Speaker 1: On the Bell Cast, the questions asked if movies have
Speaker 1: women in them? Are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands?
Speaker 1: Do they have individualism? The patriarchy? Zef and best start
Speaker 1: changing it with the bec Del Cast. Hello, welcome to
Speaker 1: the Vital Cast. Hi. Why who is Jamie London? My
Speaker 1: name is Cala Darante. This is our show. This is
Speaker 1: our podcast about the betrayal of women. Did a betrayal? Betrayal?
Speaker 1: Which I think it's not too far off. I'm depending
Speaker 1: on the movie. Most movies betray Usually it's about the
Speaker 1: betrayal of women. Yes, um, anyways, this is the show.
Speaker 1: It's if you're your first time listening. Hey, welcome, Welcome.
Speaker 1: If you like Gremlin's the movie we're discussing today, probably
Speaker 1: sorry and yes, because we will be talking about both
Speaker 1: the portrayal of women in the movie and the betrayal
Speaker 1: of women in the movie. T FW, your dad Bryce's
Speaker 1: neck being Santa problem. We can all that was nuts.
Speaker 1: That was a twist I totally forgot about. Well, we'll
Speaker 1: talk about it anyways. Uh So, we critique the portrayal
Speaker 1: of women in famous movies using the Bechdel test as
Speaker 1: a jumping off point, the Bechdel Test being a media
Speaker 1: metric created by Alison Bechdel in the nine eighties. Uh
Speaker 1: and uh, Caitlin, what is it? I'm fucking dummy? I
Speaker 1: forget Well, first of all, Jamie, you're not a dummy.
Speaker 1: But I'm happy to remind you that the Bechdel test
Speaker 1: requires that a movie have two named, female identifying characters
Speaker 1: in the narrative. They must speak to each other, and
Speaker 1: that conversation cannot be about men. Wouldn't you know? A
Speaker 1: lot of movies do not pass this very simple test
Speaker 1: is a very low bar shocks I know. Well, that
Speaker 1: was that we're in the We're in the holiday episodes? Now, yes,
Speaker 1: we certainly are. When are we gonna do a Crazy Nights?
Speaker 1: You know what? We should? Because there are very few
Speaker 1: movies about Hanakah or any other which is going to
Speaker 1: be one of my talking points. But there's so many
Speaker 1: Christmas movies and so few holiday movies that are representative
Speaker 1: of any other major religion. I genuinely I think we
Speaker 1: should do. I love A Crazy Nights. I've never seen it.
Speaker 1: There's so much wrong with it. I mean, it's it's
Speaker 1: kind of a nightmare, but you know, it is it's
Speaker 1: nicer to have to see Adam Sandler as a cartoon.
Speaker 1: Oh sure, yeah. Anyway, so well, that didn't pass the
Speaker 1: test because we talked about Adam. That we did talk
Speaker 1: about Hanakah, and that always passes the Bechtel test. But no,
Speaker 1: I don't know. Basically, because every major religion focuses on
Speaker 1: a patriarchy, I would say that talking about religion in
Speaker 1: general does not actually pass the Bechdel test. But any who,
Speaker 1: here we are the podcasts, this is it. Let's should
Speaker 1: we just introduce our guests. Yeah, I'm psyched to have her.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, our guest today. She is a TV writer,
Speaker 1: a comedian, and the co creator and a voice on
Speaker 1: the podcast Mission to Zix Mujan sol Fagari. Happy to
Speaker 1: be here. Hi, that went too high, just just like
Speaker 1: a gremlin. Oh I can I can? I just realize
Speaker 1: I'm really while watching it. But I can do a
Speaker 1: really good giz really born to do gizmo. You should
Speaker 1: have been cast instead of Howie Mandel. Wait what are ope? Wow? What?
Speaker 1: I don't even know where else where to fall on that?
Speaker 1: That is good? Wow girl, wow? Hire this woman to
Speaker 1: be your voice actor on anything? Um? So what is
Speaker 1: your history relationship with the movie. So I've never seen
Speaker 1: it before, but I remember it was a choice I
Speaker 1: recalled as a kid being around, Like I think I
Speaker 1: was alive when Grandlin's Too came out because this came out,
Speaker 1: came out Believe Too, and I just didn't want to
Speaker 1: because it looked really scary and I was a really
Speaker 1: scared kid. In fact, I think around that time when
Speaker 1: Gremlin's Two came out, it was like going to be
Speaker 1: at a birthday party. We're going to watch it, but
Speaker 1: we were also watching Brave Little Toaster and that freaked
Speaker 1: me out, and so I called home and like I
Speaker 1: told my mom, I wanted to go home, and that
Speaker 1: was the movie that got me away from sleepovers. But
Speaker 1: I couldn't tell my mom because I have I'm from
Speaker 1: an immigrant Persian family, and my mom did not approve
Speaker 1: or understand the idea of sleepovers, like why would you
Speaker 1: send your kid to be at a person's house or
Speaker 1: adults drink beer and they have dogs and so like,
Speaker 1: and so I couldn't say it was because they were
Speaker 1: showing me scary movies. I think I was like, I
Speaker 1: just like have a stomach ache or something. Put the
Speaker 1: blame on myself so I could continue this sinful practice
Speaker 1: of sleepovers. I chose not to see it. So I
Speaker 1: saw it for the first time when you told me
Speaker 1: this is a good movie to watch, yeah, or a
Speaker 1: movie to watch. Yes, it's just been a it's been
Speaker 1: a popular request for three holiday seasons running now, and
Speaker 1: so we buckled and uh, yeah, Caitlyn, what's your history
Speaker 1: with the story? Well, I did not see it for
Speaker 1: the first time until fairly recently as well. I think
Speaker 1: I probably watched it maybe three years ago. Like, this
Speaker 1: is not a movie. This is the type of movie
Speaker 1: that I probably would have grown up with under other circumstances,
Speaker 1: because like I would place this in the camp of
Speaker 1: like Back to the Future, the Goonies, like Indiana Jones,
Speaker 1: like that camp of, just like iconic eighties movies. But
Speaker 1: for some reason, this just wasn't in my household, so
Speaker 1: I didn't grow up with it. I have no sentimental
Speaker 1: attachment to it. It's fun, but people love this movie
Speaker 1: and I'm just not quite there with it. But yeah,
Speaker 1: so I saw it for the first time a couple
Speaker 1: of years ago. I still have not seen Gremlins too,
Speaker 1: but I have seen The Key and Peel sketch about
Speaker 1: the pitch meeting for Grandlins too, and I love that
Speaker 1: sketch so much. It has to be better than the
Speaker 1: actual Gremlins to movie, So I'm just going to keep
Speaker 1: watching that over and over again. Yeah, what's your history?
Speaker 1: Jamie also didn't grow up with it. I think my
Speaker 1: mom's reasoning at the time was that it was too violent,
Speaker 1: and watching it now, I'm like, not extremely. It was
Speaker 1: PG when it came out, but that was before before
Speaker 1: there was I think I think this was one of
Speaker 1: two movies that ushered in the PG thirteen rating, This
Speaker 1: and Doom because there are many murders and the Gremlins,
Speaker 1: I mean including those of the Grandlins. There's human murders
Speaker 1: and then a lot of vicious the gremlins die, and
Speaker 1: it's very the microwave thing. I was like, if I
Speaker 1: saw the microwave scene when I was a kid, I
Speaker 1: would have been traumatized. The last Gremlin who just wouldn't
Speaker 1: die and they just showed he was still ALIGNE like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that treat. What a treat? Yeah, I didn't. I didn't
Speaker 1: grow up with it, and I don't think anyone in
Speaker 1: my family had a particular attachment to it. So I
Speaker 1: saw it for the first time a couple of years
Speaker 1: ago and then rewatched it twice for this because there's
Speaker 1: just like, there's so much going on in this movie.
Speaker 1: It's even like genre wise, you're like, what who is
Speaker 1: this for? Exactly? Like it's apparently it was for every
Speaker 1: I mean, it was a very successful let's see, yeah,
Speaker 1: an eleven million dollar budget and it made a hundred
Speaker 1: fifty million dollars back. But then you produced Resolves. It's wild, okay,
Speaker 1: So getting into it there, it is not surprising that
Speaker 1: this movie was written, produced, and directed by all men
Speaker 1: and all white men as well. You know, it almost
Speaker 1: goes without saying because it's a movie made in the
Speaker 1: nineteen eighties, but boy does that show this is an
Speaker 1: early Chris Columbus joint. How old he wrote before and
Speaker 1: it was an YU and he was actually this is
Speaker 1: a spec script. He wasn't intending it to be written,
Speaker 1: no kidding, but well, what what a treat to be
Speaker 1: Chris Colon And actually the film I think it's like
Speaker 1: maybe the film draft or one of the drafts before
Speaker 1: Spielberg got his hands on it was even more Yes,
Speaker 1: I read that that it was really gruesome, and Spielberg
Speaker 1: was like, let's dial this back so that we can
Speaker 1: show it to a broader audience. Spielberg tries to get
Speaker 1: a lot of guys to dial back during this time,
Speaker 1: with varying degrees of success. For for more, go to
Speaker 1: our Indiana Jones episode where he tries to talk George
Speaker 1: Lucas out of making Indiana Jones a rapist and fails.
