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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck,

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Speaker 2: and Jerry's here, too, harvesting souls. And this is Stuff

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Speaker 2: You Should Know, the podcast.

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Speaker 1: That's right. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: I'm excited about this one, Chuck. Do you want to

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Speaker 2: know why?

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Speaker 1: Why's that?

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Speaker 2: Well, mainly because it's Halloween-esque, and I love Halloween. Sure.

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Speaker 1: That's it?

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Speaker 2: No, that's not it. There's so much to know about

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Speaker 2: the Grim Reaper. But the biggest thing that I've learned

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Speaker 2: about the Grim Reaper is there's actually not that much

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Speaker 2: to know about him. Because, listen, out of all of

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Speaker 2: the different ways that death has been represented, the Grim

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Speaker 2: Reaper is actually like the least invested with like lore

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Speaker 2: or background or mythology. It just is what it is, man.

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Speaker 1: Is what it is. But we can talk about Bill

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Speaker 1: and Ted at least.

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Speaker 2: For sure. Well, that's the spoiler. There's the best part

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Speaker 2: of the whole episode. Oh, no.

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Speaker 1: Well, that's coming in act three. So you got to

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Speaker 1: stick around if you want to hear what, you know,

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Speaker 1: what Bill and Ted have to do with this.

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Speaker 2: That's right. So if you are not a Westerner, if

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Speaker 2: you're one of our listeners who lives outside of the West,

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Speaker 2: you might not be familiar with the Grim Reaper, although

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Speaker 2: the chances are probably pretty slim. But I say that

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Speaker 2: because the Grim Reaper is an entirely Western representation of

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Speaker 2: death all around the world over time. The eons that

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Speaker 2: humans have been around, there have been different ways of

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Speaker 2: people like kind of putting a face on death. Not

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Speaker 2: the faces of death. That's totally different. Putting a face

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Speaker 2: on death itself, like death with a capital D.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. And, you know, I guess the idea or at

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Speaker 1: least people speculate the idea behind this is if there

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Speaker 1: is a, you know, a visible personification of an abstract,

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Speaker 1: scary thing like death that we're all going to face. Right.

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Speaker 1: that it might make it a little bit easier to face. And,

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Speaker 1: you know, depending on what history and what religion and

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Speaker 1: what culture you're looking at, there have been a lot

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Speaker 1: of ways that that's been done over the years. Some

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Speaker 1: kind of super scary and some not as scary. Right.

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Speaker 2: I found that pretty interesting, too. Chuck, let's take it

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Speaker 2: back a step, though. I'd like to talk in real

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Speaker 2: depth about some creation myths.

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Speaker 1: Great.

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Speaker 2: Just kidding. We'll just kind of cover this. This point,

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Speaker 2: to me, is very important, that there's creation myths from

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Speaker 2: all over the world, from all different cultures that have

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Speaker 2: some really like detailed stuff in common, like people being

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Speaker 2: made out of clay or that there's like a, like

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Speaker 2: creation was supposed to be perfection at one point, but

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Speaker 2: then some trickster figure came along, say a serpent and

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Speaker 2: managed to ruin the whole thing. And then what really

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Speaker 2: kind of, um, it applies to this episode. Um, in

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Speaker 2: a lot of different creation myths, humans were originally intended

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Speaker 2: to be immortal beings, but because they broke some rule

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Speaker 2: through free will of their own, they became mortal, right?

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Speaker 2: And the whole point of even bringing that up is

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Speaker 2: that it's kind of like that, how long have people

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Speaker 2: been aware of death? Well, since the first person witnessed

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Speaker 2: the other first person dying, this is kind of like

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Speaker 2: Codifying that in text, our oldest myths that have ever

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Speaker 2: been written down that predate writing by centuries and probably

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Speaker 2: thousands of years all talk about people dying. Like that

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Speaker 2: is a thing that's part of the creation myth. It's

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Speaker 2: that important. Right. So you can kind of chalk up.

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Speaker 2: We've been thinking about death at the very least, if

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Speaker 2: not pretty scared of dying, you know, mortal terror and

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Speaker 2: all that. Yeah. For for. A very long time, which

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Speaker 2: I've now very beautifully set the table for talk about

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Speaker 2: Grim Reaper and other personifications of death. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And, you know, like I said earlier, like sometimes, depending

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Speaker 1: on the culture, it could be something super scary. Sometimes

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Speaker 1: it's a little more, I don't know about friendly, but yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean, maybe friendly. Like if you look at ancient Greece,

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Speaker 1: they had Thanatos, who was a twin. I don't think

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Speaker 1: I knew that until this. Thanatos had a twin brother.

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Speaker 1: which was Hypnos, the god of sleep, like hypnosis. And

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Speaker 1: they were, you know, they were young dudes. They weren't

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Speaker 1: a chore to be around, like both pretty handsome, I think.

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Speaker 1: And Thanatos had a job, and that was to, and

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Speaker 1: as you'll see, this is a pretty common thing, of

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Speaker 1: accompanying the dead to whatever their version of the afterlife is.

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Speaker 1: In this case, it would be Hades.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, and he was friendly, like you said. His catchphrase was, hi, guy,

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Speaker 2: time to die. And people loved it. They went crazy

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Speaker 2: for it.

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Speaker 1: That's pretty scary, actually.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, especially if he's got, like, a creepy smile.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what I was picturing.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess. So, yeah, he'd accompany you to Hades.

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Speaker 2: He'd drop you off with Charon, the ferryman who crossed

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Speaker 2: the River Styx, took you across the River Styx, and

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Speaker 2: then you were officially in the underworld, right? And the

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Speaker 2: fact that Thanatos' job... was to guide you, the dead

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Speaker 2: person's spirit or soul or whatever you want to call it.

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Speaker 2: That makes him a very specific kind of personification of death,

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Speaker 2: a psychopomp, which is, it's a pretty word to look

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Speaker 2: at in some ways.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's, there has to be a band named psychopomp.

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Speaker 2: Gotta be, yeah.

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Speaker 1: There's just no way. That one's too good to ignore,

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Speaker 1: especially with the meaning of it and everything. Yeah, but

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Speaker 1: that's one way you can go. It's generally kind of

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Speaker 1: split in half as far as, what your culture or

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Speaker 1: religion personifies as death. You can be the psychopomp, which

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Speaker 1: just sort of helps guide you to the afterlife and

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Speaker 1: drop you off at the front door. Or you could

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Speaker 1: be a collector. And that is like, you know, you

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Speaker 1: know what that means. That means the Sith comes along

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Speaker 1: and actually causes your death.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. And so there's, there's like psychopomps. It's a pretty

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Speaker 2: recurring theme, like Anubis, the dog headed God from Egyptian mythology.

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Speaker 1: Love and noobs.

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Speaker 2: It's like Psycho Pump. Me too. I like him a lot.

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Speaker 1: You know why? Why? Because he's a good boy.

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Speaker 2: Oh, my God. He would smite you so quick for

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Speaker 2: doing that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you're right.

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Speaker 2: But, I mean, I guess if he was to score

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Speaker 2: you the afterlife anyway, you're dead already. So what do

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Speaker 2: you have to lose?

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Speaker 1: That's a good point.

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Speaker 2: Baron Samedi, who I had not heard the name of,

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Speaker 2: but once I read the description of him, I'm like, oh, yeah,

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Speaker 2: he's in The Man with the Golden Gun. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Oh, yeah, for sure. And just also, like, I think

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Speaker 1: that's a, like, a lot of these things are things

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Speaker 1: that you may not have heard of, but you recognize

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Speaker 1: from either, like, a Grateful Dead sticker or, like, some

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Speaker 1: other piece of pop culture.

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Speaker 2: Or a metal album cover art.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, but definitely, I mean, yeah, which one was that,

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Speaker 1: Live and Let Die?

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Speaker 2: I thought it was the man with the golden gun,

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Speaker 2: the one with Yafit Koto. Is it Live and Let Die?

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Speaker 2: I think you're right.

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Speaker 1: It is.

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Speaker 2: It's Live and Let Die.

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Speaker 1: I think Live and Let Die was the sort of

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Speaker 1: voodoo-centric one.

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Speaker 2: Yes, then that would be it, yeah. But Baron Samedi,

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Speaker 2: he's depicted as often like a skeletal figure. He wears

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Speaker 2: a top hat. He wears a coat with tails. He

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Speaker 2: also wears sunglasses all the time.

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Speaker 1: Sure.

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Speaker 2: He drinks rum. He smokes cigars. He chases women. He

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Speaker 2: tells dirty jokes.

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Speaker 1: My kind of dude.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, he's pretty interesting for sure. But he's a psychopomp

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Speaker 2: because when you die under Haitian voodoo tradition— He comes

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Speaker 2: and digs you up and is like, let's go to

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Speaker 2: the afterworld. And hey, you got a cigar on you?

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Speaker 1: Yeah. And would you like a Mai Tai?

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Speaker 2: Yes, is the answer to that.

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Speaker 1: The collector, again, that's a different thing. That actually causes

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Speaker 1: the death. There are plenty of examples from this. There's

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Speaker 1: one that comes from the UK, which is Anku. It

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Speaker 1: comes from the Britain mythology and Welsh, mainly Welsh and

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Speaker 1: Cornish traditions. And this, again, is a robed skeletal figure.

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Speaker 1: You know, you're going to see these recurring themes over

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Speaker 1: and over. And this guy actually carries an actual Sith.

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Speaker 1: So I think kind of the first time we've seen

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Speaker 1: that particular implement. And the Sith is used to cut

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Speaker 1: down wheat and also cut down life short.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, or long. You know, when it's your time, that's

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Speaker 2: how you go.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a good point.

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Speaker 2: Is Anku comes and takes you is the rhyme.

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Speaker 1: Right. But Anku is not death, is not death, is

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Speaker 1: basically a shimp, an employee for death.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. And he's a collector, right? He's not guiding you anywhere.

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Speaker 2: He doesn't care where you go after that. And that's

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Speaker 2: like another subcategory you just touched on. He's a bureaucrat.

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Speaker 2: There's like a whole type of personifications of death that

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Speaker 2: are like, I just I'm just here to do my job, man.

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Speaker 2: Just I'm sorry, I can't do anything for you. It's

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Speaker 2: your time.

