05] He will join a military campaign to Egypt, or Heliopolis as they call it, to fight what appear to be the aliens from Stargate.

[22:12] Yeah, the Gwa'uld.

[22:14] Who show up and fight.

[22:16] And they kill everybody except Hercules and his soon-to-be best friend, Sotiris.

Stuart Wellington

[22:22] And he's kind of like a poor man's Sean Bean.

Elliott Kalan

[22:26] Yep.

[22:26] It was like the Bean.

[22:28] Does he have a beard?

Stuart Wellington

[22:29] And he doesn't die, so I guess he isn't a poor man's Sean Bean.

[22:32] I take it back.

Elliott Kalan

[22:33] Just erase that part.

[22:34] It would be like if he was the Bean in, was it Mickey and the Beanstalk, that they cut into three little, they're cutting tiniest lizards' livers off?

[22:41] Because they're so poor.

[22:43] Okay.

[22:44] Is that Mickey and the Beanstalk that happens?

[22:45] Okay.

[22:45] Yeah, yeah.

[22:46] I remember as a kid, that scene made me so sad.

Dan McCoy

[22:49] And then they sing the song to Fennicula, Fennicula.

[22:53] And they're like, pancakes pulled up till they reach the sky.

[22:56] I forgot about that part.

[22:59] I want to eat and eat and eat and eat and eat until I die.

[23:03] I just think that's really funny, that line, I want to eat and eat and eat and eat and eat until I die.

Elliott Kalan

[23:09] It's a poor man's way of choosing his execution, I guess.

[23:16] Were they all on death row?

[23:17] Is that why?

[23:18] Yeah.

[23:19] And they said to Mickey, you can either fight this giant or we'll give you the chair.

Dan McCoy

[23:22] What do you want for your final meal?

[23:24] I want a bean.

Elliott Kalan

[23:26] I want a tiny slice of a bean.

[23:29] Now what crime did Mickey and Donald and Goofy pull that they're on death row now?

Dan McCoy

[23:33] Like, did they kill a bunch of children?

[23:35] What was it like?

[23:36] I mean, maybe they just knew that there was intent to steal a giant's harp.

[23:41] That's not a capital punishment offense.

Elliott Kalan

[23:45] In Montana, apparently.

[23:48] You're saying Mickey and the Beanstalk all takes place in Montana.

[23:52] The state Dan hates.

[23:53] They know what they did.

[23:54] Sentenced Mickey Mouse to death.

[23:56] And then fed Goofy till he died.

[23:58] Have you no heart, Montana?

[24:02] Anyway.

[24:03] So Hercules and Satyrus are set on this Egyptian mission.

[24:06] They get captured.

[24:07] The leader of the Egyptian troops says, leave those two alive.

[24:13] We get a good splash of 300.

[24:16] Well, yeah.

[24:17] Here's a moment.

[24:18] So the movie goes into 300 mode.

[24:20] And I guess it was in Troy mode before.

[24:22] Now it's in 300 mode.

[24:23] And just like 300, they keep breaking formation.

[24:27] I mean, they're not Spartans.

[24:28] It doesn't make sense why they would use the Spartan, what's it called?

[24:32] Phalanx?

[24:32] Yeah.

[24:33] But they do the thing where they lock shields and then immediately break and just spin around

[24:37] killing people.

[24:37] Yeah.

[24:38] As soon as the bad guys charge them, they're like, they start doing their moves.

[24:41] Run away!

[24:42] And there's a lot of slow motion.

[24:43] And it is, let's say this about Zack Snyder.

[24:46] He overuses slow motion.

[24:47] But in 300, he uses it fairly effectively at times.

[24:51] Yeah.

[24:51] And it was a relatively new thing to be used that way.

[24:54] So it was exciting.

[24:55] Here, it's like, anytime anyone jumps or does anything, there's slow-mo.

Stuart Wellington

[24:59] But it's always like, I think you said it during the movie, it feels like Rennie Harlan

[25:03] picks the wrong couple seconds to do slow-mo.

[25:06] Yeah.

[25:07] Once the excitement's passed.

[25:07] Like, right before they jump.

[25:09] And then they're like, oh yeah, fuck it.

[25:10] Let's just speed it up.

Elliott Kalan

[25:11] At a certain point, it stops being to make it look cool.

[25:13] And it starts being, we shot an hour and 20 minute movie.

[25:16] How are we going to pad this thing out to an hour and 39?

[25:19] We'll just put slow-mo in a lot of it.

[25:21] Slow it down, you know.

[25:23] Let's make, if they can make Vertigo run for 20, no, Psycho run for 24 hours by slowing

[25:28] it down, we can do that with this movie.

[25:31] It's an art piece.

[25:32] Anyway, the Egyptians sell Hercules and Soterios to a slave gladiator guy.

[25:38] Here's where the movie becomes a little gladiator-y, where they fight in a big muddy pit.

[25:42] Who are they fighting?

[25:43] Are they fighting monster men?

[25:45] Are they fighting anyone interesting?

[25:47] Snake guys?

[25:47] No.

[25:48] Just fighting dudes in mud.

[25:50] Hercules and Satyrus manage to trick their owner.

[25:53] They say, hey, I thought they were making this stuff up, but apparently it's true.

[25:56] They're like, there's a big tournament in Greece.

[25:59] The biggest fight is two men go up against six undefeated fighters.

[26:03] If they win, they get their freedom.

[26:06] And if they, and the guy who, and there's a lot of betting, so you can make a lot of money

[26:10] on the betting.

[26:11] And he goes, I already have undefeated fighters, half-faced and Haramba over there.

[26:15] And there are these two, these are finally when the monster men show up.

[26:17] Yeah.

[26:18] And they say, we'll fight them and the survivors will go to Greece.

[26:22] And so this is another gladiator moment where it's these, it's Hercules and his best buddy.

[26:26] And let me tell you this, his best buddy's job is to get injured during fights, thus making

[26:30] it harder for Hercules.

[26:31] So he is not very helpful.

Stuart Wellington

[26:33] Yeah.

[26:33] To make it more challenging, add a handicap.

Elliott Kalan

[26:35] Yeah.

[26:35] It's almost like his friend is their version of Schwarzenegger getting shot in the arm

[26:40] at the end of Commando so that it's not quite so, quite so lopsided when he's fighting

[26:47] fat Vernon Wells.

[26:48] I gotta say.

[26:49] Yeah, but Vernon Wells has that awesome chainmail, like, tank top?

Stuart Wellington

[26:53] And a mustache.

[26:53] But that's not going to help him in a fight.

[26:55] What are you talking, I mean, he doesn't stop a pipe from ramming through his body.

[26:58] No, the chainmail doesn't stop a pipe from literally going through him to the point that

Elliott Kalan

[27:02] steam goes down.

[27:04] And then, yeah, steam starts shooting at it.

[27:05] When he says, Bennett, let off some steam.

[27:06] Or let off some steam, Bennett.

[27:08] I don't remember.

Dan McCoy

[27:09] What a great movie Commando is.

[27:10] I guess, like, Half-Face, though, like, for his name, like, I was expecting, like, he's

[27:14] a bit of a monster man, but I was expecting more of, like, a two-face level of Half-Face.

[27:18] Yeah.

[27:18] Where's this guy kind of like a little bit of scarring and then, like, some, like, Counting

[27:22] Crows hair.

[27:23] That's pretty much all that's going on.

Elliott Kalan

[27:24] Yeah, they both had Counting Crows hair, both Half-Face and Humbaba, it turns out, as

Stuart Wellington

[27:28] I look at the movie.

[27:29] Yeah, you know, I bet somebody just came up with that nickname real early on and it just caught

[27:32] on, you know.

[27:34] He probably didn't even have Half-Face at that point and he just kind of cut his face

[27:37] up afterwards.

[27:38] Just to keep the name.

Elliott Kalan

[27:39] It reminds me of a...

Stuart Wellington

[27:40] It was about to expire.

Elliott Kalan

[27:43] He's about to lose the rights to the Half-Face name.

[27:45] His option on the name Half-Face was running out.

[27:47] You better act on this name or it's going to go back in the public domain.

Stuart Wellington

[27:51] This guy would like...

[27:52] Shit, I better cut my face up.

[27:53] We can see his skull.

[27:54] He's super gross if you don't cut up your face.

Elliott Kalan

[27:55] Mel Gibson from Man Without a Face.

[27:57] He has a face, but it's half a face.

[27:59] So we want to call him Half-Face.

[28:02] I'll take it.

