WEBVTT - The Strain: Dissecting del Toro's Vampires 0:00:03.120 --> 0:00:06.000 Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind from how Stuff 0:00:06.000 --> 0:00:13.480 Works dot com. Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind. 0:00:13.480 --> 0:00:16.200 My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Christian Seger. And 0:00:16.280 --> 0:00:19.840 in this episode, we're talking about the a little book series, 0:00:19.920 --> 0:00:24.720 a little TV show, a little franchise known as The Strain. Yeah, 0:00:24.800 --> 0:00:28.560 so this is something that Giermo del Toro originally came 0:00:28.560 --> 0:00:33.160 out with as a series of novels with Chuck Hogan. Uh, 0:00:33.159 --> 0:00:36.559 and it is primarily you know, we're gonna try not 0:00:36.600 --> 0:00:39.760 to spoil this story for anybody during this episode. It's 0:00:39.760 --> 0:00:42.519 primarily about vampires, but they have a very particular kind 0:00:42.560 --> 0:00:46.040 of biology that's unique to this story. So what we 0:00:46.040 --> 0:00:47.800 were thinking was that we could take a look at 0:00:47.840 --> 0:00:51.280 that and how it relates to the biology of actual 0:00:51.400 --> 0:00:55.240 parasites and vampire like creatures in nature. Yeah, it's kind 0:00:55.240 --> 0:00:57.480 of in the same vein with some past episodes we've 0:00:57.520 --> 0:01:02.200 done with Monster of the Week blog series, Monster Science 0:01:02.320 --> 0:01:04.679 video series, that sort of thing. And uh, you know, 0:01:04.720 --> 0:01:07.360 I know some of you out there I love The Strain. 0:01:07.480 --> 0:01:09.679 Some of you out there may hate The Strain, and 0:01:09.720 --> 0:01:12.160 a number of you have no idea what we're talking about. 0:01:12.200 --> 0:01:14.760 Perhaps you end up checking some of it out because 0:01:14.760 --> 0:01:17.600 of this episode. But but we're gonna use the show. 0:01:17.680 --> 0:01:20.160 We're gonna use the books, which you've read, but I 0:01:20.200 --> 0:01:22.319 have not. I have. Yeah, I've read the books, and 0:01:22.319 --> 0:01:25.240 I've read the comics, and I've watched the first season, okay, 0:01:25.319 --> 0:01:28.800 and I've watched the first and second season up until 0:01:28.959 --> 0:01:31.480 like this right where yeah, where it's that now? So 0:01:31.520 --> 0:01:34.399 we're not gonna we're not gonna get into spoilers related 0:01:34.440 --> 0:01:36.800 what happens to characters in the book or on the 0:01:36.840 --> 0:01:39.760 TV show. We are going to discuss the biology of 0:01:39.800 --> 0:01:43.800 the fictional creature so as to discuss real world comparisons. 0:01:43.800 --> 0:01:45.920 But but that's about it. So if you want, like 0:01:46.080 --> 0:01:47.680 if you want to enter into the show just on 0:01:48.560 --> 0:01:52.080 purist unspoiled, then I guess you should skip this episode 0:01:52.080 --> 0:01:54.040 and come back to it later. But but for the 0:01:54.040 --> 0:01:55.880 most part, you don't have to worry. Yeah, So for 0:01:55.920 --> 0:01:57.560 the most part, what we're gonna do is stick to 0:01:58.080 --> 0:02:00.000 the biology of these things. And I think I could 0:02:00.000 --> 0:02:02.440 place to start is with Del Toro himself. So if 0:02:02.480 --> 0:02:07.120 you're not familiar with his movies, Del Toro is I 0:02:07.160 --> 0:02:09.440 think it's fair to call him a horror mastermind. Or 0:02:09.480 --> 0:02:13.639 at least he's considered one. He's done movies about vampires before, 0:02:13.760 --> 0:02:18.559 He's done of fantasy kind of fairytale movies, movies about demons. 