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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow your Mind from how Stuff

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Speaker 1: Works dot com. Hey you welcome to Stuff to Blow

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Speaker 1: your Mind. My name is Robert Lamb and I'm Joe

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Speaker 1: McCormick and Robert. I just have one thing to say,

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Speaker 1: and that is remember Highland. Ah, Yes, your home five

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Speaker 1: years ago on the planet seized. Yes, you're referring, of course,

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Speaker 1: to the film Highlander to one of the most Uh wait,

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Speaker 1: you're forgetting the most important part of the title, Highlander

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Speaker 1: to coal in the Quickening. I've lost track of all

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Speaker 1: the subtitles for this film. There's like because it's like,

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Speaker 1: there's Highlander to colon the Quickening, colon the Renegade edition.

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Speaker 1: I mean, there's been so many cuts of this over

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Speaker 1: over time, but for the most part, in this episode,

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Speaker 1: we're getting back to the theatrical cut of Highlander two.

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Speaker 1: We're talking about Highlander two as presumably somebody we saw

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Speaker 1: in the theater when it came out, and then a

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Speaker 1: lot of us saw on VHS when it hit our

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Speaker 1: local video rental stores. Now, we've been threatening to do

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Speaker 1: this episode on Highlander too, Nate, not just threatening. We've

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Speaker 1: been promising to do it for probably over a year now,

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Speaker 1: and people. Some people say, what are you talking about?

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Speaker 1: Why would you do that? And other people say, when

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Speaker 1: is the Highlander too episode coming? So that latter group,

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Speaker 1: you're about to be very happy that former group. Here

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Speaker 1: we are and you're gonna listen and you're gonna like it. Well,

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Speaker 1: we're gonna catch up to speed on what the Highlander

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Speaker 1: one was all about, what Highlander two was seemingly about,

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Speaker 1: and there is going to be discussion of science in

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Speaker 1: this episode. There is a lot of science to discussed,

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Speaker 1: and in a way this allows us to tackle at

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Speaker 1: least a couple of subjects that we've just never covered

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Speaker 1: on the show before but are certainly of scientific interest.

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Speaker 1: But before we get into all of that, let's just

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Speaker 1: go ahead and have a taste from the original theatrical

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Speaker 1: trailer for high Islander. To taste the quickening. That has

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Speaker 1: some fun. There's centuries among the first nothing could have

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Speaker 1: prepared them for quickening. Christopher Lambridge, Sean Connery Highlander too

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Speaker 1: quickening alright, well sounds intriguing. Perhaps everyone out there can

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Speaker 1: understand a little bit, uh why there was some excitement

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Speaker 1: about this film for for fans of the original Highlander.

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Speaker 1: Now I will say as concerns of fandom of the

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Speaker 1: Original Highlander. The Original Highlander is a very fun movie,

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Speaker 1: but it is also also a very bad movie. Well

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Speaker 1: it is, it is. I definitely would argue that the

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Speaker 1: film is far sillier than a lot of people. Remember, Yes,

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Speaker 1: I mean I loved it when I saw it in

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Speaker 1: goodness early junior high or whenever I saw The Highlander

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Speaker 1: for the first time. I'm just like, this is a

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Speaker 1: amazing It's you know, it's it's fantasy, it's it's kind

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Speaker 1: of historical, it has all these art wrestling it's good.

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Speaker 1: Well did every I don't think I was really a

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Speaker 1: fan of wrestling at the time, so I was just

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Speaker 1: kind of I kind of glossed over that aspect of it.

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Speaker 1: I didn't know who any of those guys were, but

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Speaker 1: but I knew who the other guys were, you know,

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Speaker 1: Sean Connery. And then then it's this weird uh Christopher

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Speaker 1: Lambert or Lambert character, and then the Kurgan played by

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Speaker 1: Clancy Brown. I just had a just so much scene

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Speaker 1: chewing energy in this film. And then a magnificent score

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Speaker 1: by Queen The Queen really ties it all together. But

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Speaker 1: it's also just that blood bath of ridiculous acting that

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Speaker 1: sells the movie. You've got Christopher Lambert or Chris Stophe Lambert,

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Speaker 1: who is doing in Highlander one and two, both of

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Speaker 1: which he kind of does like a Peter Laurie sort

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Speaker 1: of thing. He's a little bit like, yes, I'm a

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Speaker 1: Highlander and he's basically Peter Lori's handsome younger brother. Yes,

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Speaker 1: that's that's the kind of vibe I always get off

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Speaker 1: of it. But so let's let's rehash who the characters

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Speaker 1: are versus the accents. So you've got, uh, Christoph Lambert

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Speaker 1: plays a Scotsman and he's got a French accent. That's

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Speaker 1: Connor McLoud, right. Sean Connery plays a Spanish Egyptian person,

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Speaker 1: but he's got a Scottish accent. That's Ramira. It seems

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Speaker 1: a little backwards. But then you've got Clancy Brown who

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Speaker 1: plays like a like a Central Asian Russian kind of guy,

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Speaker 1: but he has an American accent. Yes, this is definitely

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Speaker 1: one of those areas of of of Highlander mythology that

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Speaker 1: it it doesn't it doesn't pay off to think too

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Speaker 1: hard about it. It gets confusing rather quickly. But let

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Speaker 1: me just go ahead and rehash what the basic plot

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Speaker 1: is for Highlander one in case you haven't seen it

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Speaker 1: before or you've never seen it at all. Okay, so,

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Speaker 1: first of all, film came out in nine six, big

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Speaker 1: year for genre films. Uh. You know, if you were

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Speaker 1: to make a like top ten genre films of eighty six,

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Speaker 1: I don't even know that The Highlander would make the cut.

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Speaker 1: There were just so many great flicks that came out

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Speaker 1: that year. Is that the year of Aliens? Yeah, that

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Speaker 1: was the year of you two. I think you you

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Speaker 1: entered the world that year. Maybe that's if I recall correctly.

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Speaker 1: So in this movie, certain humans are randomly or seemingly

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Speaker 1: randomly born imbued with this immortal energy that's kind of

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Speaker 1: immortal fire, and that fire can only be snuffed out

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Speaker 1: if they're just outright decapitated. And then that fire, that

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Speaker 1: that immortal energy can be absorbed by another immortal Okay,

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Speaker 1: So they're invincible except for decapitation, right, And they run

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Speaker 1: around decapitating each other, right, hunting each other out, kind

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Speaker 1: of sensing each other's presence. They're like playing their own game,

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Speaker 1: and so they have these magical beings they battle across

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Speaker 1: the ages, and the ideas that they're gonna keep doing this.

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Speaker 1: They're gonna keep hunting each other down and engaging in

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Speaker 1: sword fights, and and one of them wins and absorbs

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Speaker 1: all the energy. They're gonna keep doing this until there's

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Speaker 1: very few left on the planet, and then those few

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Speaker 1: remaining individuals are going to go to some location on

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Speaker 1: the Earth ends up being New York City, and this

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Speaker 1: is going to be the gathering where the final immortals

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Speaker 1: duke get out. There can be only one left at

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Speaker 1: the end, and that final immortal is going to have

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Speaker 1: all this collected energy of all those deceased immortals, and

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Speaker 1: in doing so, he's gonna win the prize. The complete

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Speaker 1: allotment of the immortal fire. You will presumably allow them to,

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Speaker 1: you know, the wield godlike power, achieve great and terrible

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Speaker 1: things depending on their individual temperament. This is like a

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Speaker 1: really awesome idea for a fantasy movie that would be

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Speaker 1: dreamt up by a high school sophomore. I mean, it's

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Speaker 1: there is something wonderful about it, I have to say,

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Speaker 1: like the idea of of and I do think that

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Speaker 1: there is perhaps a deeper subtext to that that the screenwriter,

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Speaker 1: especially director Russell McKay um, was perhaps getting into like

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Speaker 1: this is feeling of like outsider individuals, um, you know,

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Speaker 1: trying to you know, to find each other and and

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Speaker 1: and and and battling for how they're perceived by the world.

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Speaker 1: I would love to see somebody do like deeper, read

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Speaker 1: some sort of film theory um uh l g B

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Speaker 1: t Q reading of Highlander. Um. I myself, I'm not

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Speaker 1: a film theorist, but but I would love to read

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Speaker 1: the work of somebody who is on this matter. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I could see that there's some subtexts like that there,

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Speaker 1: especially in the first movie. But so you've got literally

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Speaker 1: the character Christoph Lambert, with his French accent, plays the

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Speaker 1: Scottish Highlander Connor McCloud. Right, he's Connor, He's he is

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Speaker 1: our our hero and he we we we we get

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Speaker 1: flashbacks from the president. We would find out this is

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Speaker 1: how he learned that he was immortal. And then he encounters, uh,

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Speaker 1: first the Kurgan, who is out to just decimate him

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Speaker 1: and absorb his energy, but that Clancy Brown, right, and

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Speaker 1: then he runs into Sean Connery's Ramire's character who schools

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Speaker 1: him in the ways of the immortal. He's like, this

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Speaker 1: is how we operate this is what we do. This

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Speaker 1: is what you need to be careful about. The is

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Speaker 1: who you need to beware of, and you know it

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Speaker 1: prepares him. But then Kuragan comes along and kills Ramiras

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Speaker 1: and uh well, anyway, we get to the end of

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Speaker 1: the film. The inevitable final showdown is between Connor McCloud

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Speaker 1: and the Kurrigan. They have a ridiculous sword fight that

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Speaker 1: goes on forever. Lots of sparks. I mean, Russell McKay

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Speaker 1: was was and is one of the great music video

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Speaker 1: directors of the nineteen eighties, right Wild Boys, Wild Boys

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Speaker 1: from Duran Duran I think he did. He did multiple

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Speaker 1: Duran Duran videos. He did Total Eclipse of the Heart. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: so he has this, he always had. This is fantastic

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Speaker 1: visual flare and it is in full effect in Highlander.

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Speaker 1: I would say that his music video of the Wild Boys,

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Speaker 1: for me somehow slightly pre figures the aesthetics of the

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Speaker 1: mad Max Fury Road war Boys. Yeah, to a certain

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Speaker 1: ex Yeah, I could see that being the case. They're

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Speaker 1: they're kind of like violence swinging about in a in

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Speaker 1: a grimy industrial future. Absolutely so. Anyway, spoilers for Highlander one.

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Speaker 1: He wins Connor wins, spares the world that a terrible

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Speaker 1: fate at the hands of the Kurgan, and we're told

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Speaker 1: that he gains the ability to read people's thoughts around

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Speaker 1: the world. It's kind of tacked on, you know, that's

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Speaker 1: certainly the exact nature of the prize is kind of

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Speaker 1: an afterthought because the movie is ultimately not about that.

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Speaker 1: It's it's about it's about style. It's style over substance.

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Speaker 1: It's a fabulous style. But yeah, when at the end

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Speaker 1: you have to realize, oh, yeah, he's supposed to win something,

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Speaker 1: what is it? Well, now he's psychic and you can

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Speaker 1: connect people. I completely forgot that element. All I remember

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Speaker 1: about the end is like explosions and queen yes and

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Speaker 1: ultimately like that's that's all you needed has to play

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Speaker 1: is your fabulous, fabulous soundtrack. Wonderful explosions. Uh, some goofy funds,

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Speaker 1: some very some some nice dramatic moments, and some very

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Speaker 1: charismatic performances. You know, we'll spend a little bit of time,

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Speaker 1: uh having fun with Sean Connery. But but Sean Connery

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Speaker 1: was great in Highlander one, like he is he was

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Speaker 1: at like peak silver Fox charisma level. Uh and uh.

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Speaker 1: And he's just a joy to watch in that film. Oh,

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Speaker 1: he's the perfect charismatic yet silly character actor. Yeah. And

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Speaker 1: it was well balanced and you know, the Kurgan was appropriate,

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Speaker 1: appropriately fearsome. Uh. And everything I feel like Highlander one

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Speaker 1: is is ultimately a well balanced cocktail. It is. It

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Speaker 1: is a silly but entertaining, stupid movie. Yes, absolutely, and

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Speaker 1: it ties everything up at the end. At the end

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Speaker 1: of Highlander one, there's no reason to do a sequel.

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Speaker 1: There's no reason to do um. Uh. You know a

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Speaker 1: two animated films and animated TV shoots show, a hundred

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Speaker 1: nineteen episodes of Highlander, the series, twenty two episodes of

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Speaker 1: Highlander The Raven, which I've never even heard of. That

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Speaker 1: and four additional live action sequels as well. So obviously

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Speaker 1: the we we know, nobody can get enough Highlander after

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Speaker 1: it's done, quoth the Karragan nevermore. I'm to understand The

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Speaker 1: Raven is like an immortals cop show basically. Um that

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Speaker 1: I've never seen it, so I can't really vouch for.

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Speaker 1: But the TV show I watched a little off and

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Speaker 1: that was that was that was pretty good at times.

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Speaker 1: That's a great genre direction to take any previously existing

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Speaker 1: genre franchise, like you go from Scanners to Scanner cop. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: well it it's a more sensible move. Well that the

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Speaker 1: TV series was a more sensible move because they said,

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Speaker 1: let's not try and pick up afterwards, Let's just do

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Speaker 1: a new character with lots of flashbacks. Each episode is

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Speaker 1: a mix of coming to terms with old trauma and

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Speaker 1: old enemies or old friends and then um and then

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Speaker 1: and then hammering it out in the present or you know,

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Speaker 1: sword fighting it out in the present. But that's not

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Speaker 1: what they did for Highlander two. The sequel which comes

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Speaker 1: out came out, continues where the first film left off. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And that's an ambitious task to begin with, especially if

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Speaker 1: you insist on fee during Sean Connery in it, which,

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Speaker 1: if what I was reading was correct, that was Lambert's insistence.

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Speaker 1: You can't see it at home. But I'm rubbing my

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Speaker 1: fingers together in the Money signal, the international gesture for money.

