The Flop House: Episode #83 - I Am Number Four

Dan McCoy

[0:00] In this episode, we discuss the film that doesn't even try for the bronze, I Am Number 4.

[0:30] Hey everyone, and welcome to the Flophouse. I'm Dan McCoy. I'm Stuart Wellington. And I'm Elliot Kalin.

[0:41] I thought I'd get a little more extravagant with my introduction there. Yeah, I noticed.

Elliott Kalan

[0:46] Kicked it up a notch. Barely. I think you kicked it up one-seventeenth of a notch.

Stuart Wellington

[0:51] Well, I'm kind of a mess right now, so I didn't really notice.

[0:54] Yeah, Stuart's been through a lot. He found out that he was from another planet, his hands got all glowy.

[1:00] He had to fight some aliens. I did that, didn't I? And my father figure died and turned into dust.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05] Turned into dust. He had to go to high school, get beat up by the bully.

[1:09] Yeah. Wow, I can't believe that... Why would I do that?

[1:12] I don't know. Why would I fight those aliens?

Stuart Wellington

[1:14] Well, because they were after you. Oh, okay. So it was like a self-defense?

Elliott Kalan

[1:18] Yes. And you were saving the Earth from aliens.

Dan McCoy

[1:21] I'm amazed that you were jumping straight into the meat of this podcast.

[1:24] Well, what are we going to do? Well, normally we waste our time a little bit.

[1:27] We can waste some time. Is it because...

Elliott Kalan

[1:29] So, Dan, what's that enchanting scent you're wearing?

Dan McCoy

[1:32] Sweat.

[1:33] I mean, is it because we were featured in the Onion AV Club?

[1:38] Do you feel like we're more pressured to be professional?

Elliott Kalan

[1:40] We've had an episode up since then.

Dan McCoy

[1:42] Yeah, but this is the first time we've taped since we saw the review.

[1:46] That's true.

[1:46] What are you talking about?

[1:46] We had one in the can.

Elliott Kalan

[1:48] Stuart, I think you're familiar with this review.

[1:50] What are you talking about?

[1:51] Of what it said about you, which was, in two words...

Stuart Wellington

[1:55] I do have to say, listeners at home, I was looking at the internet the other day and...

Elliott Kalan

[2:00] Wait, so you're going to just pretend that you didn't know what you were talking about

[2:03] and then go into it and then talk about it like you found it?

Stuart Wellington

[2:05] Yeah, I'm like a bashful guy.

[2:09] Really humble.

Elliott Kalan

[2:09] Okay, well, explain. So you're looking at the internet.

Stuart Wellington

[2:11] I was looking at the internet and I have...

[2:13] You're like, one internet, please.

[2:15] Yep.

[2:16] I was looking at a little review of podcasts and it just so happened that our podcast,

[2:21] The Flophouse, was reviewed and I think my favorite part was, and I quote,

[2:27] you guys can correct me if I'm wrong, equally funny Stuart Wellington.

[2:31] That's me.

[2:32] That's true.

Elliott Kalan

[2:32] Stuart Wellington was...

[2:33] Stuart Wellington.

[2:34] Stuart was described as equally funny to me and Dan.

[2:38] So I did it.

Dan McCoy

[2:40] I made it.

[2:41] Stuart did it.

[2:41] I did it, guys.

[2:43] I'm just happy he's taking that as a compliment rather than an insult.

[2:46] Yeah.

[2:46] I mean, like, it's not really a...

[2:48] It's not so much a judgment, a value judgment as just like...

Stuart Wellington

[2:52] It's a begrudging admission.

[2:53] You guys don't understand.

[2:54] You guys are professional comedy writers.

Elliott Kalan

[2:57] Well, Dan is kind of like an apprentice professional comedy writer.

Stuart Wellington

[2:59] Yeah.

[2:59] So you're like a sorcerer's apprentice of comedy writers.

[3:02] I'm the Jay Beruchel of the Daily Show.

[3:04] So there's like a prophecy.

[3:05] Very accurate, yeah.

[3:06] There's a prophecy that you're someday going to be the best comedy writer of all time.

[3:10] I don't...

[3:11] Elliot's kind of schooling you, but he's kind of...

[3:13] I don't know.

Elliott Kalan

[3:15] That part is true, yes.

[3:16] That part is very accurate.

[3:17] Yeah.

[3:18] We were reviewed in the AV Club for The Onion, and they were very flattering.

[3:22] It was an honor.

Dan McCoy

[3:23] If you haven't seen it already, which is unlikely because most of you probably arrived here through

[3:28] that.

[3:28] I could have used more photos.

[3:30] Because we got...

[3:30] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[3:31] There are no photos of us, unfortunately.

[3:32] I know there's one on the website of you in a jaunty hat, Stuart.

[3:35] Sure.

[3:36] And of Dan probably dancing.

[3:37] Wait.

[3:37] On the AV Club?

[3:38] No, no, no.

[3:39] On the Flophouse website.

[3:40] Oh, okay.

[3:41] On the AV Club website, our review was illustrated with a picture of Zach Galifnakis eating a

[3:45] piece of watermelon.

Stuart Wellington

[3:46] For a second, I thought he was going to be on our podcast.

Elliott Kalan

[3:48] Yeah.

[3:49] That'd be awesome.

[3:50] The part I was proudest of was that my quote was on the top of the notable quotes for the

[3:54] week list.

[3:55] That was a good quote.

[3:56] Yeah.

[3:56] I laughed when I read it, even though I'd already heard it.

[3:59] I laughed when I read our review because it's so... it did such a good job of describing

[4:03] the normal bullshit that we do on this show.

[4:06] Right.

[4:06] But not sounding irritated at it.

Stuart Wellington

[4:08] No, no.

[4:09] Sounding like it was entertaining, but mentioning like...

[4:10] Unlike many of the vocal reviews I've heard from people.

Dan McCoy

[4:14] Sure.

[4:15] Well, those are our friends.

[4:16] They feel like they can be real dicks to us.

[4:17] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[4:18] I mean, if they're my listeners, they're not really my friends.

[4:21] Wow.

[4:22] I need to keep a distance.

[4:23] You really put yourself above them.

[4:24] Well, I'm the artist and they appreciate what I do.

Dan McCoy

[4:29] He's on-air talent.

[4:31] Yeah.

[4:32] Well, anyway, now that we've bullshitted about ourselves for a while, we can talk about

[4:37] the movie.

Elliott Kalan

[4:37] Yeah, which we never do.

[4:39] We're mysterious.

[4:40] That's how they know the kind of food I like.

Stuart Wellington

[4:44] What the names of our significant others are.

[4:47] Yeah.

[4:48] And that your insignificant other...

[4:50] Wait.

[4:51] Insignificant other?

[4:53] Well, she doesn't listen to the podcast.

[4:55] That's where you're going with it.

[4:56] Yeah, that was a burn.

[4:57] So you can call her insignificant.

Elliott Kalan

[4:58] Yeah.

[4:59] Well, she's not insignificant.

[5:00] And we will have words after this recording, gentlemen.

[5:03] But yeah, she doesn't listen to this, so...

Dan McCoy

[5:05] I mean, in height, maybe.

[5:07] She's a small...

[5:09] I mean, she's taller than he is.

[5:10] She's the same height as me.

[5:12] Whoa.

[5:12] She's not taller than me.

Stuart Wellington

[5:13] Well, if I was making a basketball team, I would probably pick her first.

[5:17] Whoa.

[5:18] I'll have you know she is very, very slow.

[5:21] Well, that's...

[5:21] I mean, she might be able to...

[5:22] She can't run.

[5:22] But can she shoot?

[5:24] Does she have hand-eye coordination?

[5:25] Yes, she's very good at hand-eye coordination.

Dan McCoy

[5:26] How is she from the outside?

[5:27] She good?

[5:28] Is that something...

[5:29] Wait.

[5:29] Wait, is that important for basketball?

[5:30] Because she's beautiful.

Elliott Kalan

[5:32] If that's what you're asking, how does she look on the outside?

Dan McCoy

[5:34] No, I meant she hit a shot from the outside.

Elliott Kalan

[5:36] Of what?

[5:37] Of the court.

[5:39] Wait, are you talking about photography again?

[5:41] Yeah.

[5:41] What are you...

Dan McCoy

[5:41] I don't know what this is.

[5:42] Because that's what happened in this movie.

[5:44] There's that girl who's way to photography.

[5:46] Let's get into the movie, shall we?

[5:48] Well, we're talking about us.

[5:50] There's this movie called I'm Number Four.

[5:52] Was that a good enough digression for you, by the way, Dan?

[5:54] That was fine.

[5:54] Okay.

[5:55] It wasn't one of our top digressions, but I'll take it.

Elliott Kalan

[5:57] Well, where would you rank it?

[5:59] Like, 37?

[6:00] Yeah.

[6:00] 38?

[6:01] Probably.

[6:01] Number four, perhaps?

[6:02] No, no way.

[6:03] Number four is probably Chopin Goatables.

[6:06] No.

[6:07] The serial...

Dan McCoy

[6:08] The Portal of Time is number one.

Elliott Kalan

[6:10] The Portal of Time was...

[6:11] The Portal of Time is number one.

Dan McCoy

[6:13] Teddy Grahams is number two.

[6:14] Teddy Grahams I forgot about.

Elliott Kalan

[6:16] That's right.

[6:16] Well, for anyone who's a new listener, these are a couple of our Flophouse favorites.

[6:20] Do you remember what episode Port Hole of Time was in?

[6:23] Oh, God.

[6:24] It's on the internet.

[6:25] Go back and listen to every episode.

[6:26] You got a lot of good ones, such as Portal of Time, which is a monologue I did about...

[6:30] Based off of a mis...

[6:31] Based off of Dan...

[6:32] Barely, barely mispronouncing the title Beastmaster 2 Portal of Time.

[6:37] Through the Portal of Time, where it was the steward of a ship explaining...

[6:42] Of a cruise ship.

[6:43] The purser, I think.

[6:44] Explaining to some guests why they should stay away from the porthole in their room.

[6:48] Teddy Grahams was, of course, about...

[6:50] In World War II, when women's husband would be killed in war and the government would deliver

[6:54] a Teddy Grahams.

[6:56] Notifying them of this.

Dan McCoy

[7:00] I don't even understand...

[7:01] I don't know where Chopin Goatables came from.

[7:03] Chopin Goatables just...

Elliott Kalan

[7:04] We just started saying Pot-and-Potables and, like, something Notables.

[7:07] And Chopin Goatables was...

[7:09] It was a cereal.

[7:10] Breakfast cereal.

[7:11] It was a breakfast cereal.

[7:11] Will Hines was with us for that one.

[7:13] But, yeah, a breakfast cereal that, I guess, Chopin endorsed or invented that was Goatable.

[7:21] I don't understand it myself.

