Speaker 1: On the Bechdelcast.
Speaker 2: The questions asked if movies have women and them, are
Speaker 2: all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands, or do they
Speaker 2: have individualism? The patriarchy Zephyn bast start changing with the
Speaker 2: Bechdel Cast.
Speaker 3: Hello Bechdel Cast.
Speaker 1: A listener, whoa we wi we woo, we are here.
Speaker 3: This is uh Jamie and Caitlin, sorry and panicked.
Speaker 1: It's okay, It's okay, and we are here unlocking an
Speaker 1: episode of our Patreon aka Matreon, and we should say
Speaker 1: Matreon formerly known as Patreon, quite frankly for your listening
Speaker 1: pleasure this week to observe the release of Ready or
Speaker 1: Not too, a movie that neither of us have seen
Speaker 1: and neither of us can vouch for or argue against. True,
Speaker 1: but we know that tomorrow Weaving is in it. And
Speaker 1: I do like the internal logic of you thought she
Speaker 1: was ready or not? What if two? I like there
Speaker 1: like one woman? What about two? And honestly it's very
Speaker 1: base logic, But I'm listening what if two women? Many
Speaker 1: movies are not asking this question.
Speaker 3: Yeah, ready or not? Two women?
Speaker 1: Ready or not? Here's two women? I think that's maybe
Speaker 1: supposed to be the horror element Ready or Not two
Speaker 1: women in the movie. Wow yeah, so yeah, really impressive.
Speaker 1: I mean and honestly, in the in the wave of
Speaker 1: feminist backlash we're in right now, some people do need
Speaker 1: the warning that there's going to be two women. Yeah,
Speaker 1: hope you're ready for two women and don't blond white women.
Speaker 1: So yes, yes, but but yeah, we're unlocking our episode
Speaker 1: on Ready or Not one to observe Ready or Not
Speaker 1: two a movie. By the way, I will be seeing it.
Speaker 1: I'm actually pretty excited. Same. I hope it's good. I
Speaker 1: love samaraw Weaving. I feel like she's very underrated.
Speaker 3: Yeah she's she's good. I hope the movie's fun.
Speaker 1: Or if I'm correct, Samara Waving she's Australian, right.
Speaker 3: She is Australian. Yes, famously.
Speaker 1: That was definitely respectful what I just did, Samara Waving,
Speaker 1: she would love that I did that. Tony, all kinds
Speaker 1: of women are from there. Jacob BELORDI shakeup BELORDI, he's
Speaker 1: for the girls. I think I don't know who. Well,
Speaker 1: I just I just said that I have no idea
Speaker 1: he's worked with a woman that we know he's met
Speaker 1: a woman.
Speaker 3: Sure has he's met at least one woman and that
Speaker 3: makes him a feminist.
Speaker 1: Anyway, really, cast, by the way, it so is, Hope
Speaker 1: this is your first episode. I think we say this
Speaker 1: at the beginning of every episode at this point, Hope
Speaker 1: this isn't your first episode, but statistically it may very well. Maybe. Yeah, listen,
Speaker 1: this is the Bechdel Test. Nope, cast, Nope, this is
Speaker 1: the Bechtel Cast. If this is your first episode, welcome
Speaker 1: Tomorrow Weaving, And this is our podcast where we take
Speaker 1: a look at your favorite movies using an intersectional feminist lens,
Speaker 1: using the Bechdel Test as a jumping off point for discussion.
Speaker 1: And we do not define the parameters of the Bechdel
Speaker 1: Test in our Matreon episodes. So, Caitlin, what the hell
Speaker 1: is it?
Speaker 3: It is a media metric created by friend of the
Speaker 3: pod Alison Bechdel, first appearing in her comic collection Dicks
Speaker 3: to Watch out For in the eighties, and its origins,
Speaker 3: we're more focused on, Hey, are there any queer women
Speaker 3: in this movie that I'm watching?