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Speaker 1: Of course, Sean Connery is gonna want millions to come

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Speaker 1: and reprise his role as Ramirez in this film. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And it especially doesn't make sense because he was just

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Speaker 1: conclusively murdered in the first time he's been dead for

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Speaker 1: centuries first, but they said, all right, we gotta bring

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Speaker 1: him back. Okay, if you read a lot about the

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Speaker 1: production of this movie, it seems like the creative decisions

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Speaker 1: about it were largely very investor driven. So there were

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Speaker 1: some sort of like money dudes who were making a

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Speaker 1: lot of the calls about what the movie would contain

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Speaker 1: and be about. Right, and and then I think it

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Speaker 1: seems like a lot of creative decisions ended up being

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Speaker 1: made for the wrong reasons. Like I did read that

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Speaker 1: Lambert was like, yeah, you gotta bring Connrey on and

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Speaker 1: he was great, We had a great time. He should

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Speaker 1: be in the sequel. But even though he died, you know,

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Speaker 1: and then I'm sure the industry folks were like, yeah,

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Speaker 1: Connery is a bankable star, let's get him in there.

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Speaker 1: So in order to continue the story of Highlander, it

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Speaker 1: is necessary then to expand the mythology, because again it

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Speaker 1: was all tied up in a neat little bow. Uh,

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Speaker 1: there's no there's nothing left to continue. So they decided

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Speaker 1: to come up with a twist, a new way that

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Speaker 1: we can expand Highlander into a sequel, and that twist

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Speaker 1: was that the immortals are aliens. It's so good. They

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Speaker 1: should have just gone with Highlander cop but they didn't.

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Speaker 1: Instead they went with aliens. Yeah, and you know I

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Speaker 1: and I ultimately think it's not a bad idea. It

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Speaker 1: gets a bum rap because most people hated Highlander too,

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Speaker 1: But if you've got to come up with something, why

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Speaker 1: not aliens? Why not them being beings from another world?

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Speaker 1: And it's right there in the Queen theme song. Here

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Speaker 1: we are Princess of the Universe, Princes of the Earth,

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Speaker 1: Princess of the Universe. Okay, I can see you there.

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Speaker 1: I mean, it all depends on how it's handled, right,

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Speaker 1: But I think part of the reason people react with

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Speaker 1: such uh incredulity to the sudden revelation that they're all

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Speaker 1: aliens is literally just the way it's introduced in the film.

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Speaker 1: So we're talking about the original Highlander to the quickening,

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Speaker 1: the theatrical cut, this has been butchered and edited out

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Speaker 1: of these re releases that you can get in digital

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Speaker 1: form and on DVD and stuff today, which are now

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Speaker 1: they remove references to the alien planet. But so the

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Speaker 1: way it's introduced is you've got Christopher Lambert. Uh Lambert

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Speaker 1: is an old man makeup sitting at an opera and

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Speaker 1: suddenly the camera just like zooms in on him while

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Speaker 1: fans are blowing his hair, and he looks confused, and

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Speaker 1: you get voiceover from Sean Connery saying, remember Highland of

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Speaker 1: your home the planet Zeist, and then it cuts to

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Speaker 1: this flashback and he's going, yes, I remember Zeist, and

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Speaker 1: it's it's impossible not to laugh while watching this. So

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Speaker 1: the basic idea that is then uh presented or on

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Speaker 1: in Highland or two uh in the theatrical cut anyway,

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Speaker 1: is that the immortals of Earth, we're all exiled immortals

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Speaker 1: from another world, planet Zeist, following a failed rebellion, and

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Speaker 1: the rebels here that basically the ideas instead of being

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Speaker 1: put to death, they're sent to Earth and they have

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Speaker 1: to battle each other across time to only one remains,

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Speaker 1: and then the winner will have the choice between staying

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Speaker 1: on Earth and growing old or returning to Zeist and

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Speaker 1: becoming immortal again. Uh. So, I know that's confusing. The

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Speaker 1: first one was contrived, so you know there's a lot

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Speaker 1: that that doesn't work with that that concept, but but

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Speaker 1: I don't know, I still kind of like it. Exiled

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Speaker 1: immortals from another world? Fine, uh In the more recent

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Speaker 1: cuts of it that you'll find, including one that was

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Speaker 1: at least recently on Amazon Prime. They changed it from

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Speaker 1: Exiles from Another World to Exiles from the Distant Past.

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Speaker 1: So and so, if someone rebels against them, instead of

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Speaker 1: sending them to another planet, they send them far into

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Speaker 1: the future. We're gonna punish you by sending you to

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Speaker 1: a time with indoor plumbing. Oh no, no, don't send

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Speaker 1: me to a time after penicillin. But that's that's apparently

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Speaker 1: what they did. Um. So, for my money, there there

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Speaker 1: are some positives about the film, just to run through

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Speaker 1: really quickly. Um And besides the obvious being that I

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Speaker 1: enjoy watching bad films, first of all, I would say

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Speaker 1: that it was at least ambitious enough to expand and

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Speaker 1: take a sci fi twist on the original film rather

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Speaker 1: than just redoing it, which is, you know, often the

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Speaker 1: way you do a sequel, you're just like, all right,

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Speaker 1: do it again, except bigger, and they didn't do that.

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Speaker 1: I will say that Russell McKay created an interesting sci

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Speaker 1: fi and war look for much of the film. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: a couple of the sets are really good. Yeah, there's

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Speaker 1: especially you know, the very Blade Runner esque Uh, you know,

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Speaker 1: kind of blade runner with more Casablanca heaped on top,

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Speaker 1: and then hoverboards and swords. I think these were the

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Speaker 1: sets that were built earlier in the production. I mean,

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Speaker 1: one of the stories about the production is that the

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Speaker 1: movie was made in Argentina. They were like lured there

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Speaker 1: because it was like, hey, it's much cheaper to make

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Speaker 1: a movie here. You can build elaborate sets and all

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Speaker 1: that for half the cost. So they went there, and

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Speaker 1: then suddenly there was there was an economic crisis in

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Speaker 1: Argentina while they were filming the movie. There was like

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Speaker 1: hyper inflation, and then they didn't have any money to

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Speaker 1: finish the movie with. Yeah, so so yeah, I guess

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Speaker 1: some of the these scenes and some of the sets

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Speaker 1: better than others. But but certainly the sequence where the

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Speaker 1: assassins from the future show up to fight Old Connor, uh,

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Speaker 1: that sequences a lot of fun. I enjoyed that one. Um.

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Speaker 1: There's also some goofy scenes with Ramira's buying a suit

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Speaker 1: and watching a flight safety video efter he comes back

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Speaker 1: from the dead. Highlight of the film is just Sean

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Speaker 1: Connery's high jinks in Future Scotland. Yeah, and then there's

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Speaker 1: yeah that there's that in addition to that flight safety video,

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Speaker 1: there's also and that you only find this in later

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Speaker 1: cuts of the film, but there is a fake commercial

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Speaker 1: kind of like from you know, something from RoboCop or

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Speaker 1: Total Recall for something called Psychic Chef just pops up

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Speaker 1: in the middle of the film and it's completely bonkers.

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Speaker 1: Like if for anyone out there is a fan of

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Speaker 1: the film, Mandy, it's um it's cheddar Goblin esque in criticulousness.

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Speaker 1: So it's one of the definite pros to checking out

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Speaker 1: a more recent kind of Highlander. Two. I would say

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Speaker 1: another huge highlight of the film is the villain Michael Ironside.

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Speaker 1: He's this guy from planet Zeist who is their enemy

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Speaker 1: who eventually gets tired of waiting on Christoph Lambert to

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Speaker 1: just die on Earth and uh and he like goes

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Speaker 1: there to fight him. Uh and he you know, there's

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Speaker 1: the expression chewing the scenery, but Michael Ironside and this

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Speaker 1: is not really he's like a shark, you know, the

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Speaker 1: way shark teeth are just always coming out in the

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Speaker 1: things they buy it, So he's leaving his teeth all

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Speaker 1: over the scenery. Yeah, it's very like skull far Forward

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Speaker 1: Scanners esque acting for Michael Ron's side, I saw an

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Speaker 1: inner view with him where he basically said, yeah, I

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Speaker 1: wasn't a fan of the script. The production was kind

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Speaker 1: of a wreck. But I decided like, if I'm going

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Speaker 1: to do this, I'm going to be the most memorable

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Speaker 1: thing in the film. I'm just gonna go you know, completely,

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Speaker 1: you know, crank it up to eleven on the scene shooting. So, yeah,

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Speaker 1: he's a he's a tremendous amount of fun. Anytime he's

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Speaker 1: on the screen, you can't help but but invest yourself

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Speaker 1: and know what he's doing. Oh wait, we haven't even

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Speaker 1: mentioned yet the sci fi premise of the movie, have

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Speaker 1: we No, we haven't, And this will be something that

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Speaker 1: we'll discuss uh later on a little more depth. Because

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Speaker 1: one of the ideas here is that what what does

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Speaker 1: Connor do with the prize? Right, so he's got this

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Speaker 1: great power and wisdom after cutting off all the other

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Speaker 1: Zeistian heads we find out that they're from Zeis the heads.

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Speaker 1: What does he do with it? Well, apparently he becomes

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Speaker 1: like an atmospheric or geoscientist of some kind. Yeah, or

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Speaker 1: at least he uses his psyche powers to connect important

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Speaker 1: people who are and yeah, he ends up bringing them

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Speaker 1: together to solve the problem of Earth's depleted ozone layer,

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Speaker 1: and ends up called found founding the Shield Corporation, which

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Speaker 1: creates these enormous machines that beam some sort of energy

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Speaker 1: up into the stratosphere and create an artificial ozone layer

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Speaker 1: of sorts, like an energy layer that protects the Earth

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Speaker 1: from UV rays but also makes everything. It makes the

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Speaker 1: whole world like permanent Casablanca climate, So everything is dark

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Speaker 1: and everything is sweaty everywhere all over the Earth. It's

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Speaker 1: a perfect way to justify your like dark and war sets. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and it does create this. You can see where they

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Speaker 1: were going with this idea of like Connors, this was

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Speaker 1: the savior, but now he's he's vilified, you know, which

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Speaker 1: is an interesting trope. You know they sometimes rolled out.

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Speaker 1: You see shades of that, certainly in uh in the

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Speaker 1: Dune saga. But yeah, so now he's this guy that

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Speaker 1: people curse because yeah, he's the planet from UH from

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Speaker 1: It's it's o's own problem. But then you replaced it

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Speaker 1: with this weird thing that nobody likes. I hate sweating.

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Speaker 1: I'd rather be burned alive by UV rays. And so

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Speaker 1: that's the sci fi in war World that the bulk

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Speaker 1: of Highlander two deals with. Okay, well, now that we

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Speaker 1: have described perhaps the most awesome bad movie of all time, Like,

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Speaker 1: would you say for me, it's like a top five

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Speaker 1: all time bad film. Yeah, it's pretty great, and we

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Speaker 1: don't even have time to get into all the ways

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Speaker 1: that it is is bad and all the ways that

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Speaker 1: it's it's it's ultimately fun to watch. But but yeah,

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Speaker 1: at the end of the day, it's not a good

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Speaker 1: film by anybody's standard. But hey, if you can get

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Speaker 1: you one of those pristine VHS tapes that's got the

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Speaker 1: original cut, I highly recommended if you're a fan and

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Speaker 1: you want to treat yourself to a brain self funeral. Um,

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Speaker 1: now we should take a quick break and then when

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Speaker 1: we come back, let's start to discuss the science of

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Speaker 1: Highlander two. All right, we're back. Yes, we're gonna do it.

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Speaker 1: We're going to We're gonna reach into the corpse of

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Speaker 1: this movie. We're gonna pull back the ribs and wrench

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Speaker 1: out some juicy, um, you know, moist portions of actual

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Speaker 1: science to discuss. Wow, where did that description come from?

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Speaker 1: That was? I'm riveted. Now I gotta see what we're

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Speaker 1: gonna do. Okay, So the first thing that I think

402
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Speaker 1: we should mention is the weirdness of using the the idea.

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Speaker 1: I guess this this maybe does go into the first movie.

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Speaker 1: I don't recall the use of the phrase the quickening,

405
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Speaker 1: which is the subtitle of the film is Highlander to

406
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Speaker 1: colon the quickening and the quickening? What is it? What

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Speaker 1: happens when the quickening is on screen? Are you referring

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Speaker 1: to the you know what happens after that one of

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Speaker 1: them cuts the other's heads off? Yeah, that seems to

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Speaker 1: be what it's referring to, right the I think there's

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Speaker 1: something in the first film where Ramirez is encouraging him to,

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Speaker 1: like Feele, the quickening of watching an Elk run or

413
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Speaker 1: something like that. But yeah, for the most part, the

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Speaker 1: quickening is this is explosive transfer of magical electronic energy

415
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Speaker 1: and or and made it demons from the body of

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Speaker 1: the deceased immortal into the body of the living immortal. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it seems to be what happens when one Zeisteon cuts

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Speaker 1: another Zysteon's head off, and then suddenly there are just

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Speaker 1: lots of sparks and explosions and electrical arcs and the

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Speaker 1: decapitate or receives all of the power and wisdom of

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Speaker 1: the decapitate. T Yes, it is, I would say, unapologetically orgasmic,

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Speaker 1: right is it is? It is a you know, pyrotechnic

423
00:23:31,320 --> 00:23:34,760
Speaker 1: orgasm on the screen every time this occurs. But we

424
00:23:34,760 --> 00:23:37,560
Speaker 1: we should mention. I guess the idea that the quickening

425
00:23:37,800 --> 00:23:42,280
Speaker 1: is actually a term that already had historically relevant meaning

426
00:23:42,920 --> 00:23:45,800
Speaker 1: like too. I want to quote a section from article

427
00:23:45,840 --> 00:23:48,840
Speaker 1: in Slate by the journalist Ruth Graham about the idea

428
00:23:48,840 --> 00:23:54,320
Speaker 1: of the quickening. Quote. Maift thirty seven was a momentous

429
00:23:54,440 --> 00:23:58,080
Speaker 1: day for Jane Seymour, the third wife of Henry the eighth.