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Speaker 1: That's right.

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Speaker 2: You know. You're now dead. Sorry. I got to move on. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: he punches the clock. And the Anku is a good

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Speaker 2: example of that. And like you said, they're a worker

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Speaker 2: for death. And it's actually a changing role. Like you

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Speaker 2: could be the Anku in your village if you wanted to.

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Speaker 2: You just have to die at the right time.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, if you're the first person to die that year,

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Speaker 1: then you are the Anku, I guess, for the remainder

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Speaker 1: of the year.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. And you die going, Anku, like you called it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's pretty interesting. The bureaucrat thing also

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Speaker 2: is like, like I said, it's kind of a recurring

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Speaker 2: theme across cultures, including in the Bible. Yeah. So there's

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Speaker 2: a lot of like, I don't really know my Bible

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Speaker 2: that well, especially like real detail stuff. But supposedly in

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Speaker 2: the entire Bible, there is no angel of death named.

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Speaker 2: There's an angel that's called the destroyer at one point,

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Speaker 2: and then that's it. There's not really a lot of

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Speaker 2: lore about who comes and gets you and, you know,

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Speaker 2: takes you to heaven or whatever or hell. Like there's

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Speaker 2: there doesn't seem to be anything like that in the Bible.

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Speaker 2: It's all just kind of been added over time through

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Speaker 2: like Christian fanfic, basically. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Like Michael and Gabriel have both sort of taken that

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Speaker 1: role as the angel of death and in the religion,

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Speaker 1: but not like in the Bible. Like there's no actual

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Speaker 1: story in the Bible about Gabriel being the angel of death.

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Speaker 2: Right. But Michael and Gabriel, again, they're bureaucrats. As angels

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Speaker 2: of death, they're bureaucrats because they're working at the behest

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Speaker 2: of God who says, smite that guy.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. And you know what you do then? You better

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Speaker 1: smite that guy.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. You don't really have a choice because you will

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Speaker 2: be the one who's smote.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. And you don't get the pay bump either.

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Speaker 2: You get skipped over on your Christmas bonus.

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Speaker 1: Should we take a break?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, we'll take a break and come back and talk

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Speaker 2: a little more about Angels of Death because it's fun.

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Speaker 2: And then I guess we'll start to get into the

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Speaker 2: Grim Reaper, huh?

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Speaker 1: Let's do it. All right. So before the break, we

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Speaker 1: mentioned Michael and Gabriel in Judeo-Christian religion, but they also

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Speaker 1: appear in the Islamic faith as death angels, as does

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Speaker 1: the Islamic angel of death, who is Azrael in this case.

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Speaker 1: And Azrael can appear as a This is maybe the

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Speaker 1: creepiest image, I think, out of all these as a

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Speaker 1: spirit with eyes and tongues covering his entire body. That's

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Speaker 1: pretty good. Yes.

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Speaker 2: I wonder if he makes a sound when he walks.

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Speaker 1: Probably so. Or you ought to hear that thing run.

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Speaker 2: Just like wet slapping all over the place. So I've

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Speaker 2: seen discrepancies on whether Asriel is the actual angel of

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Speaker 2: death or if the Malak al-Ma'at is, which is actually

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Speaker 2: just Arabic for angel of death. But regardless of which

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Speaker 2: one it is, they both perform the same function. They

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Speaker 2: get handed down from Allah a ledger every year right

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Speaker 2: before or right after Ramadan. I don't remember exactly.

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Speaker 1: I think it's the month before, yeah.

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Speaker 2: The month before. Okay. And in that ledger, it's everyone

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Speaker 2: who's going to die in the coming year. And that's it.

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Speaker 2: You have what's called an ajal, right? Your fixed state

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Speaker 2: of death. And there's not a lot you can do.

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Speaker 2: And by a lot, I mean there's nothing.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Pretty much. I mean, get your hands on that

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Speaker 1: ledger if you can.

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Speaker 2: I guess so. I'll bet you there's a story about that,

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Speaker 2: about somebody trying that. And the lesson probably is don't

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Speaker 2: even try.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, well, you know, as we'll see, there's a lot of, well,

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Speaker 1: we'll get to that, but people trying to cheat death

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Speaker 1: in various ways. That's coming soon. If you go back

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Speaker 1: to the very, very most ancient of cultures, God, like,

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Speaker 1: needs no helpers, basically. It's like, hey, I'm God, so

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Speaker 1: I don't need bureaucrats to help me rid the planet

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Speaker 1: of people. I can just do it myself. And that

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Speaker 1: is the case with Motu. the god of the ancient

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Speaker 1: Canaanites and Phoenicians. And there's also one in Hindu, right?

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Speaker 1: This one sounds pretty cool. Yeah, Yama rides a black

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Speaker 1: buffalo and carries a noose. That's also a pretty creepy visual.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, he uses it to capture the souls that he harvests, right?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, not bad.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, but then he personally takes them into the underworld,

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Speaker 2: and then he, I guess, puts a robe on, He

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Speaker 2: takes his traveling sweater off and puts his robe on

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Speaker 2: and judges that soul.

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Speaker 1: Right.

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Speaker 2: So he does it all for sure. Yeah. The pictures

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Speaker 2: I've seen of Yama are pretty intense, but cool.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. I got no beef with the Valkyries either. They

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Speaker 1: have appeared in the Marvel Universe most recently, I guess,

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Speaker 1: is where I've seen them. And they are Odin's messengers.

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Speaker 1: But they also fly in. And these are attractive women

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Speaker 1: on horses, like flying horses. So what's not to love?

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Speaker 2: I can't think of anything because I've heard they also

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Speaker 2: smell like strawberry shortcake, the doll.

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Speaker 1: Oh, man. You just made it creepy.

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Speaker 2: Did I? Is it creepy to sniff old strawberry shortcake

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Speaker 2: dolls at the store?

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Speaker 1: At the garage sale?

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Speaker 2: Yeah.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you'll get thrown out of a front yard for that.

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Speaker 2: Hasn't happened yet.

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Speaker 1: All right. Well, keep that run going.

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Speaker 2: Okay. I really do love that smell.

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Speaker 1: Oh, do you really?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, man. It's one of the best smells ever. All

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Speaker 2: of the different strawberry shortcakes smell great. All right.

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Speaker 1: I'll have to give him a sniff.

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Speaker 2: Didn't you have any girlfriends when you were little?

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Speaker 1: No, I was raised Baptist. I wasn't allowed interaction with

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Speaker 1: young girls.

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Speaker 2: I got you. Okay.

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Speaker 1: When I was a young boy, I was only allowed

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Speaker 1: to go to boy-boy parties.

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Speaker 2: None of them like strawberry shortcake?

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Speaker 1: No, which also explains why I was so into the

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Speaker 1: village people.

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Speaker 2: That's probably where that originates.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: So you're talking about the Valkyries. They're a bunch of

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Speaker 2: different atypical things going on. Rolled into one. One, they're

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Speaker 2: feminine personifications of death, which in the West typically is not.

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Speaker 2: It's usually it's almost always a man in a lot

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Speaker 2: of Slavic cultures. It's a woman. But yeah, in Norse mythology,

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Speaker 2: Valkyries are women. The other thing is, is they're bureaucrats

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Speaker 2: and that they're coming in harvesting souls. They guide you.

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Speaker 2: So they're also not just collectors. They're psychopomps. But the

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Speaker 2: big thing that differentiates them is they're like, you, you're

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Speaker 2: going to die. Like they choose who lives and who dies. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And I think it's usually like a wartime thing. Like

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Speaker 1: on the battlefield, they'll choose, you know, who they think

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Speaker 1: is the bravest, which isn't very good strategy for winning

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Speaker 1: any war. But whatever, you know.

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Speaker 2: No. But I think they take them where they're needed more,

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Speaker 2: which is Valhalla, to await the Ragnarok or just Ragnarok.

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Speaker 2: Which I know all about, not from the Marvel Universe,

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Speaker 2: but from our friend John Hodgman. He used to talk

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Speaker 2: about it ceaselessly.

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Speaker 1: I remember his Ragnarok days.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. He really went through a Ragnarok phase for sure.

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Speaker 1: I think we're finally the capital TGR Grim Reaper, right? Mm-hmm.

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Speaker 1: So this is the big daddy. This is the one

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Speaker 1: here in the West that everybody has seen. In movies

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Speaker 1: and on glow-in-the-dark posters and various album covers as the robed, well,

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Speaker 1: I was about to say skeleton, but the robe is

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Speaker 1: kind of the thing that keeps it shrouded in mystery.

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Speaker 1: So generally you see like a robe and then sort

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Speaker 1: of darkness and then that Sith.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, but sometimes the giveaway is that it's a skeletal

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Speaker 2: hand holding the Sith.

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Speaker 1: Ah, true.

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Speaker 2: Skeletal finger pointing at you. And you're like pointing yourself

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Speaker 2: and looking around like me.

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Speaker 1: So what you're saying is the skull is assumed because

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Speaker 1: it matches the hand.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. And then also it does like the Grim Reaper

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Speaker 2: is often depicted like with a skull without the hood

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Speaker 2: on or anything like that.

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Speaker 1: Okay.

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Speaker 2: So let's talk about this, right? Because there's some, all

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Speaker 2: of them symbolically, is that a word?

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Speaker 1: Symbolically. I think it is. Yeah. I like symbologically, actually.

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Speaker 2: I do, too. It sounds more academic, you know?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, let's go with it.

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Speaker 2: Okay, so symbologically, all of these things are kind of

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Speaker 2: obvious in a lot of ways, but they really work,

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Speaker 2: even if they are a little on the nose. But

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Speaker 2: I said earlier that the Grim Reaper's almost loreless. He's

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Speaker 2: got no backstory. He's not some cursed soul who has to,

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Speaker 2: you know, rove the earth for eternity. Didn't do anything

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Speaker 2: wrong as far as I know. Um, it's not Fats Domino.

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Speaker 2: I looked and it's, he just doesn't have a backstory.