0:02:18.560 --> 0:02:25.160 He's very into the gothic horror supernatural genre. Uh, he's 0:02:25.760 --> 0:02:28.840 has he done. He's also done some stuff that isn't supernatural, though, right, 0:02:28.840 --> 0:02:32.760 I feel like has he I don't know that he has. 0:02:32.840 --> 0:02:35.200 I feel like like even his you know, he has 0:02:35.240 --> 0:02:38.280 these two types of films. He has the more personal, 0:02:38.440 --> 0:02:41.839 artsy films and then the bigger budget stuff. But they 0:02:41.919 --> 0:02:44.120 all seem to have monsters in them. Maybe he has 0:02:44.120 --> 0:02:48.160 a monster free um film out there. I am totally 0:02:48.200 --> 0:02:50.959 forgetting it. Yeah, I am too. Maybe maybe I'm I'm 0:02:50.960 --> 0:02:55.480 wrong on this, but yeah. So the first two vampire 0:02:55.520 --> 0:02:57.720 movies that he worked on, though, the first one was Chronos, 0:02:57.760 --> 0:02:59.880 which is what like twenty years old at this point, 0:03:00.080 --> 0:03:04.280 the first future film, yeah uh, and then he also 0:03:04.560 --> 0:03:08.720 directed the classic Blade, to which I love. Yeah, I'm 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:12.120 a fan as well. And uh, there is a particular 0:03:12.200 --> 0:03:14.720 kind of vampire and both of these that sort of 0:03:14.960 --> 0:03:18.040 we can look back to as the you know, uh 0:03:18.400 --> 0:03:21.840 vampire for Del Toro's Vampires in the Strain before we 0:03:21.880 --> 0:03:23.840 get into that. I think it's really interesting. There's a 0:03:23.919 --> 0:03:27.520 quote by him where he talks about why he was 0:03:27.560 --> 0:03:29.480 interested in creating the show in the first place, and 0:03:29.480 --> 0:03:31.600 he said that since he was a little kid, he's 0:03:31.639 --> 0:03:38.040 always kept a notebook full of ideas about vampire mutations, biology, sociology, 0:03:38.040 --> 0:03:40.720 and mythology. So this is just something he's been thinking 0:03:40.720 --> 0:03:43.320 about since he was a child. He knows, you know, 0:03:43.440 --> 0:03:44.920 he put he put some of it in Chronos, he 0:03:44.960 --> 0:03:47.520 put some of it in Blade, But he really wanted 0:03:47.640 --> 0:03:53.360 the strain to be like his his opus on vampires. Yeah, yeah, 0:03:53.400 --> 0:03:56.560 he and you and you really get that from these properties, 0:03:56.600 --> 0:03:59.200 you know, like, well, whatever failings there might be regarding 0:03:59.480 --> 0:04:01.920 you know, the main characters in this or that, or 0:04:02.200 --> 0:04:05.000 or the you know, the plot or the narrative, you 0:04:05.120 --> 0:04:07.840 can't thought the monsters because the man, the man loves 0:04:07.880 --> 0:04:10.320 his monsters. And it's it's it's clear the amount of 0:04:10.320 --> 0:04:12.880 work he puts into it, the people that he brings 0:04:12.920 --> 0:04:16.480 into design, like he's always bringing in such a fantastic 0:04:16.520 --> 0:04:19.200 team of artists, And I understand he sets up when 0:04:19.279 --> 0:04:21.520 when he's developing any of these properties, he sets up 0:04:21.520 --> 0:04:23.200 in the middle of the art department, like it's not 0:04:23.279 --> 0:04:25.240 another room. He's there in the middle of its saying 0:04:25.320 --> 0:04:27.919 that's great. That's I believe. That's his background is that 0:04:27.960 --> 0:04:31.320 he worked in television, I want to say, in Spanish 0:04:31.360 --> 0:04:35.360 language television as like an art director before he started 0:04:35.400 --> 0:04:38.440 directing and writing himself. But yeah, have you ever looked 0:04:38.480 --> 0:04:42.280 at um there? They may even have published a version 0:04:42.320 --> 0:04:46.920 of this of his notebooks there fascinating, Like each each 0:04:46.920 --> 0:04:49.960 project he works on, he just fills a notebook with 0:04:50.080 --> 0:04:53.479 drawings and little writings and scribblings. And he's an amazing 0:04:53.560 --> 0:04:55.920 artist as well, so you get to see kind of 0:04:56.000 --> 0:04:59.560 his ideas for how these things flesh out, literally flesh out, 0:04:59.560 --> 0:05:01.920 because these really into them. Yes, but I mean it 0:05:02.360 --> 0:05:04.920 seems like there's always a monster autopsy scene and any 0:05:04.960 --> 0:05:07.960 film he does which is which is perfect, absolutely, and 0:05:08.000 --> 0:05:12.480 he is seriously got an obsession with jaws and mandibles 0:05:12.520 --> 0:05:16.600 and tongues like pretty much everything. I remember watching Pacific 0:05:16.720 --> 0:05:19.520 rim which is what that's the last major