The Flop House: Episode #128 - Red Dawn

[0:00] In this episode, we discuss the Teens Take Down the North Korean Army movie, Red Dawn.

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

[0:34] Hey Dan McCoy. I am Stuart Wellington.

[0:37] Hey guys, I'm Elliot Kalin. Nice to meet you.

[0:40] No, really, get out of here.

[0:42] Oh, I gotta go.

[0:43] We're replacing you.

[0:44] Footsteps, footsteps, footsteps. Door slams. Car, plane, rocket ship.

[0:48] Crackle, crackle, crackle. Cellophane.

[0:51] Cellophane. I guess I should say it's fire.

[0:53] Cornstarch, cornstarch. It's snowing outside.

[0:58] It was in the winter of 1812 that I first...

[1:02] Wait, what are we doing?

[1:03] This is our old-time radio comedy podcast, right?

[1:07] Yeah, it's called The Flophouse.

[1:08] What do we do on The Flophouse, Dan?

[1:10] We talk about a bad...

[1:12] Aside from dick around and make up garbage.

[1:13] We watch a bad movie directly before the podcast.

[1:17] People ask, do you watch the movie directly before the podcast?

[1:20] We do.

[1:20] We are coming fresh off the movie.

[1:23] We watched it literally less than eight minutes ago.

[1:26] Not even had time to towel off.

[1:28] Nope, we're still all sweaty from the movie.

[1:30] If we seem crazy or angry, it's because we just watched the movie.

[1:34] And what movie made us angry this night?

[1:36] We watched a little movie called Red Dawn.

[1:39] Rated R.

[1:40] Rated PG-13.

[1:41] Wait, the original Red Dawn?

[1:43] We did not watch the original Red Dawn.

[1:44] I was disappointed that this was not the movie where Prairie Dawn from Sesame Street is a serial killer.

[1:52] Red Dawn.

[1:52] You lost me.

[1:53] No?

[1:53] You have those.

[1:54] Come on, Red Dawn.

[1:55] That's weirder than the red dinosaurs joke where communist dinosaurs invade America.

[2:00] Yeah, it's Joseph Stalinosaurus Rex.

[2:03] All right, well, here's where you lose me.

[2:04] The idea that a dinosaur...

[2:06] Stalinosaurus Rex.

[2:07] The idea that a dinosaur ascribes to any particular ideology.

[2:10] Their brains were the size of a walnut.

[2:12] If they don't work together, how are the Tyrannosaurus is going to scratch their back or brush their teeth?

[2:17] For the greater good of the collective.

[2:18] Oh, collective.

[2:18] Yeah, I get it.

[2:20] All right.

[2:20] There's got to be some kind of a dinosaur that does that for them.

[2:23] The means of production need to be in the tiny hand of the T-Rex.

[2:25] Yep, the two-fingered hand of the T-Rex.

[2:28] Whereas, like, I don't know,

[2:31] brontosauruses are used for, I don't know,

[2:33] mining a quarry or something?

[2:35] Yeah, brontosauruses are used for mining a quarry,

[2:38] and then you slide down their backs when it's quitting time.

[2:41] Okay, one, that's from a cartoon,

[2:43] and two, you're both morons, they're called apatosauruses.

[2:45] It's true.

[2:46] The brontosaurus was a fallacy.

[2:49] It was a misnamed, incorrect speech.

[2:52] This has been Elliot's

[2:54] Dorky Dinosaur Hour.

[2:54] This has been The Fossil House

[2:56] with me, paleontologist Elliot Galen,

[2:58] and our own house dinosaur.

[3:01] Elliot Palin,

[3:02] the paleontologist.

[3:04] My last name is not Palin.

[3:06] So we watched the movie

[3:09] Red Dawn tonight.

[3:10] Sarah Palin's favorite movie.

[3:12] It might be.

[3:13] It's probably either that

[3:14] or like Steel Magnolias

[3:15] or like The Hands of Dr. Orloff

[3:17] or some shit.

[3:18] I don't know.

[3:18] Pirates of the Caribbean.

[3:19] Pirates of the Caribbean, yeah.

[3:22] She likes Shag.

[3:25] She's a big fan of Shag.

[3:27] She might be a big fan of Shag.

[3:28] And who isn't?

[3:29] It's about a dance.

[3:30] Or Dag.

[3:31] For a second I thought you were bringing us back on track there, but no.

[3:34] So Red Dawn, we watched the remake, which came out last year.

[3:37] Yep, sat on the shelf.

[3:39] Sat on the shelf for a little while, partly as a result of a couple different things.

[3:43] MGM, the production company, or I guess Metro Golden Mayor.

[3:47] Just to clarify.

[3:49] Goldwyn Mayor, not Golden Mayor.

[3:52] You're so wrong in everything tonight.

[3:53] Metro,

[3:54] Goldwyn after Samuel Goldwyn,

[3:56] and Mayer after Leo G. Mayer.

[3:58] Metro is from Metro Studios.

[4:00] You moron.

[4:02] What movie company did I buy stock in?

[4:04] So wait a minute.

[4:05] You bought stock in Metro Golden Mayer,

[4:08] the sequel to Golden Hotel,

[4:09] Golden Palace,

[4:10] which was the sequel to the Golden Girls.

[4:11] So that's the movie studio

[4:13] that Blanche,

[4:15] Dorothy,

[4:15] Rose,

[4:16] and Sophia opened up

[4:18] to make movies about randy old ladies.

[4:21] Basically a bunch of cocoons.

[4:22] Yeah, the Cocoon 3, The Sexifying, and Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.

[4:27] All right.

[4:28] So, Red Dawn.

[4:29] So, Red Dawn.

[4:30] It sat on the shelf for a while.

[4:32] MGM, the parent company, filed for bankruptcy.

[4:35] It's the movie studio with the tiger, right?

[4:37] Or no, lion.

[4:38] It's a lion.

[4:39] Do you guys know anything about anything?

[4:42] It's a podcast that specializes in wrong facts about MGM.

[4:49] I know I get, I get, I'm a pedant.

[4:51] Put all their money on tiger food, probably.

[4:53] That's why they had money troubles.

[4:56] And then their lion died because they had a lion and not a tiger.

[4:59] They eat completely different food.

[5:01] Their body doesn't absorb nutrients the same way, so it ate all the tiger food and it didn't do any good.

[5:06] Okay, so, Red Dawn.

[5:09] The parent company filed for bankruptcy after production of this movie, but I think before post-production and before release.

[5:15] It's out of the shelf for a while.

[5:16] It's a movie about an invasion of the United States by a foreign country.

[5:19] Originally, that country was China.

[5:21] But they realized China is the, I think, second largest film market in the world.

[5:27] Yeah, I mean, Iron Man 3 famously added extra China-centric scenes to pander to the Chinese audience.

[5:34] Or to panda, if you will.

[5:37] To panda to them, Stuart.

[5:40] Well, they did add that scene where Iron Panda comes in.

[5:43] and you don't have sex and domesticity

[5:47] or captivity i guess um yeah so because it's not like they're keeping pandas in their house and

[5:54] shit the panda has settled down it doesn't get out as much as it used to you know just

[5:59] pandas are married for a while their sex life dies off they've let themselves go

[6:05] they're already fat bears they get morbidly make fun of them let's be honest they're already the

[6:13] least sexy of bears they have neither the robust buxomness of the grizzly nor nor the svelte

[6:22] naughtiness of the of the black bear yeah once you go black bear and of course polar bears are

[6:27] just fucking they'll do anything yeah polar bears you just know the sluts of the animal kingdom

[6:31] they're just open to whatever so red is you may have noticed audience we don't have red dawn made

[6:38] very little impression on us it is red dawn drove us mad so originally it was china who were the

[6:42] villains but realizing that china is too busy with their pandas it's a huge time to invade

[6:48] that's what stewart took away from it in post-production they actually changed the

[6:51] movie so that it was about north korea invading america which is stupid for two reasons stupid

[6:57] and racist well racist that you just swap out chinese people that you can just say you can

[7:02] dub in north korea uh dubbing korean and change the cgi flags well the underlying assumption is

[7:09] one all asians look alike and which we do all the time anyway in our movies like we have japanese

[7:14] and chinese actors playing asian of all types like joel gray and uh that that uh that movie that uh

[7:21] well that's yellow face that's a different thing that's the james bond villain but yeah that's i

[7:25] mean for years you had white actors playing asian characters and it was very offensive but now it's

[7:30] just like we've made the step in progress that at least we have the right continent yeah the actors

[7:34] are from but uh they this what's stupid about it is that also is that and this is a point that's

[7:40] been made for north korea and i'll boy will i have egg on my face if north korea invades and

[7:45] conquers the u.s before this episode shows up but it is very unlikely that north korea a country

[7:51] with when america's using the flop house as the voice of resistance yeah exactly a very small

[7:56] country that has been isolated globally it has one main supporter which is china that it's

[8:01] dependent on and it has no food for a lot of the people in it throughout the 90s it went through

[8:06] massive starvation and hasn't totally recovered from that so like the idea that it literally

[8:12] watches a huge attack huge air invasion with paratroopers and immediately cripples and takes

[8:19] over the country is astounding also somehow somehow like within like i it seems like days

[8:25] or a day of invading.