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Speaker 2: And the reason why is because he was assembled from

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Speaker 2: different parts and pieces over the course of centuries before

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Speaker 2: he finally, it wasn't until like the 1850s where he

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Speaker 2: had been fully packaged into what we think of as

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Speaker 2: the Grim Reaper, but he had been kind of slowly

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Speaker 2: assembling like a death-based Voltron or something. Right. Since the

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Speaker 2: 13th century, basically.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, if you go back to the European

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Speaker 1: religion in the Middle Ages, you kind of get your

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Speaker 1: first representation of the angel of death as a skeleton.

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Speaker 1: I think that was from a 13th century illustration called

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Speaker 1: The Three Living and the Three Dead, where you had

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Speaker 1: these three skeletons wearing burial shrouds. They have maggots crawling

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Speaker 1: all over them. Uh, one of the skeletons is like

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Speaker 1: peeking out from the page. It's like, like looking at

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Speaker 1: the reader and smiling. Yeah. It's a, it's a totally

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Speaker 1: cool illustration. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: I mean, it's a big, like not even a mean or,

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Speaker 2: or like, um, scary smile. Like it's a big grin. Like, Hey,

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Speaker 2: good to see you. Kind of. I love that picture.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Me too.

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Speaker 2: Um, yeah, it's not knowing, like, I know what's going

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Speaker 2: to happen to you and you're not going to like

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Speaker 2: it kind of thing. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: If we really want to see where this took hold,

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Speaker 1: you've got to look at the Black Death, which I

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Speaker 1: figure it seems like we've talked about that several times semi-recently.

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Speaker 2: I think we did an entire episode on it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, that was a while ago, but it's just popped

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Speaker 1: up here and there. Has it? Yeah, just like how

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Speaker 1: many people died, which was at least 25 million people

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Speaker 1: in the initial outbreak. Mm-hmm. And I know we talked

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Speaker 1: about this in the episode, but it changed the way

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Speaker 1: like so many people died. It changed the way that

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Speaker 1: people thought about death. Like everyone knew death was eventually coming.

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Speaker 1: But when the when the plague hit, death was at

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Speaker 1: the forefront of everybody's mind all the time.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that initial outbreak over just a couple of years,

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Speaker 2: the estimates are something like 30 to 50 percent of

395
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Speaker 2: the entire population of Europe at the time. And everybody, men, women, babies,

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Speaker 2: old people died. Rich people, poor people, everyone just started dying.

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Speaker 2: And the living were subjected to living among the dead.

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Speaker 2: And yeah, how could that not just completely alter not

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Speaker 2: just you and then the people who are young and

400
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Speaker 2: being impressed upon for the rest of their life, but

401
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Speaker 2: just society as a whole?

402
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Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure. I mean, that was a morbid pall

403
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Speaker 1: that hung over a continent. For a long time. And

404
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Speaker 1: the books that were coming out, the poems and the

405
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Speaker 1: odes and the paintings, like all this stuff was pretty

406
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Speaker 1: dark at the time. You saw a lot of skeletons,

407
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Speaker 1: never seen more skeletons in your life and paintings than

408
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Speaker 1: during the plague.

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Speaker 2: Everybody was talking about it.

410
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Speaker 1: It was the hot thing. And then eventually that would

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Speaker 1: lead to the dance macabre, the dance of death.

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Speaker 2: Yes, which I think dance macabre, D-A-N-S-E-M-A-C-A-B-R-E, is a really

413
00:21:38,560 --> 00:21:39,619
Speaker 2: cool term.

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00:21:40,300 --> 00:21:43,060
Speaker 1: Yeah, it looks like a band name or an album,

415
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Speaker 1: like a dark metal album cover or something.

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Speaker 2: I think it was a nonfiction book that Stephen King

417
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Speaker 2: wrote in the 80s, too, if I'm not mistaken.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, there's something about a slight misspelling as we know it.

419
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Speaker 1: That ups the creep factor. If it was D-A-N-C-E, it

420
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Speaker 1: is 75% less scary. Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Remember that band Dead Can Dance?

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Speaker 1: Was that with a C? Yes. If they would have

423
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Speaker 1: made it with an S, you know how scary that

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Speaker 1: band becomes?

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Speaker 2: I know. They would have only gotten booked around this

426
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Speaker 2: time of year, you know?

427
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Speaker 1: This is the one where I think of the Grateful

428
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Speaker 1: Dead sticker. I don't know if that is strictly Grateful.

429
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Speaker 1: A dance macabre, but the skeletons dancing, like that's what

430
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Speaker 1: that is, right?

431
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Speaker 2: Yeah, I think anytime you see skeletons dancing, it somehow,

432
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Speaker 2: some way has its roots in the dance macabre because

433
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Speaker 2: that's how that was the depiction. It was skeletons cavorting, dancing,

434
00:22:39,260 --> 00:22:40,740
Speaker 2: partying with the living.

435
00:22:41,109 --> 00:22:41,290
Speaker 1: Yeah.

436
00:22:41,420 --> 00:22:43,659
Speaker 2: And in a lot of cases, the living depicted in

437
00:22:43,720 --> 00:22:47,649
Speaker 2: these images like clearly aren't aware that the skeletons are

438
00:22:47,690 --> 00:22:50,750
Speaker 2: partying with them. Yeah. But they are nonetheless. So death

439
00:22:50,810 --> 00:22:53,430
Speaker 2: is always around you. And then another part of it

440
00:22:53,490 --> 00:22:56,830
Speaker 2: is like they would sometimes dance and party, lead the

441
00:22:56,890 --> 00:22:59,290
Speaker 2: party right to the grave. And that was, you know,

442
00:22:59,890 --> 00:23:03,189
Speaker 2: everybody's going to end up there eventually. That's essentially the

443
00:23:03,270 --> 00:23:06,490
Speaker 2: basic message of the dance of death. But it goes

444
00:23:06,560 --> 00:23:08,700
Speaker 2: even deeper than that, really. Yeah.

445
00:23:08,880 --> 00:23:10,780
Speaker 1: And actually, I don't do this often, but I just

446
00:23:10,800 --> 00:23:14,480
Speaker 1: looked up and apparently there was an actual event called

447
00:23:14,700 --> 00:23:19,200
Speaker 1: Dance Macabre featuring the Grateful Dead and who else? Country

448
00:23:19,240 --> 00:23:19,840
Speaker 1: Joe and the Fish.

449
00:23:20,680 --> 00:23:21,570
Speaker 2: Back in the 60s?

450
00:23:22,950 --> 00:23:24,010
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think it was 1966.

451
00:23:24,010 --> 00:23:25,250
Speaker 2: That's awesome.

452
00:23:25,750 --> 00:23:28,310
Speaker 1: Because, you know, if you want to evoke death, you

453
00:23:28,330 --> 00:23:31,470
Speaker 1: got to have. I'm going to go to the country.

454
00:23:33,010 --> 00:23:34,390
Speaker 2: Oh, is that Country Joe and the Fish?

455
00:23:34,410 --> 00:23:36,859
Speaker 1: I think so. Isn't that like their one big song?

456
00:23:37,119 --> 00:23:39,960
Speaker 2: I don't know. Oh, my God. That's hilarious.

457
00:23:40,600 --> 00:23:42,780
Speaker 1: That song is just I don't know why it's endlessly

458
00:23:42,820 --> 00:23:43,360
Speaker 1: funny to me.

459
00:23:44,020 --> 00:23:47,080
Speaker 2: That'll change the tone of an acid test like in

460
00:23:47,140 --> 00:23:47,640
Speaker 2: a snap.

461
00:23:49,160 --> 00:23:50,330
Speaker 1: I diverted it. So where were we?

462
00:23:51,050 --> 00:23:53,670
Speaker 2: We were talking about the dance macabre is basically like

463
00:23:53,710 --> 00:23:57,130
Speaker 2: death is inevitable, but there's more to it. And really

464
00:23:57,170 --> 00:23:59,300
Speaker 2: the more to it was also like the people who

465
00:23:59,320 --> 00:24:03,760
Speaker 2: are often depicted in the dance macabre illustrations were from

466
00:24:03,859 --> 00:24:06,440
Speaker 2: all stations in life, right? So there could be like

467
00:24:06,480 --> 00:24:08,960
Speaker 2: the Pope and there could be like a peasant and,

468
00:24:09,090 --> 00:24:11,429
Speaker 2: you know, some merchant or whatever. Just a bunch of

469
00:24:11,450 --> 00:24:14,510
Speaker 2: different people meant to just basically say like death does

470
00:24:14,570 --> 00:24:19,590
Speaker 2: not care about your social strata. It just levels everybody.

471
00:24:20,520 --> 00:24:23,380
Speaker 1: My brother and I used to crack up at the

472
00:24:23,500 --> 00:24:28,060
Speaker 1: Black Sabbath line. Would you like to see the Pope

473
00:24:28,180 --> 00:24:30,080
Speaker 1: at the end of a rope? Do you think he's

474
00:24:30,119 --> 00:24:34,780
Speaker 1: a fool? For some reason, maybe it was because soap

475
00:24:34,840 --> 00:24:36,240
Speaker 1: on a rope. I don't know. My brother just thought

476
00:24:36,270 --> 00:24:37,290
Speaker 1: that was the funniest thing ever.

477
00:24:37,650 --> 00:24:39,370
Speaker 2: That is pretty good. Which one is that from?

478
00:24:40,090 --> 00:24:40,970
Speaker 1: I don't even know.

479
00:24:41,310 --> 00:24:44,530
Speaker 2: It sounds familiar, but I can't place the song. Yeah.

480
00:24:44,730 --> 00:24:47,670
Speaker 1: I never thought I would literally sing twice in this episode.

481
00:24:47,830 --> 00:24:48,490
Speaker 1: Didn't see that coming.

482
00:24:48,990 --> 00:24:52,210
Speaker 2: Maybe there's a third time coming, too. You know any

483
00:24:52,270 --> 00:24:53,250
Speaker 2: Dead Can Dance songs?

484
00:24:53,850 --> 00:24:55,650
Speaker 1: Oh, I don't. But they had a hit, right?

485
00:24:56,410 --> 00:24:58,450
Speaker 2: I don't know. I just, I knew they were good.