[7:23] All right.

[7:23] Anyways, those are some of our top digressions.

Dan McCoy

[7:25] Now that we've taken a trip down memory lane, we can get into tonight's...

[7:29] So, final judgments.

Elliott Kalan

[7:31] No, no, no, no.

[7:32] Sure.

[7:32] You're skipping way ahead.

[7:35] No, no.

[7:35] We've got to talk about this movie.

[7:36] I recommend a little movie called Castle Freak.

[7:39] Instead of Freak that lives in a castle.

[7:40] What am I going to recommend now, Nick?

[7:43] Invisible Maniac.

Dan McCoy

[7:43] He Castle Freaks your head there.

[7:46] There's a mind freak on Elliot's part.

Elliott Kalan

[7:48] So, that was a lot of good inside jokes for the people who are coming to us for the first

[7:52] time off of the AV Club.

[7:53] Yeah.

[7:54] Hope that intrigued you.

[7:55] That's how we build an audience.

[7:57] But the movie we watched today was a little thing called Yo Soy Numero Quatro.

[8:01] Or, for the gringos, I am number four.

[8:05] Thanks.

Dan McCoy

[8:06] Yeah, it starred Alex Pettifer, I think was his name.

[8:11] What?

[8:12] Which is not a name.

[8:13] I think you made that up.

[8:14] He's from Hertfordshire, England.

[8:16] Okay.

Elliott Kalan

[8:16] And you could tell it because he had a terrible American accent.

[8:19] His American accent would often slip into a vaguely English accent.

[8:23] Here's my question.

[8:24] Is that a sound effect from the movie we just watched?

[8:25] No, that was your phone.

[8:26] Oh, okay.

[8:28] Here's my question.

[8:29] What happened to the names of young actors?

[8:32] Pettifer, Gajandit, Meister.

Dan McCoy

[8:35] Zane.

[8:36] I'm a leister.

[8:36] I mean, you did point out to me, and you might be right, that Gajandit may be a French

[8:42] name.

[8:43] It could be Gajandit.

[8:44] Gajandit.

Stuart Wellington

[8:45] Yeah.

[8:46] Which is slightly less crazy.

[8:48] Are we complaining that people have dumb names nowadays?

[8:51] Yes, that's exactly what I was.

[8:52] This is the Andy Rooney cast.

Elliott Kalan

[8:54] When actors had names like Kirk Douglas or like Clark Gable.

[8:58] Rock Hudson.

[8:59] Rock Hudson.

[8:59] Well, Rock Hudson is a dumb name.

[9:02] I assume his name was originally Hudson Rock.

[9:04] Yeah.

[9:04] It's from the movie Hudson Hawk is based on.

[9:07] That's why Bruce Willis' character dies of age.

Dan McCoy

[9:09] Normal names like Humphrey Bogart.

[9:12] Humphrey Bogart.

[9:12] Well, that's...

[9:13] And Cary Grant.

Elliott Kalan

[9:14] That's...

[9:14] Okay.

[9:15] They had stupid names, but that's the thing.

[9:17] It's...

[9:17] Humphrey Bogart sounds like a tough name, but Humphrey is possibly the least tough name

[9:21] for men.

[9:22] Next to Cam.

[9:24] Yeah.

[9:25] Gajandit.

[9:26] Anyway, this is tough Pettifer.

[9:28] So, okay.

[9:29] We are introduced to Alex Pettifer and Timothy Oliphant.

[9:34] After we see a kid get stabbed.

[9:35] Oh, I forgot about that.

[9:36] It opens in a jungle somewhere, and these two guys are in a cabin, a kid and another guy.

Dan McCoy

[9:41] Outside the planet Earth.

[9:42] Yes.

[9:42] It opens like the seventh season of Buffy with random kids being stabbed, and then you

[9:47] realize that they're super-powered.

Elliott Kalan

[9:48] Spoiler.

[9:49] Yeah.

[9:49] I've never seen that, so thanks.

[9:51] What's Buffy?

Dan McCoy

[9:54] The internet will tell you, Stuart.

[9:55] But seriously.

Elliott Kalan

[9:56] That's the TV show that it was a non-porn parody of that porn Muffy the Vampire Lair.

[10:00] Yep.

[10:01] Sure.

[10:01] The...

[10:02] So, anyway.

[10:03] We open outside of Earth.

[10:06] We zoom in to a jungle.

[10:08] There's a kid in a cabin with a grown man.

[10:10] What are they doing?

[10:10] We don't know.

[10:11] But the grown man has a stone dagger with a kind of glowy orb on the back of it.

[10:16] Probably from outer space.

[10:17] Suddenly, a monster comes along, kills the guy, chases the kid.

[10:21] The kid can do all sorts of crazy flips and gymnast stunts.

[10:24] As Dan mentioned, we were watching it.

[10:25] It was like Jeff Goldblum's daughter in The Lost World, Jurassic Park 2.

[10:30] The monster fails to kill him, but then aliens come, or some kind of crazy-looking guys.

[10:35] They're aliens.

[10:35] Come, and they stab the kid.

[10:37] Mumble something and stab him, right?

[10:39] Yeah.

[10:39] They're like...

Stuart Wellington

[10:40] And take his charm necklace.

Elliott Kalan

[10:42] They take his charm necklace and stab him, and he turns into stone and then bursts into dust.

[10:47] Then the title.

[10:48] I am number four.

Stuart Wellington

[10:49] It's like a bad, like, vampire dying effect from...

[10:53] The aforementioned Buffy.

Elliott Kalan

[10:55] Yeah.

[10:55] That's for sure.

[10:55] Yeah, there we go.

[10:57] Yeah.

[10:57] I'm not saying they were perfect, guys.

[10:58] Buffy the vampire payer.

[11:00] Okay.

[11:01] She was worked in accounting for the vampire company.

[11:05] People would bring in their blood invoices and pay it out.

[11:08] Yeah.

[11:08] She'd say, fill out this paperwork.

[11:10] There you go.

[11:11] Here you are.

[11:12] Sorry, we're going to have to deduct the cost of the bag.

Dan McCoy

[11:16] Not an entertaining show.

[11:18] They were really scraping the bottom of the barrel of the vampire.

[11:20] It had its moments.

Stuart Wellington

[11:21] It had its moments.

[11:21] Well, I mean, it dresses like she's this young girl in the big city and has to...

Dan McCoy

[11:26] She's got a dream of working at a...

[11:28] Sex and vampires or something?

[11:28] She has a dream of working at a vampire fashion magazine, but she has to get a job in vampire

[11:33] accounting.

Elliott Kalan

[11:33] And then in the third season, she cut her hair.

[11:35] Yeah.

[11:36] That's so better than Buffy the vampire Bayer.

[11:39] God, we're still doing this.

[11:41] Just making aspirin for vampires.

[11:43] It's still going on.

[11:45] There's more.

[11:46] Okay, so then we meet the hero of our film.

[11:48] He is a young guy, blonde, really buff.

[11:52] Like a real everyman.

[11:53] We're introduced to him while riding a jet ski so hard that he flips it around in the

[11:58] air and then lands again.

[11:59] But then, as a girl is coming on to him...

[12:01] Oh, here is a story.

[12:02] As a girl is coming on to him in a late night beach rendezvous, his hands and thigh get...

[12:07] No, not thigh.

[12:07] His calf get all glowy.

[12:09] And he's like, ah, I can't control it.

[12:10] What's happening?

[12:11] There's glow coming out of my hands.

[12:13] And then the next day, Timothy Olyphant is like, we gotta go.

[12:16] And it turns out this kid is...

[12:18] Burned into the ground.

[12:18] This kid is an alien.

[12:20] And Timothy Olyphant is his alien warrior bodyguard.

[12:23] And the two of them are on the run from bad aliens who are trying to kill all of the good aliens.

[12:28] And the good aliens are kids who have superpowers.

[12:31] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[12:32] And are indistinguishable from humans.

[12:35] And the bad aliens...

[12:36] Except for their magic powers.

Dan McCoy

[12:37] Except for their glowy hands and magic powers.

[12:39] The bad aliens have tattooed heads and gills.

[12:41] And they have a name that, when shortened, kind of sounds like monk, which I think is on purpose because they wear robes around.

Elliott Kalan

[12:47] Well, they wear like dusters.

[12:48] Yeah.

[12:48] I mean, they look like they stepped at it.

[12:50] They look like...

[12:51] It's like, give me a little bit of alienation.

[12:53] Okay, now a little bit of Matrix.

[12:56] Now a little bit of...

Dan McCoy

[12:57] A little bit of Road Warrior.

Elliott Kalan

[12:58] A little bit of Road Warrior.

[12:59] A little bit of Blade II.

[13:00] Okay, we got our villains.

[13:02] But they're called Mogadorians.

[13:04] Was that it?

Stuart Wellington

[13:05] It's just a bunch of fucking syllables.

[13:07] It was a bunch...

[13:08] Yeah, they're like Star Trek aliens, right?

[13:10] Basically.

Elliott Kalan

[13:11] And that, just their heads are different and everything else is the same.

[13:14] They're a little bit stronger.

[13:15] They go to...

[13:16] So Timothy Olyphant's like...

[13:17] Like Star Trek aliens.

[13:18] Yeah.

[13:18] Timothy Olyphant's like, there's a video of you with your glowy hands on the internet now.

[13:22] We gotta leave.

[13:22] And they drive from, I guess, Florida to...

[13:26] Yeah, I think they're on the Keys.

[13:27] Yeah.

[13:28] The Francis Scott Keys.

[13:29] Sure.

[13:30] The Lisa Keys.

[13:32] Oh, okay.

[13:32] And for the young audience.

[13:34] Sure.

[13:34] And they go to, what, Ohio?

[13:37] Paradise, Ohio.

[13:37] A town called Paradise, Ohio, which is ironic because it's raining.

[13:40] Oh, that's why.

[13:42] I guess that would be paradise for someone who likes to be moist, though.

[13:45] Yeah, like a frog.

[13:47] Yes.

[13:48] Frog's paradise.

[13:48] Like a battle toad.

[13:50] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[13:53] A lot of talking battle toads.

Elliott Kalan

[13:54] Yeah, we talked a lot about battle toads before the movie.

Stuart Wellington

[13:56] I mean, we said the name.

[13:58] We didn't really talk about it.

Dan McCoy

[14:00] We didn't discuss how hard that speeder level was.

[14:03] The kid just came up as a reference.

[14:04] Yeah, because he kept running into things.

[14:07] Yeah, that's to counteract your Alicia Keys reference.

Elliott Kalan

[14:10] Yeah.

[14:11] Something really topical.

[14:12] The people in the audience.

[14:12] Battle toads.

[14:13] Battle toads.

[14:15] They go to Ohio, and Timmy Olyphant's like, we're going to live in this foreclosed house,

[14:19] but you've got to stay invisible.

