Ep.#433 - Dangerous Game: The Legacy Murders

Dan McCoy

[0:00] On this episode, we discuss Dangerous Game, The Legacy Murders.

Stuart Wellington

[0:05] Have you ever wanted to watch a Saw movie directed by the Bratz director?

[0:09] Well, here it is.

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

Dan McCoy

[0:36] I'm Dan McCoy.

Stuart Wellington

[0:38] I'm Stuart Wellington.

Elliott Kalan

[0:40] And I'm Elliot Kalin riding a bicycle down some stairs.

[0:44] Oh, that's what's happening.

Dan McCoy

[0:45] For a second, I thought he died.

Stuart Wellington

[0:49] That's the thing.

[0:50] I feel like, is that why ghosts sound like that?

[0:52] Because they were riding a bicycle down the stairs and then they died.

[0:54] That's what it is.

[0:55] Exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[0:56] They all died riding bicycles downstairs, and they continue to do so in the afterlife.

[0:59] That actually makes sense.

[1:01] Yeah, it's Beetlejuice rules.

Dan McCoy

[1:03] Yeah, and they're all penny farthings, so it's a lot of jiggling.

[1:06] It's very painful.

Stuart Wellington

[1:08] Uh-huh.

[1:08] Wait, penny farthing is the giant wheel and the little wheel?

[1:11] Yep.

[1:11] Bone shakers, they used to call them.

[1:13] Why do they call it a penny farthing?

Elliott Kalan

[1:14] Because one wheel is the size of a penny and one is the size of a farthing in relation to each other, right?

[1:18] Oh.

[1:19] That actually makes perfect sense.

Stuart Wellington

[1:20] Okay.

Dan McCoy

[1:21] I'm glad Elliot had the actual answer.

Stuart Wellington

[1:23] I thought I was going to be setting up some comedy bits.

[1:26] Nope.

[1:26] This show is all about getting things right.

Dan McCoy

[1:29] Educational.

[1:30] Welcome to strangely, incredibly fascinating.

[1:33] Today, bicycles.

Elliott Kalan

[1:35] Today, terms for bicycles.

[1:39] Not bicycles themselves, just the words.

[1:41] Did you know bicycle means to cycle?

[1:44] Oh.

[1:45] Thanks.

Stuart Wellington

[1:46] Let me check your math on that.

[1:48] Yeah, you're right.

Dan McCoy

[1:49] It's not that fascinating, but okay.

Elliott Kalan

[1:51] I've got some interesting surprise information for you about tricycles.

Stuart Wellington

[1:56] Oh, no.

[1:57] Maybe save that for later.

[1:58] I'm already a little worked up.

[2:00] Yeah.

[2:01] I don't want to make it too hard for you.

[2:02] Ed Stewart a little on these.

[2:03] Yeah, I'm in half mass already.

Dan McCoy

[2:06] Hey, we're shading into the fall months.

[2:11] Of course, we got a couple of theme months in the fall.

[2:16] You're at the Flophouse, a podcast where we watch a bad movie and then talk about it.

[2:20] Yeah, let's set up the premise.

[2:21] It's that.

[2:22] We watch a bad movie and then we talk about it.

[2:24] Should I say it too?

Elliott Kalan

[2:26] Just to complete?

[2:26] Just to round the horn?

[2:28] Two cycles?

[2:28] That we watch a bad movie and then we talk about it.

[2:30] Put your own mustard on it.

[2:31] Yeah.

[2:31] There you go.

[2:32] Well, we watch a bad movie and we talk about it.

[2:35] This is a long flight of stairs.

Dan McCoy

[2:38] I'm amazed that you can keep the microphone with you during this trip.

[2:41] Yeah.

[2:42] It's a headset, Mike.

[2:44] So, yeah, we do that.

Elliott Kalan

[2:45] Yeah, because I'm on my way to a TED Talk.

[2:48] Yeah, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[2:49] And, you know, oftentimes, most of the year, we watch bigger Hollywood pictures because why

[2:55] make fun of movies that people aren't really going to see anyway?

Elliott Kalan

[3:00] Why punch down?

[3:01] It would be like hitting a ferret.

Stuart Wellington

[3:03] But, you know, once a year.

[3:05] Us being titans of podcasting.

[3:07] Exactly.

[3:08] Striding over the earth, stuffing villagers into our gaping maw.

Dan McCoy

[3:12] Yeah.

[3:13] But once a year, we get a dispensation from the bad movie Pope to do some small movies.

[3:19] It's called Small Timber or Small Vember, depending on, you know.

[3:22] Whether you're right or wrong.

[3:24] Yeah.

[3:26] And for this one, this was a movie we made reference to another Max Fun podcast earlier.

[3:33] Let's do another Max Fun reference.

[3:36] This was recommended by Justin McElroy of My Brother, My Brother and Me and The Adventure

[3:41] Zone.

[3:42] He said, you got to check this out.

Elliott Kalan

[3:44] The actual podcast titan striding the earth and stuffing villagers into his maw, unlike

[3:49] us.

[3:49] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[3:50] I think he may have seen it on a plane, Dan McCoy style.

[3:53] Seems odd.

[3:54] I don't know why they would have it on a plane.

[3:55] Maybe I'm making that up.

[3:56] But anyway, it's called.

[3:58] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[3:58] I mean, the story stretches credibility, Dan.

[4:02] There's too many holes in the idea that he could watch this movie on a plane.

[4:06] One more thing.

[4:07] One more thing.

[4:07] Plains, which are famous for only carrying the creme de la creme of cinema for your viewing

[4:12] entertainment.

Dan McCoy

[4:13] I thought you were going to say, like, the story has changed over the years.

[4:17] It's in the retelling.

[4:19] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[4:20] Originally, it was watched on a stagecoach.

[4:22] Yeah.

[4:24] They updated it for the 21st century.

Dan McCoy

[4:26] Yeah.

[4:27] This is called, as we said, Dangerous Game, The Legacy Murders.

[4:32] The biggest name here is John Voight.

[4:35] You know, no stranger, certainly in the back half of his career to bad movies.

[4:40] Yeah.

[4:41] Directed by his guy, Sean McNamara, who did, as Stuart said, Bratz and a bunch of baby geniuses

[4:48] direct-to-video sequels.

[4:49] And I see Elliot wanting to say it, so why don't you say it?

[4:53] He's in theaters.

[4:54] Oh, I thought you were going to say he's in theaters now.

[4:57] A little movie called Reagan.

Stuart Wellington

[4:59] Directed by Sean McNamara of Bratz fame.

Dan McCoy

[5:02] What I was going to say was-

Stuart Wellington

[5:03] It's a movie where they hired that huge musician to play Frank Sinatra.

[5:08] Oh, yeah.

[5:08] Scott Statt from the band Creed.

[5:11] And I'm like-

[5:11] I mean, perfect casting.

[5:12] I'm like, Woody Allen's son is right there.

[5:14] Just cast him.

Elliott Kalan

[5:15] That was one of the, not to talk about, not to make light of a family that's been through

[5:21] a lot of turmoil.

[5:23] But when Mia Farrow was like, actually, his father might be Frank Sinatra.

[5:28] And it was like, really?

[5:29] The guy who shares a head with him?

[5:31] The guy he looks just like?

[5:33] I was going to say, Dan, that the movie also features one of the Bratz.

[5:36] Skylar Shea plays Joy.

[5:38] She was the athletic boy in Bratz.

Stuart Wellington

[5:41] Yeah, Sporty Bratz.

[5:42] That's nice.

[5:42] So when you were watching Bratz, I'm sure Dan was like, I wonder what it would look like

[5:47] if she had her guts ripped out.

[5:49] Oh, God.

Elliott Kalan

[5:50] Because that's what happens in this movie.

[5:52] Dan's like, I'll never find out what that would be like if she had a dog whistle stuffed

[5:56] in her gut.

[5:57] And Jonathan Rhys-Myra had to pull it out of her.

[5:59] I'll never know.

Dan McCoy

[6:00] Shockingly brutal for the people involved and the cover of the thing.

[6:06] It looks like it's going to be a clue.

[6:09] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[6:09] It looks like it's going to be a drawing room Agatha Christie mystery.

[6:12] But it is much more of a saw than anything else.

[6:15] In that we saw it.

Dan McCoy

[6:16] We did see it.

[6:17] And now let's talk about it.

[6:19] When I put this movie on Paramount+.

Elliott Kalan

[6:24] On your top 10 list of the year?

[6:26] Yeah.

[6:27] When you put this movie on your sight and sound top 10 list, because Dan is like, now that

[6:32] I'm in the highest echelons of podcasting Titan Dome, I'm going to send him my list of

[6:38] sight and sound, but I'm going to put only bad movies on it.

[6:40] Just to skew the results.

Dan McCoy

[6:41] When I hit play on this movie, I forgot that I had actually skipped an ad for a second.

[6:49] I'm like, oh, they didn't even want an ad to be on this.

[6:52] But the movie jumps right in without any production logos or anything.

[6:57] Media res.

[6:58] Is this the movie?

Elliott Kalan

[7:00] Did the movie start?

[7:01] I was confused.

[7:01] I had the same thing.

[7:02] I thought for a moment that there was a mistake because it does feel like it has suddenly

[7:06] started, not just in media res, like in the middle of an action, but in the middle of a

[7:10] scene that has not been set up properly.

[7:13] What's going on, Dan?

Dan McCoy

[7:14] And that scene, there's a redhead lady.

[7:16] She's screaming for help.

[7:19] She's in some sort of evidence dungeon that also has a wall with video projections on it,

[7:23] like it's an art installation.

[7:25] It's pretty cool.

[7:25] Yeah.

[7:26] There's a voice that says, welcome to the murder castle.

[7:30] And she is gassed and presumably dies on the floor.

[7:35] Well, you're on.

[7:35] She does.

Stuart Wellington

[7:36] So I'm assuming Elliot immediately clocked one of the images in the evidence dungeon was

[7:42] what, H.H. Holmes?

Elliott Kalan

[7:44] This is exactly what I was going to ask you guys.

[7:46] If I was alone, the minute he said murder castle, I said, oh, this is related to H.H.

[7:51] Holmes in some way.

[7:52] And I wondered if that was a tip off to you guys or if I'm the only one who read Devil

[7:55] in the White City.

[7:56] No, I read it too.

[7:58] Well, isn't that written by Eric Larson?

Stuart Wellington

[8:00] And I'm like, oh, the Savage Dragon guy?

[8:03] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[8:03] Yeah.

[8:03] There's three Eric Larson's and it's not the Savage Dragon guy who wrote that book.

[8:07] Yeah.

[8:08] Also Disney animator Eric Larson.

[8:09] But it is in Chicago, right?

[8:11] Just like Savage Dragon.

[8:12] I mean, I don't know if Eric Larson, I stopped reading Savage Dragon at a certain point.

[8:16] So I wonder if Eric Larson was ever like, I'll jump on this bandwagon into the Savage

[8:19] Dragon versus H.H.

[8:20] Holmes story.

[8:21] But as soon as they said murder castle, I was like, okay, so this is related to the

[8:25] Devil in the White City in some way.

Dan McCoy

[8:26] Not only, I texted Elliot this, like not only have I read Devil in the White City.

[8:31] You guys have a separate group chat and I'm not in on it?

[8:34] Yeah.

[8:34] But don't worry.

[8:35] We only talk about you on it.

Stuart Wellington

[8:36] Oh, okay.

[8:37] That's fine.

[8:38] I was like, out of Stuart and Elliot.

[8:41] What do you say?

[8:41] You're so mean to me in the normal group chat.

Elliott Kalan

[8:44] No, we only say nice things in our separate one.

[8:46] I like how you said a separate group chat.

[8:48] It's just two people.

[8:49] It's not really a group.

Dan McCoy

[8:51] As if Stuart gets it worse than anyone else.

[8:56] No, well, I said it to Elliot in part because I'm like, which of, like maybe I'm wrong.

[9:01] Maybe you're a big Rick Geary fan.

[9:03] I thought that Elliot might be more of a Rick Geary head.

Elliott Kalan

[9:05] I do like Rick Geary's stuff also, but to be honest, I had not read Rick Geary's H.H.

[9:09] Holmes one.

[9:10] At a certain point, I stopped reading the Treasure of Victorian Murder books because they started

[9:13] to make me feel bad.

Dan McCoy

[9:14] Well, yes.

[9:15] We got off track before explaining the reason.

[9:17] I was saying to Elliot that not only, yeah, on top of reading The Devil in the White City,

[9:22] but I read Treasure of Victorian Murder the day before I watched this movie.

[9:27] Oh, okay.

[9:28] And specifically the H.H.

[9:29] Holmes segment of it.

[9:31] And so it was very wild to then have him, spoiler, figure more prominently in this film

[9:36] than I would have.

Stuart Wellington

[9:38] You're like, wow, that's all anyone's talking about these days.

Elliott Kalan

[9:40] His name's on everybody's lips.

[9:43] Herlock Holmes.

[9:44] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[9:45] This unseen movie, this comic that was written decades ago, everybody's talking about them.

Elliott Kalan

[9:50] Dan, I mean, the scary thing is that Dan was like, does this mean I have to become a serial

[9:55] killer with a murder castle?

[9:57] Is that what the universe is telling me?

[9:59] It's a lot of work.

[10:00] It's a lot of work.

[10:01] But at this point in the movie, the movie is banking on you not being as familiar with

[10:06] the work of prolific 19th century serial killer H.H.

[10:11] Holmes as we were.

[10:12] So I think you're supposed to be like, what?

[10:13] What?

[10:14] Huh?

[10:14] You're not supposed to know what's going on.

[10:16] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[10:16] But anyway, the scene's in.

[10:17] We finally get the production info.

[10:18] SB Media.

[10:20] Probably stands for Scary Picture.

Elliott Kalan

[10:23] Suppressive Person Media.

[10:24] It's a Scientology thing.

[10:25] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[10:25] We get the credits over some evidence flashes and clue-style board game pieces.

Stuart Wellington

[10:31] It is like this.

[10:32] These opening credits are like not as nice as the credits for The Traitors, the like reality

[10:39] competition show my wife and I have been watching all the time that's basically like a reality

[10:43] competition show version of the game Werewolf.

[10:46] Oh, okay.

[10:47] So there's like it like flashes of like board game pieces, a flash of a knife.

Dan McCoy

[10:52] Yeah.

[10:52] We're like, ooh, a mystery is afoot.

[10:56] And we will be part of this dangerous game.

[10:58] In this full motion video adventure.

[11:01] Cut to the man you would expect in a murder mystery, Will Sasso.