feature that 0:05:19.560 --> 0:05:23.240 he came out with. And yeah, and even the giant 0:05:23.360 --> 0:05:27.000 monsters in that that the Kaiju had these like mandibles 0:05:27.000 --> 0:05:29.200 that separated off of their face and these huge tongues 0:05:29.240 --> 0:05:32.400 that shot out. He's he's really into that. Yeah. I 0:05:32.400 --> 0:05:35.640 but I believe most of his recent films he's brought in. 0:05:35.680 --> 0:05:38.520 Wayne Barlow is one of the artists. Is of course 0:05:38.560 --> 0:05:43.240 his work designing alien physiologies and demonic physiologies all based 0:05:43.279 --> 0:05:45.760 on a background that he and his parents had in 0:05:46.040 --> 0:05:51.520 uh in in in Natural World Illustrations. This is Wayne Barlow. Yeah. 0:05:51.600 --> 0:05:55.279 But Wayne Barlow's work is just so I mean, you 0:05:55.360 --> 0:05:58.560 believe and he designed that he gives you it feels 0:05:58.640 --> 0:06:02.840 like a real, actually creature that you've just never witnessed before. Yeah. 0:06:02.839 --> 0:06:05.960 So his his team that he works with, that he's 0:06:06.000 --> 0:06:08.159 kind of he's assembled this like a team over the 0:06:08.200 --> 0:06:11.640 years of working on project. But Wayne Barlow is a mainstay. Uh. 0:06:11.640 --> 0:06:13.680 And then another guy who I'm a fan of his, 0:06:13.720 --> 0:06:16.920 Guy Davis, who is a comic book illustrator who's worked 0:06:16.920 --> 0:06:20.800 on stuff like the bpr D, his own book, The Marquee. Uh. 0:06:20.839 --> 0:06:23.360 And he did a really interesting one of his first 0:06:23.400 --> 0:06:26.480 comics was like a punk rock take on Sherlock Holmes 0:06:26.480 --> 0:06:28.720 if Sherlock Holmes was a woman in the seventies who 0:06:28.760 --> 0:06:32.840 was a punk rocker. It was fascinating. Uh. It's good stuff. 0:06:33.120 --> 0:06:36.680 But guy is also just an amazing concept artist, and 0:06:36.720 --> 0:06:39.360 so he's designed monsters as well along with that team 0:06:40.000 --> 0:06:43.320 with Wayne, and then looking at the research that we 0:06:43.360 --> 0:06:46.240 had for this episode, there were two guys in particular 0:06:46.279 --> 0:06:49.599 that seemed to work with them on the actual special 0:06:49.640 --> 0:06:53.560 effects and makeup. It was Steve Newberne and Sean Sansom, 0:06:53.680 --> 0:06:55.800 or the team on the at least the first season 0:06:55.839 --> 0:06:58.159 of The Strain, they were responsible for a lot of 0:06:58.160 --> 0:07:01.320 the practical special effects. Now just go back to Chronos 0:07:01.360 --> 0:07:03.719 and Blade Too for a second. Um. In Chronos, we 0:07:03.760 --> 0:07:08.800 saw Vamporism as this kind of hybrid of an you know, 0:07:08.880 --> 0:07:14.760 alchemical insect clockwork contraption that was pretty interesting, like it 0:07:14.840 --> 0:07:17.040 kind of pins to you, sinks its teeth in, and 0:07:17.120 --> 0:07:21.600 begins to transformation. Yeah. I had actually forgotten the main 0:07:21.680 --> 0:07:23.720 plot of that movie because it's been so long since 0:07:23.760 --> 0:07:25.640 I've seen it. So I reread the summary before we 0:07:25.680 --> 0:07:29.560 came into the studio, and it really immediately came back 0:07:29.600 --> 0:07:32.000 to me that what stuck with me was the aesthetic 0:07:32.000 --> 0:07:37.320 imagery of that clockwork bug thing, you know, piercing people 0:07:37.560 --> 0:07:39.920 more and and also the like sort of marble ish 0:07:40.440 --> 0:07:45.760 white translucent skin yeah of the vampire. Yeah, that that 0:07:45.960 --> 0:07:48.040 definitely stuck with me, and that's something he came back 0:07:48.080 --> 0:07:50.680 to Emblade too as well for the Elder Vampire, and 0:07:50.720 --> 0:07:53.920 that where you have this this ancient creature that is, 0:07:54.120 --> 0:07:57.840 you know, at once beautiful and ghastly that it's it's 0:07:57.880 --> 0:08:01.360 taken on this nos Ferato appearance, but it also has 0:08:01.480 --> 0:08:03.680 the look of like a marbled statue. So it's that 0:08:03.800 --> 0:08:08.320 kind of dichotomy that I feel like he captures