[8:27] They have tanks on the ground in the U.S.

[8:29] Like, apparently, they have crippled,

[8:32] they've had this blackout,

[8:34] they've crippled us with paratroopers,

[8:35] and then they have, like,

[8:37] they speedboated these tanks across the ocean.

[8:40] And yet, all you see as a result,

[8:42] we should go back to the beginning of the movie,

[8:43] but all you see as the result,

[8:44] mainly of the North Korean occupation,

[8:46] is a lot of roadblocks.

[8:47] Yeah.

[8:48] And a lot of posters that they've put up.

[8:51] Yeah, that's what they put in their tanks.

[8:52] It's a poster-based war.

[8:54] I mean, North Korea is a poster-based society to a certain extent,

[8:57] but it's like North Korea invaded and conquered America,

[8:59] and then it really wanted to promote its band.

[9:01] So it just plastered posters all over the walls.

[9:04] Oh, come out.

[9:05] There's also free beer for an hour.

[9:07] Well, 15 minutes.

[9:08] But also...

[9:10] That's how you trick them into leaving their houses.

[9:12] Then you round them up and stick them in shipping containers.

[9:14] For the re-education,

[9:17] the most passive-aggressive re-education camp ever.

[9:19] But we'll get to that.

[9:21] The reason I'll say that is because there's a big billboard

[9:23] in the re-education camp that says you deserve to be here which is such a it's like what your mom

[9:29] would put up they need a billboard that says think about what you did do you really think

[9:35] you need to eat that that's that's another poster you're gonna ruin your appetite yeah

[9:39] uh so we open up we're in spokane washington and we're introduced to the eckert bustling

[9:46] metropolis bustling small city uh and we're introduced to the eckert family that's chris

[9:53] Hemsworth as Eckhart

[9:55] Guy number one. Jed Eckhart

[9:57] who just came back from the

[9:59] war in Iraq. And Aaron Eckhart

[10:01] is Two-Face. Nope.

[10:03] His younger brother

[10:05] He's playing two characters. His younger brother who's a

[10:07] football star at the high school and their dad

[10:09] who is the sheriff played by an actor who

[10:11] looks like Chris Cooper but is not. He's playing Chris Cooper

[10:12] playing this character. He's a

[10:15] he's a character he's a actor you may

[10:17] remember from The Dark Knight Rises

[10:18] as the senator. Bane.

[10:20] Senator Bane. Senator Bane.

[10:22] No, he was not a senator.

[10:23] I don't think you understood that movie.

[10:25] Do you remember that part where Bane was elected to the Senate?

[10:27] And then he spent all his time with fundraisers.

[10:30] It's so hard to work within the system.

[10:33] Batman, what we need is a comprehensive filibuster reform.

[10:38] I actually don't know that they're going to be able to hear us when we're covering our mouths in front of a microphone.

[10:41] But we were doing Bane as a senator.

[10:43] Anyway.

[10:43] I rise in protest, Batman, to this vote.

[10:47] Anyway, and so forth.

[10:49] Yeah, good comedy move.

[10:52] my name you can imagine other jokes right some yourself play along at home call batman and ask

[11:00] him why he hasn't provided the funds i'm bane and i approve this message children of the night

[11:06] he should have been a vampire anyway so we're introduced these characters at a football game

[11:13] high school football game uh the younger brother the team the wolverines the team the wolverines

[11:17] The younger brother has a girlfriend

[11:19] One of their friends

[11:21] Has a video podcast

[11:22] And another friend is black

[11:25] And that is the extent of the characterization

[11:26] For the movie for the most part

[11:28] And there's a lady who's Tyra Collette

[11:31] From Friday Night Lights

[11:32] Can't get away from football

[11:33] And she's a friend of theirs

[11:37] She's a waitress

[11:38] I don't want to pull an in time here

[11:39] Basically a match at the beginning of Battleship

[11:42] But without a burrito

[11:43] There was a point where they're all hanging out at a bar

[11:46] and we and stuart i looked at each other we both were like is this battleship did they trick us

[11:49] into watching battleship again and yet without the best scene when john carter goes in and steals a

[11:54] burrito from a store uh but anyway i don't remember yeah when john carter does that he

[12:00] jumps really high through the window right yeah sure steals the burrito from tars tarkis

[12:03] his fucking his fucking he's used to earth's gravity so he can steal burritos really well

[12:09] our yellow sun gives him burrito stealing powers anyway they're at a bar hanging out after the game

[12:16] that they lost and the power goes out there's been a blackout that's weird uh-oh but they don't

[12:22] really it doesn't affect them that much but until the next morning when north korean troops are

[12:28] literally just falling out of the sky i mean they're parachuting down it's not like

[12:31] that would be a very ineffective it's not like the beginning of the happening when those guys

[12:36] just falling off the construction site.

[12:37] They just shot a bunch of human cannonballs.

[12:39] We couldn't afford parachutes.

[12:42] So hopefully some of you will make it.

[12:44] The first wave of you will break the other people's fall.

[12:49] We'll get a pile of three or four dead guys

[12:51] and that'll serve as a cushion

[12:52] for the next guys who finally pull the invasion off.

[12:55] It's Clyde Barker's In the Hills of Cities.

[12:57] So it's like the one big,

[12:59] it's the one big,

[13:01] it's the one big effect shot in the movie

[13:03] is this CGI guy's parachuting down and then planes crashing.

[13:07] And that was the shot that was in all the trailers.

[13:10] Yeah.

[13:10] Leading you to believe that,

[13:11] oh, the whole movie's going to be filled with some huge effects stuff.

[13:15] But there's very few.

[13:16] Actually, one of the things that I would say I liked about it

[13:18] if I liked the movie at all, which I didn't,

[13:20] is that there isn't that much CGI in the movie, which is nice.

[13:24] Terrible. That's the thing.

[13:25] You got computers. Use them, man.

[13:27] Have the Koreans already invaded and stole our own computers?

[13:30] The movie opens with a montage of some real news footage, some fake news footage of America's economy is collapsing, we're sending troops everywhere, Russia invades Georgia, and North Korea is amping up, and there's literally a CGI shot of a CGI North Korean flag being raised up a flagpole with other Asian flags, and it's like, come on, seriously, it was cheaper to do that than to just shoot a flag being raised on a flagpole? Come on, people.

[13:54] but uh so there's this big cgi army of paratroopers falling down america is instantly

[14:01] crippled but our teen heroes i call them the kid commandos uh led by chris hemsworth and his family

[14:09] and a bunch of their buddies yeah you may know chris hemsworth as thor or as the hunter the

[14:14] huntsman from snow and the huntsman or the cabin from the cabin you did not play the cabin you

[14:18] played john cavan with his partner dirk woods and they have sex at one point that's why it's

[14:24] the cabin in the woods wow but he's also a christ figure that's the jc yeah exactly yeah yeah yeah

[14:30] i don't think you get it all right wait hold on let's go so anyway what i'm recommending

[14:35] tonight is the gay porn film christ allegory cabin in the woods

[14:38] uh so he cares he cares someone's that's a cure someone's urinary tract infection at one point

[14:50] by turning it into bees what that would make it so much worse

[14:56] stewart knows what i'm talking about no yeah he's right let's listen to him is this because i did

[15:04] Because I'm Jewish, I don't understand.

[15:05] I miss this story of Christ

[15:06] when he has a urinary tract infection

[15:09] and he's putting bees in someone's penis.

[15:10] There's a fire burning inside you

[15:13] and it's the Green Mile.

[15:14] Oh, I see. He turned it into locusts.

[15:19] Yeah, that's what it was.

[15:20] But you made it sound like

[15:21] he said, like, boom, the infection

[15:23] inside you is now bees.

[15:25] You're welcome.

[15:26] Pay the receptionist on your way out.

[15:29] One, these are bees inside me, and two,

[15:31] I didn't realize I had to pay for the service.

[15:34] The bees are stinging my urethra.

[15:38] And Nicolas Cage is like,

[15:39] giving me a UTI won't bring back your stupid bees.

[15:42] Okay.

[15:44] Oh, there's so many cross-overs on this show.

[15:47] So the kids escape in a car chase,

[15:50] and the North Koreans are hapless to catch them.

[15:52] I mean, most of the chase is them just driving away.

[15:55] That's true.

[15:55] They get away pretty early,

[15:57] and then they're just driving over bumps,

[15:58] but it's shot as if they're in trouble.

[15:59] And there's one North Korean guy

[16:02] who you see a close-up of.