Stuart Wellington

[11:08] I gotta say, Will Sasso puts in a pretty fun performance.

Dan McCoy

[11:13] No, I mean like, look, do I mostly associate Will Sasso with being curly in the ill-fated Three

[11:21] Stooges movie personally?

[11:23] Perhaps.

[11:24] But, you know, he's an actor who's been around for a while.

[11:28] He's been on lots of stuff.

[11:29] He's been on a lot of TV shows.

[11:30] Yeah.

[11:30] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[11:31] He seems to be having fun.

Elliott Kalan

[11:33] He seems to be going for the level that the movie is asking for.

[11:37] Yeah, yes.

[11:38] You know, which I always admire in an actor.

[11:40] When an actor is like, what this movie needs me to do, I am doing it.

[11:45] You know?

[11:45] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[11:46] We see him.

[11:47] He's in a plane with his wife, Marie, and teen daughter, Libby.

[11:51] Did I get that right?

[11:52] Or is it reversed?

Elliott Kalan

[11:53] It doesn't matter.

[11:53] No, you're correct.

[11:54] You're correct.

[11:54] Okay.

[11:55] Ultimately, though, it doesn't matter.

Dan McCoy

[11:57] Meanwhile, his son and the son's girlfriend are arriving by boat to this private island.

Elliott Kalan

[12:04] And are we supposed to pick up that the girlfriend is way better than the son should be?

[12:09] That she's much smarter and more competent than him in every way?

Dan McCoy

[12:14] I mean, that's true.

[12:16] It's true.

[12:16] We don't get to know the son that much other than like he's seen.

[12:20] He seems like a real doof.

[12:22] Takes him a long time to die.

Elliott Kalan

[12:24] It does.

[12:25] So maybe she's more into him for the fact that his genes give him greater endurance in poisoning situations.

[12:31] Okay.

[12:32] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[12:33] But yeah, they're on the way to a isolated private island owned by a rich person.

[12:39] Always a good choice to do that.

[12:41] Like no, nothing's going to happen.

[12:43] You're not going to be hunted for sports or.

[12:46] Dan, name 35 bad things that could possibly happen on a voyage to a rich person's private island.

Stuart Wellington

[12:52] Oh, boy.

[12:53] You might have to wear a vest with a chain attached to it.

[12:56] The chain is attached to a thing in the basement and you're not allowed to go into the room of the person you're supposed to be watching.

[13:01] It's normal stuff.

[13:02] There's like, yeah, there's that.

Dan McCoy

[13:04] Yeah, vacation stuff.

[13:05] There might be a dangerous game situation.

[13:06] There might be a blink twice situation.

[13:08] Some sort of a menu might be happening.

Elliott Kalan

[13:10] You might be going to a sex trafficking pyramid.

[13:13] There's all – I mean, never go to a private island.

[13:15] Best case scenario, you're on a private island and you stumble upon Richard Branson using his outdoor toilet.

[13:21] That's the best case scenario on a rich person's private island.

Dan McCoy

[13:24] You know, there's all sorts of family friction, of course.

[13:28] It's a rich family.

[13:29] They hate each other.

[13:31] Who's the dad, though?

Stuart Wellington

[13:32] Who's the patriarch?

Dan McCoy

[13:33] Who's the daddy?

[13:34] The daddy is Don Voight.

[13:37] He's in a – yes?

[13:39] You seem like you have more to say on that.

[13:40] No, you're correct.

Stuart Wellington

[13:41] I was just confirming that Dan is right.

[13:43] Thank you.

[13:44] Put two points up on the board for Dan.

Dan McCoy

[13:46] I identified Jon Voight.

[13:49] In my Jon Voight watching journal, I can put down a check mark.

[13:55] He's in a wheelchair attended by his manservant Burnham.

[14:00] And Will Sass is like, I only wish mom was here to see your house.

[14:03] And Voight says, fuck her for running out on us.

[14:06] Jon Voight gives also a weird performance.

Elliott Kalan

[14:09] He provides what's required.

[14:12] He's doing what's required, but he is so – he is portraying – he's trying to be Logan Roy.

[14:18] Logan is the dad in Succession, right?

[14:20] He's trying to be a certain type of Logan Roy type old – like rich person who is – who doesn't trust their children and da-da-da and feels betrayed.

[14:27] But he's doing it without the feeling of aristocracy that I feel like they have on Succession.

[14:35] So he seems like a guy who won the lottery and his family took the money and he's like –

[14:40] He seems feral.

[14:41] Fucking shits.

[14:41] Yeah, he feels feral.

[14:43] There's something kind of weird and like not cultured about him.

Stuart Wellington

[14:47] Logan Roy has a quality that makes you want to call him sir.

[14:51] Yes, yes.

[14:52] Jon Voight's character does not have that quality.

Elliott Kalan

[14:54] Jon Voight wouldn't have surprised me if the twist was that they had found a homeless man, dressed him up in fancy clothes, and had presented him – he was the dad's double that they discovered.

[15:04] And they have him impersonating the dad.

Dan McCoy

[15:06] Voight plays this so villainously from the start.

[15:10] From the beginning.

[15:12] That I'm like, okay, well, it can't be him that's like the bad guy.

[15:17] And I guess it's the movie playing a double reverse bluff on me.

[15:20] Being like, oh, you're going to think that we're trying to fake you out with a red herring.

[15:26] But no, he's going to be a bad guy.

[15:28] It's so funny.

Elliott Kalan

[15:28] It's like there's like – you're going to assume that the bad guy can't be it and one of these people who's pretending to be nice is.

[15:33] But it turns out, no.

[15:34] They actually are nice and he is a villain.

Stuart Wellington

[15:36] Yeah, there's a moment where I think his daughter-in-law is like, I'm going to go to the bathroom.

[15:41] And he's like, must be nice.

[15:43] And I'm like, what?

Elliott Kalan

[15:46] Because he's an old man who can't pee.

[15:47] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[15:48] But we haven't assembled a full family yet.

Elliott Kalan

[15:50] It is – wait, here's something I will say is realistic about this.

[15:54] When you have a grandparent slash parent who is elderly and is losing their mind and is being very mean to everybody,

[16:01] everyone has to kind of pretend that they're not and pretend that things are normal.

[16:05] And I have been in that situation.

[16:06] So I was like, okay, that's kind of real.

[16:08] They wouldn't automatically be like, dad, don't say that.

[16:11] I'm leaving right now.

[16:12] Instead, they're like, ha-ha.

[16:13] Well, anyway, let's go into the house.

[16:14] And he's like, fuck them.

[16:15] Oh, shit.

[16:16] Oh, goddammit.

Dan McCoy

[16:17] I won't get into it here.

[16:18] But later on, we learned that one of the characters knows some stuff that would suggest that maybe they shouldn't have come to the island in the first place.

[16:26] Yes.

Dan McCoy

[16:26] Or spoken up.

Elliott Kalan

[16:27] Once you learn what the other characters know, you're like, well, this is – it seems like this should have been dealt with a long time ago.

[16:32] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[16:33] But anyway, let's talk about another character that is coming to the island.

[16:38] Another John.

[16:39] Jonathan Rhys-Meyers.

[16:41] That's right.

Elliott Kalan

[16:41] Steer Pike himself from the Gormenghast miniseries.

[16:45] Mm-hmm.

[16:46] The tutor.

[16:47] His best-known role.

[16:48] Okay.

[16:49] Match point.

[16:50] Bend it like Beckham.

[16:52] And he was Dracula at one point, right?

[16:54] Dracula.

Dan McCoy

[16:55] Yes.

[16:56] Also a –

[16:57] From Paris with love.

[16:59] Viparous-seeming gentleman.

[17:01] His character's name is Kyle.

[17:03] He's coming in with his fiancée, Joy, via helicopter.

[17:07] Joy played by one of the brats.

[17:08] Mm-hmm.

[17:09] Sporty brat, yeah.

[17:11] He's the other son of John Voight.

[17:13] The family is here, ready for some dangerous games, ready for legacy murders.

Elliott Kalan

[17:19] I mean, they don't know that they're ready.

[17:21] They don't know that they're for legacy murders.

Dan McCoy

[17:23] I'm just saying that the cast has been assembled.

Elliott Kalan

[17:26] What if the invitation says, you are invited to grandpa's birthday party for some legacy murders?

[17:32] Would they still go?

Stuart Wellington

[17:32] Okay, I guess I got to go.

[17:34] You got to, right?

[17:35] Yeah.

[17:36] Maybe they misspelled legacy Mardi Gras, what they meant to say.

Dan McCoy

[17:43] I thought it was funny.

[17:44] Reese Myers, like when he gets out of the helicopter, sort of takes a moment to explain all of the relationships that have already been set up.

[17:53] It would have been more helpful to have that scene earlier.

[17:55] Yeah.

[17:56] Yeah.

[17:57] We learned that Voight blames him for stealing the family business from him.

[18:02] And Reese Myers is like, I see it as saving the failing empire that you fucked up.

[18:09] You know.

[18:10] What does he do?

[18:12] What did they make money off of?

[18:13] I don't.

[18:14] Pharmacies, I think.

[18:15] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[18:16] I don't know.

[18:17] They said something about how he opened his first pharmacy.

[18:20] Oh, that's right.

[18:21] Yeah, they're a pharmaceutical company.

[18:22] So again, they're already evil.

[18:23] They're all evil people already.

Dan McCoy

[18:25] Also, this type of movie throws so much shit at you that I feel like my brain has learned to blank out the stuff that's not going to be important.

Elliott Kalan

[18:34] That's fair.

[18:35] There's not going to be any clues towards the mystery that involved their family business.

[18:38] Yeah.

[18:39] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[18:40] That's what makes Dan so good at solving dangerous game legacy murders.

Elliott Kalan

[18:46] Yeah, if you're hosting a rich person, evil island, dangerous game, legacy murder, do not invite Dan.

[18:51] He will solve it so fast.

[18:52] He will annihilate it, yeah.

[18:53] It'll just be like in Glass Onion.

[18:56] Yeah, exactly.

[18:57] When what's his name?

[18:57] Rupert Von Valentine, whatever Daniel Craig's character is called.

[19:01] When he just figures it out right away.

Dan McCoy

[19:03] I love that part.

Elliott Kalan

[19:06] The movie is downhill from the moment that he calls BS on the first day.

Dan McCoy

[19:11] A little bit, but I like that one.

[19:12] They snipe at each other a lot.

[19:14] There's a part where the grandson throws a fish head into his sink, giving a creepy smile.

[19:24] There's a cat established earlier.

Stuart Wellington

[19:26] Yeah, I got to say, FYI, if anyone knows there's going to be a cat death in a movie, just give me a heads up before I watch it with my wife.

[19:34] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[19:35] I mean, I didn't.

[19:36] This is a particularly gruesome one, too.

[19:38] Yeah, it fucking sucked.

[19:39] When I saw that there was a cat in the movie, I immediately stopped the movie for a moment to Google to find out whether the movie was going to anger me later, just so I was prepared.

[19:49] And the movie does anger me.

[19:52] But I will say, I will say, I don't like any time that there's a cat death in a movie, but this is so goofily presented.

[19:59] You don't actually see what's, like, it all happens within the sink.

[20:03] You just see spurts of blood going up.

[20:05] Yeah, you just see the aftermath.

[20:07] Army of darkness, you know.

[20:10] CGI blood.

[20:12] Yeah, the grandson throws this fish head in the sink, which leads to this cat death, which doesn't play into anything.

[20:20] It's stupid and gross.

Elliott Kalan

[20:21] My guess is that it is supposed to be a literal red herring, because it's a fish head, that maybe you think he's a bloodthirsty monster because he's lured the cat into the garbage disposal unit.

[20:31] But it's just, and it's also, they can't kill any of the main cast characters yet.

[20:36] It's too early, and they got to give you a little shock.

[20:37] So instead, they're going to grind up a cat, you know.

Dan McCoy

[20:40] Not a fan.

[20:41] It is, no, I'm not a fan of the death.

[20:43] I am a fan of the.

[20:44] It is the least, it's the least funny of the deaths in the movie, probably.

[20:48] Yes.

Elliott Kalan

[20:48] And there are a couple, there's some death violence moments that are hilarious coming up.

[20:52] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[20:53] I don't like that.

[20:54] I do like the way Will Sasso, like, John Voight comes in and is like, what happened?

[21:00] And Will Sasso, in the most blasé way, says, cat died, dad.

[21:07] That was pretty good.

[21:08] But, so later on, they gather around the fire.

[21:12] Joy gives us some backstory about Voight's business career that, like, does not matter.

[21:18] Self-made man, you know.

[21:19] Built an empire.

[21:21] They give him his birthday present.

Elliott Kalan

[21:22] And I assume that is supposed to be the movie building suspicion in you that she is a gold digger who's there to kill people or in league with him or something.

Dan McCoy

[21:31] I don't even know.

[21:31] This movie is so clumsily written that I'm not even sure what, like, the misdirects are supposed to be.

Elliott Kalan

[21:36] I mean, it makes no sense for the character who is new to the family to be like, let me give you an info dump to everyone here about your dad's history.

[21:42] It's just very, a lot of, it's a clumsy way to give out information.

[21:46] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[21:48] They give him his birthday gift.

[21:49] It's a watch, which he tosses aside immediately.

[21:53] Alec.

Stuart Wellington

[21:54] I mean, getting an old guy shit fucking sucks.

[21:56] Because old guys, like, they want to be the one to find the cool shit.

[22:00] They don't want a watch.

[22:01] Let's just say it.

Elliott Kalan

[22:02] Buying presents for a dad sucks.

[22:04] Buying presents for your dad stinks.

[22:06] You don't know what they want.

[22:07] If you get them the thing they want the most, they tell you this is fine.

[22:10] So you'll just end up buying them, you know, books that never read about history subjects or something like that.

Dan McCoy

[22:15] My issue is, like, you know, like, I, you know, my dad is a lovely man.

[22:19] He is not a John Voight.

Elliott Kalan

[22:20] Oh, no, I mean, I love my dad.

[22:21] My dad's great, but it's just hard to buy him presents, you know.

Dan McCoy

[22:24] But he has been on the earth for a long time.

[22:26] He has a lot of stuff.

[22:28] He doesn't want more of it, necessarily.

Stuart Wellington

[22:31] And you can only give him so many coupons for a free hug.

[22:34] Yeah.

[22:34] Yeah, I mean, basically all you can do is give, if you're not giving him a grandchild,

[22:39] you got to give him, like, a shirt with his grandchild's face on it.

Elliott Kalan

[22:42] They do like that.

