Ep. #440 - Borderlands

Elliott Kalan

[0:00] Hi, Floppers. Before we start this episode, I just wanted to remind you we are in the middle of FlopTV Season 2.

[0:06] That's right. The one-hour internet televised Flophouse TV show is here for you the first Saturday of every month through February.

[0:14] Just go to theflophouse.simpleticks.com and get your tickets or season pass for this all-new Flophouse TV stuff.

[0:22] We're covering movies we've never covered before. We've got video segments. It's amazing.

[0:27] Just go to theflophouse.simpleticks.com for FlopTV Season 2. This time, it's personal.

Dan McCoy

[0:33] On this episode, we discuss Borderlands.

Elliott Kalan

[0:38] Borderlands. Think that I'm going to lose my hands. You just keep on pushing movies over the Borderlands. Borderlands.

Stuart Wellington

[0:50] Is that what the movie's about?

[0:51] I was so close to doing the same thing.

[0:54] Hey, everyone, and welcome to the Flophouse. I'm Dan McCoy.

[1:20] I'm Stuart Wellington.

Elliott Kalan

[1:22] I'm Elliot Kael, and I still have a little bit of a cold, so I may be coughing my way through the episode, but don't worry.

Stuart Wellington

[1:28] That's all right, Elliot.

[1:29] Hey, Elliot, it's that time of year. It's that time of year, guys. We all got colds.

Dan McCoy

[1:33] Yeah, plus there were like whole years of the podcast when I was sick, so, you know.

[1:38] Uh-huh. Sick in the head.

[1:39] Your turn.

[1:41] All right.

Elliott Kalan

[1:44] Dan, that was the name of your Calypso album. You can't get mad at Stuart for referencing it.

Dan McCoy

[1:51] That's my genre, apparently.

[1:53] So this is a podcast where I get roasted, but it's also a podcast where we watch a bad movie and then we talk about it.

[2:00] A movie that society has deemed bad. We will be the final arbiters eventually.

[2:06] Yeah.

[2:07] For all time.

[2:08] In this case, oh boy, we got a big sweet meatball here.

[2:14] A sweet ball.

[2:17] Borderlands, the movie based on a video game. Let's start out here. I have no familiarity with this video game. I have to admit, I kind of stopped playing games regularly in the platformer era and haven't done that much later.

[2:34] Stuart, you put your hand up.

Elliott Kalan

[2:35] You're more of a Prince of Persia type guy.

Stuart Wellington

[2:38] Yeah. Dan was like, is there a Mario in this? So yeah, I have played, I think, the second Borderlands, maybe the third. I don't remember.

[2:47] I picked up one of the random ones. They are described as a role-playing game, which I feel like is a misnomer because you're not really role-playing.

[2:53] You're just running around shooting things and you occasionally have missions where you have to go around and shoot other things.

[2:59] And the idea is that you're constantly shooting and fighting and enemies are constantly dropping better and better weapons.

[3:06] And the whole idea is that it's a loot based game.

[3:09] So you're like, you're constantly killing people for their weapons with the hope of getting a rare or like crazy loot weapon thing.

[3:18] And you can play with your friends online and run around and kill more stuff.

Elliott Kalan

[3:21] So it sounds like there's a lot of socially redeeming value to the gameplay and the message of the game.

Stuart Wellington

[3:26] And an exciting story to play along with.

Elliott Kalan

[3:28] I'm sorry, is that what you're looking for in your video games, Elliot?

[3:30] Is that your...

[3:32] Not entirely, no.

[3:33] But it's just the more the older I get, the more I have to think about what lesson would my child take from this game if they were playing it.

[3:40] And, you know...

[3:41] Goombas need to be stumped on.

Dan McCoy

[3:45] They're going to take the right lesson, which is get that loot.

[3:47] I mean, I guess that's a what-if scenario.

[3:49] But if you're playing the game alone, I think it's fine.

[3:54] Yeah, I don't...

[3:55] Yeah, Borderlands...

[3:56] This movie...

[3:57] I have to say, there's a certain, like, zippy, like, neon-ness to some of the aesthetic, or at least, like, bright colors, that I actually enjoyed.

[4:06] As cheap as the movie can look sometimes.

[4:08] But I assume that that comes from the game.

[4:10] I assume that that's all stuff lifted from the game.

[4:12] Is that true, Stuart?

Stuart Wellington

[4:14] Yeah, the game is notable for being very bright.

[4:18] And also, I don't know if this is the most accurate description, but it has a kind of, like, cell-shading classic art or animation style that I've seen replicated on Warhammer figures to great contrast.

Dan McCoy

[4:32] Yeah, I was talking to someone last night about this, and they were saying the same thing.

[4:35] That it's, like, it has, like, kind of lines on the outside to make it look a little more comic book-y, maybe.

[4:43] Yeah, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[4:44] So, maybe this would have been served better as an animated movie, possibly, as an adult animated movie.

Stuart Wellington

[4:51] A hundred percent.

[4:51] It's also a game that is, like, constant things being thrown in your face.

[4:58] Bullets, like, loot.

[5:00] Eyes.

[5:01] Like, notifications.

[5:02] Rabbit bombs.

[5:03] Rabbit bombs.

[5:03] And there is, of course, a lot of it is being narrated by a very annoying robot, here voiced by all-star voice actor Jack Black.

Elliott Kalan

[5:13] Now, does the game also feel like it is desperately trying to be Guardians of the Galaxy, or is that just this movie?

Stuart Wellington

[5:19] I feel like this is kind of an attempt to take the, that kind of general, like, snappiness and sassiness and turn it into, I mean, I feel like Guardians of the Galaxy is at least the most palatable way to do this.

[5:36] And that they're trying to take this and push it toward something that's a little more accessible for, say, a normal person, as opposed to a, I don't know, like, Mountain Dew, Code Red-fueled teenager.

Dan McCoy

[5:51] Yeah, well, I mean, I guess let's get into it.

[5:54] This is, you know, this is a movie, I will say, also up front, went through a lot of production difficulties.

[6:00] Like, Eli Roth's name is the only listed director name, but I, it was my understanding that at least half of this was reshoots done by a later director.

[6:11] No, it was done by the guy who did Terminator Dark Fate.

[6:14] They brought him in.

[6:15] Yeah, Steven Spielberg did that too.

[6:16] Late in the game.

[6:17] Okay.

[6:18] I thought you said D.B. Cooper.

[6:22] There are several more.

Elliott Kalan

[6:23] Director, better Cooper.

[6:25] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[6:26] Yeah.

[6:27] There's several, several more screenwriters who worked on this, as is always the case.

[6:31] I mean, that's, that's, that's, every, every movie has, has extra screenwriters.

[6:34] Yeah.

[6:34] Um, but it went through a lot of, like, originally, you know, there's, but the, Roth delivered an R-rated cut, apparently, and then they didn't want that.

[6:43] They wanted a PG-13 cut.

[6:45] It got wildly changed.

[6:46] Nothing but dicks, I believe, is what that cut is called.

Stuart Wellington

[6:49] The, uh, one of the screenwriters is what, Craig, Craig Mazin, Craig Mazin of, uh, Chernobyl.

[6:56] Yeah.

[6:57] Wow.

[6:58] Similar, similar tone.

Elliott Kalan

[7:00] He's the one, he's the screenwriter.

[7:01] I mean, he also wrote, like, the Hangover movies and things like that, you know, like, it's the, he's Chernobyl.

[7:05] Similar tone to Chernobyl?

[7:06] Chernobyl is the outlier in his, in his filmography.

[7:09] Chernobyl is the ultimate Hangover, if you ask me.

[7:12] But he, but yeah, his name was, he had his name removed from the credits at a certain point, so.

Dan McCoy

[7:16] Well, it's interesting that it went through so many hands, including, you know, some big screenwriters.

[7:21] Considering that every line in this seems like a cliche that was lifted from a different film.

[7:27] Like, I don't feel like there's any sort of line of dialogue that I'm like, yeah, that's new.

[7:33] You know, it all feels like.

Elliott Kalan

[7:35] It, it does feel like it, there's certain movies where you're like, oh, oh, they started using the AI program.

[7:40] Okay, that AI program, they started using it to make movies.

[7:42] And this is.

[7:42] Yeah.

[7:43] Unfortunately, one of them, even though we know from the documented history that human beings worked on this movie and made it, you know.

[7:50] Mm-hmm.

Stuart Wellington

[7:51] Yeah.

[7:51] So there's, like, at any one point, a character's going to be saying something like, well, that happened.

[7:57] Or.

[7:57] Yes, yeah.

[7:58] I don't know.

Dan McCoy

[8:00] Yeah, it's all on that basic level.

[8:02] That's got to hurt.

[8:03] Mm-hmm.

[8:04] So let's, let's start talking about the movie.

[8:07] This movie, of course, does what all great Flophouse films do.

[8:12] And it leaps right into the narrator voiceover right away.

[8:18] We learn.

Elliott Kalan

[8:19] But this narrator, Dan, this narrator voiceover's got a little bit of attitude.

[8:22] A little bit of sass.

[8:22] A little bit of sass and a little bit of cynicism.

[8:24] Not at the beginning, though.

Dan McCoy

[8:25] At the beginning, it's deadly serious until she changes.

[8:29] So we know it's going to be a little different.

[8:31] A little bit of a vocal record scratch.

[8:33] We do things a little differently here at Borderlands.

[8:37] Some say a little bit worse.

[8:39] Bottomless wings.

[8:39] You serve you the dessert first.

[8:44] Yeah.

[8:44] Yeah, Aridians.

[8:45] Aridians.

[8:46] These aliens to us, not to them.

[8:49] They're just Aridians.

[8:50] I'm going to stop you right there, Dan.

[8:51] I'm already bored.

[8:53] I'm already bored.

[8:54] Let me change my phone real quick.

[8:55] Okay.

[8:55] You want to talk about another movie?

[8:57] How's Indiana?

[8:58] You're on the road.

Stuart Wellington

[8:59] Yeah, yeah.

[9:00] I'm spending a lot of time with my parents.

[9:02] They started watching Foundations, so that's going to keep them busy for a while.

Dan McCoy

[9:06] Interesting.

[9:06] Interesting choice.

Stuart Wellington

[9:08] I mean, last time I came to visit, it was Shogun.

[9:10] I just popped Shogun on, and they were like, whoop.

[9:14] They're like iPad kids.

Dan McCoy

[9:17] Yeah, distract them.

[9:18] Distract them a little bit.

[9:18] But Aridians used to rule the universe.

[9:22] They left fragments of their highly advanced technology around, and that was what civilization sprung up from this.

[9:31] But there's a vault, a fabled vault on the planet of Pandora where all their real good stuff is hidden.

[9:39] And that's turned – what?

Stuart Wellington

[9:41] Real quick.

[9:42] When you name something Pandora, does that mean it's full of good stuff?

Dan McCoy

[9:47] Yeah.

[9:47] Unobtainium and whatnot.

[9:49] It's all there.

[9:50] Yeah, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[9:50] It usually means that there's no bad effect.

Dan McCoy

[9:54] Yeah, everything's going to be fine.

[9:55] Sure, just in case you've forgotten because you're in a different town.

[9:59] You don't have to raise your hand, although I do appreciate it.

[10:02] I do appreciate that you do that rather than interrupting me, so maybe I shouldn't argue with it.

Elliott Kalan

[10:06] It's like a little visual cue for all the listeners at home.

[10:09] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[10:09] You guys ever been to an Au Bon Pandora, and you just get a chocolate croissant when you open it up, all the evils of the world come out?

Stuart Wellington

[10:16] I like to call it a Pandora chocolate.

Dan McCoy

[10:20] Sure, that's what they call it in France, yeah.

[10:23] Okay, so because everyone knows –

Elliott Kalan

[10:26] Guys, you ever been to Pandora Express, and you just want to get that orange chicken, and then it turns out all the evils of the world are in it?

Dan McCoy

[10:31] Yeah, but at the end, you open up the fortune cookie, and there's hope inside, so that's good.

[10:37] Oh, yeah.

[10:38] In bed.

Elliott Kalan

[10:40] How do they get the hope inside the cookie?

[10:42] That's the thing I always wonder.

Dan McCoy

[10:46] So corporations and treasure seekers –

[10:48] Vault hunters, Dan.

[10:50] They're called vault hunters.

[10:50] Vault hunters.

[10:51] They all want to find what's in this vault.

[10:54] And of course, you know it.

[10:57] There's a prophecy.

[10:58] Gotta be.

[10:59] I don't know who prophesied this or why, but –

[11:01] The Iridians, I guess, before they died.

[11:04] A daughter of Aridia would be the one who will open the vault and restore order to the planet.

[11:09] And then we see –

Elliott Kalan

[11:12] Stuart responds to that with what I believe the children understand as a jerk-off motion.

Stuart Wellington

[11:17] But like a real soft and sensitive one.

[11:20] Like I care about the ghost.

[11:22] Yeah.

[11:22] Very generous and caring.

Dan McCoy

[11:24] He's saying that this is a great turn of events because it causes pleasure.

[11:28] Yeah, exactly.

[11:29] Exactly.

[11:30] Gives the gift of pleasure.

[11:32] But Dan –

Elliott Kalan

[11:32] So, Dan, and the person doing this voiceover, they're like, I believe in this prophecy and this is great, right?

[11:37] That's the way that they leave us?

Dan McCoy

[11:39] They're pretty sardonic about it.

[11:41] I don't remember exactly what they say, but this is –

[11:43] I think she calls it a load of shit or something like that.

[11:46] Oh, yeah.

[11:46] Okay.

[11:46] You know.

[11:47] So, we see this space station where Tina, who's, you know, a sassy, amoral girl, is being –

[11:57] It's unclear what's going on here because it seems like it's a rescue by her dad.

[12:03] Later on, we find that it's quite the opposite.

[12:06] And I couldn't tell whether that was the movie deliberately misleading me.

[12:11] It was the movie being difficult to understand or it was just my fault.

[12:16] But –

Elliott Kalan

[12:17] I think you're supposed to have those questions in mind because it looks like she's being rescued from a prison of some kind.

