Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind Listener mail.
Speaker 3: This is Robert Lamb and this is Joe McCormick. And
Speaker 3: it is Monday, the day of each week that we
Speaker 3: read back messages from the Stuff to Blow Your Mind
Speaker 3: email address. If you would like to make your own
Speaker 3: contribution to the mail bag, why not reach out to
Speaker 3: us at contact at stuff to Blow your Mind dot com.
Speaker 3: Whatever you want to send is fine. We always appreciate
Speaker 3: feedback to recent episodes, especially if you have something interesting
Speaker 3: you would like to add to a topic we have
Speaker 3: talked about on the show. But again, whatever you want
Speaker 3: to send, just just throw it on our way contact
Speaker 3: at stuff to Blow your Mind dot Com. All right, Rob,
Speaker 3: we got a big, big haul today. We can get
Speaker 3: through some of it here. Let's see. Maybe I will
Speaker 3: kick things off with this message from Hugh about our
Speaker 3: Vault episode on the invention of the gimbal.
Speaker 2: All right, let's have it.
Speaker 3: Hugh says, Hello, Robert, Joe, and jj I hope you
Speaker 3: and your loved ones are happy and healthy. I'm not
Speaker 3: sure if your recent Vault episode covered this aspect, but
Speaker 3: the gimbal serves another very important surface on sea going vessels,
Speaker 3: and that is helping keep the crew fed. I think
Speaker 3: this is adding to the fact that we talked about
Speaker 3: some kinds of instruments in ships at sea that would
Speaker 3: be mounted on gimbals.
Speaker 2: Right, right, and illusions I believe to ancient devices that
Speaker 2: seem to have been gimbals of one sort or another.
Speaker 3: Right, But Hughes says, yes, gimbals are also used to
Speaker 3: keep the crew fed. The email goes on to say
Speaker 3: the cook tops and ovens on vessels are usually hung
Speaker 3: on gimbals that swing perpendicularly to the vessel's center line,
Speaker 3: with some sort of adjustable rail system to capture pots
Speaker 3: and pans in the direction of travel. This makes the
Speaker 3: job of dealing with hot liquids and such safer for
Speaker 3: the galley crew while underway. Wishing you the best as always, Hugh. Well,
Speaker 3: thank you, Hugh. That is an interesting fact and I
Speaker 3: don't know if I would have considered that, but yeah,
Speaker 3: that makes perfect.
Speaker 2: Sense, absolutely, chef. All right, let's turn to some more
Speaker 2: responses from our October episodes. This one is from Colin.
Speaker 2: This was on Facebook. I believe probably the discussion module
Speaker 2: responding to our episode on Necromancer Episodes on Necromancy, Hey
Speaker 2: Joe and Rob and JJ writing in about the episodes
Speaker 2: on the Necromantic Urge, specifically part two where you talk
Speaker 2: about dream interpretation and the temples of Aslepios where this
Speaker 2: was done in ancient Greece by trade. I'm a professional
Speaker 2: actor mostly for the stage, and part of my education
Speaker 2: in classical theater mentioned this. I'm going off memory here
Speaker 2: as I'm currently at work on a national tour of
Speaker 2: a show and separated from my notes, but from what
Speaker 2: I remember, there was a temple to Aslepis underneath the
Speaker 2: theater at Epidaurus, and apparently patients were put into a
Speaker 2: dream like or suggestive state by the use of some
Speaker 2: sort of snake venom I think, either ingested as a
Speaker 2: potion or patients were bitten. Under controlled circumstances, the patient's
Speaker 2: dreams were told to one of the temple attendants called therapons,
Speaker 2: same word rout as words like therapy, which roughly means
Speaker 2: ritual substitutes. If a dream was judged to be significant
Speaker 2: enough that it would benefit ancient Greek society on the whole,
Speaker 2: the therapons would then enact elements of the Dream in
Speaker 2: a play at the theater upstairs, so that all patrons
Speaker 2: attending the show could learn from it. Side note, Aslepius's
Speaker 2: association with snakes is made more apparent with the presence
Speaker 2: of them wrapped around the staff of Estilepius, which itself
Speaker 2: is often confused with the medical symbol of the cadusius.
Speaker 2: I'm trying madly to back up what I've written here
Speaker 2: with references and citations, but I'm coming up a little dry.