[22:43] Yeah, that's true.

[22:45] Anyway, Reese Byers.

[22:46] Until that's all they're wearing.

[22:47] Their wardrobe is entirely shirts with their grandchild's faces on it.

Dan McCoy

[22:52] Like me, a Flophouse shirt.

[22:54] Over the years, I've accrued so many.

[22:58] Alec wants to leave.

[22:59] He's like, I'm out of 5,000, which starts everyone arguing with one another again.

[23:04] But what?

[23:05] What's this?

[23:05] It's another gift.

[23:06] It's Dangerous Game from Parker Brothers.

[23:09] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[23:09] This is the most elaborately constructed board game for a murder I've ever seen.

Stuart Wellington

[23:16] I've seen some pretty elaborately constructed board games.

[23:20] But for a murder?

[23:21] For the purpose of a murder?

Elliott Kalan

[23:23] Yeah.

[23:23] This is a bespoke, I have to assume, just one copy version of this game.

[23:28] But, Stuart, I wanted to get your opinion.

Stuart Wellington

[23:29] That's like a really high-up Kickstarter reward right there.

[23:33] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[23:33] Stuart, I was wondering your opinion as a gamer of this board game.

Stuart Wellington

[23:38] The game is that you just have to guess where everyone's going to die and with what weapon.

Elliott Kalan

[23:42] Yeah, but also like the way the board's set up and the individual pieces and the way the puzzles are set up.

Dan McCoy

[23:46] I was going to say, the game, yeah.

[23:48] I'm sorry to jump in on Stu's things.

[23:49] But like, there's no clear rules or objective.

[23:53] It's like you open up a box and there's a bunch of stuff in it and you got to figure out what to do with that stuff.

Elliott Kalan

[24:00] And then a scary voice starts telling you to play the game.

[24:03] And it's like, uh, are there instructions?

[24:05] Like, what's going on?

Stuart Wellington

[24:06] Yeah.

[24:07] Well, Dan, you always complain that you hate it when somebody just sits there and explains all the rules to a game.

[24:12] It's not that I hate it.

[24:13] So, wouldn't you rather just like crack that thing open and just start playing?

Dan McCoy

[24:16] Right.

[24:16] Well, that's the thing.

[24:16] It's not that I hate it.

[24:17] It's that I can't learn that way.

[24:21] Uh-huh.

[24:21] Like, someone reading instructions to me, either I need to be able to like pour over it very carefully or I just need to play the game myself.

[24:29] Yeah.

[24:30] And so, sure.

Stuart Wellington

[24:31] Well, what if somebody did it with like a really nice-sounding voice and he's your friend, Stuart?

Dan McCoy

[24:36] Plus, like, you know, our good friend John, who does the Cassettes animations and other animations for our Flop TV shows, like, he's very patient about.

Stuart Wellington

[24:45] Yeah, yeah.

[24:46] But John also will teach people a game, but he won't even have opened it or looked at the game yet.

[24:53] And he'll be like, oh, let's just figure this out.

Dan McCoy

[24:55] I'm like, this is insane.

[24:56] Such a Stuart-specific objection.

[24:58] Like, it's not a problem that I've had, but that's because my attitude towards games is more like, sure, let's play one.

[25:04] Rather than like, this is part of my life.

Stuart Wellington

[25:07] Yeah, yeah.

[25:07] This is how I define my personality.

Dan McCoy

[25:11] Anyway, so this board game has a bunch of, like, crime scene photos in it and dossiers on the various members of the family.

[25:22] And it has, we will find later on, play pieces, little minifigs that are related to the family members in some way or another.

[25:31] It's themed to the family.

Stuart Wellington

[25:32] I would rank the components pretty high.

[25:35] It's pretty high quality components here.

Elliott Kalan

[25:36] You get a lot of, it's not, I mean, the fact that there's an entire murder journal with annotations right there in the game.

[25:42] Yeah, I mean, it looks nice.

[25:44] That takes work.

Stuart Wellington

[25:44] I feel like it's not going to hold up to multiple plays.

[25:47] That's a downside.

Dan McCoy

[25:48] Yes.

[25:48] Sure.

[25:49] Well, most of the players are dead.

[25:50] I don't think it's intended to, really.

[25:51] Afterwards, it's a problem.

[25:53] That's a, it's a great game, but you can only play it once.

Elliott Kalan

[25:56] Yeah, like the Daffy Duck swallowing explosives in a vaudeville edition game.

[26:00] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[26:02] Well, anyway, Void is too tired for some murder shenanigans that night.

[26:07] Joy manages to convince Alex to stay for the weekend.

[26:10] It's very funny.

Elliott Kalan

[26:10] As we learn later, he set up this whole thing.

[26:12] It's very funny for him to introduce it and then be like, well, I'm tired.

[26:14] Goodbye.

[26:15] Like, are you even going to go through with the murders that you're setting up?

Stuart Wellington

[26:19] Well, he also is the one that, like, Archie's knocking shit off the shelf.

[26:24] The game shows up and everyone's like, that's weird.

[26:28] I don't want to play this weird game.

[26:30] And he's the one guy who's like, oh, a game?

[26:32] That sounds like a hoot.

[26:33] Let's play.

[26:34] That's true, yeah.

[26:35] And then, like, 10 minutes later, he's like, I'm too tired.

[26:38] Let's play tomorrow morning.

[26:39] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[26:41] Anyway, Alec wanted to leave.

[26:44] Joy convinces him to stay.

[26:47] Unconvincingly, I don't know, you know, why.

[26:49] And Alec is Kyle, right?

[26:52] Alec, what, Alec is Kyle?

[26:54] No, but that's the name of the character.

[26:56] No, no, no.

Stuart Wellington

[26:56] So Alec is Will Sasso's character.

Dan McCoy

[26:58] Oh, sorry.

[26:59] And Kyle is Jonathan Rees-Meyers.

[27:00] Kyle is the one who's committed to space.

Elliott Kalan

[27:02] Sorry.

[27:02] Alec and Kyle.

[27:04] I mean, you should just refer to them by their actors' names, Dan.

[27:06] Yeah, I know.

[27:07] I don't think we need to say character orthodox on this one.

[27:10] Okay.

[27:11] I'm just going to be saying John Voight.

[27:13] I'm not going to be saying Ellison Betts at any point.

[27:14] No, I know.

Dan McCoy

[27:15] I mean, definitely Voight and Sasso are in here.

[27:18] I just felt like a certain point.

[27:20] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[27:20] I know.

[27:20] And you're worried that if you keep saying Jonathan Rees-Meyers, you're going to say Jonathan

[27:23] Rees-Davies.

[27:24] Yes.

[27:25] And that will confuse people.

Dan McCoy

[27:26] And if I say that three times, he'll appear.

Elliott Kalan

[27:29] And why wouldn't you want that?

[27:31] I don't understand.

Dan McCoy

[27:32] Yeah, it's true.

[27:33] He'll save me from eating some bad dates.

[27:34] So that'll be good.

[27:36] But anyway.

Elliott Kalan

[27:38] What if he was playing that part and we could just see him and John Voight shouting at each

[27:41] other as loudly as possible?

Dan McCoy

[27:44] Oh, that would be so much better.

[27:46] So much better.

[27:47] Yeah.

[27:49] Anyway, I don't know.

[27:50] There's some stuff that is like red herrings.

[27:52] There's one point where Will Sasso walks in on his wife in the bath and she's doing something

[27:58] on her cell phone and acts really suspicious about it.

[28:02] That's nothing.

Elliott Kalan

[28:03] Except I feel like he is very charming in this moment.

[28:06] He comes in and he's like being kind of flirty with her.

[28:08] And she's like, you're drunk.

[28:09] And he's like, you're drunk.

[28:10] And it felt like the one moment of genuine people being people with each other in the

[28:15] entire movie.

Dan McCoy

[28:17] Yeah.

[28:18] I mean, like there's another kind of red herringy thing where the grandson's girlfriend,

[28:22] Tara, jokes that she's going to kill them all.

[28:25] You know, saying, watch out for the quiet ones.

[28:28] Spoiler alert.

[28:29] She's not going to kill anybody.

Elliott Kalan

[28:31] She's not the opposite.

[28:32] She's going to help people.

[28:33] Yeah.

[28:34] Well, anyway.

[28:35] She's also, she's a veterinarian, which means she has a very ironic death later on.

[28:41] Spoiler alert.

Dan McCoy

[28:42] Oh.

[28:43] Yeah.

[28:44] That's a, oof.

[28:45] That was a rough scene.

Stuart Wellington

[28:46] That was a rough moment.

[28:47] I did not like it.

[28:48] But anyway.

[28:48] I thought it was hilarious.

[28:52] Okay.

[28:53] We'll talk about it later.

[28:54] We'll talk about it later.

[28:55] It's like, it's so silly.

Elliott Kalan

[28:56] It's silly and over the top.

[28:58] But there's also like, there's some, there's some under, I felt like there was some maybe problematic

[29:03] aspects to the industry.

[29:04] Oh, yeah.

[29:05] You're right.

[29:05] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[29:06] That's, that's correct.

[29:07] Um.

[29:08] But also, this movie is like, so goofball, but it's also so mean that I had a hard time

[29:13] enjoying some of the goofiness.

Elliott Kalan

[29:15] It feels a little bit like, um, a murder movie made by a little kid who is trying their hardest

[29:21] to be like extreme and rough, but it's also pretty silly.

[29:24] And the clash of those tones is very, is unpleasant, you know?

Dan McCoy

[29:28] Um, anyway, so back to the, back to what goes on in this film, which is that everyone is asleep.

[29:34] An alarm goes off, red lights, uh, hurricane shutters come down over the windows.

[29:39] A gate comes down to the front door.

[29:40] They're trapped in the house.

[29:41] Is this Abigail?

[29:42] Yeah.

[29:44] A Saw voice, uh, I'm gonna, I'm just gonna call this voice, uh, Schmigschmaw.

[29:49] It says, okay, the game has started.

[29:53] Everyone needs to go to the great room.

Elliott Kalan

[29:55] And, uh, here's the funniest thing about this Saw voice.

[29:57] It's not that great.

[29:58] Is that I feel like Jigsaw, he traps you in a game and you have no choice but to play it.

[30:02] This voice spends so much of the movie being like, oh, so why don't you start playing the

[30:06] game now?

[30:07] You're not playing the game.

[30:08] You're not playing the game.

[30:09] It becomes so petulant and powerless.

[30:11] And it's killing them.

[30:12] And it still feels like it is, it is totally not in power in the situation.

[30:16] There's the game.

[30:17] I'd really suggest that you play it.

[30:18] Yeah.

[30:19] You're not abiding by the rules.

[30:21] I kind of put together a whole game for you here.

[30:23] It's hurting my feelings that you're showing some little interest.

Stuart Wellington

[30:25] I had to corral uninterested game players before.

[30:28] I have sympathy for this voice.

[30:31] Like, would you rather die than play the game?

[30:34] I guess you will.

Dan McCoy

[30:36] There's so much cool stuff I set up that you're never going to see.

[30:39] Don't do it that way.

Elliott Kalan

[30:41] You're doing it wrong.

[30:42] You know what?

[30:43] Why don't I leave wherever I am talking to you and just show you how to play the game?

[30:47] Be helpful.

[30:48] Should I start playing?

[30:49] Would that get things moving?

Stuart Wellington

[30:51] Oh, you don't think the game's cool?

[30:52] Well, check out Board Game Geek.

[30:54] It has a really high rating.

Elliott Kalan

[30:56] Some people like their games to be complicated.

[30:58] I guess you just want to play Sorry or something.

Dan McCoy

[31:01] Burnham, the manservant, is missing.

[31:05] You know, again, I thought like, oh, this is going to be a red herring.

[31:08] No, it's just a herring.

[31:09] He's involved.

Elliott Kalan

[31:10] He's involved and you have to assume he's the one who's being the voice this whole time.

[31:14] Yeah.

[31:17] It's bad enough I have to clean up after your dad and now you're not even playing my game.

Dan McCoy

[31:22] There's a ransom-style note saying, wake up and play me on the dangerous game box.

Elliott Kalan

[31:29] You may realize the trouble I went to having to cut out the magazine letters to make that note for the game.

[31:34] The least you could do is pretend that you're interested in playing my game.

[31:38] You guys aren't even trying to have fun.

Dan McCoy

[31:41] Sasso tries to shut down.

Elliott Kalan

[31:43] Oh, excuse me for trying to liven up this family gathering.

[31:47] Let's lose our bad emotions and a little bit of gameplay.

[31:51] Maybe it'll bring us closer together, but I guess not.

[31:54] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[31:56] Sasso does the first obvious thing and tries to shut down the smart house, but the voice electrifies a plate under his feet which shoots him back across the gate into a glass table.

Stuart Wellington

[32:12] So the explosion is very funny.

[32:14] Yeah.

[32:14] It looks very fake.

[32:15] It is very funny.

[32:16] The noise he makes when he's exploded is very funny.

[32:19] Yeah.

[32:20] Two thumbs up.

Elliott Kalan

[32:21] At this point, when I saw that happen, I was like, is Wile E. Coyote the voice that's forcing him to play this game?

[32:26] It is very funny.

Dan McCoy

[32:28] Yeah.

[32:28] His legs fucked up real bad.

[32:30] They have to tourniquet him and cauterize the wound with an iron.

Stuart Wellington

[32:35] Yeah.

[32:35] When he's lying there and they're trying to figure out how to save his life, I guess, his wife is like, yeah, do it.

[32:43] He can't die.

[32:45] And I'm like, that is a really kind of blasé response to your husband's foot getting basically blown off.

[32:51] Yeah.

[32:52] Inside a house.

[32:53] It's not like, I don't know.

Elliott Kalan

[32:55] He's not on a minefield.

[32:57] It's not a place you would expect it to happen.

[32:59] You'd think he'd be a little bit more shocked from her.

[33:00] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[33:01] Unless she's the killer, which she's not.

[33:03] I guess you're right.

[33:04] Kyle immediately is like.

Elliott Kalan

[33:06] Do you always have to cauterize the wound?

Stuart Wellington

[33:09] Why are you asking me?

Elliott Kalan

[33:11] Because, Stuart, you took battlefield medicine, right?

Stuart Wellington

[33:14] Yeah.

[33:15] Yeah.

[33:15] I mean, usually, I mean, I learned it all from Rambo.

[33:18] So, yeah, you got to stuff the wound with.

[33:20] I mean, I don't think you have to.

[33:22] I think it is a.

[33:23] It's probably better.

[33:25] Well, in the case that you don't have proper cleaning supplies and like proper surgery supplies, then yeah.