486
00:24:58,470 --> 00:25:01,389
Speaker 2: They had a weird, they had their own unique sound,

487
00:25:01,430 --> 00:25:04,280
Speaker 2: if I'm thinking of the right one. I often confuse

488
00:25:04,300 --> 00:25:06,260
Speaker 2: them with Rusted Root, and I think they were like

489
00:25:06,400 --> 00:25:08,720
Speaker 2: nothing alike. I think Dead Can Dance was way more

490
00:25:08,760 --> 00:25:12,220
Speaker 2: like goth and dark, but also cigarose-y, maybe?

491
00:25:12,240 --> 00:25:14,040
Speaker 1: Oh, I love cigarose.

492
00:25:14,520 --> 00:25:16,970
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, you'd probably like Dead Can Dance. I think

493
00:25:16,990 --> 00:25:20,150
Speaker 2: the guy also sung like Ian Curtis from Joy Division

494
00:25:20,150 --> 00:25:20,770
Speaker 2: 2 a little bit.

495
00:25:21,230 --> 00:25:21,990
Speaker 1: Oh, well, that's good.

496
00:25:22,530 --> 00:25:24,830
Speaker 2: I could be making this up, but I'm putting together

497
00:25:24,869 --> 00:25:28,020
Speaker 2: an ideal band as I speak.

498
00:25:28,820 --> 00:25:34,320
Speaker 1: But it wasn't like Oingo Boingo. It's a dead man's party.

499
00:25:34,340 --> 00:25:34,399
Speaker 2: No.

500
00:25:34,619 --> 00:25:36,260
Speaker 1: Who can ask for more?

501
00:25:36,720 --> 00:25:39,260
Speaker 2: Do you know who the lead singer was of that band?

502
00:25:40,310 --> 00:25:41,250
Speaker 1: Come on. Seriously?

503
00:25:42,030 --> 00:25:44,600
Speaker 2: I didn't know. I should have known.

504
00:25:45,040 --> 00:25:46,520
Speaker 1: Wait, when did you find that out?

505
00:25:46,980 --> 00:25:49,480
Speaker 2: No, no, I didn't know that you knew, but I

506
00:25:49,480 --> 00:25:52,070
Speaker 2: should have known that you knew. I found that out. Man,

507
00:25:52,369 --> 00:25:54,990
Speaker 2: I was in diapers when I knew that.

508
00:25:55,810 --> 00:25:57,850
Speaker 1: The great Danny Elfman, for those of you who don't know,

509
00:25:58,550 --> 00:26:00,369
Speaker 1: and I'm not shaming you if you didn't know that,

510
00:26:00,410 --> 00:26:02,270
Speaker 1: by the way. I did just see, by the way,

511
00:26:02,390 --> 00:26:03,290
Speaker 1: I just sang a third time.

512
00:26:04,350 --> 00:26:04,890
Speaker 2: Yeah, you did.

513
00:26:06,230 --> 00:26:10,480
Speaker 1: Danny Elfman at a music festival recently did the Simpsons

514
00:26:10,560 --> 00:26:13,800
Speaker 1: theme on stage. Yeah. And it's pretty great.

515
00:26:14,220 --> 00:26:16,080
Speaker 2: Man alive. I'll bet it is. Can you imagine?

516
00:26:16,100 --> 00:26:16,580
Speaker 1: Yeah.

517
00:26:16,660 --> 00:26:18,720
Speaker 2: Where did you, what music festival?

518
00:26:19,109 --> 00:26:21,169
Speaker 1: I don't know. I just saw it on Instagram. It

519
00:26:21,190 --> 00:26:21,669
Speaker 1: popped up.

520
00:26:22,250 --> 00:26:23,610
Speaker 2: I thought you went to the music.

521
00:26:24,050 --> 00:26:25,869
Speaker 1: Oh, no, no, no. I don't know. I don't go

522
00:26:25,890 --> 00:26:27,310
Speaker 1: to this anymore. I'm too old for that stuff.

523
00:26:28,230 --> 00:26:30,129
Speaker 2: But that is cool. I'm glad you told me. I'll

524
00:26:30,210 --> 00:26:30,990
Speaker 2: have to go check it out.

525
00:26:31,010 --> 00:26:33,890
Speaker 1: All right. So back to the Dance Macabre.

526
00:26:34,090 --> 00:26:34,669
Speaker 2: Yeah.

527
00:26:35,090 --> 00:26:36,950
Speaker 1: Did you mention the first depiction of that?

528
00:26:37,300 --> 00:26:37,470
Speaker 2: No.

529
00:26:38,380 --> 00:26:41,320
Speaker 1: The first one, I think, was a big mural. on

530
00:26:41,460 --> 00:26:44,740
Speaker 1: the wall of the Charnel House at the Cemetery of

531
00:26:44,760 --> 00:26:48,810
Speaker 1: the Holy Innocents in Paris in the 1420s. But then

532
00:26:48,960 --> 00:26:52,490
Speaker 1: it became a kind of a play where you would

533
00:26:52,550 --> 00:26:55,710
Speaker 1: perform this at like, you would get some churchgoers together

534
00:26:55,790 --> 00:26:58,530
Speaker 1: and perform it in a cemetery or churchyard or something.

535
00:26:59,369 --> 00:27:04,470
Speaker 1: And it's basically a play that says like, hey, death

536
00:27:04,530 --> 00:27:06,570
Speaker 1: is coming for you and you and you, and we

537
00:27:06,609 --> 00:27:09,580
Speaker 1: all understand this, right? Mm-hmm. Yeah.

538
00:27:09,760 --> 00:27:11,820
Speaker 2: Can you just imagine the kind of spread out like

539
00:27:12,460 --> 00:27:18,690
Speaker 2: sporadic claptor at the end? People standing around the graveyard

540
00:27:18,730 --> 00:27:20,429
Speaker 2: watching it. Oh, man.

541
00:27:20,530 --> 00:27:21,790
Speaker 1: Worst performance ever.

542
00:27:23,290 --> 00:27:24,970
Speaker 2: Should we take a break or talk about some of

543
00:27:25,030 --> 00:27:26,430
Speaker 2: the symbology?

544
00:27:26,890 --> 00:27:28,530
Speaker 1: No, I'm all out of songs. So let's take a

545
00:27:28,540 --> 00:27:29,540
Speaker 1: break and we'll come back.

546
00:27:29,940 --> 00:27:31,639
Speaker 2: You could sing I'm All Out of Love first.

547
00:27:33,580 --> 00:27:34,460
Speaker 1: That's for you only, buddy.

548
00:27:34,859 --> 00:27:36,840
Speaker 2: Okay. All right. We'll take a break and you can

549
00:27:36,880 --> 00:28:13,070
Speaker 2: sing it to me then. Okay, that was a great rendition, Chuck.

550
00:28:13,109 --> 00:28:15,350
Speaker 2: I actually teared up a little bit, so thank you

551
00:28:15,390 --> 00:28:18,429
Speaker 2: for that. I feel like it really kind of reinvigorated

552
00:28:18,510 --> 00:28:19,270
Speaker 2: our partnership.

553
00:28:19,970 --> 00:28:21,530
Speaker 1: Well, I know how you feel about air supply.

554
00:28:22,460 --> 00:28:24,760
Speaker 2: So I love them. I told you about that time

555
00:28:24,780 --> 00:28:26,760
Speaker 2: Yumi and I went and saw them in Jacksonville, and

556
00:28:26,800 --> 00:28:29,640
Speaker 2: I said it was like a church tent revival somehow.

557
00:28:29,700 --> 00:28:32,770
Speaker 2: It was amazing to just be there and experience that.

558
00:28:32,890 --> 00:28:34,010
Speaker 1: That's so cool. Yeah.

559
00:28:34,609 --> 00:28:37,369
Speaker 2: So we're talking about the symbolism of the Grim Reaper,

560
00:28:37,410 --> 00:28:40,730
Speaker 2: which I said earlier is pretty– you can– just if

561
00:28:40,750 --> 00:28:42,550
Speaker 2: you stop and think about all of it, you're like, yeah,

562
00:28:42,570 --> 00:28:45,810
Speaker 2: of course that makes sense. But I don't know how

563
00:28:45,850 --> 00:28:48,770
Speaker 2: much of that is because– You're just so used to

564
00:28:48,830 --> 00:28:51,430
Speaker 2: seeing the Grim Reaper with like, say, Scythe or the

565
00:28:51,560 --> 00:28:57,219
Speaker 2: Hourglass or whatever. Or if it's because they were already

566
00:28:57,320 --> 00:29:00,260
Speaker 2: common sense elements that were added over the years to

567
00:29:00,320 --> 00:29:02,620
Speaker 2: create the whole Grim Reaper package.

568
00:29:03,380 --> 00:29:05,300
Speaker 1: Yeah, I've been saying Sith. Have I been saying it

569
00:29:05,320 --> 00:29:05,960
Speaker 1: wrong this whole time?

570
00:29:06,460 --> 00:29:10,270
Speaker 2: I think you were talking about the Dark Lords, the anti-Jedi.

571
00:29:11,810 --> 00:29:13,570
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what I was thinking.

572
00:29:14,530 --> 00:29:16,750
Speaker 2: So it makes sense. They're kind of evil.

573
00:29:17,560 --> 00:29:18,540
Speaker 1: Yeah. Scythe, isn't it?

574
00:29:19,640 --> 00:29:20,200
Speaker 2: I think so.

575
00:29:20,810 --> 00:29:22,810
Speaker 1: Yeah. And you're very sweet for not correcting me.

576
00:29:23,370 --> 00:29:25,650
Speaker 2: I didn't want to upset you.

577
00:29:26,030 --> 00:29:28,010
Speaker 1: You didn't want to upset me like all the other

578
00:29:28,050 --> 00:29:30,730
Speaker 1: times where I'm like, Josh, never do that again.

579
00:29:30,750 --> 00:29:33,990
Speaker 2: I know, man. If we had an outtake reel of

580
00:29:34,030 --> 00:29:37,210
Speaker 2: you yelling at me for correcting you, it'd be something else.

581
00:29:37,550 --> 00:29:39,700
Speaker 1: Well, hopefully you would live with the best of those,

582
00:29:39,780 --> 00:29:43,900
Speaker 1: like Casey Kasem and Bill O'Reilly. Those are so great.

583
00:29:44,100 --> 00:29:45,140
Speaker 2: And Winnebago Man.