[14:20] No one can see you.

[14:21] And he's like, screw that.

[14:22] I'm going to school.

[14:23] And because-

[14:24] Like most teenagers.

[14:25] Like most teenagers.

[14:26] He loves going to school, wants to go to school all the time.

[14:29] He goes to school, and he bluffs his way into being a student at this school.

[14:35] And long story short, he becomes friends with the nerd.

[14:37] He falls in love with the pretty girl.

[14:39] He's basically the-

[14:40] The pretty girl who's kind of like-

[14:42] Who's kind of artsy.

[14:43] Yep.

[14:43] She takes photographs and wears hats.

[14:44] The jocks don't like him, do they?

[14:45] The jocks don't like him, because one of the jocks used to go out with the photographer

[14:49] girl.

[14:49] Before she became a artsy person.

Dan McCoy

[14:52] She's played by Diana Agron.

[14:53] Who's that?

[14:54] She's from the television program Glee.

[14:56] And what would we know her from?

[14:57] Yeah.

[14:58] Nothing.

[14:59] Okay.

[15:00] And it's a popular program, but not among the Flophouse demographic.

[15:04] Nope.

[15:04] Sure.

[15:05] Which we watch primarily pornos, I guess.

Elliott Kalan

[15:08] Yep.

[15:08] That's right.

[15:09] I think the only shows we watch are like Life on Top and Lingerie.

[15:13] Big Sausage Pizza, which I've already addressed.

[15:15] Which is not a TV show, but a series of web videos.

[15:19] I mean, that's the way.

[15:20] It's a web series.

[15:21] That's like saying.

[15:22] It's really a web series, Elliot.

[15:23] It's like saying your favorite show is Brazzers.

[15:26] Well, that's.

[15:27] All those shows should join the guild.

[15:28] That's.

[15:29] We.

[15:29] Actually.

[15:30] Frankly.

[15:30] I mean, that's probably shot in Los Angeles.

[15:32] Okay.

[15:32] But if they were.

[15:33] If you write for Big Sausage Pizza or any of the.

[15:37] Or Bang Bus.

[15:38] I'd like to meet them, first of all.

[15:39] The Writers Guild East is really looking to get into new media.

[15:43] Yeah.

[15:43] Really trying to cover more people writing for the internet.

[15:45] So if you're a writer and you're feeling exploited, please contact the Writers Guild of America East.

[15:50] No judgments.

[15:51] Yeah.

[15:51] We make no judgments.

[15:53] So.

[15:54] So he goes to the school.

[15:55] It's a basic Rebel Without a Cause setup where you've got the alienated young guy and his girlfriend who used to be a popular girl and his friend who's a nerd that people make fun of.

[16:07] The Salmoneo character.

[16:08] The Salmoneo character.

[16:09] The Salmonella character.

[16:10] Sure.

[16:11] And basically there's a whole bunch of nonsense where they're teenagers and they're hanging out and they get into fights and blah, blah, blah.

[16:18] And then the aliens come by and they kill Timothy Oliphant.

[16:21] They come by.

[16:21] They drop by the house.

[16:22] Hey, how you doing?

Stuart Wellington

[16:23] Yeah, it's like warrior bodyguard gets killed.

[16:26] It's the saddest part.

[16:26] It's that moment of like the father figure dying.

Elliott Kalan

[16:29] Yeah, this happens about an hour and ten minutes into the movie.

[16:32] Significantly too far.

Stuart Wellington

[16:33] No, it's a basic.

Elliott Kalan

[16:34] A lot of the characters just hanging around the high school, mumbling to each other and acting like what they're doing is interesting.

[16:41] He finds out he has magic hands.

Dan McCoy

[16:42] This is your basic template.

[16:44] This is Harry Potter by way of Twilight by way of Star Wars.

[16:49] A little Spider-Man throw in there.

[16:50] A little Spider-Man.

[16:51] A little Spider-Man.

[16:53] Yep.

Elliott Kalan

[16:54] And yet his powers are that he has glow.

[16:55] He has telekinetic powers basically.

[16:57] Sure.

[16:58] But his hands are also all glowy and he has super strength and it can flip around.

Dan McCoy

[17:02] Elliot took to calling him Glowy Hands in the movie.

[17:04] That's a superhero name.

[17:05] Yeah.

[17:05] Glowy Hands.

[17:06] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[17:06] I mean you should – I mean that's like a Marvel character, right?

[17:09] It should be.

[17:10] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[17:10] Well, for most of the movie he's just using his glowy hands like flashlights.

[17:14] He just uses them to illuminate –

[17:15] Like he's like, oh, it's dark in here.

[17:16] I got to use my glowy hands.

[17:17] This time –

Stuart Wellington

[17:18] Like it's actually not that dark, dude.

[17:19] What are you – I mean you're just showing off at this point.

Elliott Kalan

[17:21] But that's his catchphrase is, now is Glowy Hands time to shine.

[17:26] And he – it's not, but it should be.

[17:28] I mean it's a little complicated.

[17:29] He walks – there's nobody else there.

[17:32] His catchphrase can be as long as he wants.

[17:33] It's just him wandering around empty rooms.

Stuart Wellington

[17:35] Yeah, but I mean that's not going to catch on.

[17:37] Like I couldn't see somebody wearing a T-shirt that says that.

[17:39] We'll take up the whole shirt.

[17:41] How about flame on?

Dan McCoy

[17:43] No, that's taken.

[17:44] I think that's taken.

[17:45] Shine on.

[17:46] Shine on you crazy diamond.

[17:47] Yeah.

[17:47] Okay.

[17:48] We got it.

[17:48] That's his catchphrase.

[17:49] Guys, I'm number four too.

[17:52] What about –

[17:53] Wait.

[17:53] That's confusing.

Elliott Kalan

[17:54] Well, his catchphrase would be, let there be light and light pours out of his palms.

Stuart Wellington

[17:59] Okay.

[18:00] No, I mean these are all better than your first suggestion.

Elliott Kalan

[18:02] I thought now is Glowy Hand's time to shine.

[18:05] I thought it was a pretty good catchphrase.

[18:07] And he says his name.

[18:08] That takes up some time.

[18:09] Yeah, I mean –

[18:09] But he has to introduce himself.

[18:10] And it reintroduces the IP.

[18:12] His costume has a big GH on the front, but people don't know what that stands for.

Dan McCoy

[18:17] Yeah.

[18:17] I think it's for General Hospital.

[18:19] Yes.

[18:20] I mean, I'd assume.

[18:22] So, yeah, but no, he literally just uses his hands as –

[18:27] Flashlights.

[18:27] Flashlights for most of the film.

[18:28] He blinds a guy with them, right?

Elliott Kalan

[18:30] Well, he beats up a lot of people and hurts them badly.

[18:34] But he – like, there's a kid who's fighting him who has night vision goggles on, and he puts his glowy hands –

Stuart Wellington

[18:41] That's like the perfect prey for a glowy hands.

[18:43] Exactly.

[18:44] That's the sweet spot.

Elliott Kalan

[18:45] It's right in there.

[18:46] You discovered my one weakness.

[18:48] Bright lights.

[18:48] And he puts his glowy hands up against the guy's face, and the guy's like, ah!

[18:53] I can't close my eyes.

[18:54] That's what the dialogue is like.

[18:55] For some reason.

Stuart Wellington

[18:56] Yeah, he's a perfect target.

[18:57] He's like Minka Kelly's character in The Roommate for a roofie enthusiast.

Elliott Kalan

[19:00] Yeah, because she'll just put anything in her mouth and swallow it down.

[19:04] No questions asked.

Dan McCoy

[19:05] But at the end of the movie, number six shows up.

[19:09] Number six.

Elliott Kalan

[19:09] Throughout the movie, you've occasionally seen this mysterious girl blowing up stuff or tracking down number four.

[19:16] You think she must be a bad guy.

[19:18] Because she's got leather pants, and she walks away from an explosion real slow early on.

Stuart Wellington

[19:24] That's a rule for Nicolas Cage, to be honest with you.

Elliott Kalan

[19:26] But it turns out to be a different person.

[19:28] Yeah.

[19:29] Yeah, I mean, it's not obvious.

Dan McCoy

[19:29] Except for here, they've got an attractive young girl instead of Nicolas Cage.

[19:32] She's too tiny.

[19:32] She's too petite.

[19:34] She was apparently the love interest in Sorcerer's Apprentice.

[19:37] I looked her up on the internet.

[19:38] Which we just saw recently.

[19:40] But I actually didn't recognize her.

[19:42] Yeah, no.

[19:43] Well, she's apparently Australian, and she has a more convincing American accent than our lead.

Elliott Kalan

[19:50] But she also just becomes the character when she's playing it.

[19:53] Well, she puts on leather pants.

[19:54] I really believe she was number six, who's basically...

[19:57] You really believe she was wearing leather pants.

[19:59] Oh, and also, there's a lizard that turns into a dog and becomes number four's pet dog,

[20:03] and at the end, he's a big monster who fights evil monsters.

[20:06] Yeah.

[20:06] This is the kind of movie...

Dan McCoy

[20:07] He's a chimera who's been the bodyguard.

Elliott Kalan

[20:10] This is the kind of movie where the problem could have been solved much earlier if the cool characters had just shown up and beaten up the bad guys.

[20:19] But the movie instead has all this crap about the high school and Timothy Olyphant and number four.

Stuart Wellington

[20:24] Yeah, you're wondering why you're not watching a show about the cool characters instead of...

Elliott Kalan

[20:28] Yeah, and then at the end, number six comes in and is way more badass than number four, and more likable, frankly.

[20:33] I didn't really like the character.

Stuart Wellington

[20:34] I mean, I couldn't really understand what she was saying, but the other guy just mumbled the whole time.

Dan McCoy

[20:38] The main guy was not charismatic.

[20:40] It's a movie that's trying to kill its screenplay.

[20:41] Yeah.

[20:42] I mean, he was a muscly, dour young guy.

[20:46] I mean, he is...

[20:46] So I'm sure for young ladies...

Elliott Kalan

[20:48] As you said, he's super cut.

[20:49] I'm sure he's patented.

[20:50] He's patented like lettuce.

Dan McCoy

[20:51] He's patented to the tween girls, I'm sure.

Elliott Kalan

[20:52] I guarantee you they cast this movie by flipping through an Abercrombie catalog.

[20:57] Yeah.

[20:57] And said that one, that one, Timothy Olyphant, that one.

[21:00] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[21:00] I mean, he's just in really good shape.

[21:02] Sure.

[21:03] He must do a lot of cardio.

Dan McCoy

[21:04] You just want to rub your hands over and just feel the ripples.

Stuart Wellington

[21:07] Well, kind of, yeah.

[21:08] I mean, it's like a work of art.

Dan McCoy

[21:10] It's like Ruffles have ridges.