[33:30] But it turns out they had all the proper supplies just downstairs.

Elliott Kalan

[33:35] But because it seems like in that situation, and they were doing this, I guess, the most important thing is to stop the bleeding.

[33:40] Yeah.

[33:40] They almost immediately.

[33:41] I think that's kind of the idea.

[33:42] Yeah.

[33:42] They hold a metal, hot metal to his foot and he screams a lot.

[33:46] Mm-hmm.

Dan McCoy

[33:48] Jonathan Rhys-Myers, of course, immediately is like, Dad, this is you.

[33:52] And he's like, no, it's not me.

[33:56] So, but he runs off, tries to, with the grandson, they're looking for Burnham.

[34:01] Meanwhile, everyone looks at the game.

[34:03] Like I said, it has all this very stuff, but mostly it has a bunch of ciphers that they have to figure out.

[34:10] Lewis ciphers?

Stuart Wellington

[34:11] Mm-hmm.

[34:12] Oh, shit.

Dan McCoy

[34:14] There are letters from a soldier to his dad describing people he killed and information about nine women who died between 1971 and 2015.

[34:23] And they figure out the cipher with some nonsense related to the names of the victims.

[34:29] Meanwhile, grandson gets caught in the video installation art piece.

[34:35] Uh-huh.

[34:36] About the murder castle.

[34:38] And Rhys-Myers finds some blueprints to the house that show that it's full of secret passages and immediately gets punched by the manservant.

[34:47] Yeah.

[34:47] Who runs off into the depths of the mansion.

[34:52] Um, and the first cipher that they code back in the Dangerous Game gaming room is,

[34:58] I was born with the devil in me, which Will Sasso identifies immediately as being from H.H. Holmes,

[35:06] the serial killer, murder castle in Chicago, devil in the white city, all that stuff.

Elliott Kalan

[35:10] For anyone who hasn't read devil in the white city, it is about the twin events of the Columbian Exposition,

[35:16] this huge fair that was in Chicago.

[35:19] It was called the White City, uh, where Chicago was kind of showing off, you know, it was kind of a world's fair type expo.

[35:25] And at the, at the, at the, basically the same time, this guy had turned his house into a murder dungeon where he could trap and kill people.

[35:31] And no one knows exactly how many people he killed.

[35:33] Somewhere between 20 and a billion, depending on who you talk to, you know.

[35:37] Yeah.

[35:38] There are some people who really enjoy inflating the numbers of how many people.

Stuart Wellington

[35:41] I'm sure there's like plenty of true crime podcasts who have some grizzly episodes.

[35:46] Yes, exactly.

Elliott Kalan

[35:47] I mean, devil in the white city is a, is a really good book.

[35:49] It's a great book.

[35:50] It's great.

[35:50] It's an interesting read.

Stuart Wellington

[35:51] The Columbian Exposition, uh, the fact that like they make the, the stuff about the Columbia Exposition is more exciting than the murdering.

Elliott Kalan

[35:58] I mean, it is objectively, I mean, maybe not objectively.

[36:00] To me, that stuff is much more interesting than the serial killer stuff.

[36:02] It feels like there it's, it's, the serial killer stuff is to lure in the people who are not as interested in, uh, massive public expositions of arts and sciences as I am.

[36:11] Yeah, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[36:12] And then you get in there and you're like, that's how they made a Ferris wheel?

Dan McCoy

[36:16] Why don't we have these things anymore?

[36:17] Or I want a World's Fair style exposition.

[36:21] This would be great.

Elliott Kalan

[36:22] But it isn't.

[36:23] So, but, uh, well, you have to assume that, that Will Suss's character just read the book recently because that he recognized the quote, you know.

Dan McCoy

[36:28] Well, I assumed he's, you know, he's a middle-aged dad.

[36:31] So he's like, he really loves historical series.

[36:33] Every time, every time.

Elliott Kalan

[36:35] I mean, Eric Larson did have a new book recently.

[36:37] So maybe he rereads them all in anticipation of the next one.

[36:40] MCU style.

Dan McCoy

[36:41] Anyway, they all hear the grandson, uh, pounding on the room where he's trapped.

[36:45] Uh, he suddenly notices the corpse in the room with him, which apparently he didn't see before.

[36:51] Classic song.

[36:52] Uh, it's Aunt Virginia, uh, the, the sister, the absent sister.

[36:58] Uh, and Cam starts getting gassed.

[37:01] This is very funny.

Elliott Kalan

[37:03] Not like, not like he's having a great time.

[37:05] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[37:05] He's having a gas.

[37:06] Uh, Jumpin' Jack Flash.

[37:08] Uh, um, it is a gas, gas, gas.

Elliott Kalan

[37:11] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[37:12] Right.

[37:12] Uh, I know that's a different song.

[37:14] Uh, no, that's it.

[37:15] Jumpin' Jack Flash.

[37:16] It's gas, gas, gas, gas.

[37:16] Oh, that's right.

[37:17] Uh, Reese Myers comes in to accuse John Voight again.

[37:21] And this is very funny to me.

[37:22] He pushes some button on his wheelchair that makes him sort of stand up.

[37:26] And then he tries to threaten Reese Myers with an electrified wire he just pulls from his own chair, but only succeeds in nearly electrocuting himself.

[37:35] It is a wild scene.

Elliott Kalan

[37:37] It's very cool.

[37:39] There, there, there are two scenes, the exploding foot and this one, where this movie, I'll admit, I'll spoiler for my final judgment a little bit.

[37:46] A lot of this movie I found kind of, it's like humdrum for the most part.

[37:49] But then a scene like this would happen, I'd be like, movie, why are you hiding this from me?

[37:53] Just, why, why aren't you doing more of this stuff?

Stuart Wellington

[37:55] This is bonkers.

[37:57] I feel like basically every death scene in this movie is really funny.

Elliott Kalan

[38:01] For the most part.

[38:02] They're very, they're, they're amateurishly put together, I guess.

Dan McCoy

[38:04] They're funny in that they're over the top.

[38:06] I find them.

[38:07] Yeah.

[38:07] Too sadistic to.

[38:09] Oh, okay.

[38:10] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[38:11] I think they're funny to me in the, in the way that they are produced rather than in the.

[38:14] Yes.

[38:14] Yeah.

[38:15] In the concepts.

[38:16] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[38:16] Yeah.

[38:17] I'm like, I'm not like, oh, this is hilarious.

[38:19] But like.

Dan McCoy

[38:19] No, no, I, I'm not accusing you of being a sociopath.

[38:23] At least not on air.

[38:24] Dan, we'll talk about it in our private group chat.

[38:28] That's just the two of us.

[38:29] No.

[38:30] Yeah.

[38:31] No, it's just my personal reaction.

[38:33] They try and break in, but too late.

[38:36] Cam, the grandson has, is all gooey and covered in pus.

[38:40] Mm-hmm.

[38:42] They get a little bit of mourning.

[38:44] Happens to all of us, guys.

[38:45] Schmig's ma says, get back to the game.

[38:48] There's a line where like.

Elliott Kalan

[38:49] Have you guys forgotten about the game?

[38:51] I know it's, it's pretty, pretty wild that your, your dad slash grandpa just electrocuted himself.

[38:55] But like the game, can we get back to it?

Dan McCoy

[38:57] Uh, there's a line where the daughter says, he's not who you think he is about the, John Voight.

[39:02] And Reese Meyer says, maybe none of us are who we think we are.

[39:07] I'm like, what?

[39:09] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[39:09] What a thing for, that only a character in a movie would ever say.

[39:13] Um.

[39:13] Although actually, although I guess what he is, what he is, he, although he is hinting at the thing he knows that I guess the other ones don't know.

[39:20] The thing that he should tell them, but he's not telling them for some reason.

Dan McCoy

[39:24] Yeah, we'll get to it and we'll all be angry about it eventually.

[39:27] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[39:28] Everyone's playing by X-Men villain rules where it's a lot of like, I know more about you than you know yourself.

[39:33] Okay, well, tell me then, Mr. Sinister.

[39:35] I don't know what power it gives you to know this stuff and not tell me.

Stuart Wellington

[39:38] I don't understand.

[39:38] Yeah, you're just so bored of like hiding in a fucking basement somewhere.

[39:42] You just want to tell somebody what's happening.

[39:44] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[39:45] Um, so Reese Myers and, uh, the wife go off, uh, to break into a secret passage, uh, and a trap door opens beneath him.

[39:56] And she's briefly held at gunpoint by the manservant.

[39:59] And, and downstairs where, uh, Jonathan Reese Myers has been dumped.

Stuart Wellington

[40:04] There's, there's a great moment when Burnham pushes, uh, Jonathan Reese Myers down the trap door, uh, that it cuts to a shot of him like falling with like, uh, like a, like a, like a green screen backdrop behind him.

[40:15] I think that was great.

Dan McCoy

[40:17] Um, downstairs in this, uh, murder basement, it turns out Joy never actually left the, uh, island as, uh, he had thought.

[40:26] She is on an operating table, uh, being punished for trying to leave the game.

[40:31] There's an incision in her chest that has been sewed up.

Elliott Kalan

[40:34] And she was trying to leave before the game started, right?

[40:37] Yeah, yeah.

[40:37] So it's not even, it's, I feel like it's unfair to be like, you tried to get out of the game.

[40:41] And she's like, what game?

[40:42] I had to get somewhere.

[40:43] I just came to meet people.

Dan McCoy

[40:45] Yeah.

[40:46] Good point.

[40:46] I'm sure that, yeah, the murderous killer, uh, we should send that to him as a goof that he made.

Elliott Kalan

[40:53] Put it in the goof section and the murderous LinkedIn profile, I guess.

[40:56] The LinkedIn profiles have goofs.

[40:58] Yep.

[40:59] Um.

[41:00] If it's like someone's employment history, but you can add one time this person farted in a meeting.

[41:04] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[41:05] So, so we all called him Toots behind his back.

[41:08] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[41:12] And that's how Toots and the Maytals got their name.

[41:14] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[41:16] This is LinkedIn history for being in a reggae band.

[41:22] Anyway, uh, she's downstairs, like I said, on this gurney and he is warned that there's an industrial oven in the room that's going to cook him alive in three minutes.

[41:32] Although it also like reaches temperatures that would have killed him and he's alive for a while, but nevermind.

[41:40] Upstairs, the other people find a window down into the basement so they can see into the oven.

[41:45] Um, and, uh, and the clue that is given to get out of there is search deep in your heart to find a way out.

[41:54] So, uh-oh, whatever he needs is in joyous chest.

[41:59] And, uh, so.

Elliott Kalan

[42:00] Which has been gruesomely cut open and sewed back together again.

[42:04] Yeah.

[42:04] Kind of Frankenstein's monster style.

[42:06] Yeah, saw style.

Dan McCoy

[42:08] Uh, and she's.

Elliott Kalan

[42:09] That's when you get, saw style is when there's French fries and Russian dressing on the, on the dog, right?

[42:14] That's saw style.

Dan McCoy

[42:15] Yeah.

[42:16] And he's all like initially like, like you think that these people are, you know, vipers who hate each other.

[42:21] But he, like, Reese Myers is like, no, I can't do this.

[42:24] I love you.

[42:24] I can't do this.

[42:25] I will, you know.

[42:26] And she's like, you gotta do it.

[42:27] You gotta get out.

[42:29] So he starts pulling all her guts out.

[42:31] Yeah, this is very upsetting.

Elliott Kalan

[42:33] This is very gruesome and upsetting.

[42:35] I don't like it.

[42:36] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[42:36] Like the, what he thinks is going to be a key is not like just lying on top after he peels the skin back.

[42:42] It is beneath.

[42:43] So he has to pull everything out.

Stuart Wellington

[42:45] And then like afterwards she like sits up briefly to give us a little scare.

[42:50] Man.

[42:51] Yeah.

[42:51] This is, I love this kind of crap.

[42:53] But.

Elliott Kalan

[42:53] I mean, in this, in this, I mean, he is essentially being forced to murder her.

Stuart Wellington

[42:57] Here's the thing.

[42:58] She's been mutilated and now he has to kill her to get out.

[43:01] It's horrible.

[43:02] It's similar to, yeah, it's the saw thing where it's like, well, I didn't kill anyone.

[43:06] You killed him.

Elliott Kalan

[43:07] You did it.

[43:08] Yeah, but I wasn't going to do it unless you put me in the situation, asshole.

Dan McCoy

[43:10] Like, come on.

[43:11] That doesn't seem fair.

Elliott Kalan

[43:12] You say you love this kind of stuff.

[43:13] Why are you hitting yourself?

[43:14] You're taking my arm and using it to hit me with my own hand, Jigsaw.

[43:18] Come on.

[43:19] Anyway, you're saying.

Dan McCoy

[43:20] You say you love this kind of stuff.

[43:21] And the thing is, like, in a different type of movie, I might enjoy it.

[43:28] Like, if it was.

[43:29] Dan, that's even worse.

[43:30] Yeah, that's wild.

[43:32] Why would you say that?

[43:33] Why would you say that, Dan?

[43:34] A Stuart Gordon tone.

[43:36] And I'm talking like reanimator Stuart Gordon.

[43:38] Yeah.

[43:38] Not like Castle Freak Stuart Gordon.

[43:39] Like, if there was sort of, like, lethal grossness to it.

[43:45] But this seems to be.

Elliott Kalan

[43:47] If Bruce Campbell was doing this in an Evil Dead movie, you'd be like, oh, boy.

[43:52] You know, but in the here it's.

Dan McCoy

[43:53] Yeah, but this is pushing the sadism of it.

[43:55] Yes, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[43:56] My pushback here is when I say that I love it, it's that when we watch a bad movie, we,

[44:02] here at the Flophouse, we often try to find things about it that give us joy.

[44:06] Yes, that's fair.

[44:07] I mean, this is not giving us the character joy.

[44:09] Yeah.

[44:10] Yes, exactly.

[44:10] I was waiting for somebody to pick up on that.

[44:12] Yeah.

[44:13] The, and so with this, it's like, yeah, I mean, there's not much else here.

[44:18] At least it has, like, over-the-top wild amounts of, like, gore and brutal crap that is done

[44:25] sloppily and amateurishly.

[44:27] Yeah.

[44:28] And so at least I find some joy in that, like, it's so silly.

[44:33] I get what you're saying.

Dan McCoy

[44:34] I'm not trying to indict you by saying how I feel about it.

[44:37] I am just saying, like, the conditions under which I would enjoy this more.