430
00:23:58,560 --> 00:24:01,320
Speaker 1: She had been pregnant for some but now it was official.

431
00:24:01,600 --> 00:24:05,040
Speaker 1: Seymour had felt the quickening, the child's first kick in

432
00:24:05,080 --> 00:24:08,640
Speaker 1: her womb. The milestone was announced too much rejoicing in St.

433
00:24:08,640 --> 00:24:11,960
Speaker 1: Paul's Cathedral in London, with bonfires throughout the city and

434
00:24:12,040 --> 00:24:16,000
Speaker 1: celebratory wine distributed to the poor. At Oxford, a preacher

435
00:24:16,040 --> 00:24:20,080
Speaker 1: delivered a sermon to mark the occasion quote upon Trinity Sunday,

436
00:24:20,200 --> 00:24:23,040
Speaker 1: like one given of God, the child quickened in the

437
00:24:23,080 --> 00:24:27,159
Speaker 1: mother's womb. The assembled worshippers praised God and prayed that

438
00:24:27,200 --> 00:24:30,040
Speaker 1: the new baby would be a prince of the universe.

439
00:24:30,520 --> 00:24:33,359
Speaker 1: I don't know. Maybe, I mean, if you're going to

440
00:24:33,400 --> 00:24:35,040
Speaker 1: be a Prince of England at the time, you might

441
00:24:35,080 --> 00:24:37,480
Speaker 1: as well consider yourself a prince of the universe. Right, No,

442
00:24:37,480 --> 00:24:40,639
Speaker 1: no need to undersell. But why all of this hubbub

443
00:24:40,680 --> 00:24:43,760
Speaker 1: about the fact that Jane Seymour had felt a kick? Uh?

444
00:24:43,840 --> 00:24:47,200
Speaker 1: So the quickening literally means when a pregnant woman first

445
00:24:47,240 --> 00:24:50,160
Speaker 1: feels a kick or a movement from the developing fetus.

446
00:24:50,160 --> 00:24:52,080
Speaker 1: And the root of this word in English is the

447
00:24:52,080 --> 00:24:55,119
Speaker 1: word quick meaning alive. Like you know, the phrase of

448
00:24:55,160 --> 00:24:57,359
Speaker 1: the quicken the dead, that's not just a movie title,

449
00:24:57,359 --> 00:25:01,200
Speaker 1: it's a phrase from from the New Testament. As Second Timothy,

450
00:25:01,240 --> 00:25:04,600
Speaker 1: I charged the therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ,

451
00:25:04,640 --> 00:25:07,880
Speaker 1: who shall judge the quicken the dead at his appearing

452
00:25:07,920 --> 00:25:10,320
Speaker 1: in his kingdom? So it means judging the living and

453
00:25:10,359 --> 00:25:13,840
Speaker 1: the dead. So, while today the moment of the quickening

454
00:25:13,920 --> 00:25:18,000
Speaker 1: is not really invested with any particular biological significance, it

455
00:25:18,200 --> 00:25:22,199
Speaker 1: used to be considered very important legally, morally, religiously. Like

456
00:25:22,400 --> 00:25:25,600
Speaker 1: Aristotle wrote that the moment of the quickening was the

457
00:25:25,680 --> 00:25:30,080
Speaker 1: moment that the fetus became animated or became alive, And

458
00:25:30,119 --> 00:25:32,560
Speaker 1: many would go on to interpret this, like, especially in

459
00:25:32,560 --> 00:25:34,840
Speaker 1: a lot of Christian traditions, as the moment that the

460
00:25:34,840 --> 00:25:39,280
Speaker 1: fetus received a soul or became alive. All right, Well,

461
00:25:39,359 --> 00:25:41,000
Speaker 1: in that I can see where we could get to

462
00:25:41,040 --> 00:25:44,000
Speaker 1: the to the idea of what's happening with the immortals. Yeah,

463
00:25:44,080 --> 00:25:47,560
Speaker 1: they are absorbing a soul exactly. And and so for

464
00:25:47,640 --> 00:25:51,640
Speaker 1: this reason, like the quickening had very weird legal status,

465
00:25:51,720 --> 00:25:53,960
Speaker 1: especially for us to read back on now, like Graham

466
00:25:54,040 --> 00:25:57,240
Speaker 1: Rights for example, about a precedent in English law where

467
00:25:57,280 --> 00:26:00,560
Speaker 1: if a pregnant woman was condemned to death, like she

468
00:26:00,640 --> 00:26:03,800
Speaker 1: had to be executed, she could be executed if she

469
00:26:03,840 --> 00:26:06,280
Speaker 1: had not yet felt the quickening, but she would be

470
00:26:06,320 --> 00:26:09,080
Speaker 1: given a delay of sentence if she had felt the quickening.

471
00:26:10,160 --> 00:26:13,080
Speaker 1: I can't have an imagine like ramires As as a

472
00:26:13,160 --> 00:26:18,920
Speaker 1: lawyer then defending your honor, my client only absorbed the

473
00:26:19,000 --> 00:26:23,840
Speaker 1: quickening after he knocked the futuristic a shassion off the train,

474
00:26:23,920 --> 00:26:26,639
Speaker 1: and then the train ran over his neck. So I

475
00:26:26,680 --> 00:26:31,720
Speaker 1: would argue that this was a case of accidental quickening. Yeah, anyway,

476
00:26:31,920 --> 00:26:34,160
Speaker 1: this makes a kind of odd choice of terms though

477
00:26:34,200 --> 00:26:36,960
Speaker 1: for for a movie about like alien swordsman cutting off

478
00:26:37,000 --> 00:26:40,720
Speaker 1: each other's heads, Like, I guess the idea of receiving

479
00:26:40,720 --> 00:26:43,560
Speaker 1: a soul or receiving a life essence at a certain

480
00:26:43,640 --> 00:26:46,080
Speaker 1: moment like that could be in there. Also. I don't

481
00:26:46,119 --> 00:26:48,399
Speaker 1: know if it's just a coincidence, maybe like he just

482
00:26:48,520 --> 00:26:52,080
Speaker 1: independently Whoever the writer was arrived at the h the

483
00:26:52,160 --> 00:26:55,080
Speaker 1: idea of the quickening after thinking about the word quick

484
00:26:55,119 --> 00:26:58,160
Speaker 1: meaning living, living essence or something. I mean, you gotta

485
00:26:58,160 --> 00:27:01,080
Speaker 1: call it something, right. Maybe for a while they just

486
00:27:01,480 --> 00:27:05,920
Speaker 1: referred to it as the sparky explode e uh, post

487
00:27:06,040 --> 00:27:11,119
Speaker 1: decapitation brain orgasm. I don't know. Um quickening rolls off

488
00:27:11,119 --> 00:27:19,400
Speaker 1: the tongue a little easier, the decapagasming, Yes, the decephalizagasming. Now,

489
00:27:19,760 --> 00:27:21,439
Speaker 1: I want to talk a little bit about just the

490
00:27:21,480 --> 00:27:25,719
Speaker 1: idea of immortality and mortality, Okay, And we've we've covered

491
00:27:25,880 --> 00:27:27,760
Speaker 1: aspects of this on the show before. We did a

492
00:27:27,760 --> 00:27:31,080
Speaker 1: two parter um in the last year, I believe about

493
00:27:31,160 --> 00:27:34,760
Speaker 1: the desire for immortality. Yeah, and where we talked about

494
00:27:34,800 --> 00:27:39,240
Speaker 1: like what is the biological reality about why animals age?

495
00:27:40,119 --> 00:27:42,440
Speaker 1: Why do animals grow old and die? Like why don't

496
00:27:42,560 --> 00:27:44,639
Speaker 1: you know, why don't our our bodies just have us

497
00:27:44,680 --> 00:27:47,280
Speaker 1: live forever? And the answer to that is generally that

498
00:27:47,359 --> 00:27:50,640
Speaker 1: there's what's sort of known as antagonistic pleotropies. There are

499
00:27:51,080 --> 00:27:54,440
Speaker 1: forces within the genome that are driving fitness in multiple

500
00:27:54,480 --> 00:27:58,280
Speaker 1: different directions, and it just turns out that nature doesn't

501
00:27:58,440 --> 00:28:01,520
Speaker 1: see a whole lot of advance age and extending human

502
00:28:01,560 --> 00:28:04,479
Speaker 1: lifespans over a long period of time. And so when

503
00:28:04,560 --> 00:28:08,120
Speaker 1: there's a gene that, say, like, maybe prevents cancer when

504
00:28:08,160 --> 00:28:12,159
Speaker 1: you're young, but also happens to lead to deterioration of

505
00:28:12,200 --> 00:28:16,320
Speaker 1: the body and death of old age later on, natural

506
00:28:16,359 --> 00:28:18,400
Speaker 1: selection doesn't care a whole lot about the old age.

507
00:28:18,440 --> 00:28:21,480
Speaker 1: It cares more about preventing cancer when you're young, so

508
00:28:21,680 --> 00:28:24,800
Speaker 1: it just selects for that and rarely sees what happens

509
00:28:24,840 --> 00:28:27,400
Speaker 1: in old age because there's a lot of natural mortality

510
00:28:27,680 --> 00:28:31,720
Speaker 1: throughout the span of a life anyway. Right, So it's

511
00:28:32,000 --> 00:28:35,439
Speaker 1: on one level, it's difficult to come up with an

512
00:28:35,600 --> 00:28:40,720
Speaker 1: argument for for how biologically immortal creature would work within

513
00:28:40,800 --> 00:28:45,840
Speaker 1: a given um environment. However, we do have a few

514
00:28:45,880 --> 00:28:49,600
Speaker 1: possible examples, the main one being that of the hydra,

515
00:28:50,280 --> 00:28:55,760
Speaker 1: the real world hydra, not the mythical hydra um, because

516
00:28:56,200 --> 00:29:00,160
Speaker 1: you know, these are hardy, regenerative creatures that evolved to

517
00:29:00,240 --> 00:29:04,080
Speaker 1: thrive in a in harsh war like environments, perhaps not

518
00:29:04,240 --> 00:29:07,400
Speaker 1: unlike our our planet Zeist. It seems like we all

519
00:29:07,560 --> 00:29:13,200
Speaker 1: are are all male species of of immortal swordsmen, are

520
00:29:13,240 --> 00:29:16,720
Speaker 1: in a constant state of war. Uh So maybe we

521
00:29:16,760 --> 00:29:19,480
Speaker 1: can compare them to the hydra a little bit. Yeah,

522
00:29:19,560 --> 00:29:25,000
Speaker 1: Hydrozoa's ice danum. And it's worth noting that, uh that

523
00:29:25,280 --> 00:29:30,000
Speaker 1: even with biologically immortal or or you know, possibly biological

524
00:29:30,040 --> 00:29:33,080
Speaker 1: immortal organisms, they still live in a dangerous world that

525
00:29:33,120 --> 00:29:36,720
Speaker 1: will inevitably kill them. Like nobody's saying, oh, hydras live forever. No,

526
00:29:36,840 --> 00:29:40,600
Speaker 1: hydras still don't live tremendously long. They'll die for any

527
00:29:40,640 --> 00:29:44,760
Speaker 1: number of reasons. But there have been there have been

528
00:29:45,200 --> 00:29:49,000
Speaker 1: experimental observations that have have shown that in in in

529
00:29:49,080 --> 00:29:52,440
Speaker 1: certain lab situations, they live far longer than we thought,

530
00:29:52,440 --> 00:29:56,440
Speaker 1: and they don't appear to age. Uh So, you know,

531
00:29:56,520 --> 00:30:00,080
Speaker 1: we could maybe look to some parallels there for our

532
00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:04,840
Speaker 1: our fictional magical swordsman from another planet. Um. You know

533
00:30:04,880 --> 00:30:09,440
Speaker 1: that that's this is the basic pitch behind the biologically

534
00:30:09,520 --> 00:30:14,160
Speaker 1: immortal Adrien's an alien fictional alien species in the culture

535
00:30:14,200 --> 00:30:17,720
Speaker 1: novels by Nim Banks that I've mentioned probably several times

536
00:30:17,760 --> 00:30:20,320
Speaker 1: in the show at this point. The idea is that

537
00:30:20,440 --> 00:30:24,280
Speaker 1: they emerged in a very competitive, very harsh environment that

538
00:30:24,360 --> 00:30:28,800
Speaker 1: they ultimately ended up mastering, but they retained this biological

539
00:30:28,880 --> 00:30:33,360
Speaker 1: immortality as being just a part of their their physiology. Now,

540
00:30:33,400 --> 00:30:35,680
Speaker 1: it's hard to say for sure, but it makes me

541
00:30:35,960 --> 00:30:38,360
Speaker 1: I mean, I tend to think that wherever you are,

542
00:30:38,400 --> 00:30:41,880
Speaker 1: you'd probably have, even on an alien planet, some similar

543
00:30:41,960 --> 00:30:45,560
Speaker 1: natural selection forces at play. As long as you have

544
00:30:45,640 --> 00:30:50,440
Speaker 1: the same basic principles of evolution working, you probably wouldn't

545
00:30:50,440 --> 00:30:53,880
Speaker 1: have many large organisms having any kind of mechanism that

546
00:30:53,960 --> 00:30:57,640
Speaker 1: favored immortality, just because, much like on Earth, there wouldn't

547
00:30:57,640 --> 00:31:01,000
Speaker 1: be much reason for natural selection to still elect it. Now,

548
00:31:01,040 --> 00:31:03,680
Speaker 1: the other big possibility, and this is probably the more

549
00:31:03,720 --> 00:31:05,600
Speaker 1: likely possibility if we're trying to come up with a

550
00:31:05,680 --> 00:31:09,520
Speaker 1: reason that the immortals of Zeist are indeed immortal, is

551
00:31:09,560 --> 00:31:12,720
Speaker 1: that perhaps they engineered it. Because certainly they just seem