[21:12] And so does this guy.

Elliott Kalan

[21:12] Yeah, just the...

[21:13] He has tiny ridges all over his body.

[21:15] Just like Ruffles.

[21:17] Wait, is that one of his powers?

[21:19] Yes.

[21:20] He's ridgy.

[21:21] They call him Ruffles.

[21:22] Glowy Hands Ruffles.

[21:23] I don't know why I am...

[21:24] Hello, Ruffles Glowy Hands at your service.

[21:27] Chickleman thief.

[21:30] Quickest cat bugling in all of Brighton.

Dan McCoy

[21:34] I don't know why it's important for me to clarify this, but I brought up number six.

[21:38] In part to say that the Glowy Hands, his Glowy Hands power, weren't just glowiness.

[21:43] It's the...

[21:44] He apparently can charge...

[21:45] He's telepathic.

[21:46] Oh, yeah.

[21:46] He can use the glowing to charge her powers.

[21:49] Because her powers, which are like...

Elliott Kalan

[21:50] She's basically Nightcrawler.

[21:51] Yeah.

[21:52] She can dodge around fast and teleport.

Dan McCoy

[21:54] But there's sort of like a symbiotic relationship between the numbers.

Elliott Kalan

[21:58] Yeah.

[21:58] And when we say number six, I don't want you to get your hopes up.

[22:01] It is not Patrick McGowan's number six from The Prisoner, which would have been awesome.

[22:05] That would have been awesome.

[22:06] He has...

[22:07] Anyone who's a Prisoner fan knows, Patrick McGowan is great in The Prisoner.

[22:11] But also The Prisoner character, number six, is a belligerent jerk to everyone he meets.

[22:15] And he cannot control the volume of his own voice.

[22:18] So I wish he had shown up.

[22:19] That would have been great.

[22:21] Well, he's a human being.

[22:23] Yeah, not an alien.

[22:24] And he also died a couple years ago.

[22:25] Well, not a number.

[22:26] He is a free man.

[22:27] That's the thing.

Stuart Wellington

[22:28] Yeah, they couldn't bring like a dead body back to put him into the movie.

Elliott Kalan

[22:32] We can have Bernie's did it.

[22:33] That guy died during the making of the movie and they had to change the plot.

[22:36] Wait, really?

[22:37] To accommodate it.

[22:38] Oh, yeah.

[22:38] Like in The Crow?

[22:40] Yes.

Dan McCoy

[22:40] Wait, wait.

[22:40] The guy...

[22:41] So the actual...

[22:42] Bernie, the dead guy from Bernie actually died.

[22:44] Not Andrew McCarthy.

Elliott Kalan

[22:46] Originally...

[22:46] Wait.

Dan McCoy

[22:48] They didn't make a puppet out of Andrew McCarthy's skin.

Elliott Kalan

[22:50] That they did.

[22:52] Oh, okay.

[22:52] Actually, it was a stuntman wearing it.

[22:54] They couldn't do the computer stuff they did for The Crow.

[22:56] So they had Kevin McCarthy do all the lines.

[22:58] They skinned Andrew McCarthy.

[23:00] Yes.

[23:00] And they had Kevin McCarthy from Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Dan McCoy

[23:03] Middle-aged actor Kevin McCarthy come in.

[23:06] Middle-aged?

[23:07] Well, I mean, at that point he was.

[23:08] That's a lot charitable.

[23:09] That's a lot of charitable.

[23:10] That's a lot of 60s.

[23:10] Really?

[23:10] I mean, I guess I'm thinking of him in Twilight Zone the movie, which was still 10 years earlier.

[23:16] But I mean, nowadays, 60s is almost middle-aged.

Elliott Kalan

[23:18] That's true.

[23:19] 60 is the new 40.

[23:21] And 40 is the new 20, according to Cougar Town.

[23:24] Cougar in Massachusetts, right?

[23:25] Wow, so I'm 15.

[23:27] Yes.

[23:28] Weekend at Bernie's was originally...

[23:29] And I'm nine years old.

[23:31] Weekend at Bernie's was originally about, uh-oh, we've got to go to Bernie's.

[23:35] He told me to bring my friend.

[23:37] I thought he meant just my roommate, but he meant my boyfriend.

[23:40] So we've got to pretend we're gay now.

[23:42] But then the guy playing Bernie died, so they changed him to where they have to pretend Bernie is gay.

[23:46] So it was like a Blake Edwards movie.

Stuart Wellington

[23:47] Maybe initially.

Elliott Kalan

[23:48] Yes, exactly.

[23:49] I made it all up.

[23:52] It was originally called Weekend at Hernias.

[23:56] It's retorted.

[23:57] I'm making up for the last...

[23:58] Not a very good chance not.

[23:59] Look, it's late, okay?

[24:01] We're talking about I'm number four.

[24:04] But there's a big fight at the end, and the number four wins, and all the other guys win.

[24:08] The good guys win, and then ride off to find the other numbers, the other...

[24:12] You're right off into a sequel that will not happen.

[24:15] Yes.

Stuart Wellington

[24:16] Yeah, this is all the, uh, the, what the, like the opening for a bigger story, right?

Dan McCoy

[24:21] Yeah, well, I...

[24:22] Can we talk about the, uh, like the backstory to this?

[24:24] That's what I was going to go into, yeah.

[24:27] Yeah, I mean, do you know this?

[24:28] I mean, I know it vaguely.

[24:30] Like, James Fry, the guy who, uh, did A Million Little Pieces.

[24:33] Yes.

[24:34] The famously, uh, false memoir.

[24:37] The book that fooled Oprah.

[24:38] Uh, he has his, like, sort of...

[24:41] It's like a fiction factory.

[24:42] Fiction factory, where, yeah, he barely pays young writers to, uh, churn out these, uh,

[24:48] these books that he thinks might become franchise...

Elliott Kalan

[24:51] Franchises or movie ideas or things like that.

[24:54] It's very much like a Cowboys and Aliens type thing, where they print up a comic just

[24:59] that they can say that the movie is based on the comic.

Stuart Wellington

[25:02] To add some credibility to a wacky movie.

[25:05] Yes.

Elliott Kalan

[25:05] So, like, these are books that are designed to become franchise adapted events.

[25:10] Like, they're not meant to...

[25:11] It's not meant to stand alone on its own as a book.

Dan McCoy

[25:13] Or as a good piece of writing.

[25:16] Yes.

[25:16] Sure.

Elliott Kalan

[25:17] But, yeah, but James Fry, apparently he pays the writers very little.

[25:20] They're young people just trying to get into writing.

[25:23] And, uh, they churn them out, I assume, under pseudonyms, but I'm not sure about that.

[25:27] The same way that, like, the old Shadow or Doc Savage books were all written mostly by the

[25:33] same guy, but not always.

[25:34] But they were written under the same pseudonym, no matter who was writing it.

[25:36] Or like how whoever drew Batman for the first 20-some-odd years Batman existed signed the

[25:42] name Bob Kane, even though Bob Kane hadn't touched a pen in decades.

Dan McCoy

[25:45] Or how Carl Barks was only known as the Good Duck Artist.

Elliott Kalan

[25:48] Well, that's the opposite.

[25:49] He was not allowed to sign any name.

[25:51] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[25:51] Man.

[25:52] And it's the opposite because he was good at what he did.

[25:55] This has been nerd talk with the nerd gang.

[25:57] This has always been nerd talk.

[25:59] Too bad this bad movie podcast got a little nerdy.

[26:02] Yeah, but I mean, you know, this is not to say that, you know, good, uh, you know, fun,

[26:09] good art cannot be made under certain genre restrictions.

[26:14] Oh, no, of course it can.

[26:15] But, uh, I think this explains.

Elliott Kalan

[26:17] You and I spent a lot of today talking about they live.

[26:19] Yeah.

[26:20] You know, so.

Dan McCoy

[26:20] But I think that this explains why this movie feels so much like just the most, uh, boilerplate

[26:29] version of the story.

Elliott Kalan

[26:30] Yeah, very rote, very boilerplate by the numbers.

[26:32] It's like, like we were saying, like a little bit of Harry Potter, a little bit of Spider-Man,

[26:36] a little bit of, you know, what?

[26:38] Other alien stuff.

[26:40] X-Men.

[26:40] Like, just throw it all into the pot and do the same story that you've seen a hundred

[26:44] times before and get some stupid person to pay $4.99 to watch it on demand on their television

[26:49] to do a bad movie podcast about it.

Dan McCoy

[26:51] Wait, uh.

[26:53] You just got to be stupid.

Elliott Kalan

[26:54] What I'm saying is, don't just walk to see it.

[26:58] And, I mean, I was saying I shouldn't have sprung the extra dollar to watch it in HD

Dan McCoy

[27:02] like I did.

Elliott Kalan

[27:03] Yes.

[27:03] Did you spend another dollar for HD?

Dan McCoy

[27:05] Look, I, uh, I'm a high-end video file, Elliot.

[27:09] I can't, I can't bear to see it.

Stuart Wellington

[27:10] He spent all this money on his home entertainment system to not watch it in jaw-dropping HD.

Elliott Kalan

[27:15] It was jaw-dropping.

[27:16] The glowy really came through.

[27:17] You could really see the glowy coming out of his hands.

Dan McCoy

[27:19] It was the glowiest.

[27:21] Here's something that I want to say.

[27:23] So say it.

[27:24] You're allowed.

[27:25] We're stopping you.

[27:27] No, I have to have a preamble that delays it.

Elliott Kalan

[27:30] Does this mean that most of the things you say are things you don't want to say?

[27:32] Oh, God.

Elliott Kalan

[27:33] So many things I say.

[27:33] There's a difference.

[27:34] Here's something I want to say.

Dan McCoy

[27:36] No, uh, the, you know, the end of the movie, I didn't hate.

[27:40] There's a...

[27:40] Like, when action started, I thought the action sequence was actually handled pretty well.

Elliott Kalan

[27:43] The fight at the end, it was a little frantic.

[27:46] Mm-hmm.

[27:46] But there were some fun things.

[27:47] There was a giant bat monster that fought a giant dog monster.

[27:49] I like the monster stuff.

[27:50] The monsters were pretty good.

[27:51] Those were well-designed monsters, frankly.

[27:54] Yeah.

[27:54] Which is rare.

Dan McCoy

[27:55] And they moved like monster, like living monsters.

[27:58] And it wasn't as frantic as a lot of action movies are these days.

[28:02] I mean, there was a little bit more of a sense of...

Stuart Wellington

[28:04] I could have used slightly more variety between the good monster and the bad monster, but...

[28:09] Yeah.

[28:09] Ultimately, it was...

Dan McCoy

[28:10] One of them was like a bad monster, one of them was like a dog monster.

Stuart Wellington

[28:12] Yeah, but when they were rolling around, like, biting each other and shit, they looked

[28:15] the same.