Stuart Wellington

[44:42] No, and I think I'm also trying to clarify for the listeners who were like, should I watch

[44:46] Dangerous Game, the Legacy Murders?

[44:48] Is this for me?

Elliott Kalan

[44:50] I think I'm in the middle where, I think I would have been able to enjoy the scene on that level

[44:53] story if it didn't go on for as long as it does.

[44:56] Like, he's pulling our guts out for a little.

[44:57] They're, like, their skin's blistering and whatnot.

[44:59] Yeah.

[44:59] It's a little too, it's just a little too gruesome for me.

[45:02] But if it was the, if it was, if the person was already, if this was an Evil Dead Army

[45:07] Darkness type movie, the person's already dead and Bruce Campbell has to keep digging through

Stuart Wellington

[45:10] their guts and is going, oh, God, oh, oh, God.

[45:14] I would really enjoy that scene.

[45:15] Yeah.

[45:15] I do like when he, like, multiple times, so he pulls out, what, like, a dog whistle?

[45:21] Yes.

[45:21] And multiple times characters have to, like, grab it, and every time I'm like, just rinse

[45:26] it off.

[45:27] Yeah.

[45:27] It must be so gross.

[45:29] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[45:29] He gets a dog whistle out of her, not a key.

[45:33] So he's still trapped, and he's burning up, and at least the silver lining is the brothers

[45:38] finally reconcile.

[45:41] And we see a flashback where Reese Myers is hitting Jon Voight with a baseball bat, presumably

[45:47] what put him in the wheelchair, and there's the implication this is to protect Will Sasso

[45:52] in some way that perhaps Will, uh, Reese Myers should have talked about.

[45:56] It's, they have a weird family dynamic.

[45:58] Yeah, he's just beating on the Brett, you know?

Elliott Kalan

[45:59] Yeah.

[46:00] Will Sasso is the younger, Will Sasso's supposed to be the younger brother, right?

[46:04] Uh, I think so.

[46:06] It's, I think he's supposed to be the younger brother, but it's like the, the, the, what

[46:10] we're led to believe is that Jon Voight was always just closer with Will Sasso, and he

[46:15] would take Will Sasso to go do activities that Jonathan Reese Myers was not invited to come

[46:20] with.

[46:20] And it, it, there, we learn that there's a sinister side to this, but, uh, until basically

[46:25] this moment, there's part of me that's like, seems like kind of a slender read for this

[46:29] movie to be, uh, resting this, this bad relationship between the two brothers that Jon Voight used

[46:33] to just take Will Sasso to go like fishing and stuff like that and wouldn't take Jonathan

[46:36] Reese Myers.

[46:37] But you know what?

[46:37] All families are different.

[46:38] When you're a kid, that stuff hits hard.

Dan McCoy

[46:40] So then you'll learn the truth soon enough, which is, so they decipher a clue that relates

[46:45] to you.

Stuart Wellington

[46:45] Like a John Irving novel or something.

Dan McCoy

[46:47] Yeah.

[46:48] Yeah.

[46:49] They decipher a clue that relates to walk a mile in your moccasins.

[46:52] They take that to mean the distance of a mile, uh, expressed in Roman numerals, which,

[46:56] uh, allows them to turn some wheels on the thing to reveal.

Elliott Kalan

[47:01] Really misinterpreting the meaning of that phrase.

[47:03] Like why people would actually say it, but yeah.

Dan McCoy

[47:05] Yeah.

[47:06] It reveals the confession of H.H.

[47:08] Holmes, uh, uh, the book, uh, with notes in the margin from Jon Voight detailing all

[47:14] of the murders he did.

[47:16] And, uh, so here's where the movie takes a wild historical turn.

[47:22] Mm-hmm.

[47:22] Because up until this point, I'm like, oh, you know, the H.H.

[47:24] Holmes stuff is, uh, essentially window dressing.

[47:27] You know?

[47:27] It's like, oh, we're evoking this.

[47:29] But no.

[47:30] And, uh...

[47:31] It is very literal, Daniel.

Elliott Kalan

[47:32] Yeah.

[47:32] Very literal, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[47:33] You can correct me if I get any of this wrong because it comes in like sort of this info

[47:36] dump thing, but it turns out H.H.

[47:39] Holmes was actually Voight's grandfather and William H.H.

[47:43] Holmes' child murdered, uh, Voight's mother.

[47:48] And then Voight also himself killed Sasso's mom.

[47:53] That was one of the women he killed.

[47:55] Yes.

[47:55] And, uh, and the thing that Voight and Sasso would do is like Voight would take him out

[48:01] as a small child on his murder sprees and like Will Sasso child form would be sleeping

[48:08] in the car as he was killing these.

[48:10] As Jon Voight's murdering women.

Elliott Kalan

[48:11] And so he was taking out his son as cover for why he would be out of the house murdering

[48:16] women.

[48:16] And he's like, how can you suspect a man with his, who's out with his son?

[48:20] And the part of one part of it is like.

Dan McCoy

[48:21] Yeah, it's not like they've seen Dexter before.

Elliott Kalan

[48:24] And one part of it is like, well, I don't know why you wouldn't take, why once, why

[48:27] you can't just alternate sons if that's the issue, unless Will Sasso was just a dumber,

[48:31] sleepier kid.

[48:32] So it was easier to get away with the murders.

[48:34] But also the idea that like, if a police officer came upon him murdering a woman at night, he

[48:39] would be like, oh no, I'm just out with my son.

[48:41] He's in the car sleeping.

[48:42] Everything's fine.

[48:43] All of your story checks out there.

[48:44] Oh, yes.

[48:46] It's so fine to see a father and a son enjoying fine time together.

[48:50] I wish my own papa had been so sociable and loving.

[48:54] Maybe you have a good night to you.

[48:55] And good night to you too, ma'am.

[48:57] I hope you feel better.

[48:59] I hope you, oh, you're just kipping back, taking a nap in the road.

[49:02] That's okay.

[49:04] You know, we don't always make our way to the nice, nice warm bed.

[49:08] Now, if I would, now, if I was, would I just leave my son in the car while I murdered a

[49:13] woman outside?

[49:14] You might, Rabbit.

[49:15] You might.

Dan McCoy

[49:16] Yeah.

[49:16] They just had keystone cops back then.

[49:18] It was the problem.

[49:19] Yeah.

[49:20] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[49:20] They lived in Max Senate Sylvania.

[49:23] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[49:24] But anyway, Will Sasso is just, is obviously disgusted by this revelation and he hangs John

[49:29] Voight with a sheet.

Stuart Wellington

[49:31] This is, guys, I know you guys keep pushing back, but I found this to be objectively hilarious.

[49:36] No, this is funny.

[49:37] That he fashioned a noose while everybody's kind of standing around horrified.

[49:41] And then he, like, drags him across the room and then up the stairs and then over to the

[49:46] balcony.

Elliott Kalan

[49:46] This is after his foot has also been blasted apart earlier.

[49:48] Yeah.

[49:50] It is very funny that no one tries to stop him at any point in this long process.

[49:54] Yeah.

[49:54] Oh, it's so funny.

[49:55] But this is a wild reveal that John Voight is not just, like, inspired by H.H.

[50:01] Holmes, but is the illegitimate grandson of H.H.

[50:04] Holmes and that there is a satanic bloodline.

[50:07] Right.

[50:07] At one point.

[50:08] That he has been, he's the latest, you know, murderer in.

Dan McCoy

[50:11] The kid says grandpa was a third generation murderer.

[50:14] Yes.

[50:14] The film seems to posit that serial killism is a genetic disorder that gets passed down.

Elliott Kalan

[50:21] Here's what really gets to me.

[50:22] He's a self-made man when it comes to money, but he's a total Nepo murder baby.

[50:26] Look.

[50:27] That's true.

[50:27] It's like, oh, how did he know how to be a murderer?

[50:29] How is he so good at it?

[50:30] You know what?

[50:30] He had a leg up.

[50:31] He had a leg up in his family.

[50:33] And you look at all these murderers.

[50:34] They're all the children and grandchildren of murderers.

[50:37] It's unfair.

[50:38] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[50:38] No, you're right.

[50:39] Yeah.

[50:40] So he hangs Voight, but the shmig shmaw voice is like, that's just what he wanted for you

[50:44] to carry on as a murderer.

[50:46] Now you're a killer just like him.

[50:48] Yeah.

[50:49] I'm like, I don't think it's the same thing, murder voice.

Elliott Kalan

[50:53] Look, I'm grasping at straws.

[50:54] Nobody's really playing the game the way I intended them to.

Dan McCoy

[50:57] Yeah.

[50:57] But the game's still going on and everyone's like, we're not going to be H.H.

[51:00] Holmes' grandson's posthumous murder victims.

[51:04] So Tara sifts through the ashes and she gets the dog whistle so they can escape the house

[51:08] without being eaten by dogs.

[51:10] How does that work out?

[51:12] Well.

Elliott Kalan

[51:12] There are guard dogs.

[51:13] And earlier on, we saw that they can only be stopped by the dog whistle.

[51:16] Yeah.

[51:16] They're very cute.

Dan McCoy

[51:18] Burnham shoots at them as they're escaping with a rifle and he hits Will Sasuke.

[51:25] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[51:25] It seems like he's doing it to kind of corral them toward more game.

Elliott Kalan

[51:30] But I feel like he must feel like it's a failure on his part that he's having to resort to

[51:35] using a sniper rifle as opposed to sounding a little bit wittier, you know?

[51:39] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[51:40] They all escape to a treehouse shed in the woods.

[51:43] Tara runs to the water where she finds a rowboat and she shot in the way.

[51:47] A rowboat?

[51:48] A rowboat, sorry.

Elliott Kalan

[51:50] Because that would be a wild twist if she found a robot and it was like, I'm from the future.

[51:54] I can help you, but only if you follow my instructions exactly.

Dan McCoy

[51:58] It's like, I'm so sick of this crap.

Elliott Kalan

[52:00] The first thing you have to do is murder the rest of your family.

[52:04] Wait a minute.

[52:05] Yes, that's right.

[52:05] I'm a robot invented by the great, great, great, great grandson of H.H. Holmes.

Dan McCoy

[52:12] Well, she shot on the leg on the way back, sorry, and hides in a well from the dogs.

[52:18] Big mistake.

[52:19] Because Marie conveniently can't find the dog whistle and the dogs follow her into the well

[52:27] and we hear the noises of dogs eating and tearing apart.

Stuart Wellington

[52:31] Okay.

[52:31] So this is, you know, this is horrible.

[52:33] The image of a woman of color being chased by dogs, terrible.

[52:37] However.

Elliott Kalan

[52:38] It's a bad historical parallel to be drawing to what is supposed to be a,

[52:41] what's supposed to be ostensibly dumb fun, this movie.

Stuart Wellington

[52:45] Yeah.

[52:45] There, but when she's hanging from the inside of the well

[52:49] and the dogs are supposed to be like eating her fingers so that she falls,

[52:53] it very clearly is them licking her fingers.

[52:56] Yeah.

[52:57] Like these vicious dogs are clearly like, oh, let me lick up those fingers.

[53:01] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[53:01] It is.

[53:02] All that bacon grease you put on there.

Elliott Kalan

[53:03] It is silly in that way.

[53:05] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[53:06] And here comes the big twist.

Elliott Kalan

[53:08] Unless they're licking the fingers that they'll be slipperier so she'll fall.

[53:11] But you're right.

[53:12] Yeah.

[53:13] And it is something you see in bed.

[53:14] You think this is cute when it's evil.

[53:16] It is.

[53:17] It is something that you see in bad movies with dogs often is that when they're supposed

[53:20] to be attacking someone, they're clearly showing them affection.

[53:23] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[53:25] Guys, we're at the twist.

[53:26] And that is that the daughter had the whistle the whole time.

[53:30] She's the one who inherited the murder gene.

[53:33] And she double stabs Will Sasso in the head with two knives.

[53:37] And then eats one of his eyeballs.

[53:39] This is a.

[53:40] Yes.

[53:41] This is a.

[53:41] This is incredible.

[53:42] First off.

Elliott Kalan

[53:42] And also, I think I don't think there's anything in the H.H.

[53:45] Holmes stories that involves cannibalism.

[53:46] I could be wrong about that.

[53:47] This is her new twist.

[53:48] She's putting on this.

Stuart Wellington

[53:49] So when the twist is revealed, Will Sasso sitting down, it just goes, what?

[53:54] Then she double stabs him.

[53:56] And the face he is making is so funny.

[53:59] It is.

[53:59] This is very funny.

[54:00] It's like, oh.

Dan McCoy

[54:01] Yeah.

[54:01] It's so great.

Elliott Kalan

[54:03] Stuart, you say that.

[54:04] But if you someday when your daughter sitting behind you admits that she's a murderer and

[54:08] then double stabs you, I bet you'll have a silly look on your face too.

[54:11] Yeah.

[54:11] Oh, man.

Stuart Wellington

[54:12] I'll be so.

[54:12] The silliest.

[54:13] Yeah.

[54:14] Like, nobody filmed this place.

Elliott Kalan

[54:17] This is embarrassing.

[54:18] I hope nobody got that on tape.

[54:19] Your last words are, I hope nobody got that on tape.

[54:22] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[54:23] Anyway, so she monologues about how evil John Voight was upset that Reese Myers didn't have

[54:33] the darkness in him.

[54:34] That he just broke his back and took over the company when he found out.

[54:38] And this is the point.

[54:39] Instead of killing him, as he should have.

[54:40] Yeah, call me crazy, but, you know, if you know what Reese Myers knows, maybe don't come

[54:47] to any further birthdays of your serial killer father.

[54:51] It does raise the question.

[54:53] At the least.

[54:54] Yeah.

[54:54] At the most, tell the cops.

[54:57] Definitely, once murders start happening, tell your family what's going on.

Elliott Kalan

[55:02] Yeah, it raises the question of why he, I mean, I could see that maybe he hid this information

[55:06] because he didn't want the family to live with the horror and the shame of knowing what had

[55:11] happened, especially his brother.

[55:13] And potential financial ruin.

[55:15] Yes.

[55:15] Certainly, once the murder game begins, why are you hiding it?

[55:19] You know, why aren't you sharing this necessary data?

[55:22] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[55:22] Yeah.

[55:22] But anyway, the point of the monologue is, of course, now she's the true legacy.

[55:27] She is the legacy murderer doing the legacy murders.

[55:32] And she shoots her mom and a cheery song about it being a perfect day plays.

[55:39] Burnham picks her up in a limo.

[55:41] Congrats to her on winning.

[55:42] And she makes a point of saying Uncle Burnham.

Stuart Wellington

[55:45] And I'm like, wait a minute.