[28:03] I'll take it.

[28:04] He was exercising the option.

[28:05] Yeah.

[28:06] Now, it reminded me of my disappointment when I finally saw an episode of the Game of Thrones

[28:11] TV show.

[28:12] Now, I came to the books late, long after Stuart had spent years recommending them to

Stuart Wellington

[28:16] me.

[28:16] And complaining about the TV show.

Elliott Kalan

[28:18] Yeah.

[28:18] And when I read them, I imagined Sander Clegane, the hound, had this totally screwed up face.

[28:24] Like, I imagined his jaw was not set right.

[28:27] You could see part of the skull of his bone.

[28:29] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[28:29] And then in the movie, in the show, he's just kind of like a little scratched up.

[28:33] It's not that impressive.

[28:34] Yeah, he's got a little wubby face.

[28:34] Yeah.

[28:35] He actually doesn't look like he was in a fire.

[28:37] It just looks like he got beaten up once and it never totally healed.

Stuart Wellington

[28:39] And in some ways, I think that is a description of the entire show for me.

Elliott Kalan

[28:43] Yeah.

[28:44] You know what?

[28:45] I'm going to go that way for me, too.

[28:46] But anyway, Half-Face is kind of like that.

[28:47] But I will tell you this.

[28:48] Having zero lines of dialogue, you don't see their faces too clearly.

[28:53] Half-Face and Humbaba are instantly the most charismatic characters in the whole movie.

[28:56] Yeah.

[28:57] They are so incredibly, like, it's, Humbaba is like an old man's head on top of this huge,

[29:03] you know, strong man body.

[29:05] And Half-Face is half a face.

[29:06] And like you said, Counting Crow's hair.

[29:08] They're leaping around, fighting Hercules.

Stuart Wellington

[29:10] And it was like...

[29:11] I was kind of hoping at that moment that it would take a strange narrative shift and it would

[29:14] jump all the way back to the beginning of their lives.

[29:17] Yeah.

[29:18] And we could follow what Half-Face and Humbaba have been doing.

Elliott Kalan

[29:20] It would be like the great moment in The Power Broker when Robert Caro takes like 12 pages

[29:25] to stop talking about Robert Moses and start talking about the governor of New York.

[29:34] Old Governor.

[29:35] Old Governor.

[29:35] No, Al, what's his name?

[29:37] Now I can't remember it, which is terrible.

[29:38] Swearingen.

[29:39] Not Swearingen.

[29:39] Jolson.

[29:40] But anyway, not Jolson.

[29:42] But Al Smith.

[29:44] And he goes, he takes like 12 pages.

[29:47] Al Smith.

Dan McCoy

[29:48] No wonder you forgot the most generic name.

Elliott Kalan

[29:50] That's why I forgot it.

[29:51] But he goes through 12 pages and you're like, this guy's really exciting.

[29:54] And it gets so exciting that you kind of forget the books about Robert Moses.

[29:58] And then when it goes, and that's when he met Robert Moses.

[30:00] And it's like, holy shit, these two guys are going to meet now?

[30:03] Oh my God, it's amazing.

[30:05] I would have wanted it to be that.

[30:06] You go back to the flashback of how Half-Face and Humbaba became friends.

[30:09] Half-Face lost his face.

[30:11] Maybe they grew up together.

[30:11] And then you forget it's a Hercules movie.

[30:14] And then they finally get back to that scene and you're like, oh yeah.

[30:17] Now those characters are going to fight Hercules.

[30:19] But that doesn't happen.

[30:20] Hercules just kills them.

[30:22] So they get back to Greece.

[30:23] Hercules goes into...

[30:24] Spoiler alert.

[30:25] But the Egyptians have sent Hercules' helmet back to Greece.

[30:29] Yeah.

[30:29] Not realizing they've captured this prince.

[30:32] Everyone thinks Hercules is dead.

[30:33] And Hebe is very sad.

Dan McCoy

[30:35] But this is also where it really starts getting Jesus-y.

[30:39] Because he starts gathering followers.

[30:42] He rides back into his hometown.

Elliott Kalan

[30:44] Let's first say, he wins that tournament against the six undefeated people.

[30:47] In like two seconds.

[30:48] Super easy.

Stuart Wellington

[30:49] Undefeated, they don't even get names.

[30:51] Half-Face is cackling from the underworld.

[30:53] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[30:55] Well, he's gathering strength, Hercules.

Elliott Kalan

[30:57] And that's the one piece of enjoyment Half-Face will get as a shade in the Hades realm.

Stuart Wellington

[31:02] Waiting for Hercules to arrive so he can serve him for eternity?

Elliott Kalan

[31:06] Because you know Half-Face isn't getting into the Elysian fields.

[31:08] There's no way.

[31:09] They're going to take one look at his half-a-face and go, whoa, we let you in here.

[31:13] We can't call this paradise no more.

[31:15] But anyway, meanwhile, Hercules' mom confronts the king, reveals that Zeus is the father of

[31:22] Hercules.

[31:22] He is the king in a fit of rage.

[31:24] She tries to stab the king and the king kills her.

[31:26] Not Half-Face.

[31:27] Which, at the time, I was like, oh, he just murdered her.

[31:29] But it's kind of self-defense.

[31:30] She pulled a knife on him.

Stuart Wellington

[31:32] Yeah, I mean, even Chiron, his advisor, really doesn't try and stop him.

Elliott Kalan

[31:36] Chiron stands there watching all this, and as soon as the queen is dead, he runs out and

[31:39] is like, no!

[31:40] He's like, wait!

[31:41] It's kind of like maybe a couple minutes.

[31:49] It's the equivalent of in G.I. Joe Retaliation when Snake Eyes just allows London to be destroyed

Stuart Wellington

[31:57] before he decides to take down the bad guys.

[32:00] Yep, because the queen's life is equal to all the citizens of London Alley.

Elliott Kalan

[32:04] There were so many fewer people back then that probably, yeah.

[32:08] But anyway, Hercules leaves.

[32:11] He starts raising an army to fight for the freedom of Greece against the king.

[32:15] Chiron tells him his mother died, which is terrible.

[32:19] Hebe tries to kill herself.

[32:21] Chiron stops her, and he reunites her with Hercules.

[32:24] The two have a, let's call it a moment of tranquility.

[32:29] Yeah.

[32:30] A pollen-crusted moment of tranquility.

[32:32] As they have sex inside of a Hercules-made hoopa in the forest as pollen falls around them

[32:38] constantly.

[32:39] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[32:40] It looks like a grown-up version of the Blue Lagoon.

[32:43] Like this, uh...

[32:43] Yeah, with like seashells threaded through...

Stuart Wellington

[32:45] Yeah.

[32:46] Or...

[32:46] What I can only imagine is like intestinal...

[32:49] Cubic hair.

[32:50] What?

[32:51] Like leather straps.

Elliott Kalan

[32:53] I was gonna say it's like a classy version of one of the tarp orgies at the end of a

[32:56] seduction cinema movie.

[32:57] Cidu hair.

[32:57] But anyway, because they're in the forest.

[33:00] Anyway, but, uh...

[33:02] There's also...

[33:03] Anyway, let's just go...

[33:04] Let's just skip through much of this.

[33:05] You got a lot of details going in.

[33:07] They raise an army.

[33:08] Ithocles is fighting.

[33:10] He brings in the Egyptians to fight back.

[33:13] Hercules is just picking up followers.

[33:15] But then at one town, he's taken captive by the king.

[33:18] The king has him whipped.

[33:20] This is the most Jesus-y part of it.

Dan McCoy

[33:21] Well, but he's also taken captive because of...

[33:23] Were you gonna say the betrayal?

[33:25] Eh.

[33:26] Of his, uh...

[33:26] Who even cares?

[33:27] No, I mean, it's just that there's another, like...

[33:29] There's like a Judas character.

[33:31] But, I mean, like, he's sort of forced into the betrayal role.

[33:33] He's not doing it for gain.

[33:34] Well, no, his...

Elliott Kalan

[33:35] The life of his son is threatened.

[33:36] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[33:36] So he gives away Hercules' location.

[33:38] But then...

[33:39] But then, uh...

Elliott Kalan

[33:40] Hercules is whipped in a crucifix position.

[33:42] He's whipped in front of a crowd as the king says,

[33:44] See?

[33:45] He's not a god.

[33:46] A small crowd.

[33:47] It's pretty small.

[33:48] There's not a lot of extras.

[33:49] It would not have been a glorious death for Hercules.