[16:04] So you know he's like

[16:05] the leader of the bad guys.

[16:06] Yeah, he's the boss.

[16:07] I don't know that he ever gets

[16:08] a full name, character, personality.

[16:10] He is just the single

[16:13] North Korean face of the evil

[16:15] that we are being taken over by.

[16:17] And this evil is expressed mainly by...

[16:19] He is the yellow menace in this film.

[16:21] Yeah, exactly.

[16:22] I'm pretty sure that it's like

[16:23] General Cho or something

[16:25] because we made that...

[16:26] Like it's John Cho from, you know...

[16:28] Oh, yeah, yeah.

[16:28] Oh, yeah, maybe they call him that.

[16:30] That classic joke.

[16:31] Yeah.

[16:32] but uh just doing some riffs riffing on names harold that's us check it out yeah anyway i'm

[16:39] back i left for a minute i think it wasn't yourself i didn't get up but my spirit left my

[16:46] body and i just returned so they go to a cabin they hole up in the cabin for a night and there's

[16:53] an art they find again chris hemsworth should know better than to go in a cabin in the woods

[16:57] he's already been a huntsman he knows woods are dangerous and he's already been thor just hit the

[17:01] north koreans with your hammer dude yeah fucking done but uh actually i don't know how many of

[17:07] those movies he had made when he shot this since this the release was delayed for a while well

[17:11] then i feel that's like the story of his career because uh cabin in the woods you know sat around

[17:16] for a long time too a much better movie obviously but i didn't realize that yeah so chris hamsworth

[17:21] was uh destined for stardom uh five years ago i mean he now he's now thor he's yeah yeah he's a

[17:28] big shot everyone's favorite marvel movie thor well no but you and i were talking about like uh

[17:34] we both agree that he was probably the best thing in that snow white and the hutsman movie oh by far

[17:38] but that's he was the only one with any personality in that yeah what about christian stewart she was

[17:43] great christian stewart christian stewart another christian no she is terrible first off gorgeous

[17:50] what's weird beautiful snow white the personal land does play to christian stewart's strength

[17:55] and that she seems to be floating through the movie in a coma the entire time.

[17:58] Confused.

[17:58] Confused and just kind of like vaguely sleepwalking and not saying much

[18:02] and just looking like she's tired.

[18:04] And with her strange, like, emaciated figure and weird ear shape.

[18:07] Wow.

[18:08] Really judgy.

[18:10] Come on.

[18:12] The movie, making her wet most of the time, really plays to her strengths.

[18:16] Whoa.

[18:16] Okay, Red Dawn.

[18:17] Let's just go through.

[18:18] There's not a lot of plot in Red Dawn.

[18:20] There's an argument between Chris Hemsworth and one of their buddies.

[18:25] and he runs off tips off the north koreans to where these kids are hanging out

[18:28] north koreans come by with their dads and the sheriff not the north korean

[18:34] it's take your father to war day having honor in front of your parents is a big thing in our

[18:41] culture so just let us conquer you okay we're really embarrassed take your dad to war day

[18:47] he goes take your dad to work day is the thing when you take your retired dad to your office

[18:54] your dad i did this i did this for 65 years and your dad's like just let me die i should be at

[19:01] work right now why am i missing a day at work to sit here and watch you well let me get you some

[19:05] coloring books no i don't want that uh is there a recliner i can map in possibly somewhere to put

[19:15] it in word anywho okay uh that's their dad not chris cooper says he there's he they want him to

[19:22] say, come out, surrender.

[19:23] And he says, I want you to do what I would have done.

[19:26] Fight back and kill this piece of shit or something like that.

[19:30] And they shoot, knock Christopher in the head.

[19:31] And this is the scene that everyone remembers from the original Red Dawn

[19:35] when Harry Dean Stanton gets killed.

[19:37] But it's more exciting because he's actually in an internment camp at the time.

[19:42] He's clinging to the fence, if I recall.

[19:44] Yeah, here they're just in a field.

[19:45] They're just in the front yard of a house.

[19:48] It's not even really a camp.

[19:49] And we haven't really seen them kill that many people at this point.

[19:52] That's the thing.

[19:52] It's an incredibly bloodless victory.

[19:54] They've killed on...

[19:55] Well, that's to the North Koreans' credit, guys.

[19:57] Yeah, that's true.

[19:58] They're humane conquerors.

[19:59] You know what?

[20:00] The train's finally running on time.

[20:02] Subway's packed.

[20:03] Subway sandwich.

[20:05] Wolverines are really the villains of this.

[20:06] So the kids decide to go into hiding

[20:09] and they become a terrorist paramilitary group

[20:11] called the Wolverines.

[20:12] Chris, after their hiding...

[20:13] So they train by jumping off of cliffs.

[20:14] They train mainly by jumping off of cliffs

[20:16] and pointing water guns at each other.

[20:18] It's a relatively boring montage of them doing stuff.

[20:21] they don't even have an 80s pop power song behind the training montage and then they get guns and

[20:27] money from like what they refer to as like friends yeah like and they pull off instantly like a

[20:35] series of of incredibly successful insurgent attacks yeah on the on the north koreans the

[20:41] north koreans are caught flat-footed literally every time for the most part and it's literally

[20:47] just a bunch of like six or seven kids shooting the hell out of these soldiers and it gets to a

[20:51] point where i'm almost kind of feeling bad for the north koreans because they're totally outclassed

[20:55] by these high school students but also stewart you pointed this out that in addition to like being

[20:59] like like the weird thing about this movie it is is that it's at both a militia person's fantasy

[21:05] but also like like a pro-terrorism film like uh like a totally like oh let's root for the

[21:12] insurgents uh yeah it's a great idea teach terrorists they can put bombs under skateboards

[21:18] Then they'll just blow up all these checkpoints with them.

[21:20] Yeah.

[21:20] And like you were saying, so the way that – there's three ways that the North Korean occupation displays itself.

[21:28] One is checkpoints at every street corner it looks like.

[21:31] The second is they give a lot of speeches through megaphones.

[21:34] Really checking to make sure they're not Wolverines.

[21:37] I guess so.

[21:37] Making sure that your pants aren't sagging.

[21:39] That's really big.

[21:42] No crack can show in North Korea.

[21:44] And the third way is they have an internment camp that's like just barbed wire around a bunch of shipping containers.

[21:49] And people just hang around in orange jumpsuits.

[21:52] They don't seem to do anything.

[21:53] And that's where they have a big billboard that says you deserve to be here.

[21:56] And yeah.

[21:57] I'm thinking about what you're doing.

[21:58] One of the football players' girlfriend is thrown in this internment camp.

[22:02] We don't know why.

[22:03] What did she do?

[22:04] We don't find out.

[22:05] She has non-regulation eyebrows, probably.

[22:07] She does have very bushy eyebrows.

[22:09] For a woman that skinny and that blonde, her eyebrows are oversized.

[22:13] Very dark.

[22:14] Eventually, they try to sabotage a speech that would kill the main commander.

[22:18] You're talking about something that happens after a daring daylight raid on a Subway sandwich shop.

[22:25] I thought this was before the Subway sandwich shop.

[22:27] No, this is...

[22:28] Oh, I'm sorry.

[22:28] Where they steal a bucket full of every kind of soda.

[22:31] During one of the dozens...

[22:34] A suicide bucket of soda.

[22:35] One of the dozens of flawlessly executed amateur terrorist attacks.

[22:39] Or, sorry, patriotic insurgent rise-em-ups.

[22:43] They stop into a Subway sandwich shop

[22:45] Well two of them just find themselves

[22:47] Holeing up in a Subway sandwich

[22:48] They run away from the soldiers and they end up in a Subway sandwich shop

[22:51] They immediately demand bread and sandwiches

[22:53] From the guy at the counter

[22:54] Tuna chicken

[22:55] Give us a bucket to put soda in

[22:58] You just see one of them take a bucket

[23:01] And put it up against the soda dispensers

[23:02] That's probably the mop bucket

[23:04] So that like five or six different sodas

[23:08] Are all pouring into this bucket

[23:09] They should have cut to like

[23:11] all of the wolverines

[23:12] with straws

[23:13] into the one bucket.

[23:14] Into the same bucket?

[23:15] Oh, I imagined him

[23:16] trying to drink

[23:16] out of the one bucket

[23:17] and just spills all over him.

[23:18] Oh.

[23:19] Oh, man, my sodas.

[23:21] This is my only shirt.

[23:22] But I love,

[23:23] it's,

[23:24] but this is,

[23:25] the fact that they will drink

[23:26] a big mop bucket

[23:28] full of soda,

[23:29] mixed up soda,

[23:30] is the only sense we get

[23:31] that they are

[23:32] suffering at all

[23:33] during this.

[23:34] That they have any hardship.