[12:22] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[12:23] Mm-hmm.

[12:23] Because there's other people imprisoned on this thing, this space station.

[12:27] Yes.

Elliott Kalan

[12:27] My question is why is – so, why is she imprisoned on like a – if she's being – we'll find out later she's being held by this corporation

[12:35] because they want to – they've genetically created her as a clone to open up this vault.

[12:39] So, why is she being held on like a prison satellite with Krieg, a monster psycho who is just violent?

[12:45] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[12:45] But he's kind of – he's actually a good guy.

[12:48] I think he's a good guy.

Elliott Kalan

[12:49] You'd think you'd keep her somewhere that was probably like a little bit safer and also not as liable to be part of a prison riot.

[12:56] But again, that's just me.

[12:57] I'm not Borderlands.

[12:57] That's just me.

[12:58] I'm not the head of an intergalactic company.

[13:00] Maybe I don't know.

[13:00] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[13:01] If Elliot was in charge, he'd store in some kind of nursery with a bunch of other kids, like little wrinkled up kids with tattoos on their hands.

Elliott Kalan

[13:07] Like blue skin with wrinkles and numbers tattoos on their hands.

[13:09] There'd be a huge rabbit right there, like a huge rabbit that can turn into a monster.

Stuart Wellington

[13:14] That'll keep those kids from freaking out and blowing crap up.

Elliott Kalan

[13:17] It's what you got.

[13:18] Look, you got a powerful kid.

[13:20] You keep them in a nursery so they feel like a baby.

[13:22] Otherwise, yeah, they're going to blow stuff up with their minds.

[13:23] Thank you.

[13:24] I don't want my little blue wrinkled kids getting out.

[13:26] Yeah.

[13:26] This guy gets it.

[13:28] What you definitely don't do is you don't introduce a street punk who just got mind powers to this group of kind of sheltered kids because he's going to give them bad ideas.

[13:35] Suddenly, there's going to be like milk dripping out of those giant rabbits.

[13:38] You don't want that.

[13:38] Elliot, the waveforms he has is unprecedented.

[13:42] That's true.

[13:43] He does have unprecedented waveforms.

[13:44] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[13:44] He's talking about Akira.

[13:46] Yes, we're talking about Akira, Daniel.

[13:47] Yeah.

[13:47] It matches the Akira effect.

[13:49] I just kind of zone out.

[13:49] Yeah.

[13:51] Yeah, the fact that she seems to be on this prison thing is part of, I think, what confused me because it seems like she had been kidnapped and she's being rescued.

[13:59] But, in fact, quite the opposite is happening, sort of.

[14:02] Anyway, Roland, Kevin Hart, shows up to bust her out.

Elliott Kalan

[14:06] Named, of course, after the hero of European myth.

[14:09] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[14:10] And, yes.

[14:11] The gunslinger.

[14:12] As you mentioned before, Krieg, who kind of looks like a big Jason from Friday the 13th kind of guy, is also a prisoner here.

[14:23] You think he's going to be creepy, but he's a gentle giant.

[14:26] So they escape.

Elliott Kalan

[14:27] His main thing is that he fights and also he says, like, two-word kind of crazy phrases to describe things.

Stuart Wellington

[14:34] Which I think is game accurate.

[14:37] He's also – that character is also the poster boy.

[14:40] I believe he's on the covers of all the games.

[14:42] Great visual.

Elliott Kalan

[14:43] Look, he's this big shirtless brute with a mask on.

[14:46] Masks always look cool.

[14:47] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[14:48] Yeah.

[14:49] So, anyway, we cut to Promethea, a different place, a planet.

[14:55] We're in a bar.

Elliott Kalan

[14:55] Not the comic book Promethea by Ellen Moore and James Williams.

[14:58] I knew we were going to talk about this.

[15:01] Which – beautiful book.

[15:03] Beautiful book.

[15:04] I did lose a little bit of interest in the, what, 16-issue rundown of the levels of the Kabbalah.

[15:09] But, you know what?

[15:10] Still beautiful.

Stuart Wellington

[15:12] Elliot, if you can't love him at the 16-issue rundown of the Kabbalah, you can't love him at the, what, painted doll doing backflips and shooting biblical accurate demons.

Elliott Kalan

[15:21] Yeah, I guess you're right.

[15:22] You're right.

[15:23] I'm currently reading Alan Moore's book of short stories, Illuminations, and I'm finding that there's a certain point in each of the stories where I'm like, oh, I feel like I'm kind of like full.

[15:32] Like how much – it's like a lot of language here and I feel pretty full.

[15:35] How much more is there in this story?

[15:37] 35 more pages.

[15:38] Oh, okay.

[15:39] So.

Dan McCoy

[15:39] Yeah.

[15:40] At a certain point, maybe you just switch over to novels, sir.

Elliott Kalan

[15:44] He's written novels, Dan.

[15:45] He's written very long novels.

Dan McCoy

[15:46] I know, but just switch over.

Elliott Kalan

[15:48] Careful what you wish for.

[15:50] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[15:51] Anyway, on Promethea, we meet Lilith, the bounty hunter who's played by Cate Blanchett, our main character.

[16:00] And let's just say it.

Elliott Kalan

[16:01] Let's just say it because we're going to be tiptoeing around her the whole time.

[16:04] Looks amazing.

[16:05] Yeah.

[16:06] We'll just mention she looks incredible.

[16:08] She's got bright-dyed red hair.

Dan McCoy

[16:09] She's got, you know, cosplay bounty hunter stuff on.

[16:13] She looks cool.

[16:13] Yeah, she's great.

[16:14] I would love to see Cate Blanchett in this kind of thing if it was better.

[16:18] It would be great.

Stuart Wellington

[16:20] And like the idea of Cate Blanchett getting to do this and get to be an action hero, it's awesome.

[16:27] It's a cool idea.

[16:28] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[16:29] Yeah, yeah.

[16:29] I wish it lived up to like the – you want to see action tar.

[16:34] You want to see tar as an action hero and it's not – it doesn't get you to that place, you know.

Stuart Wellington

[16:39] There is a scene later on where she picks up a flamethrower and roasts a bunch of dudes and I'm like,

[16:44] I think I came a million times.

Elliott Kalan

[16:48] But also when I was looking up –

[16:51] I brought this up because I didn't want it to seem creepy later.

[16:53] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[16:54] When I was looking up Borderlands the game on Wikipedia, like the very short explanation of it made it sound like, oh, you know, a ragtag group of treasure hunters.

[17:06] And I'm like, yeah, treasure hunting aliens.

[17:08] That could be really fun.

[17:09] But then I don't know to what degree stuff from this is like lifted from the sequels.

[17:14] But it all gets mucked up with stuff about like a chosen one and all the – like all the bullshit you don't need in these things.

[17:22] I would rather just see like a heist.

Stuart Wellington

[17:24] And people dealing with their issues with their parents.

[17:27] Yeah.

[17:27] Plenty of that, please.

[17:28] Flashbacks to mommy leaving – like letting her chosen one go.

[17:32] Yeah.

[17:34] Anyway, Lilith is, you know –

Elliott Kalan

[17:36] Lilith is a character from the games though, right?

[17:38] I think so.

[17:39] Honestly –

[17:40] She's not just from Frasier.

[17:43] She's also from the Borges.

[17:43] She's not just from Frasier.

Dan McCoy

[17:45] We are literally in the second scene of the movie.

[17:49] There's been so many interruptions.

[17:51] We've got to move this along a little better.

Elliott Kalan

[17:54] So she's on Promethea.

[17:55] She's what?

[17:55] She just – she caught a bounty or something?

Dan McCoy

[17:57] Yeah, yeah.

[17:58] But it gets interrupted by a bunch of people trying to shoot at her.

[18:02] She kills them all, of course, because, you know, she's our hero.

[18:05] She's the badassiest badass, whatever.

Elliott Kalan

[18:07] Life means nothing in the rough world of Borderlands.

[18:11] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[18:12] It turns out this has been a test from Atlas who's kind of like – I don't know.

[18:16] Just like a big shot.

[18:17] Like he's a rich guy.

[18:19] He rules a lot of stuff.

Elliott Kalan

[18:20] He's an evil rich guy.

[18:22] Evil corporate guy.

[18:22] He's like an Elon Musk.

[18:24] Yeah.

[18:24] He's not the Atlas that has to hold the earth up all the time.

Dan McCoy

[18:28] Yeah.

[18:28] Man, man.

[18:29] He probably thinks he does.

[18:29] Imagine if that guy shrugged because, oh, boy.

[18:32] Oh, boy.

[18:33] Would we be in trouble?

[18:33] Disaster.

Stuart Wellington

[18:34] Oh, boy.

[18:35] Would we have to learn about a bunch of economic garbage?

Dan McCoy

[18:38] Bullshit.

[18:41] So – but this has all been like a test from Atlas.

[18:44] He – this is kind of fun.

[18:47] He projects himself like via hologram onto like one of the dead guys and then like the one remaining living guy has to sort of bear his message.

[18:54] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[18:55] It's like he's got – it's like a – one of the things that looks neat in this movie is these kind of like hologram masks that people wear.

[19:01] And here, yeah.

[19:02] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[19:02] Yeah.

[19:02] There's a guy who is wearing a hologram mask so that the boss can talk through him.

[19:07] Yeah.

[19:07] And then that guy gets killed.

[19:09] So the one underling who's left alive has to take that mask off and put it on so that the boss can talk.

[19:14] It's a fun idea.

[19:14] That's a funny idea.

Stuart Wellington

[19:15] It's like a personal portable deepfake machine.

[19:18] Yeah.

[19:18] Yes, exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[19:19] It's one of those things that is a future – a piece of future technology that is actually – that functions a little bit worse and less naturally than the technology we have now.

[19:29] But that's the world we live in.

[19:30] That's – most of the new technology that comes in functions worse than what we have.

[19:34] So it's realistic, you know.

Dan McCoy

[19:37] But he wants her to go find his daughter Tina who has been kidnapped, the amoral kid with the bunny ears that we saw earlier on.

Elliott Kalan

[19:47] I don't know if she had the bunny ears when we saw her the first time.

[19:49] Did she?

Dan McCoy

[19:50] Could be.

[19:51] Could not be.

[19:52] Who knows?

[19:52] Hey, let's pause the podcast.

[19:54] Let's get the –

[19:54] Go back, rewatch it.

[19:56] Let's find out when the bunny ears – you know, the picture.

Elliott Kalan

[20:00] Well, we know the bunny ears stay in the picture as in Robert Evans' famous memoir.

Dan McCoy

[20:05] She gets a beacon to activate when she finds his daughter.

[20:08] Anyway, we go to Pandora and she arrives in this transport pod.

[20:13] We learn that this is, you know, the planet that she's from.

[20:15] Yeah.

[20:16] Which has become, you know, a big junkie from people fighting over it, you know, trying to find this vault for centuries or whatever.

[20:26] I guess just decades.

[20:27] I don't know how long the timeline on this thing is.

[20:30] But here's the first part of the movie where I'm like, wow, this really shows how this movie must have been chopped up.

[20:38] Because there's like a long sequence of her being like, yeah, I talked to these kids and they directed me here.

[20:45] And then I was attacked by these marauders, whatever.

[20:47] And it's all in narration.

[20:48] And we just get like a couple of shots of it.

[20:51] And I'm like, this has 100% got to be stuff that they shot.

[20:55] And they're like, well, we don't want to get rid of all of it.

[20:58] So let's just paper all of it.

Elliott Kalan

[21:00] So let's just keep the scene where she rides a bus for a while and the guy keeps calling her a vault hunter and it never pays off ever.

[21:06] Let's just do that instead.

[21:09] It does feel like it would be funny if the movie made a little bit more out of that.

[21:14] If we were seeing clips of something really exciting and she's like, yeah, so I got attacked by this stuff and yada yada.

[21:20] It sucked.

[21:21] Anyway, I got to keep going.

[21:22] So let's – like I wish they had made more of a joke out of the fact that she's just yada yadaing us through this thing.

[21:27] But you're right, it does feel like they were like this movie – it does feel like Eli Roth, you handed in a two-hour and 30-minute Borderlands movie.

[21:34] So you got to cut some stuff as opposed to a deliberate choice.

Dan McCoy

[21:38] Yeah.

[21:38] I mean I will say that the next thing that you get, the bus is at least kind of a funny idea.

[21:44] It's not necessary but it gives the sense of like, okay, this is a place where everyone comes to treasure hunt to the degree that there's now this whole like tourist industry basically that has sprung up around it.

[21:56] But we flash forward a couple weeks again through that narration.

Elliott Kalan

[21:59] And also just like any – she doesn't want to be mistaken for a vault hunter.

[22:02] So she keeps saying, I'm not a vault hunter.

[22:04] I'm not a vault hunter.

[22:05] Because as with James Bond, when you're on a secret mission of some kind, you want everybody to know why you're there and who you are and not have the wrong idea because they might be – they might pay less attention to you if you don't tell them.

Stuart Wellington

[22:17] I think the problem is that she is so incredibly capable that it's not like if people get the right idea and they're like, oh, you're a bounty hunter trying to find the chosen one.

[22:29] It's not like she wouldn't be able to just shoot them to death.

[22:31] No, that's true.

[22:32] Because she could.

[22:32] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[22:33] Well, the thing about it is like this is one of the cases – Audrey hasn't watched a lot of the more recent bad movies with me, but she watched this one.

[22:40] And she immediately was like, spoiler alert for the end of the movie that we're going to explain later.

[22:46] Like, oh, Cate Blanchett's going to be the one who's going to be able to open the vault.

[22:50] And part of that is, you know, by the diagrammatic nature of this storytelling, like she's the one who doesn't care about it.

[23:00] So she has to be the one who, you know, can do it.

[23:02] And Tina keeps saying, I'm the special one.

Elliott Kalan

[23:04] I'm special.

[23:05] You know she's not going to turn out to be special.

[23:07] Exactly.

[23:08] Because the thing about this bus thing is it's a funny idea, but there's no actual jokes in it.

[23:11] It's just kind of like –

[23:12] Yes, that's true.

[23:12] The driver's like, aha, vault hunter.