really well. 0:08:08.320 --> 0:08:11.920 And yeah, there's he does a great job. You know, 0:08:11.960 --> 0:08:13.840 this is pop culture talking about science talk, but he 0:08:13.880 --> 0:08:17.720 does a great job of honoring the sort of lineage 0:08:17.760 --> 0:08:22.120 of vampire stories and incorporating aspects of notes ferra To 0:08:22.360 --> 0:08:25.080 or Dracula into these things, but also putting his own 0:08:25.120 --> 0:08:27.760 spin on it by adding weird science, I guess is 0:08:27.760 --> 0:08:31.560 the best way to put it. Yes. Yes, the reapers 0:08:31.640 --> 0:08:35.439 in Blade two, which is like bad new Strain of Vampires, 0:08:35.679 --> 0:08:38.840 they are even closer to what we see in the strain. Uh. 0:08:38.880 --> 0:08:42.000 They have these cool mandible jaws that opened like the jaw, 0:08:42.320 --> 0:08:44.960 though the lower jaw splits down the middle and becomes mandibles, 0:08:45.000 --> 0:08:48.880 and then there's a probiscus type tongue that comes out 0:08:48.920 --> 0:08:51.880 to pump out blood and My favorite bit, which I 0:08:51.880 --> 0:08:54.199 think I mentioned in the Stigmata episode is that they 0:08:54.240 --> 0:08:57.960 have hardened bone plating front and back, so the only 0:08:58.000 --> 0:08:59.520 way to stab him in the heart is to go 0:08:59.559 --> 0:09:02.440 into the side. Yeah, like under the armpit, right, Yeah, 0:09:02.520 --> 0:09:04.079 where where you get into this into the course of 0:09:04.080 --> 0:09:07.880 the Catholic imagery that del Toro is really into as well. Yeah, 0:09:07.960 --> 0:09:10.679 and uh, I think it's important to note to this 0:09:10.760 --> 0:09:12.600 is also part of the strain in a number of 0:09:12.720 --> 0:09:17.160 his uh designs, I suppose, but there's definitely a vagina 0:09:17.240 --> 0:09:21.800 dentata theme going on with his vampire monsters, and that 0:09:22.160 --> 0:09:25.160 like their monster mouth's kind of open up and have 0:09:25.440 --> 0:09:29.480 teeths in a way that like the vagina dentata mythology 0:09:29.600 --> 0:09:33.000 I think represents. Yeah. I remember listening to The Blade 0:09:33.000 --> 0:09:36.640 to director's commentary, Oh, I have not heard that while back, 0:09:36.720 --> 0:09:39.160 because like I said, I really loved that movie came 0:09:39.160 --> 0:09:41.240 out and it's one of those I could probably watch anytime. 0:09:41.280 --> 0:09:44.360 But I remember del Toro pointing to like different scenes 0:09:44.400 --> 0:09:46.319 and saying, yes, that that door kind of looks like 0:09:46.360 --> 0:09:48.040 a vagina. This is far away, it kind of looks 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:51.520 like a vagina. So who's like that Catholicism and monsters. 0:09:51.760 --> 0:09:54.400 That's this thing. Did you ever see the third one? Yes, 0:09:54.480 --> 0:09:56.320 because in the third one, I think they took it, 0:09:56.360 --> 0:09:59.320 didn't they take his model? He did not direct it, 0:09:59.400 --> 0:10:01.120 but they took his model and like applied it to 0:10:01.120 --> 0:10:03.960 a Pomeranian dog. Yeah, it kind of has a cameo 0:10:04.120 --> 0:10:07.680 with a Pomeranian. Yeah, just just to mock you with 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:11.480 how great that the second one was? So? All right 0:10:11.800 --> 0:10:14.400 before basically, this is how we're gonna play this out. 0:10:14.440 --> 0:10:18.000 We'll present to you how the vampires in the strain 0:10:18.200 --> 0:10:24.080 are biologically formed, how their fictional biology works. And then 0:10:24.280 --> 0:10:26.240 the second part of this episode, we're going to talk 0:10:26.280 --> 0:10:29.520 about string oi, which is what they call them in 0:10:29.559 --> 0:10:33.160 the series in the natural World. So everything from wasps 0:10:33.320 --> 0:10:38.880 to uh, creepy worm, syphilis, you name it, we're gonna 0:10:38.880 --> 0:10:41.960 try to cover it. Excellent, alright, so let's do it. 0:10:42.040 --> 0:10:46.559 Let's dissect the strog i hear um. Do you want 0:10:46.559 --> 0:10:50.720 to take us through this? Yeah? I will try so. Uh. There. 