584
00:29:46,060 --> 00:29:48,220
Speaker 1: Oh, well, sure. They made a whole documentary about that guy.

585
00:29:48,360 --> 00:29:49,160
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was great.

586
00:29:50,140 --> 00:29:52,570
Speaker 1: All right, so back to the Grim Reaper and the symbolism.

587
00:29:54,230 --> 00:29:56,790
Speaker 1: You're not surprised to hear us talk about skulls and skeletons,

588
00:29:56,850 --> 00:29:59,150
Speaker 1: of course, and this was just a a common thing

589
00:29:59,190 --> 00:30:02,430
Speaker 1: during the plague. Like people saw more bones than they'd

590
00:30:02,510 --> 00:30:05,690
Speaker 1: ever seen in their life. And so that became just

591
00:30:05,750 --> 00:30:08,430
Speaker 1: a popular depiction, obviously, in that era.

592
00:30:08,870 --> 00:30:11,370
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think it's interesting, don't you, that you can

593
00:30:11,410 --> 00:30:14,750
Speaker 2: basically place an event that essentially gave us the Grim

594
00:30:14,790 --> 00:30:16,670
Speaker 2: Reaper because it was so awful.

595
00:30:17,150 --> 00:30:17,470
Speaker 1: For sure.

596
00:30:18,390 --> 00:30:20,610
Speaker 2: So you talked about the cloak and the black cloak,

597
00:30:21,290 --> 00:30:24,390
Speaker 2: specifically in the West, black is associated with death and

598
00:30:24,430 --> 00:30:27,140
Speaker 2: mourning and funerals. I mean, have you ever seen a,

599
00:30:28,740 --> 00:30:34,540
Speaker 2: Like a bottle green hearse? You haven't. No. Sometimes they're white, though.

600
00:30:34,900 --> 00:30:36,780
Speaker 2: I feel like I've seen a white hearse here or there.

601
00:30:37,380 --> 00:30:39,960
Speaker 1: Wasn't the hearse in Six Feet Under green?

602
00:30:41,760 --> 00:30:42,380
Speaker 2: Maybe so.

603
00:30:42,400 --> 00:30:44,200
Speaker 1: Isn't that weird that you said green?

604
00:30:44,220 --> 00:30:46,320
Speaker 2: Yeah. And there's a literal.

605
00:30:47,420 --> 00:30:48,740
Speaker 1: Cultural green hearse?

606
00:30:49,220 --> 00:30:50,719
Speaker 2: Yeah. To contradict me?

607
00:30:51,010 --> 00:30:55,410
Speaker 1: Right. I think it's bottle green. I don't even know

608
00:30:55,430 --> 00:30:56,190
Speaker 1: what that is, but....

609
00:30:58,550 --> 00:31:01,690
Speaker 2: Yeah, bottle green is like a green from the 70s,

610
00:31:01,780 --> 00:31:05,440
Speaker 2: a car green, not metallic pee. This is a different

611
00:31:05,520 --> 00:31:08,120
Speaker 2: kind of like darker, more attractive green than metallic pee.

612
00:31:09,180 --> 00:31:10,480
Speaker 1: All right. Let's talk about that scythe.

613
00:31:11,520 --> 00:31:17,780
Speaker 2: Okay. The scythe itself is, this one is the money implement,

614
00:31:17,860 --> 00:31:20,870
Speaker 2: if you ask me, but it's not exactly clear what

615
00:31:20,900 --> 00:31:23,090
Speaker 2: the Grim Reaper is doing with this, right? So earlier,

616
00:31:23,110 --> 00:31:27,420
Speaker 2: the Grim Reaper used to hold the arrow and Or darts. Nah.

617
00:31:27,440 --> 00:31:29,940
Speaker 2: I guess he was a dart champion at his local pub.

618
00:31:30,280 --> 00:31:30,480
Speaker 1: Yeah.

619
00:31:30,540 --> 00:31:31,979
Speaker 2: A spear? What about a spear?

620
00:31:32,220 --> 00:31:33,300
Speaker 1: That's creepy, yeah.

621
00:31:33,640 --> 00:31:34,740
Speaker 2: What about a crossbow?

622
00:31:35,320 --> 00:31:38,310
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, that's scary, but I think I could

623
00:31:38,350 --> 00:31:42,670
Speaker 1: see a Grim Reaper with a spear in my mind's

624
00:31:42,770 --> 00:31:43,950
Speaker 1: eye more than I could a crossbow.

625
00:31:44,430 --> 00:31:46,710
Speaker 2: I'm sure the crossbow would be distracting because a lot

626
00:31:46,730 --> 00:31:48,630
Speaker 2: of people would be like, man, can I see that thing?

627
00:31:48,650 --> 00:31:50,410
Speaker 2: I want to hold the crossbow. It's pretty cool.

628
00:31:51,390 --> 00:31:52,110
Speaker 1: Have you ever shot one?

629
00:31:53,110 --> 00:31:56,490
Speaker 2: I don't think I have. I've just always admired them. Remember,

630
00:31:56,530 --> 00:31:58,030
Speaker 2: we did a whole episode on them.

631
00:31:58,390 --> 00:31:59,090
Speaker 1: Did we really?

632
00:31:59,290 --> 00:32:00,070
Speaker 2: We totally did.

633
00:32:00,650 --> 00:32:01,450
Speaker 1: Oh, good Lord.

634
00:32:01,470 --> 00:32:03,870
Speaker 2: I think we both kind of fanboyed out the whole time.

635
00:32:06,290 --> 00:32:10,590
Speaker 1: Yeah. So eventually it became the scythe. And, you know,

636
00:32:10,730 --> 00:32:13,190
Speaker 1: it was, I think I said earlier, like this thing

637
00:32:13,730 --> 00:32:16,410
Speaker 1: was used with a big swing to bring down a

638
00:32:16,430 --> 00:32:20,530
Speaker 1: lot of grain. So I think just sort of symbologically, yeah.

639
00:32:21,570 --> 00:32:25,020
Speaker 1: The idea of a scythe like sweeping through and taking

640
00:32:25,100 --> 00:32:27,990
Speaker 1: out humans is like a pretty good visual or, you know,

641
00:32:28,020 --> 00:32:29,230
Speaker 1: at least creepy. Right.

642
00:32:29,260 --> 00:32:31,800
Speaker 2: Especially during a plague like the Black Death, where a

643
00:32:31,820 --> 00:32:34,260
Speaker 2: lot of people were cut down at the same time.

644
00:32:35,920 --> 00:32:39,300
Speaker 2: So and that's where the scythe got added was out

645
00:32:39,340 --> 00:32:42,480
Speaker 2: of that experience. Right. So it totally makes sense. Plus, also,

646
00:32:42,540 --> 00:32:44,460
Speaker 2: this is like an agrarian society.

647
00:32:44,660 --> 00:32:45,160
Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.

648
00:32:45,400 --> 00:32:50,640
Speaker 2: Like that whole allegory of death coming along to harvest souls.

649
00:32:51,120 --> 00:32:53,870
Speaker 2: In just the same way that a farmer comes along

650
00:32:53,890 --> 00:32:57,450
Speaker 2: and harvests wheat and say like the fall when the

651
00:32:57,490 --> 00:33:00,750
Speaker 2: earth itself is about to die. All of it is,

652
00:33:01,090 --> 00:33:03,830
Speaker 2: it's a pretty good analogy, I think, or it's a

653
00:33:03,830 --> 00:33:04,650
Speaker 2: pretty good prop.

654
00:33:05,180 --> 00:33:05,360
Speaker 1: Yeah.

655
00:33:05,680 --> 00:33:10,040
Speaker 2: The question is, does the Grim Reaper use the scythe

656
00:33:10,100 --> 00:33:12,540
Speaker 2: to cut you down and take your life? Or is

657
00:33:12,560 --> 00:33:14,760
Speaker 2: he just holding the scythe because it's just part of

658
00:33:14,800 --> 00:33:19,080
Speaker 2: his whole look? That's unclear. The fact that he used

659
00:33:19,120 --> 00:33:22,200
Speaker 2: to hold arrows and darts and spears and crossbows makes

660
00:33:22,270 --> 00:33:24,930
Speaker 2: it seem like the scythe is the implement he uses

661
00:33:25,310 --> 00:33:28,350
Speaker 2: to cut your life out. He also used to carry

662
00:33:28,410 --> 00:33:31,390
Speaker 2: a candle snuffer I saw sometimes. So that makes it

663
00:33:31,430 --> 00:33:35,770
Speaker 2: seem like he's actively taking your life. But if you

664
00:33:35,810 --> 00:33:40,050
Speaker 2: think about more modern depictions of the Grim Reaper... Maybe

665
00:33:40,190 --> 00:33:42,090
Speaker 2: once in a while if he touches you. I think

666
00:33:42,150 --> 00:33:43,870
Speaker 2: there was a Grim Reaper that touched your head and

667
00:33:43,890 --> 00:33:46,250
Speaker 2: it killed you. I don't remember on what. But for

668
00:33:46,290 --> 00:33:49,250
Speaker 2: the most part, he's just there. He's like a bureaucrat

669
00:33:49,310 --> 00:33:52,130
Speaker 2: collector is basically what he seems to be depicted as

670
00:33:52,230 --> 00:33:53,990
Speaker 2: mostly these days. Yeah.

671
00:33:54,170 --> 00:33:56,300
Speaker 1: So like he walks up, you see the scythe, and

672
00:33:56,320 --> 00:33:58,480
Speaker 1: you're like, oh. And he goes, that's just for show.

673
00:33:58,580 --> 00:34:01,580
Speaker 1: Don't worry about the scythe.

674
00:34:01,960 --> 00:34:02,940
Speaker 2: It's made of plastic.

675
00:34:03,300 --> 00:34:05,340
Speaker 1: That's right. And he bends the blade like, see?

676
00:34:06,340 --> 00:34:08,640
Speaker 2: It's a retractable scythe blade.

677
00:34:11,190 --> 00:34:15,509
Speaker 1: The hourglass is another symbol. You know, obviously, you know

678
00:34:15,530 --> 00:34:17,609
Speaker 1: what an hourglass is. It has the two bulbs with

679
00:34:17,630 --> 00:34:20,169
Speaker 1: the sand. And I believe it takes an hour for

680
00:34:20,250 --> 00:34:22,240
Speaker 1: the sand to fall from one bulb to the next.