Speaker 2: Perhaps someone else in the discussion module who knows about
Speaker 2: this can give us a hand with it. Otherwise, keep
Speaker 2: up the excellent work. Chaps. Love the podcast as always,
Speaker 2: especially when you managed to sneak in references to D
Speaker 2: and D. I have no doubt that game was a
Speaker 2: part of why I chose the performing arts as a job.
Speaker 3: Colin ah barred to the core. Well, I'd never heard
Speaker 3: of any of this, but this is interesting, especially the
Speaker 3: idea about re enacting parts of the Dream in a
Speaker 3: theatrical performance. I have to say, for some reason, I'd
Speaker 3: be a little skeptical about the snake venom aspect, but
Speaker 3: I don't know that could be true. I'd be interested
Speaker 3: in following up on that and looking into it.
Speaker 2: You know that would be something though to think about
Speaker 2: this in a modern context. What if you had to
Speaker 2: you had to sign off the rights to any dream
Speaker 2: contents you shared with your therapists because they might be
Speaker 2: produced as a play.
Speaker 3: Or how about when you go to therapy you have
Speaker 3: to sign off on the contents of your dreams because
Speaker 3: they will be used to train AI.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, I guess if it helps pay for
Speaker 2: one's therapy, I guess it would like if you could
Speaker 2: do that instead, It's like, okay AI gets rights to
Speaker 2: my dreams or Hollywood gets right first pass. Let's say
Speaker 2: first pass on the contents of my dreams. But that
Speaker 2: means I also don't have to pay We're going to
Speaker 2: reduce rate on my therapy sessions. I don't know, I'd
Speaker 2: have to consider it because most of these dreams are
Speaker 2: real dogs. I mean, they're not going to really get
Speaker 2: anywhere with this content.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm trying to imagine a Greek chorus saying it
Speaker 3: was my high school, but it was not my high school,
Speaker 3: and it was also my first apartment, and I was me,
Speaker 3: but I was also Brad Dourif.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that's most of my dreams these days are
Speaker 2: kind of like that. Oh I did have a good one.
Speaker 2: As long as we're talking about dreams, I've been meaning
Speaker 2: to share this one with you. So one of our
Speaker 2: bosses in this dream, I think you know which one,
Speaker 2: but one of our bosses an individual we both like,
Speaker 2: we both look up to excellent chat. But in the
Speaker 2: dream he had written a book called how to Write,
Speaker 2: and how to Write was being released as a candle
Speaker 2: and we had to and I don't think the candle
Speaker 2: produced sound, but somehow the book was being released in
Speaker 2: candle form and we had to record ads promoting the
Speaker 2: candle adaptation of how to Write.
Speaker 3: My god, I mean, it makes perfect dream logic. Though
Speaker 3: I can see exactly why you dreamed that.
Speaker 2: It is one of those rare moments too in the
Speaker 2: dream where I was like, this is what It's a candle,
Speaker 2: but it's an adaptation of a book. How does that work?
Speaker 2: It doesn't produce sound, but still you know it to dream,
Speaker 2: so you go with it.
Speaker 3: The ad department is like, yeah, just go with it.
Speaker 2: So you heard it here first. How to Write now
Speaker 2: available in all formats including candle.
Speaker 3: That's really good. Okay, we got a bunch of responses
Speaker 3: to our anthology of horror episode from this year. Let's see,
Speaker 3: maybe I'm going to do this one from longtime correspondent
Speaker 3: Jim and New Jersey that has just packed with Star
Speaker 3: Trek trivia. How about that? Yeah sounds good, okay, Jim
Speaker 3: and New Jersey, says Robert Joe and JJ. Robert's Halloween
Speaker 3: anthology choice reminded me of transporter technology in other stories,
Speaker 3: especially its use in Star Trek. This is in response
Speaker 3: to the the anthology segment Rob picked this year, which
Speaker 3: was from the nineties Outer Limits, and it was a
Speaker 3: parable about the use of a teleportation machine, but one
Speaker 3: in which your body at the original the departure point
Speaker 3: the teleportation has to be destroyed, and there were questions
Speaker 3: about like is this really death? What is self identity
Speaker 3: if you're recreated at the destination and so forth. Yeah, Jim,
Speaker 3: talking about transporter episodes of Star Trek, says, here are
Speaker 3: a few things I can recall, and I'm sure I
Speaker 3: won't remember them all. Gene Roddenberry created it since a
Speaker 3: few visual effects and glitter spinning in a tank of
Speaker 3: water would have cheaper production values than having to use
Speaker 3: the shuttle craft and the docking bay. That's interesting. You know,
Speaker 3: it wouldn't be the first time that the material and
Speaker 3: practical constraints of filmmaking led to what was in the
Speaker 3: end an interesting plot device or idea.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, now, it's almost impossible to imagine Star
Speaker 2: Trek without teleportation, without people being beamed up and beamed down.