[23:35] They live in an abandoned

[23:36] mineshaft

[23:37] and they're so clean,

[23:39] their clothes are so well ironed,

[23:40] They have beautiful skin and hair.

[23:42] One of them's wearing a kinky scarf around.

[23:45] Yeah, it's after they finish their amazing meal of Subway sandwiches and bucket soda.

[23:51] They're having this conversation about...

[23:54] It's called Boda.

[23:54] They're having this conversation about all the things they miss.

[23:57] And they're all looking around.

[23:58] They all look like they just took a shower.

[24:00] They're all well-shaved.

[24:01] They look like they're waiting for the Abercrombie photo shoot to start in this abandoned mineshaft.

[24:07] They didn't run out of hair gel yet.

[24:10] Nothing. They run through a thrift store at one point

[24:13] and the thrift store woman's like, here, take a bunch

[24:15] of clothes and have a gun.

[24:16] They are doing a great

[24:19] job living off the land. Yeah, there are some

[24:21] blessed terrorists, I'll tell you what.

[24:23] And there was something really adorable

[24:24] in Dan when

[24:26] they ran into the thrift shop and Dan went, ooh.

[24:29] As if he was going to get

[24:31] to visit the thrift shop and

[24:33] maybe buy some old albums. It was more interesting

[24:35] than anything else I'd seen on screen

[24:37] up until that point. It's like, oh,

[24:39] Look, they've got a whole rack of CDs up there.

[24:41] I wonder what they've got there.

[24:42] I can get those for two bucks, probably.

[24:45] Sure.

[24:47] Let's take a trip.

[24:48] That's an entire afternoon's worth of organizing your CDs after that.

[24:51] So they have a bunch of successful raids,

[24:54] but then they're trying to blow up a big speech,

[24:57] and they mess up.

[24:58] They get caught.

[24:59] Because the younger brother breaks ranks to rescue his girlfriend.

[25:04] And captures her and rescues her.

[25:06] But by doing so, one of their number is killed.

[25:09] His name, I don't remember.

[25:10] I remember he's Latino, and that's about it.

[25:12] They don't give him much personality beyond that.

[25:14] He is the first of the casualties the Wolverines will face, ultimately, up to three, I think, die.

[25:21] And one of them is left at the end, but we'll get to that.

[25:25] Anyway, that gets screwed up, and they go back to their hideout.

[25:31] Their hideout gets attacked by the Koreans.

[25:34] they run into a bunch of former Marines

[25:38] who are on the run trying to catch up

[25:41] with this legendary group, the Wolverines.

[25:42] Including what's-his-face?

[25:43] Who is it?

[25:44] Including the comedian from Watchmen.

[25:46] Yeah.

[25:46] McDreamy?

[25:47] McSteamy.

[25:48] No, he played Dinny from Grey's Anatomy,

[25:52] but what was his name?

[25:53] Which one was McSteamy, though?

[25:54] I don't...

[25:54] McSteamy was...

[25:55] Jeffrey Dean Morgan.

[25:56] Yeah, that's him.

[25:57] That was McSteamy.

[25:58] No, that was not McSteamy.

[25:59] So who was McSteamy?

[26:01] He was the fucking guy who was Chris O'Donnell.

[26:06] I think Chris O'Donnell was McSteamy.

[26:07] I think you're making that up.

[26:08] McDreamy was Patrick Dempsey.

[26:09] He was on the CSI.

[26:10] I know who McDreamy is.

[26:12] All right.

[26:12] Okay?

[26:12] You don't get to a podcast without knowing who McDreamy is.

[26:15] Guys, guys, who is McCreamy?

[26:17] That's an ice cream cake from Carvel.

[26:20] Whoever he is, he sounds delicious.

[26:23] But he's going to go straight to my thighs.

[26:26] I think we've got to talk about that.

[26:31] Yeah, we've got to talk about firing Dan.

[26:33] And I say that being about to make this joke,

[26:36] my favorite character is Mick Screamy.

[26:40] Gripteeper loves Grey's Anatomy.

[26:44] Or as he calls it, Grey's Anatomy.

[26:46] Because it's still a scary thing.

[26:48] Like, it's a book about corpses and stuff.

[26:49] Okay, so Jeffrey Dean Morgan showed up.

[26:53] Yeah, the comedian, though.

[26:55] Happy R. Bardem.

[26:56] Wait.

[26:57] Happy R. Bardem and Robert Downey Jr. had a little...

[27:00] A baby.

[27:01] No, I say if Robert Downey Jr. and MC Ganey had a baby.

[27:03] That is much cooler.

[27:05] MC Dreamy or whatever.

[27:06] MC Dreamy.

[27:07] No, Steamy.

[27:08] MC Downey?

[27:09] MC Scat Steamy.

[27:10] Sure.

[27:11] We can all agree on that.

[27:13] It sings opposites of steam.

[27:14] So they meet up with these...

[27:18] Elliot's distracted by his phone for a second.

[27:21] My wife texted me for a second, but just to tell me that a character from The Wire was on Veronica Mars in the episode she's watching right now.

[27:28] No, that's worth the break.

[27:30] Wait, really? Pause that.

[27:31] So they meet up with these Marines who then say,

[27:35] okay, we are here to help you Wolverines.

[27:38] We have a mission.

[27:39] They've been communicating,

[27:41] the North Koreans are communicating

[27:42] with these green radio cases.

[27:44] We, like the Marines show up and they're like,

[27:47] we have a MacGuffin for you.

[27:49] There's 30 minutes left in the movie.

[27:52] This movie has been lacking focus.

[27:53] We finally have a thing for you to do

[27:55] after the nonstop nonsense of just,

[27:57] And look, we've got like an hour of action scenes, which sounds exciting, but it's not.

[28:02] It's so low stakes and not exciting.

[28:06] And the only thing I like about it.

[28:07] If everything is action, nothing is action.

[28:09] Thank you.

[28:09] And in actions outlawed, only outlaws will have action.

[28:12] And if action Jackson, then Jackson is action?

[28:16] And I action, therefore I am.

[28:17] Your math works.

[28:19] That's the action Jackson transitive property.

[28:25] And they've been super successful at this point.

[28:28] They don't need a bunch of military-trained snipers following them around,

[28:31] killing any possible bad guy who might kill them.

[28:34] But, if anything, the snipers are worse for them.

[28:36] Oh, of course. They're terrible.

[28:38] They're not kids.

[28:40] Kids rule, adults drool, man.

[28:42] They should have called this movie Warfare No Adults at All.

[28:46] Now that's an equation I can get behind.

[28:49] It's not an equation.

[28:51] Sure, kids equals rule.

[28:55] Slash adults equals drool.

[28:56] We need to start our line of novelty folders that we sell to kids.

[29:01] We'll wait outside of schools and we'll sell that shit.

[29:04] That will be creepy.

[29:04] You guys just waiting outside of schools, saying to kids,

[29:07] No, Dan, I'll wear a trench coat to keep all the folders in.

[29:10] And we'll sell them all the trench coats.

[29:12] And you'll be videotaping the whole thing for your commercials.

[29:14] The folders will be strapped to my boxer shorts so I can keep my hands free for my presentation.

[29:20] And you'll just drive over there in your windowless van.

[29:22] It sounds great.

[29:23] With kid stuff written on the outside.

[29:26] At least one of the S's.

[29:28] Wait, there's only one S.

[29:29] But that one S is backwards.

[29:31] It's got to be backwards.

[29:32] And written like it's in Korean.

[29:33] What font is that, Dan?

[29:35] What font?

[29:35] It's called kids-er-us.

[29:41] It's er-us.

[29:43] Like you forgot the name of the store halfway through.

[29:45] Like you are?

[29:46] No, er is how you pronounce it backwards, R.

[29:49] It's like a schwa.

[29:53] Anyway so they go on this mission

[29:57] To get this radio box

[29:59] Everything gets screwed up

[30:00] More people die

[30:01] And one of their friends gets

[30:03] It seems stabbed but really they put a tracer under him

[30:06] So when they go back to their hideout

[30:08] After a successful mission in which they

[30:10] Kill everybody

[30:11] Crack some brews

[30:13] They're cracking brews and slapping booze

[30:16] I don't know

[30:17] They are attacked again

[30:21] That's the one moment where

[30:22] the two brothers who have been feuding this whole time.

[30:24] They've been at each other's throats all the time.

[30:26] They've been a-feuding and a-fussing.

[30:28] They stop all that, and they become, I guess, friends?

[30:31] He says, I may not like you, but damn it, I respect you.

[30:36] Actually, he doesn't say that, but he should.

[30:38] There's a slow clap, and he walks out of the room,

[30:40] and then, spoiler alert, close your ears real quick.

[30:42] And then, don't you forget about me, please.

[30:44] And then he gets shot and killed.

[30:49] Chris Hemsworth gets shot in the head right after he reconciles with his brother.

[30:52] And he dies with a smile on his face.