681
00:34:22,340 --> 00:34:25,420
Speaker 1: But if the Grim Reaper walks up to you or

682
00:34:25,700 --> 00:34:29,000
Speaker 1: here's a fun trick, get like a foot tall hourglass

683
00:34:29,620 --> 00:34:32,860
Speaker 1: and just like walk up to somebody's table in an

684
00:34:32,960 --> 00:34:35,980
Speaker 1: outdoor cafe with a creepy look on your face and

685
00:34:36,040 --> 00:34:37,700
Speaker 1: look him in the eye and turn it upside down

686
00:34:37,739 --> 00:34:41,489
Speaker 1: and walk away and leave it on their table. The

687
00:34:41,530 --> 00:34:45,010
Speaker 1: message isn't, you know, if you finish that meal before

688
00:34:45,090 --> 00:34:46,410
Speaker 1: the hourglass is up, it's free.

689
00:34:48,010 --> 00:34:51,969
Speaker 2: I would take it like that. Yeah. So, yeah, the

690
00:34:51,989 --> 00:34:55,760
Speaker 2: hourglass also, I mean, now you're conflating time with death, right?

691
00:34:55,820 --> 00:34:59,680
Speaker 2: Everybody has a certain amount of time. So, yeah, I mean,

692
00:34:59,800 --> 00:35:02,020
Speaker 2: you put all those together, you get yourself a Grim Reaper.

693
00:35:02,200 --> 00:35:05,960
Speaker 2: There's not too many other implements. He's pretty, he travels light,

694
00:35:06,120 --> 00:35:06,500
Speaker 2: I guess.

695
00:35:07,060 --> 00:35:08,239
Speaker 1: He rides a horse, right? Yeah.

696
00:35:08,580 --> 00:35:12,060
Speaker 2: Yeah. I don't know. That's not necessarily true. So he

697
00:35:12,140 --> 00:35:16,410
Speaker 2: rides a horse if the Grim Reaper is also considered

698
00:35:16,450 --> 00:35:21,230
Speaker 2: the same as the horseman Death, who rode a pale

699
00:35:21,290 --> 00:35:25,770
Speaker 2: horse to bring about the apocalypse along with war, pestilence,

700
00:35:25,810 --> 00:35:26,390
Speaker 2: and famine.

701
00:35:27,010 --> 00:35:27,850
Speaker 1: In the Bible, that is.

702
00:35:28,710 --> 00:35:32,240
Speaker 2: I should say that, yes. So the reason we bring

703
00:35:32,280 --> 00:35:37,420
Speaker 2: that up— well, you brought it up— is because that horseman, one

704
00:35:37,460 --> 00:35:41,210
Speaker 2: of the four horsemen, was— is often depicted as looking

705
00:35:41,290 --> 00:35:43,570
Speaker 2: identical to the Grim Reaper. He's just on a horse.

706
00:35:44,010 --> 00:35:46,270
Speaker 1: Yeah. You got pestilence, you got war, you got famine,

707
00:35:46,290 --> 00:35:49,680
Speaker 1: you got death. And those are the four equestrians.

708
00:35:49,700 --> 00:35:53,299
Speaker 2: That's right. I guess death is the only one that's

709
00:35:53,360 --> 00:35:56,219
Speaker 2: specifically named in the Bible and they call him Thanatos.

710
00:35:57,020 --> 00:35:59,660
Speaker 1: Oh, really? All right. From the ancient Greek.

711
00:36:00,820 --> 00:36:03,299
Speaker 2: I guess so. He was supposed to be friendly, not,

712
00:36:03,660 --> 00:36:07,069
Speaker 2: you know. horseman of the apocalypse, something happened to him.

713
00:36:07,130 --> 00:36:09,670
Speaker 2: I guess he got dumped and took it really hard, maybe.

714
00:36:11,190 --> 00:36:13,750
Speaker 2: And do you remember I said that he didn't come

715
00:36:13,950 --> 00:36:16,860
Speaker 2: as a full package until the middle of the 19th century?

716
00:36:17,260 --> 00:36:19,940
Speaker 2: That's when he finally got the name, the Grim Reaper.

717
00:36:20,420 --> 00:36:23,500
Speaker 2: And it came from a Christian devotional text called Circle

718
00:36:23,520 --> 00:36:27,200
Speaker 2: of Human Life. That's where the name Grim Reaper originally

719
00:36:27,440 --> 00:36:27,839
Speaker 2: came from.

720
00:36:27,860 --> 00:36:29,839
Speaker 1: I love it. Do we know who wrote that?

721
00:36:30,500 --> 00:36:30,660
Speaker 2: No.

722
00:36:31,860 --> 00:36:32,160
Speaker 1: All right.

723
00:36:32,830 --> 00:36:33,450
Speaker 2: Jack Handy.

724
00:36:36,390 --> 00:36:37,549
Speaker 1: Well, now we're at the part where we can talk

725
00:36:37,590 --> 00:36:39,360
Speaker 1: about a little bit more of the fun stuff in

726
00:36:39,380 --> 00:36:41,860
Speaker 1: pop culture. We promised to talk of Bill and Ted,

727
00:36:41,920 --> 00:36:45,540
Speaker 1: but the way it's handled in Bill and Ted is

728
00:36:45,580 --> 00:36:47,600
Speaker 1: the way that it's handled in a lot of cases,

729
00:36:47,640 --> 00:36:50,390
Speaker 1: like I mentioned, is where someone's trying to cheat death.

730
00:36:50,930 --> 00:36:53,649
Speaker 1: A lot of times in stories and movies and books

731
00:36:53,710 --> 00:36:56,169
Speaker 1: and stuff, it's like someone's trying to trick the Grim

732
00:36:56,210 --> 00:37:01,740
Speaker 1: Reaper to escape death, maybe steal that scythe, maybe break

733
00:37:01,780 --> 00:37:05,410
Speaker 1: that hourglass or something. Mm-hmm. And it can be funny, obviously,

734
00:37:05,430 --> 00:37:07,130
Speaker 1: in the case of Bill and Ted's, or it can

735
00:37:07,170 --> 00:37:11,109
Speaker 1: be very symbolic and kind of heavy if you're talking

736
00:37:11,150 --> 00:37:12,830
Speaker 1: about Bergman's The Seventh Seal.

737
00:37:13,890 --> 00:37:16,670
Speaker 2: I've never seen The Seventh Seal. Have you? No.

738
00:37:16,989 --> 00:37:19,550
Speaker 1: I mean, I've seen clips of it in film classes

739
00:37:19,590 --> 00:37:22,810
Speaker 1: and stuff, but it's, you know, that type of Bergman

740
00:37:22,830 --> 00:37:25,090
Speaker 1: stuff is a tough watch for me.

741
00:37:25,890 --> 00:37:30,580
Speaker 2: Yeah, I've seen it depicted in like perfume ads sometimes.

742
00:37:30,600 --> 00:37:31,779
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah.

743
00:37:31,900 --> 00:37:33,779
Speaker 2: You know, like they always seem to be kind of

744
00:37:33,820 --> 00:37:37,180
Speaker 2: tapping into that somehow. But essentially, it's like an existential

745
00:37:37,380 --> 00:37:44,020
Speaker 2: angst type movie where in this film, very famously, a crusader,

746
00:37:44,060 --> 00:37:47,400
Speaker 2: a knight on his way back from the Crusades, finds

747
00:37:47,500 --> 00:37:52,000
Speaker 2: death waiting for him. And to basically say like, I'm

748
00:37:52,020 --> 00:37:53,719
Speaker 2: not ready to die yet. How about this death? Let's

749
00:37:53,739 --> 00:37:56,250
Speaker 2: play a game of chess. And Death, I guess, kind

750
00:37:56,270 --> 00:37:59,589
Speaker 2: of bored is like, all right, let's play. And Death

751
00:37:59,670 --> 00:38:02,750
Speaker 2: actually loses. I don't know what happens after that. But

752
00:38:02,790 --> 00:38:07,240
Speaker 2: the upshot of the Seventh Seal in mentioning this personification

753
00:38:07,280 --> 00:38:09,759
Speaker 2: of Death is because if you ever see Death in

754
00:38:09,800 --> 00:38:12,880
Speaker 2: a black cloak with just a white, like super pale face,

755
00:38:12,980 --> 00:38:17,450
Speaker 2: they're pointing to the Seventh Seal, that depiction of Death.

756
00:38:17,610 --> 00:38:20,830
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, for sure. And that's where exactly where Bill

757
00:38:20,850 --> 00:38:25,660
Speaker 1: and Ted were trying to pull from because... they challenge

758
00:38:25,719 --> 00:38:31,049
Speaker 1: him to a game, except in this case, it's Battleship. Yes.

759
00:38:31,590 --> 00:38:35,730
Speaker 2: And if you want to find a piece of bizarre

760
00:38:35,910 --> 00:38:40,780
Speaker 2: AI slop, go look up the enigmatic legacy of William

761
00:38:40,840 --> 00:38:45,540
Speaker 2: Sadler's Grim Reaper. It's the strangest article I've ever read.

762
00:38:46,180 --> 00:38:49,160
Speaker 2: And I'm You didn't get to read it, did you?

763
00:38:49,219 --> 00:38:51,239
Speaker 2: I sent it to you and you said it came

764
00:38:51,280 --> 00:38:52,219
Speaker 2: up with a virus alert.

765
00:38:53,320 --> 00:38:56,220
Speaker 1: He sent me two links that were both virus alerts

766
00:38:56,480 --> 00:39:00,300
Speaker 1: to the point where I thought someone had like hijacked

767
00:39:00,320 --> 00:39:01,680
Speaker 1: your phone or something.

768
00:39:02,040 --> 00:39:04,430
Speaker 2: No, this is really a thing. I stumbled upon it.

769
00:39:04,680 --> 00:39:09,040
Speaker 2: William Sadler is the guy, the actor, the very frequently

770
00:39:09,160 --> 00:39:12,220
Speaker 2: used character actor who plays death in Bill and Ted's

771
00:39:12,260 --> 00:39:16,219
Speaker 2: Bogus Journey. But this article writes about it as if

772
00:39:16,280 --> 00:39:20,879
Speaker 2: the cultural impact of his depiction of death was just

773
00:39:20,980 --> 00:39:24,970
Speaker 2: so sweeping and so wide that it changed art forever, basically.