552
00:31:12,760 --> 00:31:14,880
Speaker 1: to be running around the desert fighting the swords and

553
00:31:14,960 --> 00:31:17,280
Speaker 1: using some sort of guns. I can't remember if they're

554
00:31:17,360 --> 00:31:22,880
Speaker 1: laser laser guns. Yeah, so they have some advanced technology,

555
00:31:22,960 --> 00:31:27,840
Speaker 1: and they have the technology to either exile individuals to

556
00:31:27,880 --> 00:31:32,040
Speaker 1: another planet or to the to the distant future, so

557
00:31:32,920 --> 00:31:35,400
Speaker 1: it doesn't seem impossible that they would have also figured

558
00:31:35,400 --> 00:31:39,560
Speaker 1: out a way to make themselves biologically immortal um or

559
00:31:39,600 --> 00:31:44,600
Speaker 1: technologically and technologically immortal artificially. So at any rate, it's

560
00:31:44,600 --> 00:31:47,960
Speaker 1: also worth noting that again that there are no female

561
00:31:47,960 --> 00:31:51,320
Speaker 1: immortals that we see in Highlander two. I tend to

562
00:31:51,320 --> 00:31:53,000
Speaker 1: think this has more to do with just sort of

563
00:31:53,040 --> 00:31:56,680
Speaker 1: like sexist envisioning of story tropes than to do with

564
00:31:56,720 --> 00:32:01,360
Speaker 1: the their biological ideas about Zeist or they reproduce via

565
00:32:01,440 --> 00:32:04,760
Speaker 1: a sexual budding like the Hydra. Okay, you know, we

566
00:32:04,840 --> 00:32:08,360
Speaker 1: never we don't see we never see a scene where

567
00:32:08,400 --> 00:32:12,400
Speaker 1: Sean Connery buds additional Sean conneries. But who knows. Well,

568
00:32:12,440 --> 00:32:14,200
Speaker 1: I mean, I would point out that you could very

569
00:32:14,200 --> 00:32:18,800
Speaker 1: well say the Highlander films are buddy films christof Lambert

570
00:32:18,880 --> 00:32:21,720
Speaker 1: and Sean Connery. I mean, if that's that, they should

571
00:32:21,720 --> 00:32:25,160
Speaker 1: have had their own buddy cop series. Chiefs says, I'm

572
00:32:25,200 --> 00:32:30,520
Speaker 1: taking it too personal, No Islander, We've got to stop him. Hey,

573
00:32:30,560 --> 00:32:32,560
Speaker 1: I'm so that would have That would have been great, though,

574
00:32:32,560 --> 00:32:35,240
Speaker 1: can you be a buddy cop without budding. I don't

575
00:32:35,240 --> 00:32:38,520
Speaker 1: know several others Riggs and MYRTA manage it all right, Well,

576
00:32:38,600 --> 00:32:40,840
Speaker 1: let's let's move on to decapitation. What do you have

577
00:32:40,880 --> 00:32:43,960
Speaker 1: for us in the way of decapitation science. Well, I

578
00:32:44,000 --> 00:32:46,640
Speaker 1: was wondering, you know, is there an animal that does

579
00:32:46,680 --> 00:32:49,880
Speaker 1: the Zeist thing, that does the immortal thing, that wanders

580
00:32:49,880 --> 00:32:52,240
Speaker 1: the earth in search of combat with enemies who can

581
00:32:52,240 --> 00:32:55,240
Speaker 1: supply it with the quickening if and only if it

582
00:32:55,360 --> 00:32:58,880
Speaker 1: kills them by decapitation? And I, you know, at first,

583
00:32:58,920 --> 00:33:00,800
Speaker 1: I was like coming up with a blank. I was like, no,

584
00:33:01,000 --> 00:33:03,240
Speaker 1: I don't think there's really anything like that out there. Actually,

585
00:33:03,280 --> 00:33:08,240
Speaker 1: decapitation just does not seem very common in the animal kingdom. Yeah,

586
00:33:08,320 --> 00:33:11,640
Speaker 1: it's a it's it's one of those things that happens

587
00:33:11,680 --> 00:33:14,160
Speaker 1: all the time in movies. And I believe is it

588
00:33:14,240 --> 00:33:18,960
Speaker 1: appears easier to do in films, um, but you're really

589
00:33:18,960 --> 00:33:20,400
Speaker 1: having to You're having to cut through a lot of

590
00:33:20,600 --> 00:33:23,520
Speaker 1: material there. And to what end if you're an animal? Right,

591
00:33:23,560 --> 00:33:25,640
Speaker 1: what's the point. Normally, if you're an animal, you're not

592
00:33:25,680 --> 00:33:27,920
Speaker 1: like trying to make your enemy or your prey like

593
00:33:28,120 --> 00:33:30,160
Speaker 1: get a quick death as if it's like a you know,

594
00:33:30,200 --> 00:33:33,240
Speaker 1: a judicial execution or something. It's not the guillotine here.

595
00:33:33,400 --> 00:33:35,240
Speaker 1: You're trying to eat them or you're trying to fight

596
00:33:35,320 --> 00:33:39,800
Speaker 1: them off or something. But as always, as always, nature

597
00:33:39,880 --> 00:33:43,520
Speaker 1: is weirder than fiction. So I present for your consideration

598
00:33:43,880 --> 00:33:48,200
Speaker 1: an insect, a highlander insect. It is a genus of

599
00:33:48,360 --> 00:33:53,040
Speaker 1: forward fly, known scientifically as suit acton. Now, I was

600
00:33:53,080 --> 00:33:56,120
Speaker 1: wondering what this means for like, false pseudo means false,

601
00:33:56,160 --> 00:33:59,920
Speaker 1: so false Acteon acton is a figure from Greek Man

602
00:34:00,120 --> 00:34:02,640
Speaker 1: who was a herdsman who got torn apart by his

603
00:34:02,680 --> 00:34:06,960
Speaker 1: own hounds. Oh, yes, there's some paintings that depict this. Yeah,

604
00:34:07,160 --> 00:34:09,560
Speaker 1: I'm not sure what significance that has there. Maybe acting

605
00:34:09,640 --> 00:34:12,160
Speaker 1: on is another type of fly or animal that it's like,

606
00:34:12,640 --> 00:34:15,560
Speaker 1: maybe a false mimic of an outward appearance. I couldn't

607
00:34:15,600 --> 00:34:18,640
Speaker 1: figure that out. But despite the scientific name, I will

608
00:34:18,640 --> 00:34:21,279
Speaker 1: propose hereafter we call it either I don't know, we

609
00:34:21,280 --> 00:34:23,520
Speaker 1: can pick from a few of the highlander fly, the

610
00:34:23,640 --> 00:34:26,560
Speaker 1: zeist fly, or maybe the quickening fly, or if you

611
00:34:26,560 --> 00:34:28,800
Speaker 1: can think of a better one, I'm still open. The

612
00:34:28,880 --> 00:34:34,040
Speaker 1: Connor McFly A little back to the future bridge there.

613
00:34:34,280 --> 00:34:36,919
Speaker 1: So here's how it goes. You've got these flies from

614
00:34:36,920 --> 00:34:40,120
Speaker 1: the family for a day, and they're they're pretty familiar

615
00:34:40,160 --> 00:34:42,560
Speaker 1: to us. We can see them buzzing around food sources

616
00:34:42,600 --> 00:34:46,040
Speaker 1: as pests. We often mistakenly call them fruit flies. They're

617
00:34:46,040 --> 00:34:49,440
Speaker 1: not fruit flies, but the genus sued Acteon is different.

618
00:34:49,680 --> 00:34:55,040
Speaker 1: These flies are parasitoids, their reproductive parasites that attack ants,

619
00:34:55,239 --> 00:34:58,880
Speaker 1: especially ants in the genus sullen Opsis, which includes the

620
00:34:58,960 --> 00:35:02,640
Speaker 1: invasive red fire ant Solenopsis invicta, which we've talked about

621
00:35:02,640 --> 00:35:05,279
Speaker 1: plenty on the show before, and the black imported fire

622
00:35:05,320 --> 00:35:10,080
Speaker 1: ant Solenopsis ricktieri. So species of this fly can be

623
00:35:10,080 --> 00:35:12,640
Speaker 1: found throughout the world. In the United States, you'll mainly

624
00:35:12,680 --> 00:35:15,440
Speaker 1: find them, I think in the Southeast, like the Texas,

625
00:35:15,480 --> 00:35:18,200
Speaker 1: through the Deep South in Florida in those areas, and

626
00:35:18,320 --> 00:35:22,600
Speaker 1: the process of their parasitism is amazing. Robert, I've included

627
00:35:22,680 --> 00:35:24,600
Speaker 1: some images for you to look at as we go

628
00:35:24,680 --> 00:35:27,600
Speaker 1: along here, so feel free to comment sharing with the

629
00:35:27,640 --> 00:35:30,520
Speaker 1: listeners in any color that strikes you here, but absolutely

630
00:35:30,920 --> 00:35:33,359
Speaker 1: uh So. First of all, you've got a female suit

631
00:35:33,400 --> 00:35:36,319
Speaker 1: act on or highlander fly. She mates and so now

632
00:35:36,320 --> 00:35:39,200
Speaker 1: she's got fertilized eggs, and what she does is she

633
00:35:39,280 --> 00:35:42,360
Speaker 1: will find a fire ant of the particular species that

634
00:35:42,400 --> 00:35:46,200
Speaker 1: she can parasitize. So certain species of this genus of

635
00:35:46,320 --> 00:35:50,440
Speaker 1: fly attack generally a certain species of ant, And so

636
00:35:50,520 --> 00:35:52,839
Speaker 1: she'll find the right kind of aunt, and she'll fly

637
00:35:52,960 --> 00:35:56,760
Speaker 1: around above groups of worker ants during their foraging behavior,

638
00:35:57,239 --> 00:35:59,760
Speaker 1: and then suddenly, when the time is right, she swoops

639
00:35:59,760 --> 00:36:02,359
Speaker 1: down on and stabs one of the ants with her

640
00:36:02,440 --> 00:36:06,480
Speaker 1: external ovipositor. And I've got some close up micrographs of

641
00:36:06,520 --> 00:36:09,319
Speaker 1: these ovipositors for you to look at, Robert. I love

642
00:36:09,400 --> 00:36:12,239
Speaker 1: these things because they look so metal. They're straight out

643
00:36:12,239 --> 00:36:15,120
Speaker 1: of like a Mortal Kombat game. Oh yeah. One of

644
00:36:15,120 --> 00:36:17,719
Speaker 1: them in particular does remind me a bit of the

645
00:36:17,800 --> 00:36:21,120
Speaker 1: Kurgan's sword from the first Highlighter film. Oh yeah, I

646
00:36:21,160 --> 00:36:22,759
Speaker 1: forget what that looks like. Oh it's kind of got

647
00:36:22,800 --> 00:36:25,759
Speaker 1: claws on it, doesn't it. So I guess she's this

648
00:36:25,800 --> 00:36:27,960
Speaker 1: is kind of the sword fight portion. She is like

649
00:36:28,080 --> 00:36:30,719
Speaker 1: the Kurgans. She flies in with the sword and stabs

650
00:36:31,440 --> 00:36:35,040
Speaker 1: instead of immediately decapitating. But we're getting there. So then

651
00:36:35,120 --> 00:36:39,160
Speaker 1: with the ovipositor, she injects an egg into the ants thorax,

652
00:36:39,640 --> 00:36:42,360
Speaker 1: and the egg develops within the ant, and then the

653
00:36:42,440 --> 00:36:46,319
Speaker 1: larva hatches, and from here the larva travels into the

654
00:36:46,360 --> 00:36:51,600
Speaker 1: ant's head and waits there consuming material inside the ant's head.

655
00:36:51,680 --> 00:36:55,080
Speaker 1: It consumes hema lymph, and hema lymph is the invertebrate

656
00:36:55,120 --> 00:36:58,799
Speaker 1: equivalent of blood. So imagine this thing basically going inside

657
00:36:58,840 --> 00:37:01,360
Speaker 1: your head and then sit there and drinking your blood.

658
00:37:01,960 --> 00:37:05,920
Speaker 1: But it also, over time eats the ant's brain, and

659
00:37:06,040 --> 00:37:08,520
Speaker 1: this causes the ant, i've read in reports to kind

660
00:37:08,520 --> 00:37:11,080
Speaker 1: of wander around zombie like. This is, of course, not

661
00:37:11,120 --> 00:37:15,120
Speaker 1: the only parasite that can affect an ant's nervous system

662
00:37:15,200 --> 00:37:18,760
Speaker 1: and cause it to wander around and strange zombie like behavior,

663
00:37:19,280 --> 00:37:21,880
Speaker 1: but it did make me wonder. So when does the

664
00:37:21,920 --> 00:37:25,680
Speaker 1: ant first feel the quickening inside its own head? Oh?

665
00:37:25,719 --> 00:37:27,560
Speaker 1: I don't know. That's a tough one. We'll come back

666
00:37:27,560 --> 00:37:29,440
Speaker 1: to it then. So anyway, when it's time for the

667
00:37:29,520 --> 00:37:33,920
Speaker 1: larva to pupate, it secretes an enzyme that dissolves the

668
00:37:33,960 --> 00:37:38,360
Speaker 1: connective membrane of the ants exoskeleton, particularly at the site

669
00:37:38,440 --> 00:37:42,759
Speaker 1: where the ant's head connects to its thorax. Basically, it

670
00:37:42,880 --> 00:37:47,360
Speaker 1: is externally digesting the ant's neck, and while that enzyme

671
00:37:47,400 --> 00:37:49,840
Speaker 1: is doing its work, the larvae continues to eat the

672
00:37:49,880 --> 00:37:52,520
Speaker 1: stuff inside the ant's head, and then the ants head

673
00:37:52,719 --> 00:37:57,040
Speaker 1: falls off, so that here is the decapitation ant's head

674
00:37:57,160 --> 00:38:01,280
Speaker 1: off the larva is inside it. So the larva inside

675
00:38:01,280 --> 00:38:04,440
Speaker 1: the severed head shoves the ant's mouthparts out of the

676
00:38:04,480 --> 00:38:08,400
Speaker 1: severed head, and the fly pupa extends to fill different

677
00:38:08,440 --> 00:38:10,960
Speaker 1: cavities in the ant head, especially like it extends to

678
00:38:11,080 --> 00:38:13,920
Speaker 1: fill in the oral cavity with part of its plate,

679
00:38:14,560 --> 00:38:17,240
Speaker 1: and then it's it sends out a couple of spikes

680
00:38:17,280 --> 00:38:19,880
Speaker 1: that stabs these spikes out through the sides of the

681
00:38:19,920 --> 00:38:23,760
Speaker 1: ant head, and these are respiratory horns like breathing tubes.