[55:46] Does that mean Burnham is like, is that just like a playful nickname?

[55:50] Or is he intended to be the son of his first wife?

Elliott Kalan

[55:54] Yes.

[55:54] I thought that they were getting across that he is an unacknowledged son, that maybe the

[55:59] others don't know that.

Stuart Wellington

[56:01] In which case, isn't he basically carrying on the legacy?

[56:04] Because he does some murdering, right?

Dan McCoy

[56:06] Yeah.

[56:06] But she does say, like, maybe next time he'll be, whatever.

[56:10] Like, maybe next legacy murders.

Stuart Wellington

[56:12] And then we get a little shot of him putting away the game pieces, taking care of them.

Dan McCoy

[56:17] I don't know why you're resting the summary from me right at the end here.

[56:22] Oh, I'll give it back.

[56:24] Here you go, Dan.

[56:25] So she drives off.

[56:26] Music goes gloomy.

[56:28] And then we get a montage of each of the corpses in turn lying around as the pieces are put

[56:34] away, including a noose for John Voight.

[56:38] He was actually the noose, not the gas mask, I guess.

[56:42] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[56:42] Well, they had originally assigned pieces to everyone based on what they thought their personalities

[56:46] were, but it actually coincided with how they were going to get murdered.

[56:51] Yeah.

[56:51] Which is wild.

[56:52] Yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[56:54] Hey, it's an intricate plan.

[56:55] When that montage was happening, I was so mad that the movie was not over.

[57:00] I was like, yeah, I got it.

[57:01] Like, just be done.

[57:03] I was like, I finished washing dishes five minutes ago.

[57:05] I mean, that's part of it.

[57:07] I mean, there was this, I'm like, can I, I have five minutes left of washing dishes.

[57:11] Can I just watch a couple minutes of the young ones instead of this?

[57:13] You know?

Dan McCoy

[57:14] How did he know he was going to be killed by a noose?

[57:17] Like, this is a psychic H.H.

[57:19] Holmes' grandson, I guess.

[57:22] Mm-hmm.

[57:23] Anyway, that's.

Stuart Wellington

[57:23] He's just, he's just that good.

[57:25] It's his greatest weakness.

[57:27] Yeah.

[57:27] Being a psychic.

[57:28] Being too good at a murderer.

[57:29] Yeah.

[57:29] I was going to say getting hung by the neck.

Dan McCoy

[57:34] It's a, yeah, a flaw.

Stuart Wellington

[57:36] Unfortunately, he was vulnerable.

Elliott Kalan

[57:37] He had one weakness.

[57:39] All the things that would kill a normal person.

[57:41] Mm-hmm.

[57:43] So, that's.

Dan McCoy

[57:44] Just like Achilles.

[57:45] Dangerous game.

[57:46] The legacy murders.

[57:49] Let's do final judgments, whether it's a good, bad movie, a bad, bad movie, or a movie we kind of like.

[57:55] I'm going to say, like, is an edge case for me.

[58:00] I'm going to go with bad, bad movie because I found it too unpleasant in a lot of ways.

[58:09] But part of that might just be, like, I was annoyed at having to, like, take notes on all the dumb twists and turns.

Elliott Kalan

[58:16] The movie does go down easier when you're not taking notes on it.

[58:19] Yeah.

[58:20] When you're not doing homework.

Dan McCoy

[58:21] Yeah.

[58:22] I think if I had seen it with, like, friends, maybe I would have been more delighted by it.

[58:25] Because it is, like, particularly the historical fiction turn it takes was pretty wild and funny.

[58:34] So, you know, it's borderline, you know.

Stuart Wellington

[58:37] Yeah, I'm going to join you on that.

[58:38] I think I'm going to say it's a bad, bad movie.

[58:41] There's moments of it that I think could, like, I feel like depending on, like, kind of how nasty of a mood you're in.

[58:48] Because I think there's enough of it that's, like, very sloppily and shoddily done that make it pretty silly.

[58:54] But, you know, it's really hard to get over a cat death for no reason.

Elliott Kalan

[59:00] Yeah.

[59:00] I think I'm in the same boat as Dan that it's, like, I think I was watching.

[59:05] I'm in the same boat as you guys.

[59:06] We're all in the same boat.

[59:07] The boat's in the same.

[59:08] I'm in the same just two-person group chat as Dan where I agree.

[59:15] I think if I was watching this with other people, I think it might be a good, bad.

[59:18] But by yourself, it's a bad, bad.

[59:20] It's just kind of unpleasant.

[59:21] And the funny parts are a little too far apart for me, you know.

[59:25] Yeah.

[59:26] But if you're with other people, then you can kind of talk to them during those moments and maybe get another drink or something.

Stuart Wellington

[59:32] Go pop some corn.

[59:33] Yeah.

[59:34] Yeah.

[59:34] Why not?

[59:34] If you're going to pop something, why not as well make it corn?

S4

[59:36] One thing we all have in common, we all have a mind.

[59:45] It makes me so scared because I'm like, when is the bad thing going to happen?

[59:50] And minds can be kind of unpredictable and eccentric.

Elliott Kalan

[59:53] Everybody wants to hear that they're not alone.

[59:56] Everybody wants to hear that someone else has those same thoughts.

S4

[59:59] Depression Mode with John Moe is about how interesting minds intersect with the lives and work of the people who have them.

[1:00:07] Comedians, authors, experts, all sorts of folks trying to make sense of their world.

Elliott Kalan

[1:00:11] It's not admitting something bad if you say, this is scary.

S4

[1:00:16] Depression Mode with John Moe.

[1:00:18] Every Monday at MaximumFun.org or wherever you get podcasts.

S5

[1:00:26] Sound Heap with John Luke Roberts is a real podcast made up of fake podcasts.

[1:00:31] Like, if you had a cupboard in your lower back, what would you keep in it?

[1:00:34] So I'm going to say mugs.

[1:00:36] A little yoghurt and a spoon.

Dan McCoy

[1:00:37] A small handkerchief that was given to me by my grandmother on her deathbed.

[1:00:41] Maybe some spare honey?

Stuart Wellington

[1:00:43] I'd keep batteries in it.

[1:00:44] I'd pretend to be a toy.

[1:00:46] If I had a cupboard in my lower back, I'd probably fill it with spines.

S5

[1:00:49] If you had a cupboard in your lower back, what would you keep in it?

[1:00:52] Doesn't exist.

[1:00:53] We made it up for Sound Heap with John Luke Roberts.

[1:00:56] An award-winning comedy podcast from Maximum Fun made up of hundreds of stupid podcasts.

[1:01:02] Listen and subscribe to Sound Heap with John Luke Roberts.

[1:01:05] Now.

Dan McCoy

[1:01:07] Hey guys, why don't we take a few moments to honor the people that helped make the Flophouse possible.

[1:01:16] Mostly, that's listeners like you who are members at MaximumFun.org.

[1:01:22] But also, we have a couple of sponsors.

[1:01:25] And this week, we're sponsored in part by Squarespace.

[1:01:29] The all-in-one website platform for entrepreneurs to stand out and succeed online.

[1:01:35] You know, these days you've got to have a website.

[1:01:36] And whether you're just starting out or you have a growing brand,

[1:01:40] Squarespace makes it easy to make a website that is going to look beautiful.

[1:01:44] It's going to help you engage with your audience.

[1:01:45] And it'll help you sell anything from products to content to your services, time,

[1:01:52] all in one place, all on your terms.

[1:01:54] Start a completely personalized website with a new guided design system,

[1:01:58] which is called Squarespace Blueprint.

[1:02:01] A blueprint filled with secret passages.

[1:02:05] Choose from professionally curated layout and styling options

[1:02:08] to build a unique online presence from the ground up that is tailored to your brand

[1:02:12] and is optimized for every device,

[1:02:15] which is good because most people are going to look at it on their phones.

[1:02:18] Let's be real.

[1:02:19] So, you can also make checkout seamless for your customers

[1:02:22] with simple but powerful payment tools,

[1:02:24] except credit cards, PayPal, and Apple Pay.

[1:02:27] And in eligible countries,

[1:02:30] you can offer customers the option to buy now and pay later

[1:02:33] with Afterpay and Clearpay.

[1:02:36] Sell your products and services with an online store,

[1:02:38] whether it's physical goods, digital content, services, whatever.

[1:02:43] Squarespace has the tools you need to start selling online.

[1:02:45] So, go to squarespace.com for a free trial.

[1:02:48] And when you're ready to launch,

[1:02:50] go to squarespace.com slash flop

[1:02:53] to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:00] Dan, do you think,

[1:03:00] I had an idea for a website

[1:03:01] and I was wondering if Squarespace could help me with it.

[1:03:03] Do you think they could?

Dan McCoy

[1:03:04] Wow, it's been a while since we had one of these questions, probably.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:07] Okay, so it's called 23andRIP

[1:03:09] and it's where you can get a genetic analysis

[1:03:11] that's matched with the famous murderers of the past

[1:03:14] just to make sure you don't carry the deadly legacy inside you.

[1:03:17] You think they'd be able to help me with that website?

Dan McCoy

[1:03:19] You know, even though that is not scientifically backed by anything.

[1:03:26] Oh, well, I've told our investors something different.

[1:03:29] I think on the website side, you would be fine with Squarespace.

Stuart Wellington

[1:03:33] I think they would help you out.

[1:03:34] I mean, your website would probably require

[1:03:35] a lot of functionality and drag and drop type stuff.

Dan McCoy

[1:03:39] Is that available in Squarespace?

[1:03:40] It's all available.

[1:03:42] You can drop as many dragons as you want.

[1:03:44] What if I wanted people to look at it on their phones?

[1:03:46] It's optimized for mobile.

[1:03:48] Oh, wow.

Elliott Kalan

[1:03:48] Right, yeah.

[1:03:50] Fantastic.

[1:03:50] As soon as I figure out which gene is the murder gene.

[1:03:51] That's how people usually use websites these days.

Stuart Wellington

[1:03:53] Yeah.

[1:03:54] I think there's a Jumbotron, Stuart.

[1:03:56] There is a Jumbotron!

[1:04:00] Does your partner have interests?

[1:04:03] Why?

[1:04:04] Yeah.

[1:04:04] What are interests?

[1:04:06] What are they for?

[1:04:07] I know they're a threat to me, but in what way?

[1:04:11] Have you ever done a ninth grade level research project on Kai truck crumple zones while in line at the bank?

[1:04:20] Or track the evolutionary history of moles after seeing your neighbor post about blowing them up on Nextdoor?

[1:04:27] Each episode, host Alex will investigate one of his wife Ani's browser tabs and demand answers.

[1:04:35] Can he survive his journey into the heart of interests?

[1:04:40] So listen to Close Other Tabs with Ani and Alex.

[1:04:44] What a great premise for a show.

[1:04:47] That is a great premise for a show.

[1:04:48] We should have done that 17 years ago.

Dan McCoy

[1:04:50] Instead of having to curse ourselves.

[1:04:53] Watching legacy murders.

Stuart Wellington

[1:04:54] The deadly legacy of our podcast.

Elliott Kalan

[1:04:57] Yeah.

[1:04:57] Speaking of continuing the deadly legacy of our podcast, the Flophouse has a very special thing going on right now.

[1:05:04] We are recording this the next day after the premiere of Flop TV.

[1:05:09] That's right.

[1:05:09] Flop TV is back for season two.

[1:05:11] You may remember last year we did Flop TV.

[1:05:14] It's kind of one hour live video broadcasts online of this show.

[1:05:19] Yet last night we did our first episode, Robocop 2.

[1:05:22] And if you missed it, that's fine.

[1:05:24] The video is up online and it will stay up online through the end of February, right?

Stuart Wellington

[1:05:29] Guys, I hate to say it, but I think it was one of our best one of those.

[1:05:33] It was.

[1:05:33] Why do you hate to say that?

[1:05:35] I just hate to say it, you know?

Elliott Kalan

[1:05:36] He just hates.

[1:05:37] I think he hates to denigrate our previous season, but I think it was one of our best ones.

[1:05:41] Yeah.

[1:05:41] If you go to theflophouse.simpleticks.com, you can buy individual episode tickets or a season pass that has a discount in it.

[1:05:51] The season pass gets you all six episodes for the price of five episodes.

[1:05:55] And your ticket or your season pass gets you access to the show even after we've already done it.

[1:06:01] So we're going to be premiering the show the first Saturday of every month doing live premieres online.

[1:06:05] But if you can't make it on the first Saturday of every month at 6 p.m. Pacific, 9 p.m. Eastern, then that's okay.

[1:06:13] You can watch the video at your leisure as many times as you want through the end of February 2025 when Flop TV will go back into the Flophouse vault.

[1:06:25] Maybe to be released when we die.

[1:06:28] Oh, hooray!

[1:06:29] I mean, no, no, that's not great.

[1:06:30] But we'll be doing six episodes once a month, first Saturday of every month.

[1:06:34] It's all sequels this time.

[1:06:35] The next one will be October 5th, Breaking 2, Electric Boogaloo.

[1:06:41] A movie we've talked about a lot.

[1:06:42] We've never done an episode on it.

[1:06:43] It's going to be super fun.

[1:06:44] And I think, Dan, you were going to breakdance live during the show?

Dan McCoy

[1:06:48] I mean, no guarantees.

[1:06:50] We'll see.

[1:06:51] Okay.

[1:06:52] I mean, if I try to dance, I probably will break at this age, but we'll see what happens.

Elliott Kalan

[1:06:58] Dan, do we have time for me to mention two personal promotions that I'd like to bring up?

Dan McCoy

[1:07:02] We always have time for you, Elliot.

[1:07:03] For you, Elliot, anything.

[1:07:04] The world.

Elliott Kalan

[1:07:05] That's wonderful.

[1:07:06] I would like to say if you go to your local comic book store, you will most likely find the most recent issue of Hercules or Disney Hercules.

[1:07:13] It could also be called my comic series that I've written through Dynamite Comics.

[1:07:17] It is the characters from the Hercules movie plus some new characters based on old Greek mythology.

[1:07:23] It starts out as a few individual adventures and builds into a big epic storyline that still has a satisfying story in each issue.

[1:07:32] So that's Hercules from Dynamite Comics written by me in comic stores now.

[1:07:36] And also, if you want to hear me talk about stuff without Dan and Stuart, uh-oh.

[1:07:41] What?

[1:07:42] Why?

[1:07:43] I mean, that's a good question.

[1:07:44] Well, if you want to hear me talk about civic and municipal maintenance and management, a subject Dan and Stuart are not as interested in, go to the 99% Invisible feed where once a month Roman, Mars, and I are breaking down the book The Power Broker by Robert Caro.