[33:51] Hercules, who has denied that he was the son of Zeus all along,

[33:55] looks up to the guy and says,

[33:56] Father, I believe in you.

[33:58] And Zeus sends some lightning down, right?

[34:01] And Hercules...

[34:02] No, that's later, I guess.

[34:03] He sends, like, a shaft of sunlight that, I guess, empowers him.

[34:06] It powers him up?

[34:07] Yeah.

[34:07] He sends down, like, a regenerating beam or something?

[34:10] I feel like he's Apollo from the authority.

Dan McCoy

[34:12] This is where it gets suddenly a lot less Jesus-y,

[34:15] since Jesus didn't say,

[34:16] Hey, Dad, give me, uh...

[34:18] Give me strength powers to fight off all these, uh...

[34:20] Yeah, are you saying...

Elliott Kalan

[34:21] Pharisees?

[34:21] Jesus didn't use the rocks he was chained to as a kind of giant whip morning star to kill people with?

Stuart Wellington

[34:29] No, I don't recall that.

[34:30] I think that would have stuck in my head from Sunday school.

Dan McCoy

[34:32] It's when the movie goes full-on God of War mode,

Stuart Wellington

[34:35] where literally the hero is using weapons attached to chains to do fucking combos on his enemies.

[34:41] And this is...

[34:41] Anyway, it gets much more awesome.

Elliott Kalan

[34:43] And it's one of two scenes in which he turns into Whiplash from Iron Man 2.

[34:47] But that's the thing is, this...

[34:48] The movie is crazy at the top.

[34:51] Then it's very dull.

[34:52] And then as soon as Hercules admits his demigodhood, it becomes crazy again.

[34:57] Because he is constantly just whipping guys with shit and fighting, like, killing tons of people.

[35:03] And they finally confront the king.

[35:05] The king, uh...

[35:08] I guess lights things on fire to try to stop them.

Stuart Wellington

[35:10] Yeah, it looks like the king's got him surrounded, but you're like,

[35:13] he don't have him surrounded.

[35:14] He's hurt.

[35:15] And the king's gonna fight him with the power of his pulse.

[35:17] Hercules does a very...

Elliott Kalan

[35:18] Is it called the legend of Amphitira?

[35:21] That's a good point.

[35:22] Hercules does a very lame version of the, like, St. Crispin's Day,

[35:27] they'll never take our freedom sort of speech that the hero gives to his army before their final battle.

[35:32] They go to the battle...

Stuart Wellington

[35:33] And it's to, like, six dudes.

[35:35] Yeah.

[35:35] Like, just a few farmers.

[35:37] They, uh...

[35:39] But somehow, somewhere in the process, he managed to pick up a Nemean lion skin from, I guess,

[35:44] a fucking Pier 1.

[35:45] I don't know.

Elliott Kalan

[35:46] I don't remember how he got the lion skin.

[35:47] And also...

Dan McCoy

[35:47] Well, the other brother sold it to, like, a pawn shop.

[35:51] Ah.

[35:51] Because he needed quick...

Elliott Kalan

[35:52] He needed fast cash.

[35:53] Yeah.

[35:53] To take Hebe out on a date to try to win her over.

[35:57] And his brother is just, like, buying chocolates for her, and he's running out of money.

[36:03] What do I got?

[36:04] He brings me better chocolates.

[36:06] But, uh...

[36:07] And also, along the way, that group of farmers that's fighting for their freedom turns into,

[36:11] like, an elite fighting force with shields and armor and helmets and everything.

[36:16] But anyway, I guess they're picking up Greek soldiers along the way.

[36:18] But Hercules calls on his dad.

[36:21] His dad shoots lightning into Hercules' sword.

[36:24] And it becomes kind of an electricity whip that he's just killing dozens of people with.

[36:29] Dozens of, like, jackal-masked Egyptian warriors.

[36:31] Yeah.

[36:32] Because no true Greeks will fight for the king anymore.

[36:35] Only these heartless Egyptian mercenaries, I guess.

[36:40] It's so weird, because you kind of thought the Egyptians were busy taking over, overthrowing

[36:45] the Greeks that had colonized them.

[36:47] Yeah.

[36:47] But they still got time to, like, come over and help the king that they were fighting?

[36:51] It doesn't make sense.

Stuart Wellington

[36:51] Well, they got invited back, I don't know, for a feast.

[36:54] And then he was like, no feast.

[36:56] You guys fucked up and didn't kill my son.

[36:58] Uh, you gotta finish the job.

[36:59] And they're like, I guess we have to.

Elliott Kalan

[37:01] Or was the whole mission that they sent Hercules on a ploy to kill him?

[37:05] Yes.

[37:05] And there was never?

[37:06] Okay, then I missed that.

[37:07] Yeah.

[37:08] It was all just, oh, so the Egyptians were working for the king the whole time.

Stuart Wellington

[37:10] You probably lost it when he just started electrocuting everybody with, when Zeus came to him

[37:15] in the form of, uh, like a laser whip.

[37:18] Lightning whip.

[37:18] When Zeus came to them in the form of the opening of He-Man.

Elliott Kalan

[37:21] Uh, so anyway, uh, they fight.

Stuart Wellington

[37:25] Unsurprisingly, we have Heracles versus his, I guess, adopted father?

[37:30] Yeah.

[37:31] Uh, you're a doctor.

Elliott Kalan

[37:32] I tell ya, for Heracles, he sure got an Oedipus complex.

[37:37] Does that fit?

[37:38] It's a Greek, it's a Greek myth, Jay.

[37:39] I don't know if it, does it fit?

[37:41] It's Greek.

[37:42] It's Greece.

[37:42] Okay.

[37:43] He's trying to kill his dad.

[37:44] But he doesn't want to have sex with his mom, though.

[37:46] Oh, sure he does, but she's dead.

[37:47] It's too late.

[37:47] Okay.

[37:48] Uh.

[37:49] It's a subtext?

[37:50] Yeah.

[37:50] The subtext, the whole movie, is that Hercules is totally into his mom.

[37:53] Okay.

[37:53] But, uh, it's good.

[37:54] That's why this is, that's why this was usually called The Legend of Spanking the Monkey.

[37:58] They have an amazing fight.

[38:00] Totally balls and walls.

[38:01] They have a fight, which Hercules doesn't do that much.

[38:03] He kind of dodges a lot of Amphitrons.

[38:06] Yeah.

[38:06] What's his name?

[38:08] Amphitiron.

[38:09] Amphitiron.

[38:09] Amphitiron, I guess, would be the Transformer version.

[38:11] Yeah, he's right.

[38:12] He's fighting Hercules and then turns into a car.

[38:14] And here's, wait, let me tell you the moment the movie almost could have totally won me over.

[38:18] And I mentioned this to you guys.

Stuart Wellington

[38:19] You've been conquering all of Greece for Energon cubes.

[38:22] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[38:22] And then Unicron shows up.

[38:24] Yeah.

[38:24] So, there's a moment where Hercules is facing off with his dad.

[38:27] And his dad says, like, I have a surprise for you, Hercules.

[38:31] And at that point, I wanted, if the king had pulled out, like, a revolver and shot Hercules,

[38:37] I would have been like, movie, you won me back.

[38:39] And suddenly people are driving cars around.

[38:42] And, like, Hercules gets in a biplane and is firing at the Egyptians.

[38:46] I would have loved that.

[38:48] If they were just like, you know what?

[38:50] Why are we even bothering to pretend that we're, we already have all the Greeks.

[38:53] This doesn't have connection with anything.

[38:54] Already, all the Greeks are played by English people.

[38:57] Why don't we just sucker punch this up and have them be in World War I trenches with mechs, you know?

[39:02] Yep.

[39:03] But they didn't do that.

[39:03] Instead, they had a sword fight.

[39:05] They had a fight.

Dan McCoy

[39:06] Where Hercules really puts the Demi into Demi God in this fight.

[39:10] Because he's having a hell of a time with this one mortal.

Elliott Kalan

[39:13] Now, Hercules is super strong.

[39:16] He's much younger and in better shape than the king.

[39:18] And he's wearing a lion's cloak that cannot be pierced by a blade.

[39:21] And yet, he still is losing for a while.

Stuart Wellington

[39:24] He probably grew up watching his adopted father fight or was trained by him.

Elliott Kalan

[39:28] He knows his style.

[39:28] Yeah.

[39:29] Anyway, eventually he wins.

[39:31] His brother comes in with Hebe, threatening her.

[39:35] But Hebe sacrifices herself seemingly to kill the brother by stabbing herself through the shoulder and killing him.