Speaker 3: But I can absolutely see how. Yeah, you would have
Speaker 3: to have fewer sets than if you were like having
Speaker 3: people take a ship down, up and down.
Speaker 2: Yeah, just right from the ship to the cave environment
Speaker 2: or the alien terrain that you've prepared on the other
Speaker 2: portion of the set.
Speaker 3: Jim says, while Kirk and crew could request being beamed
Speaker 3: out of a bad situation, there was no emergency beam
Speaker 3: out button on their communicators.
Speaker 4: It would make it too easy for them to get
Speaker 4: out of a jam.
Speaker 3: Also, Kirk never said the words beam me up, Scottie. Interesting.
Speaker 3: It's kind of like Luke, I am your father you
Speaker 3: and Darth Vader never says that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, or it's elementary, my dear Watson. Though I don't
Speaker 2: recall the details on that. It's probably been said in adaptations,
Speaker 2: but if memory serves it's not ever said in the stories.
Speaker 2: Don't quote me on that just in case.
Speaker 3: What's the actual Darth Vader quote? I think he says, No,
Speaker 3: I am your father. I think you're right anyway, Star
Speaker 3: Trek facts continue, Jim says in the Enemy within the
Speaker 3: original series, there was a transporter incident when a crew
Speaker 3: member returns from a planet with magnetic dust on his uniform.
Speaker 3: Kirk beams up next and leaves the platform. Then, after
Speaker 3: everyone leaves the transporter room, another Kirk materializes. The first
Speaker 3: Kirk has all of Kirk's good traits, the second Kirk
Speaker 3: has all of his bad traits. This was inspired by
Speaker 3: Doctor Jekyll and mister Hyde. I feel like the straying
Speaker 3: a little bit from hard science fiction, you know, saying
Speaker 3: like that the physically separated, the moral quality is into
Speaker 3: different beings. I don't know about that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, the settings were weird on those older
Speaker 2: teleportation devices.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but I bet it maybe for a good episode.
Speaker 3: I've never seen that one. Let's see. Jim goes on
Speaker 3: to say doctor McCoy hates the transporter quote. I signed
Speaker 3: aboard this ship to practice medicine, not to have my
Speaker 3: atoms scattered back and forth across space by this gadget.
Speaker 3: I think sound reasoning doctor McCoy in Realm of Fear.
Speaker 3: In the Next Generation, Lieutenant Barkley has an outright phobia
Speaker 3: of the transporter. I have a vague memory that this
Speaker 3: was the first time Star Trek showed the transporter process
Speaker 3: from the point of view of the person being transported.
Speaker 2: That rings a bell.
Speaker 3: I don't remember if I ever saw that one. In
Speaker 3: Relics from the Next Generation, the Enterprise crew finds Scotty,
Speaker 3: who has rigged the transporter to be a type of
Speaker 3: suspended animation for the past seventy five years to keep
Speaker 3: him quote alive while he awaits a rescue. Oh, that's interesting.
Speaker 3: So he can like beam himself to well, I don't know,
Speaker 3: just beam himself to nowhere, just in the middle of
Speaker 3: a transport while he's waiting for somebody to come get
Speaker 3: him physically.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a great way to have him serve as
Speaker 2: a guest star on an episode. But I do remember
Speaker 2: this episode. I actually referenced it in my interview with
Speaker 2: the astrophysicist Adam Frank because this is the Dyson Sphere
Speaker 2: episode of Star Trek the Next Generation, and I had
Speaker 2: distinctly remember watching this episode for the first time when
Speaker 2: I was probably in junior high, maybe a little or earlier,
Speaker 2: but it was just such a mind blowing episode, you
Speaker 2: know this. I don't think I'd ever been introduced to
Speaker 2: the idea of a cosmic megastructure before, and it was
Speaker 2: just amazing. Like this episode, which I haven't watched in
Speaker 2: a very long time, but it's one of those episodes
Speaker 2: that made me fall in love with Star Trek the
Speaker 2: Next Generation and just blew my young mind.