[23:15] Ah, welcome.

[23:16] I'll drive you, vault hunter.

[23:17] She's like, I'm not a vault hunter.

[23:17] And then he starts playing a video that's like, vault hunters, welcome to Pandora.

[23:22] But then it's just him talking about guns they might need.

[23:24] Like there's no jokes in any of it, but it's presented as if there's jokes.

Dan McCoy

[23:28] Yeah, the thing I wrote down about the dialogue for this movie is everything in this movie is either exposition, a cliche, or mirthless jokes.

[23:38] Like there are things that are supposed to be jokes, but none of them are funny.

[23:41] Like I have to admit I chuckled at some of the stuff in the movie, but it was mostly just like, wow, this is like – what's this movie doing?

Stuart Wellington

[23:50] And I feel like this sequence feels like part of the like on-ramp element in the game where you're like, this is how you play.

[23:58] Welcome to the game.

Elliott Kalan

[24:00] While you're waiting, why not press the A button to control your camera?

[24:04] That kind of stuff.

[24:05] Yeah, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[24:05] Oh, you need to crouch now.

Dan McCoy

[24:08] But a very important thing is about to happen, which is, of course, that Jack Black enters the picture in the form of a little box robot named Claptrap.

[24:17] And I don't know if this is true.

[24:19] I should have confirmed this actually.

[24:21] I was talking to a friend about the production of this movie, and they said that they had heard that he – like all of the Jack Black stuff was recorded way early.

[24:30] Like he didn't even know kind of what he was reacting to.

[24:33] It was just like some of the earliest stuff that was – I don't know.

[24:36] Maybe we can figure out later on whether that's true.

[24:37] Seems like the best idea.

[24:39] Yeah.

[24:41] But somebody, some unknown person –

[24:44] Somebody once told me.

[24:45] Somebody once told Claptrap that he was programmed to protect Lilith should she ever return to the planet.

[24:53] Who was it?

[24:54] We don't know right now.

Elliott Kalan

[24:54] We don't know.

[24:55] Luckily, he happens to be in the right side of the planet for her to meet up with him because, again, this is a planet.

[25:00] So even a small planet is very big, and Claptrap is a very small robot.

[25:05] So it's lucky they happened to meet up in the right place.

Stuart Wellington

[25:08] Maybe it's one of those like little planets that has the exact same gravity as Earth, though.

Elliott Kalan

[25:12] Oh, maybe like the little prince lives on on the cover of the little prince?

[25:15] Yeah, the petit prawns.

[25:16] Yeah, could be.

Dan McCoy

[25:19] The little prawns.

[25:21] So Claptrap is able to locate Tina, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Elliott Kalan

[25:29] So here's a Claptrap – I do like one thing about Claptrap, which is I like the concept of him where he is programmed to serve Lilith, but he does not like her.

[25:38] So he's very openly derisive of her, but he has to listen to what she's saying.

[25:41] I mean, is this kind of –

Stuart Wellington

[25:43] Passively aggressive derisive.

[25:45] Like he's very passive aggressive, like, oh, no, it would be terrible if you died.

Elliott Kalan

[25:49] Yeah.

[25:49] Is this kind of like Marvin from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy?

[25:51] Yes, very much so.

[25:53] Like a high-energy Marvin.

[25:54] But at the same time, it's a funny attitude for a robot.

[25:57] And I just wish the – I wish the things that he said were a little funnier because it's –

[26:00] I like that concept that I have to follow you, but I don't want to.

Dan McCoy

[26:06] So she finds Tiny Tina in the quarry.

[26:09] She introduces herself, I believe, as Tiny Tina or like the movie does or something.

[26:14] I'm like, okay, I guess that's your full name that you go by is Tiny Tina.

[26:18] From the desk of Tina.

Stuart Wellington

[26:21] Guys, how shocked were you that this movie did not have like freeze frame, like paint swatch title cards

[26:28] every time one of our main characters showed up?

[26:30] I feel like that.

Dan McCoy

[26:31] I'm so shocked.

[26:32] Very surprised.

[26:33] I'm so shocked that my memory supplied the possibility of one just now.

[26:39] I'm like, did the movie do that?

Elliott Kalan

[26:41] No, it does do the thing where it'll like cut to a planet and it'll just say like Pandora

[26:46] in big yellow letters on the screen or something like that.

[26:49] Yeah.

[26:49] But we didn't get freeze frame, paint swatch intro moments, you know, suicide squad.

[26:57] Suicide squad style.

Stuart Wellington

[26:58] Oh, you idiot.

[27:00] You sound so stupid.

Dan McCoy

[27:01] Oh, yeah.

[27:03] So Tina at first seems like she's like, oh, great, you rescued me.

[27:08] But of course, she's an amoral hit girl, amoral hit girl style, you know, character.

[27:14] She's not actually.

Elliott Kalan

[27:15] There's nothing funnier.

[27:15] There's nothing funnier or more fun than little kids who are violent little maniacs.

[27:20] Uh-huh.

[27:20] It's the world we're developing.

[27:22] Uh-huh.

Stuart Wellington

[27:23] Les enfants terribles, you know what I mean?

Elliott Kalan

[27:26] She tosses.

[27:27] Stuart is being so bilingual today.

[27:29] I love it.

[27:31] She tosses Lilith.

[27:32] Gordon Lance is really bringing out the all Francais in him.

Dan McCoy

[27:35] The in France?

[27:37] The Lilith tosses Tina an exploding bunny.

[27:42] Uh-huh.

[27:42] And these bunnies, I got to say, these are some of the least effective bombs.

[27:46] They occasionally seem to work on bad guys.

[27:50] If they're tossed at a character we care about, they will at best knock them out.

[27:53] Yeah.

[27:54] And they also have a blinking red eye light that signals to someone that they're holding

[28:00] a bomb, which seems like a bad thing to do if you're trying to disguise bombs.

[28:03] But let's give them credit for this.

Elliott Kalan

[28:05] They don't, you can carry them on your person without it showing or without even having a

[28:10] bag or any sort of carrying thing.

[28:11] Right.

[28:12] They just appear when you need them.

[28:13] Yeah.

[28:13] As if you're keeping them in your butt.

[28:16] So you got to give them credit for that.

Stuart Wellington

[28:18] I mean, there's other options, Elliot, but you're probably right.

[28:20] It is the butt.

Elliott Kalan

[28:21] Yeah, I don't know how, where else in your body you're going to be able to carry that

[28:24] many stuffed bunnies.

[28:25] Yeah.

[28:26] We don't have flesh sacks as humans.

[28:28] No.

[28:29] Because unfortunately we're not descended from marsupials.

[28:31] The marsupials had the right idea.

[28:33] Yeah.

[28:33] That is unfortunate.

[28:34] Put the pocket on the body, you know.

Dan McCoy

[28:36] Krieg is there with Tina also, you know, protecting her.

[28:41] And, but then, and they fight a bit, Lilith and Krieg.

[28:44] But then Nox shows up, the commander of the Crimson Lance, which is, I guess, Atlas's

[28:49] army force.

[28:50] And they're going to take them in.

[28:54] When Tina throws another bunny bomb, there's a big, you know, things collapse.

[28:59] In the chaos, they escape with Roland, who has returned.

Elliott Kalan

[29:02] Have we explained who Roland is, that Roland is Kevin Hart?

Dan McCoy

[29:05] Roland is Kevin Hart.

[29:06] He's, he was part of the Crimson Lance in the past.

[29:10] He seems to have gone rogue.

[29:12] There also seems to be some sort of romantic history with him in Nox.

Elliott Kalan

[29:15] Yeah.

[29:16] And this is a very, this is a grim portrayal by Kevin Hart.

[29:19] This is not the, this is not the jokey, smiley Kevin Hart we've come to know from nearly

[29:24] every other performance he's given on film.

[29:26] This is a very serious, very dour Kevin Hart.

Stuart Wellington

[29:29] I, I very much love a movie where it feels like everybody but one person is slumming it.

[29:35] And that one person is Kevin Hart.

[29:37] Like, I feel like when he showed up to set, he's like, oh yeah, I can't wait to be in this

[29:40] great movie.

[29:41] And everyone else is like, this piece of shit.

Elliott Kalan

[29:43] And the kid, I feel like the kid was probably excited about it.

[29:46] Yeah.

[29:46] But I, I read that Kevin Hart, I don't know if this is true because it's just something

[29:50] I read on the internet, that he trained with a Marine to, for the audition for the movie.

[29:54] And I'm like, that's hard, that's hardcore to be training for the audition.

[29:58] When you're a big superstar like Kevin Hart, like, and maybe they just need to be trained

[30:01] for the film.

[30:01] He should be offer only, right?

[30:02] He should be offer only.

[30:04] Kevin Hart, if you're listening to this, if your reps are not making you offer only for

[30:07] this kind of movie, then call me.

[30:10] I will be your management.

[30:11] I will represent you because you should be offer only.

[30:13] You should not be auditioning for these roles.

[30:15] You'd be really, you'd be a really good talent manager, Elliot.

[30:18] Oh, I'd be great at it.

[30:18] Oh yeah.

[30:19] Cause I love conflict.

[30:20] I love really pushing people.

[30:21] I love getting down to brass tacks and really like putting the screws to people.

Stuart Wellington

[30:25] Sure.

[30:25] But you have like an auctioneers mentality.

[30:27] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[30:27] You got that fast talking vibe.

[30:29] I mean, I can talk fast, but.

Dan McCoy

[30:31] That's the main thing that is necessary from, as I understand it, from pop culture.

[30:36] A lot of fast talking.

[30:37] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[30:38] Yeah.

[30:38] But then I'd have to wear a suit.

[30:40] I'd have to have a ponytail.

[30:41] I'd have to draw on.

Stuart Wellington

[30:42] You could probably talk into two different cell phones at the same time.

[30:46] I probably could do that.

Elliott Kalan

[30:47] Yeah.

[30:48] And then I'd go, you guys talk to each other and just smush the cell phones together.

[30:51] And then the scene would start with me and whoever just walked into the room.

[30:54] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[30:55] Oh, I thought you'd be like yelling into one and being really sweet and the other.

[30:58] And then at some point you get them confused.

[30:59] I get them mixed up.

Elliott Kalan

[31:00] Yeah.

[31:00] Police toy style.

[31:01] Sure.

[31:02] Yeah.

[31:02] Perfect.

Dan McCoy

[31:04] Anyway, so they're escaping in a car with Roland.

[31:07] They go through a gully full of pee and feces.

[31:11] So that's funny.

[31:13] And there's a monster that we see, a tentacle monster that they kill.

[31:20] And they have to, like, the tire gets blown.

[31:22] They have to take a little break.

[31:24] For some exposition, we find out that Lilith's mom died trying to find this vault.

[31:33] Roland's deal is he wants to keep Atlas from finding the vault himself because Atlas cannot be trusted with whatever's inside.

[31:40] He's such an evil guy.

Elliott Kalan

[31:41] He's such an openly evil guy.

[31:43] Yeah.

[31:43] But not like fun evil.

[31:45] Like, he's evil in the way where it's like all the characters should know he's evil.

[31:48] But it's not like –

Stuart Wellington

[31:49] He's not like Denzel Washington in Gladiator 2 who's just having the time of his life.

[31:54] Yes.

[31:55] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[31:57] Well, anyway, there's a tri-part key, I guess, and they have one part of the key.

[32:01] You've got to find three things.

Elliott Kalan

[32:02] Yeah, it's like Zelda or whatever.

[32:04] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[32:04] So, anyway, we go to Sanctuary City.

[32:08] Moxie's red light.

Elliott Kalan

[32:09] Take me down to Sanctuary City where the grass is green and the girls are pretty because Gina Gershon is there.

Dan McCoy

[32:14] Yeah.

[32:15] Gina Gershon is playing Moxie, doing a Mae West impression, basically.

Elliott Kalan

[32:20] She's like a southern Mae West, yeah.

[32:22] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[32:22] She knows what movie she's in.

Elliott Kalan

[32:23] Like a southern-fried Mae West with cabaret makeup and a little top hat and stuff.

[32:29] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[32:31] And Moxie knows where the scientist is who kind of raised Lilith.

[32:38] And, you know, like there's parent issues, like you said.

[32:44] Like Lilith's like, why did she send me away?

[32:47] Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[32:49] We're going to learn.

[32:49] There's reasons, of course.

Elliott Kalan

[32:52] Because Lilith is – she's now – this is now – we're now at the stage in the movie where Lilith is encountering people from her life on Pandora.

[32:59] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[32:59] And so, like, when they go, Moxie knows everybody.

[33:01] Everybody knows Moxie, you know.

[33:03] And the – so, yeah, we get some backstory there, you know.

Dan McCoy

[33:07] Yeah.

[33:08] Meanwhile, someone from the army knows Roland.

[33:13] His roommate.

[33:13] His former roommate.

[33:14] Yeah.

[33:15] They have a little comedy scene where they both try and pretend like –

Elliott Kalan

[33:18] That's Bobby Lee.

Dan McCoy

[33:19] Is that right?

[33:20] Yeah.

[33:22] Yeah.

[33:23] Anyway, he's going to rat them out, of course.

[33:25] So, they have to knock him out and escape.

[33:28] And then we meet Tannis, who is played by Jamie Lee Curtis.

Elliott Kalan

[33:32] And Tannis is – it's helpful for making wine, right?

[33:36] Yeah.

[33:36] Those are Tannins.

[33:37] Oh, Tannins.

[33:38] Sorry.

[33:39] My apologies.

Dan McCoy

[33:40] My apologies.

[33:41] Those are the sort of astringent thing that you find in wine or tea.

[33:45] Oh, never mind.

Stuart Wellington

[33:46] So, this is our second Academy Award winner in Borderlands.

[33:49] Yeah.

[33:49] Just keep in track.

Elliott Kalan

[33:49] To be fair, I don't think she had won her Academy Award when they made Borderlands yet, right?

[33:54] Because she just won.

[33:55] That is probably fair.

[33:56] Although, maybe she did.

[33:57] But, I mean, she's still a legend.

[33:59] I mean, she's still a legend.