[39:41] Because the sword goes all the way through and kills him.

[39:45] Hercules killed...

[39:45] We call that die-harding somebody.

[39:48] Yeah.

[39:48] Because it's hard to die that way.

Stuart Wellington

[39:50] Yeah.

[39:50] We call that the old heebie-jeebie.

Elliott Kalan

[39:54] That's the old age in Greece.

Stuart Wellington

[39:55] We never know what we're saying when we say that.

[39:57] But we do it all the time.

Elliott Kalan

[39:58] Constantly.

[40:00] He kills the king with the same dagger that killed Hercules' mother.

[40:04] And then...

[40:05] So they can be together for eternity.

[40:06] And then it just fades to Hercules in bed with Hebe as they have a newborn child.

[40:11] Yeah.

[40:12] There's no...

[40:12] It's not even...

[40:13] And there's no dialogue from that point on.

Dan McCoy

[40:15] And then Hercules is up on the roof and he sees the Hercules symbol.

[40:18] And he approaches off.

Elliott Kalan

[40:19] You'd think that there...

[40:20] You'd think...

[40:20] I assume there was a voiceover from Chiron or somebody explaining like,

[40:24] but Hercules survived and became king himself.

[40:27] Chiron died, dude.

[40:27] And that they cut it.

[40:28] When did...

[40:29] Did they kill him?

[40:30] Yeah, they killed him after he...

[40:31] That's what made him super mad.

[40:32] Oh, that's right.

[40:33] He smashed people with Hercules.

[40:34] He could do a voiceover from Beyond the Grave.

[40:36] Okay.

[40:37] But then it does cut to...

[40:38] The music is like...

[40:39] And then you go see Hercules brooding on a castle top overlooking the kingdom he has sworn to keep safe.

[40:47] From the Joker, I guess?

Stuart Wellington

[40:49] He looks over his shoulder.

[40:52] We see a night sky.

[40:53] And then zooming out of the distance, the credits.

Elliott Kalan

[40:56] Yeah.

[40:56] A film by Rennie Harlan.

[40:57] So the implication is Hercules is watching the credits to his own movie.

Dan McCoy

[41:02] He's watching Artemis Driver Chariot.

[41:04] I think I'll call this constellation the credits.

Stuart Wellington

[41:10] See, that would have been better.

[41:12] That's a Greek myth movie where out of the stars, the constellations form the credits.

Elliott Kalan

[41:17] That over there is the winged horse, and over there is Draco, the dragon, and of course the credits.

[41:23] It's just like four stars.

[41:26] But if you connect the lines right, it spells out the names of everyone who made the movie.

[41:30] Yeah.

[41:31] Hercules defeated Saul Bass and threw him into the sky.

[41:35] And that's why the credits is up there.

[41:40] Now, this is a movie that is very boring for most of it.

[41:43] It has some craziness on the bookends.

Dan McCoy

[41:46] Yeah, which leads us.

[41:47] We've got to just move along into final judgments.

[41:51] Whether this is a good, bad movie, a bad, bad movie, or a movie kind of like Elliot.

[41:54] I think you're already kind of getting into it.

[41:57] You know what?

Elliott Kalan

[41:58] I'm going to call this, even though it gets a little dull in the middle, I am going to call this a good, bad movie.

[42:03] Because there was enough stuff in it that I enjoyed making fun of while we were watching it.

[42:07] But I would say it's definitely a good, bad movie if you've watched the first 15 minutes and then the last 15 minutes.

Dan McCoy

[42:12] Yeah, fast forward a little bit.

[42:13] I say good, bad for the same reasons.

[42:15] Basically, it never bored me as much as the truly bad movies that we've watched.

Elliott Kalan

[42:21] It's not like a 10,000 BC.

[42:23] What was the one where the woman, what's her name, was in the Antarctic?

[42:26] Whiteout.

[42:27] That was super dull.

[42:28] Was that Kate Beckinsale?

[42:29] It was largely fun.

Stuart Wellington

[42:30] The thing is, I was kind of assuming we were going to watch this movie for the Flophouse.

[42:35] Because if we weren't going to, I was going to watch it anyway.

[42:37] Because I love Scott Adkins.

Elliott Kalan

[42:40] Who plays King Infratron.

[42:41] Yeah.

[42:42] The robot king of Greece.

Stuart Wellington

[42:44] Who begins the movie by chokeslamming a guy and then, I guess, cutting his helmet off.

[42:48] But not his head, which is weird.

[42:49] No, just his helmet.

[42:50] He's that good with a blade.

[42:51] Yeah.

[42:52] And then the rest of the movie he spends with a really fake beard.

[42:55] Did you explain who this actor is?

[42:57] Scott Adkins is a ninja.

[43:01] Yeah.

[43:01] He's a white guy karate star who's been in movies like Ninja Shadow of a Tear or Ninja 2,

[43:08] depending on which name.

[43:09] He's also been in previous Stuart Wellingman recommendation, Universal Soldier, Day of Reckoning.

[43:16] He's just like a martial arts dude.

[43:18] He's a fight guy.

[43:19] And he brings, I felt he brought a lot more charisma to that role than most of the cast of this movie.

Elliott Kalan

[43:25] According to Wikipedia, he shared the role of Deadpool with Ryan Reynolds.

[43:29] Oh, wow.

[43:29] So he must have done the actual fighting stuff.

[43:32] Yeah, like the slow motion bullet slashing and things like that.

[43:36] Yeah, but according to Wikipedia, he's best known for playing Yuri Boyka in Undisputed 2, Last Man Standing,

[43:41] and Undisputed 3, Redemption.

[43:44] So he gets redemption in the out.

Stuart Wellington

[43:46] So you can tell from those titles what kind of actor he is.

[43:49] So yeah, I guess I'll say it's a good, bad movie.

[43:52] It's been better than some of the other swords and sandals we've seen in the past.

Dan McCoy

[43:57] But before we move on to letters, just a word from our sponsor.

[44:03] This episode is brought to you by Squarespace, the all-in-one platform,

[44:07] making it fast and easy to create your own professional website, portfolio, and online store.

[44:12] You can get a free trial and 10% off by visiting squarespace.com

[44:16] and entering offer code FLOPHOUSE at checkout,

[44:20] which also helps support this show, The Flophouse.

[44:24] Tell me more about Squarespace, Dan.

[44:27] Hey.

[44:27] Who?

[44:27] Do you want a website, Elliot?

[44:29] Yeah, I do.

[44:29] Elliot Kalin, want a website.

Elliott Kalan

[44:31] Yeah, I do.

[44:31] I've always wanted one.

[44:32] How do I do that?

[44:32] I don't know how.

[44:33] Well, you go to Squarespace.

[44:35] Dot com?

Dan McCoy

[44:36] Dot com.

[44:36] Because I can't go on to the internet first.

[44:39] You go to Squarespace.

[44:41] The dimension where everything is square.

[44:44] It's kind of like Flatland.

Elliott Kalan

[44:45] It's the nerdiest dimension.

[44:47] Squarespace.

[44:48] No, squarespace.com, though.

[44:50] That sounds like a website that I can go to.

Dan McCoy

[44:52] They've got beautiful design, simple and easy templates you can use, drag and drop content

[44:58] for designing your website.

[45:00] Wait a minute.

[45:01] So you're saying I don't need to know how to code like a dork?

[45:03] No.

Stuart Wellington

[45:04] I mean, if you...

[45:05] You don't have to drag and drop.

[45:06] Yeah.

[45:07] That's not dragons.

[45:08] It's dragging something.

[45:09] Because I don't think I can drop a dragon.

Dan McCoy

[45:11] And look, you don't have to drag this thing with your hand.

[45:14] You're not like Hercules with like a chain and a big rock on it.

[45:17] If only.

[45:17] You just drag it with your mouse.

Elliott Kalan

[45:20] What if I don't have a pet mouse?

Dan McCoy

[45:21] Oh, boy.

[45:22] My mouse is on a chain.

[45:23] Yeah.

[45:24] Do you need Squarespace?

[45:25] Because it doesn't sound like you know anything about technology.

[45:27] But it sounds like even a guy like me who doesn't even know what a computer is

[45:30] could use Squarespace.

[45:31] Especially because they've got 24-7 support through live chat and email.

[45:36] Plans start at just $8 a month, including a free domain name if you sign up for one year.

[45:40] And it's got responsive design.

[45:42] So your website...

[45:43] Like the Flophouse podcast.