Speaker 1: It fails. Um so, you know complicit. So shall I
Speaker 1: do the recap? Yeah, let's go for it. Okay, So Gremlins,
Speaker 1: we opened with a guy going into a store in Chinatown.
Speaker 1: It's the holiday season. We're not sure what city or
Speaker 1: area of the country. This isn't I don't foggy. It
Speaker 1: reminded me of the l A that is. What is
Speaker 1: that movie that I hate with Harrison Ford Runner Unner.
Speaker 1: Yeah it looks like the start of it. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: like the foggy blueness and yeah yeah I was. I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, I hate that, I hate Blade Runner.
Speaker 1: That's how I started the low key racism that's about
Speaker 1: to happen. Yeah, yeah, we'll get there. So. Um So
Speaker 1: he goes into Chinatown in whatever city that they're in,
Speaker 1: somewhere where it snows um and he sees a creature
Speaker 1: called magua, but we don't we don't see this creature
Speaker 1: yet as the audience. But he's like, this will make
Speaker 1: a perfect gift for my son. And then the store
Speaker 1: owner is like, hey, this isn't for sale and you
Speaker 1: shouldn't take this, because he was basically like, you can't
Speaker 1: hand right because the maguay require a lot of care
Speaker 1: and attention, and there are three rules for taking care
Speaker 1: of the maguay, which is to keep them out of
Speaker 1: bright light, especially sunlight, because it will kill them. Number two,
Speaker 1: to keep them away from water, and number three, never
Speaker 1: feed them after midnight. So he's like, great, here's two
Speaker 1: hundred dollars. I'm taking this with me, and then we
Speaker 1: meet his son, Billy, who, based on the opening a
Speaker 1: few scenes of this movie, you're like, oh, he's buying
Speaker 1: a small furry animal for his son. His son's probably
Speaker 1: ten years old and he works. He's an adult with
Speaker 1: a job at a bank. He could be also a
Speaker 1: third year old playing at twenty year old, like I
Speaker 1: wouldn't be. He is a young either way. You think
Speaker 1: he's going to be a child, and he is an
Speaker 1: adult with a job at a bank, although when his
Speaker 1: dad gives him the gift, he's like, is it a puppy?
Speaker 1: He is? Also his only friend is Corey Feldman is
Speaker 1: like a ten year old, so I have to believe
Speaker 1: that the original draft in the script was like him
Speaker 1: as a kid, and then they aged him up for
Speaker 1: some reason, but also just a bad choice for a
Speaker 1: friend of any age. It's weird because you would, like,
Speaker 1: I feel like this movie would almost work better if
Speaker 1: it were a ten year old discovering mom instead of
Speaker 1: a twenty year old man. But there's a lot of
Speaker 1: like I think this movie kind of tries and fails
Speaker 1: a bunch of times to make commentary on class, and
Speaker 1: that's why the character was aged up, because there's like
Speaker 1: a few references to like, well, he has to support
Speaker 1: his family and that's why he works at the bank,
Speaker 1: and because his dad's a shitty inventor where it's like
Speaker 1: there were also a lot of weird like Disney. I mean,
Speaker 1: I guess it couldn't have been references to this because
Speaker 1: it was like references to Disney movies that may not
Speaker 1: have even existed yet. But like the whole like dad
Speaker 1: being a shitty inventor thing, You're like, oh, that's kind
Speaker 1: of beauty and the Beastie. And then there's that whole
Speaker 1: for a scene with what's the name of the mean
Speaker 1: old lady that is like Mrs Deeg she's basically Mrs
Speaker 1: Galt exactizard. She's a combo of Miss Gulch and of
Speaker 1: Mr Potter from It's a Wonderful Life and also Scrooge. Right,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, she's she's a lot of villains in one
Speaker 1: and then ultimately I'm just like, it feels like her
Speaker 1: character is supposed to be yea like the like she
Speaker 1: has a main villain or something, but then but then
Speaker 1: it kind of falls flat. My first reaction upon seeing
Speaker 1: Ms Mrs Degle like, who I like this badassum and
Speaker 1: like she doesn't take like she's just walking by and
Speaker 1: just like stopping cars. Like she has her own agenda,
Speaker 1: she has her own backstory. But but then she's a
Speaker 1: capitalist like boozals ceramic head. You're like, this could go
Speaker 1: a lot of ways. She's killing dogs. So Billy works
Speaker 1: at a bank. He has a dog, and then there's
Speaker 1: also a woman there named Kate who works at the
Speaker 1: bank and his friends with Billy, and then Mrs Deegle
Speaker 1: comes in and she's so much misgul that she's basically like, oh,
Speaker 1: get to my pretty and your little dog to She
Speaker 1: literally tries she's except if she goes a step further
Speaker 1: and describes how she would kill her dog. But in
Speaker 1: her defense, like the dog ruined like a precious ornament
Speaker 1: of a ceramic, Like probably she saved money, Like we
Speaker 1: don't know the backstory, but this vicious dog came and
Speaker 1: destroyed it, this beautiful thing she had, maybe the last
Speaker 1: thing her dad husband gave her. And like Stell brings
Speaker 1: this dog to work. I mean, come at that's true.
Speaker 1: The dogank necessarily there is here at Anderson Sophie's dog.
Speaker 1: We had a degree in it. I feel like at
Speaker 1: the bank, I don't know, maybe I'm being a stiff
Speaker 1: by being like, don't bring your dog to the bank,
Speaker 1: but I feel perhaps don't banks are Yeah, they're not
Speaker 1: necessarily a dog friendly and the hell dogs don't belong there? Yeah,
Speaker 1: dogs being happy places? Um okay. So then so we
Speaker 1: meet Billy and Kate and Mrs Deagle and then the
Speaker 1: man from the beginning gives the Maguay to Billy for Christmas,
Speaker 1: and he's cute. He's fury. His name is is Gizmo.
Speaker 1: He likes to sing. And then Billy's friend Pete, which
Speaker 1: is Corey Felman's character, comes over and Gizmo his friend
Speaker 1: is a ten year old who's dressed as a Christmas
Speaker 1: tree for most of the movie, and he accidentally spills
Speaker 1: a jar of water on Gizmo and then these little
Speaker 1: like furballs burst out of his body and then they
Speaker 1: grow into other magua, so he like, we find out
Speaker 1: that they multiply when they come in contact with water.
Speaker 1: But the new ones, the new magua, are not like Gizmo.
Speaker 1: They're a little bit more rambunctious, and there's one with
Speaker 1: a stripe on his head and he's like their leader.
Speaker 1: And then Billy wakes up and his dog Barney is
Speaker 1: like hanging outside tangled in like Christmas lights, and he
Speaker 1: thinks it was Mrs Deegle, but it's like maybe it
Speaker 1: was the Muguay. We don't know, uh, And then he
Speaker 1: takes one of them to school and one of his like,
Speaker 1: I guess former teachers run some tests on it, oh, right,
Speaker 1: because he's not it's weird that he would just go
Speaker 1: to the high school. He's a man man, Right, I
Speaker 1: have no relationship with anyone in my high school anymore.
Speaker 1: To go to a scientist, like a proper scientist. You're
Speaker 1: an adult. You were at a bank, so like I didn't.
Speaker 1: That didn't even register with me because he actually he
Speaker 1: belongs there, right, He's like, oh, yeah, I just go
Speaker 1: into the high school unless he is in high school
Speaker 1: and he just also has a job at a bank,
Speaker 1: and he's never we just never seen him at school.
Speaker 1: It's not clear how old he's supposed to be. And
Speaker 1: his best friend is ten, yes, so I don't know
Speaker 1: what's what's going on with Billy. So then Billy feeds
Speaker 1: the other magway and he wakes up and they've transformed
Speaker 1: there in these like cocoon phase now, and he's like,
Speaker 1: wait a minute, I didn't feed them after midnight. But
Speaker 1: it turns out he did because they like cut the
Speaker 1: cord to his alarm clock, and I tricked him so
Speaker 1: that they would be fed after midnight. And then these
Speaker 1: like egg cocoon things hatch and born are these scary, creepy,
Speaker 1: violent gremlins because most still nice and cute, so he's fine.
Speaker 1: So these gremlins start to reak havoc on the city.
Speaker 1: There's like the one at the school who's like attacking
Speaker 1: the teacher. Um, there's the ones at home that attack
Speaker 1: his mom. The mom fights back, the mom fights back,
Speaker 1: and we'll talk about that scene. But Stripe, the stripy
Speaker 1: one survives and escapes, and then so Billy goes after Stripe.
Speaker 1: Stripe jumps in a swimming pool and multiplies like crazy,
Speaker 1: go to the y. They like read havoc on the
Speaker 1: y is just open. It's fun to stay at um.
Speaker 1: And so now there's an army of gremlins and they're
Speaker 1: going all over town. They kill Mrs Deegle and they
Speaker 1: kill a lot of people. They do kill the racist neighbor,
Speaker 1: so that's a win. But also the man who looked
Speaker 1: like Santa Claus who was in the beginning of the movie.
Speaker 1: He was just simply buying a tree. There are some
Speaker 1: of their kills are on point, others are, Yeah, they're
Speaker 1: just killing at random, Pope Kate reveals in the eleventh hour.