0:10:51.280 --> 0:10:54.160 He definitely has thought out from beginning to end a 0:10:54.320 --> 0:10:57.200 process through which these things go through. And it all 0:10:57.240 --> 0:11:00.480 starts with a worm, this kind of capillary worm that 0:11:00.600 --> 0:11:04.160 passes from one creature to another. Uh, and in the 0:11:04.160 --> 0:11:06.920 case of the vampires, they you know, they bleed the 0:11:06.960 --> 0:11:09.400 worms or you know, when they when they drink the 0:11:09.400 --> 0:11:12.080 blood of their victims, they passed the worms onto their victims. 0:11:12.240 --> 0:11:15.319 They might vomit it into your face. Yeah, is there 0:11:15.320 --> 0:11:17.719 one or two of those as well? Yeah, um, I 0:11:17.760 --> 0:11:21.360 mean it can really happen. Happen like any way that 0:11:21.559 --> 0:11:24.080 like even if you like touch I think, like spilled 0:11:24.120 --> 0:11:25.920 blood by one of these things, there's worms in it 0:11:25.920 --> 0:11:28.440 that will burrow unto your skin. Yeah. They're always like 0:11:28.480 --> 0:11:31.160 wiping off their swords because they with you know that 0:11:31.200 --> 0:11:34.280 I corps on them with little little worms. So this 0:11:34.360 --> 0:11:38.360 worm is essentially responsible for the whole fictional biology of 0:11:38.400 --> 0:11:40.439 these vampires. And the way that it works is you 0:11:40.480 --> 0:11:42.600 get infected by one of them, you lie in a 0:11:42.640 --> 0:11:45.400 suspended state of animation for about a day, and then 0:11:45.440 --> 0:11:48.440 the following night you rise as a vampire. And it's 0:11:48.440 --> 0:11:51.640 so it's not like the idea of the vampire from 0:11:51.800 --> 0:11:55.240 sort of past fiction where it kills the victim. They die, 0:11:55.360 --> 0:11:57.720 they're buried, and then they rise. These people are still alive. 0:11:57.720 --> 0:12:01.560 They're just undergoing like a metamorphosis. Yeah, yeah, like that definitely, 0:12:01.600 --> 0:12:05.960 it's a situation where the parasite transforms the host um 0:12:06.000 --> 0:12:09.720 into really a different kind of organism, and they the 0:12:09.800 --> 0:12:12.120 primary thing, Like I think the first thing in these 0:12:12.720 --> 0:12:16.679 vampires biology that changes is they grow a six ft 0:12:16.720 --> 0:12:20.439 long stinger out of their mouth that fills up their 0:12:20.520 --> 0:12:23.720 torso cavity. Uh. And I guess what's supposed to happen 0:12:23.840 --> 0:12:26.520 is the lungs and the throat tissue all kind of 0:12:26.559 --> 0:12:30.920 like melt down and recompose and modify into this stinger thing. 0:12:31.080 --> 0:12:34.160 And it's hideously long too. Yeah, yeah, and it and 0:12:34.240 --> 0:12:37.360 it uh is how they feed. They shoot it out 0:12:37.400 --> 0:12:40.400 of their mouths and latch onto people or they also 0:12:40.600 --> 0:12:42.560 that's how they pass on warms so other people to 0:12:42.600 --> 0:12:46.680 spread the infection. Uh. And like the like we mentioned 0:12:46.679 --> 0:12:49.320 with the mandibles of the blade to vampires, their jaws 0:12:49.320 --> 0:12:51.320 are on this weird lower hinge and they kind of, 0:12:52.000 --> 0:12:54.440 you know, drop so that the stinger has room to 0:12:54.440 --> 0:12:58.080 come out of. And that I think in the storylines, 0:12:58.920 --> 0:13:01.200 at least from my experience the books and the comics, 0:13:01.520 --> 0:13:03.280 I think it takes like that's the first thing, Like 0:13:03.320 --> 0:13:05.760 within eight hours you've got a stinger, and you might 0:13:05.800 --> 0:13:07.760 still have a little bit of your personality. But then 0:13:07.760 --> 0:13:11.760 it takes seven days for this other set of of 0:13:11.920 --> 0:13:15.600 traits to change within your body. So, uh, your skin 0:13:15.679 --> 0:13:20.280 becomes opaque, your digestive system gets fused together. Uh, the 0:13:20.360 --> 0:13:23.640 stinger forms. Of course, you lose your hair and your 0:13:23.640 --> 0:13:27.959 fingernails and your nose and also your genitals and