774
00:39:24,989 --> 00:39:28,430
Speaker 2: It's just completely mad and made up. And then even

775
00:39:28,510 --> 00:39:32,320
Speaker 2: more bizarre, the pictorial... in it are all of Prince William.

776
00:39:32,760 --> 00:39:35,020
Speaker 2: There's no, and he doesn't look anything like that. It's

777
00:39:35,080 --> 00:39:38,100
Speaker 2: just normal stock photos of Prince William. And I want

778
00:39:38,140 --> 00:39:41,120
Speaker 2: to know what AI test produced that because it is

779
00:39:41,219 --> 00:39:44,560
Speaker 2: a very strange article. I just happened to stumble upon.

780
00:39:45,080 --> 00:39:48,279
Speaker 1: Yeah. I think I'd rather hear your description of it. Actually,

781
00:39:48,320 --> 00:39:48,739
Speaker 1: that's more fun.

782
00:39:49,510 --> 00:39:53,580
Speaker 2: Pretty funny to read, though, in itself. Sure. So what else?

783
00:39:54,320 --> 00:39:56,980
Speaker 1: Well, you've got the Blue Oyster Cult, or just Blue

784
00:39:57,040 --> 00:40:01,300
Speaker 1: Oyster Cult, and their cowbell-heavy song, Don't Fear the Reaper,

785
00:40:01,440 --> 00:40:03,989
Speaker 1: of course. Don't Fear in parentheses.

786
00:40:04,850 --> 00:40:07,330
Speaker 2: The Reaper. I don't know why they did that, because

787
00:40:07,770 --> 00:40:10,390
Speaker 2: they never just say the Reaper. It's always Don't Fear

788
00:40:10,430 --> 00:40:10,850
Speaker 2: the Reaper.

789
00:40:11,489 --> 00:40:14,670
Speaker 1: Yeah, the 70s, they were just wild about the parentheticals

790
00:40:14,730 --> 00:40:15,310
Speaker 1: for some reason.

791
00:40:15,350 --> 00:40:18,719
Speaker 2: Yeah, they were. Like, I'm All Out of Love by

792
00:40:18,820 --> 00:40:23,910
Speaker 2: Air Supply. Did you read that poem by Emily Dickinson,

793
00:40:23,969 --> 00:40:25,630
Speaker 2: Because I Could Not Stop for Death?

794
00:40:26,390 --> 00:40:27,790
Speaker 1: Yeah, I read that in college.

795
00:40:28,210 --> 00:40:29,610
Speaker 2: I had never read it before, and I went and

796
00:40:29,630 --> 00:40:32,210
Speaker 2: read it today. And it is a beautiful, it's a

797
00:40:32,250 --> 00:40:36,750
Speaker 2: nice short read, very crisp, efficient, economical. And it's just

798
00:40:36,790 --> 00:40:39,569
Speaker 2: basically about her riding in a cart through death and

799
00:40:39,610 --> 00:40:41,690
Speaker 2: going past all the phases of her life until she

800
00:40:41,790 --> 00:40:45,319
Speaker 2: ends up at the grave. And she seems pretty okay

801
00:40:45,340 --> 00:40:45,610
Speaker 2: with it.

802
00:40:46,550 --> 00:40:48,090
Speaker 1: Yeah, E.D., one of the best.

803
00:40:48,489 --> 00:40:52,780
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's definitely worth reading, everybody. Of course, the Ghost

804
00:40:52,820 --> 00:40:56,600
Speaker 2: of Christmas Yet to Come was very clearly based on

805
00:40:56,640 --> 00:41:01,700
Speaker 2: the Grim Reaper, although that's often depicted as somebody you

806
00:41:01,800 --> 00:41:05,270
Speaker 2: just don't see, like you don't see necessarily as a skeleton.

807
00:41:05,350 --> 00:41:06,930
Speaker 2: It's just basically hidden in shadow.

808
00:41:07,770 --> 00:41:08,649
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, for sure.

809
00:41:10,190 --> 00:41:13,830
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I think that's a great inclusion by Dickens.

810
00:41:14,390 --> 00:41:16,989
Speaker 1: Yeah. Uh, I want to throw out death takes a

811
00:41:17,030 --> 00:41:22,069
Speaker 1: holiday because that was actually remade into a pretty bad movie. Uh,

812
00:41:22,110 --> 00:41:24,089
Speaker 1: the 1934 film was supposed to be good. I never

813
00:41:24,130 --> 00:41:26,690
Speaker 1: saw it, but it was about death decision to take

814
00:41:26,730 --> 00:41:30,230
Speaker 1: a break basically, uh, and like take a mortal form

815
00:41:30,290 --> 00:41:33,470
Speaker 1: and see what that's like. And the 1998 remake was

816
00:41:33,510 --> 00:41:36,459
Speaker 1: of course, meet Joe black, uh, with Brad Pitt is death.

817
00:41:36,500 --> 00:41:38,160
Speaker 1: And it's, it's, I never saw it because it was,

818
00:41:38,239 --> 00:41:39,680
Speaker 1: it's pretty legendarily bad.

819
00:41:40,670 --> 00:41:42,350
Speaker 2: Oh, you didn't see it? It is as bad as

820
00:41:42,370 --> 00:41:46,580
Speaker 2: you think. He acts blank, and you get the impression

821
00:41:46,620 --> 00:41:48,339
Speaker 2: that he's just kind of being himself in a lot

822
00:41:48,380 --> 00:41:48,760
Speaker 2: of ways.

823
00:41:49,780 --> 00:41:50,360
Speaker 1: Oh, interesting.

824
00:41:50,480 --> 00:41:54,500
Speaker 2: It's a very strange— he made some strange choices. Almost as

825
00:41:54,540 --> 00:41:57,050
Speaker 2: strange as the voice he used as the Amish man

826
00:41:57,110 --> 00:42:01,550
Speaker 2: in 12 Years a Slave, which almost threw the entire

827
00:42:01,610 --> 00:42:04,630
Speaker 2: movie off the rails. It was such a weird decision.

828
00:42:05,150 --> 00:42:08,850
Speaker 2: It's so weird. But there's a Simpsons treehouse of horror.

829
00:42:09,320 --> 00:42:10,800
Speaker 2: That kind of plays off of that.

830
00:42:11,300 --> 00:42:13,359
Speaker 1: Of Meet Joe Black? A little bit.

831
00:42:13,390 --> 00:42:16,390
Speaker 2: Or Death Takes a Holiday, where Homer accidentally kills Death,

832
00:42:16,850 --> 00:42:20,029
Speaker 2: and so everybody stops dying. So Homer actually has to

833
00:42:20,070 --> 00:42:22,870
Speaker 2: become Death, and it's a really good one for sure.

834
00:42:22,910 --> 00:42:26,370
Speaker 2: I think it's called Reaper Madness.

835
00:42:27,590 --> 00:42:28,590
Speaker 1: That's so good.

836
00:42:28,610 --> 00:42:29,630
Speaker 2: They are so great.

837
00:42:30,530 --> 00:42:32,790
Speaker 1: I did just see Obsession, by the way. Not about

838
00:42:32,810 --> 00:42:34,790
Speaker 1: the Grim Reaper, but I know that you had recommended that,

839
00:42:34,810 --> 00:42:35,870
Speaker 1: and I finally checked it out.

840
00:42:36,170 --> 00:42:37,070
Speaker 2: It's a good one, isn't it?

841
00:42:37,640 --> 00:42:40,359
Speaker 1: Yeah, I thought it was good. You know, a pretty

842
00:42:41,100 --> 00:42:42,640
Speaker 1: clever idea done well.

843
00:42:43,400 --> 00:42:45,799
Speaker 2: Yeah. I don't remember the name of the actor, but

844
00:42:46,520 --> 00:42:47,980
Speaker 2: the main girlfriend.

845
00:42:48,000 --> 00:42:48,859
Speaker 1: Oh, man, she was so good.

846
00:42:50,110 --> 00:42:53,370
Speaker 2: Somebody was saying there's like Oscar buzz around her and

847
00:42:53,390 --> 00:42:57,410
Speaker 2: it would be a really unusual, non-traditional Oscar. I'd love it.

848
00:42:57,410 --> 00:43:01,170
Speaker 2: But if you give actors Oscars for their performance, she

849
00:43:01,410 --> 00:43:03,250
Speaker 2: definitely should be in the running for sure.

850
00:43:03,780 --> 00:43:05,580
Speaker 1: No, she was fantastic.

851
00:43:06,160 --> 00:43:08,400
Speaker 2: It was great, though, but not as good as Back Rooms.

852
00:43:12,100 --> 00:43:13,980
Speaker 1: I think I liked it more as far as enjoying

853
00:43:14,020 --> 00:43:16,240
Speaker 1: a movie, but I thought Back Rooms was definitely more

854
00:43:16,980 --> 00:43:19,040
Speaker 1: kind of creative and out there.

855
00:43:19,200 --> 00:43:23,290
Speaker 2: Yeah, I got shouted down at dinner last night with you, me,

856
00:43:23,310 --> 00:43:26,730
Speaker 2: and my sister-in-law and brother-in-law and niece. All of them

857
00:43:26,810 --> 00:43:28,130
Speaker 2: didn't like Back Rooms either.

858
00:43:28,150 --> 00:43:31,969
Speaker 1: Oh, I liked Back Rooms. It fell apart for me

859
00:43:32,010 --> 00:43:33,989
Speaker 1: more after I sort of thought about it more.

860
00:43:34,010 --> 00:43:35,450
Speaker 2: La, la, la, la, la, la, la.

861
00:43:36,320 --> 00:43:39,640
Speaker 1: But I did like it for sure, but I liked

862
00:43:39,700 --> 00:43:40,200
Speaker 1: Obsession more.

863
00:43:41,320 --> 00:43:43,120
Speaker 2: I got you. And then there's a third one I

864
00:43:43,180 --> 00:43:47,860
Speaker 2: can't think of right now. Oh, yeah. Disclosure Day. I

865
00:43:47,900 --> 00:43:49,799
Speaker 2: didn't see that. Is that any good or not? Didn't

866
00:43:49,820 --> 00:43:50,200
Speaker 2: you see it?