Speaker 3: Okay, one last bullet point here, Jim says in Second
Speaker 3: Chances from the Next Generation, we learned that when Riker
Speaker 3: had been rescued from a planet via the transporter eight
Speaker 3: years previously, the transporter beam split. One version was rescued,
Speaker 3: the other version bounced back to the original planet. There
Speaker 3: have been two Rikers, and one has been stranded for
Speaker 3: eight years. His personality is much more bitter than the
Speaker 3: Riker we know, and for good reasons. I heard that
Speaker 3: the food replicators are based on transporter technology. That means
Speaker 3: that every cup of Picard's Earl Gray Hot is identical
Speaker 3: to the one before. This begs the question Dartrek's transport
Speaker 3: technology transport the original atoms or just transport the information
Speaker 3: about those atoms the replicators, and several plotlines in the
Speaker 3: show tend to suggest that it's the information and not
Speaker 3: the atoms themselves. So what about this for the show?
Speaker 3: Every time a landing crew is sent on a mission,
Speaker 3: the transporter maintains a copy of what it sent, sort
Speaker 3: of like what Scotty rigs up. Therefore, when one of
Speaker 3: the Red Shirts buys the farm, they can just spin
Speaker 3: up a new one from the transporter, much like saving
Speaker 3: the state of a video game and then restarting it
Speaker 3: once your character dies. Of course, this could work for
Speaker 3: everyone on the landing party, but let's be serious, it's
Speaker 3: only the Red Shirts who are in danger. I would
Speaker 3: think that it would mess with a security officer's mind
Speaker 3: to know that they could be dying repeatedly and then
Speaker 3: resurrected without any memory of their deaths Jim in New Jersey.
Speaker 2: But then again, getting back to the basic premise of
Speaker 2: think like a dinosaur and so forth, is like the
Speaker 2: idea that that's what teleportation is, dying repeatedly and then
Speaker 2: being resurrected without any memory of your death.
Speaker 3: Well, anyway, thank you Jim for all the trek facts.
Speaker 2: Good food for thought, you know, before we get any
Speaker 2: listener mail about this. I do want to settle the
Speaker 2: Darth Vader quote question. I had to look it up
Speaker 2: just to make sure, but basically the whole exchange is
Speaker 2: Vader says, if you only knew the power of the
Speaker 2: dark Side, Obi Wan never told you what happened to
Speaker 2: your father. Skywalker says he told me enough, He told
Speaker 2: me you killed him. And then Vader says, no, I
Speaker 2: am your father.
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, that's what I thought it was.
Speaker 2: It's better than Luke, I am your father. The actual
Speaker 2: writing is better than the meme. Yeah.
Speaker 3: That touches on a theme that's come up in many
Speaker 3: episodes we've done this year, just coincidentally, not on purpose,
Speaker 3: but the idea of false memories. This is another one
Speaker 3: of those false memories we can have because lots of
Speaker 3: people not only mistake the line for being Luke, I
Speaker 3: am your father, it's like you can hear it in
Speaker 3: your head. You remember the voice of James Earl Jones
Speaker 3: saying Luke, I am your father, even though you never
Speaker 3: actually heard that because it wasn't in the movie. And
Speaker 3: so it's like another one of these cases where a
Speaker 3: you know, like reading a phrase has given you a
Speaker 3: false memory of like a sense impression of hearing words
Speaker 3: spoken that were not actually spoken in exactly that order.
Speaker 2: But when reality is better than the memory, or even
Speaker 2: if it's the same quality wise but different and like,
Speaker 2: it almost kind of keeps the media fresher, you know,
Speaker 2: because because you're going in there with a preconceived notion
Speaker 2: that is then subverted and improved upon.
Speaker 3: That's a good point.
Speaker 2: I agree. Yeah, It's one of the great things about
Speaker 2: getting older is that you remember less, and so when
Speaker 2: you reread your favorite book, you're like, oh man, this
Speaker 2: is great. I don't remember any of this. Yeah, this
Speaker 2: when comes to us from Mark, Mark says Hi, Robert
Speaker 2: and Joe. At the beginning of the latest Anthology of
Speaker 2: Horror episode, Robert said, this might be your last anthology episode.