Speaker 1: Sorry Phoebe Ka plays Kate. She reveals in the eleventh
Speaker 1: hour because originally she's like, I don't like Christmas, and
Speaker 1: Billy's like, why I'm ten, I love Christmass and she's
Speaker 1: at the end, She's like, well, since you asked, my
Speaker 1: dad dressed up as Santa and got in our chimney.
Speaker 1: First of all, why would you do that? And then
Speaker 1: he got like, well he got confronted, fell and broke
Speaker 1: his neck and chimney. She's like, and that's how I
Speaker 1: found that Santa wasn't and she could smell him. She
Speaker 1: knew there was like a it's a weird, like very
Speaker 1: dramatic monologue. That also if you google it is in
Speaker 1: comedy monologues. Uh, because actually the intention of that scene,
Speaker 1: it was like Joe Dante Eisther the director, or Chris Cooper,
Speaker 1: the dude who wrote it, Chris Cooper, Christmas Scoop, Chris Coop.
Speaker 1: But they actually want they wanted that scene in because
Speaker 1: it's it's both comedy and drama, so it plays with
Speaker 1: the crowd. So I guess, like back in the day
Speaker 1: when the movie came out, if you watch it with
Speaker 1: like a full theater, people will be laughing at that
Speaker 1: scene because it's jarring. But me watching it alone, I
Speaker 1: was like, what is happening? Morbid? It's a moment of backstory.
Speaker 1: Do we need this? This was like one of the
Speaker 1: few times that a movie chooses to characterize. It's like, basically,
Speaker 1: it's only female character, and you're just like, I didn't
Speaker 1: need that. Yeah, I actually didn't want to know like that,
Speaker 1: What did that add to the story? Nothing? Because for
Speaker 1: a while I was on board with her because I'm
Speaker 1: a curmudgeon who thinks Christmas is creepy and I don't
Speaker 1: like it. And she's like, yeah, I don't celebrate Christmas,
Speaker 1: and I'm fine with that. But then you find out
Speaker 1: why and it's because like her dad had this grizzly
Speaker 1: Christmas related death and it's like, Chris Columbus, you sick
Speaker 1: of Like what are you talking about? That's crazy? There?
Speaker 1: I don't know. I liked her character. Well, we can
Speaker 1: get into that. I liked her character a lot where
Speaker 1: she's you know, she's a working gal. She's she's like perfect,
Speaker 1: we'll get it, like perfect girl next door with demon background,
Speaker 1: with the most fucked backstory ever. I just don't God.
Speaker 1: I mean, when I eventually fish back Chris Columbus and
Speaker 1: I will Chris coop Columbus, Mr, I'm just like, why
Speaker 1: did she why did you do her like that? There?
Speaker 1: She worked so hard? Why did you have to kill
Speaker 1: her dad and the most violent fashion. Okay, so then
Speaker 1: the Gremlins are killing people. They invade a movie theater
Speaker 1: where they watch snow White, which is how we know
Speaker 1: that they're the villains of the movie because they love
Speaker 1: snow White and stuffing dwarves. Refer back to our snow
Speaker 1: White episode for more details. Um. And then Billy and
Speaker 1: Kate blow up the movie theater and then it kills
Speaker 1: all the Grandlins except again for Stripe, and then he goes.
Speaker 1: Stripe goes into a department store and comes everything up right,
Speaker 1: I remember place the Stripe has a gun and just
Speaker 1: shooting that Billy. Not only does he have guns, but
Speaker 1: they grandma's have these tiny guns like Greenlin Gruman size gun.
Speaker 1: Did they get them? Like, oh boy, I just don't know.
Speaker 1: And then Stripe tries to multiply himself again. But then Gizmo,
Speaker 1: he's been racing around in a like little toy car,
Speaker 1: and he zooms up and opens a window and lets
Speaker 1: the sunlight in and then it melts Stripe in what's
Speaker 1: a horrifying scene. Yeah, it's really disgusting. And then so
Speaker 1: then the bad Grandmins have been defeated. And then at
Speaker 1: the end of the movie, the Chinese store owner comes
Speaker 1: back and he's like, you messed up, you white people.
Speaker 1: I'm taking gizmo back because you don't know how to
Speaker 1: do anything. The Dad's just like, oh man, sorry, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think that would help. Oh boy. And that is
Speaker 1: the movie. Yea, So why don't we take a quick
Speaker 1: break and then we will come back to discuss and
Speaker 1: we're back where to begin? Well, let's talk about should
Speaker 1: we just go right into the racism of the movie,
Speaker 1: part of the Sunday or the chocolate I mean, we
Speaker 1: let's get into it. That's that's a lot. That's a lot. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So the way Asian and specifically Chinese culture is represented
Speaker 1: in this movie is um. I talked to a friend
Speaker 1: of the cast, former guest Steve Shaun, who was our
Speaker 1: guest on the Crazy Rich Asians episode, and she had
Speaker 1: this to say about it. I'm just gonna read what
Speaker 1: she wrote because it's great. She says, well, there's no
Speaker 1: existence of furry critters in Chinese history that explode into
Speaker 1: a mass of overpopulation overnight. Magua in Chinese literally means
Speaker 1: demon or devil, but it doesn't have the traditional Judeo
Speaker 1: Christian connotations attached. Sometimes a demon in Chinese culture is
Speaker 1: simply a spirit that has returned to Earth or someone
Speaker 1: with an unsettled debt. Demons aren't necessarily evil. The thing
Speaker 1: I find funny about the Chinese origin of Gremlins is
Speaker 1: that the movie Critter takes very little from any kind
Speaker 1: of real Chinese mythology, but really builds on the nineteen
Speaker 1: eighties fear of Red China. I really see the Magwis
Speaker 1: or Chinese critters as just another extension of the Red scare.
Speaker 1: These Chinese monsters are uncontrollable. They run rampant in America,
Speaker 1: aping all the things that make America American. The Gremlins
Speaker 1: are incredibly destructive once they've been let out of the bag,
Speaker 1: so to speak. They run amuck during the height of
Speaker 1: a very sacred holiday in America, which is Christmas. This
Speaker 1: to me really reads as a what happens scenario if
Speaker 1: something Asian does take over in America. This is supported
Speaker 1: textually by a line of dialogue. Um. This is the
Speaker 1: racist character who we mentioned, who hates all things for
Speaker 1: and he says, you gotta watch out for gremlins because
Speaker 1: foreigners put gremlins in their machinery. The same gremlins that
Speaker 1: brought down our planes in World War Two. There's definitely
Speaker 1: a weird other ring of Asian culture here. The only
Speaker 1: Asian characters are mysterious speaking riddles, and if we think
Speaker 1: of the Gremlins as Asian, then they also speak in Gibberish.
Speaker 1: Gremlins rely pretty heavily on the idea of Orientalism, which
Speaker 1: is that the Far East is inscrutable and it's impossible
Speaker 1: for any Westerner to try, and once anyone tries, the
Speaker 1: unleashed chaos that has to be contained by any means necessary.
Speaker 1: Billy doesn't ever try to understand the Gremlins in the movie.
Speaker 1: He only tries to defeat them, which makes sense if
Speaker 1: you think of Billy in the American exceptionalism sort of way.
Speaker 1: So that's everything that Sita had to say about it.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Yes, that was great, And I mean that
Speaker 1: says it all. Yeah, I mean the fact that it
Speaker 1: is and and it's it's tricky with movies like this.
Speaker 1: For me, it is anyways to try to identify because
Speaker 1: it came out almost thirty five years ago. Now exactly
Speaker 1: what you're supposed is to be laughing at and what
Speaker 1: you're just because most of it now does not read
Speaker 1: as jokes that hold up in any way, because a
Speaker 1: lot of them are just racist. But the neighbor character
Speaker 1: is the most overtly racist. Um and there's so much
Speaker 1: coding in this movie, which will which see the references
Speaker 1: and when we can get into but the neighbor is,
Speaker 1: you know, like literally implying that I think people from
Speaker 1: Asian cultures are putting gremlins in cars, and like the
Speaker 1: title of the movie comes from this like bizarro racist
Speaker 1: rant from the neighbor, which later becomes a town wide
Speaker 1: accepted word for what they are. And it's just I
Speaker 1: can't tell if audience is supposed to think that's funny.
Speaker 1: Well maybe also, I mean that character ends up being
Speaker 1: killed and so that and like the villainous Lady were
Speaker 1: killed but created in such a way that people the
Speaker 1: audience would hate them. So maybe they were intended to
Speaker 1: be this racist, so their death would it would be
Speaker 1: more comical than us having any empathy for their death.
Speaker 1: I was confused about that because but then they also
Speaker 1: killed Santa, and you're like, and then they try to
Speaker 1: kill like Billy's mom, so they're they're like, they killed
Speaker 1: the biology dude, So they're in first Steth I think too,
Speaker 1: which is like one of the only people of color
Speaker 1: in the movie, of course, is the first to die. Well,
Speaker 1: there's some historical context to like the gremlin word, which
Speaker 1: is it's from like I think we're all one or
Speaker 1: World War two, which is like that's the word that
Speaker 1: they would use explain why so many planes were falling
Speaker 1: or there were so many technical errors. Is the idea
Speaker 1: that these mysterious like demons or something are messing things up?