[33:59] She's still Jamie Lee Curtis.

Dan McCoy

[34:01] It was so long.

[34:04] So, Tannis was supposed to kind of take care of Lilith after her mom was – like, we see later on, she's like – there's some sort of siege that she can't escape her.

Elliott Kalan

[34:15] It's one of these things where a secret has been kept from Lilith about what her mom was doing and her true identity for no reason.

[34:23] Only to create resentment.

[34:25] Yeah.

[34:25] And I feel like if Tannis had been played a little bit more absent-minded, then maybe I would get that, like, it just didn't occur to her that she would want to know these things about her past.

[34:36] But also, why is Tannis the person you're going to leave your child with?

[34:39] Like, it doesn't – it's one of these things – this movie is a lot of characters doing the things they need to do to keep the movie going so that it hits movie beats as opposed to characters doing things that make sense for them to do.

[34:51] Like, there's a part where Lilith is like, all right, I guess I have to work with you guys because of that fight with Crimson Lance.

[34:58] And it's like, I don't see why.

[35:00] Like, I don't know – I don't see why you couldn't just take the girl and bring her back now or why you couldn't just tell Crimson Lance, yeah, I was trying to capture her when you guys showed up.

[35:08] Like, I don't – there's no – there's a lot of – there's a lot of just, well, I guess this is part of the part of the movie where I do this now, you know.

Stuart Wellington

[35:14] Yeah, it's time to team up.

[35:16] I do like how Jamie Lee Curtis as Tannis is dressed up kind of like a drum major.

[35:21] She's wearing like a red little coat and with like – she almost looks like Dr. Robotnik.

[35:25] I really like that.

[35:27] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[35:28] Well, anyway, this is the person who's supposed to sort of be a surrogate mom to Lilith, but she left Lilith with tradespeople so she could continue her vault-chasing ways.

[35:41] She's been studying this for years.

[35:44] And so here we learn also from Tina that Atlas created her, like that Atlas is her father only in the sense that he is her creator, that there was a piece of DNA from an iridian on an old – on the vault key that he used to clone an iridian because, you know, an iridian is – who's supposed to be able to open the vault?

Elliott Kalan

[36:11] Yeah, there's a problem.

[36:12] She is Atlas' child in the same way that like the Marvel characters are Disney's children, you know, been acquired rather than a natural, you know, creation.

[36:24] The miracle life, you know.

Dan McCoy

[36:28] Tannis has the information that the second vault key is in Caustic Caverns.

[36:34] So that's where they got to go on their next fetch quest.

Elliott Kalan

[36:38] I love Caustic Caverns.

[36:39] It sounds like something at like the Itchy and Scratchy Land amusement park.

[36:43] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[36:44] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[36:46] Meanwhile, you know, someone's seen Claptrap in Sanctuary City and so they have to escape.

Elliott Kalan

[36:52] What's amazing here is, okay, we haven't mentioned Claptrap very much and you would think that Claptrap is not a visible presence in the movie as a result.

[36:59] But Claptrap is a constant, constant nattering, chattering presence in this movie.

[37:04] Yeah.

[37:04] And he is impossible to forget for a second because he's constantly just wheeling up and going like, hey, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

[37:11] And the scene where he's in Sanctuary City, I don't know what he's doing.

[37:14] He's just walking around going, spare parts?

[37:16] Anybody got some spare parts?

[37:17] And like hitting on a vending machine?

[37:19] I don't know why he's there.

[37:20] They just need to have someone see them so that they can be chased.

[37:23] But it's just what it's like that Claptrap is such a – it's just that he's such a through line for the movie.

[37:29] But for no – it's like if someone sees Star Wars and they're like, yeah, guess you got to have droids that are just kind of making noises and talking during the movie.

[37:36] And it's like, well, are you going to give the droids like much of a personality or like a thing that they do?

[37:40] Do you have to?

[37:41] I don't think so.

Dan McCoy

[37:42] Well, I mean, I will say that like –

[37:45] He does have a personality.

[37:46] A funny guy and he's a talented voice actor.

[37:50] Like he's not doing a bad job with what this character is, but they give him so much.

[37:56] Like he's talking all the time like you say.

[37:58] And a little of Claptrap goes a long way.

[38:01] Even if the point is he's annoying.

Elliott Kalan

[38:03] When you go to – it's like you go to a restaurant and on the menu it says like house sauce on the hamburger.

[38:10] You're like, all right, I'll try that I guess.

[38:12] And then it comes back and the sauce is covering the bun.

[38:15] It's dripping off the plate.

[38:17] You're like, it's the house sauce?

[38:19] Yeah.

[38:20] You know, it's the house sauce, which means ghosts, cats.

[38:23] Yeah, there's a laughing watermelon in the background.

[38:26] Cuts off your fingers.

[38:28] But there's – you are not allowed to forget for one moment that Claptrap is a character in this movie.

[38:33] Like it's just all over the place.

[38:34] You know what would make this scene better?

[38:36] Claptrap.

[38:36] But I agree.

[38:37] Jack Black I think is doing his best with what they've given him.

[38:39] Yeah.

[38:40] You know.

[38:40] I feel like nobody in this movie is necessarily like –

[38:45] completely sleepwalking through it, but nobody is given a lot to succeed with.

[38:49] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[38:50] Yeah.

[38:51] So we go into caustic caverns.

[38:58] They're immediately – they can't get by because there's a bunch of these bloodshot people.

[39:04] As the movie says, they're psychos that the psychos are afraid of.

[39:08] And there's a lair.

[39:09] And they're like – and Claptrap's like, there's a 0% chance we can get through without being detected.

[39:13] You never see that, which is actually pretty funny.

[39:15] I like that.

Elliott Kalan

[39:17] And I genuinely –

[39:17] Was that as funny as the part where he has to poop bullets and he's saying, don't look at me.

[39:21] Don't look at me.

Dan McCoy

[39:22] We'll get there.

[39:23] Don't skip to dessert like the restaurant I said before that does things a little differently.

[39:31] I do kind of like – I admit this next bit where they're like, well, did you run a thing where you're the distraction?

[39:38] And the way he does the distraction where he's like, even though it would make no sense for me to say this to all you violent people who will just shoot me,

[39:48] if there's any other reason that I was making a distraction, but then he insults them in a very dumb way.

Stuart Wellington

[39:55] And again, a little bit of Claptrap goes a long way.

[40:01] Yeah.

[40:02] Some of these moments where he actually is doing something and doing an actual joke as opposed to just doing schtick in the background,

[40:11] Joe is better, I would say.

[40:12] Yeah.

[40:12] No, I agree.

Elliott Kalan

[40:13] And I think this sequence is – when they're being chased eventually by the blood shots, I think it's one of the better sequences in the movie.

[40:21] I think it does get across that idea, Stuart, that you were talking about from the game of like there's just constant stuff coming at him.

[40:27] You know, like it's kind of never-ending.

Stuart Wellington

[40:28] And as we said, like it feels like the script in the dialogue is written by AI.

[40:33] The choice for this big action sequence to be set to Ace of Spades feels like an AI decision.

Elliott Kalan

[40:39] Yeah.

[40:40] And it – yeah.

[40:41] I was – we were watching this.

[40:43] They start attacking.

[40:43] They get caught.

[40:44] They start attacking.

[40:45] And Ace of Spades just comes in out of nowhere.

[40:47] It's non-diegetic.

[40:48] That's fine.

[40:49] And I had a brief moment of like –

[40:50] They weren't listening to it.

[40:51] It's not like they were listening to it.

[40:53] I had a brief moment of like, oh, I love this song.

[40:57] Like why isn't this movie?

[40:57] And then I was like, you know what?

[40:58] There's some 14-year-old kid who thought Borderlands was going to be a real badass, kick-ass movie and went to go see it and is not enjoying it.

[41:06] And then at least it's going to introduce them to this song the same way when I was 10, the young ones introduced me to this song.

[41:12] And it just really blew my mind.

[41:13] So I was like, you know what?

[41:14] If this is just an Ace of Spades delivery method, then that's fine.

Dan McCoy

[41:18] I'm glad that you answered this question for me because while watching it, I had the question in my head.

[41:22] I'm like, okay, is Elliot sitting watching this being like, ugh, they used Ace of Spades in this dumb movie?

[41:31] I hate this.

[41:32] Or is Elliot like perking up because, oh, at least I get to listen to Ace of Spades for a while?

Elliott Kalan

[41:36] There's a little bit of that.

[41:37] I mean, when I listen to Ace of Spades, I like to hear it without the sounds of, ugh, boom, get out of here.

[41:43] That's got to hurt.

[41:46] But no, it is fine.

[41:48] But honestly, it reminded me of when they played Ace of Spades in Shoot Em Up.

[41:51] And I was like, oh, I wish I was watching Shoot Em Up.

[41:53] Like that's a movie that feels like it's doing something.

[41:55] But it also reminded me of when Whiplash, the Metallica song, plays in That's My Boy.

[42:00] Oh.

[42:01] And that's the funny thing.

[42:03] In the movie Whiplash, I'm like, when are they going to play Whiplash?

[42:05] Like there's a whole drum sequence in that.

[42:07] But in the movie that Whiplash plays, I think in that Adam Saylor movie we watched years ago with him and Andy Samberg.

[42:13] And it flashed me back to that.

[42:15] And I was like, well, I didn't like that at all.

[42:16] So I don't know, guys.

[42:18] I guess like Proust's Madeleine, more excuses for Stuart to drop some French on us.

[42:23] This brought back a lot of memories for me.

[42:26] But I will say Ace of Spades is going to survive fine from Borderlands.

[42:30] So it didn't – and I'd rather they play – here's the thing.

[42:33] I will say I'd rather they played one of the greatest kind of kick-ass metal songs of all times during this action sequence than play an ironic kind of like a Dean Martin song or like a children's song or something bright and fluffy that's supposed to be an ironic counterpoint.

Stuart Wellington

[42:50] Or like a 70s funk song or something.

[42:53] Yes, exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[42:55] Like it wasn't like Argyle, you know.

[42:59] And so – and one of the things that were in – and it didn't bother me as much as in Guardians when they're fighting those pig monsters and No Sleep Till Brooklyn comes up.

[43:06] And I was like, come on, dudes.

[43:08] Like can we have – can we – can we find a new song – can we find a song that I haven't heard in another movie this year?

[43:14] You know, so – so you know what, guys?

[43:16] This is my – if my review of Borderlands was entirely about their use of the song Ace of Spades, then I'd probably give it a pretty good review to be honest.

Dan McCoy

[43:22] Well, anyway, Claptrap, you know, having served as the – having served as the distraction was shot the hell up.

[43:34] So then we get the teased pooping scene where he's like – like they've gotten through the first part of trying to evade these people without being detected.

[43:43] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[44:13] It would have been invasive, I think, if you had texted the entire audience.

Dan McCoy

[44:18] Yeah, I would have been liking that U2 album.

[44:20] Eli Roth stated that his French bulldog pooping gave him inspiration while pitching the film.

[44:26] I have to look away because she gets really shy.

[44:28] But one day I filmed her.

[44:30] She had that shy look on her face and I was like, that's Claptrap.

[44:34] A scene of Claptrap pooping was included in the final film.

[44:38] So there you go.

[44:39] Movie magic.

[44:41] A dog pooping turns into a robot pooping.

Elliott Kalan

[44:45] It's a real Shakespeare in love moment.

[44:47] You know, just inspiring art, you know, from something.

Stuart Wellington

[44:50] You know, Ben Franklin put a kite up in the thing and got hit by lightning.

[44:54] That's exactly what you're like.

[44:56] Put a kite up in the thing.

Elliott Kalan

[44:56] He did put a kite up in the thing and got hit by lightning.

[45:00] I think you misunderstood the story a little bit.

Stuart Wellington

[45:03] Yeah.

[45:04] But that's the inspirational poster that I have in my dentist's office.

Elliott Kalan

[45:08] Yeah.

[45:09] In the dentist's office.

[45:12] But yeah, this is Newton's apple or Newton's crapple, if you will.

[45:15] Oh.

Dan McCoy

[45:15] Thank you.

[45:16] Well, anyone.

[45:17] Him.

[45:18] Anyone.

[45:19] Any who.

[45:20] Him shooting.

[45:21] Shitting bullets.

[45:22] Shooting bullets.

[45:23] Him shitting bullets.

Elliott Kalan

[45:24] Kind of shooting him at his butt.

[45:28] That raises the alarm.

[45:29] Again, just like that Meganette song.

[45:31] Pooping bullets.

Stuart Wellington

[45:32] Yeah, yeah.

[45:32] I don't know about you guys, but every time I go to the bathroom, every time I make a little

[45:36] poop, I make a little gun sound effect with my mouth just to keep it exciting.

[45:40] You know, just to be silly.

Elliott Kalan

[45:41] I do do the thing that I do.

[45:43] Do you do?

[45:44] Sorry.

[45:44] Hey, hey.

[45:44] I'm sure that many men do, though, where when you're peeing into a urinal, you pretend

[45:49] that you're a gunner who's firing like the anti-aircraft bullets at some kind of like

[45:55] a German plane or something, you know?

[45:57] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[45:58] There's another scene of them evading people.

[46:01] They're chased.

[46:02] Roland has to stay behind.

Elliott Kalan

[46:04] If you're asking if that means I don't pee just a stream, but instead individual bursts

[46:08] like a fly fire, then yes, of course.

[46:12] Yeah, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[46:12] Okay.

[46:13] Roland has to stay behind to fix the elevator so the rest of them can escape.

[46:18] He promises that he'll return.

[46:22] So then they go to a new place, an old mine.

[46:29] A new place in the old mine, yep.

[46:31] They put the two keys together to form a map to the vault, and Tannis reveals that Tina's

[46:39] the third key, and the vault will consume all the keys to open.

[46:44] We don't know what that means.

[46:45] She says, I don't think that means she'll die, but who knows?

Elliott Kalan

[46:49] And Tina does not know that she may die when the vault is open.

[46:52] She's just super, she's like, I'm special.

[46:55] I'm going to open the vault.

[46:55] La, la, la, la.

[46:57] She's, you know, really, really playing up the kids' ears.