[30:54] And they've been attacked by Russian agents who have been working with the North Koreans.

[30:58] This is a plot complication that is unnecessary and makes no sense.

[31:02] But they're fighting again.

[31:05] The Wolverines narrowly escape with some of the Marine guys.

[31:08] And then they...

[31:12] Something. What happened?

[31:14] Just keep doing Wolverine stuff. That's it.

[31:16] Just keep doing what they're doing, man.

[31:17] The younger brother gives a speech to a bunch of possible Wolverines.

[31:22] the same speech that his brother gave to them earlier,

[31:24] and it ends with an assault on the re-education internment facility

[31:30] with the implication that everything's going to be okay now.

[31:35] Yeah, eventually.

[31:36] Like the war has just started, but I think they're going to win.

[31:39] Yeah, we're going to stamp out this North Korean menace.

[31:43] And now one thing that Dan didn't like about this movie

[31:44] is people are constantly jumping from high heights

[31:46] and not hurting their legs or knees.

[31:48] And there's a lot of guys who shoot other guys in the knees.

[31:51] They're jumping way far across giant buildings with huge gaps, and their knees are...

[31:59] We call those moguls.

[32:00] We're supposed to believe that their knees are magically going to be okay?

[32:03] What kind of...

[32:04] I mean, what kind of legs...

[32:08] How am I supposed to buy this movie about a North Korean invasion of Spokane, Washington,

[32:12] fought off by a bunch of rowdy kids?

[32:14] With magic knees?

[32:15] I mean, come on.

[32:16] Everything up until then, I buy.

[32:18] It should be called The Magic Knees Squad.

[32:20] Which is called Red Knees, because their knees are going to be sore after all that jumping.

[32:24] Let me tell you, their knees are going to be sore and swollen.

[32:27] That was why in the training montage they're doing all that jumping off a hill, jumping off a rock.

[32:32] They do have a lot of jumping.

[32:33] Do not do that at all.

[32:34] But this movie is so dumb and so dull.

[32:40] And it is nonstop action in such a dull way.

[32:43] And there's so many explosions and there's so many gunshots, and yet it is so boring somehow.

[32:48] and it's you know i want it and it's such it would be cliche of me to say like it's because we don't

[32:53] care about the characters and there's no emotional but we don't care about the characters but we

[32:57] don't like it comes a lot of it comes down to that they cut out everything that they cut out

[33:01] was character development they cut out as we were talking during the movie any sense of what it's

[33:06] like to live in occupied uh spokane like we don't see in the rest of like yeah you never find out

[33:14] was the american army ever there like it's kind of implied in the beginning that the american army

[33:19] is overstretched overseas but you never see you know nothing happens it's just the paratroopers

[33:26] fall out of the sky and then the next minute the north koreans have control of spokane and tanks

[33:31] and everywhere and there's nobody left to fight except these kids and there's one moment where

[33:36] the where the marines say to them oh well there's still enough true americans around who are able

[33:41] to fight over there in the southwest and along the mexico texas border and michigan and montana

[33:46] and so yeah militiaville but basically all the militia states but it's like so what happened to

[33:53] the police like in spokane there seems to be one policeman and it's their dad and he gets shot in

[33:58] the head like there's no sense of any it's almost like the movie henry portrait of a serial killer

[34:04] where there's no policeman basically in the whole movie so henry is just free to kill at whim except

[34:08] here it's north korea that's free i mean i would not have minded if there was a limited point of

[34:13] view minded if michael rooker played the entire country i wouldn't mind if michael rooker played

[34:18] every character if america was invaded by an army of michael rookers i would think it was great no

[34:23] but like i i don't mind a limited point of view like if if you know we see what only the characters

[34:29] in this town know that's fine but that's still like the movie still cuts out like the viewpoint

[34:33] of anyone who's not in the wolverines like fighting for their like insurgent force and

[34:38] and we have no like sense of what like the koreans are up to like we don't know why they're doing it

[34:43] we don't know what they're doing we don't know what it's like to live there but even like

[34:46] what's among the most successful movies with limited points of view i would say is maybe the

[34:51] most successful to set them is night of the living dead yeah you have those characters in that house

[34:55] they see stuff on tv but otherwise it's just what's happening around them and you get such a

[35:00] great sense of their place in the world and what they're going through and it's so tense and

[35:06] dramatic without you know a shot to a it never cuts to the president being like what's with all

[35:11] these zombies we can't handle it you know to give them they can't do that here to give a more recent

[35:16] example i would say children of men is a yeah children of men does a great job of it too to

[35:20] make it claustrophobic and actually play up the insanity of actual violence as opposed to dudes

[35:25] It's just fucking Yosemite Sam and all over the place.

[35:28] And also giving you a sense that these characters are lost in a world

[35:32] where they don't know everything that's going on around them.

[35:34] Trapped in a world they never made.

[35:35] Trapped in a world they never made,

[35:36] but you get the sense that there is something going on in the world around them,

[35:40] even if you don't know what it is.

[35:41] They made a pretty sick fort in that abandoned mine shaft.

[35:44] That's true.

[35:44] They didn't, though.

[35:45] They cleared out all the My Bloody Valentines.

[35:47] Got rid of them.

[35:48] Got rid of them.

[35:49] Please, if you're going to go into an abandoned mine shaft,

[35:51] please check for My Bloody Valentines first.

[35:55] get them out of there this feel you know we've said this before that it feels like they took

[35:59] the outline for a movie and then shot it as if it was a script but that's what this kind of feels

[36:04] like is it feels like one of those robert rodriguez scripts you hear about where he just puts in the

[36:07] action sequences and like vague descriptions of scenes and it's like a 45 50 page script for a

[36:13] whole movie but he knows how to flesh it out that's not a lot right no it's not a lot at all

[36:17] but here they just didn't there's not there's not a lot of movie here there's a lot of stunt scenes

[36:22] yeah so let's let's flash forward to uh final judgments very quickly by robots and north

[36:28] koreans oh no very quickly wolverines lost wolverines forever is this a good bad movie

[36:35] a bad bad movie a movie you kind of like store what do you say it's a bad bad movie dan uh yeah

[36:40] this is a bad bad movie despite having actors i like in it like chris hemsworth jeffrey dean

[36:47] morgan and that guy looks like chris cooper it was boring it was boring when the most exciting

[36:52] moment for me in the whole movie was during the end credits when someone in the credits was named

[36:56] julie k smith and i thought wait a minute is that the actress in all those jim winarski movies i

[37:01] better look this is that the frequently topless julie k smith that was when that was the most

[37:05] exciting part of the movie it's a boring movie so i'll say bad bad also is she moonlighting she was

[37:10] yeah while she was doing what was that sound design i think it was i think it was assistant

[37:14] set direction or something like that. Yeah, while she was

[37:16] set directing, she might have been topless.

[37:18] Oh, had to have been. Topless and possibly

[37:20] bottomless. We don't know.

[37:21] She may have set to set decorated from a bubble bath

[37:24] the whole time. Who knows?

[37:25] Two other women in it.

[37:27] But I will say this. Even if you

[37:30] are a big militia nut looking for some

[37:32] militia porn and some right-wing

[37:33] gun survivalist fantasy porn,

[37:36] Just go to the original, man. Just get the original Red Dawn.

[37:38] Get something that has the crazy

[37:40] craft stamp of John Milius

[37:42] and not this kind of, like, gun-for-hire stuff.

[37:45] Stuart, it looks like you've got a little something to say.

[37:48] Hey, guys.

[37:49] I just want to touch on for a second.

[37:52] I just want to mention our friends over at TiVo.

[37:55] We here at the Flophouse make a lot of use out of DVR technology

[38:01] and using the Internet for movies.

[38:04] I don't know about you.

[38:05] I've multiple times tried to record stuff at home and had difficulty

[38:09] because I'm already recording something or already watching something.

[38:12] Well, the great thing about TiVo is you can watch a lot.

[38:15] It has four tuners, so you can record multiple things while watching on your iPad, your iPhone.

[38:22] You could be, I don't know, at work watching stuff while you're in the bathroom.

[38:26] Who knows?

[38:26] Let's say it's Sunday, the night when every television show is on, apparently.

[38:30] You've got time-worn cable.

[38:32] At best, you can record two things.

[38:34] Two.

[38:34] If you were like me, Anthony Bourdain, Parts Unknown, Game of Thrones, Mad Men, Bob's Burgers, etc.,

[38:40] you've got to pick and choose.

[38:42] Because they're going to overlap and cancel each other out.

[38:44] You can't do it.

[38:44] But not with your T-I-V-O.

[38:46] But with TiVo, you can do it.

[38:48] Unlike Time Warner.

[38:48] Yeah.

[38:49] Yeah, and if you like movies, you don't have to worry about, say, Time Warner TiVo, or DVR rather.

[38:54] Time Warner DVR, sorry, only TiVo is TiVo.