Speaker 1: So but Chris Coope, Carter Carter, Chris Coop, Carter Columbus,
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna each time I mess it up. He
Speaker 1: apparently wrote it based off of the mice in his
Speaker 1: living room. Yeah, but then he probably also any inherent
Speaker 1: racism and may I've had I don't know, I'm just
Speaker 1: I'm just right. Well, I mean that's a tricky thing
Speaker 1: with this where it's like he it seems pretty well
Speaker 1: accepted now. And I honestly wasn't familiar with this reading
Speaker 1: of the movie and felt silly once I started to
Speaker 1: read about it, because the second you read about you're like, oh,
Speaker 1: of course, I'm a fucking idiot, Like yeah, and it's
Speaker 1: it's confusing a little bit because you're just it's it's
Speaker 1: I mean, it's possible that Chris Coop Carter Columbus did
Speaker 1: not fully understand it was being an ignorant dumbass by
Speaker 1: doing this. But then there are certain moments like with
Speaker 1: the neighbor, where it's like you couldn't not know what
Speaker 1: you were saying there, but maybe he thought he was
Speaker 1: playing it for last. I don't know, Like it's just
Speaker 1: I feel like there's just so much inherent racism and
Speaker 1: people white people of this time that they're you know,
Speaker 1: coding things certain ways, which because also the movie has
Speaker 1: been criticized for coding the Gremlins as black youth and
Speaker 1: playing into negative black stereotypes. That's like the big right.
Speaker 1: So this comes from a blog post that I and
Speaker 1: on the Internet ever heard of it. The blog post
Speaker 1: is entitled the Racism We Never Noticed in Gremlins, and
Speaker 1: this is by WordPress user Vegan Mystical Says in Ceramic Uncles.
Speaker 1: In Celluloid Mammy's Patricia Turner writes that the Gremlins quote
Speaker 1: reflect negative African American stereotypes in their dress and behavior.
Speaker 1: They are shown devouring fried chicken with their hands, listening
Speaker 1: to black music breakdancing and wearing sunglasses after dark and
Speaker 1: newsboy caps, a style comment among African American males in
Speaker 1: the nineteen eighties. I recently ordered that book. I haven't
Speaker 1: read it yet, but I am really interested to read
Speaker 1: this book by Patricia Turner Ceramic Uncles and Celluloid Mammies
Speaker 1: um in that same in that same piece because I
Speaker 1: read it as well, there was an interesting commentary that
Speaker 1: I didn't pick up on, just strictly due to lack
Speaker 1: of historical knowledge, specifically about that first scene where the
Speaker 1: white man purchases uh like black coated character from the
Speaker 1: from the Asian coded store. Okay, it reads as a
Speaker 1: side note Asian characters, particularly Chinese, were grossly stereotyped in
Speaker 1: the eighties films. As wise, I'm sourcerer types like we
Speaker 1: just discussed from Gremlin's Karate Kid, kung Fu, etcetera. Moreover,
Speaker 1: Asians also owned slaves and tended to side with white
Speaker 1: supremacy and the color of success. Asian Americans and the
Speaker 1: originals of the model minority land Wou explains, quote Chinese
Speaker 1: immigrants and their children needed to be fully integrated into
Speaker 1: American society unquote, and did so by sacrificing unique cultural
Speaker 1: customs and engaging in American quote assimilation at the level
Speaker 1: of full equality of social, economic, and political participation unquote.
Speaker 1: So again, we don't really have any insight into where
Speaker 1: the funk this scene comes from, but there's a lot
Speaker 1: of readings of it that make it this very sinister
Speaker 1: historical I wonder if twenty four year old Chris Carter
Speaker 1: Cooper Columbus intended this, you can't find. The thing is
Speaker 1: that the thing I've been most frustrating is you can't
Speaker 1: find any evidence that he has spoken about this in
Speaker 1: public or even considered it a legitimate criticism. Where it's like,
Speaker 1: if you wrote this in your twenties and you're an
Speaker 1: ignorant ship, then the absolute least you can do is
Speaker 1: cop to it later, acknowledge it and be like, whoops off, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I just thought it was a cool thing. Now, like
Speaker 1: a mystical Asian dude selling the cute little furry animal
Speaker 1: without realizing the huge implications right, Like, you know, because
Speaker 1: there were so many movies like this with directors who
Speaker 1: are alive well and still working at a very high level,
Speaker 1: and it's the very, very fucking least you can do
Speaker 1: is acknowledge that you were either being outwardly hateful or
Speaker 1: we're really copying to these gigantic, ignorant blind spots. So,
Speaker 1: Chris Columbus, you're on notice. There's all so a moment
Speaker 1: from the movie Dear White People, where a professor says
Speaker 1: to Tessa Thompson's character, might I also remind you that
Speaker 1: I read your entire fifteen page unsolicited treatise on why
Speaker 1: Gremlins is actually about suburban white fear of black culture,
Speaker 1: and Tessa Thompson's character Sam White responds, the gremlins are loud,
Speaker 1: talking slang, are addicted to Fred Chicken, and freak out
Speaker 1: when you get their hair wet. Basically, I want to
Speaker 1: read this fifteen page documents. Yeah, I feel like because
Speaker 1: as as an outsider, foreigner human, I had the kind
Speaker 1: of the same reaction to it too, where I felt
Speaker 1: like Gizmo Maguai was the idea of becoming westernized. Like
Speaker 1: if you don't if you don't break these rules, if
Speaker 1: you stay within what we believe you should be as
Speaker 1: an American, you're fine. But if you bring any outside
Speaker 1: influence or outside things or changes in any way or come, Yeah,
Speaker 1: the idea of like outside influence and you're breaking those
Speaker 1: rules and you become gremlins, and you're scene as an
Speaker 1: intruder to American society, right, so you shouldn't try and change.
Speaker 1: I don't know, so yeah, for sure, like an adverse
Speaker 1: reaction to it was so cute and it's resting because
Speaker 1: like Gismos like whatever, the cutie that everyone remembers from
Speaker 1: the movie. But it's like you just sort of see
Speaker 1: in that character a level of like just complicitness and
Speaker 1: willingness to play ball with the problematic white protagonists of
Speaker 1: the movie. And Spielberg actually wanted to keep Gizmo in
Speaker 1: the whole movie. Originally Gizmo turns into a gremlin, but
Speaker 1: people were like, we need like a pal, We need
Speaker 1: like a fun little site character that we reminded of
Speaker 1: how cute everything is. So it worked. It did this movie.
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, this it's it's a hard wash, right
Speaker 1: because like the connotation of that then becomes, oh, well,
Speaker 1: like we've got this like cute thing that comes from
Speaker 1: this exotic, mystical culture that white people don't understand, and
Speaker 1: it's cute at first, but then it spawns these evil
Speaker 1: things and it's like the message that that sends is
Speaker 1: and the fact that it literally starts with a purchase,
Speaker 1: and like a negotiation on a purchase is so sinister
Speaker 1: and basically a colonized purchase, like you're taking it without
Speaker 1: being allowed to because yeah, right, because the elder guy
Speaker 1: in the shop is like, it's not for sale. But
Speaker 1: then the sun is like like the grandson or there's
Speaker 1: a younger kid there and he's like, no, we need
Speaker 1: the money, like well we'll take it and here here
Speaker 1: you go. But yeah, like the wise old guy is
Speaker 1: like you shouldn't have this. But even though the wise
Speaker 1: old guy is such a stereotypes just like everything is
Speaker 1: just it's just a fucking yes. All those movies in
Speaker 1: the eighties had this guy or had this like the
Speaker 1: magical Asian like whoo, which is like for Asian actors,
Speaker 1: and people have called like cool, we get roles. But
Speaker 1: at the same time, it's like, not the roles that
Speaker 1: are helping us, right, they're just perpetuating. Yeah, although stereotypes
Speaker 1: and all of that racism. And that's the first scene
Speaker 1: in the movie. It's just like it it's upsetting. And
Speaker 1: then I mean Chris Columbus to speak of his catalog
Speaker 1: Gremlins is the first movie he writes, and then he
Speaker 1: goes on to write other like The Goonies, which I
Speaker 1: haven't seen in a while, but if you do even
Speaker 1: a little bit of reading about the Goonies, it has
Speaker 1: many similar problems with race and it's just God and
Speaker 1: then the two words Harry Potters, so it's you know,
Speaker 1: funck him. You know, part of me wants to at
Speaker 1: least hope that, like these filmmakers didn't intentionally set out
Speaker 1: to portray these racist stereotypes and do all this racist coding.
Speaker 1: But again, because just racism is so ingrained into white
Speaker 1: people and society in America as a whole, they probably
Speaker 1: didn't intentionally set out to do this, but they did
Speaker 1: it anyway just because of the systematic racism. Yeah, it
Speaker 1: would be different story if a movie like this came
Speaker 1: out or we set up in the way it was
Speaker 1: came out today. But then I'm just like, I trust
Speaker 1: no bitch in regards to issues like this, because then
Speaker 1: you find the George Lucas document that's like, no, I know,
Speaker 1: he's a rapist, but he's the hero. I wish you
Speaker 1: were more of a rapist. And so there are examples
Speaker 1: of like movies of this era with creators knowing full
Speaker 1: well what they're doing and doubling down kind of for
Speaker 1: no reason other than the fact that they can and
Speaker 1: they think it's funny or cool or whatever the funk
Speaker 1: is going through these I don't know, it's or they
Speaker 1: just like needed backstory for this animatronic idea that they
Speaker 1: got like right right and make it Asian and it's
Speaker 1: just like goodness gracious. Um, well, so that's that. Um.