Elliott Kalan

[45:44] $8 a month.

[45:45] I could afford that just by skipping one Popeye's meal, which I'm not doing.

[45:49] No.

[45:49] But I could.

[45:49] That's how cheap it is.

[45:50] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[45:51] But so why don't you start a trial with no credit card required and start building your website.

[45:57] Just go to squarespace.com and use offer code FLOPHOUSE.

[46:01] Thank you to Squarespace for continuing to support the Flophouse.

[46:06] And viewers like you...

Stuart Wellington

[46:07] It's a great way to set up a website selling bootleg Flophouse merchandise.

[46:10] No, don't do that.

Elliott Kalan

[46:11] Maybe...

[46:12] Well, only if we get a cut.

[46:13] I mean, it's not really...

[46:14] Which I guess makes it not bootleg.

[46:15] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[46:15] It's not really much of a revenue source for us, but it is a revenue source.

[46:17] Yeah, if we approve it and we get a cut, then I'll approve that.

Elliott Kalan

[46:20] I think I'll go there today to make my old-time movie site.

[46:23] Stuart will go there to make his Castle Freak site.

[46:25] And Dan will go there to make a porno site.

[46:28] It's called Whose Wife's Butt Is That?

[46:32] Let's move on.

[46:33] It's a game where you guess whose wife it is.

[46:34] It's a quiz site, I guess?

[46:35] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[46:35] Is that such a thing?

[46:37] Let's move on to letters.

[46:40] This first letter.

Elliott Kalan

[46:41] Moving on to letters.

[46:44] Done with that other stuff.

[46:47] We're done here.

[46:48] So go near.

[46:49] But rather far.

[46:51] To where the letters are.

[46:54] Moving on letters.

[46:56] Letters have fucking backups.

[46:57] Letters move on.

[46:58] We gotta move to those letters because those letters won't move on to us.

Dan McCoy

[47:04] Letters was filmed before a live studio audience.

Elliott Kalan

[47:07] City was sit.

[47:08] Good letter.

[47:09] Roof.

Dan McCoy

[47:10] Sit.

[47:10] Wait.

[47:11] Wow.

[47:11] That was a really short show.

[47:12] It went directly from the theme song to the aftergrads.

Elliott Kalan

[47:15] Yeah.

[47:15] Well, and you know what?

[47:16] Stephen J.

[47:17] Cannell's pulling out of his typewriter at the end.

[47:19] A letter to the Flophouse.

[47:20] Unfortunately, he doesn't get here because he just throws it in the air.

Dan McCoy

[47:23] This one's titled...

[47:24] Does he think the fucking Fay folk are gonna bring it to us?

Elliott Kalan

[47:27] The kind-hearted ones?

Dan McCoy

[47:29] The people of the forest.

[47:30] The people of the forest.

[47:31] It turns into a letter C, so at that point we can't read it anywhere.

Elliott Kalan

[47:35] Well, we can read the C part.

[47:37] That's what letters are for, Dan.

[47:39] That's good enough for me.

[47:40] So what you're saying is a Stephen J. cookie production?

[47:42] Yep.

Dan McCoy

[47:43] Anyway, this first letter is titled Batman Villains.

[47:46] Okay, I like it.

[47:47] Hey, Floppers.

[47:48] Hey.

[47:49] I just had to report on something of great importance to the podcast.

[47:52] Last night, my five-year-old daughter wanted to play Batgirl.

[47:55] She has a Batgirl costume from Halloween and brings it out occasionally, mainly, I suspect,

[47:59] as an excuse.

[47:59] Now, which Batgirl are we talking about here?

[48:03] Oracle?

[48:03] She's not Batgirl anymore.

[48:05] No, I'm just...

[48:05] You're Barbara Gordon before the...

[48:07] Pre-paralyzing.

[48:09] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[48:11] Spoiler alert to anyone who hasn't read comics in 20 years.

Dan McCoy

[48:14] She brings it out occasionally, mainly, I suspect, as an excuse to beat up on poor old dad.

[48:18] So as we were playing, I had the chance to be several Batman villains, but as I had no makeup,

[48:22] it was difficult to convey the Joker and Two-Face.

[48:25] Also, I'm about six feet tall and couldn't find a top hat and umbrella, so the penguin was out as well.

[48:30] What is a father?

[48:32] Desperate to keep his daughter entertained to do.

[48:35] I was at a loss until the Flophouse popped in my mind.

[48:38] Clock King.

Stuart Wellington

[48:39] Yes.

[48:39] Calendar Man.

Dan McCoy

[48:41] It was the emergence of several new Batman villains.

[48:44] I started with my favorites, the Summarizer and the Contest Ruiner, but as I was dealing with a five-year-old, the subtle nuances of the fairly abstract character...

Elliott Kalan

[48:51] Yeah, they don't have the same kind of easy hooks as, say, Firebug.

Dan McCoy

[48:57] Killer Croc.

[48:58] I looked down to see that there was a seven on my T-shirt.

[49:01] Yes, it was time for seven pounds to terrorize Gotham City.

[49:04] I'm thrilled to report that seven pounds was a rousing success with her.

[49:07] She only looked at me like an idiot once or twice, far fewer times than what I get from my wife,

[49:12] who I suspect was sniffing around, trying to detect the scent of alcohol on me.

[49:15] There was none.

[49:16] More importantly, adopting the seven pounds persona doubled as a teachable moment as I worked in crimes that consisted of stealing things in multiples of seven.

[49:24] Sadly, I was eventually defeated, a.k.a. hitting the nuts.

Elliott Kalan

[49:29] As Batman defeats, Batgirl defeats most of her villains.

Dan McCoy

[49:33] And dragged off to Arkham Asylum, where I suspect I'll be serving five to seven years, or days, considering how escapable that place is.

[49:41] Yeah.

[49:42] So I'm happy to report that.

[49:43] Well, it's on the honor system.

[49:45] One of the three villains is ready for print, in my opinion.

[49:47] I suspect this is the green right for Elliot to make the jump from Marvel to DC and start his own storyline in Batman.

[49:52] I expect that when all the money comes in from the sales and myriad prizes the story is likely to win, Pulitzer, Eisner, Emmy, Oscar, and eventual Nobel,

[50:01] I will be fairly compensated for doing this proof-of-concept work for you, Tom.

[50:04] Nope.

Stuart Wellington

[50:05] I think the biggest crime that he committed as the seven pounds character is giving all of the copyright credit to Elliot Kalin.

[50:14] Because that's bullshit.

Elliott Kalan

[50:15] Yeah, that was...

[50:16] He would have stolen seven copyrights.

[50:19] Yep.

[50:19] Well, the one time I tried to pitch Batgirl stories to DC, none of them were taken.

[50:26] But I have a new contact at DC, so who knows?

[50:28] Maybe.

[50:29] Wow.

[50:30] I would love to introduce seven pounds into that universe somehow.

[50:33] Is there a lot of Marvel Distinguished Competition crossover?

[50:37] Between staff?

Dan McCoy

[50:38] Yeah.

[50:39] Yes.

Elliott Kalan

[50:39] Okay.

[50:40] There's really only two games in town when it comes to comic books.

[50:43] Mm-hmm.

[50:43] I mean, there are other companies, but for the most part, people bounce between Marvel and DC quite a bit.

Dan McCoy

[50:48] Yeah, I just didn't know whether they lock people down or not.

Elliott Kalan

[50:52] Actually, my contact...

[50:52] Well, you get contract, I guess.

[50:54] But, like, my contact at DC, Katie Kubert, now works at Marvel.

[50:59] And my longtime Marvel editor, Tom Brennan, is now at DC.

[51:02] So...

[51:03] And who's your real Freaky Friday?

[51:05] Not really.

[51:06] Who's your contact at Image so you can write some Youngblood?

[51:09] Unfortunately, I don't have any, but I would love to write Youngblood.

[51:11] Or perhaps any Image character.

[51:13] There's Blood Wolf, Blood Blood, and, of course, Stone Blood Blood Face.

[51:18] And let's not forget Rocket Butt.

[51:25] All the great Rob Liefeld characters.

[51:30] Oh, boy.

[51:32] Guess what his power is?

[51:34] It's not what you think.

[51:36] Telepathy.

[51:37] Oh, you guessed it, yeah.

[51:39] Also, his butt is a rocket.

[51:41] Which I guess is just cannonball.

[51:42] Yeah, it's not really power.

[51:45] It's more inconvenient than any of them.

[51:47] Yeah.