ears. 0:13:28.040 --> 0:13:31.840 So the vampires are are sexless kind of Uh, they're 0:13:31.880 --> 0:13:34.160 they're very machine like you in a lot of ways. Right, 0:13:34.200 --> 0:13:37.320 They just kind of dump all of the non essentials 0:13:37.320 --> 0:13:39.959 of the human body. Uh, and then their fingers grow 0:13:39.960 --> 0:13:42.080 into talent like things, which I don't know if they 0:13:42.120 --> 0:13:44.200 use them as weapons as much as they do for 0:13:44.280 --> 0:13:46.760 like crawling around on walls and stuff. Right, Yeah, I 0:13:46.760 --> 0:13:49.160 think in the show you you do see them use 0:13:49.679 --> 0:13:52.439 less as weapons, because I mean they got that stinger, right, Yeah, 0:13:52.480 --> 0:13:55.200 why would you don't have to use your close So 0:13:55.320 --> 0:13:57.800 the idea then is that, you know, after seven nights, 0:13:57.800 --> 0:14:01.880 they're fully formed into these sort of hairless, white stinger 0:14:02.000 --> 0:14:05.520 beasts that troll around and you know, kill humans and 0:14:05.559 --> 0:14:07.560 turn them into more vampires. And most of them are 0:14:07.640 --> 0:14:11.040 kind of zombie like as apt to the very few 0:14:11.240 --> 0:14:16.120 who have like a rational mind. Yeah, within the fictional world, 0:14:16.160 --> 0:14:19.040 I'd say like there's only like two or three maybe 0:14:19.080 --> 0:14:24.960 vampires that have sort of control or or individuality. The 0:14:25.000 --> 0:14:27.240 rest of them sort of turned into this hive mind 0:14:27.320 --> 0:14:31.800 of of almost like insects. Actually. Um So there are 0:14:31.840 --> 0:14:34.320 a couple of ways that they used science, or they 0:14:34.360 --> 0:14:37.600 tried to use science. It's kind of hokey pseudoscience, you know, 0:14:37.840 --> 0:14:41.000 sometimes when when fiction meets science, you have to you 0:14:41.000 --> 0:14:42.640 have to build the bridge a little bit between it. 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:44.800 Oh yeah, and I certainly I think this is the 0:14:44.840 --> 0:14:46.680 best part about the strain too. There was a lot 0:14:46.720 --> 0:14:50.239 of attention put into this. But uh so the mythology 0:14:50.240 --> 0:14:54.040 of vampires being vulnerable to silver, that's because silver has 0:14:54.080 --> 0:14:58.880 an anti viral bacterial quality that disinfects these worms and 0:14:59.000 --> 0:15:03.600 is somehow able to sort of burn through the tissue 0:15:03.600 --> 0:15:06.400 that they've created. Uh And then they're also vulnerable to 0:15:06.520 --> 0:15:08.320 UV light, which is where the you know, they can't 0:15:08.320 --> 0:15:11.080 go into sunlight thing comes from, because the UV light 0:15:11.120 --> 0:15:14.640 also has germicidal properties. It's on a certain kind of 0:15:14.640 --> 0:15:18.120 wavelength that breaks down the tissue within the vampire bodies. 0:15:18.920 --> 0:15:22.480 Um this is an interesting sort of science e thing 0:15:22.520 --> 0:15:26.200 that del Toro thru into there. So his vampires can't vomit, 0:15:26.840 --> 0:15:30.120 and all of their waste is excreted from a cloaca. 0:15:30.560 --> 0:15:32.920 Uh that you know, they're they lose their genitals and 0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:36.560 everything fuses down there into a cloaca, and their waste 0:15:36.600 --> 0:15:40.120 is all just ammonious spray, which they usually emit while 0:15:40.160 --> 0:15:42.600 they're eating, so like, while they're drinking the blood of 0:15:42.600 --> 0:15:45.880 their victims, they're also spraying ammonia out behind them. And 0:15:45.920 --> 0:15:49.840 he based this on ticks because apparently ticks have no 0:15:50.000 --> 0:15:52.640 space inside of their bodies for the food that they eat. 0:15:52.680 --> 0:15:54.360 So when like a tick is on you and it's 0:15:54.440 --> 0:15:57.480 drinking your blood. This is all from Del Toro. I 0:15:57.520 --> 0:16:00.480 didn't do tick research for this episode, but uh, he 0:16:00.520 --> 0:16:04.200 says that they spray out their waist as they're drinking. 