Elliott Kalan

[28:16] Well, it doesn't help that it was a room that was in a dimly lit room, I assumed, to make

[28:18] the effects look better.

[28:19] They're fighting...

Stuart Wellington

[28:20] And I was looking at my phone most of the times.

Elliott Kalan

[28:23] They were fighting in the shower of a gym locker room.

[28:25] They're fighting at the school.

Stuart Wellington

[28:26] Like in the opening of Savage Streets?

Elliott Kalan

[28:29] Yeah.

[28:29] Or the opening of Carrie.

[28:31] Except it's not fighting.

[28:31] It's just the showers.

[28:32] Okay.

[28:33] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[28:34] Well, they threw tampons at her.

[28:36] That's kind of like fighting.

Elliott Kalan

[28:37] That's fighting.

[28:38] I mean, yeah.

[28:38] Those are...

[28:38] Bullying.

[28:39] Weapons.

Dan McCoy

[28:40] Bullying is no joke.

Elliott Kalan

[28:41] But the final climax takes place...

[28:43] Sure.

[28:43] Cyber-bullying.

[28:45] Let's stop it for a PSA right now.

Dan McCoy

[28:46] They're throwing cyber-tampons.

Elliott Kalan

[28:48] What a lot of people don't know is Dan said some insensitive things about tampon throwing.

[28:53] Really got people up in arms, so he has to do a PSA now about it.

Dan McCoy

[28:56] I was really pro-tampon throwing in the past, and now I've been showing that that's wrong.

[28:59] Yeah.

[29:00] So I'm sorry.

Stuart Wellington

[29:03] I mean, they don't fly very well.

[29:06] They're not...

[29:06] They're not aerodynamic.

[29:07] Well, some have wings.

[29:07] Yeah, you just throw a ball or something.

[29:10] Or a rock.

[29:12] If you're going to bully someone, throw a rock.

[29:13] No, no.

[29:13] Don't get people bullying tips.

[29:14] Guys, just throw a ball to somebody.

[29:17] Don't throw a tampon at somebody.

[29:19] Oh.

[29:20] Well, play ball.

[29:20] I'll just play catch.

Elliott Kalan

[29:23] I don't even know what's going on anymore.

[29:25] Goddamn.

[29:26] You've gone down a rabbit hole.

[29:27] Yeah.

[29:28] I didn't go down with you, though.

[29:29] I'm still...

[29:29] I'm on ground level yelling down into the hole, where'd you guys go?

[29:33] Can you come out, please?

[29:34] Hey.

[29:35] No, you come down here.

[29:36] No, I don't think so.

[29:37] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[29:37] We're talking about the end of the movie.

Elliott Kalan

[29:39] The climax of the movie takes place at the high school for some reason.

[29:42] Sure.

[29:42] They just destroy it.

[29:43] All the lockers are being thrown around.

[29:45] You got telekinetic powers.

[29:46] You got teleporting powers.

[29:47] Their school is out for summer and forever.

[29:50] They rip up the football field.

[29:51] The problem is there's not a lot of variety with bad aliens.

[29:55] They all have these giant guns that look like they came out of the fifth element that shoot

[29:59] red lasers.

[30:00] And they just kind of stand around shooting lasers until one of the good guys kills them.

[30:03] Yeah.

[30:04] They're not...

Stuart Wellington

[30:04] Usually the good guys team up and kill one dude.

Elliott Kalan

[30:07] Yeah.

[30:07] But they build these bad guys up as if they're super tough and scary.

[30:11] But then they're not really that hard to take down.

Dan McCoy

[30:13] Although I do like how kind of goofy they get when we finally meet them.

[30:18] Well, they look stupid.

[30:20] Well, the movie kind of realized that, okay, this is a very humorless film.

[30:26] So let's make these aliens kind of...

[30:29] Thanks in part to the amazing performances by our leads.

[30:32] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[30:33] Well, I can't...

[30:34] Yeah, it seemed like they were kind of drugged up most of the...

[30:36] Most of the...

Dan McCoy

[30:36] And kind of mad they were in a movie.

[30:38] And Timothy Olyphant, who I normally love, was pretty boring.

[30:43] I mean, once he...

[30:43] You love him in that show, Justify Your Love.

Elliott Kalan

[30:45] Sure.

[30:46] Ever since he cut...

[30:46] That show where he plays Madonna.

Stuart Wellington

[30:48] He had that really cool haircut at the beginning of the movie, and then he cut it off, and I

[30:51] think...

[30:52] That really ruined it for Stuart.

[30:53] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[30:53] But he cut off his long beach bum hair from the beginning of the movie.

[30:57] His beach mullet.

Dan McCoy

[30:58] But, you know, when he was fighting, he's good at that stuff.

[31:02] Yeah.

[31:03] So that was something.

Elliott Kalan

[31:06] Not very good, though.

[31:07] The problem is, with the villains being, like, jokey, is that you see that a lot.

[31:11] Like, the villain likes to play around with the people he's about to kill and make jokes

[31:15] and wise em cracks.

[31:17] It's been a long time since you saw, like, a solemn villain that was really scary.

Stuart Wellington

[31:20] Well, right after watching Drive Angry, where the lead is Nicolas Cage in his most stone-faced,

[31:27] and the bad guy in the form of the devil character is, you know, kind of making jokes and acting

[31:34] funny.

[31:35] The accountant, you mean?

[31:36] Yeah, yeah.

[31:36] That guy.

[31:37] Yeah.

[31:38] I mean, it just feels like the same thing over and over.

[31:40] Yeah, but not as good.

[31:42] Well, yeah.

[31:43] I mean, that was William Feichner, and these were a bunch of Romulans.

Elliott Kalan

[31:50] Basically, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[31:52] With face gills.

Elliott Kalan

[31:54] Face gills.

[31:55] The best, I think my favorite part of the movie is, so they have this giant bat monster

[31:59] that they just truck around the-

[32:00] Two of them.

[32:00] Two giant bat monsters.

[32:01] They just truck around the country in a big truck.

[32:04] And they feed it tons and tons of uncooked butterball turkeys.

[32:08] And there's a scene where one of the aliens goes into a grocery store with his hoodie flipped

[32:12] up and just gets a cart full of turkeys, buys them, and then goes and feeds the monster

[32:19] with him.

[32:19] Presumably with space bucks.

[32:20] And I just love, like, with space, yeah, he got space bucks from his astrobank, and

[32:25] you used his space debit card.

[32:28] But I love the idea that these are these super tough aliens, but they still have to buy their

[32:32] groceries at the store.

[32:34] There's a part where they're driving along the road, and they slow down just enough to

[32:37] show their true hideous face to a fat kid in a car next door, like in the other lane,

[32:42] and then they're like, ha ha!

Stuart Wellington

[32:43] Okay, speed up now.

[32:44] Like, I have expected that fat kid to, like, smash his ice cream into his face, he's so

[32:48] scared, or like-

[32:49] Or pull out of-

[32:50] Squeeze his soda pops on the spray all over the place.

[32:52] Pull out a flask and go, never again, and throw it over his shoulder.

Elliott Kalan

[32:56] Drunk fat kid.

[32:57] So maybe, I do like the bad guys, actually.

[33:00] Yeah, they have to go to the grocery store to buy turkeys, and they like to slow down enough

[33:04] to scare fat kids.

Stuart Wellington

[33:05] So Elliot's stance, and Dan's stance, and Stuart's stance on the bad guys, thumbs up.

[33:10] Thumbs up.

[33:11] Everything else, though-

Dan McCoy

[33:12] I would rather hang out with the bad guys than anyone else in this movie.

[33:14] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[33:15] I mean, they didn't speak very clear English, but then-

[33:18] No, but everyone mumbled in this movie.

[33:20] And they were really cool dusters.

Elliott Kalan

[33:22] They liked to party, Stuart.

[33:24] This was the first-

[33:24] Oh, that's true.

[33:25] This was the first mumblecore, big-budget sci-fi movie I think I've ever seen.

[33:29] Yeah.

[33:31] Not good mixing.

[33:32] So, I don't know.

[33:35] Final judgments.

[33:36] Yeah, let's get to the final judgments of this movie.

Dan McCoy

[33:38] Was this a good, bad movie?

[33:39] No.

[33:39] A bad, bad movie?

[33:40] Yes.

[33:40] Or a movie you kind of liked?

[33:42] Elliot says it's a bad, bad movie.

Elliott Kalan

[33:43] I would say bad movie.

[33:44] It was very boring and slow and felt like any one of a thousand better movies.

Stuart Wellington

[33:48] Yeah.

[33:48] Stuart?

[33:49] I'll agree.

[33:50] If they had-

[33:50] Maybe if it had just been all monster fights, I'd been more interested in it.

[33:53] Well, certainly.

Elliott Kalan

[33:54] It's just like how Jonah Hex, the best part of it was that Snake Man that you saw very briefly.

[33:58] Yeah.

[33:58] Any movie is better-

[33:59] If it had been called Snake Man, the story of Snake Man, I would have watched it.

[34:02] Almost any movie is better with monster fights in it.

Dan McCoy

[34:05] Yeah, this is a bad, bad movie, and I'll tell you the main reason why.

[34:08] For the first-

[34:09] We just said not enough monster fights.

[34:11] For the first two-thirds of the film, they dole out information very slowly, as if you've

[34:17] never seen this movie before and aren't already ahead of it.

[34:21] And then they cram everything that might be interesting into the last third.

[34:24] Yeah, that's true.

Elliott Kalan

[34:26] It reminds me of Drive Angry in a way, where it was like the characters are going to be

[34:31] a state of mystery, but it's pretty obvious what's going on.

[34:34] They should just say it.

[34:35] We get it.

Dan McCoy

[34:35] He's a hell man.

Elliott Kalan

[34:36] Yeah, he's a hell man.

[34:37] Here, this guy's an alien kid.

[34:39] What's weird is that he tells you in the opening narration, I'm an alien.

[34:43] Yeah.

[34:43] But then they withhold, like, why does he have powers?

[34:47] What do the aliens do?

[34:48] You never find out-

[34:49] Why do the other bad aliens hate him?

[34:51] You never find out why the bad aliens are specifically after him.

[34:53] You never find out where he came-

[34:55] Well, he's the protector.

[34:56] He's got the power to stop them, basically.

Dan McCoy

[34:58] And he's all over the Facebook, man.

[34:59] He is all over the Facebook and the YouTube.

[35:02] It's not worth debating further.

[35:06] So, I'm moving us on.

[35:07] Wow.

[35:08] Half a wormy boner.

[35:09] McCoy has spoken.

[35:11] So, we have some letters here.

[35:14] Oh, it's favorite time of the night.

[35:15] My favorite time of the night.

Elliott Kalan

[35:17] Letter time.