[51:49] You do not want to use the bathroom after him because the toilet has been destroyed.

[51:54] Rocket Butt!

[51:55] Rocket Butt!

Dan McCoy

[51:57] So...

[51:59] The weird thing is no one's guessed his secret identity.

[52:01] Sure, he wears a trench coat.

[52:02] He's thinking he's some nerdy kid.

[52:04] With really baggy pants.

[52:07] Sure.

[52:09] What is that lump in your butt?

Stuart Wellington

[52:11] Who's buying all the Zubas in town?

[52:13] I've got hemorrhoids.

[52:17] A.C. Slater hasn't lived here in years.

Elliott Kalan

[52:23] So...

[52:23] There's a Zubas store, and Slater had moved away, so they were about to close down.

[52:29] And then this kid walked in.

[52:31] Saved the store.

Stuart Wellington

[52:33] You have the store manager looking at his bills.

[52:36] He's like, I can't pay it.

[52:37] I don't know what's going to happen.

Elliott Kalan

[52:37] Ever since Albert Clifford walked out of town.

Dan McCoy

[52:42] His actual name.

[52:43] Look it up.

[52:43] So, this second letter is titled, Much Nicer Flophouse Fanfic.

[52:48] And it begins...

[52:50] Page one.

[52:51] Feels like a trick.

[52:53] Page one.

[52:54] Start of book one.

Elliott Kalan

[52:55] Page one.

[52:56] The Flophouse was at a nice carnival where good things were happening.

[52:59] Then they fucked.

[53:00] Wait, what?

Dan McCoy

[53:01] Anyway.

[53:02] Page one.

[53:03] Start of book one.

[53:04] Stuart Wellington versus New York City.

[53:06] Okay, I like it so far.

[53:07] It was a rainy night in Dan's apartment when Elliot crashed in, a terrified expression on his face.

[53:12] Sounds accurate.

[53:13] The Flophouse house cat jumped off of Stuart's lap, waking him from his drunken stupor.

[53:18] Rawr, rawr?

[53:19] Asked the house cat.

[53:20] The cat is on your...

[53:21] Oh, yeah.

[53:21] Oh, let's just continue.

[53:22] As Elliot slammed the door behind him.

[53:24] Dan, Elliot began.

[53:25] Your downstairs neighbors have been murdered by a gang of street marauders.

[53:29] Like Death Wish 3?

[53:30] Stuart asked, wiping glitter off his face from a party he'd thrown in Dan's apartment the night before.

[53:35] Exactly like Death Wish 3, replied Elliot, enjoying this moment of shared amusement.

[53:39] Was I not invited to this party?

Elliott Kalan

[53:40] Why am I walking in now?

Dan McCoy

[53:42] Stuart and Elliot embraced, saddening Dan as no one had ever hugged him.

Elliott Kalan

[53:46] Oh, that's not true at all.

[53:48] I've seen Dan hugged by people.

Dan McCoy

[53:51] Thanks for the backup.

Elliott Kalan

[53:53] I'll provide your hug alibi, Dan.

[53:56] You have felt the warmth of a human embrace.

Stuart Wellington

[53:59] Just write the footnote in there in pen.

Dan McCoy

[54:02] Well, I think we should stay here where it's safe, said Dan,

[54:04] ruining the situation for everyone.

[54:06] Dan, you're ruining this for everyone, Stuart replied,

[54:08] picking up his .44 Magnum, which had been attached to his arm with a fuzzy pink handcuff.

[54:12] Let's take these fuckers down.

[54:14] This is not a bit.

[54:16] We're going to get them, said Elliot.

[54:17] We're going to John Getzim.

[54:18] We're going to Tony Collette him.

[54:20] We're going to Robert Bresson's Mouchetim.

[54:22] After Elliot finished listing words that sounded like other words,

[54:24] much to Stuart's delight,

[54:26] they're out on the rainy New York streets.

[54:30] Page 2093, end of book three, Stuart Wellington versus Al Madrigal.

[54:36] So Dan was a castle freak all along?

[54:38] Asked Carly Gugino, getting up off of Elliot's lap to polish their shared key to the city?

Elliott Kalan

[54:43] There's no reason why she has to get up off my lap.

[54:45] Elliot and Mayor...

[54:46] Somebody just brings the key over.

[54:48] There's a lot of...

[54:48] Wait, so is my relationship with Carly Gugino similar to yours with the house cat?

[54:51] There's a lot of lap sitting.

Dan McCoy

[54:53] Anyway, continue.

[54:54] Elliot and Mayor Wellington looked around their newly acquired Popeye's franchise,

[54:57] taking in the smile.

[54:59] Yeah, I guess he was, said Stuart.

[55:01] I'm amazed we got away from that burning castle in time, Elliot said.

[55:04] I guess you could say it was a million-dollar getaway.

[55:08] Everyone laughed at Elliot's hilarious callback,

[55:10] and even the Flophouse house cat peeked up through the pile of fried chicken he was under to join in.

[55:18] He said.

[55:19] Little did they know that, behind the walls of that very Popeye's,

[55:22] Dan sat playing on his Phantom of the Paradise keyboard,

[55:25] which just omits size, plotting his revenge.

[55:29] P.S.

[55:29] Keep up your stellar work, guys.

[55:30] You've consistently made my life richer as I dig through your back catalog.

[55:33] Much love.

[55:34] Vincent, last name withheld.

[55:35] Thanks, Vincent.

[55:36] That was pretty good.

[55:37] And an accurate rendition of...

[55:38] Vincent D'Onofrio, big fan of the show.

Elliott Kalan

[55:41] Wow.

[55:41] I saw you in a stage production, and you were great in it.

[55:45] Name droppers.

[55:47] I mean, name dropping that I saw him in a play.

[55:50] He was in a play with Ethan Hawke, and the play was not so great,

[55:53] but Vincent D'Onofrio was a force of nature in it.

[55:56] So thanks for listening, Vincent.

[55:57] Yeah, thank you.

Stuart Wellington

[55:58] Thank you for your literary contribution.

Elliott Kalan

[56:00] And I'm just going to stick up for Dan.

[56:01] He's a great guy who I don't think would turn out to be a monster or a recluse in the wall.

[56:06] Thank you.

Stuart Wellington

[56:07] But if you were a recluse in the wall...

Elliott Kalan

[56:09] If any of us was going to be, it would be Dan.

[56:11] Horrifying.

[56:12] Horrifying, yeah.

[56:12] And you know what, Dan?

[56:13] Just to be on the record, I'm going to hug you right now.

[56:16] You like that?

[56:17] Yeah.

[56:18] Arms around you.

[56:19] Chain meal sound effects.

[56:21] Chain meal sound effects.

[56:22] The magic of hug sounds.

[56:23] Hug sounds.

[56:24] Squish.

[56:27] Dan, you're feeling very squishy.

[56:29] Is that a packet of mayonnaise in your pocket?

[56:31] Why do you have a bunch of squid under your shirt?

Dan McCoy

[56:34] My own reasons.

[56:36] So this last letter goes like this.

[56:39] Which duck is the best duck?

[56:41] Daffy?

[56:42] Donald?

[56:42] Howard?

[56:44] Scrooge?

[56:44] Destroyer?

[56:45] Darkwing?

[56:46] Huey?

[56:47] Is it Baby Huey?

[56:48] Jacob, last name withheld.

Elliott Kalan

[56:50] Well, Jacob, I can tell you it's not Baby Huey, the dumbest of the ducks.

Dan McCoy

[56:54] I mean, this is pretty boring, but I would go with Scrooge.

Elliott Kalan

[56:57] Well, what do you mean by best?

[56:59] My favorite of those would be Daffy, but he's not reliable, you know, in a situation.

[57:04] And I like Flint Hart Glomgold a lot.

[57:08] I would say that maybe.

Stuart Wellington

[57:09] Oh, no, magic, can I say magic of the spell?

[57:11] Magic of the spell.

[57:11] She's a duck, yeah.

[57:12] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[57:12] And she's, uh, she originally, her first story was like, she's like a Greek witch, right?

[57:18] Yeah.

[57:19] Yeah, yeah.

[57:19] That's a sandwich with Greek dressing on it.

Elliott Kalan

[57:22] Greek witch.

[57:24] I would, Destroyer Duck stood up for the right of Jack Kirby to have his art returned to him

[57:27] by Marvel, so I like him, I guess.

[57:29] But, uh, you know, I'm gonna go with Howard, actually.

[57:33] Yeah.

[57:33] What about Duck Dodgers?