682
00:38:24,239 --> 00:38:25,960
Speaker 1: And then after maybe like two to four or two

683
00:38:26,000 --> 00:38:29,239
Speaker 1: to six weeks, an adult fly will just burst out

684
00:38:29,239 --> 00:38:31,920
Speaker 1: of the ant head like you know, hello, there can

685
00:38:31,920 --> 00:38:34,600
Speaker 1: be only one. And I've got I've got a picture

686
00:38:34,640 --> 00:38:37,640
Speaker 1: of it bursting out here down below. And I must say,

687
00:38:37,680 --> 00:38:40,560
Speaker 1: this little larva popping out of the ant head like

688
00:38:40,600 --> 00:38:44,040
Speaker 1: a smashed pumpkin is so cute. It's got huge eyes,

689
00:38:44,160 --> 00:38:46,719
Speaker 1: it's got little little wiggly things. I don't know what

690
00:38:46,800 --> 00:38:49,399
Speaker 1: those are. Yeah, it's just kind of like busting out

691
00:38:49,400 --> 00:38:52,280
Speaker 1: of the face. I like just a like a baby

692
00:38:52,360 --> 00:38:55,120
Speaker 1: crawled out of your face? Right? Did they ever go

693
00:38:55,200 --> 00:38:57,600
Speaker 1: there in the sequels to the Alien franchise later in

694
00:38:57,640 --> 00:39:00,560
Speaker 1: Alien movies where their face bursters. No, But I believe

695
00:39:00,600 --> 00:39:04,200
Speaker 1: one of those Peter Jackson early Gorefest films of his

696
00:39:04,400 --> 00:39:07,160
Speaker 1: there's a scene where like a baby like evil zombie

697
00:39:07,200 --> 00:39:09,560
Speaker 1: baby rips its way out of an old lady's face.

698
00:39:09,600 --> 00:39:13,600
Speaker 1: I think, sick. Yeah, yeah, by all accounts, sick indeed.

699
00:39:13,800 --> 00:39:15,560
Speaker 1: You know, maybe it takes a kind of dark sense

700
00:39:15,560 --> 00:39:18,480
Speaker 1: of humor to appreciate this, but I see when there's

701
00:39:18,560 --> 00:39:21,879
Speaker 1: one photo where the the ant's head has fallen off

702
00:39:21,920 --> 00:39:24,600
Speaker 1: of its body, and it appears that the ant is

703
00:39:24,640 --> 00:39:27,520
Speaker 1: sort of like feeling around for its head with its

704
00:39:27,560 --> 00:39:30,239
Speaker 1: four limbs, like where did my head go? This? It

705
00:39:30,280 --> 00:39:33,160
Speaker 1: reminds me once again of the Certainly, there are lots

706
00:39:33,160 --> 00:39:36,560
Speaker 1: of cartoons where people's heads come off and they you know,

707
00:39:36,600 --> 00:39:40,360
Speaker 1: they reach around for them. But the fieries in Labyrinth,

708
00:39:40,520 --> 00:39:45,719
Speaker 1: the Nightmarck orange creatures who take their own heads and

709
00:39:45,760 --> 00:39:49,040
Speaker 1: limbs off and throw them around and and nix and

710
00:39:49,080 --> 00:39:52,520
Speaker 1: match them and want to do the same thing to uh,

711
00:39:52,640 --> 00:39:57,279
Speaker 1: to us, to to our our protagonist. Uh yeah, those

712
00:39:57,320 --> 00:39:59,719
Speaker 1: are those are some nightmare creatures for sure. You know,

713
00:39:59,719 --> 00:40:01,839
Speaker 1: I to go back and watch The Labyrinth again. It's

714
00:40:01,880 --> 00:40:04,560
Speaker 1: been so I barely remember it. Oh yeah, it's it's

715
00:40:04,600 --> 00:40:07,360
Speaker 1: it's quite good. It's a classic. I mean it's no

716
00:40:07,440 --> 00:40:12,600
Speaker 1: Highlander too does have a queen soundtrack. Uh no, but

717
00:40:12,680 --> 00:40:15,359
Speaker 1: it has a tape with Bowie soundtrack. I think that

718
00:40:15,480 --> 00:40:18,000
Speaker 1: I think that that suffices. But anyway, so back to

719
00:40:18,000 --> 00:40:20,640
Speaker 1: the Highlander flies, the suit Acteon. So these flies have

720
00:40:20,680 --> 00:40:25,800
Speaker 1: actually been deployed intentionally in some areas for invasive fire

721
00:40:25,840 --> 00:40:28,160
Speaker 1: ant control. So it's kind of like if you had

722
00:40:28,200 --> 00:40:32,800
Speaker 1: a problem with invasive Michael ironside populations and they're ravaging

723
00:40:32,800 --> 00:40:35,560
Speaker 1: your local ecosystem, what do you do while you release

724
00:40:35,680 --> 00:40:38,840
Speaker 1: a population of christof lamberts to keep it in check,

725
00:40:38,920 --> 00:40:42,839
Speaker 1: going out and decapitating all of your invasive Michael ironsides.

726
00:40:43,200 --> 00:40:45,680
Speaker 1: And this works out because the specifics of at least

727
00:40:45,719 --> 00:40:48,600
Speaker 1: some species of the suit Acteon make them unlikely to

728
00:40:48,640 --> 00:40:51,200
Speaker 1: be a human pest. Like, they do not seem to

729
00:40:51,200 --> 00:40:53,640
Speaker 1: be attracted to the kinds of things that normally make

730
00:40:53,680 --> 00:40:57,320
Speaker 1: a fly past. They're not really attracted to carry in feces, fruits,

731
00:40:57,400 --> 00:41:01,400
Speaker 1: or human foods. M So more challenging to trigger the

732
00:41:01,440 --> 00:41:03,879
Speaker 1: gathering here, that's what you're saying, I guess. So, yeah,

733
00:41:03,960 --> 00:41:05,359
Speaker 1: how do you get them all in the same place?

734
00:41:05,360 --> 00:41:07,240
Speaker 1: I guess you just gather a lot of fire ants.

735
00:41:07,440 --> 00:41:09,800
Speaker 1: Another thing that that's funny I found, Uh, I guess

736
00:41:09,960 --> 00:41:12,800
Speaker 1: because of this potential to act as like pest control.

737
00:41:13,600 --> 00:41:15,960
Speaker 1: When you google this genus, you will find hits for

738
00:41:16,000 --> 00:41:20,359
Speaker 1: posts like where can I buy ant decapitating flies? They're

739
00:41:20,440 --> 00:41:24,080
Speaker 1: like international suppliers who will ship to you? Or what?

740
00:41:24,800 --> 00:41:28,520
Speaker 1: Another random but maybe interesting fact, apparently, the sex of

741
00:41:28,560 --> 00:41:32,560
Speaker 1: the emerging highlander fly will be determined by the size

742
00:41:32,640 --> 00:41:35,400
Speaker 1: of the ant head that gets cut off. So you

743
00:41:35,480 --> 00:41:37,839
Speaker 1: cut off a bigger aunt head, you get a female fly.

744
00:41:38,120 --> 00:41:39,960
Speaker 1: You cut off a smaller ant head, you get a

745
00:41:39,960 --> 00:41:43,600
Speaker 1: mail fly. Oh wow. So it's like the older, the immortal,

746
00:41:43,680 --> 00:41:46,200
Speaker 1: you know, the more quickenings within them, the more room

747
00:41:46,280 --> 00:41:50,080
Speaker 1: for growth. I'm reaching, but I'm trying to continue the

748
00:41:50,080 --> 00:41:53,520
Speaker 1: connection here now. I admire your your dedication. By the way,

749
00:41:53,719 --> 00:41:55,960
Speaker 1: if you want to read more, the University of Florida

750
00:41:56,080 --> 00:41:59,200
Speaker 1: Entomology department website as a great page with references on

751
00:41:59,280 --> 00:42:03,240
Speaker 1: the sud Acton genus. Uh. It's it's a wild ride.

752
00:42:03,360 --> 00:42:05,040
Speaker 1: All Right, we're gonna take one more break and when

753
00:42:05,040 --> 00:42:07,800
Speaker 1: we come back, we're going to talk about the ozone layer.

754
00:42:08,239 --> 00:42:12,360
Speaker 1: Thank alright, we're back. So, as we discussed earlier, one

755
00:42:12,400 --> 00:42:15,960
Speaker 1: of the major plot elements in Highlander two is the

756
00:42:16,040 --> 00:42:20,200
Speaker 1: idea that the Earth's ozone layer was was terribly depleted

757
00:42:20,280 --> 00:42:24,879
Speaker 1: and Connor McCloud uh founded the Shield Corporation, which which

758
00:42:25,600 --> 00:42:30,920
Speaker 1: created these enormous like uh you know sci fi energy um,

759
00:42:31,600 --> 00:42:34,319
Speaker 1: the pyramid pyramids ye, that are shooting some sort of

760
00:42:34,360 --> 00:42:38,320
Speaker 1: beam up into the sky and creating an artificial ozone

761
00:42:38,360 --> 00:42:41,920
Speaker 1: layer and artificial shield that is protecting the Earth against

762
00:42:41,960 --> 00:42:46,279
Speaker 1: harmful UV rays. But it makes everything like dark and

763
00:42:46,360 --> 00:42:49,000
Speaker 1: human except I must say this does not actually apply

764
00:42:49,120 --> 00:42:51,480
Speaker 1: in every scene, Like when you showed the scenes with

765
00:42:51,520 --> 00:42:56,239
Speaker 1: Sean Connery in Scotland. Scotland's fine, everything looks normal, but

766
00:42:56,520 --> 00:42:59,920
Speaker 1: which is which is generally so not what you'd expect

767
00:43:00,000 --> 00:43:03,120
Speaker 1: from Scotland, right, But yeah, so the world is all

768
00:43:03,200 --> 00:43:06,279
Speaker 1: dark and humid, and it's a classic case of like

769
00:43:06,400 --> 00:43:09,160
Speaker 1: the heroic character who does something to save the world

770
00:43:09,200 --> 00:43:12,759
Speaker 1: and is totally unappreciated. Everybody hates him for it. There's

771
00:43:12,800 --> 00:43:16,480
Speaker 1: a scene where where Christopher Lambert in Old Man Makeup

772
00:43:16,600 --> 00:43:18,480
Speaker 1: is like at a bar getting a drink in this

773
00:43:18,600 --> 00:43:21,319
Speaker 1: angry lady in a polka dot dress runs up to

774
00:43:21,440 --> 00:43:23,600
Speaker 1: him and tries to hit him, and it's like, yo

775
00:43:23,719 --> 00:43:28,399
Speaker 1: felt the sky with that puke. Alright, well, let's talk

776
00:43:28,400 --> 00:43:31,120
Speaker 1: about the puke in the sky. Um, let's talk about

777
00:43:31,120 --> 00:43:35,440
Speaker 1: the ozone layer. So, first of all, ozone or try oxygen,

778
00:43:35,640 --> 00:43:39,120
Speaker 1: is an inorganic molecule, and on the surface of the planet,

779
00:43:39,320 --> 00:43:42,239
Speaker 1: it's a pale blue gas and it's a pollutant. But

780
00:43:42,400 --> 00:43:46,120
Speaker 1: most of the Earth's ozone isn't down here. Nine of

781
00:43:46,200 --> 00:43:49,720
Speaker 1: it is up in the stratosphere, ten to thirty miles

782
00:43:49,760 --> 00:43:53,719
Speaker 1: sixty kilometers above the surface. It's just a small part

783
00:43:53,800 --> 00:43:56,960
Speaker 1: of the atmosphere up there, and it's mostly oxygen and nitrogen.

784
00:43:57,840 --> 00:44:01,000
Speaker 1: But but in the stratosphere it blocks the worst and

785
00:44:01,080 --> 00:44:06,480
Speaker 1: most energetic ultraviolet light wave lengths, namely UVC and UVB.

786
00:44:07,640 --> 00:44:11,239
Speaker 1: These uh these particles absorbed the UV waves and heat up,

787
00:44:11,280 --> 00:44:13,719
Speaker 1: as does the oxygen. And for this reason, the stratosphere

788
00:44:14,239 --> 00:44:17,400
Speaker 1: heats up the higher that you go, so temperatures that

789
00:44:18,160 --> 00:44:21,480
Speaker 1: increase from an average of negative sixty degrees fahrenheit or

790
00:44:21,480 --> 00:44:25,680
Speaker 1: negative fifty one degree celsius at the tropopas to a

791
00:44:25,760 --> 00:44:29,200
Speaker 1: maximum of about five degrees fahrenheit or negative fifteen degrees

792
00:44:29,239 --> 00:44:32,200
Speaker 1: celsius at the top of the stratosphere. And that's because

793
00:44:32,280 --> 00:44:35,359
Speaker 1: of the ozone being bombarded by the UV radiation from

794
00:44:35,400 --> 00:44:38,160
Speaker 1: space right, and so it plays an important role. It

795
00:44:38,400 --> 00:44:42,759
Speaker 1: is a shield. The ozone layer is a shield, um

796
00:44:42,880 --> 00:44:46,080
Speaker 1: and it's especially important to us mortals down here or

797
00:44:46,800 --> 00:44:49,160
Speaker 1: you know, life itself. Now, when I was a little kid,

798
00:44:49,280 --> 00:44:52,640
Speaker 1: I remember the depletion of the ozone layer being essentially

799
00:44:52,680 --> 00:44:56,640
Speaker 1: like the biggest environmental issue. I remember that from like

800
00:44:56,680 --> 00:45:00,319
Speaker 1: the late eighties and early nineties absolutely, and that's I mean,

801
00:45:00,320 --> 00:45:02,799
Speaker 1: that is what this film is coming out of, uh

802
00:45:02,840 --> 00:45:05,520
Speaker 1: and that is reflected in this film's themes. So, in

803
00:45:05,560 --> 00:45:08,799
Speaker 1: the late nineteen seventies, scientists realized that ozone levels over

804
00:45:08,840 --> 00:45:13,280
Speaker 1: Antarctica were dropping. Record low levels were occurring every spring.