[35:18] Let's read some letters and talk about them.

[35:21] Getting in touch with the fans.

[35:23] What do they think?

[35:25] Letters.

[35:26] Letters.

Dan McCoy

[35:28] Let's read some letters tonight.

Elliott Kalan

[35:30] See, you work up.

[35:31] Tonight's the night for letters.

[35:33] Let's get some letters and read them.

[35:36] Okay.

[35:36] Read them and weep with laughter.

[35:39] Letters.

Dan McCoy

[35:41] We have to-

[35:42] Talking about letters.

[35:43] We have to cut that theme down.

[35:46] That is-

[35:46] Yeah.

[35:47] That's only one tenth of it.

[35:48] Now that I hear it on the show, it seems much longer.

[35:51] There's nine more verses.

[35:52] I mean, it was significantly longer before.

Stuart Wellington

[35:54] We've been working on that for a couple weeks.

Dan McCoy

[35:55] Letters and letters and letters and letters.

[35:58] Let's get the idea.

[35:58] No numbers here.

Elliott Kalan

[35:59] Just letters.

[36:01] So, first off-

[36:03] Letters.

Dan McCoy

[36:04] This is just a donation.

[36:07] What?

[36:07] I want to say thank you for a donation.

[36:11] And the-

[36:12] To?

[36:13] The donors.

[36:14] To us.

[36:14] No, no, I mean who was the donor.

[36:16] Well-

[36:16] Who's getting the thank you?

[36:17] He says, my donation to the Flophouse is officially from the Eric Marsizak and his future wife foundation.

[36:23] Oh, that's very nice.

[36:25] Thank you.

[36:26] Star of Sandman.

Elliott Kalan

[36:28] Yes, that is Eric Marsizak, the star of the movie Sandman, which I highly recommend.

Dan McCoy

[36:31] If you want to see it on Netflix, it's S. Ampersand Man.

[36:37] It's a really good movie.

Elliott Kalan

[36:38] So we had a real Hollywood star donate money to us.

[36:41] That's really nice.

Stuart Wellington

[36:41] So other Hollywood stars, Nicolas Cage.

[36:45] I think it's time to start opening up those fat wallets.

Elliott Kalan

[36:48] Come on, Nicolas Cage.

[36:49] Liquidate one of your German castles and give the money to us.

[36:51] Sell a castle.

Dan McCoy

[36:52] Give us the money.

[36:53] We're keeping your career alive.

[36:54] So, this email is from Kurt, last name with health.

[37:01] And he says, I started-

[37:02] It's Kurt Loader.

[37:03] Possibly.

[37:04] I started listening to the Flophouse a few days ago and have been enjoying it very much.

[37:07] I wanted to pick up on a remark Elliot made on the Drive Angry in 3D Rated R podcast.

[37:14] In a tangent about Muppets Tonight, Elliot said that Clifford was a, quote, Rastafarian baboon.

[37:21] I believe that Clifford, if he's intended to be any animal, is alleged to be a catfish.

[37:25] And he has a link to a Wikipedia page about Clifford the Muppet.

[37:30] A catfish?

[37:30] Mm-hmm.

[37:31] And I have to say, I looked at the photo of Clifford and he does appear to have catfish whiskers.

Elliott Kalan

[37:38] I always assumed that that was a mustache.

[37:42] Yeah.

[37:43] Well, it plays both ways.

[37:45] So, I guess I'm the real racist here.

[37:47] Mm-hmm.

[37:47] Yeah.

[37:47] I apologize to the late Jim Henson and his production company.

Stuart Wellington

[37:50] Well, you're the racist one, right?

[37:53] No, Dan was the racist one.

[37:54] No, I thought Dan was the homophobic one.

Elliott Kalan

[37:56] Oh, that's right.

Stuart Wellington

[37:57] And I'm the party animal.

Elliott Kalan

[37:59] Wait a second.

[38:00] Why did you get that?

[38:01] Your characterization is so much more lovable than ours.

Stuart Wellington

[38:04] That's the thing, though.

Dan McCoy

[38:05] You can bestow these made-up negative qualities on us.

Stuart Wellington

[38:09] Well, sometimes my partying gets out of hand.

[38:11] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[38:11] But not to the point that it's a real problem.

Elliott Kalan

[38:15] I don't understand.

[38:17] One's a homophobe, one's a racist, and the other's a party animal.

[38:20] That seemed fair.

[38:21] That's unbalanced.

[38:22] Well.

Dan McCoy

[38:23] Okay.

[38:23] Well, Kurt goes on to say, incidentally, I haven't gone through your catalog completely,

[38:27] but I've noticed that most of the titles you've talked about have been more or less major movie releases.

[38:31] Yes.

[38:32] Have you spent much time on such new cult films as The Room, Birdemic, Shock and Terror, and other films so bad they're essentially unreleaseable?

[38:38] No, we have not.

[38:40] We've gone through this before.

[38:41] I mean, personal time.

[38:42] Yeah.

[38:42] Yeah, we've spent a lot of personal time.

[38:44] We've wasted a lot of time.

Elliott Kalan

[38:45] I mean, I've seen Birdemic, I think, three times.

[38:48] And most of the movies are shots of people driving.

[38:50] I've seen The Room, I think.

Elliott Kalan

[38:50] Three times.

[38:51] The Room I've seen any, I don't know how many times.

[38:53] But I feel like those movies are kind of taken care of.

Dan McCoy

[38:57] Yeah.

[38:57] And also.

[38:58] There's other places for that.

Elliott Kalan

[38:59] Yeah.

[38:59] We'll let the how did this get maids of the world.

Dan McCoy

[39:02] It is also like kicking a lame dog.

[39:06] Yeah.

[39:07] How would you do that?

[39:09] Well, you're not lame.

[39:10] The dog is lame.

[39:11] Oh, okay.

Elliott Kalan

[39:12] Yeah.

[39:13] Well, yeah.

[39:14] Everyone kind of knows they're bad and why they're bad.

[39:18] We'll take on the people who earn enough money that we hate them.

Dan McCoy

[39:22] Yeah.

[39:22] For making these crappy movies.

[39:24] The true villains.

Elliott Kalan

[39:25] Because say what you will about Tommy Wiseau.

[39:26] He has not seen a penny from The Room.

[39:28] Yeah.

[39:28] And probably never will.

Dan McCoy

[39:30] Well, he's also a real auteur.

Elliott Kalan

[39:32] Yes, he's a real auteur.

[39:33] Yeah.

[39:33] And we actually.

Stuart Wellington

[39:34] He's a realtor.

[39:34] That's what we're saying.

[39:35] We would actually probably enjoy watching those types of movies as opposed to the ones we

[39:39] find ourselves watching.

[39:40] Oh, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[39:40] I'd much rather watch The Room or Birdemic, Shock and Terror than I Am Number Four.

[39:44] Yeah.

[39:45] Or The Roommate.

[39:46] Yeah.

[39:46] Or what was the one where it was in.

[39:49] Gooby.

[39:50] I didn't see Gooby.

[39:51] I missed it.

[39:51] 10,000 BC.

[39:52] 10,000 BC was the worst.

[39:53] With the spear tooth.

[39:54] But Whiteout was.

[39:55] That was what I was thinking of.

[39:56] That was the worst.

[39:57] Spear tooth and the Mannix.

[39:59] Yeah.

[39:59] In 10,000 BC.

[40:01] Everyone's going to speak normal English except we're going to change what people call mammoths.

[40:05] They can call them Mannix.

[40:07] Now you feel like you're in a far off ancient wonderland.

[40:11] Now you feel like you're watching a cop show.

Dan McCoy

[40:14] Mannix.

[40:14] What?

[40:15] It's a show called Mannix.

[40:16] It's for old people.

[40:17] Oh, okay.

Elliott Kalan

[40:18] Yeah.

[40:18] I'll make more Alicia Keys references for you.

Dan McCoy

[40:20] So this is titled My Favorite New Bad Movie Podcast and it says, Dear Paul, I've been following

[40:28] your career for a long time from UCB to Human Giant.

[40:31] Wait a minute.

[40:32] And let me tell you, I think this is my favorite project of yours, your bad movie podcast.

[40:36] I've scoured the web up and down like a spider and I can't seem to find any other bad movie

[40:39] podcasts, which makes what you're doing truly unique.

[40:43] Add to the mix your wife and Jason Matsoukas and along with your A-list comedy guests, that's

[40:47] a recipe for a humorous souffle, one which can never collapse.

[40:51] If any other bad movie podcasts actually do exist, and I highly doubt it, I can't imagine

[40:55] that would be as entertaining as yours.

[40:57] I've enclosed a self-addressed stamped envelope.

[40:59] If you could please send me a season one DVD set of Human Giant signed by the cast,

[41:03] it would be appreciated.

[41:04] Thanks much.

[41:05] And that's from Andy, last name with help.

[41:08] So.

Elliott Kalan

[41:09] I think that went to the wrong place.

[41:11] I think they've clearly, who's Paul?

[41:14] Either we've got a modern day Jonathan Swift on our hands writing some set here.

[41:19] Or else that email somehow went through the wrong email address chain.

[41:23] The wrong tube.

[41:24] The wrong tube.

[41:25] Oh, they must have just written Bad Movie Podcast on the envelope and it got sent to us.

[41:29] Yeah.

[41:30] The same way how in like 1904 you could just draw a picture of glasses and teeth on an envelope

[41:34] and it would get sent to Teddy Roosevelt.

[41:36] Yeah.

[41:39] And teeth, eh?

[41:40] Because he had a big smile.

[41:41] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[41:43] So, uh.

[41:44] We got more letters?

[41:45] We do.

Dan McCoy

[41:46] What other letters for Paul Scheer do we have to answer?

[41:48] Dig deep into that mailbag, man.

[41:50] We have one more.

[41:51] We have one last letter.

[41:52] It says, uh.

[41:54] Last letter of the letter segment.

[41:56] Last letter of the night.

[41:58] I don't know why I agreed to let him take a song at this point.

Elliott Kalan

[42:01] Savor that last letter.

[42:02] I mean, he's been working on it a long time.

[42:04] Last.

[42:05] Last.

[42:05] On and on.

[42:05] Seems like it really interrupts the flow of it.

[42:09] Last letter.

[42:09] Well, no.

[42:10] I mean, that's part of it.

[42:11] It's like it flows.

[42:12] No more letters after this one.

[42:13] Doesn't it?

[42:13] No more letters.

[42:14] It brings things to the next pod show.

Dan McCoy

[42:17] Letters for none.

Elliott Kalan

[42:18] Letters for all.

[42:20] Last letter tonight.

Dan McCoy

[42:24] So this says, uh.

[42:25] Dan and the rest of the peaches.

Elliott Kalan

[42:26] Don't let it go.

[42:28] That last letter.

[42:29] Hold it to your heart.