[46:58] That's actually literally her lines, I believe.

Stuart Wellington

[47:01] And then she skips around.

Elliott Kalan

[47:02] Yeah.

[47:03] She skips around with her bunny ears on.

[47:04] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[47:04] Yeah.

[47:05] I'm like, ma'am, shouldn't you be in one of the Purge movies?

Dan McCoy

[47:12] Claptrap has fixed Atlas' transmitter, which Lilith breaks again, but a drone shows up with

[47:19] his hologram saying the transmitter was a tracker.

[47:21] Atlas' hologram.

[47:22] Yeah.

[47:23] Transmitter was a tracker.

[47:25] The Crimson Lance is going to come collect Tina and the keys, and Tina, of course, overhears

[47:31] only the most incriminating, easy-to-misunderstand part of this conversation and thinks that

[47:36] Lilith is still working for her, quote-unquote, dad and throws another useless bomb at Lilith

[47:43] that just—

Elliott Kalan

[47:44] It does knock Lilith off her feet for a moment, right?

Dan McCoy

[47:46] Yeah.

[47:47] Yeah, yeah.

[47:47] It puts her just for a little while.

Elliott Kalan

[47:49] I'll say to Tina that a bounty hunter came and said to you, I'm here to take you back to

[47:53] your dad, and then within, like, 30 minutes, you felt like you were best friends, and then

[47:58] later you think you found out that she's still working for your dad.

[48:00] This is on you, Tina.

[48:02] This is not—you can't blame Lilith for this.

[48:04] Like, you know, shame on—fool you once, shame on you.

[48:07] Fool you twice, shame on me.

[48:09] It's—you can't do it.

[48:11] Yeah.

[48:11] This is on you, Tina.

Dan McCoy

[48:13] Yeah.

[48:15] Claptrap briefly thinks that Lilith—

Elliott Kalan

[48:17] Also, where do you think she got that bunny bomb from?

[48:18] What?

[48:19] Where do you think she was storing it?

[48:20] Yeah, Dan.

Dan McCoy

[48:22] I guess it's got to be the butt, like you said before.

[48:26] It's the only place on the human body that things can be stored.

Elliott Kalan

[48:29] And we've established that things end up in people's—in characters' butts in this movie

[48:33] because Claptrap just pooped out all those bullets.

[48:36] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[48:37] Speaking of Claptrap, he's briefly excited to think that Lilith is dead, but she's not.

Elliott Kalan

[48:42] Tell us, Dan.

[48:42] What are we talking about when we talk about Claptrap?

Dan McCoy

[48:47] Lilith—in Lilith's old home, she finds a picture of her and her mom.

Elliott Kalan

[48:53] Now, wait, Dan, now, did they go deliberately to her own home or did they stumble?

Dan McCoy

[48:58] I'm not really sure why this happens, and I'll be honest, like, my notes don't really—

[49:04] I'm sure there's a lack of caring as well.

[49:05] Lack of caring that happens.

Stuart Wellington

[49:07] I think there's a chance I got hit by a bunny bomb around here because it's all pretty fuzzy

[49:11] at this point in the movie for me.

[49:13] But this triggers—

Elliott Kalan

[49:15] I will also admit, yeah, from the middle of the—as soon as Ace of Spades stopped playing,

[49:21] I think I also kind of found it hard to pay less attention.

Stuart Wellington

[49:23] Yeah, the lights got a little bit dimmer.

[49:25] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[49:27] Yeah, this movie is not a good movie all the way through, but I will say that I think—

Elliott Kalan

[49:31] I would say it's not a good movie even from the start.

Dan McCoy

[49:34] But there's something about, like, the relentless, like, we're just going to throw a bunch of

[49:39] stuff at you and it's all going to be brightly colored at least rather than, like, gray digital

[49:43] sheen.

[49:43] Like, it kept my interest for a while, and then it did sort of become less and less interesting

[49:47] to me.

Elliott Kalan

[49:49] Anyway.

[49:50] Maybe it's more recently around the time that the movie gets less colorful, to be honest.

[49:53] Yeah.

[49:53] They start being in more dark rooms.

[49:54] They start, like, just kind of being sad or, you know, I don't know.

Dan McCoy

[49:59] And I was wondering whether, like, those were parts of the research shoots because it

[50:03] does, like, there is a distinct shift in sort of the visual quality at a certain point.

[50:10] And I don't know which part was which, but anyway.

[50:14] Probably the parts that look cheaper probably came later.

[50:17] Yeah.

[50:18] This triggers a hologram, R2-D2 style, to clear a few things up.

[50:23] From Claptrap.

[50:25] Claptrap shows a hologram of—

Elliott Kalan

[50:28] Oh, my end of Act 2 circuit has been tricked.

Dan McCoy

[50:32] Lilith's mom shows up explaining that, via hologram, that she sent Lilith away on purpose

[50:38] because when she found out, quote, what Lilith was, and she programmed Claptrap to find

[50:45] her and protect her and tell her that she loves her.

[50:49] Okay.

[50:50] This is the kind of stuff that should—

[50:51] We're finally at the vault.

Elliott Kalan

[50:52] This is the kind of stuff that might have been better communicated in, say, a letter that

[50:56] she could have taken with her.

[50:57] Sure.

Dan McCoy

[50:58] Earlier on.

Elliott Kalan

[50:59] As a book, hey, I've got to make sure that Lilith knows that she's the chosen one and

[51:03] that I love her.

[51:04] I guess I'll record a hologram and stick it in a robot and leave it on a different planet

[51:07] than Lilith is on in the hope that she finds it someday.

[51:10] And I better make the robot real annoying.

Stuart Wellington

[51:12] Yeah.

[51:12] I feel like deep down, most parents are just jigsaws in disguise.

[51:16] You know, they just want to make things complicated.

Dan McCoy

[51:18] You've got to do it in a way that makes her hate my memory.

[51:20] How can I do that?

Elliott Kalan

[51:22] How can I make her feel bad for hating me legitimately up to this point?

[51:28] And this is—what's her name?

[51:30] As the mom.

Dan McCoy

[51:31] Haley Bennett.

[51:32] I looked it up.

Elliott Kalan

[51:33] Never mind.

[51:34] I thought it was somebody different.

Dan McCoy

[51:35] Can't remember what all she's been in, but she's been in—

Elliott Kalan

[51:38] Never mind.

[51:38] I thought it was someone else whose name I couldn't remember.

Dan McCoy

[51:41] So, at the vault opening—

[51:43] Guys, you go into the big vault opening.

[51:46] Everybody's going to be there.

[51:48] So, Tina talks a lot about how special she is, and of course, that means that when she

[51:52] steps on the little vault thing, the glowy vault thing, nothing happens.

[51:55] Yeah.

[51:56] Turns out Atlas has been watching the whole time behind, you know, like a disguise-y shield

[52:01] that it's been projecting.

[52:03] Yeah, yeah.

[52:03] The hologram thing.

[52:04] Yeah.

[52:05] Stuff.

[52:07] And Atlas is like, well, we're just going to kill you now.

[52:12] And Roland also shows up.

[52:14] He makes good on his promise to not die earlier in the film.

[52:17] Oh, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[52:17] So, did we mention that he seemed to have sacrificed himself in order to save them from the bloodshot

[52:24] psychos?

Dan McCoy

[52:24] I did.

[52:25] I didn't make a big deal out of it because we all knew that he was going to come back.

[52:28] Yeah, of course.

Elliott Kalan

[52:28] There's no way.

[52:30] But the movie made it seem like we were supposed to believe he was going to die there and really

[52:34] sacrifice himself, right?

Stuart Wellington

[52:35] Yeah.

[52:35] Do you think that they had originally had some shots of him being like torn apart by the blood

[52:39] shots and they had to cut those out?

Elliott Kalan

[52:42] Probably when they decided to bring him back.

Stuart Wellington

[52:44] It would have been pretty funny if they showed him being torn apart and then when he came back,

[52:49] he had like big stitches stitching him back together.

Elliott Kalan

[52:51] Like, maybe that's a better movie.

[52:54] That'd be great.

[52:54] I would love that he found Dr. Frankenstein there on Pandora.

[52:57] Yeah.

[52:57] So, guys, here's my question about some of these movies.

[53:01] Yeah.

[53:01] Is the audience supposed to be fooled by some of this kind of schmuck bait stuff where this

[53:07] character is a cynical, hard-bitten bounty hunter?

[53:10] They definitely can't be the chosen one.

[53:11] Or, oh, he's giving his life.

[53:12] We'll never see him again.

[53:14] Or are we supposed to be in a, like, just like, well, this is how movies go?

[53:18] Because here's my theory.

[53:20] And then I want to, I asked you a question and I'm going to answer it.

[53:22] My theory is, this movie originally, I guess, was supposed to be rated R and they were

[53:26] like, no, make it PG-13 or whatever for kids.

[53:30] Kids seem to be the only audience that I think would be able to follow this movie the way

[53:35] that it seems to be intended to.

[53:36] The same way that when my older son saw the Pokemon Detective Pikachu movie, the minute Bill

[53:44] Nye, he showed up on screen, he did not, like me, go, oh, that's the bad guy.

[53:48] He's going to turn out to be the bad guy later.

[53:49] Yeah.

[53:49] So when that character was revealed to be the bad guy, he was like, what?

[53:52] Like, he was genuinely surprised by it.

Stuart Wellington

[53:53] Did he have the same reaction when you guys watched Minority Report?

[53:56] And he's like, Max von Sydow, he's got to be the good guy.

Elliott Kalan

[53:59] You know what, Dan?

[54:00] You're going to take, you're going to call, you're going to call Protective Services.

[54:04] I've not yet shown Minority Report to my children.

[54:07] But is it, is it a, is it kind of, is the movie saying to the audience, you know how this

[54:12] is going to turn out, or is the movie expecting us to be surprised when these things happen?

[54:17] What do you, what do you think?

Dan McCoy

[54:18] Well, I, first I want to call out the use of the term schmuck bait, which is a term of

[54:24] art that I think that the audience probably can guess what it means.

[54:27] It's an industry term.

[54:28] Yeah.

[54:28] Yeah, it's the stuff that you lay in there that, yeah, it's supposed to fool people.

Elliott Kalan

[54:35] But it's really only going to fool people who have never seen a movie or television show.

[54:38] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[54:39] I think, I don't think that you're going to believe that Roland's really dead just because,

[54:47] I don't know, it's, it's, it is supposed to be a sacrifice, but it's not lingered over

[54:53] that much.

[54:54] And it's so cursory.

[54:56] Like, it really feels like, yeah, yeah, no, he's going to make good on this.

[54:59] Like, I'll be back.

[55:00] I do think that people aren't necessarily supposed to know, like, Lilith is really the one who's

[55:06] going to be able to open the vault.

Elliott Kalan

[55:08] I think that's what I, so, because I do wonder that a lot because it seems so telegraphed

[55:12] from so early on.

[55:13] But maybe that's just because we've seen so many movies that have a similar, similar

[55:16] mechanic.

[55:17] Could be.

Stuart Wellington

[55:18] Yeah.

[55:18] Is this the type of movie that's operating under the assumption that their audience has

[55:22] never seen a movie before and they're like, oh, wow, this is so novel.

Elliott Kalan

[55:26] Yeah.

[55:26] I mean, that's it.

[55:27] That train's coming right at me.

[55:32] Are they expecting to, the Paul Schrader audience where they've been raised not being allowed

[55:36] to see movies because they're strict Calvinist upbringing?

[55:38] And so it's all new to them.

[55:41] What did Paul Schrader think about this?

[55:43] Did he do a letterboxd review of it?

[55:44] I'm sure he did.

[55:45] We should track them.

Dan McCoy

[55:46] I'm still delighted by the idea that that man went and saw Twisters based on his letterboxd.

Elliott Kalan

[55:51] He loves movies.

[55:52] He loves them.

[55:53] He loves movies.

[55:53] You know who loved Jurassic Park?

[55:55] Ingmar Bergman.

[55:56] People who love movies love movies, you know?

[55:58] Yeah.

[55:58] There's that, Bobcat Goldthwait has talked about Martin Scorsese coming up to him and going,

[56:02] oh, I really like Shakes the Clown.

[56:03] Like, people who like movies like movies, you know?

[56:06] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[56:09] Anyway, so back at the vault.

[56:11] Knox, the captain of the Crimson Lance, you know, briefly is like, you were right, Roland,

[56:16] and like tries to stand with him and immediately gets vaporized by guns from the ship, which

[56:22] was pretty shocking, actually.

[56:24] It was pretty.

Elliott Kalan

[56:24] But also, why is this the moment when she changes sides?

[56:29] Like, what is she learning about her evil boss now?

[56:32] Her evil boss who has a private army that he's been using to try to track down a child to

[56:36] open a vault?

[56:37] Like, what is she learning?

Dan McCoy

[56:38] I think it's because Atlas is immediately like, I'm just going to kill this kid.

[56:42] I think that's it.

[56:44] But it doesn't seem like that should be the final straw if she's, you know, the head of

[56:49] a private army.

Stuart Wellington

[56:50] I feel like she had been like, the whole time she had been like, let's capture these guys.

[56:53] And then at this point, he's just like, kill them all.

[56:55] And she's like, wait a minute.

[56:57] That could be it.

Dan McCoy

[56:58] I'm going to sign on for that.

[57:00] Lilith comes in.

[57:02] She's like, hey, I'm the daughter of Aridia.

[57:05] We get flashbacks to all the clues like we need them.

[57:07] Things like Gina Gershon being like, your mom always told me you were special, which is

[57:12] the dumbest of clues.

Stuart Wellington

[57:14] I mean, people with very dumb children tell me that their kids are special all the time.

Elliott Kalan

[57:21] Also, the moment when she teleported everybody to safety, but Tina thought she was the one

[57:25] who teleported everyone to safety.

[57:27] Yeah.

[57:27] That's a clue, you know.

Dan McCoy

[57:30] She agrees to open the vault if Atlas leaves everyone alone.

[57:35] She also tells Tina, memories are more powerful than anything Atlas can create, which I don't,

[57:41] that just seems like nonsense to me.