[38:56] Where you record like two movies and your box is full.

[38:59] Yeah, because TiVo's got way more space.

[39:01] Yes.

[39:02] With a normal DVR box, you can only record a couple of HD shows before it's all full.

[39:08] TiVo gives you access to things like Hulu, Netflix, things that other services don't provide.

[39:14] You don't have to buy an Xbox just to be able to watch Netflix nowadays on your TV.

[39:18] Stuart, isn't there a special promotion that TiVo is running?

[39:21] There is a special promotion that TiVo is doing right now.

[39:23] I'd love to hear about that.

[39:24] Visitors to TiVo.com can get $25 off a new TiVo Premier unit, a P4, or an XLR DVR when they use the special promo code.

[39:34] Wait, get a pen and paper.

[39:36] Get that pen and paper.

[39:37] Hold on, hold on.

[39:38] Get it?

[39:39] Do you have a pen and paper?

[39:40] Write it down.

[39:41] Okay, now write it down.

[39:42] Well, he hasn't said it yet.

[39:43] You can't write it down.

[39:43] The promo code is ATC.

[39:46] Now you write it down.

[39:47] I need to write that down.

[39:48] It's so easy to remember because that's all things comedy.

[39:50] Oh, that's great.

[39:51] So the letters A-T-C, capitals preferably?

[39:54] I don't know if it's case sensitive.

[39:55] Yeah, it doesn't matter.

[39:56] And that's available until November 1st, so get out there.

[40:00] And what website would that be at?

[40:01] That would be at TiVo.com.

[40:02] What website was that?

[40:03] TiVo.com.

[40:06] It's so easy to remember because it's the name of the company.

[40:08] with dot com at the end yeah and it gives you 25 off it's not tv it's not tivo.edu

[40:15] tivo's educational website yeah tivo.com or tivo.xxx which the less said the better yeah

[40:24] tivo.com and also all things comedy that's a podcast network is it not yes our friends over

[40:29] at all things comedy for some reason endorse us because we're part of it good thinking so so head

[40:36] over to allthingscomedy.com download a couple of podcasts maybe ours but i think you might

[40:42] have already done that and then go to tivo.com to get a tivo yeah or at least a discount on that

[40:49] tivo so guys with the promo code atc this is the point of the podcast where uh things got sexy all

[40:57] of a sudden where we answer letters letters from listeners what kind of letters letters from

[41:02] listeners oh god what kind of letters letters from listeners maybe they've got a question maybe

[41:08] they need advice maybe it's trouble or maybe it's mice whatever you need just drop us a line

[41:15] don't worry we've got the time for your letters what kind of letters they're letters from you

[41:23] oh so this letter it's from steve uh aka james last name withheld that'll make sense

[41:33] that'll make sense in a second he says it's been nearly two years since i last wrote in

[41:40] with a story about stewart wellington nearly remembering my name at the first 92 y tribeca

[41:45] show that was hilarious i believe that was the show when legendarily dan's pizza was

[41:50] sometimes in my most private moments i still sometimes think of myself as steve

[41:57] i must admit i've been remiss in my flophouse fandom as in the intervening two years i've

[42:04] left brooklyn for the windy city of chicago now happily settled into a new job as a photographer

[42:09] at a woman's fashion company whoa it's like a sitcom sounds terrible i decided to i decided

[42:14] to load up the recent alex cross episode to see if the magic had continued in my absence

[42:18] surrounded by fashionable female stylists working diligently there at their desk i prepared myself

[42:25] to enjoy dan's pleasing baritone elliot's barrage of facts and stewart's repeated interjections

[42:31] about ding dongs through the privacy of my headphones i believe it was when dan clarified

[42:36] that krang's penis was actually ejaculating on the girl's feet versus his robot penis which is

[42:42] simply urinating why remember that that i had to beat a hasty retreat to the bathroom

[42:48] so as to laugh desperately into a paper towel.

[42:54] Under no circumstances could I allow my co-workers to witness my laughing fit.

[42:59] Because inevitably they'd ask, what are you laughing at?

[43:01] And you'd have to think fast to make up some shit.

[43:04] Do you realize how impossible it would be to explain what I was laughing at?

[43:08] I don't think my corn-fed Midwestern female fashionista co-workers

[43:12] would enjoy the idea of a double-donged dick monster from Dimension X

[43:16] violating some girl

[43:17] through two separate

[43:18] sexual fetishes

[43:19] simultaneously.

[43:20] I don't know if it was

[43:21] violating.

[43:21] Congratulations,

[43:22] gentlemen.

[43:23] You made me laugh so hard

[43:24] I nearly lost my job.

[43:26] In any case,

[43:27] I wish you all

[43:28] a heartfelt congratulations

[43:29] on the continued success

[43:30] of your podcast

[43:31] and I wanted to offer

[43:32] condolences to Dan

[43:33] on his accident.

[43:34] Knee injuries are

[43:35] a particularly nasty

[43:36] brand of awful

[43:37] and I'm glad to hear

[43:38] you're on the mend.

[43:38] Your vaguely remembered

[43:39] friend and fan,

[43:40] Steve,

[43:41] a.k.a. James

[43:42] last name withheld.

[43:42] Now, look.

[43:43] Well, Steve,

[43:44] those are some

[43:45] kind words for Dan.

[43:46] Yeah, thank you

[43:46] very much for listening again and listeners out there if you ever want to get your letter read

[43:50] you know the formula you know it's just like how you're going to be on tv if you put up a sign that

[43:54] says sports center is on next sporting event it was 90 the story 10 my knee but i also want to i

[44:00] want your knee must be like a hundred years old now we've been hearing about it for a long time

[44:04] i want to object what like when we started this thing oh god it's only been three and a half

[44:09] months since my surgery it takes a year guys a year to recover but i wanted to object to a certain

[44:15] thing in this which was that the the idea that corn-fed chicago wins the the third most populous

[44:23] city in the united states in my opinion one of the three world-class cities for years the second

[44:29] most populous uh would be uh somehow scandalized by the idea of this crane i don't know i think i

[44:38] do think anywhere outside of like i don't know copenhagen i'm from downstate illinois i'm from

[44:44] downstate corn fed real corn fed illinois and i i read this email on the podcast and i was unscarred

[44:53] so let's these are not flyover states people these are these people have their own uh i think what

[44:58] dan's trying to say is these are lonely states yeah they get to get up to a lot of craziness

[45:03] because there's no one else around dan has had sex with corn and sex with animals that eat corn

[45:08] he's eaten corn while animals had sex with i've been ejaculated on by corn i've been peed on by

[45:12] Where do you think this double-dicked crang came from?

[45:15] I'm going to look at my phone for a little while, guys.

[45:17] This is Stuart's time to leave.

[45:19] So this next email.

[45:22] There's more of these, huh?

[45:22] This next email is entitled Crangate.

[45:26] Dear Floppers, what a great podcast.

[45:28] I don't have anything disparaging to say about any of you,

[45:31] unlike the other letter writers whom I regard as pathetic ingrates.

[45:36] Wow.

[45:36] Wow, harsh.

[45:37] I love watching bad movies with groups of friends,

[45:40] but since i live in japan american friends with the same interests are few and far between

[45:44] your podcast provides me fine with a much-needed surrogate to help save stave off homesickness and

[45:51] for this i thank you my question is this you all seem to have an excellent grasp of good screen

[45:56] writing and storytelling elements in general for a novice like me what would you recommend reading

[46:03] as a primer on this sort of thing i can intuitively understand why you would talk about set off and

[46:07] set up on payoff and establishing characters but it would be interesting to learn more in book form

[46:12] adam last name withheld so uh i would say that um there are a lot of screenwriting books out there

[46:21] most of them are terrible and i don't know i'm wondering if this is an academic interest or

[46:26] because you want to write most of them i feel like are written in order to for people who want

[46:31] to write a screenplay yeah i mean of of the big ones story by robert mckee is better than like

[46:38] like say screenplay by sid field but they're not there's also like the writer's journey is is is

[46:44] pretty good i would say that my i would say that my favorite book on uh the topic is actually the

[46:51] art of dramatic writing by lajos igri that's the other one i was going to mention the art of

[46:54] dramatic writing is a very good book um and that was actually focused on you know like on on sage

[47:00] writing but it is applicable to pretty much any kind of writing i'd also recommend the website

[47:06] cockeyed caravan yeah our friend matt bird friend of the show matt bird oh yeah who it which is a

[47:11] very good screenwriting site and he specializes in a lot of ways in structure so if you're

[47:16] interested in learning more about story structure uh that's one to check out the website cockeyed

[47:22] caravan the art of dramatic writing is also good and i think the writer's journey is also good

[47:25] so i hope for once we actually uh paid it forward you did it we taught somebody something

[47:33] but uh this next one we'll erase that yeah sure the educational content will not exceed

[47:41] 0.0001 of this podcast it's like insect parts and peanut butter and now we'll move on to the

[47:48] next email which says hey floppers did somebody say mr payback i had the i did a while ago i had

[47:56] the ecstatic honor of attending the new york press screening of mr payback as well as its predecessor

[48:02] i'm your man oh i didn't know about that these films were presented in the interfilm system a

[48:07] process that ganged two laser disc players note not dvd laser disc to a control system that tracked

[48:13] audience clicks on the buttons of a

[48:15] control stick attached to the arm of

[48:17] each theater seat. Yeah, you chose the story.