805
00:45:14,120 --> 00:45:17,319
Speaker 1: In they figured out why it was due to the

806
00:45:17,360 --> 00:45:22,200
Speaker 1: release of chlorofluoro carbons or c f c's in the

807
00:45:22,239 --> 00:45:25,799
Speaker 1: atmosphere and these chemical compounds or things that we were

808
00:45:25,880 --> 00:45:30,280
Speaker 1: using them in in air conditioning, aerosol spray cans, cleaning products,

809
00:45:30,320 --> 00:45:33,400
Speaker 1: and the manufacture of things like styrofoam, right, And I

810
00:45:33,440 --> 00:45:36,920
Speaker 1: believe specifically it was the chlorine component of the chloroflora

811
00:45:36,960 --> 00:45:41,719
Speaker 1: carbons that was especially damaging to ozone levels because it

812
00:45:41,760 --> 00:45:44,640
Speaker 1: would the CFCs would go up in the atmosphere and

813
00:45:44,640 --> 00:45:47,040
Speaker 1: then then the chlorine ions would come off of them

814
00:45:47,080 --> 00:45:50,440
Speaker 1: and bond with other molecules and it would eventually lead

815
00:45:50,520 --> 00:45:54,000
Speaker 1: to ozone depletion. That's right. Yeah, the CFCs were drifting

816
00:45:54,040 --> 00:45:56,160
Speaker 1: up into the stratosphere and then the CFCs would be

817
00:45:56,239 --> 00:46:00,080
Speaker 1: broken apart by UV radiation releasing the chlorine. Now, it

818
00:46:00,120 --> 00:46:02,719
Speaker 1: was only popping up in the spring because there are

819
00:46:02,760 --> 00:46:07,520
Speaker 1: seasonal factors that influence ozone levels over the Antarctic at Arctic,

820
00:46:07,600 --> 00:46:09,640
Speaker 1: so it's really only popping up during that one period

821
00:46:09,640 --> 00:46:12,840
Speaker 1: of time, and the Arctic wasn't affected due to a

822
00:46:12,880 --> 00:46:17,200
Speaker 1: fewer icy clouds and other climate factors. Now there's a

823
00:46:17,280 --> 00:46:21,920
Speaker 1: dystopian version of this story. Uh, there's a dystopian timeline

824
00:46:21,960 --> 00:46:27,000
Speaker 1: extending from the nineteen eighties. Uh. Ultimately a fiction, and

825
00:46:27,040 --> 00:46:31,200
Speaker 1: it doesn't involve immortal swordsmen at all. It was partially

826
00:46:31,239 --> 00:46:35,120
Speaker 1: foreseen in the nineteen eighties and then in two thousand nine, UH.

827
00:46:35,320 --> 00:46:39,680
Speaker 1: Goddard Space Flight Center scientist Paul Newman uh ransom computer

828
00:46:39,760 --> 00:46:43,480
Speaker 1: simulations to see what would have happened? What? What kind

829
00:46:43,520 --> 00:46:47,000
Speaker 1: of what? What might we have seen if we had

830
00:46:47,040 --> 00:46:51,560
Speaker 1: done absolutely nothing, If there had been uh no concerted

831
00:46:51,600 --> 00:46:54,919
Speaker 1: efforts to to do something about the depleted ozone layer,

832
00:46:54,920 --> 00:46:57,040
Speaker 1: if there's been no connor McCloud, what would the future

833
00:46:57,040 --> 00:47:00,920
Speaker 1: have been like? And according to Newman's model, if humans

834
00:47:00,920 --> 00:47:04,560
Speaker 1: had done nothing about it, if we'd stubbornly continued pumping

835
00:47:04,600 --> 00:47:09,520
Speaker 1: these CFCs into the atmosphere. Uh. He said that we'd

836
00:47:09,520 --> 00:47:13,800
Speaker 1: find ourselves ultimately in the year by the way Highlander

837
00:47:13,840 --> 00:47:17,759
Speaker 1: two takes place in what's going to happen when we

838
00:47:17,800 --> 00:47:23,640
Speaker 1: get there? Well? Anyway, with two thirds of the Earth's

839
00:47:23,640 --> 00:47:27,399
Speaker 1: ozone layer gone, we'd have a permanent ozone hole over

840
00:47:27,440 --> 00:47:31,600
Speaker 1: the Antarctic and the Arctic, and UV radiation in mid

841
00:47:31,680 --> 00:47:34,640
Speaker 1: latitude cities like Washington, d C would be enough to

842
00:47:34,680 --> 00:47:37,480
Speaker 1: give you a sunburn in a mere five minutes of exposure.

843
00:47:38,239 --> 00:47:43,640
Speaker 1: DNA mutating UV radiation levels would be up sixty uh,

844
00:47:43,920 --> 00:47:48,719
Speaker 1: greatly increasing cancer rates and impacting numerous organisms. Yeah, I

845
00:47:48,719 --> 00:47:51,719
Speaker 1: imagine that would that would really hurt the environment and

846
00:47:51,800 --> 00:47:55,279
Speaker 1: ecosystems too. And and indeed, this is this is the

847
00:47:55,560 --> 00:47:58,200
Speaker 1: sort of dystopian world week we kind of see reflected

848
00:47:58,239 --> 00:48:01,880
Speaker 1: in Highlander two, you know, when the fear of this

849
00:48:01,920 --> 00:48:07,200
Speaker 1: world right, and yet somehow humanity avoided this right as

850
00:48:07,239 --> 00:48:11,800
Speaker 1: if a psychic French Scotsman unified our minds uh and

851
00:48:12,000 --> 00:48:15,239
Speaker 1: and and caused seventy countries to come together and enact

852
00:48:15,440 --> 00:48:18,799
Speaker 1: the Montreal Protocol, which is what happened in nine six,

853
00:48:18,840 --> 00:48:22,880
Speaker 1: mind you, the year that Highlander one came out. Absolutely

854
00:48:22,880 --> 00:48:24,920
Speaker 1: no connection between the two, but it did occur. In

855
00:48:25,920 --> 00:48:28,960
Speaker 1: so there actually was a massive effort kind of like

856
00:48:29,080 --> 00:48:33,120
Speaker 1: Connor McCloud shield, except instead of putting a barrier in place,

857
00:48:33,239 --> 00:48:35,799
Speaker 1: what they were trying to do was stop harming the

858
00:48:35,840 --> 00:48:38,400
Speaker 1: ozone layer to begin with. Right, The scientists presented the

859
00:48:38,440 --> 00:48:40,719
Speaker 1: case and they said, look, here's the evidence, and it

860
00:48:40,840 --> 00:48:43,320
Speaker 1: is it's CFCs that are doing it. If we stopped

861
00:48:43,400 --> 00:48:46,960
Speaker 1: producing CFCs, or we at least, you know, tightened down

862
00:48:46,960 --> 00:48:50,799
Speaker 1: our regulations of CFC's, we can stop this process. And

863
00:48:50,880 --> 00:48:54,120
Speaker 1: so they set some goals reduced CFC production by t

864
00:48:54,840 --> 00:49:00,120
Speaker 1: by by and the targets were subsequently strengthened, banning the

865
00:49:00,120 --> 00:49:04,839
Speaker 1: worst CFC offenders by and stiffly regulating them. And as

866
00:49:04,840 --> 00:49:08,640
Speaker 1: it stands today, the ozone layer is recovering and should

867
00:49:08,719 --> 00:49:12,600
Speaker 1: fully recover by Yeah, and I should point out we're

868
00:49:12,600 --> 00:49:16,480
Speaker 1: actually now seeing direct evidence of the of the recovery

869
00:49:16,520 --> 00:49:20,040
Speaker 1: of the ozone layer hole over the Antarctic. Like I

870
00:49:20,120 --> 00:49:24,000
Speaker 1: was looking at a NASA press release about this direct evidence,

871
00:49:24,360 --> 00:49:27,680
Speaker 1: and there was a measuring instrument called the Microwave Limbs

872
00:49:27,680 --> 00:49:31,000
Speaker 1: Sounder MLS aboard the AURA satellite. It was used to

873
00:49:31,040 --> 00:49:34,560
Speaker 1: measure ozone depletion levels and or measure chlorine I think,

874
00:49:34,800 --> 00:49:37,319
Speaker 1: and it showed from two thousand five to eighteen there

875
00:49:37,360 --> 00:49:40,960
Speaker 1: was a net of about twenty percent reduction of ozone depletion.

876
00:49:41,120 --> 00:49:44,120
Speaker 1: So it is actually recovering. Things are getting better, and

877
00:49:44,160 --> 00:49:46,760
Speaker 1: we know this directly now, Yeah, I mean, it's ultimately

878
00:49:46,800 --> 00:49:49,840
Speaker 1: an inspiring success story. It's uh, you know, it's not

879
00:49:49,960 --> 00:49:52,799
Speaker 1: one to one with the problem of human caused climate change,

880
00:49:52,960 --> 00:49:57,359
Speaker 1: but it demonstrates our potential to enact change based on

881
00:49:57,360 --> 00:50:01,359
Speaker 1: our on sound scientific consensus, to to change the way

882
00:50:01,440 --> 00:50:04,239
Speaker 1: we're approaching the world, to cut back on what we're

883
00:50:04,239 --> 00:50:07,720
Speaker 1: doing to it, and and see some recovery take place.

884
00:50:07,760 --> 00:50:10,280
Speaker 1: Like it, it can be done. People. We've done it before.

885
00:50:10,920 --> 00:50:12,919
Speaker 1: It just makes me worry what would have happened if

886
00:50:13,000 --> 00:50:17,600
Speaker 1: there had been as much money behind attacking that scientific

887
00:50:17,640 --> 00:50:21,120
Speaker 1: consensus as there is on the consensus about climate change, right, yeah,

888
00:50:21,200 --> 00:50:24,680
Speaker 1: or if it had been politicized to the accident that

889
00:50:24,640 --> 00:50:27,719
Speaker 1: the climate change has has unfortunately been politicized, we could

890
00:50:27,760 --> 00:50:30,520
Speaker 1: be living in a world a heard right now? Yeah, alright,

891
00:50:30,560 --> 00:50:33,759
Speaker 1: so so speaking of a world of heard, Okay, so

892
00:50:33,800 --> 00:50:37,080
Speaker 1: all this squares rather nicely with what we see in

893
00:50:37,120 --> 00:50:40,200
Speaker 1: Highland or two. You know, clearly again it was this.

894
00:50:40,360 --> 00:50:42,960
Speaker 1: This story emerged from this time of great concern over

895
00:50:42,960 --> 00:50:45,200
Speaker 1: the ozone layer. You can see where the idea for

896
00:50:45,280 --> 00:50:48,320
Speaker 1: the movie came from exactly so, because you know, faced

897
00:50:48,320 --> 00:50:51,279
Speaker 1: with environmental challenges, Connor decided to do something about it,

898
00:50:51,840 --> 00:50:56,399
Speaker 1: partially preventing the dystopian vision we related earlier. And at

899
00:50:56,400 --> 00:50:58,880
Speaker 1: the same time, the movie deals with the self healing

900
00:50:58,960 --> 00:51:01,320
Speaker 1: nature of the ozone like here, because there's this whole

901
00:51:01,600 --> 00:51:03,560
Speaker 1: uh we didn't even really get into this, but there's

902
00:51:03,600 --> 00:51:06,000
Speaker 1: a there are some freedom fighters who believe that the

903
00:51:06,040 --> 00:51:09,880
Speaker 1: Shield Corporation doesn't need to exist anymore, that the ozone

904
00:51:09,920 --> 00:51:12,040
Speaker 1: layer is fixed itself, and then the shields are just

905
00:51:12,160 --> 00:51:16,120
Speaker 1: keeping us in this permanent noir world for no reason.

906
00:51:16,960 --> 00:51:19,319
Speaker 1: And and it turns out that that's the case, right,

907
00:51:19,360 --> 00:51:22,040
Speaker 1: that the Shield Corporation is evil now and must be stopped.

908
00:51:22,280 --> 00:51:25,839
Speaker 1: Like Virginia Madson plays a scientist and eco terrorist who

909
00:51:25,880 --> 00:51:29,520
Speaker 1: believes that the ozone levels are normal and that we

910
00:51:29,560 --> 00:51:32,000
Speaker 1: need we no longer need the Shield. Yeah, so it

911
00:51:32,040 --> 00:51:37,399
Speaker 1: would seem that Connor also managed to ban CFCs as

912
00:51:37,400 --> 00:51:41,880
Speaker 1: well as creating this artificial shield. Um but but but

913
00:51:41,920 --> 00:51:44,400
Speaker 1: it did make me wonder what could we do with

914
00:51:44,480 --> 00:51:47,480
Speaker 1: an artificial ozone layer? Like what sort is there any

915
00:51:47,520 --> 00:51:51,400
Speaker 1: research out there about about how we might you know,

916
00:51:51,440 --> 00:51:54,040
Speaker 1: fix it? If is there anything like the shield that

917
00:51:54,120 --> 00:51:58,080
Speaker 1: we see in Highlander two in scientific literature? Well, I

918
00:51:58,080 --> 00:52:00,400
Speaker 1: mean you see this kind of reaction to certain thing,

919
00:52:00,520 --> 00:52:04,160
Speaker 1: like you often hear people say about climate change, like, well,

920
00:52:05,120 --> 00:52:07,080
Speaker 1: it would just be too hard to get people to

921
00:52:07,160 --> 00:52:10,239
Speaker 1: stop burning fossil fuels and releasing all this carbon into

922
00:52:10,280 --> 00:52:12,600
Speaker 1: the atmosphere. What we need to do instead is focus

923
00:52:12,680 --> 00:52:15,560
Speaker 1: all of our scientific efforts on coming up with ways

924
00:52:15,680 --> 00:52:19,840
Speaker 1: to like counteract climate change. There is geo hacking scheme.