[57:43] Yeah.

[57:43] I don't know how that's true.

[57:45] Nope.

[57:47] But the act of opening the vault turns Lilith into a champion.

[57:51] She grows sort of these like plasma wings, fire wings around her.

Stuart Wellington

[57:56] Yeah.

[57:56] She's like, she turns into like a dark Phoenix.

Dan McCoy

[57:58] Yeah.

[57:59] She's the firehawk now.

[58:01] And she's got superpowers.

[58:03] And she zaps all her friends with protective plasma so they can't get hurt until Atlas uses

[58:10] his gun that had previously vaporized a lady to shoot Lilith, who of course being the firehawk

[58:16] is not killed by it, but it does seem to hurt her.

[58:20] We don't know the level of her powers.

Stuart Wellington

[58:22] Yeah.

[58:23] It puts all of her support powers into cool down.

[58:27] Mm-hmm.

Elliott Kalan

[58:27] Here's something that, it just surprised me this happened because the whole chosen one

[58:32] thing was presented as she's the key to the vault.

[58:35] There was never any mention of superpowers or that the Iridians ever had giant rainbow

[58:40] colored flame wings or the ability to then give people bullet stopping body flames that

[58:47] protect them.

[58:48] Again, some of this stuff looks great.

[58:50] I think those wings look, the actual wing effects I liked a lot, but it does come out

[58:55] of nowhere that this is, it's not, oh yeah, yeah.

[58:57] By the way, the chosen one also is a superhero, not just like keyed to this lock at this vault.

Stuart Wellington

[59:02] Yeah.

[59:02] It's pretty boring.

[59:03] I don't know about you guys.

[59:05] I think this is pretty boring.

[59:06] I mean, it is pretty boring at the same time.

Dan McCoy

[59:08] Yeah.

[59:09] Any of the stuff that he was closer to the chosen one stuff is boring.

[59:14] Like I don't, again, I don't know what the game was like, but it feels like some of

[59:20] this is, oh, this is how a movie has to be stuff that has been laid on top of whatever

[59:27] that was.

Elliott Kalan

[59:28] The climax of movies now with heroes often is not, oh, this is when the hero is pushed to

[59:34] their biggest challenge and they've got to go the distance.

[59:37] It is, well, this is the moment when the hero's power unlocks and then they get to just beat

[59:41] the shit out of everybody.

[59:42] Yeah.

[59:42] You know, which is, which can sometimes be very cathartic in a certain movie.

[59:46] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[59:47] Yeah.

[59:47] Like in Sword of Doom.

[59:49] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[59:49] Like in Sword of Doom.

[59:50] When he's, when he's literally damning himself with his addiction to violence.

[59:53] Yeah.

[59:54] Very much.

[59:54] As he mows through one attack or after another.

[59:57] Yeah.

[59:57] Very much.

[59:57] He's become so, that's your stand up and cheer moment.

[1:00:00] That's your stand up and cheer.

[1:00:01] And then it's not even like he wins, Stuart.

[1:00:05] His life is now just a never ending battle.

[1:00:08] He's, he's, he's, you know, he's achieved eternal damnation in a way.

[1:00:11] But, uh, but yeah, that it's a, there's a moment in, um, there's a moment in the Iron

[1:00:17] Giant, which I always feel very cathartic when the giant finally unleashes and is just

[1:00:21] walking through troops and blowing up tanks because Hogarth has been hurt and it's, it's

[1:00:26] pushed him over the edge.

[1:00:26] But that's not like the end of the movie.

[1:00:28] The end of the movie is him then making the sacrifice to possibly destroy himself, taking

[1:00:34] out that missile to save everybody.

[1:00:35] And it feels like the current, the modern version of that movie, which would just end with him

[1:00:39] mowing down the army and Hogarth being like, that's my friend, you know, and that would

[1:00:43] be the, that would be the climax.

[1:00:45] That's like, that's what we have here, you know.

Dan McCoy

[1:00:47] Rather than him rejecting his violent nature.

[1:00:50] Yes.

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:51] Or at least, or doing something difficult, like having to do something that is difficult

[1:00:55] for him that may harm him in order to save other people, you know.

Dan McCoy

[1:00:59] Anyway, when last we left off Lilith, she was being buffeted by guns from the ship, which

[1:01:06] was, you know, hurting her a bit.

[1:01:07] But she manages to take the ship down.

[1:01:10] She's stronger than ever.

[1:01:12] Atlas has Tina, makes Lilith take them into the vault where there's like a bit of a face-off,

[1:01:21] but not much of anything, honestly.

[1:01:23] How could there be?

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:24] How could there be?

[1:01:25] Atlas is literally just a dude.

[1:01:27] And Lilith is now the, you know, redeemer of souls, you know.

[1:01:32] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:33] He's taken away by a tentacle monster who, like, why is he in the vault?

[1:01:37] I don't know.

[1:01:38] I don't care.

[1:01:38] There's a tentacle monster down there too.

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:40] It'd be very funny if they were like, oh yeah, the prophecy also mentioned there might

[1:01:43] be a tentacle monster in the vault.

[1:01:44] But yeah, it's just a monster.

[1:01:45] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:46] Yeah.

[1:01:46] Anyway, so after that, they're having a big Ewok celebration.

[1:01:49] But at least we see all the wonders that are in the vault, right?

Elliott Kalan

[1:01:52] It's like floating stuff, right?

Dan McCoy

[1:01:54] There's some glowy stuff.

[1:01:54] Just a bunch of boxes, it seems, right?

[1:01:56] Yeah.

[1:01:57] Floating boxes.

[1:01:58] Glowy Tron floor.

[1:02:00] Yeah.

[1:02:01] That's basically it.

Stuart Wellington

[1:02:01] I feel like that's the thing.

[1:02:03] Atlas at that point is like, worth it, baby.

[1:02:06] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:02:07] Anyway, as I was saying, by then everyone's singing Yub Nub that night.

[1:02:11] What are they celebrating exactly?

[1:02:13] Well, I guess that now it's like, it's this sort of vague, like the balance is back.

[1:02:19] Because they have a, they've opened the thing, the riches are theirs, like they have a protector,

[1:02:25] you know, outsiders aren't going to be plundering their world or whatever.

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:28] Why are outsiders not going to be plundering their world?

[1:02:30] All that stuff's still there.

Dan McCoy

[1:02:31] Because the firebird's back, baby.

[1:02:32] Why aren't the vault hunters, like the vault hunters on Pandora aren't still going after

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:36] that stuff?

[1:02:37] It's like they're celebrating, they're celebrating like-

[1:02:39] Elliot, shut up.

[1:02:40] Shut up.

[1:02:41] They won, all right?

[1:02:42] And the people of Pandora know this?

[1:02:44] Like they're aware of this personal thing?

[1:02:46] Like it's a-

[1:02:47] I guess.

[1:02:48] I don't know.

Stuart Wellington

[1:02:48] They got an Amber Alert or whatever.

[1:02:51] They've got-

Elliott Kalan

[1:02:51] It's fireworks.

[1:02:53] They're like, what does that sound like?

[1:02:54] Sounds like peace.

[1:02:55] Let's keep it going.

[1:02:56] And it's like, what is peace of what?

[1:02:58] Like what were people-

[1:02:59] Yeah.

[1:03:00] I don't know.

[1:03:00] It seemed like nobody seemed to have that much of an issue with Pandora except Lilith up

[1:03:04] to this point.

Dan McCoy

[1:03:05] But anyway, like the movies ends with like Tina basically being like, I don't know, she's

[1:03:11] like Winona Ryder at the end of Beetlejuice.

[1:03:13] Yeah, do that thing.

[1:03:14] Do the thing.

[1:03:15] The thing in this case being that like Lilith goes up into the sky with her wings and turns

[1:03:20] into a big firebird in the sky.

[1:03:22] And then credits and we get a brief credits thing that Stuart may or may not have seen

[1:03:26] where Claptrap-

[1:03:28] You know I didn't.

[1:03:28] Claptrap is dancing.

[1:03:30] But the scrolling of the names and the credits pushes him off screen, which was kind of fun,

[1:03:36] I guess.

[1:03:37] Yeah.

[1:03:37] Like as those things go, it was pretty short.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:40] I mean, this movie gets a lot of credit from me for not setting up a sequel.

[1:03:43] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:03:44] Well, maybe the sequel would be the stuff that you're talking about where Pandora is still

[1:03:47] under, you know, attack from various sides or whatever.

[1:03:50] Or just, it's just full of people who are trying.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:51] So, they were going for the idea that Pandora is like this lawless, chaotic, you know, wasteland.

[1:04:00] You know, it's this Mad Max type land.

[1:04:02] And then at the end, something happens and everyone's like, hey, let's get along with each other.

[1:04:05] And I'm like, I don't really know what happened.

[1:04:07] I don't understand why.

[1:04:09] At the same time, I don't want to watch more of the movie.

[1:04:11] So, it's not like I'm saying movie, explain this to me.

Dan McCoy

[1:04:15] Well, as long as we're in that zone, let's get into final judgments, whether this is a

[1:04:19] good bad movie, a bad, bad movie, or a movie we kind of like, I am going to say that it's

[1:04:25] a bad, bad movie, but Roman Mars was right.

[1:04:29] Doing the show for decades has warped my brain.

[1:04:33] And on the sliding scale of the stuff we've, we watch, like this movie is a disaster in

[1:04:38] a lot of ways, but it's a way that kind of charmed me more than other movies.

[1:04:43] Because you rarely see a big budget movie with big stars that feels this like chopped up and

[1:04:53] slapdash and, you know, like something really went wrong.

[1:04:58] And like I said, some of the brightness of it appealed to me.

[1:05:02] Some of the really bad effects in it.

[1:05:04] I was like giggling at the way they looked.

[1:05:07] You know, like there was more fun in this movie to be had than I was led to believe, but I

[1:05:12] wouldn't, you know, tell anyone to watch it or anything.

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:15] Yeah.

[1:05:15] I would say this is a bad, bad movie.

[1:05:17] It's like, it's kind of charming to see a crummy video game adaption, uh, by people who

[1:05:23] don't seem to forget how to make movies and also what makes video games fun.

[1:05:28] Uh, but what I will say is that like compared to something like the fucking, uh, what are

[1:05:33] those rebel moon movies, which is, I feel like the closest, uh, equivalent to this that we've

[1:05:38] seen recently.

[1:05:38] I would watch a million borderlands over rebel moons.

[1:05:41] Like rebel moons are so like overly serious garbage.

[1:05:45] And, uh, this at least moved relatively quickly.

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:48] I will, I will join Stuart and damning this with the faintest praise possible, which is yes,

[1:05:53] I would rather watch it than the rebel moon movies.

[1:05:56] Um, but, but it's similar to the rebel moon movies to me in that it feels like it makes

[1:06:01] me, it's a bad, bad movie to me.

[1:06:03] It makes me sad watching this movie because it feels like, well, this is the kind of movie

[1:06:06] not to sound like Martin Scorsese, you know, that, that old, that old superhero hating geezer,

[1:06:11] you know, but that, uh, this is the kind of movie that is getting made a lot now where

[1:06:15] it's like, there's no reason to make it.

[1:06:18] It's not, it's not doing anything fun or interesting.

[1:06:20] It just kind of fills that fills the plate and, and hits the checkpoints.

[1:06:25] And I kind of miss the world we used to live in where a borderlands movie would get made

[1:06:30] and it would be a mid to low budget kind of like fly by night movie, just trying to cash

[1:06:36] in on a name.

[1:06:37] Maybe there's one famous British actor in there playing like the king of the borderlands

[1:06:42] or something to give it a little bit of cash.

[1:06:44] Yeah.

[1:06:44] Brian Blessed.

[1:06:45] Yes.

[1:06:46] Yeah.

[1:06:47] Or, or like, or, or Ralph Richardson or something like that, or, you know, Peter O'Toole.

[1:06:50] And it's, and, uh, and then everyone else is just kind of like young, young actors that

[1:06:55] are trying to catch their break.

[1:06:56] And it's really slapdash and it's made really fast.

[1:06:59] And as a result, they might stumble into something really fun and something really like neat and

[1:07:05] original and interesting in a way that will stick in like a kid's mind when they see it in

[1:07:10] the middle of the day on HBO, you know, or something like that.

[1:07:12] Yeah.

[1:07:13] And it's, it's, it's just sad to me that instead the version of borderlands that we get is like,

[1:07:18] it's kind of like, it is, it is kind of slapdash, but just kind of like derivative and, and pull

[1:07:23] off other things.

[1:07:24] And a lot of people who should be making more interesting stuff are instead kind of spending

[1:07:28] their time on this.

[1:07:29] And, um, you know, it's just kind of like, uh, I, it was hard for me to watch it and not

[1:07:34] see it as a, as an indication of a larger problem with, um, with my beloved movies right now,

[1:07:40] you know, but that's enough of me and my, that's enough of Kaylin's corner soapbox, you

[1:07:44] know, uh, so on a, on a score of one to five exploding bunnies, I give it one exploding

[1:07:50] bunny.

[1:07:51] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[1:07:53] Well, uh, this podcast, the flop house is, uh, made possible in large part by members of

[1:08:00] the max fun community, uh, who, uh, give every month to help it keep going.

[1:08:07] But we also have a couple of sponsors.

[1:08:08] And we want to thank those people, right?

[1:08:09] Thank you.

[1:08:10] I want to thank them.

[1:08:11] Thank you members.

[1:08:12] Uh, dearly, dearly thank them.

[1:08:14] Uh, it may surprise no one to learn that my newsletter doesn't pay the bills.

[1:08:20] So.

[1:08:21] What?

[1:08:21] This is your, your personal newsletter.

[1:08:23] Yeah.

[1:08:24] Um, but, uh, we, we also have some sponsors.

[1:08:27] Uh, the first of those is Squarespace, the all-in-one website platform for entrepreneurs

[1:08:33] to stand out and succeed online.

[1:08:37] And Squarespace wants, uh, to introduce you to something.

[1:08:40] It's called design intelligence from Squarespace.

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[1:08:48] unlock your strongest creative potential.