0:16:05.040 --> 0:16:07.680 You know. That reminds me. I was reading about scorpions recently, 0:16:07.760 --> 0:16:10.000 or actually it was a really cool article about the 0:16:10.040 --> 0:16:13.080 anus and the evolution of the anus, and they mentioned 0:16:13.120 --> 0:16:15.760 as a particular type of scorpion that can jettison its 0:16:15.800 --> 0:16:19.000 tail when threatened, much like a lizard. Really yeah, autotomy 0:16:19.440 --> 0:16:21.880 uh and uh And in this case though, when they 0:16:21.960 --> 0:16:24.920 jettison their tail, they also jettison their anus, so they 0:16:24.960 --> 0:16:27.560 can no longer defecate at that point, so they just 0:16:27.600 --> 0:16:30.600 continue to balloon up with feces for the rest of 0:16:30.600 --> 0:16:33.240 their life and then die from it eventually. Like there's 0:16:33.240 --> 0:16:36.360 a toxic only here on stuff to blow your mind? 0:16:36.400 --> 0:16:40.640 Will you go from anus to scorpion to vampire? Um? 0:16:40.680 --> 0:16:42.040 You know, I do want to throw in real quick 0:16:42.040 --> 0:16:48.680 that another interesting vampire myth uh tidbit that they employ 0:16:48.800 --> 0:16:53.280 in the Strain is the whole vampires cannot cross moving 0:16:53.320 --> 0:16:56.960 water of their own volitions, which which they never really 0:16:57.000 --> 0:16:58.960 flesh out because it's it's kind of more of a 0:16:59.000 --> 0:17:01.760 magical idea. But I think gets at least hinted that 0:17:01.840 --> 0:17:04.359 this might have to do with like the evolutionary history 0:17:04.359 --> 0:17:07.040 of the worm that like something in The Worm of 0:17:07.160 --> 0:17:10.840 Whores moving water. There is I don't want to spoil 0:17:10.840 --> 0:17:12.800 it for our listeners are for you, but there is 0:17:12.840 --> 0:17:16.480 a explanation to it that comes in the third book, 0:17:16.640 --> 0:17:20.240 I want to say, and maybe you know, I guess 0:17:20.240 --> 0:17:22.399 if the TV shows a season for every book, it 0:17:22.400 --> 0:17:24.680 would probably be in the third season. Well, I have 0:17:25.040 --> 0:17:27.680 that to look for. Yeah, there is a sort of explanation. 0:17:27.760 --> 0:17:30.240 I don't think it's science though, but I like you. 0:17:30.359 --> 0:17:34.719 I like your idea better. Yeah, because it will end 0:17:34.760 --> 0:17:38.359 up exploring um, you know, water moving water, parasites and 0:17:38.480 --> 0:17:42.120 parasitositic manipulation of the host. Hugely important, hugely important. Yeah, 0:17:42.119 --> 0:17:45.280 we do see that in the real world. So Del 0:17:45.320 --> 0:17:49.720 Toro himself has said in interviews that he based these 0:17:49.800 --> 0:17:53.720 worms in the strain on two real worms. The first 0:17:53.760 --> 0:17:56.000 one is the heartworm, which we're all familiar with if 0:17:56.000 --> 0:17:57.280 you have a pet, if you have a dog. I 0:17:57.320 --> 0:18:00.000 just gave my dog is heartworm pill this morning. Uh 0:18:00.280 --> 0:18:02.439 and it you know, it's a worm that lodges itself 0:18:02.440 --> 0:18:04.480 in the heart of dogs. It's not a thing that 0:18:04.520 --> 0:18:07.320 you want. And then the other is an old friend 0:18:07.359 --> 0:18:10.840 of stuff to blow your mind, the horsehair worm. We 0:18:10.920 --> 0:18:13.000 did a video about this while back, and yeah, I'll 0:18:13.040 --> 0:18:15.880 link to it on the landing page. It is. Um. 0:18:15.920 --> 0:18:19.760 I gotta say this episode was a little tough for 0:18:19.800 --> 0:18:23.199 me to research. Um I really, I really feel like 0:18:23.280 --> 0:18:26.520 I've gotten my uh my, my badge of of stuff 0:18:26.560 --> 0:18:29.560 to blow your mind courage this week, because there's some 0:18:29.720 --> 0:18:34.440 pretty disgusting stuff in the biology of these different parasites 0:18:34.440 --> 0:18:37.840 and insects. And just watching the video of the horsehair 0:18:37.880 --> 0:18:40.879 worms squirm its way out of a cricket's body is 0:18:41.440 --> 0:18:45.479 It just gives me goose bumps. Uh, it's it's chilling, 0:18:45.600 --> 0:18:48.760 but it's also