Speaker 2: I am writing to say, please don't let that be
Speaker 2: the case. I genuinely look forward to the anthology episodes
Speaker 2: every year. While they are similar to weird House cinema,
Speaker 2: the medium of an anthology is so different from a film.
Speaker 2: It's like comparing short stories to novels. Yes, they are
Speaker 2: both written works, but there's something about the medium of
Speaker 2: a shorter format that changes what the creators can do
Speaker 2: with the story. Anthology shows are premise based, not character based,
Speaker 2: and almost always have a satisfying or surprising twist. Also,
Speaker 2: i'd say, on the whole, they tend to have darker,
Speaker 2: more foreboding endings. Your anthology episode discussions are a glorious
Speaker 2: buffet of supernatural concepts and twists. I love them. Weird
Speaker 2: house cinema episodes seem to focus more on the elements
Speaker 2: of the film, casting, dialogue, special effects, etc. And marveling
Speaker 2: at the weirdness of the final product, which I also
Speaker 2: enjoy very much. Please continue the anthology series, your fan, Mark, Ah, Well.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Mark. Yes, I agree that there are things
Speaker 3: that are very often just just different across the board
Speaker 3: about anthology episodes versus movies. Anthology episodes tend to be often,
Speaker 3: like you say, more premise based or more about philosophical ideas,
Speaker 3: whereas you know, full length movies tend to be more
Speaker 3: involved with the struggles of particular characters and more about plot.
Speaker 3: But I would say the other big difference is that
Speaker 3: you know, our anthology episodes we treat as core episodes
Speaker 3: of the show. They're Tuesday Thursday outings, so we usually
Speaker 3: use the anthology segment as a springboard to talk about
Speaker 3: some kind of idea or topic raised in it, more
Speaker 3: like we would in a regular core episode, whereas in
Speaker 3: Weird House Cinema we're just talking about the movies.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, it can be hard to select something for
Speaker 2: anthology of horror because you have to find that they
Speaker 2: have to have to be this right, everything else to
Speaker 2: line up just so. You want something that is genuinely enjoyable,
Speaker 2: you know, that's fun to talk about, it's well made.
Speaker 2: But also whatever that premise is, whatever that nugget is,
Speaker 2: for the purposes of a core episode, there has to
Speaker 2: be some way to spin that off into sort of
Speaker 2: a core episode discussion. And there are just a lot
Speaker 2: of things that don't match up. Like there's so many
Speaker 2: great I love Tales from the Crypt, so many wonderful
Speaker 2: episodes of Tales from the Crypt, but very few of them,
Speaker 2: in my experience so far of going through them, actually
Speaker 2: have something you can talk about in a core episode.
Speaker 2: You know, there's only so much science or culture of
Speaker 2: mythology you can necessarily squeeze out of a given one.
Speaker 2: I mean, most of them are bad thing happens to
Speaker 2: bad person, you know, and that's fine, that's what it is,
Speaker 2: which is probably one of the reasons we often come
Speaker 2: back to things like Outer Limits and Twilight Zone, as
Speaker 2: those tend to be a little more sci fi, sometimes
Speaker 2: a little more contemplative, where other shows like Night Gallery,
Speaker 2: which is another one I love to death. Again, most
Speaker 2: of those don't necessarily have something you can really spin off,
Speaker 2: or at least for our purposes.
Speaker 3: But we'll see. I mean, if we can bring it
Speaker 3: back for next year, maybe we will. I guess we
Speaker 3: shouldn't promise anything.
Speaker 2: Card subject to change.
Speaker 3: All right, you want to do some Weird House messages
Speaker 3: before we wrap up?
Speaker 2: Yeah, what do we have in the bag here? Oh?
Speaker 2: Do we have some Critters email?
Speaker 3: Oh boy, yes, the crits are chompin'. Let's see. This
Speaker 3: first message comes from Jeff. Jeff says greeting science humans.
Speaker 3: In the Weird House Cinema episode on Critters, you briefly
Speaker 3: discussed the origins of the quote suiting up scene. Yeah,
Speaker 3: so this is the montage that's in like every Batman
Speaker 3: movie where you get a series of rapid close up
Speaker 3: shots of buckles fastening and things snapping into place, and
Speaker 3: gear going into sheaths and stuff, and then you finally
Speaker 3: zoom out and you see the full suit in its
Speaker 3: assembled form. Obviously it's in all these Batman movies, but
Speaker 3: it's in other movies too, and we saw that it
Speaker 3: is in Critters, which predates all of the modern Batman movies.