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[1:08:56] to their unique needs and craft a bespoke digital identity to use across one's entire

[1:09:04] online presence.

[1:09:05] I've thought many times to myself, my online presence, not bespoke enough.

[1:09:10] Could we bespeak this a bit more?

[1:09:13] Well, Squarespace will help you.

[1:09:14] So why not go to squarespace.com for a free trial?

[1:09:18] And when you are ready to launch, go to squarespace.com slash flop to save 10% off your first purchase

[1:09:26] of a website or domain.

Stuart Wellington

[1:09:28] Hey guys, do you ever notice how the days are getting shorter, but your to-do list isn't?

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[1:10:46] Hey everybody.

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:01] We also have some live shows coming up.

[1:11:04] Well, one live show coming up and then other kind of live on your computer shows.

[1:11:08] We are going to be appearing in person.

[1:11:10] That's right.

[1:11:10] We're appearing in person on Sunday, January 19th at Cobb's Comedy Club as part of the San

[1:11:16] Francisco Sketch Fest.

[1:11:17] We're going back to San Francisco.

[1:11:19] That's right.

[1:11:20] To the Sketch Fest.

[1:11:21] We're going to be doing an all new show and we're going to be talking about one of the

[1:11:25] biggest flops in film history.

[1:11:27] Dan, what's that flop we're talking about?

Dan McCoy

[1:11:29] It's called Cutthroat Island.

[1:11:31] It's all about pirates.

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:33] It's all about pirates.

[1:11:34] Remember how pirates were really big after Pirates of the Caribbean?

[1:11:37] There was a movie before that that did not have that effect on the American popular

[1:11:41] culture.

[1:11:42] The opposite, in fact.

[1:11:43] Yes.

[1:11:44] So go to sfsketchfest.com where you'll find the schedule and I think there's some tickets

[1:11:49] still available.

[1:11:50] That's San Francisco Sketch Fest Sunday, January 19th, 7 p.m. at Cobb's Comedy Club.

[1:11:56] 7 p.m. Pacific time, of course, because it's in San Francisco.

[1:11:59] Don't show up at 4 p.m. thinking it's 7 p.m. Eastern.

[1:12:03] And we're going to try to do some more.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:04] You might want to get in line, right?

[1:12:06] You want to get in line at 4 p.m. so you can show off your cosplay and all that stuff?

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:10] Yeah, show off which one of us you're dressed up as or one of the cutthroats, perhaps.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:14] And you're going to tailgate, right?

[1:12:15] You're going to tailgate.

[1:12:16] You're going to cook out of hibachi.

[1:12:18] Get excited for the show.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:19] Right there on the street in San Francisco.

[1:12:22] And we will hopefully do more live shows this year, but we don't have any others lined up

[1:12:27] at the moment.

[1:12:27] So this is your chance if you're in the Bay Area to see us live Sunday, January 19th.

[1:12:31] Go to sfsketchfest.com.

[1:12:33] If you are not in the Bay Area and you want to, or maybe you're in a different Bay Area,

[1:12:37] like Green Bay.

[1:12:37] That's a different Bay with a different area.

[1:12:39] Maybe just like Old Bay.

[1:12:41] Yeah.

[1:12:42] Maybe you just like Old Bay.

[1:12:45] Yeah, that could be it.

[1:12:46] Well, anyway, what I'm getting at is...

[1:12:47] That's what I call Dan.

[1:12:48] Dan's my Old Bay.

[1:12:50] Thanks, buddy.

[1:12:51] We are also still doing Flop TV.

[1:12:54] As you may have heard at the top of this show, Flop TV season two continues.

[1:12:57] There's two more episodes left.

[1:12:58] That's our one-hour televised version of the Flophouse the first Saturday of every month.

[1:13:02] That's at 9 p.m. Eastern, 6 p.m. Pacific.

[1:13:05] The first Saturday in January and February.

[1:13:07] Every episode this season is about a sequel.

[1:13:09] And this next episode on January 4th, we're going to be talking Ski School 2.

[1:13:14] Uh-oh.

[1:13:15] We're getting into the Ski School franchise.

[1:13:16] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[1:13:17] Finally a good movie.

[1:13:19] We'll be talking Ski School 2.

[1:13:21] There's going to be a presentation.

[1:13:22] There's going to be video components of some kind.

[1:13:24] We've been having a lot of fun with this season.

[1:13:26] I think people have been really enjoying it.

[1:13:27] The videos have been driving us a little mad, as you may have seen from the last couple.

[1:13:32] Just a descent into insanity.

[1:13:34] I can't guarantee.

[1:13:35] I'm doing the one for January 4th.

[1:13:36] Can't guarantee it's going to be quite as bizarre as Stuart and Dan's recent ones have been.

[1:13:40] Can't make it to the show at that time, January 4th at 9 p.m. Eastern, 6 p.m. Pacific.

[1:13:45] That's okay.

[1:13:46] Your ticket gets you access to the video recording of the show through the end of February.

[1:13:50] All videos will stay up to the end of February when they will come down

[1:13:53] and go back to the Flophouse vault to be found by a vault hunter thousands of years from now.

[1:13:58] He's the chosen one.

[1:13:59] A child of Danridia.

[1:14:01] And so you might want to get a ticket or you might also want to get a season pass.

[1:14:05] A season pass is six episodes for the price of five.

[1:14:08] And again, it gets you access to all the videos for all the episodes.

[1:14:11] Why not just binge it?

[1:14:13] Just binge the whole season when it's all over.

[1:14:15] Why not?

[1:14:15] We can't stop you.

[1:14:16] So that's Flop TV season two, next episode, January 4th.

[1:14:20] And for tickets, go to theflophouse.simpleticks.com.

[1:14:25] I also want to mention one of my own things, guys.

[1:14:27] Can I mention one of my own things?

[1:14:27] Okay.

[1:14:28] Fuck it.

[1:14:28] You're crazy, buddy.

[1:14:30] I'm still writing the Harley Quinn comic series for DC Comics.

[1:14:33] So that's coming out once a month.

[1:14:34] Check your local comic book stores.

[1:14:36] Harley Quinn from DC Comics.

Dan McCoy

[1:14:38] I pre-ordered the eventual collection because I'm not one these days to keep up on individual

[1:14:45] issues, unfortunately.

[1:14:47] But I do want to read this.

[1:14:48] I understand.

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:48] As long as you're paying money for it, that's all I care about.

[1:14:50] Mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[1:14:52] How sweet.

[1:14:54] What a sweet sentiment.

[1:15:00] Oh my gosh.

S4

[1:15:02] Hi.

[1:15:03] It's me, Dave Holmes, host of Troubled Waters, the pop culture battle to the ego death.

[1:15:09] Okay, everybody.

[1:15:10] Word association with Troubled Waters.

[1:15:11] First one to fumble, loses.

[1:15:13] Go.

[1:15:14] Comedy.

[1:15:15] Panel show.

[1:15:16] Guests.

[1:15:17] Celebrities.

[1:15:18] Games.

[1:15:19] Oh, sound rounds.

[1:15:20] Improvised speeches.

Dan McCoy

[1:15:22] Puns disguised as trivia.

[1:15:23] Um, a very niche Flash Gordon clip.

S4

[1:15:26] Um, Chabble Rowan.

[1:15:27] Oh, no, Riley, I'm sorry.

[1:15:29] She will not return our phone calls.

[1:15:30] I am afraid you're out.

[1:15:32] A girl can dream.

[1:15:34] Oh, but dreaming will not earn a girl any points.

[1:15:37] Troubled Waters.

[1:15:38] Listen on Maximum Fun or wherever you get your podcasts.

S5

[1:15:44] I'm Yucky Jessica.

[1:15:46] I'm Chut Crudsworth.

[1:15:48] And this is Terrible.

[1:15:50] A podcast where we talk about things we hate that are awful.

Elliott Kalan

[1:15:54] Today we're discussing Wonderful.

[1:15:56] A podcast on the Maximum Fun Network.

S5

[1:15:59] Host Rachel and Griffin McElroy.

[1:16:01] A real-life married couple.

Dan McCoy

[1:16:03] Yuck.

[1:16:04] Discuss a wide range of topics.

S4

[1:16:06] Music, video games, poetry, snacks.

S5

[1:16:09] But I hate all that stuff.

[1:16:11] I know you do, Yucky Jessica.

[1:16:14] It comes out every Wednesday.

Elliott Kalan

[1:16:15] The worst day of the week.

[1:16:17] Wherever you download your podcasts.

S5

[1:16:19] For our next topic, we're talking Fiona, the baby hippo from the Cincinnati Zoo.

Dan McCoy

[1:16:24] I hate this little hippo.

[1:16:27] Let's move on to some letters from listeners.

[1:16:29] This first one is from James, last name with hell.

[1:16:32] James Hetfield.

[1:16:33] Yeah.

[1:16:34] Who writes, hey peaches.

[1:16:36] Long-time listener, first-time writer, shamelessly attempting to appeal to Elliot's special interest.

[1:16:42] This is at least half a brag, but I sometimes appear in my friend's pornographic videos.

[1:16:48] What?

[1:16:49] On a recent occasion, we shot a scene in a hotel room, and I left on the bedside table the paperback copy that I was currently reading of Robert Caro's masterpiece biography of Robert Moses, The Power Broker.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:02] Meaning that it was—

[1:17:03] What a funny thing to bring to a porn video shoot.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:07] It was visible in a large number of shots, and once I realized that, it was hard to focus on anything else while watching the video.

[1:17:13] Sidebar, I could tell that Elliot was like, what?

[1:17:15] Is he saying that porn is my special interest?

[1:17:17] Yeah, because that's not my thing.

[1:17:19] No, we're getting on to, of course, The Power Broker.

[1:17:22] The porn of books.

Stuart Wellington

[1:17:22] Man, that's so great that there is this porn that I can just send to Elliot as a Christmas gift that's perfect for the holidays.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:31] Track it down.

[1:17:33] So my question, since I don't think you're equipped to answer—

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:35] I just hope it doesn't get pulled off of YouTube as a copyright infringement thing.

[1:17:39] Yeah.

[1:17:39] You can't put porn on YouTube.

[1:17:41] I don't know, guys.

[1:17:43] I don't know where porn is.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:46] So my question, since I don't think you're equipped to answer, am I the first person to put The Power Broker in a porn video?

[1:17:52] But I am curious about that as well.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:54] Is, has there ever been a prop—

[1:17:55] You know who's the only person who'd be able to do the research for that?

[1:17:58] Who?

[1:17:58] Robert Caro.

[1:17:59] True.

[1:18:00] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:18:01] He has the tenacity.

[1:18:03] Has there ever been a prop or piece of set dressing in a movie that drew your attention totally away from the things you're supposed to be paying attention to by its specificity?

[1:18:14] I'm not talking about, that's a Pokemon toy in the medieval setting or anything that belongs in IMDb's goof section.

[1:18:21] I mean things that could validly be in the place that are shot, but that nevertheless distract you personally.

[1:18:27] Thanks.

[1:18:28] James' last name was held.

[1:18:30] And I got to admit, I put this in thinking it was a great email.

[1:18:34] I don't necessarily have a great answer to it because I know that this has happened to me.

[1:18:38] I know that I'm like distracted by something like, oh, I've got that thing.

[1:18:41] Yeah.

[1:18:41] Or I, but I can't think, I mean, it's not the same thing as it being so specific or weird.

[1:18:52] But I remember watching Mad Men and being like, those are the exact same rocks glasses I have.

[1:18:57] Look at it.

[1:18:58] Don Draper's drinking out of the same glass as me.

Elliott Kalan

[1:19:00] You're like, I'm like Don Draper.

[1:19:02] I'm like, I should be called Dan Draper.

Dan McCoy

[1:19:05] I should be called Dan Draper.

Elliott Kalan

[1:19:07] I don't know if this fits into the goofs thing.

[1:19:10] Because the thing that came to mind for me was, I mean, partly it's whenever you see, whenever I see a movie that's shot in a place that I know.

[1:19:18] Like if I see a movie that's shot in Park Slope in Brooklyn, it's like, it distracts me because I'm just thinking about my memories of that neighborhood where I lived for so long.

[1:19:25] But in the movie 40-Year-Old Virgin, he's supposed to be like a big comic book nerd or something.

[1:19:31] And he has framed comic books on the wall.

[1:19:34] And the comic books they chose are, unless he worked on those comics, there is no reason to frame them.

[1:19:39] They're just kind of random books that somebody put in a frame and then slapped on the wall.

[1:19:43] And that did really distract me because I was like, why is he, like, why is that the book he chose to frame and put on the wall?

[1:19:49] It's just some random thing.

[1:19:50] Are they autographed maybe?

[1:19:52] Maybe they're autographed.

[1:19:53] I mean, he never gets close enough to them.

[1:19:56] I guess I'll have to check the DVD special features to see if they reach them.

Stuart Wellington

[1:19:59] Maybe there's a deleted scene where he is doing close-ups and taking them on to, like, Antiques Roadshow or some shit.

[1:20:06] Yeah.

[1:20:06] I would say, I don't know if there's the same thing, but I'm very distracted any time I see, like, a glass brick wall in a movie.

[1:20:15] Like, ideally in a bathroom or something because it's just the coolest thing in the world.

[1:20:18] It's just the height of class, yeah.

[1:20:20] Oh, yeah.

[1:20:21] There is also a scene, I recently watched the movie Thelma, and there's a scene where Parker Posey is riding in the passenger seat of a car, and she is wearing a pair of sunglasses over her normal glasses.

[1:20:34] And she is wearing them in such a way that I'm like, this is the coolest thing I've ever seen in my life.

Dan McCoy

[1:20:41] Stuart, I can't remember.

[1:20:42] I may have said this on the podcast before, but my, like, online bad movie watching crew, like, they will shout out GBA on the chat, glass brick alert, whenever one shows up.

[1:20:54] One of those walls shows up in the movie.

[1:20:55] Yeah, hell yeah.

[1:20:56] Because, I mean, particularly low-budget movies, there's a lot of glass brick walls that show up.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:02] I mean, I was watching the, there's this old thriller with James Spader and Rob Lowe called Bad Influence,

[1:21:11] where James Spader plays, like, a buttoned-up guy who meets, like, a bad influence in a bar, and he goes to a downward spiral.