[48:19] The controller only looked like a joystick.

[48:21] Aside from three buttons

[48:23] lit and color-coded to options

[48:25] presented on the screen, it had no

[48:27] directional functions.

[48:28] There are actually a few...

[48:31] It was actually not based on a joystick, but on the old popcorn tray.

[48:33] There are a few unsettling

[48:35] parallels between the Oogie Loves

[48:37] and Mr. Payback. Yes,

[48:39] Chris Lloyd appears in both.

[48:40] Similar... Chris Lloyd.

[48:43] Not Christopher Lloyd, as we know.

[48:44] That's younger, cooler brother.

[48:45] Similar to Oogie Loves, Payback encouraged you to scream, shout, and otherwise carry on

[48:50] in order to convince other audience members to select the choice you favored at that point in the storyline.

[48:55] There was no explanation of what you should do if you didn't want any of the options.

[49:00] And like Oogie Loves, Mr. Payback made you wish you could travel back in time

[49:04] to shoot Thomas Edison before he invented the motion picture

[49:07] just to be sure such atrocities could never be inflicted on innocent audiences.

[49:11] Shoot him with a Tesla cannon.

[49:13] It was clear that after the not-successful I'm Your Man, a romantic comedy crime thing starring Kevin Seale, directed by Interfilm inventor Bob Bajon with music by Joe Jackson, the people behind the Interfilm system had worked to fix its flaws with Mr. Payback.

[49:29] This included removing a one-man, one-vote interlock.

[49:33] You could now click the button as many times as your itchy finger could handle.

[49:36] And more importantly, instead of a lame light comedy adventure told through a branching story system, Mr. Payback told the episodic tale of a cyborg detective who was part Inspector Gadget, part Marquis de Sade, and the system allowed you to choose which punishments he would inflict on his victims.

[49:53] i've blocked most of the details from memory but do remember that options at various points

[49:57] included cattle prod eat monkey brains and for me the most memorable make it legal which meant

[50:05] that a non-disabled person who parked his car in a handicapped space got kneecapped now come on

[50:10] again knee injury i will also mention that a lot of these different options are available on youtube

[50:15] there are i don't know if they're full everything in that was in the movie but

[50:19] i have watched compilations on youtube of mr payback scenes and they are terrible uh especially

[50:27] fun when you have an auditorium full of people screaming cattle prod or monkey brains at the

[50:31] top of their lungs over and over because mob mentality is always delightful isn't it there's

[50:37] also this quote from roger ebert there were lots of small children in the audience i thought about

[50:41] asking one little girl if she had voted for the paddle the rod or the cattle prod mr payback was

[50:47] directed by bob gale who previously wrote 1941 and back to the future it was repulsive tacky

[50:52] sadistic annoying cheap insulting blurry distasteful lunk-headed unfunny cynical and

[50:57] crass but i don't know maybe you guys would like it that's from dan last name with blurry may have

[51:03] been the projectionist problem wow the press screening yeah he was there at the birth of a

[51:08] new era the birth and death remember how that changed movies forever forever i was like the

[51:13] jazz singer now everyone had to retool for their for their uh choose your own adventure movies it

[51:19] was like william castler castles the tingler oh man so that is a that is an exciting magical

[51:28] postcard from the edge magical recount of our magical night um so this email is titled tom

[51:37] noonan okay i'm in i like it already hey from tom last name with l tom noonan it starts hey dudes

[51:45] sounds like tom noonan just had a bit of a bone to pick with elliot here i for one sir have zero

[51:52] problems with your nasally voice what i do have a problem with is you're using tom noonan as an

[51:57] example of a man who could not get kate beckinsale i'll have you know that i for one a solid 5.5 or

[52:03] six on a scale of cuteness have a major crush on tom newton i would be damn lucky to have

[52:11] tom newton sincerely sarah last name withheld ps my favorite flopper is dan so that plus loving

[52:18] tom newton on a physical level might make elliot and stewart question my taste and fellas

[52:23] you are correct to do so well i mean tom newton was super buff in manhunter so you know that's

[52:29] He was like a monster serial killer, too.

[52:32] He was a monster.

[52:33] You can see why it gets him dripping.

[52:34] He had that big William Blake tattoo that they covered up for the actual movie.

[52:38] You like him lanky?

[52:40] Tom Noonan's your man.

[52:42] Everyone's got their type, and you know what?

[52:44] Everybody has someone who loves them, and I think that's great.

[52:47] But Tom Noonan has no chance, so it came back in sale.

[52:49] But he would have been great in Total Recall.

[52:51] I would have loved it.

[52:53] But I'm glad.

[52:55] Wouldn't have liked Dan and Tom Noonan, huh?

[52:57] Yeah, I'm a real Tom Noonan type.

[52:59] casting agents are like

[53:02] give me a Tom Noonan type

[53:04] you have the Frankenstein style stance

[53:06] of a Tom Noonan

[53:07] you could have also played Philip Seymour Hoffman

[53:10] super stretched out with two walking stick canes

[53:13] as he did in

[53:14] Synecdoche, New York

[53:15] I carry the creepy serial killer

[53:19] gravitas of a Tom Noonan

[53:20] you also could be a guy

[53:23] who says he's working on a novel after work

[53:25] but is in fact a loser and a failure

[53:27] you know

[53:28] in that movie

[53:29] What Happened Was

[53:30] that he wrote

[53:31] yeah sure

[53:31] what

[53:32] never mind

[53:32] thank you Sarah

[53:33] it's a really good movie

[53:34] so this

[53:36] last letter of the evening

[53:37] is titled

[53:38] An Idea

[53:39] Whose Time Has Come

[53:41] greetings floppers

[53:43] I don't know

[53:44] what they do yet

[53:45] greetings floppers

[53:46] listening to the classic

[53:47] head of the family

[53:48] be disparaged

[53:49] by a listener

[53:50] who I assume

[53:51] thought he had tuned

[53:51] into a prairie

[53:52] of companion

[53:53] I feel the need

[53:54] to not

[53:55] to not simply

[53:56] defend the movie

[53:56] they do talk about

[53:56] ding dongs a lot

[53:57] I feel the need to not simply

[54:00] defend the movie, but pitch a remake

[54:01] in that most cutting edge of formulas.

[54:04] This is Jacqueline, last name Lavelle.

[54:05] The radio play.

[54:07] Stay with me.

[54:09] Jacqueline Lavelle.

[54:11] Come on, guys. He's pitching ahead of the family

[54:14] radio play. Yeah, radio play. I love it.

[54:16] Stay with me. I see Elliot as the

[54:18] convinced of his own genius, Myron.

[54:20] Done. Dan as the pervisoid wheeler.

[54:22] Stuart as the deep-voiced

[54:24] and horny Otis.

[54:25] and the Flophouse house cat as the wordless but essential Ernestina.

[54:29] Elliot's lady love, Anne Hathaway, would of course play Loretta.

[54:32] Don't know if we can get her.

[54:33] And John Hodgman would fill the roles of Elliot's nemesis, Lance.

[54:37] I think I can say without hyperbole, this would be single-handedly save radio,

[54:41] make Ms. Hathaway a star, and earn more cash than Delgo.

[54:45] You can have it for $750,000.

[54:48] Whoa, that is $50,000 too high.

[54:50] Or you can just let me play Howard.

[54:52] That's from Izzy, last name with L.

[54:54] Thanks, Izzy.

[54:54] What I like is now this podcast has the same section that Wizard Magazine used to have

[54:59] when they would cast superhero movies and Howie Long would always, for some reason,

[55:03] be cast in them.

[55:04] Howie Long is a great actor, first off.

[55:08] He's got the chops.

[55:09] I mean, we've all seen the commercials, guys.

[55:11] Their consistent ones were always Howie Long as Venom and Glenn Danzig as Wolverine.

[55:16] And RoboCop.

[55:19] Peter Weller.

[55:20] Peter Weller would be Vision from the Avengers.

[55:23] Missed their chance there, Joss Whedon.

[55:25] So, yeah, I think we could do that.

[55:29] We might have trouble making Anne Hathaway more of a star than she is,

[55:33] since she's won an Oscar and she's a big star.

[55:35] But if anything, it's the head of the family radio.

[55:38] Yeah, guys, get on it.

[55:39] Let's kickstart this thing.