Speaker 1: Shall we talk about the female characters, which one come anywhere? There? Well,
Speaker 1: there are three three. We've got missult, Miss Gulch, We've
Speaker 1: got the Mom, and we've got Kate. There's also, um
Speaker 1: the one that Miss Steagle talks to in the beginning
Speaker 1: of movie. Yeah, yeah, yeah, she's on screen for that
Speaker 1: one scene. And we'll we'll talk about that later whenever
Speaker 1: we discuss whether or not the movie passes the Bechdel test.
Speaker 1: But um, okay, so let's start with Kate. UM. I
Speaker 1: would argue that she is an example of a female
Speaker 1: character in a movie that you can remove from the
Speaker 1: script and the movie is virtually unchanged. I agree, the
Speaker 1: story would play out basically the same exact way because
Speaker 1: there's nothing that she does that advances the story or
Speaker 1: changes the direction of the story. Um, she's basically a
Speaker 1: sidekick to Billy who does nothing. Sir, could you take
Speaker 1: Billy out of the movie. Also, like, I don't this
Speaker 1: whole Like, I don't know, this is like a weird
Speaker 1: not to give. I know we're talking about Kate now,
Speaker 1: but there's like all this getting back to sort of
Speaker 1: like the failed class commentary of this is. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't think this movie even remotely meant to make
Speaker 1: this point, but it's like, oh yeah, like very often
Speaker 1: all white communities that are middle class can be very racist.
Speaker 1: I don't think that's what the movie is trying to
Speaker 1: say at all. But like with Kate, we have like
Speaker 1: a working girl character who it's weird because she checks
Speaker 1: a lot of like boxes that I'm looking to get checked,
Speaker 1: where we know what she does for a job. We
Speaker 1: know she feels strongly about at least two things, which
Speaker 1: is that she does not like Christmas and she would
Speaker 1: like to save this bar. Uh. We know unfortunately, we
Speaker 1: know a little bit about her back history, which is
Speaker 1: the worst thing I've ever heard in my entire life.
Speaker 1: But you can you're totally right. She can be removed
Speaker 1: very easily. It's it's confusing to me that that we
Speaker 1: do know so much about her given how little impact
Speaker 1: she has on the plot, right, and then she is
Speaker 1: essentially there to serve as the romantic interest for Billy
Speaker 1: and to get a little kiss at the end. Right.
Speaker 1: So I wanted to talk a little bit about that,
Speaker 1: because they are called leagues and friends at the beginning
Speaker 1: of the movie somewhere I'd stay around. Halfway through, Billy
Speaker 1: asks Kate out on a date, and I've seen that.
Speaker 1: I think it's fairly well handled because he's clear about
Speaker 1: his intentions and you don't hear people ask ask for dates,
Speaker 1: but he literally says, hey, if you're not doing anything
Speaker 1: this Thursday, i'd I was wondering if you'd like to
Speaker 1: go on a date with me? Like the language that's
Speaker 1: he's there, I appreciate because I can't tell you how
Speaker 1: many times the guy's been like, hey, do you want
Speaker 1: to hang out sometime? And it's like, okay, in what context?
Speaker 1: What do you mean? And then they're like I don't
Speaker 1: know this, just like whatever, like when just hang out
Speaker 1: and it's like, okay, are you asking me out on
Speaker 1: a date? I need to know this, and it's remarkable.
Speaker 1: It's been a year. I don't understand what's happening, right,
Speaker 1: And they're like, I don't understand why you're asking me
Speaker 1: to define something together. Okay, we have a child, we're married.
Speaker 1: I don't understand. Are we in a relationship? We're married there, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know. There's so many examples of like already
Speaker 1: being in the middle of a meal and then being like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, this is a date to this person, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: So I don't know if just anyone who's asking anyone
Speaker 1: else for a date, be clear about your intentions for Billy,
Speaker 1: but Billy, also be clear about your age, be like,
Speaker 1: just go on a date. I am also blank years
Speaker 1: old and ten? Is that okay? Are you ten? Are
Speaker 1: you funny? Are you thirty? We don't like the movie Jack. Also,
Speaker 1: I'm Benjamin Button bej Um. And then she says he
Speaker 1: asks her out for a date. She says I'd love
Speaker 1: to and he's like, okay, yeah, that's great. We can
Speaker 1: square away the details on the phone, and it's just like, okay,
Speaker 1: I appreciated how that happens. But then later on they're
Speaker 1: fighting the gremlins in the department store and then he
Speaker 1: just like out of nowhere, kisses her, like there was
Speaker 1: no lead up to that. I feel like he does say,
Speaker 1: like go look for lights, and then they kiss. He
Speaker 1: gives her a task, and that gets everyone horned up.
Speaker 1: I simply cannot feel sexual feelings unless I'm given a
Speaker 1: job to get a task. If I'm not caring for someone,
Speaker 1: am I relevant to the world. Well, speaking of care,
Speaker 1: so like after the battles have happened between you know,
Speaker 1: Billy and the Gremlins, Gizmo is there and like he
Speaker 1: gets kind of wrapped up and he's like, here, caregiver woman,
Speaker 1: take care of this thing while I go off and fight.
Speaker 1: So that was cute. Well there's also uh, oh, you
Speaker 1: know what, let's take a break. Let's take a break
Speaker 1: and then we'll talk more. Very very organic break take
Speaker 1: and we're back. I'm sorry, I just snowplowed to you.
Speaker 1: People do dive via snowplow on this most snow. That's true.
Speaker 1: So yeah, she's exists in the story to basically be
Speaker 1: the cute girl that Billy likes and serves really no
Speaker 1: other function. We're talking about Kate. She's like the yeah,
Speaker 1: the perfect girl. Next door who is just always there
Speaker 1: for him whenever he needs them. And then all these
Speaker 1: movies too, it's just like the white male, geeky nerd
Speaker 1: savior who gets the hottest girl in town or the
Speaker 1: only girl in town. I don't know. That's like, at
Speaker 1: least it's not as bad as a John Hughes movie,
Speaker 1: but it's still like, really, Billy has no skills. He
Speaker 1: is a nice boy. He's not like a you don't
Speaker 1: know his demon backstory ten and that's what he hasn't
Speaker 1: said yet, right you. Unlike a lot of male heroes
Speaker 1: in movies, especially from this area era but also still today,
Speaker 1: they carry so much like toxic masculinity and machiesmo and Billy,
Speaker 1: to this movie's credit, is not like that. He has
Speaker 1: no skill except that he can draw comics. He can draw,
Speaker 1: He draws, and he counts money and he I mean, hey,
Speaker 1: neither is a crime. And he hangs out with little
Speaker 1: Corey Fellmon, which is actually a crime. We're not sure
Speaker 1: how old he is. I just wanted to point out
Speaker 1: in regards to the mom scenes, so we don't know
Speaker 1: a lot about the mom other than she's a mom
Speaker 1: and so we see her. She'd be cooking a lot.
Speaker 1: She's supporting her mediocre husband. She's very supportive in a
Speaker 1: way that's like there's there's something going on, Like she's
Speaker 1: like the most supportive person, Like, honey, I'm like, this
Speaker 1: thing is broke. She's like, Oh, don't worry, honey, that's great.
Speaker 1: Here's your dad's another and invention made Like I feel
Speaker 1: like if she just said it, if she acted it
Speaker 1: out and just like a little slight or more annoyed way,
Speaker 1: we totally get the backstory of this family. Want Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm like, let's see her without xanax and see like
Speaker 1: what happened. But I feel for her because I'm like,
Speaker 1: your husband is a dud dude. He can't even crack
Speaker 1: an egg. He's a doric loser. He seems to be
Speaker 1: hemorrhaging money by pursuing his dreams and by dropping two
Speaker 1: d on these mystical pets just to get a gift
Speaker 1: that he didn't consult his wife about. Like he just
Speaker 1: assumes she would also be okay with this maguai furry
Speaker 1: character being in the house an unknown species that we
Speaker 1: don't understand how it is to take care of. You
Speaker 1: just assume you're coming to a manual with scary sounding rules.
Speaker 1: Take care of it when your son's at the bank.
Speaker 1: And also high school or elementary school, like you don't know,
Speaker 1: there's the or college or grad school. This is a
Speaker 1: great time to mention that I do have a master's
Speaker 1: degree in script writing from Boston University. But any time
Speaker 1: current them. Okay, the what I wanted to talk about
Speaker 1: was the mom fighting scene. This is a very typical
Speaker 1: scene of this era, but also kind of still of
Speaker 1: almost any era, where you know, it's like a woman
Speaker 1: is fighting and she's defending herself and she is to
Speaker 1: some extent victorious, even though she ultimately needs to be
Speaker 1: rescued uh and is immediately handed off to a man
Speaker 1: and is like she's give her literally just handed up
Speaker 1: like shoved into him and then by bye mom. Rest
Speaker 1: of movie. But but the thing we've talked about a
Speaker 1: lot on this show is the only weapons she has
Speaker 1: are domestic weapons. She's only allowed to defend herself using.