Elliott Kalan

[1:21:19] It is so funny that at that point in time, it felt like it made sense for James Spader to be the buttoned-up innocent guy, Rob Lowe to be the bad influence.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:26] And James Spader's apartment is in L.A., and it's like, it's like everything is glass brick walls.

[1:21:31] It's crazy.

[1:21:32] There's also a scene where he goes to, they go to, like, a club with, like, performers dancing on everyone's table,

[1:21:39] and they're, like, playing Skinny Puppy or some shit.

[1:21:42] It's pretty crazy.

[1:21:42] It's a crazy movie, guys.

Dan McCoy

[1:21:45] It's a, I believe that's an early Curtis Hanson movie.

[1:21:47] That's a.

[1:21:48] You believe correct.

[1:21:50] Yeah.

[1:21:51] This next letter is from Rob, last name withheld.

[1:21:54] Rob Lowe.

Elliott Kalan

[1:21:55] Who writes.

[1:21:55] Hey, have you guys seen my movie Bad Influence?

[1:21:59] I was trying to be the normal guy, and they're like, nope.

[1:22:02] Nope, be the weirdo.

Dan McCoy

[1:22:04] Well, not weirdo, but, you know, the bad guy, the bad guy, yeah.

[1:22:06] Hi, peaches.

[1:22:08] I was relistening to episode 374, Firestarter, 2022, and another listener, Matthew, mixed a song from a

[1:22:17] mini episode called Flophouse the Movie.

[1:22:20] I was only half listening, so instead of hearing palm trees, jet skis, I heard palm trees, skeksies, a la the dark crystal.

[1:22:31] Thank you for clarifying.

[1:22:33] As opposed to the skeksies in Kramer versus Kramer, yeah.

[1:22:39] Skeksies versus sketsies.

[1:22:41] It made me think of them soaking up the sun in California, and then also maybe riding jet skis.

[1:22:47] This then immediately led my imagination to think of you guys talking about Freddie and Jason vacationing on Fire Island.

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:52] I was imagining someone going, hey, what are they?

[1:22:54] Are those jet skis over there?

[1:22:56] Mmm.

[1:22:58] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:22:59] It's got to be like Boca or something, right?

Dan McCoy

[1:23:02] Do you think they made a lot of those noises for the same reason that, like, anime has a lot of those noises?

[1:23:09] It's because, you know, dark crystal originally was not supposed to be in English.

[1:23:13] Like, Henson was like, we'll have it all in fantasy language.

[1:23:16] And then they saw it cut, and they're like, no, no, Jim.

[1:23:18] It doesn't make any sense.

[1:23:19] You can't do it like this.

[1:23:20] So maybe there's extra noises because they have to, like, match the lip flap.

[1:23:24] Maybe.

Elliott Kalan

[1:23:25] I don't know.

[1:23:25] Oh, maybe.

[1:23:27] It feels a little bit more natural than it does sometimes in anime where they're like, what did you say?

[1:23:32] We have to go over there, and then we have to do this, huh?

[1:23:34] You know, like, that's the.

[1:23:35] Yeah.

[1:23:36] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:23:37] This then immediately led my imagination to think of you guys talking about Freddie and Jason, Vacation on Fire Island with Pennywise and the Babadook.

[1:23:44] I couldn't stop laughing at myself on the train.

[1:23:47] My question, where do you think famous movie monsters and villains would like to get some R&R?

[1:23:53] Love the show.

[1:23:53] Rob, last name withheld.

Stuart Wellington

[1:23:55] I mean, I feel like they're always going to New Yorker space, right?

Dan McCoy

[1:24:00] You think those are tourist destinations?

Stuart Wellington

[1:24:02] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:24:03] I guess they turn into work trips, right?

[1:24:05] Yeah.

[1:24:05] That's the problem.

[1:24:06] It's hard to get away from.

[1:24:07] Like, the Jigsaw says that he wants to just get away and not have to do the work and make decisions, but he can't.

[1:24:13] Once he goes on vacation, he just can't help himself.

[1:24:15] You know, he doesn't know how to relax anymore.

[1:24:18] Luckily, there's a whole hotel just for monsters.

[1:24:21] It's in Transylvania.

[1:24:21] Yeah.

[1:24:22] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:24:23] And they apparently also then go on a cruise together, even though that seems like a bad place for many monsters to be.

[1:24:29] Yeah, that's true.

[1:24:30] A lot of sun, you know.

[1:24:32] What about the feature from the Black Lagoon?

Elliott Kalan

[1:24:34] That feels perfect, right?

Dan McCoy

[1:24:36] Yeah.

[1:24:37] For him, sure.

[1:24:39] The whole vampire family that's involved there, though.

[1:24:41] Maybe not so much.

[1:24:42] Maybe not.

Elliott Kalan

[1:24:42] And I'm sure there's some of those monsters have trouble being around running water.

[1:24:46] You know, to be surrounded by the ocean is probably not great.

Dan McCoy

[1:24:49] Yeah.

[1:24:50] They can't cross it, but maybe.

[1:24:52] Yeah, it's tough.

[1:24:53] I mean, like, then how do they get on with the gangplank?

[1:24:55] Like, you got to cross some water there, right?

[1:24:57] I mean, maybe they just bring their.

Stuart Wellington

[1:24:58] We should watch Last Voyage of the Demeter.

[1:25:01] Maybe that'll clear that up.

[1:25:02] Yeah.

[1:25:02] It does not answer the questions that we're asking.

Dan McCoy

[1:25:07] Anyway, that's what we call the letter to saying.

[1:25:11] Let's move on to recommendations.

[1:25:14] Recommendations, of course.

[1:25:16] Movies that might be a better use of your time.

[1:25:20] Than Borderlands?

[1:25:21] Than Borderlands.

[1:25:25] You know what?

[1:25:25] I was, like, looking at my.

[1:25:28] Oh, you know what?

[1:25:29] I want to recommend.

[1:25:29] I want to recommend a movie called Drive from 1997.

[1:25:34] Not the.

[1:25:35] Not the.

[1:25:36] Nicholas Winding Refn Drive.

[1:25:38] But from 97, there was a movie called Drive.

[1:25:41] That starred.

[1:25:42] Let me.

[1:25:43] I'm going to.

[1:25:44] I got to check on the.

[1:25:45] Is it License to Drive?

[1:25:47] Is that the movie?

[1:25:48] No, it's just.

[1:25:49] Is it Drive My Car?

[1:25:49] It's just.

[1:25:50] No, it's just Drive.

[1:25:52] The lead is Mark Dacascos.

[1:25:56] Hell yeah.

[1:25:56] Dacascos.

[1:25:58] Yep.

[1:25:59] He.

[1:25:59] You may have seen him most recently in John Wick 3.

[1:26:04] Probably.

[1:26:05] As the.

[1:26:06] The bad guy.

[1:26:08] Or the kind of, like, nice bad guy.

Stuart Wellington

[1:26:10] He also plays.

[1:26:11] He also plays Manny in.

[1:26:14] He.

[1:26:14] Mark Dacascos plays Manny in Brotherhood of the Wolf.

[1:26:17] Right?

Dan McCoy

[1:26:18] Yes.

[1:26:18] He's in Brotherhood of the Wolf.

[1:26:21] It.

[1:26:21] It also has Kadeem Hardison, who I, of course, think of as Dwayne Wayne from a different world, but is always sort of charming when he shows up.

[1:26:29] Never had the career that I think he probably could have had if he was a little more fortunate.

[1:26:33] But it's a buddy comedy.

[1:26:35] One year before Rush Hour, you got this, you know, this black guy in L.A. teaming up with a martial arts master to fight some baddies.

[1:26:47] And it's just a lot of fun.

[1:26:50] It is a fun action comedy.

[1:26:53] Very silly.

[1:26:54] Didn't get a lot of attention because it was released straight to HBO.

[1:26:57] It was produced direct-to-video.

[1:27:00] Brittany Murphy also shows up for a little while to remind us about how sad it is that she's not around anymore because she does a great job.

[1:27:07] It's just like a fun, silly action comedy of a kind that I'm like, oh, I, you know, sometimes I feel like I've seen all of, like, the good stuff in that vein.

[1:27:19] Like, the really, like, popcorn-y fun shit from the past.

[1:27:22] And it's nice to know, like, there's still stuff out there to find that is maybe a little more under the radar.

[1:27:29] So I would look it up.

[1:27:29] It is, like so many things, on Tubies.

[1:27:32] So you can find it there.

[1:27:33] Hell yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:27:35] I'm going to recommend a movie that I saw with Dan McCoy as a matinee the day before Thanksgiving, which shows how long it's been since we've recorded one of these full episodes.

[1:27:47] I'm recommending one of my favorite movies of the year, Luca Guadagino's Queer, starring Mr. Daniel Craig.

[1:27:55] You might know him as Jimmy Bond.

[1:27:58] I don't.

[1:28:02] This is a, this is a adaptation of a Burroughs, a short Burroughs novel.

[1:28:07] And I'm not familiar with the source material.

[1:28:10] Yeah.

[1:28:11] That's what I meant.

[1:28:11] Yes, that's right.

[1:28:12] That's what I meant.

[1:28:14] The pulp novel.

[1:28:15] Yeah.

[1:28:15] The, but yeah, it's a, it's like, I found it to be a really, in a year when he, Guadagino also made or had Challengers released.

[1:28:26] It's so great to see him kind of falling back kind of into his like sweet spot of this like kind of smaller story that is filled with characters that have like intense longing and a desire for connection.

[1:28:43] And like all these great little like physical and like character moments.

[1:28:49] But it also like, this one is also like, like less immediately satisfying than something like Challengers.

[1:28:55] I just found it to be a really beautiful movie.

[1:28:57] That's really well acted and really interesting.

[1:29:00] What do you think, Dan?

Dan McCoy

[1:29:02] I liked it a lot.

[1:29:03] It's, yeah, Jason Schwartzman is also very fun.

[1:29:08] He is.

[1:29:08] He's supporting the part.

[1:29:10] Yeah.

[1:29:11] He provides this like weird sort of grounding of like a more normal guy, but still silly.

[1:29:17] Like it's like, he's still a funny, like weird guy in his own way, but he's, he also provides a lot of warmth in a supporting part.

[1:29:25] Yeah.

[1:29:25] It's a, it's a, it's a very interesting movie in that like, it doesn't have a lot of plot thrust,

[1:29:31] but I found myself really engaged by just the main characters sort of desperate need for connection.

[1:29:39] So check it out.

[1:29:40] It's queer.

[1:29:41] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:42] I want, I was going to recommend something similar.

[1:29:44] It's also about the need for connection between, between people who are otherwise lonely.

[1:29:50] This is the new Wallace and Gromit movie, which I took my kids to see a screening of yesterday.

[1:29:54] It's called Wallace and Gromit, Vengeance Most Foul.

[1:29:57] And it was, I'm a big fan of those, those, their stuff and those movies.

[1:30:02] The last one that they had done, A Matter of Loaf and Death, which was years ago, I was not such a fan of.

[1:30:08] It seemed like it didn't quite have it.

[1:30:10] But this one, I found it was just super fun and super funny and had a lot of that Wallace and Gromit, Aardman, Nick Park inventiveness.

[1:30:17] That is, that is the hallmark of the series.

[1:30:21] And it's a, it moves fast and doesn't get weighed down and just got like lots of fun sequences in it.

[1:30:27] And the animation looks great.

[1:30:28] And it was great seeing those characters again.

[1:30:30] So if you want to see something that is going to be fun, then why not check out Wallace and Gromit, Vengeance Most Foul, when it's available.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:38] I've been looking forward to that one.

[1:30:40] I want to see it.

[1:30:41] I really enjoyed it a lot.

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:42] There are a number of sequences in it where I'm like, oh yeah, this is, this is top Wallace and Gromit stuff.

[1:30:47] That's three recommendations I'm pretty excited about.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:52] Hey, this is, this has been the Flophouse.

[1:30:55] That's how we end it, right?

[1:30:56] This has been the Flophouse.

[1:30:57] It's been a while since we've actually been recording one of these things.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:00] It's been a while since we started the show and identified what this show is.

Dan McCoy

[1:31:04] Yeah, I like to reset right at the end.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:06] What was I listening to?

Dan McCoy

[1:31:07] Oh yeah, the Flophouse.

[1:31:09] The Flophouse is on the Maximum Fun Network.

[1:31:13] If you go to MaximumFun.org, you can find other great podcasts on the network about all kinds of different stuff.

[1:31:20] I'm sure if you like this, you might find another one there that you like as well.

[1:31:24] Why don't you check it out?

[1:31:25] Our producer is Alex Smith.

[1:31:28] He does a great job for us.

[1:31:30] Happy holidays, Alex.

[1:31:32] Thank you so much.

[1:31:34] You can find him online as Howell Dottie, which is the name under which he makes a lot of music.

[1:31:42] He does some Twitch streams.

[1:31:44] Check his stuff out.

[1:31:46] And I guess that's it for the Flophouse.

Stuart Wellington

[1:31:48] I've been Dan McCoy.

[1:31:50] I've been Stuart Wellington.

Elliott Kalan

[1:31:53] And I'm Elliot Kalin.

[1:31:56] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[1:31:56] Bye.

[1:31:57] See ya.

[1:31:58] Bye.

[1:32:00] Deuces.

[1:32:02] What?

[1:32:03] On this episode, we discuss Borderlands.

[1:32:15] Sort of an unconventional remake of the movie Badlands.

Dan McCoy

[1:32:21] Let's retake that only because I think you said the word a little weird, unconventional.

[1:32:26] Yeah.

[1:32:27] I did.

[1:32:27] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:32:28] It was an unconventional way of saying unconventional.

[1:32:31] Yeah.

[1:32:32] Maximum Fun.

[1:32:34] A worker-owned network.

[1:32:35] Of artist-owned shows.

[1:32:37] Supported.

[1:32:38] Directly.

[1:32:39] By you.

Ep. #440 - Borderlands

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