[57:35] In the 24th and a half century?

[57:36] See, that's Daffy.

[57:37] That's just Daffy.

[57:37] I hate to break it to you.

[57:38] I thought he was a different guy.

[57:39] Duck Dodgers and Daffy Duck are the same guy.

Dan McCoy

[57:42] Which one's Space Jammed?

[57:44] Just Daffy.

[57:45] Stuart, Super Grover is also Grover.

[57:48] No, no, Dan, we don't know that.

Stuart Wellington

[57:49] Neither of them is the monster at the end of the book, right?

[57:51] No, Grover is.

Dan McCoy

[57:52] It is the monster at the end of the book.

[57:54] He's so embarrassed about it.

Elliott Kalan

[57:57] I'm sorry to anyone who just spoiled the end of the monster.

[57:59] At the end of this book for it.

[58:01] Yeah.

[58:01] You would have found the answer within a minute, anyway.

Dan McCoy

[58:03] I mean, there is half of a spoiler in the title.

Elliott Kalan

[58:07] Oh, only that there's a monster at the end of the book.

[58:08] And the book ends.

[58:09] Not the O. Henry.

[58:11] It's true.

[58:11] That it's not the never-ending story.

[58:13] Sure.

[58:14] That it's not Franz Kafka's The Castle, which ends mid-sentence,

[58:17] because he died before finishing it.

Dan McCoy

[58:21] So, I hope that answers your question.

Elliott Kalan

[58:23] And now.

[58:23] Anyway, worthy of O. Henry,

[58:25] the twist at the end of the monster at the end of this book.

Dan McCoy

[58:28] Let's close out with our usual final segment.

[58:32] Recommendations.

[58:32] O. Henry died and became the Crypt Keeper, right?

[58:34] Oh.

[58:35] Yeah.

[58:35] I like that backstory.

[58:36] The Crypt Keeper is the corpse of O. Henry.

[58:40] Stuart, why don't you start us off with a recommendation of a movie you actually liked.

Stuart Wellington

[58:46] Okay.

[58:47] So, I've been seeing a lot of movies lately, but I'm going to recommend one I saw very recently

[58:51] at the Angelica Theater in New York City.

[58:55] I mentioned the theater because it led to a very immersive experience.

[59:00] I went and saw Snowpiercer, a movie about a...

[59:03] I'm planning to see that this Saturday.

[59:05] A future where the entire planet is frozen.

[59:08] Like the movie Frozen.

[59:10] I don't...

[59:11] Is that a movie?

[59:13] Frozen?

[59:13] Yeah, it is.

[59:14] So, and all that's left of humanity lives on a super train.

[59:19] So, in the Angelica Theater, you can constantly hear subway sounds, and it was super freezing

[59:25] cold from the cranked up AC.

[59:26] So, it was a immersing, immersive movie going.

[59:29] So, the things that usually make the Angelica a terrible place to go for movies.

Elliott Kalan

[59:32] Perfect for Snowpiercer.

[59:33] They should have called Snowpiercer Super Train to Cold Town.

[59:38] All aboard!

[59:39] Let me call...

[59:40] Bring your parka.

[59:41] Let me call director Jun Ho Bong.

[59:44] Of the host?

Stuart Wellington

[59:45] Yes, of the host.

[59:46] And Memories of Murder, another movie I recommend.

[59:49] Which I actually like much more than The Host.

[59:50] Yeah.

[59:51] Memories of Murder.

Dan McCoy

[59:51] Well, that's crazy.

[59:53] You love monsters.

Stuart Wellington

[59:54] I do, but I don't...

[59:55] Maybe it just shows how great Memories of Murder is.

[59:58] Exactly.

[59:59] There you go.

[59:59] So, Snowpiercer is great too.

[1:00:02] In some ways, I feel like it's a movie that would be much less good in the hands of a less

[1:00:08] skillful filmmaker.

[1:00:10] It's a great sci-fi movie.

[1:00:12] It gets a little bit heady and a little bit overly metaphorical near the end.

[1:00:17] In some ways, it feels like somebody...

[1:00:20] If somebody were to make a movie of the Bioshock video game with all the plasmids and shit,

[1:00:26] that's kind of how it feels like.

[1:00:28] Kind of with some great Wizard of Oz references and everything.

[1:00:31] But I'm not going to talk that much more about it.

[1:00:33] It's great.

[1:00:34] You should go see it if you like sci-fi and or action.

Dan McCoy

[1:00:37] Well, sounds awesome.

[1:00:38] As I referenced earlier in the show, I went to England recently.

[1:00:43] And you know what that means.

[1:00:44] Country dropper.

[1:00:45] I saw a lot of movies on planes.

[1:00:48] Oh.

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:49] Time yet again.

Dan McCoy

[1:00:50] For Dan McCoy's Plane Corner.

[1:00:53] Where I talk about...

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:54] What's that in the sky?

[1:00:56] Who's that sighing guy?

[1:00:59] Dan McCoy.

[1:01:00] Flying so high.

[1:01:02] Up in the blue.

[1:01:03] Where the movies are new to you.

[1:01:06] Plane Corner.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:08] So I watched five movies.

[1:01:10] Wow.

[1:01:11] Well, going there and back.

[1:01:12] Five movies.

[1:01:13] And you hate books.

[1:01:15] Like...

[1:01:16] And sleeping.

[1:01:17] It's like 14 hours worth of possible movie watching time.

[1:01:21] So I watched...

[1:01:23] What the hell did I watch?

[1:01:26] Wow.

[1:01:26] Really made an impression, huh?

[1:01:28] No, no.

[1:01:28] I got this.

[1:01:29] Solid recommend.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:30] So I watched I Love Trouble over and over again.

[1:01:33] I watched The Lego Movie.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:35] I watched The Hunger Games Catching Fire.

[1:01:38] Sure.

[1:01:38] I watched 12 Years a Slave.

[1:01:40] Catch that kid.

[1:01:41] I watched Muppets Most Wanted.

[1:01:44] And Jack Ryan Shatter Recruit.

[1:01:46] Are you recommending all of these?

[1:01:47] You're recommending the last one over all the others.

[1:01:49] I would say that I would watch any of these movies not on a plane.

[1:01:52] Wow.

[1:01:53] Oh, wow.

[1:01:53] I enjoy them all to one degree.

[1:01:55] So what you're saying is...

[1:01:56] Even Shatter Recruit?

[1:01:57] Yeah, even Shatter Recruit.

[1:01:58] Which, by the way, I wanted to mention, after we trashed Three Days to Kill, Kevin Costner

[1:02:03] is the sporting actor, the second male lead in Shatter Recruit.

[1:02:10] I guess Kevin Costner is probably the second male lead.

[1:02:12] But Kevin Costner is Chris Pine's handler at the CIA.

[1:02:16] And he's very enjoyable in it.

[1:02:19] And speaking of Three Days to Kill, I noticed as I was flying home that the guy in front of

[1:02:24] me who was wearing a black trench coat and had one of those stupid haircuts where it was

[1:02:29] very shaved on the side and very long on top and had his sunglasses...

[1:02:33] Like a screw-ups?

[1:02:34] Yeah, and he also looked back and he had his sunglasses on the top of his head the entire

[1:02:37] time he was in the plane.

[1:02:39] Yeah, in case it got bright on the plane.

[1:02:41] And who put his chair all the way back, which basically makes you...

[1:02:45] Keep spinning a word portrait about this man, Dan.

[1:02:47] You're like Charles Dickens.

[1:02:49] This guy put his chair all the...

[1:02:50] Leant his chair all the way back in front of me, which basically makes you a human monster

[1:02:54] in my book.

[1:02:55] Hugh Monster.

[1:02:56] He was watching Three Days to Kill.

[1:02:59] That was what he decided to watch.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:00] He watched it over and over again.

Dan McCoy

[1:03:02] Yeah.

[1:03:02] Slow-mo.

[1:03:03] No, I felt very validated in my hatred for this man when I saw what then his movie choice

[1:03:08] had been.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:08] Wow.

[1:03:09] So what you're saying, Dan, about the movies you saw was you think they should get these

[1:03:12] motherfucking movies off that motherfucking plane.

Dan McCoy

[1:03:15] And into their hearts.

[1:03:16] And watch them.

[1:03:16] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:17] Onto their TVs.

[1:03:18] Onto their eyeballs.

[1:03:20] So, Stu Elliott, what do you have to...

[1:03:23] You really could not remember my name for a moment.

[1:03:25] It's true.

[1:03:25] We've known each other for almost ten years.