[42:32] Dan.

[42:32] Love it forever.

[42:34] The last letter.

[42:35] Don't go apart.

Dan McCoy

[42:38] Okay.

[42:39] We have lost all of our new listeners.

[42:41] Yes.

Elliott Kalan

[42:41] No, we've gained like a thousand new listeners.

[42:44] Uh.

[42:44] The words.

[42:46] Kids like glee, dude.

[42:48] Yeah.

[42:49] Those fucking glee kids are going to listen to that shit.

[42:51] Gleeks are going to love that.

[42:53] Somebody just poked their head in and said, congratulations, you just recorded your first

[42:57] number one hit.

Stuart Wellington

[42:58] Ha ha.

[42:58] It was your cat.

[42:59] He had sunglasses on.

Elliott Kalan

[43:00] That means he's cool.

[43:02] Or blind.

[43:05] Same thing.

Dan McCoy

[43:06] Yeah.

[43:06] Kids love interruptions.

[43:09] Uh.

[43:09] It says Dan.

[43:10] Kids hate interruptions.

Elliott Kalan

[43:11] Dan and the rest.

[43:12] That's all they do.

[43:13] Forgot the thing.

Stuart Wellington

[43:14] The little phones and sticker books.

Elliott Kalan

[43:16] And their shoes with the lights on them and the wheels.

[43:18] Okay.

[43:19] So there's no more letters, guys.

[43:20] No.

[43:20] Don't read those letters.

[43:21] Come on, Dan.

[43:22] I'm sorry.

[43:23] Uh.

[43:23] Candy cigarettes.

Stuart Wellington

[43:27] Did you say stickers?

[43:28] Yes.

Dan McCoy

[43:30] Dan and the rest of the peaches, which, by the way, is the correct way to refer to Elliot

[43:35] and Stuart.

[43:36] The rest.

[43:36] The original podcast title.

[43:38] I'm the only one who deserves my actual name to be used.

Elliott Kalan

[43:42] Because you're not a peach.

[43:44] Just discovered.

[43:45] You are a moldy pair.

Dan McCoy

[43:45] The podcast through the AV Club's write-up.

[43:48] Yes.

[43:48] Thank you.

[43:49] I've burned through most of the back catalog and equally await new episodes.

[43:54] Since you guys are-

[43:55] Glad you're enjoying it.

[43:55] Since you guys are the arbiters of what's spookily bad or one and a half boners-

Elliott Kalan

[44:00] Wormy boners.

[44:03] I-

[44:03] That's a great female.

[44:04] Yeah.

[44:04] Those were never good boners.

Dan McCoy

[44:06] I wanted you guys to help settle an argument I've had with a friend.

[44:09] My friend argues there are no movies that are, quote, bad, and that any evaluation of a movie

[44:13] is based on arbitrary beliefs and unique life experiences of the viewer.

[44:18] He argues that even a movie's poor technical quality can't make a movie bad because some

[44:22] people prefer poor production values as a type of art.

[44:26] I disagree and believe that some art, whether it's movies, books, or music, can be better

[44:31] than other art.

[44:31] Without sounding too snobby, there are some objective truths that Shakespeare traps into

[44:36] that have kept it around for 400 years while other works have fallen away.

[44:40] His argument is more logical and it's hard for me to argue my points.

[44:43] But it just doesn't feel right to say 10,000 BC is as good as a Coen Brothers movie.

[44:48] Anyway, I'd be happy to hear your thoughts.

Elliott Kalan

[44:50] It's as good as, like, The Lady Killers.

Dan McCoy

[44:54] And Tom O'Rourty.

Elliott Kalan

[44:56] Nanny wasn't there.

[44:57] No, that's a great movie.

[44:59] Anyway, Dan, if you would finish the letter, please.

Dan McCoy

[45:01] But even if you don't get around to it, thanks for the podcast.

[45:03] Keep up the good work.

[45:04] Mike, last name withheld.

Elliott Kalan

[45:05] Well, thanks for starting to listen to the show, Mike, and we're glad you're enjoying

[45:07] it so much.

[45:08] And you are right.

[45:09] Tell that song.

[45:10] Yeah.

[45:11] Yeah.

[45:11] When that song came on, Mike was probably like, this is the best podcast I've ever heard.

[45:17] This is my ringtone now.

[45:20] Wait, what's a ringtone?

[45:22] I might actually put that as a ringtone.

[45:23] I'm just joking.

[45:24] Are you a young person or an old person?

[45:26] I can never figure it out.

Dan McCoy

[45:27] I mix it up.

[45:28] Every time I get a call from Elliot, I'll hear that irritating song.

[45:31] Last letter tonight.

[45:34] Pick up the phone.

[45:35] I think that there was a – Roger Ebert had a quote.

[45:39] I can't remember the specific – but I think he was talking –

[45:41] He said, thumbs down.

[45:43] Yep.

Stuart Wellington

[45:44] I can't remember what he was saying about it.

[45:46] But he said something like, I'm not going to review Human Centipede.

Dan McCoy

[45:50] There was – I think it was that movie – what's the movie that was a gangster film that

[45:57] had Sean Connery and Matthew Broderick.

[46:00] The Untouchables.

[46:01] No.

[46:02] Sean Connery and Matthew Broderick?

[46:03] Yeah.

[46:03] I think it was like Career Opportunities or something like that.

[46:07] No, that's a –

[46:08] That's a Clash song.

[46:10] No, it's a comedy.

[46:12] I can't remember.

[46:15] Family Business or something like that.

[46:17] There was a terrible gangster film that clearly has lived through time because I can't even

[46:23] remember the name of it.

[46:25] But there was a reviewer who said that it was better than The Godfather.

[46:30] And Roger Ebert said to him, sometimes matters of opinion shade over into errors of fact.

[46:36] And I think that that's true.

[46:37] Very nice.

[46:37] There are some things that are objectively better.

[46:40] And it doesn't – obviously personal preference can come into it.

[46:46] There are movies that I recognize are good movies while still not particularly enjoying

[46:51] them.

[46:52] Yeah.

[46:52] And you can have both feelings in your head at the same time if you're not an idiot like

[46:57] your friend.

[46:58] Wow.

[46:59] I've turned.

[46:59] I've turned on them.

Elliott Kalan

[47:00] Okay.

[47:00] I'll take over from here.

[47:02] Yes.

[47:03] There are movies that are – there are some movies that are just bad.

[47:06] Even if – and there are movies that people like a lot that are not very good.

[47:09] And it doesn't mean that they're good.

[47:14] I used to have this – I actually used to have this – I used to have this

[47:16] I used to have this very same argument a lot with my college roommate late in the night

[47:20] when Star Trek Voyager was over.

[47:23] And there was nothing to talk about except subjective versus objective experience.

[47:27] And I always came down to the side of you can – there are some standards that you can

[47:31] judge by.

[47:31] Not everything is subjective.

[47:32] Voyager was the one with Odo on it, right?

[47:35] No, that was – was it?

[47:37] I don't remember.

[47:38] No, that was Deep Star 6.

[47:40] It was Deep Star 6.

[47:42] Voyager was the one with Lady Captain Janeway.

[47:45] Okay.

[47:45] And they would voyage a lot.

[47:49] Okay.

[47:50] But yeah, no, I think your friend is wrong.

[47:53] It's hard to disprove it.

[47:55] But you can say that if some – there's nobody – I don't think there's anyone who's like,

[48:00] I like movies that are made bad because they tell me they're more truthful.

[48:04] The people who say they – people who like bad movies usually like to laugh at them.

[48:08] Even if they say there's something realer about them, they're still laughing at them in a way.

Dan McCoy

[48:11] Or they enjoy not having themselves text, which is not always a bad thing.

Elliott Kalan

[48:16] Well, that's not the same as – like a poorly produced movie and a dumb movie are not the

[48:21] same thing necessarily.

Dan McCoy

[48:22] But I think that it enters into the same conversation.

[48:29] Like a bad movie like I Am Number 4, which –

[48:33] No one likes.

[48:34] – is aggressively mediocre.

[48:35] Like I could see someone – well, like a kid enjoying it just because it hits –

[48:41] Because it was just like bright colors and lights.

Stuart Wellington

[48:43] Yeah, and he's got his baseball cap on backwards.

[48:45] But that kid is wrong.

[48:47] Okay.

[48:47] And should be punished.

[48:49] So he should turn the hat around or –

[48:51] Yep, to protect his face from the shame.

[48:54] That's what a baseball cap's for.

[48:55] For blocking out shame?

[48:57] Okay.

[48:58] A baseball cap is for telling people what team you like.

Dan McCoy

[49:00] For blocking out UV shame rays.

[49:02] They can give you shame cancer.

[49:03] Nope.

[49:04] Okay.

[49:04] This is straight and straight and straight and straight and straight.

Elliott Kalan

[49:05] Well, anyway, this has been a not very satisfying answer to your question.

[49:09] But I think you're right.

Stuart Wellington

[49:10] What do you think, Stuart?

[49:12] Personally, if somebody started making that argument with me, I would laugh and then try

[49:16] and change the subject.

[49:17] So –

[49:18] Stuart is pleasant and conflict-averse.

Dan McCoy

[49:20] Yeah, that's true.

Stuart Wellington

[49:21] Well, I just think that's a stupid argument and that's a type of argument that somebody

[49:24] would have with me that I wouldn't want to be involved in.

[49:26] So I'd start talking about my favorite X-Men characters.

[49:30] You'd say, whatever, dude.

[49:31] Or why – wasn't that a great episode when Alf had to help deliver that baby in the elevator?

Elliott Kalan

[49:37] I thought no.

[49:38] You'd think of Zach Morris.

[49:39] No, I thought it was Alf.

[49:40] Maybe they both did it at the same time.

Stuart Wellington

[49:42] Oh, crossover.

[49:44] It was the same person.

Elliott Kalan

[49:44] So who are your favorite X-Men characters?

[49:46] I would love it.

Stuart Wellington

[49:46] I assume Rila Chaney, the intergalactic rock star.

[49:48] Absolutely.

[49:49] Mojo.

[49:50] Yep, Mojo.

[49:51] And Forge, the guy who can invent anything.

Elliott Kalan

[49:55] The guy whose mutant superpower is that he's a good inventor.

Stuart Wellington

[49:58] He's also a shaman.

Elliott Kalan

[49:59] You're objectively wrong.

[50:00] He has the same mutant power as Thomas Edison.

Stuart Wellington

[50:05] And it's wasted on fixing the blackbird all the time.

[50:08] Yes.

[50:09] So, comics talk.

Elliott Kalan

[50:12] You're listening to Comics Talk, the comics podcast disguised as a bad movie podcast.

Dan McCoy

[50:18] The most complicated Trojan Horse podcast out there.

Stuart Wellington

[50:21] So thanks for all the letters, guys.