Speaker 1: She has a knife, but it's when she was just
Speaker 1: using to cook. She kills him using a blender. She
Speaker 1: kills him using a microwave, like their every way she
Speaker 1: has to defend herself. As impressive as it looks and
Speaker 1: is our domestic tools. And also when you take in
Speaker 1: the whole racial issue with this whole movie, it's a
Speaker 1: domestic white woman absolutely slaughtering a bunch of white character.
Speaker 1: So that is actually not as triumphant, and it's just
Speaker 1: it's not it's it's a mess. It's not. I came
Speaker 1: into this being like, oh man, that seems pretty cool,
Speaker 1: and I'm like, oh yeah, never mind, Yeah, you're right,
Speaker 1: peel back those layers, and then you realize us. And
Speaker 1: then and then contrast that with so, as you mentioned, Jamie,
Speaker 1: she does need to be saved, so she kills three
Speaker 1: of the four grandmans who attack her. So she kills
Speaker 1: the first three, but then a fourth one comes at
Speaker 1: her and she can't fight it off from the tree
Speaker 1: and she can't fight it off, So then Billy shows
Speaker 1: up and saves her, and he while she has been
Speaker 1: using the blenders and the microts and the kitchen appliances,
Speaker 1: he comes in, grabs the sword off the wall, hits
Speaker 1: the Groundlin with the sword, and launches it into the fire.
Speaker 1: So these are like very typical, like manly, like actual
Speaker 1: weapons that he uses to defeat the Groundlinds with. And
Speaker 1: then by contrast, she has used these like very domestic,
Speaker 1: typically feminine, and Katie U the in dress, Yes, she
Speaker 1: was using a camera like very like not very violent,
Speaker 1: but veryistic womanly. And I suppose there's an argument to
Speaker 1: be made for like, Okay, so she is resourceful, she's
Speaker 1: using what she has at her disposal. But but the
Speaker 1: fact that we see the again and again. We talked
Speaker 1: about this in the Halloween episode with um the Lori
Speaker 1: Stroke character using like clothing hangers and knitting needles to
Speaker 1: try to fight off a killer, and then Indiana Jones
Speaker 1: star she uses a frying pan to hit a guy
Speaker 1: over the head with a lot of frying box and
Speaker 1: the history of cinema. You know, I've tried and it
Speaker 1: doesn't work really well. You'd have to get like a
Speaker 1: cast iron skillet, like a really heavy like iron skillet.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so but yeah, so we see this again
Speaker 1: again and or the other option. If a woman is
Speaker 1: fighting men usually or anything, it's usually like a female
Speaker 1: action hero who wraps her legs and her crotch around
Speaker 1: a guy's face and then like the body slams. And
Speaker 1: also the idea that they can only defend themselves to
Speaker 1: a certain point, like they can't fully defend themselves. They
Speaker 1: always need to be saved Halloween too. Not in Halloween,
Speaker 1: they can give them thirty more seconds. They would have
Speaker 1: figured out a solution. I didn't need to be there,
Speaker 1: but they always Yeah, but it's always so. Even though
Speaker 1: this movie doesn't have like the typical macho male hero,
Speaker 1: it does like fall into the many trappings of these,
Speaker 1: like well, the man still has to stay able. Woman
Speaker 1: and mom kill only fight using mom stuff. And then
Speaker 1: later on he blows up a movie theater with like
Speaker 1: this big explosion, which is again a very like macho
Speaker 1: manly way to defeat something. And then Kate's just like,
Speaker 1: I don't know what did here's a camera. Yeah. Also,
Speaker 1: my dad dressed up in Santa and then died. I
Speaker 1: can't get over it. I wish she'd had more of
Speaker 1: those soliloquies, just like more backstory. What if all of
Speaker 1: her family members had died in a horrifying way, dressed
Speaker 1: as a seasonal character always going through the chimney to
Speaker 1: that was dressed as the Easter Bunny. She put herself
Speaker 1: in an egg, So that's why I don't It annoyed
Speaker 1: me that that's the reason that she ends I mean
Speaker 1: it makes sense for the character and for anyone that
Speaker 1: you wouldn't like a holiday kills your father. But I
Speaker 1: want to see representation on screen of a person who
Speaker 1: doesn't like Christmas because Christmas is creepy. And I know
Speaker 1: I'm going to get a lot of ship for saying,
Speaker 1: but Christmas is creepy. I hate Christmas music. It's all
Speaker 1: those like slow like him like songs, especially like Silent
Speaker 1: Night that is creepy. Santa Claus an old white guy
Speaker 1: deciding if children are good or not, that's creepy. Nativity
Speaker 1: scenes are frightening. And I also hate the capitalism and
Speaker 1: consumerism of the holiday in general. I will said, I
Speaker 1: enjoy the spirit of giving and the emphasis on like
Speaker 1: being with loved ones around the holiday time, but everything
Speaker 1: about Christmas is creepy. Cut a tree and you watch
Speaker 1: it die, right, Yeah, you're just like destroying nature. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of things wrong with Christmas. Well, I you're
Speaker 1: allowed to love Christmas. I do. Um. But with that,
Speaker 1: as I hinted that before, there are so many movies
Speaker 1: about Christmas, so few movies. There's a movie called Winter Solstice,
Speaker 1: which is the holiday that I celebrate around this time.
Speaker 1: Of year, but I don't know what it's about, and
Speaker 1: no one saw it, including me. This is just the
Speaker 1: time of year where Caitlin and I drink a lot
Speaker 1: and watch Titanic. It's the most wonderful time of the year.
Speaker 1: The version of the holiday season that I have cultivated
Speaker 1: for myself I now enjoy very much because it literally
Speaker 1: is just like watching Titanic on repeat, and that's we're
Speaker 1: really good at that. But this movie actually didn't come
Speaker 1: out during the Christmas holiday. Came out earlier because they
Speaker 1: were wanted to, I think fighting against Ghostbusters. So I
Speaker 1: came out like the summer or something like that. Another
Speaker 1: movie riddled with problem. I can't stand Ghostbusters. I simply
Speaker 1: can't stand it. Bothers me. Anyways, this movie sucks. Also,
Speaker 1: yes it does, and it's great. Gizzy is a sweetheart.
Speaker 1: But my point is, let's see more movies and stories
Speaker 1: about holidays that are celebrated, usually by marginalized people because
Speaker 1: they are Muslim, or they are Jewish, or or do
Speaker 1: the way my family did, which is I forced Christmas
Speaker 1: upon my family because I didn't want to be the
Speaker 1: one kid in my town Irish Catholic towny didn't do it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it sucks that you felt you had to do that,
Speaker 1: but that is a very common, huge thing. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: then one there is one Christmas where my parents totally
Speaker 1: got into it, like like we would decorate our house
Speaker 1: top to bottom Christmas decorations and we would have Latter
Speaker 1: Day Saints. Solicitors always come to our door. And one
Speaker 1: time they came to our door and they're like, do
Speaker 1: you believe in Jesus? And my mom had like a
Speaker 1: Christmas brooch or's like a tree behind her presence Jesus,
Speaker 1: like like a placard or whatever. She's like, no, no,
Speaker 1: we don't know what that these Christmas to us is
Speaker 1: just like it's just a gift. One morning, I don't
Speaker 1: have the sweater anymore. But one morning she makes us
Speaker 1: new to make a dress up in like all the
Speaker 1: same and take a photo. She buy us all the
Speaker 1: same sweaters. The sweater somewhere in our house when she
Speaker 1: got it from Walmart, of course, and it says Christmas
Speaker 1: and as a tree an American holiday. Yeah, sinister, it
Speaker 1: was the one person in the family photo. I think
Speaker 1: it was like fifteen. I'm like, no, mother, I don't agree.
Speaker 1: I was like, you brought this upon us. My family
Speaker 1: had an opposite thing where we did celebrate Christmas until
Speaker 1: I was I think like sixteen or so, and the
Speaker 1: mom I was like, my mom was like, no, we're
Speaker 1: atheists and we're going to celebrate Winter Solstice instead, which
Speaker 1: was basically the same exact thing as us celebrating Christmas,
Speaker 1: because we still like put up a tree and stuff,
Speaker 1: but we just got gifts four days earlier on December.
Speaker 1: It was pretty cool. Um. Does anyone have any other
Speaker 1: final thoughts about the film Gremlins? I wanted to say
Speaker 1: one last thing about and this is, you know, for
Speaker 1: for us as kind of you know, an obvious point,
Speaker 1: but miss Deegle, just of the three female characters, making
Speaker 1: one the shrewiest shrew who's ever shrewd? Is like, it's
Speaker 1: an easy choice that they certainly did make every easy.