[1:03:27] And you were looking directly at his face.

[1:03:28] You were looking right at me.

[1:03:29] There's only two other hosts besides you.

[1:03:31] And you see everyday words are well documented.

[1:03:33] I'm your boss, Dan.

[1:03:34] Couldn't even remember my name.

[1:03:36] Yeah.

[1:03:36] Just kidding.

[1:03:37] I'm just saying I'm boss.

[1:03:38] Yeah.

[1:03:39] I'm super cool.

[1:03:40] I'm a rude dude with tood.

[1:03:42] That's just how it is.

[1:03:44] Anyway, I wanted to recommend a...

[1:03:46] The Croods.

[1:03:49] Star of the Croods.

[1:03:50] Yep.

[1:03:51] Sometimes nude.

[1:03:52] In the shower.

[1:03:52] Occasionally booed on stage.

[1:03:58] Flued?

[1:03:59] Is that a word?

[1:04:00] And enjoying the music of Yehud Amenuin.

[1:04:03] Sure.

[1:04:04] But anyway, so...

[1:04:05] She likes his pork stewed.

[1:04:08] Yep.

[1:04:09] Don't want to be gooed.

[1:04:10] That's when goo is thrown at you.

[1:04:13] But I love the art of Steve Rude.

[1:04:16] I already used that one.

[1:04:17] What about lewd?

[1:04:18] I used it, but that was before I have word.

[1:04:20] Now it's a name.

[1:04:20] Anyway, occasionally lewd.

[1:04:22] So I wanted to recommend a good Greek myth movie, because I haven't seen anything recently

[1:04:27] I really liked.

[1:04:28] I watched on a plane the first Amazing Spider-Man movie, the first one of the ones with what's-his-face.

[1:04:34] Yeah.

[1:04:35] And I didn't like it very much.

[1:04:37] I was disappointed in it.

[1:04:38] Yeah.

[1:04:38] So anyway, so I wanted to recommend a classic Greek myth movie, but the only really good ones

[1:04:44] that come to mind are, that are not just wild retellings of the story.

[1:04:48] You're, you know, Orpheus the Poets and things like, or Blood of the Poets and stuff like that,

[1:04:52] is the Ray Harryhausen movies, which I assume our listeners have seen or are already aware

[1:04:57] of.

[1:04:57] So instead, I'll recommend a Greek movie.

[1:05:00] How about that?

[1:05:02] Called Zorba the Greek.

[1:05:03] Called Zorba the Greek.

[1:05:04] Or rather, I think I'm going to recommend a movie that people have probably already heard

[1:05:09] of, but they may have missed it when it came out.

[1:05:11] You guys, I think, have seen it.

[1:05:12] Called Dogtooth.

[1:05:14] Which is nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, and it's a weirdo movie

[1:05:17] about a mother and father who keep their kids in their house and teach them wrong things

[1:05:24] about the outside world, including what different words mean, and also are deciding which daughter

[1:05:29] to pair off with, the son to have sex with.

[1:05:32] It's a totally crazy movie, but in a way, it embodies somewhat the morality you find in

[1:05:39] Greek myths in that the authority figures are not bound by what we'd consider goodness

[1:05:46] or justice, and instead create a world in which the main characters, the kids, have to survive

[1:05:52] or figure out ways to free themselves, even though the only probable fate is destruction,

[1:05:58] because they really can't survive in the outside world when you think about it.

[1:06:02] So it's not a retelling of Greek myths, but I feel like it embodies that sensibility in

[1:06:06] some ways.

Stuart Wellington

[1:06:07] That's interesting, Elliot, that you say that, because IMDb user Cliff Brissett says,

[1:06:13] not only is it one out of ten, but he was lured in by promises of an awesomely dysfunctional

[1:06:21] family, insanity, and death.

[1:06:23] But where was the plot?

[1:06:25] Yeah.

[1:06:26] I mean, it's a movie told through incidents.

[1:06:27] But for some reason, they decide to stretch it into an hour and a half of torture, and

[1:06:30] not the good kind.

[1:06:32] So I guess you listeners are going to have to decide who you're going to believe, Elliot

Dan McCoy

[1:06:35] or Cliff Brissett.

[1:06:37] And I can recommend a different movie, too, I guess.

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:39] One out of ten.

[1:06:40] You know what?

[1:06:40] If you don't like that one, I'll recommend a French movie set in Greece, Z.

[1:06:44] How about that?

[1:06:45] Sure.

[1:06:45] Loosely based on the military coup that overthrew the Greek government.

[1:06:51] It's a really good kind of whodunit political thriller.

[1:06:54] So there you go.

[1:06:55] If you want plot, watch Z.

[1:06:56] If you want a weirdo creepsy movie, watch Dogtooth.

Stuart Wellington

[1:07:00] You've beaten my skills at finding negative reviews of movies that you recommend.

Dan McCoy

[1:07:05] Put it on the DVD case.

[1:07:06] If you want a weirdo creepsy movie.

[1:07:08] Ellie Caelin of the Flophouse.

[1:07:10] So guys, that was a pretty crazy episode.

[1:07:14] A lot of ends.

[1:07:16] A lot of outs.

[1:07:17] A lot of zaniness.

[1:07:18] I look forward to listening back to it and remembering what the hell we talked about.

Elliott Kalan

[1:07:21] All I remember is that at one point Carl Gugino sat on my lap, I think.

[1:07:24] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:07:25] Dan was complaining that we...

[1:07:27] No.

[1:07:27] Dan, you were complaining that we had some listener that didn't like how little we talk

[1:07:32] about the movie or something.

[1:07:33] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:07:33] Well, he will hate this episode if he's still listening.

[1:07:36] He isn't.

[1:07:37] No.

[1:07:38] So all the talk he did about that was wasted.

Elliott Kalan

[1:07:41] I'll tell you what.

[1:07:42] Let's end on a cheery note.

[1:07:44] Flophouse forever.

[1:07:45] Right, guys?

[1:07:46] The three Flopscuteers.

[1:07:47] All for one and one for flops.

[1:07:49] Yeah.

[1:07:51] Yeah.

[1:07:52] Yeah.

[1:07:52] There's Stuos, Danos, and Elliotanian.

[1:07:56] The three Flopscuteers.

[1:07:58] The bro?

[1:08:00] And the housecats.

[1:08:01] I guess it's four.

[1:08:01] The four Flopscats.

[1:08:02] There's a good guy.

[1:08:02] Yeah.

[1:08:03] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:05] I mean, honestly.

[1:08:05] Housecatamus.

[1:08:06] Like, D'Artagnan isn't really one of the three Musketeers.

Stuart Wellington

[1:08:10] But he's always...

[1:08:10] But Elliotanian sounds awesome.

[1:08:12] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:13] Thank you.

[1:08:13] Sounds kind of like Biff Tannen.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:16] It's a cross between a Musketeer and a bully from the 19th century.

[1:08:20] 1950s.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:22] So on that note of a word that sounded kind of like another word.

[1:08:26] But not really.

[1:08:26] For the Flophouse, I've been Dan McCoy.

Elliott Kalan

[1:08:29] I've been Stuart Wellington.

[1:08:31] And I remain to this day Elliot Kalin.

[1:08:33] Good night, everyone.

[1:08:34] Good night, everyone.

[1:08:49] Yep.

[1:08:49] Hey.

[1:08:50] To us.

[1:08:51] Hey.

[1:08:51] It's Miller time.

[1:08:53] Is it Miller time?

Stuart Wellington

[1:08:55] Yeah.

[1:08:55] It's 10.05.

[1:08:57] Yeah.

[1:08:58] So it's five past Miller time.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:01] So are we going to record this?

[1:09:03] Or are we just going to talk about how much Miller time?

[1:09:04] No, let's argue about the precise definition of Miller time.

[1:09:07] I mean, I'm not the right authority for this.

[1:09:09] 10 p.m.

Dan McCoy

[1:09:10] It's Miller time.

[1:09:11] You'd think it would be earlier.

[1:09:13] Yeah.

[1:09:13] Like a six.

[1:09:16] Well, it's seven.

[1:09:17] Really?

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:17] It's a...

[1:09:19] It's...

[1:09:19] I would think it's 10.05 because it runs on the TVS broadcast schedule.

[1:09:23] I guess they don't do that anymore.

[1:09:24] Mm-hmm.

[1:09:25] They're very funny.

[1:09:26] Anyway.

The Flop House: Episode #157 - The Legend of Hercules

Transcript

In this episode

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