925
00:52:19,960 --> 00:52:22,200
Speaker 1: I would say, based on what I've read, do not

926
00:52:22,320 --> 00:52:25,160
Speaker 1: put all your hope in this like, if you want

927
00:52:25,200 --> 00:52:27,279
Speaker 1: a good way to deal with the climate change, is

928
00:52:27,400 --> 00:52:30,560
Speaker 1: you you should be thinking about reducing emissions, not depending

929
00:52:30,600 --> 00:52:33,880
Speaker 1: on some savior technology to come along and geoengineer the

930
00:52:33,880 --> 00:52:37,120
Speaker 1: world back to good health. And yet, knowing, you know,

931
00:52:37,120 --> 00:52:41,200
Speaker 1: knowing scientists, I figured, well, somebody has surely Cureainly somebody

932
00:52:41,360 --> 00:52:45,440
Speaker 1: presented some sort of geo hacking measure for ozone layer depletion.

933
00:52:45,480 --> 00:52:47,440
Speaker 1: Why I stopped cutting ourselves when we can invent a

934
00:52:47,440 --> 00:52:49,600
Speaker 1: really good band aid? Well, you know, but I mean,

935
00:52:49,800 --> 00:52:51,920
Speaker 1: certainly there's a value in sort of something in the

936
00:52:51,960 --> 00:52:56,319
Speaker 1: scientific exploration of a measures as well. Yeah, having having

937
00:52:56,320 --> 00:52:58,520
Speaker 1: a plan B is worthwhile. So I hunted around and

938
00:52:58,600 --> 00:53:02,120
Speaker 1: I found the work of a Russian physicist by the

939
00:53:02,200 --> 00:53:07,920
Speaker 1: name of Alexander gurvek Born, presumably still alive, based on

940
00:53:08,160 --> 00:53:11,960
Speaker 1: what I could gather, and he proposed this idea in

941
00:53:12,120 --> 00:53:16,960
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty um the the idea of of generating an

942
00:53:17,040 --> 00:53:20,880
Speaker 1: artificial ozone layer or a o L refers to it,

943
00:53:21,480 --> 00:53:23,759
Speaker 1: but then in later papers he refers to it as

944
00:53:23,800 --> 00:53:28,520
Speaker 1: an artificially ionized region or an ai R. He's an

945
00:53:28,560 --> 00:53:32,840
Speaker 1: interesting guy. He argued that among the various high energy

946
00:53:32,880 --> 00:53:36,640
Speaker 1: proposals to deal with ozone layer loss. Quote. The most

947
00:53:36,719 --> 00:53:40,000
Speaker 1: promising approach is connected with the creation of an artificial

948
00:53:40,040 --> 00:53:45,120
Speaker 1: ionized region in the atmosphere by microwave discharges. Okay, well

949
00:53:45,120 --> 00:53:46,799
Speaker 1: that's funny because in the movie you see like a

950
00:53:46,840 --> 00:53:49,799
Speaker 1: big pyramid that's like shooting some beam of energy into

951
00:53:49,880 --> 00:53:52,640
Speaker 1: the sky. It doesn't say what that is. Presumably it

952
00:53:52,680 --> 00:53:54,919
Speaker 1: could be microwaves, So I guess it's visible in the movie,

953
00:53:54,920 --> 00:53:57,560
Speaker 1: and micro raves wouldn't be visible. Yeah, what I'm about

954
00:53:57,560 --> 00:54:00,360
Speaker 1: to explain here does not match up with what we

955
00:54:00,400 --> 00:54:03,080
Speaker 1: see in the film. But you can see where, for instance,

956
00:54:03,280 --> 00:54:05,560
Speaker 1: the screen radier writer might have read about it, like

957
00:54:05,640 --> 00:54:08,520
Speaker 1: might have read something and say popular science, like a

958
00:54:08,560 --> 00:54:13,080
Speaker 1: blurb about this paper and then use that in the screenplay.

959
00:54:13,400 --> 00:54:15,920
Speaker 1: So he wrote about this numerous times during his career

960
00:54:16,040 --> 00:54:18,360
Speaker 1: and uh and even carry out a few experiments to

961
00:54:18,400 --> 00:54:21,760
Speaker 1: sort of present how it would work. And he argues

962
00:54:21,840 --> 00:54:24,960
Speaker 1: that it's possible in principle, but would be difficult and

963
00:54:25,000 --> 00:54:28,120
Speaker 1: we require a lot more development, certainly to reach, you know,

964
00:54:28,400 --> 00:54:33,719
Speaker 1: the level that we could actually counter ozone depletion. But

965
00:54:33,760 --> 00:54:38,160
Speaker 1: the basic idea here behind his his his notion is

966
00:54:38,239 --> 00:54:41,800
Speaker 1: that ozone normally forms in the stratosphere via the combine

967
00:54:41,880 --> 00:54:47,400
Speaker 1: nation of atomic oxygen with molecular oxygen by solar radiation,

968
00:54:47,760 --> 00:54:52,280
Speaker 1: which of course also destroys but basically the solar radiation

969
00:54:52,320 --> 00:54:56,800
Speaker 1: causes a triple collision UH. And so Gouvek proposed beefing

970
00:54:56,880 --> 00:55:00,480
Speaker 1: up ozone creation by the use of microwave radiation, and

971
00:55:00,520 --> 00:55:02,440
Speaker 1: he points out that there are three key reasons to

972
00:55:02,480 --> 00:55:05,200
Speaker 1: depend on microwaves in this kind of scenario. First of all,

973
00:55:05,239 --> 00:55:08,960
Speaker 1: the energy can be transferred for considerable distances in the

974
00:55:09,000 --> 00:55:11,839
Speaker 1: air almost without losses because you're gonna want to beam

975
00:55:11,840 --> 00:55:14,880
Speaker 1: it up to the stratosphere to the energy can be

976
00:55:14,920 --> 00:55:17,600
Speaker 1: focused in the given region of the atmosphere to achieve

977
00:55:17,640 --> 00:55:21,600
Speaker 1: the necessary effect. And then three different regimes of the

978
00:55:21,640 --> 00:55:24,560
Speaker 1: microwave source can be used, which gives the opportunity to

979
00:55:24,600 --> 00:55:28,560
Speaker 1: achieve the necessary optimum conditions. So the idea here is

980
00:55:28,600 --> 00:55:32,839
Speaker 1: to create an artificially ionized region or air rather than

981
00:55:32,880 --> 00:55:35,680
Speaker 1: a shield. And while you could localize the effect you know,

982
00:55:35,760 --> 00:55:37,680
Speaker 1: point out to a pointing out a particular area in

983
00:55:37,680 --> 00:55:40,960
Speaker 1: the stratosphere, the ozone you create with then spread around

984
00:55:41,080 --> 00:55:45,680
Speaker 1: due to winds and turbulent diffusion up in the stratosphere.

985
00:55:46,120 --> 00:55:48,880
Speaker 1: So he continued to work on this idea well up

986
00:55:48,920 --> 00:55:52,560
Speaker 1: into the two thousands. Uh Uh, it's it's a again

987
00:55:53,160 --> 00:55:55,399
Speaker 1: as far as I understand it, and certainly a lot

988
00:55:55,440 --> 00:55:57,520
Speaker 1: of the paper I was looking at what consisted of

989
00:55:57,600 --> 00:56:01,200
Speaker 1: equations and stuff, and you know, breakdowns of what's happening

990
00:56:01,520 --> 00:56:04,799
Speaker 1: would be happening happening at a molecular level. But are

991
00:56:04,840 --> 00:56:09,160
Speaker 1: you saying that you're not an atmospheric physicist. Yeah, I'm sorry. Uh,

992
00:56:09,400 --> 00:56:11,960
Speaker 1: in this discussion of Highlander two, I have to reveal that.

993
00:56:12,239 --> 00:56:15,520
Speaker 1: But but yeah, basically, the idea is that this would

994
00:56:15,640 --> 00:56:18,520
Speaker 1: be a way to produce more ozone to make up

995
00:56:18,560 --> 00:56:22,400
Speaker 1: for ozone depletion, and he makes what seems to be

996
00:56:22,440 --> 00:56:25,680
Speaker 1: a strong case that that we could conceivably do it.

997
00:56:26,000 --> 00:56:28,439
Speaker 1: You can certainly see the kind of thinking that would

998
00:56:28,520 --> 00:56:31,160
Speaker 1: lead to this contingency. I'm glad we didn't have to

999
00:56:31,239 --> 00:56:34,000
Speaker 1: depend on this exactly. Yeah, we're very fortunate that we

1000
00:56:34,040 --> 00:56:36,799
Speaker 1: put in place protocols to just allow the atmosphere or

1001
00:56:36,840 --> 00:56:39,839
Speaker 1: the ozone layer to fix itself naturally. I mean, one

1002
00:56:39,880 --> 00:56:42,640
Speaker 1: reason is maybe it's just a Highlander two working on

1003
00:56:42,719 --> 00:56:45,399
Speaker 1: my brain, But I always do worry about all these

1004
00:56:45,440 --> 00:56:48,960
Speaker 1: proposed massive geoengineering projects that say, you know, we're going

1005
00:56:49,040 --> 00:56:51,440
Speaker 1: to do X, y or Z with Earth's atmosphere, like

1006
00:56:51,480 --> 00:56:55,680
Speaker 1: the idea of counteracting climate change by injecting sulfate particles

1007
00:56:55,719 --> 00:56:58,120
Speaker 1: into the atmosphere or something like that to reflect you

1008
00:56:58,160 --> 00:57:03,239
Speaker 1: know this, So, I don't know what the scientific consensus

1009
00:57:03,400 --> 00:57:06,759
Speaker 1: is on how effective that would actually be or or

1010
00:57:06,800 --> 00:57:09,160
Speaker 1: whether it's a good idea. I tend to suspect that

1011
00:57:09,200 --> 00:57:11,600
Speaker 1: it doesn't have a lot of support. But just the

1012
00:57:11,640 --> 00:57:14,560
Speaker 1: idea of trying things like that on the one Earth

1013
00:57:14,640 --> 00:57:18,560
Speaker 1: we have seems very scary. Absolutely now. At the same time,

1014
00:57:18,680 --> 00:57:21,600
Speaker 1: if we if we could do something like the shield

1015
00:57:21,680 --> 00:57:24,160
Speaker 1: that we see in Highlander two, that would of course

1016
00:57:24,200 --> 00:57:27,840
Speaker 1: be tremendously helpful, especially as we consider the possibility of

1017
00:57:27,960 --> 00:57:31,800
Speaker 1: one day um sending people to other worlds and setting

1018
00:57:31,880 --> 00:57:35,360
Speaker 1: up you know, colonies there. Like if you if you

1019
00:57:35,480 --> 00:57:39,920
Speaker 1: had the technology to create a radiation blocking shield, you know,

1020
00:57:40,080 --> 00:57:43,000
Speaker 1: install that thing on Mars, install that thing on the Moon,

1021
00:57:43,080 --> 00:57:46,560
Speaker 1: install it anywhere you need to try and house people

1022
00:57:46,680 --> 00:57:49,240
Speaker 1: off the planet. Yeah, have like a portable shield kit

1023
00:57:49,400 --> 00:57:53,040
Speaker 1: that goes with you wherever you go. Yeah. So you know,

1024
00:57:53,480 --> 00:57:56,720
Speaker 1: in that regard, this sci fi Technologyan sci fi technology

1025
00:57:56,760 --> 00:57:59,400
Speaker 1: always has a lot of of advantages, right because you

1026
00:57:59,400 --> 00:58:02,160
Speaker 1: don't actually have to develop it. It's just it's there,

1027
00:58:02,160 --> 00:58:05,439
Speaker 1: it's ready to go. But but certainly if we could,

1028
00:58:05,480 --> 00:58:07,440
Speaker 1: if we could pull something off like we see in

1029
00:58:07,440 --> 00:58:10,000
Speaker 1: the film, it would it would be tremendously useful, to

1030
00:58:10,080 --> 00:58:13,360
Speaker 1: say nothing of hoverboards which are also in highland or two.