867
00:43:50,700 --> 00:43:53,450
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's on the theater. Yeah, I like a really

868
00:43:53,489 --> 00:43:55,109
Speaker 1: good Steven Spielberg movie, I thought. All right.

869
00:43:55,430 --> 00:43:56,069
Speaker 2: I'll check it out.

870
00:43:56,350 --> 00:43:57,069
Speaker 1: Not scary, though.

871
00:43:57,830 --> 00:43:59,810
Speaker 2: You know how sometimes when you don't hear as much

872
00:43:59,910 --> 00:44:02,370
Speaker 2: buzz about something as you expect to, you just presume

873
00:44:02,410 --> 00:44:04,469
Speaker 2: it wasn't very good? That's kind of what happened with

874
00:44:04,510 --> 00:44:05,190
Speaker 2: me in that movie.

875
00:44:05,950 --> 00:44:07,799
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't think it lit it up, lit

876
00:44:07,820 --> 00:44:09,799
Speaker 1: the critics on fire, but I thought it was good.

877
00:44:09,980 --> 00:44:11,280
Speaker 1: Had a little bit of Spielberg magic.

878
00:44:12,380 --> 00:44:16,239
Speaker 2: Let's rattle off a couple more very famous or very

879
00:44:16,440 --> 00:44:18,660
Speaker 2: creative uses of the Grim Reaper, okay?

880
00:44:19,219 --> 00:44:19,839
Speaker 1: All right. What you got?

881
00:44:20,360 --> 00:44:23,800
Speaker 2: The Discworld novels by Terry Pratchett. Death is actually a

882
00:44:23,840 --> 00:44:27,620
Speaker 2: main character who comes to become very fond of humans

883
00:44:28,590 --> 00:44:32,290
Speaker 2: and is kind of an offbeat take on death. Death

884
00:44:32,390 --> 00:44:35,090
Speaker 2: rides a horse. A pale horse, but the horse is

885
00:44:35,140 --> 00:44:39,480
Speaker 2: named Binky. And Death has a granddaughter named Susan. So

886
00:44:39,500 --> 00:44:42,299
Speaker 2: it kind of gives you a rough sketch of what

887
00:44:42,340 --> 00:44:45,060
Speaker 2: the Discworld novels, the fantasy novels are like. They sound

888
00:44:45,080 --> 00:44:45,460
Speaker 2: pretty good.

889
00:44:45,860 --> 00:44:46,739
Speaker 1: Yeah, haven't heard of those.

890
00:44:47,280 --> 00:44:48,489
Speaker 2: Have you ever seen Dead Like Me?

891
00:44:52,090 --> 00:44:54,030
Speaker 1: Who was in that? Was that Christina Applegate?

892
00:44:54,790 --> 00:44:58,210
Speaker 2: I don't know. No, no. Oh, what was that movie?

893
00:44:58,850 --> 00:45:00,700
Speaker 2: That was a good one, too. Or not a movie.

894
00:45:00,739 --> 00:45:01,440
Speaker 1: That was a show.

895
00:45:01,700 --> 00:45:03,120
Speaker 2: I can't remember what it was called.

896
00:45:03,800 --> 00:45:04,650
Speaker 1: That's something, wasn't it?

897
00:45:04,920 --> 00:45:07,120
Speaker 2: Yeah. I don't remember what that was. No, this is different.

898
00:45:07,160 --> 00:45:11,120
Speaker 2: It's about a girl who dies. And rather than going on,

899
00:45:11,200 --> 00:45:13,759
Speaker 2: she gets recruited to be a Grim Reaper. So kind

900
00:45:13,800 --> 00:45:17,520
Speaker 2: of like Anku. It's like recently killed people have to

901
00:45:17,719 --> 00:45:19,319
Speaker 2: act as Grim Reapers. It's pretty cute.

902
00:45:20,160 --> 00:45:20,500
Speaker 1: Ah, okay.

903
00:45:21,239 --> 00:45:24,060
Speaker 2: And then there's the Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy,

904
00:45:24,080 --> 00:45:26,060
Speaker 2: the cartoon. It's pretty great.

905
00:45:26,080 --> 00:45:26,660
Speaker 1: Haven't heard of that.

906
00:45:27,120 --> 00:45:30,529
Speaker 2: And then let's end this on the MST3K. One of

907
00:45:30,590 --> 00:45:36,230
Speaker 2: the best Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes ever was Soul Taker.

908
00:45:37,430 --> 00:45:40,910
Speaker 2: And it has Joe Estevez in it as the main

909
00:45:40,950 --> 00:45:43,299
Speaker 2: soul taker. And I can't remember the other actor's name.

910
00:45:43,320 --> 00:45:48,060
Speaker 2: He's got a very famously has an enormous face. But

911
00:45:48,260 --> 00:45:52,180
Speaker 2: they are these like, again, recently dead dudes who are

912
00:45:52,239 --> 00:45:57,540
Speaker 2: tasked with collecting souls into these rubber glow rings, essentially.

913
00:45:57,620 --> 00:45:59,360
Speaker 2: And then they take you to the afterworld.

914
00:46:00,010 --> 00:46:00,690
Speaker 1: What's the name of that one?

915
00:46:01,270 --> 00:46:03,330
Speaker 2: Soul Taker.

916
00:46:04,250 --> 00:46:08,210
Speaker 1: Soul Taker with an actor with a famously large face.

917
00:46:08,530 --> 00:46:11,530
Speaker 2: At least if you are familiar with B and C movies,

918
00:46:12,170 --> 00:46:14,360
Speaker 2: he is famous for his very large face.

919
00:46:15,489 --> 00:46:18,759
Speaker 1: Hmm. I'm going to have to see who that guy is.

920
00:46:18,960 --> 00:46:23,239
Speaker 2: You should. You can also see Ninja Cop. He's a

921
00:46:23,239 --> 00:46:24,939
Speaker 2: bad guy in Ninja Cop, too.

922
00:46:25,580 --> 00:46:29,380
Speaker 1: And that actor's name is Robert Zadar.

923
00:46:29,940 --> 00:46:32,860
Speaker 2: Yes, that's exactly right. I would never have come up

924
00:46:32,900 --> 00:46:35,040
Speaker 2: with it, but yes, I've heard that before.

925
00:46:35,620 --> 00:46:36,140
Speaker 1: That's the dude.

926
00:46:36,880 --> 00:46:40,520
Speaker 2: Okay, well, Chuck just found out the name of Robert Zadar,

927
00:46:41,080 --> 00:46:44,469
Speaker 2: and as predicted in 2008, when Jerry broke open that

928
00:46:44,650 --> 00:46:49,489
Speaker 2: envelope containing the eighth seal, we just triggered listener mail.

929
00:46:49,510 --> 00:46:55,190
Speaker 1: That's right, this is by a cat named Chester. Hey guys,

930
00:46:55,210 --> 00:46:56,739
Speaker 1: my family and I have enjoyed your show, and I

931
00:46:56,800 --> 00:47:00,660
Speaker 1: recently got my 10-year-old interested. On road trips and playing

932
00:47:01,100 --> 00:47:02,799
Speaker 1: out loud to help my kid to go to sleep,

933
00:47:02,820 --> 00:47:05,380
Speaker 1: your voices are becoming a regular sound in my home. However,

934
00:47:05,400 --> 00:47:08,780
Speaker 1: I have a cat named Chester who's taken to digging

935
00:47:08,940 --> 00:47:11,580
Speaker 1: at my phone when I play your podcast out loud.

936
00:47:12,219 --> 00:47:14,379
Speaker 1: He's gotten so irritated by your voices that it's become

937
00:47:14,400 --> 00:47:17,339
Speaker 1: a routine to move my phone around or literally hold

938
00:47:17,390 --> 00:47:21,310
Speaker 1: him back while playing your show. I've experimented with you

939
00:47:21,330 --> 00:47:23,370
Speaker 1: because this is my question is like, is it everything?

940
00:47:23,870 --> 00:47:27,110
Speaker 1: I've experimented with music and other podcasts, but it's just you. Wow.

941
00:47:27,840 --> 00:47:30,640
Speaker 1: When I play just your podcast, he is set on

942
00:47:30,700 --> 00:47:34,990
Speaker 1: destroying you too. Help, guys. My screen is getting scratched.

943
00:47:35,110 --> 00:47:38,529
Speaker 1: Please apologize to Chester for whatever you did that offended him.

944
00:47:38,550 --> 00:47:40,710
Speaker 1: He's a smart cat. He might forgive you. And we

945
00:47:40,750 --> 00:47:42,330
Speaker 1: can listen to you in peace in my house again.

946
00:47:42,350 --> 00:47:47,299
Speaker 1: That is Lasko and family. So, Chester, we want to

947
00:47:47,340 --> 00:47:47,879
Speaker 1: say to you.

948
00:47:47,900 --> 00:47:49,719
Speaker 2: Meow, meow, meow.

949
00:47:50,219 --> 00:47:53,960
Speaker 1: Meow, meow, meow. Meow, meow, meow.

950
00:47:54,560 --> 00:47:57,339
Speaker 2: Yeah. And meow, meow, meow for me as well.

951
00:47:58,890 --> 00:47:59,170
Speaker 1: Agreed.

952
00:48:00,390 --> 00:48:05,430
Speaker 2: Well, thank you from Lasko and family. And again, Mao Chester,

953
00:48:06,090 --> 00:48:09,390
Speaker 2: really Mao from the bottom of our mouth. If you

954
00:48:09,410 --> 00:48:11,759
Speaker 2: want to be like Lasko and get in touch with us,

955
00:48:12,050 --> 00:48:14,859
Speaker 2: you can send us an email. Send it off to

956
00:48:14,880 --> 00:48:19,500
Speaker 2: Mao podcast at Mao radio dot Mao.

957
00:48:23,100 --> 00:48:25,960
Speaker 1: Stuff You Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For

958
00:48:25,980 --> 00:48:30,110
Speaker 1: more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app. Apple Podcasts

959
00:48:30,270 --> 00:48:32,050
Speaker 1: are wherever you listen to your favorite shows.