fascinating. I definitely recommend that you go 0:18:48.920 --> 0:18:51.479 watch that video because I had not heard of it 0:18:51.520 --> 0:18:53.840 before you did that episode. Yeah, that was one. I 0:18:53.840 --> 0:18:55.840 think I mentioned it in the episode that I saw 0:18:55.880 --> 0:18:58.240 it in like a junior high band class for some girl. 0:18:58.560 --> 0:19:00.480 You saw a real one. Yeah, yeah, Like there was 0:19:00.480 --> 0:19:03.480 a cricket on the floor and this girl on the 0:19:03.520 --> 0:19:06.520 clarinet section. She was acting, she was acting like all 0:19:06.880 --> 0:19:09.760 you know, grossed out by she she stopped the cricket, 0:19:10.320 --> 0:19:12.720 which I thought was a little at the top, but 0:19:12.760 --> 0:19:17.280 then in perfect karma, she was then legitimately horrified by 0:19:17.280 --> 0:19:20.840 the side of the horsehair worm emerging, you know, impossibly 0:19:20.880 --> 0:19:23.200 long from the belly of the cricket and crawling across 0:19:23.200 --> 0:19:26.479 the band room floor. So yeah, they are. I mean 0:19:26.600 --> 0:19:28.120 a lot of these things that we're about to talk 0:19:28.160 --> 0:19:32.359 about are are pretty vile. And I'd like to quote 0:19:32.400 --> 0:19:35.080 there was an article that I research I read for 0:19:35.160 --> 0:19:38.080 this episode that was about the strain, and it was 0:19:38.080 --> 0:19:39.480 the only other thing I could find that was like 0:19:39.520 --> 0:19:41.920 this episode. It was about the strain and the science 0:19:41.960 --> 0:19:45.560 behind parasites. Uh. And the science writer at Vox, her 0:19:45.600 --> 0:19:48.239 name is Susannah Locke. She was the expert that they 0:19:48.280 --> 0:19:50.680 spoke to about these uh and she had this quote 0:19:50.680 --> 0:19:52.080 in this that I really liked. She said, for as 0:19:52.119 --> 0:19:55.160 creepy as you can make some monster, there are almost 0:19:55.160 --> 0:19:58.159 certainly ten or eleven things out there in nature that 0:19:58.160 --> 0:20:01.239 are even creepier, which is that's nice. I like that, 0:20:01.280 --> 0:20:05.000 and she's She's right, it's a there's just something about 0:20:05.080 --> 0:20:08.320 these things that just are revolting. Yeah. I mean that's 0:20:08.320 --> 0:20:11.159 the thing I find again in again with my Monster 0:20:11.200 --> 0:20:15.240 the Week and Monster Science series is that, like, sometimes 0:20:15.240 --> 0:20:17.119 I approach it by like, there's a cool article that 0:20:17.119 --> 0:20:19.639 comes out and that's some neat biology. I wonder what 0:20:19.720 --> 0:20:22.560 that matches up with and fictional monsters. But in other 0:20:22.600 --> 0:20:25.919 times it's just if you think of any elaborate monster, 0:20:26.040 --> 0:20:28.080 if you watch a film and you say, hey, that's 0:20:28.080 --> 0:20:30.679 a really cool monster design, and then you wonder, is 0:20:30.680 --> 0:20:33.600 there something in the real world that matches up or 0:20:33.680 --> 0:20:37.560 exceeds that. There Almost always is, Yeah, I mean, obviously 0:20:37.720 --> 0:20:41.920 it's where the imagination probably comes from in the first place. Uh. 0:20:42.160 --> 0:20:45.000 Del Toro himself. You know, we mentioned earlier about how 0:20:45.000 --> 0:20:47.120 he was obsessed with vampires as a little kid. Well, 0:20:47.359 --> 0:20:50.680 he also refers to himself as a biologically perverse guy. 0:20:51.440 --> 0:20:53.480 Uh And he said when he was a kid that 0:20:53.600 --> 0:20:57.440 he's always keeping jars of things, like jars of animals 0:20:57.440 --> 0:21:00.400 and blood, and he had little dissection tables. He would 0:21:00.440 --> 0:21:03.200 just do his own little autopsies on animals, which is 0:21:03.320 --> 0:21:07.880 terrifying and makes me think of that that old adage 0:21:07.920 --> 0:21:10.439 that you know, the kind of people who torture. I mean, 0:21:10.520 --> 0:21:14.119 he's not torturing animals, but you know, opening up animals. 0:21:14.320 --> 0:21:16.200 His little kids are probably going to grow up to 0:21:16.240 --> 0:21:19.199