Speaker 3: I can't remember if there's a montage like this in
Speaker 3: the the sixties Batman. I don't think so, but it's
Speaker 3: certainly there from the eighty nine Tim Burton Batman on
Speaker 3: it's in Critters from nineteen eighty six, and we were
Speaker 3: asking how far back does this visual meme go. Jeff says,
Speaker 3: I have no idea where the tradition began, but I
Speaker 3: wanted to strongly recommend that all your listeners take a
Speaker 3: moment to enjoy Bruce Campbell's epic workshed suit up in
Speaker 3: Evil Dead Too. Just spectacular. There is no aspect of
Speaker 3: this scene which is not perfect, So folks at home,
Speaker 3: if you want to look up a video of this,
Speaker 3: I'm sure there are multiple YouTube videos that clip it out.
Speaker 3: But it's from the movie Evil Dead Too. It's it's
Speaker 3: where the two surviving human characters who have not been
Speaker 3: possessed by demons go to the workshed and Bruce Campbell
Speaker 3: like builds a way to He's cut his own hand
Speaker 3: off at this point in the movie, and he builds
Speaker 3: a way to attach a chainsaw to his wrist and
Speaker 3: puts like a little like hook on his suspenders so
Speaker 3: he can, you know, pull the pull cord on the
Speaker 3: chainsaw by just hooking, you know, looping it through the hook.
Speaker 3: And then in his other hand, of course, he has
Speaker 3: the boomstick.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's ridoculous, but it's pretty awesome.
Speaker 3: Jeff says, it's unlikely that a dedicated weird house listener
Speaker 3: would be unfamiliar with this classic scene, but do we
Speaker 3: have the right to take that chance. I have to
Speaker 3: assume Sam Raimi was riffing on previous suit up montages,
Speaker 3: but it's difficult to imagine anyone topping that one. Steay groovy, Jeff, Jeff,
Speaker 3: I agree, this is a great example, but I still
Speaker 3: am no closer to understanding where this this meme comes from,
Speaker 3: So I don't know the origin.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've been meaning to reach out to some folks,
Speaker 2: maybe our friends at Videodrome or some of our coworkers
Speaker 2: who were really versed in film history, because I was
Speaker 2: looking around and I saw this sort of meme, this
Speaker 2: this basic idea referred to as the lock and load montage.
Speaker 2: I've seen it referred to as the gearing up montage.
Speaker 2: I found some lists that show that it at least
Speaker 2: goes back to the nineteen eighties, but in terms of
Speaker 2: like what's the patient zero here, I'm not exactly sure yet.
Speaker 2: I mean, I would guess it goes back at least
Speaker 2: a decade earlier. And I and also it would have
Speaker 2: to line up with certain trends in editing, because I mean,
Speaker 2: it's not just a matter of close ups, right, it's
Speaker 2: a matter of the editing, the way you're cutting things
Speaker 2: together to show these various pieces coming together in the hole.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it tends to be rapid editing. It's a lot
Speaker 3: of short quick shots.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So there are eras of filmmaking, or at least
Speaker 2: the mainstream within those eras of filmmaking, where you're just
Speaker 2: not going to probably see this kind of shot because
Speaker 2: that's not the way they were assembling their scenes, though
Speaker 2: at the same time you might have something akin to it.
Speaker 3: Right, My thinking goes like this, it had to be
Speaker 3: fairly widespread in movies because by like the nineties, some
Speaker 3: of the uses of it in Batman are already satirical,
Speaker 3: and I think it wouldn't. Like when it shows the
Speaker 3: close up.
Speaker 4: Just of like the bat butt, you know, it's just
Speaker 4: like Batman's butt cheeks, and that's clearly meant to be
Speaker 4: funny as part of the montage, and I think it
Speaker 4: wouldn't It wouldn't make sense to have a joke like
Speaker 4: that unless it was a well established visual meme in
Speaker 4: a serious way already.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, a lot of the times You're right, A
Speaker 2: lot of the times that it's used, certainly more recently,
Speaker 2: it is. It is very satirical. It's like, you know,
Speaker 2: it's it's like an action style set up for a
Speaker 2: less action character, like you know, maybe they're putting a
Speaker 2: calculator into their pocket or they're into the other pocket,
Speaker 2: that sort of thing. Yeah, So I if any of
Speaker 2: you out there have some inside write in, we would
Speaker 2: love to hear from you on this one. Yeah. What
Speaker 2: what are the possible origins of the gearing up or
Speaker 2: lock and load montage? Oh?