1031
00:58:14,160 --> 00:58:16,200
Speaker 1: You know, I always wonder about like what is the

1032
00:58:16,920 --> 00:58:20,280
Speaker 1: what is the cost benefit thing of of talking a

1033
00:58:20,320 --> 00:58:24,400
Speaker 1: lot about like, you know, geoengineering contingencies for what if

1034
00:58:24,440 --> 00:58:27,480
Speaker 1: we we've got some massive environmental problem that that could

1035
00:58:27,480 --> 00:58:31,440
Speaker 1: really harm human human civilization, Uh, if we don't stop

1036
00:58:31,560 --> 00:58:34,960
Speaker 1: doing X. And meanwhile, we've got some people working on

1037
00:58:35,040 --> 00:58:38,920
Speaker 1: why saying maybe possibly why could protect us if we

1038
00:58:39,000 --> 00:58:43,600
Speaker 1: don't stop doing X. Does talking about the potential geoengineering

1039
00:58:43,640 --> 00:58:47,880
Speaker 1: solution or whatever like reduce people's incentive to say, stop

1040
00:58:47,920 --> 00:58:51,520
Speaker 1: producing chlorofluora carbons or stop producing carbon emissions, Like I

1041
00:58:51,560 --> 00:58:54,040
Speaker 1: don't know the answer, Well, I don't know. I'm always

1042
00:58:54,200 --> 00:58:56,800
Speaker 1: I'm continually perplexed by this because it's it's one of

1043
00:58:56,800 --> 00:59:02,040
Speaker 1: these things where you see humanities potential, you know, confounding

1044
00:59:02,080 --> 00:59:05,880
Speaker 1: potential to both refuse to change and be and and

1045
00:59:05,920 --> 00:59:09,320
Speaker 1: still be open to dramatic change, like the kind of

1046
00:59:09,360 --> 00:59:13,560
Speaker 1: the kind of human will that that very reasonably would think, well,

1047
00:59:13,560 --> 00:59:15,640
Speaker 1: I don't want to get rid of my hair spray,

1048
00:59:15,680 --> 00:59:17,920
Speaker 1: but I I guess I might be open to the

1049
00:59:18,080 --> 00:59:22,040
Speaker 1: entire world being clothed in sweaty darkness all the time. Yeah,

1050
00:59:22,200 --> 00:59:24,120
Speaker 1: I could, I could change. I could get used to that,

1051
00:59:24,240 --> 00:59:27,200
Speaker 1: but like, but I'm totally not gonna budge on this

1052
00:59:27,320 --> 00:59:30,080
Speaker 1: other issue. It's the it's the change of right now

1053
00:59:30,240 --> 00:59:32,480
Speaker 1: versus the change of years from now. Yeah, and we

1054
00:59:32,520 --> 00:59:34,320
Speaker 1: see this on a personal level all the time. To

1055
00:59:34,480 --> 00:59:37,440
Speaker 1: like you can imagine someone thinking, well, I really, I

1056
00:59:37,480 --> 00:59:40,200
Speaker 1: know my doctor told me I need to change my diet,

1057
00:59:40,280 --> 00:59:42,520
Speaker 1: but sorry, I'm not I'm not going to do that.

1058
00:59:42,560 --> 00:59:45,880
Speaker 1: But maybe I'll start running every day and then that

1059
00:59:45,920 --> 00:59:48,920
Speaker 1: will counterbalance the crap that I eat, you know, or

1060
00:59:49,240 --> 00:59:52,040
Speaker 1: mayage in these exercises on an individual level all the time,

1061
00:59:52,280 --> 00:59:55,000
Speaker 1: very similar to that, like somebody thinks, well, my doctor

1062
00:59:55,000 --> 00:59:57,280
Speaker 1: told me I need to change my day, but maybe

1063
00:59:57,320 --> 01:00:00,680
Speaker 1: in ten years doctors will come up with a pill

1064
01:00:00,960 --> 01:00:03,200
Speaker 1: that I can just take to make me healthy and

1065
01:00:03,240 --> 01:00:05,720
Speaker 1: that will be that'll That's kind of like the shield option. Right,

1066
01:00:05,960 --> 01:00:09,120
Speaker 1: you've got a sort of like counteracting contingency that you're

1067
01:00:09,160 --> 01:00:12,560
Speaker 1: just really crossing your fingers for. And but you know

1068
01:00:12,680 --> 01:00:15,800
Speaker 1: you shouldn't do that. That's not a good idea. Yeah,

1069
01:00:16,520 --> 01:00:20,600
Speaker 1: I mean medical technology, technology in general continues to uh

1070
01:00:20,640 --> 01:00:23,840
Speaker 1: to advance often in in in very uh you know,

1071
01:00:24,120 --> 01:00:27,760
Speaker 1: at a very alarming rate. But you absolutely can't book

1072
01:00:27,760 --> 01:00:30,520
Speaker 1: on it. You know, you can't say, well, I'm sure

1073
01:00:30,600 --> 01:00:33,240
Speaker 1: somebody will figure it out. I'm just gonna keep along

1074
01:00:33,240 --> 01:00:35,840
Speaker 1: this path and we'll see what happens. Maybe maybe someone

1075
01:00:35,840 --> 01:00:37,720
Speaker 1: will come up with a magical shield to protect the

1076
01:00:37,760 --> 01:00:42,360
Speaker 1: planet and in protecting it, I mean protect it from us, maybe,

1077
01:00:42,400 --> 01:00:45,480
Speaker 1: but don't count on it. Just regulate the dang hairspray.

1078
01:00:45,560 --> 01:00:49,160
Speaker 1: I mean, come on, yeah, now that I think about Highlands,

1079
01:00:49,200 --> 01:00:52,800
Speaker 1: who really does have a mangled environmental message? Like what

1080
01:00:53,200 --> 01:00:55,120
Speaker 1: that's not really I guess it's not really trying to

1081
01:00:55,120 --> 01:00:59,120
Speaker 1: say anything. I should not even try to decipher what

1082
01:00:59,200 --> 01:01:02,880
Speaker 1: it might be saying ing about environmentalism. But it's otherwise

1083
01:01:02,920 --> 01:01:09,640
Speaker 1: so lucid, Yes, or Robert, I'm glad we finally did it.

1084
01:01:09,760 --> 01:01:11,760
Speaker 1: This is an episode on one of the best bad

1085
01:01:11,840 --> 01:01:14,720
Speaker 1: movies of all time, And if you have never seen

1086
01:01:14,760 --> 01:01:18,240
Speaker 1: the original Highlander two, you can find yourself. I don't

1087
01:01:18,280 --> 01:01:20,080
Speaker 1: know how is the best way to find yourself a

1088
01:01:20,120 --> 01:01:22,320
Speaker 1: copy of the original cut, because I don't think you

1089
01:01:22,360 --> 01:01:24,600
Speaker 1: can get it in the United States at least well,

1090
01:01:24,720 --> 01:01:27,560
Speaker 1: we had to depend on your VHS copy for for

1091
01:01:27,640 --> 01:01:29,080
Speaker 1: us to watch it. And then, like I said, the

1092
01:01:29,200 --> 01:01:33,240
Speaker 1: version I watched on Amazon Prime last month, uh is

1093
01:01:33,320 --> 01:01:35,200
Speaker 1: a different cut of the film. I mean, it's still

1094
01:01:35,240 --> 01:01:37,800
Speaker 1: enjoyable in some respects. You still get to see that,

1095
01:01:37,920 --> 01:01:40,400
Speaker 1: you know, the visual flare of the director is still

1096
01:01:40,480 --> 01:01:43,640
Speaker 1: very much on the screen, but no Zeist. It's less

1097
01:01:43,680 --> 01:01:48,160
Speaker 1: manically incoherent. Yeah, they remix things in an attempt to

1098
01:01:48,320 --> 01:01:51,680
Speaker 1: give it more um coherence, but I'm not sure it

1099
01:01:51,800 --> 01:01:55,720
Speaker 1: really succeeds. But hey, if nothing else, you still get

1100
01:01:55,720 --> 01:01:58,240
Speaker 1: that cool sword fight in the in the you know,

1101
01:01:58,320 --> 01:02:01,200
Speaker 1: the city with the train and the the flying punks

1102
01:02:01,240 --> 01:02:05,560
Speaker 1: on their their their their hoverboards. So that's always a win.

1103
01:02:06,000 --> 01:02:07,960
Speaker 1: I don't know if we should pat ourselves on the

1104
01:02:07,960 --> 01:02:10,000
Speaker 1: back too much, but I think we did a better

1105
01:02:10,080 --> 01:02:12,880
Speaker 1: job of finding good scientific angles on Highland or two

1106
01:02:12,920 --> 01:02:15,400
Speaker 1: than I expected we could. I know, imagine what we

1107
01:02:15,440 --> 01:02:19,280
Speaker 1: could do with a real science fiction film. You know,

1108
01:02:19,320 --> 01:02:21,479
Speaker 1: but which brings us that we did one of these

1109
01:02:21,480 --> 01:02:24,479
Speaker 1: on two thousand one of Space Odyssey several months back,

1110
01:02:24,680 --> 01:02:27,440
Speaker 1: and now that we've we we've gotten Highlander two out

1111
01:02:27,440 --> 01:02:29,280
Speaker 1: of the way. I would love to do more of

1112
01:02:29,320 --> 01:02:32,360
Speaker 1: these on a regular basis. Uh. For instance, I've wanted

1113
01:02:32,400 --> 01:02:34,080
Speaker 1: to do an episode on the science of the Dark

1114
01:02:34,080 --> 01:02:38,040
Speaker 1: Crystal for a long time, and uh, I think given

1115
01:02:38,440 --> 01:02:41,720
Speaker 1: developments with Netflix, I think this is the year to

1116
01:02:41,760 --> 01:02:44,080
Speaker 1: do it. Maybe we'll have to think about that one.

1117
01:02:44,120 --> 01:02:45,720
Speaker 1: A lot of people have said, oh, do you know,

1118
01:02:45,760 --> 01:02:48,920
Speaker 1: do something related to alien and the xenomorph. You know,

1119
01:02:48,960 --> 01:02:51,320
Speaker 1: obviously there's a lot we could talk about there. So

1120
01:02:52,040 --> 01:02:53,520
Speaker 1: we would love to hear from all of you out there.

1121
01:02:53,520 --> 01:02:58,240
Speaker 1: If you enjoyed this treatment of of a film with science,

1122
01:02:58,880 --> 01:03:01,240
Speaker 1: then then a let know what you would like us

1123
01:03:01,240 --> 01:03:04,520
Speaker 1: to explore in potential future episodes. If like us, you're

1124
01:03:04,560 --> 01:03:07,520
Speaker 1: a fan of trash cinema and be movie behemoths, get

1125
01:03:07,520 --> 01:03:11,200
Speaker 1: in touch. Let us know what's your favorite awesomely bad movie. Likewise,

1126
01:03:11,240 --> 01:03:13,640
Speaker 1: we know that we have some Highlander fans out there,

1127
01:03:14,000 --> 01:03:17,480
Speaker 1: So if you have definite thoughts about Highlander one and two,

1128
01:03:17,600 --> 01:03:20,160
Speaker 1: if you have thoughts about all the various other films

1129
01:03:20,160 --> 01:03:22,160
Speaker 1: and TV shows, most of which I have not seen.

1130
01:03:22,800 --> 01:03:25,040
Speaker 1: We would love for you to to to bring us

1131
01:03:25,120 --> 01:03:28,920
Speaker 1: up to speed on the Highlander universe, quoth the Lambert

1132
01:03:29,360 --> 01:03:33,880
Speaker 1: never more. Alright, So in the meantime, check out Stuff

1133
01:03:33,920 --> 01:03:35,520
Speaker 1: to Blow your Mind dot com. That's the mother Ship.

1134
01:03:35,560 --> 01:03:37,680
Speaker 1: That's where we'll find all the episodes of the show.

1135
01:03:38,040 --> 01:03:40,000
Speaker 1: You also find links out to our very social media

1136
01:03:40,040 --> 01:03:43,080
Speaker 1: accounts there beach. If you're on Facebook, why don't you

1137
01:03:43,160 --> 01:03:46,080
Speaker 1: join our Facebook group it's Stuff to Blow your Mind's

1138
01:03:46,120 --> 01:03:49,640
Speaker 1: discussion module. Uh. Once you join, you can interact with

1139
01:03:49,960 --> 01:03:53,080
Speaker 1: other listeners. You can interact with us, You can talk

1140
01:03:53,120 --> 01:03:57,440
Speaker 1: about squirrels and Highlander two to your heart's content. And

1141
01:03:57,480 --> 01:03:59,000
Speaker 1: if you want to support the show, there are a

1142
01:03:59,040 --> 01:04:01,360
Speaker 1: number of ways to do it. Just spread the word

1143
01:04:01,520 --> 01:04:04,000
Speaker 1: for starters. If you want to buy some merchandise at

1144
01:04:04,000 --> 01:04:06,680
Speaker 1: our little tea public store, you'll find a link for

1145
01:04:06,720 --> 01:04:09,920
Speaker 1: that on the on the Mothership. And then the best

1146
01:04:09,960 --> 01:04:12,640
Speaker 1: thing you can do is just rate and review us

1147
01:04:12,640 --> 01:04:14,160
Speaker 1: wherever you have the power to do so, and make

1148
01:04:14,160 --> 01:04:16,680
Speaker 1: sure you subscribe to both Stuff Toble your Mind and

1149
01:04:16,760 --> 01:04:20,120
Speaker 1: our other show Invention. Have you not checked out Invention yet?

1150
01:04:20,160 --> 01:04:22,640
Speaker 1: If not what the heck is wrong with you? Go

1151
01:04:22,720 --> 01:04:24,560
Speaker 1: and check it out. We have a whole episode about

1152
01:04:24,600 --> 01:04:27,760
Speaker 1: the guillotine. It's totally on message with everything we've talked

1153
01:04:27,800 --> 01:04:31,840
Speaker 1: about today, the ultimate anti zic tea and technology. Yeah,

1154
01:04:31,880 --> 01:04:34,280
Speaker 1: so go check out Invention. If you like this show,

1155
01:04:34,320 --> 01:04:37,360
Speaker 1: you'll probably love that show too. Anyway, huge thanks to

1156
01:04:37,640 --> 01:04:41,920
Speaker 1: our audio producers Alex Williams and Torii Harrison. If you

1157
01:04:41,960 --> 01:04:43,880
Speaker 1: would like to get in touch with us directly with

1158
01:04:43,960 --> 01:04:46,960
Speaker 1: feedback about this episode or any other, to suggest a

1159
01:04:47,000 --> 01:04:49,280
Speaker 1: topic for the future, or just to say hello, you

1160
01:04:49,280 --> 01:04:52,440
Speaker 1: can email us at blow the Mind at how stuff

1161
01:04:52,440 --> 01:05:04,800
Speaker 1: works dot com for more on this and thousands of

1162
01:05:04,800 --> 01:05:26,680
Speaker 1: other topics. Is it how stuff works dot com. Bu