[1:07:59] Speaking of World's Fairs and Expositions, we are not there yet, but we will be coming up to the chapters soon where Robert Moses is running the 1964 New York World's Fair.

[1:08:08] So look forward to that in the 99% Invisible podcast feed.

[1:08:11] But only do that after you listen to all the Flophouse episodes.

Dan McCoy

[1:08:14] Sounds good.

[1:08:15] Hey.

[1:08:16] Let's, uh...

[1:08:17] Hey.

[1:08:18] Hey.

[1:08:19] What are you doing here?

[1:08:20] Hey.

[1:08:21] Hey, put that down.

[1:08:22] Let's move along to letters from listeners.

Stuart Wellington

[1:08:25] But that's my only weakness.

[1:08:27] Your only weakness is...

Dan McCoy

[1:08:29] Is letters?

[1:08:29] Hearing letters from our devoted listeners.

[1:08:33] Here's one of them.

[1:08:34] This is from Dalton, last name withheld.

[1:08:36] Trumbo.

[1:08:37] Who writes?

[1:08:38] Yep.

[1:08:39] Um...

[1:08:40] We're breaking the blacklist and reading his letter here on the air.

[1:08:45] I was inspired while listening to the hit podcast, The Chop House, by the discussion of what dinosaurs tasted like.

[1:08:51] And as a paleontologist, wanted to let you know that that is definitely something we discuss with each other.

[1:08:58] There's even been some work on what prehistoric creatures may have been kosher.

[1:09:02] Spoiler, not many.

[1:09:04] Wow.

[1:09:04] That's made it into the academic literature.

Elliott Kalan

[1:09:06] I guess that...

[1:09:07] Because reptiles are generally not kosher, I believe, right?

[1:09:11] They don't have...

[1:09:11] You're asking us.

[1:09:13] Yeah, Dan.

[1:09:13] Dan, you're...

Dan McCoy

[1:09:14] Dan, you're a kosher butcher, right?

[1:09:18] Of the three of us.

[1:09:21] Yeah.

[1:09:22] Oh, moving on.

[1:09:23] Sorry.

[1:09:23] The next paragraph starts like this.

[1:09:25] Okay.

[1:09:25] And continues thusly.

[1:09:27] Thank you for easing us into it.

[1:09:29] The host with the most was right on the money that we can't know for sure.

[1:09:32] And to look at birds for the closest comparison.

[1:09:35] When we were looking to make educated inferences on things in the fossil record,

[1:09:39] we tried to bracket animals using their closest modern relatives.

[1:09:44] So, with dinosaurs, we have birds on one side and alligators slash crocodiles on the other.

[1:09:50] And as a certified alligator enjoyer, I do find it lives up to its reputation of tasting kind of like chicken.

[1:09:57] So, that...

[1:09:57] Is that what a dragon would taste like?

[1:10:00] One can only assume...

[1:10:02] Well, I guess we can't because we don't know what the dragons might evolve into over the years.

[1:10:08] Yeah, or what they evolved from.

[1:10:09] Yeah.

[1:10:12] So, that kind of vaguely birdish taste with a bit more depth of flavor is probably a safe guess for dinosaurs.

[1:10:18] Diet definitely plays a role too.

[1:10:20] Things that eat fish tend to taste fishy.

[1:10:23] And I've heard that carnivores taste pretty bad.

[1:10:27] That's what I've heard that too, to be honest.

Elliott Kalan

[1:10:29] Like, bear meat is supposed to not be very good.

[1:10:32] Lion meat is supposed to not be very good.

[1:10:34] Yeah.

[1:10:34] Carnivores tend to not taste as good as herbivores.

[1:10:37] That's what I've heard.

[1:10:38] I don't know that I've ever...

[1:10:40] No, but I've eaten alligator.

[1:10:41] What carnivores would we...

[1:10:42] That's a carnivore.

[1:10:42] What carnivores would you have eaten?

[1:10:43] Alligators is one of the few, I think.

[1:10:46] Right?

[1:10:47] And if you're ever going to eat polar bear, do not eat the liver.

[1:10:51] It is toxic.

[1:10:53] Oh, okay.

[1:10:53] Cool.

[1:10:54] I mean, I'm not planning on it.

[1:10:54] Let me just open up a note set.

[1:10:56] But I guess if I...

[1:10:57] No, but you should probably keep that in mind all the time.

[1:10:59] Just in case.

[1:11:00] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:11:00] Arctic adventure.

[1:11:04] Where was I?

[1:11:04] Yeah, when you go beyond the mountains of madness.

[1:11:06] Yeah, well, he's saying a T-Rex might be out, but I bet a hadrosaur shank would be good eat.

[1:11:12] Now, what science can't give us clues on is the taste of fictional creatures.

[1:11:16] So for that, I turn to you.

[1:11:18] What made-up creature from a movie would you most want to try?

[1:11:22] Keep on chopping in the chi world, don't molesting with help.

[1:11:27] We will continue chopping in the chi world.

Stuart Wellington

[1:11:28] I'd want to eat that giant thing that Anakin surfs on when they're in the second pre-world.

[1:11:35] Yeah, that kind of grazing mammal.

[1:11:37] Yeah, yeah.

[1:11:38] I totally want to take a bite out of that.

Elliott Kalan

[1:11:40] Similarly, when Chewbacca is cooking up that porg, I have to admit, it looks really good.

[1:11:44] It looks pretty good.

[1:11:45] I mean, it looks kind of chicken-y.

Dan McCoy

[1:11:46] I'm sad at the death of such a cute animal, but of the animals, there are—

Stuart Wellington

[1:11:51] They believe in the cycle of life, Dan.

[1:11:53] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:11:53] Yeah.

[1:11:54] I mean, my first impulse was to go to something from like the Dark Crystal or something, but

[1:12:01] they all seem sentient.

[1:12:03] Like, I don't know if I want to eat something.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:05] Although that scene when the Skeksis are eating, I love it.

[1:12:08] Yes, it's the best.

[1:12:08] I mean, there's a lot of stuff in there that I would try.

[1:12:10] Yeah, it's great.

[1:12:11] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:12:11] I've talked about it extensively on the spot.

[1:12:14] Yes, yeah.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:16] There's a number of Dr. Seuss creatures that I've wanted that I bet would taste pretty good.

[1:12:20] Like the Lorax?

[1:12:22] Yeah.

[1:12:24] Give me a Lorax haunt.

[1:12:25] Sure, yeah.

[1:12:26] I mean, he does look well marbled.

[1:12:27] I am the Lorax.

[1:12:28] I speak for—

[1:12:29] Hey, hey, what are you doing?

[1:12:30] Hey, get your mouth off of me.

Dan McCoy

[1:12:32] He already sort of looks like a ham with arms and legs.

Elliott Kalan

[1:12:35] Has Danny DeVito ever played the Lorax?

Dan McCoy

[1:12:38] He did.

[1:12:38] Yes, in the movie The Lorax.

[1:12:40] Oh, that makes so much sense.

[1:12:40] He, in fact, did do that.

[1:12:41] Yes.

[1:12:42] Oh, God.

[1:12:43] Oh, boy.

[1:12:45] I saw some of that at my in-law's house because, you know, there were kids around.

[1:12:50] So, like, put the Lorax on.

[1:12:52] And I was immediately dismayed by it.

[1:12:55] I'm like, wow, you've really taken one of the most distinct art styles for a kid's book

[1:13:01] and genericed it up for this movie.

Stuart Wellington

[1:13:04] Oh, is it live action like the Grink?

[1:13:07] No, it's CGI.

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:08] It's Illumination, the company that did the Despicable Me movies and stuff like that.

[1:13:11] Oh, cool.

[1:13:11] And it looks like those.

[1:13:12] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:13:14] So, I guess that answers your question.

[1:13:17] Anyway—

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:17] I mean, but Dan, weren't you excited to learn about the Onceler's backstory?

Dan McCoy

[1:13:20] Yeah.

[1:13:23] There's a lot of unnecessary complications added to that tale.

[1:13:27] It's worth it.

[1:13:27] For kids like—

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:28] It's worth it because it gave people on Tumblr the ability to ship the Onceler and his evil self

[1:13:35] in erotic fan fiction.

Dan McCoy

[1:13:38] I did look up the Lorax on Letterboxd while it was on, and I was like, oh, a lot of people

[1:13:43] horny for the Onceler now.

[1:13:47] That's what the kids are up to.

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:48] If people online, they love tall, thin guys.

[1:13:51] They want every male animation character to be Jack Skellington, basically.

Dan McCoy

[1:13:55] And he's got that messy hair, too.

Elliott Kalan

[1:13:58] Yeah, yeah, and messy hair.

[1:13:59] Sure, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:14:00] This is from Mark Lasting Withheld, who writes—

[1:14:04] Mark Wahlberg, who writes,

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:06] Hey, Floppa's, I wanted to ask it.

[1:14:08] A question about—

[1:14:09] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:14:10] Yeah.

[1:14:11] Flawless Wahlberg.

Stuart Wellington

[1:14:13] This is also—

[1:14:15] Is it weird that I wake up at three in the morning to play golf for 20 minutes?

Dan McCoy

[1:14:20] He's got a much gentler-sounding voice, though.

[1:14:23] It's weird.

[1:14:23] Like, he both sounds like a—

[1:14:24] Oh, that's true.

[1:14:24] He does say—

Elliott Kalan

[1:14:25] He's like, oh, I was going to tell him about all—

[1:14:27] Yeah, he does have a gentler-sounding voice.

[1:14:29] That's true, yeah.

[1:14:30] I was doing more of a Matt Damon, I guess.

[1:14:32] Yeah.

[1:14:34] This is another chop house—

Dan McCoy

[1:14:34] So I bought a zoo.

[1:14:36] Can you believe it?

[1:14:38] Another chop house-related letter.

[1:14:41] You inspired—

[1:14:41] Oh, wow.

[1:14:42] A generation of letter writers.

[1:14:44] I may have to do another chop house episode.

[1:14:46] Yeah.

[1:14:49] Mark writes,

[1:14:50] I'm just pausing in the middle of your meat episode to tell you—

[1:14:53] Yeah, I had to get this out.

[1:14:54] I couldn't even finish it.

[1:14:56] To tell you a story about the John Cusack classic, Better Off Dead.

[1:15:00] I'm a little older than you guys, so I saw the film right before it came out while in film school at USC.

[1:15:06] Wow.

[1:15:07] In fact, director Savage Steve Holland came to a small press screening in one of the many little screening rooms in the then-brand-new George Lucas Instructional Building.

Stuart Wellington

[1:15:16] I'm assuming to receive his honorary degree.

Dan McCoy

[1:15:21] The brand-new George Lucas Instructional Building, which has since been torn down to make way for the Monolithic Stone Film School.

[1:15:27] Most of us loved the insane comedy of the film and were thrilled by the presence of the director, but I'll never forget the Q&A.

[1:15:35] There was a grad student whose name I never knew, but was a regular at all screenings, always asking the most laborious, pedantic questions to every guest director.

[1:15:44] Here is what he asked Savage Steve Holland.

[1:15:46] Note.

[1:15:47] Imagine the voice of a larger Arnold Horshack from Welcome Back, Cotter.

[1:15:52] Mr. Holland, I have a question.

[1:15:55] When the main character has a date with the girl—

[1:15:56] Please, call me Savage Steve.

[1:16:00] The main character has a date with the girl his father has set him up with.

[1:16:04] He goes to pick her up at her house.

[1:16:06] Now, her name was Joanne Greenwald, a clearly Jewish name, and yet she had Christmas lights on her house.

[1:16:13] At this point, Holland is nodding along and cuts him off.

[1:16:17] Yes, yes, that's an excellent point.

[1:16:19] We went back and forth.

[1:16:20] People pointed out, if she's Jewish, should she have Christmas lights?

[1:16:22] But the film takes place at Christmastime, and the fact is, when I was in high school, I dated a girl named Joanne Greenwald, and she had Christmas lights on her house.

[1:16:30] So, fuck you!

[1:16:31] And he stormed out of the room.

[1:16:33] Really?

[1:16:34] Well, hold on.

[1:16:35] The PR person started to chase him in a panic, but he was immediately totally cool and said,

[1:16:42] Oh, I'll be right back.

[1:16:43] I just have to pee.

[1:16:45] I've never enjoyed a director Q&A more.

[1:16:48] Keep on chopping and flopping, your pal Mark.

[1:16:51] Okay.

[1:16:51] What a great story.

[1:16:52] That's a great story.

Elliott Kalan

[1:16:53] That's exactly the way I want Savage Steve Holland to be in a Q&A.

[1:16:57] It seems like he's real crazy, but then it turns out it's like, hey, I'm just goofing, just having fun.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:02] Yeah.

[1:17:02] We can all laugh.

[1:17:04] Come on, we just gotta have a good laugh, you know?

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:07] Yeah.

[1:17:07] He would be canceled for having to use the bathroom now, because we all have to be perfect and never have to empty our bladders.

[1:17:13] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:17:13] Man.

[1:17:14] Uh-huh.

[1:17:15] Elliot speaks the truth, you know?

[1:17:16] You know, you can't.

[1:17:17] He says the things everyone else is too scared to say.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:20] You know, back when they made Blazing Saddles, people were using the bathroom all the time, but you can't do that now.

[1:17:24] You can't use the bathroom now.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:26] Elliot says the things that are too stupid for anyone else to say.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:33] You know, oh, oh, should I not breathe because I'm exhaling too much carbon dioxide?

[1:17:38] Is that not woke enough that my body creates carbon dioxide?

[1:17:41] That's bad for the climate.

Stuart Wellington

[1:17:42] Oh, wow.

[1:17:43] Elliot's really leaned into this Netflix special of his.

Elliott Kalan

[1:17:46] Well, the problem is at a certain point, my satirical version of this starts sounding like I mean it, and I don't mean it.

[1:17:51] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:17:52] No, we've confused listeners on occasion.

[1:17:56] Yeah.

[1:17:57] Anyway, that's all ironic.

[1:17:59] Okay, so let's move on to the final segment.

Elliott Kalan

[1:18:01] What a funny way to use the bathroom, to pretend to get mad and storm out.

[1:18:05] That's great.

Dan McCoy

[1:18:08] I mean, ask someone who often needs to use the bathroom, but feels like a weird social pressure, like, I can't speak up.

[1:18:15] Like, weirdly, it would be the easiest way to fake something like that.