Speaker 3: I just realized a movie that does this extensively, probably
Speaker 3: like you know, five or six times throughout the movie
Speaker 3: at least, is Sean of the Dead Edgar VI. Yeah,
Speaker 3: lots of satirical lock and loads there.
Speaker 2: But if you're talking about someone like, yeah, Edgar Wright
Speaker 2: or Sam Raimi, like obviously, these are individuals that were
Speaker 2: extremely well versed in various film editing styles and memes
Speaker 2: and montages and so forth, so you know they they
Speaker 2: knew what they were doing. It would be interesting to
Speaker 2: know exactly what they were drawing from in some of
Speaker 2: these cases. Because it can't I can say it can't
Speaker 2: be Sam Raimi that invented it. He's referring to something else. Yeah,
Speaker 2: there has. It has to go back further. I just
Speaker 2: don't know how far back it goes again. If I
Speaker 2: had to guess, if I had to put like five
Speaker 2: bucks on it, I'd say some nineteen sixties biker movie
Speaker 2: or something. All right, let's see. Oh, here's another one
Speaker 2: on Critters. This one comes to us from Mark. Mark says, Hi,
Speaker 2: Joe and Robert thoroughly enjoyed your weird House cinemon. I
Speaker 2: recently rewatched Critters and was surprised to see how well
Speaker 2: it held up. I think you failed to mention, however,
Speaker 2: at the best moment of the entire Critters franchise. Well,
Speaker 2: to be fair, we didn't discuss the entire Critters franchise.
Speaker 2: We just talked about the first one.
Speaker 3: We failed to mention.
Speaker 2: But Mark does bring up a very memorable scene, he continues,
Speaker 2: which is the giant critter ball in Critters Too. The
Speaker 2: critter ball is an amazing and hilarious feat of practical effects.
Speaker 2: This is back in the day before CGI, when if
Speaker 2: your movie called for a giant ball of critters, you
Speaker 2: went out and built a giant ball of critters.
Speaker 3: How deep do you think the critters went on? The
Speaker 3: giant critter ball was just like a big like I
Speaker 3: don't know what was the inside of the ball.
Speaker 2: I mean, it would be insane to build critters all
Speaker 2: the way down, but you'd have to have them a
Speaker 2: certain amount of tritters partially, you know, the way down,
Speaker 2: so that it would look all right.
Speaker 3: Oh no, the core of the critter ball is going critical.
Speaker 2: So he continues. The best use of the critter ball
Speaker 2: is when it runs over someone and reduces them to
Speaker 2: bloody bones, instantly, terrifying and funny. It did make me
Speaker 2: wonder if there are other animals that group together to
Speaker 2: form balls for some reason. The closest thing I could
Speaker 2: think of was a rat king, But I'm not sure
Speaker 2: if those are even real good episode. Don't be afraid
Speaker 2: to do another Gromlin episode in the future, Mark, So
Speaker 2: I don't know where to even begin on that listener mail.
Speaker 3: Yeah, we certainly could come back and do something more
Speaker 3: on life forms that agglomerate. I mean, I just think
Speaker 3: of one example would be army ants that not quite
Speaker 3: a ball, but they will form a gigantic mass made
Speaker 3: out of ants to protect the queen as she's moving along.
Speaker 3: So it is just kind of a huge ant wad
Speaker 3: with the Queen hidden somewhere inside.
Speaker 2: Yeah, fire ants forming a raft comes to mind. There
Speaker 2: are various animals that kind of, you know, ban together
Speaker 2: in a limited sense, and then there's also the discussion
Speaker 2: of animals that coil up into balls or sort of
Speaker 2: wheel shapes, and then the rare instances of ones that
Speaker 2: may appear to roll. I think I've covered some of
Speaker 2: this before in the past, but I don't have the
Speaker 2: notes in front of me to be clear. Though, there's
Speaker 2: nothing quite like a critter in the in the natural world.