[55:40] It reminds me of a project I was talking about with someone at work today,

[55:43] which was the film reboot of Coach starring Craig T. Nelson.

[55:47] Wait, what are you, the reboot stars?

[55:50] No, no, Craig T. Nelson plays Coach's father in the reboot.

[55:53] And you get a young guy, like Chris Pine or somebody playing coach.

[55:57] And that opens you up for the Major Dad reboot.

[56:00] Yeah, and then you get into money.

[56:03] Coach is a lost leader for Major Dad.

[56:06] Coach is just to get him in the door.

[56:10] Then you hit him with the Major Dad.

[56:12] So Coach and Major Dad all belong to the same universe, right?

[56:15] Oh yeah, of course, the Coachiverse.

[56:20] Because you've got to introduce the coach characters in order for Major Dad to make sense.

[56:23] Does it make sense that way?

[56:24] If you don't have the backstory, it doesn't make a lick of sense.

[56:27] We do four different movies, each introducing a different character from coach.

[56:29] Then they're all in the Major Dad movie.

[56:31] And the Major Dad movie, usually it ends with Major Dad coming in.

[56:35] It's a prequel to the Major Dad sequel, which is the real Major Dad film.

[56:39] So is he going to have the same guy as Major Dad?

[56:42] Wasn't he on Justified a little while ago?

[56:44] I've seen the first movie, he's just Dad.

[56:46] And then he becomes Major Dad.

[56:47] And then he becomes Major, and you're like, oh.

[56:49] Yeah, now he's hit it.

[56:50] This is the origin story of Major Dad.

[56:52] Yeah.

[56:53] So he joins the military, or he just...

[56:57] He gets promoted to Major.

[56:58] No, he's just more major.

[56:59] He's just majorly a dad.

[57:01] He ceases to be minor.

[57:02] He becomes a bigger guy.

[57:04] Honey, I Blew Up the Dead.

[57:07] That's the original title, Honey, I Blew Up the Dead.

[57:12] He begins like a Gelfling or something.

[57:14] And by the end, he's a Skeksie.

[57:19] That's the life cycle?

[57:20] It's the secret of the Dark Crystal.

[57:24] I would have said those guys who raised the gelflings,

[57:26] but I don't remember their names.

[57:27] Wrinkle faces.

[57:29] Yeah, forearm wrinkle faces.

[57:31] Yeah, I must have missed that.

[57:32] So this last segment of the podcast

[57:35] is where we quickly recommend a movie

[57:38] that we saw probably recently, maybe not,

[57:40] that we liked, unlike Red Dawn.

[57:43] Elliot, what do you have in store for us?

[57:45] I'm going to recommend a much better movie

[57:47] about an invasion of a domestic home front.

[57:51] I think I may have recommended it before,

[57:52] but I don't remember.

[57:53] But I'm going to recommend it again,

[57:54] which is the movie Went the Day Well,

[57:57] which is a British film from 1942

[57:59] in which a group of suspicious acting English soldiers

[58:03] have been billeted in a small coastal town.

[58:06] It soon turns out they're not what they seem

[58:08] and the villagers have to take up arms to defend England.

[58:11] And it's a really fantastic suspense film.

[58:14] It especially is interesting historically

[58:17] because this is a movie that was made during the war the war had would still had a number of years

[58:22] three years to go and uh they but there's this sense of this is what this might happen and

[58:29] england is ready for it it's a really suspenseful film and really well made went the day well i like

[58:33] it a lot and i'm going to throw in a plug for a new film which i think is playing might be playing

[58:39] festivals or might be playing at a theater near you eventually called adjust your tracking the

[58:44] untold story of the vhs collector and it is a documentary about guys who are obsessed with

[58:49] collecting vhs tapes mainly horror tapes let's just cut the let's just cut to the chase these

[58:53] guys collect horror tapes on vhs but uh they've amassed huge collections and they're funny

[58:58] characters and there's a lot of funny moments in the documentary uh and if it's playing near you

[59:02] if you like this podcast you may get a kick out of it so adjust your tracking and went the day

[59:07] well which is available on dvd i would like to recommend a movie that uh does not need my

[59:13] endorsement and i am fully aware of this so do not make fun of me av club commenters and as well

[59:19] that's a little film called casablanca which i re-watched uh while on vacation uh just recently

[59:27] that's right dan went on vacation and then watched a movie yeah well no it was you know one night i

[59:31] A movie is a lot like a vacation from your normal life.

[59:34] It was a fucking evening.

[59:35] I was in my hotel room.

[59:37] I watched Casablanca with my wife, who had never seen it,

[59:40] and I feel comfortable recommending it

[59:43] because I feel like as film history stretches out,

[59:47] that even the most acknowledged classics of the movie world

[59:53] become less and less seen just because there are more movies.

[59:56] And Casablanca is a movie that deserves to be seen

[59:59] because, like Citizen Kane, it is a great movie

[1:00:01] that is not taking your medicine at all.

[1:00:03] It is completely entertaining.

[1:00:04] It's a great romance.

[1:00:07] It also has war themes to tie it in with Red Dawn,

[1:00:11] and it just feels like Warner Brothers opened up the floodgates

[1:00:15] of every great character actor it happened to have

[1:00:18] on the studio lot at that time

[1:00:20] and just set them loose in a great movie.

[1:00:24] So watch Casablanca. It's fun.

[1:00:27] i'm also going to recommend a movie about an invasion of a man's home i recently watched

[1:00:32] shame starring michael fassbender who plays wait is that about invasion who plays a uh a new york

[1:00:40] like you know executive type who's also a sex addict and copes with his sister moving in with

[1:00:46] him oh he lives a very controlled lifestyle based around his weird sex addiction he was invaded by

[1:00:52] having sex oh man it invades a lot of people now you might think that i watched it to see a bunch

[1:00:59] of wiener flopping around that wasn't really the reason uh there is a bunch of wiener but that's

[1:01:03] what you stayed for yeah that's what kept me in the seat uh and uh yeah it's i mean it's it's kind

[1:01:10] of it's slow it's well shot there's uh i don't know it's good watch it well it's rated x i think

[1:01:19] sure if that if that makes it more enticing yeah yeah it's just like the devil and miss jones come

[1:01:24] on i don't know i was just trying to pull out an old x-rated film do you say the devil in miss

[1:01:29] jones the devil and miss jones devil in miss jones the devil and miss jones no i'm aware

[1:01:33] that's a gene arthur one is a play on the other oh they were plays they're both based on the same

[1:01:39] play which was called sex the pornographic play which i guess would just be a strip club

[1:01:44] You loved the live sex show

[1:01:47] Now see the movie

[1:01:48] Of course do the production code

[1:01:50] We had to take out most of the sex

[1:01:51] Change the story

[1:01:53] But we think you're still gonna like it

[1:01:53] But wait till the 70s

[1:01:55] Cause oh boy

[1:01:55] Wait till the future

[1:01:57] Cause let me tell you

[1:01:59] We're gonna be making some crazy movies

[1:02:00] Just sit in that seat

[1:02:02] And we'll hyper fast forward

[1:02:03] And you'll grow this really cool

[1:02:04] Riff and Winkle beard

[1:02:05] You'll turn into skeletons

[1:02:07] And then you'll get a boner

[1:02:08] No too far

[1:02:08] Oh no

[1:02:09] He's Ardaz

[1:02:10] From the Tony Award winning producers

[1:02:13] of Behind the Green Door,

[1:02:15] the stage play.

[1:02:16] All right, well.

[1:02:18] And Deep Throat on ABC,

[1:02:20] the TV show.

[1:02:21] It's been fun being with you guys,

[1:02:24] but now we've got to sign off.

[1:02:26] For The Flophouse,

[1:02:27] I've been Dan McCoy.

[1:02:28] I've been Stuart Wellington.

[1:02:30] And I've been Elliot Kalin.

[1:02:33] We talked about the movie a lot this time, right?

[1:02:36] Well, we might have.

[1:02:37] I don't remember.

[1:02:37] I already forgot the movie.

[1:02:39] Wolverines!

[1:02:43] like a professional i know what i'm gonna recommend i'm like you just tell stories

[1:02:55] about what he saw on an airplane recently uh wait a minute i'm gonna recommend uh drink cart

[1:03:01] i was on an airplane recently and it was full of delicious alcohol did you know that you can get

[1:03:07] full bottles of uh wine now they're small bottles now let me just tell you right now the bottles

[1:03:11] are full but they're not regular sized bottles but that's great it makes you feel like you're

[1:03:15] a giant of some kind of some kind of big kind if you drink seven of them it's basically a normal

[1:03:22] size bottle they won't give you seven but you can take seven that's why i'm telling you bring a gun

[1:03:28] on board the plane if you have a gun they'll also take the plane to cuba if you want to go there

The Flop House: Episode #128 - Red Dawn

Transcript

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