Speaker 1: Did you guys noticed that one of the Gremlins in
Speaker 1: the bar scene was wearing her red wig because after
Speaker 1: they killed her, but she wasn't wearing a wig in
Speaker 1: that scene. She was like, I'll mature out they took
Speaker 1: they killed her, and I assumed perused her clothes and
Speaker 1: was wearing their clothes. So I think the clothes are
Speaker 1: wearing in the bar scene and then later in the
Speaker 1: cinema or the clothes of the people from Ordered. Maybe
Speaker 1: that's where they got the tin to gun and think
Speaker 1: about it, I have like a big thought that came
Speaker 1: as I was watching it. So I at this point
Speaker 1: nothing is cannon. That's happened in Gremlin's too. I understand
Speaker 1: Gremlins too. It's it's more justified or it's explained. But
Speaker 1: we don't know the gender of what a magua is
Speaker 1: or like what a gremlin is. It's just like a
Speaker 1: gender neutral thing, and so we're assuming their males because
Speaker 1: we just assumed males. Yeah, I guess I was referred
Speaker 1: to they use okay, but that But also they're making
Speaker 1: it because how do they know, right well, gender doesn't
Speaker 1: apply to animals like it does to people, but they
Speaker 1: do seem gendered as male and the persona they're like
Speaker 1: person there act like humans later on. But I know
Speaker 1: in the second movie there is a female gremlin and
Speaker 1: it she looks like you have a bow or something.
Speaker 1: She has like makeup on, and I don't know she
Speaker 1: has restices. She might have rested according to the key
Speaker 1: and Peel Gremlin's to sketch that I love so much.
Speaker 1: Peel is going around the room like the writer's room
Speaker 1: and just like asking for pitches for gremlin types, and
Speaker 1: the one woman in the room says, could there be
Speaker 1: a female gremlin? And Peel's character responds, lipstick boobies, bitch,
Speaker 1: you had me a little gremlin for JJ, And then
Speaker 1: he later says, that's we need a woman in the
Speaker 1: writer's room. So I have not seen Grmlin's too. I
Speaker 1: don't know how that female quote unquote gremlin is stylized,
Speaker 1: but I'd have to imagine that it's very like egregiously,
Speaker 1: like she's got a pink bow or she has boot totally. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Oh god. So just in general, when he asked when
Speaker 1: they got the three rules in the beginning, and this
Speaker 1: is just not even It's just like a general note
Speaker 1: about the home movie. It could have all been solved
Speaker 1: if you asked, oh, why do you what happens if
Speaker 1: you break those rules? Right? What are the steaks? What
Speaker 1: are the stakes? Alright? Cool? Yeah? Yeah, okay? Cool? Bye?
Speaker 1: Oh okay. Then actually, unfortunately I cannot make this PreCure.
Speaker 1: It's a fault on both sides. A little kid should
Speaker 1: have been like you know they will mass murder your town.
Speaker 1: But you know twos, I shouldn't be spending two hundred
Speaker 1: dollars if my ten year old son's working at the bank. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I gotta go. Um. I did a quick Google search
Speaker 1: for female gremlin, and the results show a fremlin with
Speaker 1: very noticeable red lipstick, with long green hair, and she's
Speaker 1: wearing what appears to be a like cheetah print bra
Speaker 1: and mini skirt. Yeah, it's like the female eminem. Yes,
Speaker 1: just like she's like hes. You gotta make sure men
Speaker 1: want to fun. That for a video I always found
Speaker 1: really helpful of like female coded characters or creatures in
Speaker 1: movies and in media in general. Is from the past
Speaker 1: guest of the show, Anita Sarkasian. I made a great
Speaker 1: video about five years ago called the mis Male Character,
Speaker 1: and her video is about how it applies to video
Speaker 1: game characters in particular, like starting with Miss pac Man
Speaker 1: and on, but just sort of unpacking how we tend
Speaker 1: to repackage the same character but with a very like
Speaker 1: traditionally feminine appearance, and they're usually weaker characters, and they're
Speaker 1: always sexualized and given tits where tits don't beat that.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, um, last thing I'll say this is a
Speaker 1: movie where within the movie, characters are watching other movies
Speaker 1: where they're watching It's a Wonderful Life, they're watching a
Speaker 1: Clark Gable movie, they watch snow White. There's like always
Speaker 1: screens and there's always movies on them, which you know
Speaker 1: is perhaps a commentary on how influential media is. But
Speaker 1: there in one of the scenes, they're like a Clark
Speaker 1: Gable movie is on the screen, and there's the next
Speaker 1: I don't know what movie it is, so listeners, if
Speaker 1: you know, let us know. But um, a woman opposite
Speaker 1: Clark Gable says it takes a certain kind of guy,
Speaker 1: and then he responds with and that guy and he's
Speaker 1: a certain kind of dame. And then that those two
Speaker 1: lines get repeated in sort of like voiceover kind of
Speaker 1: thing when Gizmo is driving around and the toy car
Speaker 1: in the department store. And it makes no sense to
Speaker 1: me as to why it makes it seem like him
Speaker 1: hearing that would inform a certain decision of his But
Speaker 1: I can't understand why does that certain character, Well, no,
Speaker 1: it's not himself, it's not gismas saying. It is the
Speaker 1: actual dialogue from the movie that just gets yes, yes, okay,
Speaker 1: I remember, and so it does. I don't know why
Speaker 1: that choice was made. It's such a specific choice, but
Speaker 1: it doesn't seem to inform anything that happens in that scene.
Speaker 1: It's also at the end of the movie when the
Speaker 1: magical store owner comes back, he's telling them, like, you
Speaker 1: shouldn't be letting Gizmo watch television or eating sex. And
Speaker 1: it's true because like Gizmo is watching all these like
Speaker 1: mail lead like what media is portraying life to be
Speaker 1: or who the leaders or who the heroes of and
Speaker 1: you know, he adapts it, so we have in fact
Speaker 1: infected Gizmo with the patriarchy. This is like another the
Speaker 1: trend that I think gets really popular in the eighties
Speaker 1: and sort of continues on is like the whole like oh,
Speaker 1: we're like post movies, We're we're like commenting on blah
Speaker 1: blah blah and like this' that's first of all, I'm
Speaker 1: so bored. I'm dead. But like they show so much
Speaker 1: other stuff, but they don't really comment on it other
Speaker 1: than like it's a wonderful life. That was a happy movie. Anyways,
Speaker 1: this one's fucked up. So here's the movie, Like the
Speaker 1: and just like it. It almost listen doing things like
Speaker 1: this ends the end game of it, as we end
Speaker 1: up having to watch Shrek in the future because all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, it's like, oh, every post modern reference
Speaker 1: is the cutest thing in the whole world, and then
Speaker 1: all of a sudden, it's the movie, and then we
Speaker 1: had to watch that movie. The Clark Gable movie I
Speaker 1: am seeing was called to Please a Lady. Oh wow,
Speaker 1: there's also who knows better than Clark Gable and an
Speaker 1: invasion of the body Snatcher is oh right, that was one.
Speaker 1: That's when the gremlin cocoons are hatching. I took note
Speaker 1: of the first movie that was on the awning of
Speaker 1: the movie theater. It was a Boy's Life, and then
Speaker 1: it was which is a movie that happened later on
Speaker 1: in life like it's it's a fake movie at that point,
Speaker 1: but later it's the movie with I think Leonardo Dicaprios, Oh,
Speaker 1: this is a great time to bring up Titanic then
Speaker 1: and then snow White. Snow White was sleeping women. I
Speaker 1: think Alfred Milena refused to participate in this movie. Is
Speaker 1: he read the script? He's just like this, there's no
Speaker 1: parts for him. Riddled with this is riddled. He was
Speaker 1: originally the voice of Schismo. He wasn't and then they
Speaker 1: were like, sorry, Alfred, we could get Mandel's big shot Mandel's.
Speaker 1: He has a tiny person's voice. Well, I think the
Speaker 1: question on all of our minds is how many nipples
Speaker 1: does a magua have? And that's a good question. Well,
Speaker 1: we do seek cats. Mrs Goal has cats in the movie,
Speaker 1: and a lot did a lot of cats, which is
Speaker 1: demonizing owning a lot of cats. I think I loved
Speaker 1: that one of her cats was named old dollar Bill.
Speaker 1: She has one thing on her mom baby, get money girl.
Speaker 1: I want to name a cat dollar Bill and wait
Speaker 1: for it to get old. Oh gosh, he does anyone
Speaker 1: have anything else? Honestly? I will watch Grandlin's two now.
Speaker 1: I kind of want to, kind of want to because
Speaker 1: that's the one everyone talks about more, I feel because
Speaker 1: it's just like all the there's like a bat Grandma,
Speaker 1: There's a spider Grandma. There's all sexy female one and
Speaker 1: Gizmo dances. GisMo dances dances. That does sound fun? Probably
Speaker 1: damn it? Well, what are you doing later, Jamie? Let's
Speaker 1: watch Gremlins too? Okay? Should we determine whether or not
Speaker 1: this movie passes the Becktel tests Kidoki Well, as you
Speaker 1: hinted at jan there is a scene between a character
Speaker 1: named Mrs Harris and Mrs Deagle. The exchange goes something
Speaker 1: along the lines of like, hey, my husband got another
Speaker 1: job and I've taken up sewing and Mrs Eagles like
Speaker 1: what are you saying? And she's like, well, we're not
Speaker 1: going to make any money for two weeks, so like,
Speaker 1: can you give us more time? And she Mrs Deagle
Speaker 1: says the bank and I have the same purpose to
Speaker 1: make money, and she's like, dollar ability needs to eat
Speaker 1: his big fan of Mrs Mrs Harris is like, but
Speaker 1: Mrs Deagle, it's Christmas. And then she's like, well now
Speaker 1: you know what to ask Santa for or don't you?