Speaker 2: That's why they had to create critters for movies. As
Speaker 2: for the rat king, well, I mean that's also a
Speaker 2: great topic that I believe I've covered in some form
Speaker 2: in the past. I can't remember if it was on
Speaker 2: the podcast or if it's something I wrote at some point,
Speaker 2: but if memory serves like, the basic idea is rat kings,
Speaker 2: the idea that you have so many rats in your
Speaker 2: play ridden village that their tails have tangled together and
Speaker 2: they can't become untangled. And then if you, like are
Speaker 2: ripping up boards in a house and you see one,
Speaker 2: you're horrified and realize that this is an omen of
Speaker 2: great doom for your village. Like it's a cool and
Speaker 2: grotesque idea, and I think I've read that it's maybe
Speaker 2: not entirely beyond the realm of possibility, but also extremely
Speaker 2: unlikely that this would happen.
Speaker 3: I haven't researched this, so I can't speak to it,
Speaker 3: but I just did remember what the term for the
Speaker 3: for the ant thing is, like the driver ants or
Speaker 3: the army ants that formed these big wads of ants
Speaker 3: like the critter ball.
Speaker 2: It's called a bivouac.
Speaker 3: Was where the colony forms a bivouac that sort of
Speaker 3: moves along with the progress of its march.
Speaker 2: That's right, And to be clear on the rat king,
Speaker 2: there may be more recent research into this that has
Speaker 2: turned up some strong evidence for the existence of a
Speaker 2: rat King at one point or another. But as I recall,
Speaker 2: it was rather dubious. But that may have changed. But yes,
Speaker 2: for doing more Gromlin episodes, yeah, I'm totally down for that.
Speaker 2: I'm down for Critters too, if we want to come
Speaker 2: back and do that when at some point, like I said,
Speaker 2: Critters two is one the one that I definitely remember
Speaker 2: seeing when I was younger, and I remember enjoying it
Speaker 2: quite a bit. It makes some interesting choices, as I recalled,
Speaker 2: it might be fun to revisit. I don't remember exactly
Speaker 2: how they were handled, though.
Speaker 3: Is Critters two to Critters one kind of like Evil
Speaker 3: Dead two to Evil Dead one. It's almost like a
Speaker 3: comedy remake of the original with a bigger budget.
Speaker 2: I think so. It's definitely the bigger budget, you know,
Speaker 2: because Critters was a success and they written It's one
Speaker 2: of those situations where the studios like, yes, give us
Speaker 2: more of this success, make us more of this movie,
Speaker 2: and they obliged, and you know, you have some other element.
Speaker 2: You have most of the I think most of the
Speaker 2: same one up, maybe not most of the same cast.
Speaker 2: Several members of the cast are back. David Towey is
Speaker 2: on the script, so it has a lot of things
Speaker 2: going for it as well. Definitely bigger and bolder.
Speaker 3: All right, should we wrap it up there for today?
Speaker 2: Yeah, let's go ahead and wrap it up into one
Speaker 2: big Critters esque ball and send it on down towards
Speaker 2: the farmhouse.
Speaker 3: We've still got a bunch of things in the queue,
Speaker 3: so we'll have to get to those next week.
Speaker 2: That's right in the meantime, right into us. We'd love
Speaker 2: to hear from you regarding past, present, and future episodes
Speaker 2: of Stuff to Blow your Mind, Artifact, Monster Fact, other
Speaker 2: episodes of Listener Mail, and of course Weird House Cinema.
Speaker 2: Any question or inquiry is fair game, so just write in. Also,
Speaker 2: you can reach out to us in the Discussion module.
Speaker 2: That's a group on Facebook that you can join. We
Speaker 2: also have a presence in discord. If you want to
Speaker 2: acces us to that, email us and we'll send you that.
Speaker 2: And hey, if you use the social media, you can
Speaker 2: follow us. Our accounts are active again and if you
Speaker 2: are on Instagram, check us out. We are STBYM podcast
Speaker 2: on Instagram. It's a newer account. The old one is
Speaker 2: all locked up. We can't get into it, so help
Speaker 2: us breathe life into the husk of the new Instagram
Speaker 2: account for our podcast.
Speaker 3: Huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer, Jjposway.
Speaker 3: If you would like to get in touch with us
Speaker 3: with feedback on this episode or any other, to suggest
Speaker 3: a topic for the future, or just to say hello,
Speaker 3: you can email us at contact at stuff to Blow
Speaker 3: your Mind dot com.
Speaker 1: Stuffed to Blow Your Mind is a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.