Elliott Kalan

[1:18:20] Dan, the worst version of that, I was once in a friend's house, and they had dog hair all over their furniture, and I was having an allergic reaction to it.

[1:18:27] And I was with my wife and her college friends in one of their apartments, and I was like, I could feel my throat starting to close up.

[1:18:34] And I was like, I don't want to be a jerk and interrupt the conversation and be a buzzkill, so I guess I'll just sit here and asphyxiate.

[1:18:40] And then someone was like, hey, let's take a walk outside.

[1:18:42] And I was like, oh, thank goodness.

[1:18:44] So I did survive that time.

Dan McCoy

[1:18:45] Glad you're still alive.

[1:18:47] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:18:47] I thought we were going to be sharing bathroom stories, and I had a couple queued up.

[1:18:50] But you know what?

[1:18:50] I'll save those for a mini.

[1:18:52] Put those behind a paywall.

Elliott Kalan

[1:18:55] Yeah.

[1:18:55] When we do the mini, the plop house, when we're just telling bathroom stories, yeah.

[1:19:00] Let us go on to—

[1:19:01] Guys, I may change my plans for what the mini was going to be that we were going to record.

[1:19:04] Oh, God.

Dan McCoy

[1:19:06] Got to work on it fast.

[1:19:08] Let us do our recommendations of movies that might be a better use of your time than Dangerous Game, The Legacy Murders.

[1:19:16] If that's even possible.

[1:19:18] Okay, let me change my—

[1:19:19] I'd like to recommend a movie I saw just recently at a rep screening like so many.

[1:19:29] It's a Corey Yun film who recently passed away, which we only learned apparently two years after the fact.

[1:19:36] It was not widely reported.

[1:19:38] But rest in peace to both a kung fu actor and director.

[1:19:47] But this is a film he directed from 2002 called So Close, which is about a pair of—

[1:19:58] Like, there's a female assassin and her sister, who is more of like the tech person.

[1:20:04] And then they are employed to assassinate someone.

[1:20:08] And on their trail is a female cop.

[1:20:13] So it's three ladies are our primary protagonists.

[1:20:18] And there's a love interest, but this is a very gay movie.

[1:20:24] Like, they're constantly all giving—well, not those two sisters, but they're giving one another these glances that suggest that any males in the area are superfluous to the film.

[1:20:35] But it's also just a very—it's a great, silly action movie.

[1:20:41] Like, it has so many wild action sequences, wild fights, but, you know, shot clearly and beautifully, but also with sort of a turn-of-the-century, like, aesthetic of CGI that's not quite there yet in a lot of places.

[1:20:58] But stuff that would have bothered me at the time, but now with Nostalgia Goggles, I'm like, oh, look at this beautiful nonsense.

[1:21:05] It's just a lot of fun.

[1:21:06] You know, it's—if you're just looking for something purely enjoyable in the action area that's a little sexy to maybe so close is good.

Stuart Wellington

[1:21:18] I'm going to recommend a movie that just got released this weekend, and I want to pump it up so it doesn't get lost in the Netflix algorithm.

[1:21:27] I'm going to be recommending Rebel Ridge, the new Jeremy Saulnier movie.

[1:21:32] It's been a while since he made one, and boy, it's good to have him back.

[1:21:36] It's a kind of a modern-day Western about an outsider who shows up to a small town and has to deal with the web of corruption, specifically police corruption.

[1:21:48] And it is shot beautifully.

[1:21:51] It is super tense.

[1:21:53] The score is great.

[1:21:55] The soundtrack is great.

[1:21:56] I mean, it's a movie that opens with Number of the Beast playing, so it rules.

[1:21:59] Oh, wow.

[1:22:00] Yeah.

[1:22:00] I'm on board.

[1:22:01] And when it opens with Number of the Beast, you're like, man, the movie's going to have a lot to live up to.

[1:22:05] And it does.

[1:22:07] And the kind of trailer made it seem like it was going to be pretty straightforward, like actioner.

[1:22:12] But I feel like it has a little bit more on its mind, and the performances are all great.

[1:22:17] The lead, Aaron Pierre, is incredible and has such pretty eyes, guys.

[1:22:20] It's amazing.

[1:22:22] And it's just like the buildup to the first action sequence is so fucking satisfying that when it happens, it's hard not to feel that rush and pump your fists in the air.

[1:22:34] It's awesome.

[1:22:35] Don Johnson's great as a villain.

[1:22:37] Yeah.

[1:22:38] Thumbs up.

[1:22:39] Check it out.

[1:22:39] Rebel Ridge.

Elliott Kalan

[1:22:40] I'm going to recommend an older film.

[1:22:42] In fact, it is the 50th anniversary this year of this movie, which is a total coincidence.

[1:22:49] But this is one of the movies I think I've enjoyed the most of all the movies that I have watched this year so far.

[1:22:55] And it's a French movie from 1974 called Celine and Julie Go Boating.

[1:22:59] The full title is Celine and Julie Go Boating Phantom Ladies Over Paris.

[1:23:03] That's the full French title.

[1:23:05] But, I mean, obviously, it's English.

[1:23:07] That's a great title, right?

[1:23:08] Yeah.

[1:23:09] It is a French New Wave movie.

[1:23:12] I know mostly I'm all about Czech New Wave movies, but sometimes I watch New Waves from other countries.

[1:23:15] Yeah.

[1:23:17] It is a long movie.

[1:23:18] I'll warn you that off the bat.

[1:23:19] It's like three hours and change long.

[1:23:22] But it is –

[1:23:23] What is it?

[1:23:24] Terrifier 2?

[1:23:26] But I'll just say before I tell you a tiny bit about the plot that I found it to be one of the kind of lightest, in some ways, kind of the most delightful, like funniest movies I've seen in a long time.

[1:23:36] These two women, Celine and Julie, they're both living in Paris.

[1:23:39] These two young women.

[1:23:40] And they kind of meet somewhat by chance.

[1:23:44] One of them drops something in front of the other one while she's sitting on a park bench.

[1:23:47] And she goes to such lengths to chase after her, to give her back this thing.

[1:23:52] And the two of them are kind of drawn together in a sort of fun, almost irrational way.

[1:23:58] But they end up as roommates.

[1:23:59] They end up as best friends.

[1:24:01] And they discover that there is a house where whenever either one of them enter it, they are suddenly – they suddenly become the nurse in a melodramatic story that involves a love triangle and a murdered child that is replaying over and over again whenever anyone enters that house.

[1:24:19] And they decide that it is up to them to save that child by going back in and changing the story that is going on constantly in that house.

[1:24:26] And it is a movie that is – I guess you could call it kind of magical realist-y.

[1:24:30] You could call it kind of a movie about movies and what it's like if you were able to enter a movie and become part of it.

[1:24:37] But more than anything –

[1:24:38] Oh, like Last Action Hero?

[1:24:39] Yeah.

[1:24:39] I mean, to be honest, in some ways it's kind of like the French New Wave version of Last Action Hero in a sense.

[1:24:45] It's less overtly about movies, but about entering a story and becoming part of a story.

[1:24:50] And as the two women eventually decide they're going to enter that story together and change the way it goes, and they realize, oh, we can kind of do whatever we want in this story.

[1:25:00] And they go – and they become silly with it.

[1:25:02] But more than anything else, it was one of these movies where the two lead actresses, Juliette Berto and Dominique LeBourget, were friends in real life.

[1:25:11] And it feels like it.

[1:25:13] It feels like you were watching two – you were watching friends make a movie in a way that they are kind of making it up as they go along in some ways.

[1:25:20] And it's just really fun and like it has – I guess there are ominous moments, but while watching it, I was just like, oh, this is hitting so many notes of enjoyment for me while I'm watching it.

Dan McCoy

[1:25:31] This is a movie I've wanted to see for a long time, but I feel like it was difficult to see for a long time.

[1:25:37] Where did you watch it?

Elliott Kalan

[1:25:38] It's on Criterion Channel right now.

[1:25:40] So like it is a movie that – the thing that was keeping me from watching it for a long time was that it's long.

[1:25:45] It's three hours long.

[1:25:46] But – well, and I'm not going to watch it all the way through.

[1:25:49] I never have the time to sit and watch a three-hour movie.

[1:25:51] But it certainly never felt to me like I'm sitting and watching a three-hour long movie.

[1:25:56] It's a French new wave movie.

[1:25:57] It's going to take its time with things.

[1:25:59] It's not a propulsive plot that's driving you from one scene to the next.

[1:26:02] But I feel like if you watch it in a couple of installments, then there's some scenes that are just so super fun.

[1:26:08] And the lead characters I found so just delightful to be around.

[1:26:12] And it's a movie that captures the feeling of being a young adult in a friendship that – in a kind of magical way that I have not seen done as well in other movies.

[1:26:24] So I really loved it.

[1:26:25] So that's Celine and Julie Go Boating.

[1:26:26] I cannot recommend it highly enough if you are willing to sit through a three-hour long French new wave movie.

Stuart Wellington

[1:26:30] You know what's great is just being able to sit and watch an entire three-hour movie.

[1:26:35] It rules.

[1:26:36] Stop rubbing it in our poor friends.

Elliott Kalan

[1:26:39] If you have the time, which I never do ever in my life, then yeah.

[1:26:43] I mean, particularly this –

[1:26:44] I certainly miss the days when I could go with my friend Brock to go to the Guggenheim and watch the entire Craymaster cycle, all seven and a half or whatever hours in one sitting.

[1:26:52] Whoa.

Dan McCoy

[1:26:53] Can't do that anymore.

[1:26:54] Not only the time but the attention span.

[1:26:59] I think back on when I was in college and there was a semester that we took in London and a rep theater was playing La Dolce Vita and Eight and a Half back-to-back.

[1:27:12] And I sit and watch both of them back-to-back.

[1:27:14] And now that's a feat that astounds me.

Elliott Kalan

[1:27:18] I mean, I think about – there are movies I watched as a kid.

[1:27:19] I watched all the old Godzilla movies as a kid.

[1:27:22] And the idea of sitting through, like, all the talky scenes in those movies, now I'm like, how did I have the patience for all those scenes of military generals just sitting around being like, what do we do?

[1:27:31] I don't know.

[1:27:32] You know, and scientists being like, oh, here's some made-up science nonsense to explain why a dinosaur is knocking over buildings.

Dan McCoy

[1:27:37] That's the way I feel about Pink Panther movies.

[1:27:40] I thought they were so funny when I was a kid.

[1:27:42] But now I'm like, if Peter Sellers or Herbert Lomb is not on screen, these things are dire.

[1:27:47] Yeah.

[1:27:48] Yeah.

[1:27:50] Well, anyway.

[1:27:51] That's the end of the show, I guess.

[1:27:53] Yeah, I guess so.

[1:27:54] Yeah.

[1:27:55] That weird note.

Elliott Kalan

[1:27:56] Yeah, that weird note of us hating sitting through movies now that we're old angry men.

[1:28:00] Yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:28:00] No, I like it.

[1:28:01] That's what I'm saying.

[1:28:02] Put me in a movie theater with no distractions.

[1:28:04] Yeah, movie theater.

[1:28:05] Maybe give me a little nosh.

[1:28:08] Something to sip on.

[1:28:10] Sure.

Dan McCoy

[1:28:12] Kick back.

[1:28:13] Man, that's life.

[1:28:14] That's living.

[1:28:15] Yeah.

[1:28:16] We're going to write a song about it or something?

[1:28:18] Oh, yeah.

Stuart Wellington

[1:28:20] I feel like I already did with Alex on Alex's podcast.

Dan McCoy

[1:28:24] So, this has been The Flophouse.

[1:28:26] Thank you for listening.

[1:28:27] We are a member of the Maximum Fun Network.

[1:28:29] Go over to MaximumFun.org to check out other podcasts on the network.

[1:28:35] We before mentioned Alex Smith.

[1:28:37] He's our producer.

[1:28:39] He goes by the name Howell Doughty for various other endeavors.

[1:28:44] Boy, does he ever.

[1:28:45] Yeah, he's got a new album out.

[1:28:49] He does Twitch streams.

[1:28:51] You should check out all of the stuff that Alex has going on as well.

[1:28:57] And I guess that's it for this week.

[1:28:59] Thank you for being with us.

[1:29:00] For The Flophouse, I've been Dan McCoy.

[1:29:02] I've been Stuart Wellington.

Elliott Kalan

[1:29:04] And I'm Elliot Kalin.

[1:29:06] Bye.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:07] And they're almost done applauding.

[1:29:10] Okay.

[1:29:20] Well, it's just good to be back in the saddle, you know.

[1:29:22] My two cow pokes.

[1:29:25] Yep.

[1:29:26] Just poking cows.

[1:29:27] Yep.

[1:29:27] Poking cows.

[1:29:28] You know.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:28] Yeah, that's what they do.

[1:29:29] They poke cows to say, get along.

[1:29:31] Little dogey.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:35] That is what they say.

[1:29:37] They say it.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:40] As true today as it was then.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:44] That's the thing.

[1:29:45] You can't say that if it's not fucking true.

[1:29:47] Yeah.

Dan McCoy

[1:29:47] Well, you can't say it today or you'll get canceled.

Stuart Wellington

[1:29:49] I know.

[1:29:50] I tried once.

[1:29:52] I tried and I got so canceled, guys.

[1:29:54] You can't say doggies or cow pokes anymore.

[1:29:56] They won't let you.

[1:29:57] Luckily, my wife was there to hold my hand while I was being canceled.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:04] But FX picked you up, so that was good.

Elliott Kalan

[1:30:08] I'm not sure I'm sure who we're talking about anymore.

[1:30:11] Who we're veiled referencing.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:13] No.

[1:30:14] I don't know.

[1:30:15] Was there someone being referenced?

[1:30:17] No.

[1:30:18] Okay.

Stuart Wellington

[1:30:19] Sometimes I just like, I kind of like create stories.

[1:30:22] Yeah.

[1:30:22] And like, I build worlds.

[1:30:24] And they seem so real that like Elliot's like, that's got to be based on a real post.

[1:30:28] Yeah.

[1:30:28] Yeah, exactly.

[1:30:29] Turns out it wasn't.

[1:30:31] No, it just sprang forth from my skull.

[1:30:34] Like Athena.

Dan McCoy

[1:30:38] Okay.

[1:30:38] Well, we're sufficiently warmed up, I think.

[1:30:42] Maximum Fun.

[1:30:44] A worker-owned network.

[1:30:45] Of artists-owned shows.

[1:30:47] Supported.

[1:30:47] Directly.

[1:30:48] By you.

Ep.#433 - Dangerous Game: The Legacy Murders

Chapters

Transcript

In this episode

Description