[50:23] Yeah, thanks for all the letters.

[50:24] Let's hope you're still listening after this awesome episode.

[50:27] What else do we do now?

Elliott Kalan

[50:29] Well, it hasn't been one of our huge triumphs.

[50:32] It's okay.

[50:32] For anyone who's just coming in, coming off the AV Club, and this is your first episode.

Dan McCoy

[50:37] Are we supposed to feel bad about ourselves?

[50:38] Let them make their own decisions about it.

[50:40] Let's not sell ourselves out.

[50:42] Okay, you can cut this part out.

Stuart Wellington

[50:45] But not the song.

[50:47] Leave the song.

[50:47] Don't edit the song out.

Elliott Kalan

[50:48] The song should extend.

[50:50] Loop it.

[50:50] Loop the song.

[50:52] Look.

[50:52] Throw in a beat.

[50:53] I'll do a couple more verses.

Dan McCoy

[50:55] I'll just loop the song under the whole podcast.

Elliott Kalan

[50:57] That's great.

[50:58] Just erase our voices.

[51:00] Just keep the song.

[51:02] Do a movie minute that's actually 30 minutes of just the song.

[51:06] Okay.

[51:06] It'll be bigger than Ziggy.

Dan McCoy

[51:08] All right.

[51:09] So, Stuart, you're asking what we do now?

[51:12] Yeah.

[51:12] What's next?

[51:13] You're a very forgetful person.

[51:15] Sure.

[51:15] You forget the segments of the podcast.

[51:17] Even though you've done almost 100 of them now.

Stuart Wellington

[51:19] So now do we talk about movies we actually like?

[51:22] More than 100?

[51:22] Holy shit.

[51:23] Perfect.

[51:23] Holy shit.

[51:24] In a summer filled with hot superhero movies.

[51:28] The movie I want to recommend is Sam Raimi's Darkman.

[51:31] Which I just recently rewatched.

[51:35] And it's really awesome.

[51:37] And having...

[51:38] Not Die, Darkman, Die?

[51:40] No, not that one.

[51:41] Or not The Return of Durant?

Dan McCoy

[51:43] No, not that one.

[51:44] The first one.

[51:44] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[51:45] Last Tango and Darkman.

[51:46] The thing that's great about it is that having...

[51:48] Moon over Darkman.

[51:48] I haven't seen it since I've seen the Sam Raimi's Spider-Man movies.

[51:53] And it's funny to see how much the style of Spider-Man comes from Darkman.

[52:00] I mean, obviously you can see the Evil Dead influence.

[52:01] Sure.

[52:02] But like there's many scenes that are almost shot for shot from like the Spider-Man stuff.

Elliott Kalan

[52:06] Well, like when Darkman fought Dr. Octopus.

[52:08] Yes, that scene specifically.

Stuart Wellington

[52:11] So if you're out there, it's on HBO On Demand right now.

[52:15] Watch Darkman.

[52:16] It rules.

[52:19] How was that?

[52:19] Was that a good...

[52:20] That was a recommendation.

[52:21] I didn't even talk about a superhero movie.

[52:22] That was good.

Elliott Kalan

[52:23] I'm just so happy to hear you recommend a movie you've never recommended before.

[52:28] Because every podcast...

[52:29] It's going ahead of the family.

[52:31] Every podcast I go out of my way to pick a movie I haven't recommended before.

[52:34] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[52:35] But you have the same three that you usually go to.

[52:37] I don't watch that many movies.

[52:38] Mainly Head of the Family, Castle Freak, and Invisible Maniac.

Dan McCoy

[52:43] Dan?

[52:45] Well, I haven't seen a lot of movies, but I did purchase a number of Mill Creek Entertainment DVD collections.

[52:54] I purchased four collections of 12 movies each.

[52:58] Mill Creek Entertainment has bought the Crown International Film Library.

[53:03] There's a lot of people out there who are notably folks like Quentin Tarantino who are really into sort of like the grindhouse exploitation films.

[53:13] And I've always found a lot of those movies to be more pleasurable to read about than actually watch.

[53:20] Because even though there's some amazing things you can find in them, they're often draggy and terrible otherwise.

[53:29] But the two that I have watched already off of the Mill Creek collections, I've enjoyed.

[53:34] One was on the Cult Cinema Favorites and one was off of the Bombshells collection.

[53:39] And those were Death Row Game Show and Police Women.

[53:43] And Death Row Game Show is sort of a Running Man style, you know, like convicts on Death Row and a game show scenario.

[53:52] But it was much more low.

[53:54] You know, it's like an actual game show.

[53:57] Just like people in the soundstage doing stupid game show shit.

[54:01] Including one thing was Dance of the Seven Boners where a woman comes out.

[54:06] I'm listening.

[54:07] A woman comes out and strips.

[54:09] And if the electrodes attach to the man's penis move, he gets electrocuted.

[54:15] This movie was shown to children.

[54:17] No.

[54:18] They showed this in schools.

[54:19] No.

[54:19] It was an R-rated comedy.

[54:21] It was a dark comedy.

[54:23] Kind of like a Paul Bartel style film.

[54:26] It drags a little in the middle but it's fun.

[54:28] And Police Women is also kind of draggy parts.

[54:33] But the opening in particular is actually a really nice low budget jailbreak sequence with some ridiculous high kicking police woman karate in it.

[54:44] So those were both fun.

Elliott Kalan

[54:47] I will recommend an older film.

[54:50] Sure.

[54:51] For a change.

[54:53] For a change.

[54:53] I recommend an old movie.

[54:55] This one is called Gertie the Dinosaur.

[54:58] And it is.

[54:59] No, it's not.

[55:01] It's called The Train Robbery.

[55:04] The Great Train Robbery.

[55:06] The Train Robbery is the one people don't really remember.

[55:08] The Great Train Robbery was the really good one.

[55:10] Okay.

[55:12] Anyhoo, so.

[55:14] All the dead air.

Stuart Wellington

[55:15] Oh, boy.

[55:16] You're recommending Baby the Lost Dinosaur, right?

[55:19] Yeah.

[55:19] The jazz singer.

Elliott Kalan

[55:20] It's called Baby the Legend of the Lost Dinosaur.

[55:23] It's called Super Mario Brothers the movie.

[55:27] I like – I recently – a movie that I – I'm a big Alfred Hitchcock fan and one of his that I've been avoiding I guess for a long time was Young and Innocent because it seemed – it doesn't have the best reputation and it didn't seem that exciting.

[55:39] But I finally saw it recently and it's actually a really fun, very small scale Hitchcock crime movie.

[55:47] You know, the wrong guy is accused of a crime and he's on the run and he has to prove his innocence and there's a girl that comes along with him for the ride.

[55:54] And it's all very light and kind of silly.

[55:58] It never feels that dangerous and it never feels that suspenseful, frankly.

[56:02] But it's always fun and there's a lot of very funny moments of just like, you know, hip, hip, I'm an English character and I'm going to interact with another character like this.

[56:10] What, what, governor?

[56:11] And things like that.

[56:12] And it's actually a lot of fun and I would highly recommend it.

[56:16] It's a good movie to watch just as like a – just like a surprise – just as a treat, just as a surprise.

[56:24] Say you come home from work, you're tired.

[56:25] You don't have it in you to watch The Tree of Life.

[56:27] Sure.

[56:28] So you watch Young and Innocent.

Dan McCoy

[56:30] I've had that on my Netflix queue for a long time because it's on the instant view and I've been avoiding it too just because, you know, it doesn't have a great reputation.

[56:39] But now you've sold me.

Elliott Kalan

[56:40] It's very fun and there's a lot of neat shots and moments in it.

[56:43] It's a – it's one movie that if it came out now, people would think it was great.

[56:48] But –

[56:49] Just like Darkman.

[56:50] Just like Darkman.

[56:51] But compared to Hitchcock's other movies, it's just not as good.

[56:54] But it's a lot of fun.

[56:55] And there's – and the villain at the end is performing in blackface as part of his job and it's almost like it makes the villain that much eviler because he's a racist.

Dan McCoy

[57:07] Just like Elliot.

Elliott Kalan

[57:08] Yep.

[57:08] No, I'm not – I don't understand how Stuart got off with just being a party animal.

Dan McCoy

[57:15] It's Mike Ross to bear to be honest with you.

[57:18] So I think we're winding down.

[57:20] I think you're going to hear in our voices.

[57:22] We did it.

[57:23] We did it, guys.

[57:23] We made it.

[57:23] This is just like the end of a marathon.

Elliott Kalan

[57:25] Our bodies are shutting down.

[57:26] At last the nightmare is over.

[57:27] Yep.

[57:28] Nipples bleeding.

[57:29] We want to be able to turn the air conditioner back on.

[57:31] We just got to wrap ourselves in one of those silver blankets they give you at the finish line.

[57:35] Yeah.

[57:35] Have a banana.

[57:37] Is that what you do after –

[57:39] Yeah.

[57:39] Casting a banana.

[57:40] Oh, I thought because your body is so tired it's devolving into chimp form.

[57:44] That too.

[57:44] Bananas are the only things that you want to eat at the time.

[57:47] All right.

Dan McCoy

[57:47] Well, on that note, I'd like to say goodnight.

[57:51] I've been Dan McCoy.

[57:52] I've been Stuart Wellington.

Elliott Kalan

[57:53] And I am a very tired Elliot Kalen.

[57:56] Goodnight, everyone.

[57:58] Goodnight.

[57:59] Yeah, no.

[57:59] Another song.

[58:00] Keep it up.

[58:00] From the Flophouse.

[58:02] Goodnight, everybody.

[58:03] Goodnight.

[58:03] From the Flophouse.

[58:04] Kids fucking like me, man.

[58:05] That's what I'm saying.

[58:05] More letters next time.

Stuart Wellington

[58:11] I see you as a distant – a distant parent.

Elliott Kalan

[58:14] Distant – yeah, well, yeah.

[58:15] Well, when the Flophouse gets in the way, certainly.

Stuart Wellington

[58:17] That's the thing.

[58:18] They'll understand.

[58:19] They'll understand when they get older.

[58:20] They'll understand.

[58:20] It's like – it's like King Tut's kids were like, holy shit, he was building all kinds

[58:24] of pyramids.

[58:25] King Tut didn't have any kids.

Dan McCoy

[58:26] He died young.

Stuart Wellington

[58:27] No, but he built all kinds of pyramids, right?

[58:29] No, he didn't.

[58:29] No, like with – he had his army of mummies and shit built it, right?

[58:34] Yeah, exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[58:36] Kids were like, he's spending all his time with the mummies.

[58:38] King Tut's kids would wrap themselves in toilet paper to look like mummies.

[58:41] Do you like me now, Dad?

[58:42] He's like, no, you're like a stinking Yeti.

The Flop House: Episode #83 - I Am Number Four

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