Speaker 1: And then phoebe Case's character cons and it's like, actually
Speaker 1: Santa isn't really want to know how I know? Not
Speaker 1: this again. She goes telling the story every Christmas. It's
Speaker 1: like six people live here, we know. Okay. So Mrs
Speaker 1: Harris's husband Joe does get mentioned in this scene, but
Speaker 1: you could possibly make the argument that there's like at
Speaker 1: least a two line exchange where the bank and I
Speaker 1: have the same purpose to make money. Mrs Deagle, it's Christmas,
Speaker 1: although Christmas does have Christ and Christ was a man.
Speaker 1: And then she also says Santa who is also a man.
Speaker 1: And also we don't know those characters first names. I
Speaker 1: don't know if that matters. She under IMDb is credited
Speaker 1: as Mrs Joe. Oh, Mrs Joe. Here she's exclusively defined
Speaker 1: by the mention married sick. Okay. Also, that scene ends
Speaker 1: on again again, Like Chris Columbus, I it seems like
Speaker 1: a gun for fucking something. But she at the end
Speaker 1: of her son is like I'm hungry. She's like me too,
Speaker 1: and You're just like what what? That's not resolved in
Speaker 1: the movie. But when he wrote, he's like, it's like
Speaker 1: I've seen It's a wonderful life. My movie is going
Speaker 1: to be just like that, but with monster and resolution poverty.
Speaker 1: Chris Columbus coop also, could you have more? Is there
Speaker 1: a worse person to be named after? Christopher Columbus? I mean,
Speaker 1: of course he makes racist movies right, of course, practically
Speaker 1: in his d n A. Unless I'm missing something, I
Speaker 1: think that's the only scene in which two women interact
Speaker 1: in the whole movie, and I went through it again
Speaker 1: and I couldn't find one. Yeah, so, and I'm gonna
Speaker 1: I'm gonna say this, this scene does not pass because one,
Speaker 1: we kind of know that character's name, but like she's
Speaker 1: defined as Mrs Joe Harris, so like that's not great.
Speaker 1: We also only see her in that one scene, and
Speaker 1: then I think, never again does it pass? When Mrs
Speaker 1: Deagles talking to her cats, I was saying that too.
Speaker 1: My only other question is the cats are small? All
Speaker 1: tell her? Bill gives her some great advice, really opens
Speaker 1: up some discourse in the household. Um. Yeah, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: say this as a note for me on passing the
Speaker 1: pectel test. I was back and forth, but ultimately I
Speaker 1: know as well, Yeah, god damn it. Chris. Well, shoot, hey,
Speaker 1: let's write the movie on a nipple scale zero to
Speaker 1: five nipples based on its portrayal of women. Um, gonna
Speaker 1: give this a half nipple. And maybe that's even being
Speaker 1: generous because I think it's probably for the scene where
Speaker 1: you do see the mom character being active and defending
Speaker 1: herself at least for a little bit, but again, she
Speaker 1: has to be safe. She's only using domestic appliances to fight,
Speaker 1: and then the Kate character really serves no function in
Speaker 1: the movie except to be the romantic interest of the
Speaker 1: male hero. The other main female character, who is the
Speaker 1: like pro capitalist villain, she is so cartoonishly characterized that
Speaker 1: she's like basically not even a real person. Between that
Speaker 1: and the egregious racism of the movie is not good.
Speaker 1: So I'll give a half nipple, and that belongs to Gizmo,
Speaker 1: who I'm pretty sure does have a nipple in there somewhere.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go half nipple as well for other and
Speaker 1: she said, and also for goingent of the way of
Speaker 1: writing a female character in Kate where we at very
Speaker 1: least know that she has a job, we know a
Speaker 1: little bit about her. She is treated by her romantic
Speaker 1: interest generally respectfully, which is a little more than you
Speaker 1: would get in most movies of this time, especially considering
Speaker 1: this is like peekue John Hughes. So everything I don't
Speaker 1: know this movie is like it's it's I didn't like it.
Speaker 1: I didn't like it, but Jim was so cute and
Speaker 1: that's hard for me. And so why it's there though,
Speaker 1: to distract us? I know, it's like I want the
Speaker 1: lunchbox like, why is the woman crop down? Okay, small
Speaker 1: I did audibly go oh when he was on the dartboard.
Speaker 1: You're like, oh God, I googled way too much that
Speaker 1: that scene is there because they were so angry. Okay,
Speaker 1: So basically Gizmo was only supposed to be there at
Speaker 1: the beginning, but since they made it the whole movie,
Speaker 1: it costs such a pain for animatronic people and like
Speaker 1: because they had to create ways for to walk or talk.
Speaker 1: So that scene was there for the crew so they could,
Speaker 1: you know, basically not have immobilized and also just show
Speaker 1: how much anger they had towards having him there for
Speaker 1: all the movie. Whoa so so in the scene the
Speaker 1: Grundlins are bullying Gizmo, but it's really the true that
Speaker 1: was bullying guess can't catch a bread Gizz? Well, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna go yes, my nip goes to or my half
Speaker 1: nip goes to Gizz as well. Okay, I'll give because
Speaker 1: I actually so just watching this as like a piece
Speaker 1: of fluff without analyzing it or anything like that, just
Speaker 1: as a movie watcher. I enjoyed it, but the more
Speaker 1: I got into it, come on, why no, I want
Speaker 1: to like this movie? Because Kissima was so cute. But
Speaker 1: as for the portrayal specifically of women, I would give
Speaker 1: it like half yeah, because it just they were there,
Speaker 1: but they were in part of the storyline. Really, they
Speaker 1: could have disappeared. There's no point to them. The mother
Speaker 1: was supportive and just locked in that house, and I
Speaker 1: think she was letting out maybe a lot of frustration
Speaker 1: during that scene where she was murdering all the fremlins.
Speaker 1: I like to read to that scene where she's like, yes,
Speaker 1: it is for all your stupid invention. Really, Oh, I
Speaker 1: guess I have to destroy this to kill that one. Okay,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry that happens. It's not a cappuccino maker. It
Speaker 1: makes tar dumb husband God watching her to choke that down.
Speaker 1: You're like, girl, let's go Elma and Louise, let's get
Speaker 1: out of here, get out of you can go out.
Speaker 1: And also the wife of the Maga guy, sorry, she
Speaker 1: was also so supportive of him, like all the wives
Speaker 1: that were there were just like, yes, honey, of course, honey, definitely, honey,
Speaker 1: whatever you say, honey, I'm just gonna stay in my
Speaker 1: little cave house and never see the light of day.
Speaker 1: It literally was the Maga neighbor and then they killed
Speaker 1: her too, so she didn't get anything out of it.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I would say for women it's pretty much
Speaker 1: a half, but for Gizzy, I would give it a
Speaker 1: five portrays. Thank you so much for being here in
Speaker 1: that voice. Where can people follow you online? And what
Speaker 1: would you like? Whatever you want? You can see me
Speaker 1: on the Instagram where I sometimes do things at muson
Speaker 1: z and Jamie and I wrote an animation of sci
Speaker 1: fi Ladies show say that specifically for women, No, it's
Speaker 1: for everybody. It's called human kind Of. That's on facebook
Speaker 1: Watch that we wrote with co wrote with Diana McCory
Speaker 1: and she's the best, and we do voices on it,
Speaker 1: which is cool. It's on facebook Watch if you're on that.
Speaker 1: And uh, I have a wrote on a sketch show
Speaker 1: that is going to be on a network at some
Speaker 1: point for a good shot out. Yeah, that's how TV works.
Speaker 1: And also Mission desigs z y x X as a
Speaker 1: sci fi improvised podcast. I play the voice of a
Speaker 1: They're just like an old sentience spaceship who used to
Speaker 1: be a movie star called bar Jerry and Jade and uh,
Speaker 1: I don't know she she. I've tried to make her
Speaker 1: pass the Bechdel Tests as much as like good Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: thanks again for being here. You can follow us on
Speaker 1: all the platforms at becktel Cast. You can subscribe to
Speaker 1: our patreon ak Matren going to patreon dot com slash
Speaker 1: becktel Cast. It's five dollars a month and you get
Speaker 1: two bonus episodes every month. And also it tis the
Speaker 1: freaking season to go to our t public store. We
Speaker 1: just released a bunch of new designs for all of
Speaker 1: your winter sols to shopping meats. Yes, so if you
Speaker 1: want a queer icon baby grunch shirt, now is the
Speaker 1: time I made I think maybe one of my most
Speaker 1: cursed drawings yet with the baby. It's it's gorgeous. Um. Also,
Speaker 1: we have a West Coast tour coming up. You were
Speaker 1: going to San Francisco sketch Fest. We are going to
Speaker 1: Portland and Seattle. Uh. Those ticket links are on our website.
Speaker 1: If you go to back toelcast dot com and click
Speaker 1: on the live appearances tab, you can find tickets to
Speaker 1: those we're doing movies such as The Breakfast Club, Fight Club.
Speaker 1: It's a lot of club, The Little Mermaids in the
Speaker 1: Club Door we should have done. What are what are
Speaker 1: the other First Wives Club. What are we thinking. We'll
Speaker 1: do that eventually, But the movies we are doing Our
Speaker 1: Little Mermaid and Sleepless in Seattle as well, so in
Speaker 1: that area, come on down. We love you, respect to you,
Speaker 1: and and happy holidays whichever holiday you observe by