Speaker 1: And if there are queer women, are they actual characters?
Speaker 3: In any case, the test has become more kind of
Speaker 3: mainstreamified into a media metric that has many versions the
Speaker 3: one that we use is do two characters of a
Speaker 3: marginalized gender have names? Do they speak to each other?
Speaker 3: And is that conversation about something other than a man?
Speaker 3: And ideally it's narratively meaningful and not just nothing dialogue.
Speaker 1: Right, which is why we modified our version of the test.
Speaker 1: And again that's not a criticism of our dear friend
Speaker 1: Alison Bechdell. She wrote it as a joke, but for
Speaker 1: our purposes, that's to avoid I think people who are
Speaker 1: defensive of their favorite movies and wanted to pass the
Speaker 1: Backdel test, and they're like, well, there was a waitress
Speaker 1: and Meryl Streep said I'll have the chicken or whatever,
Speaker 1: so that I would watch that movie honestly, and then
Speaker 1: if they make out it does pass the Bechdel test, it.
Speaker 3: Really really passes the Bechdel test.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I hope that happens in the devil War's product too.
Speaker 1: What if that.
Speaker 3: Happens devil Ware's Product two? Here, I come, What if
Speaker 3: the subtitle to every sequel was here? I come?
Speaker 1: If I think if the Devilwaar's Product two is bad,
Speaker 1: there's going to be some sort of revolt. I mean
Speaker 1: there should there should be. There's so many reasons for
Speaker 1: there to be a revolt. But I do think that
Speaker 1: if the Devil is product too is bad, people are
Speaker 1: gonna be marching outside Stanley Tucci's house. Like I just,
Speaker 1: you know, not that he should be held accountable for it,
Speaker 1: but he will be, and you know, I just I
Speaker 1: really hope it's good. Anyways. Yeah, so we are today
Speaker 1: unlocking an episode from our Matreon from only two years ago.
Speaker 1: We don't do this very frequently because the Matreon is
Speaker 1: a sacred space. So if you're not a subscriber but
Speaker 1: a listener of the show, or you're just getting into
Speaker 1: the show and you want more episodes, our Matreon is
Speaker 1: a slightly looser version of our main fiat episodes. We
Speaker 1: don't generally have guests on there. It's Caitlin and I
Speaker 1: either choosing or very often having our subscribers choose a
Speaker 1: specific theme, and by a specific you have no idea
Speaker 1: how specific it can get. This was a theme from
Speaker 1: twenty twenty four called Wedding Webruary, in which our Matreon
Speaker 1: subscribers voted they wanted to hear us talk about ready
Speaker 1: or not and of course Madam Web which we.
Speaker 3: No, no, no, no, sorry, wait Madam Web was just
Speaker 3: coming out around the same time, so we did talk
Speaker 3: of it, we did cover it later on, but Wedding
Speaker 3: Webruary was Ready or Not and I think twenty seven dresses.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, what theme did Madam Web fall under?
Speaker 3: That was action movies directed by women, which does not
Speaker 3: have a Webruary.
Speaker 1: Okay, egg on my fucking face, we're thinking we but
Speaker 1: that's how nonsensical the themes are. Madam Web was not
Speaker 1: featured in Wedding Webruary. It's explain it. But this is
Speaker 1: an episode from there. If you enjoy it, if you
Speaker 1: enjoy the slightly looser structure, head over to the Matreon.
Speaker 1: It's five dollars a month and it gets you access
Speaker 1: to not just participate in our wonderful community over there
Speaker 1: that we've cultivated over the years, it also gets you
Speaker 1: access to over two hundred bonus episodes, including the Madam
Speaker 1: Web episode. So I know we had to pay all
Speaker 1: the Madam Web episode. We've got to pay our bills.
Speaker 3: So true. Yes, So it's the best way to support
Speaker 3: the show. So we'd love to have you over there.
Speaker 3: But in the meantime, you can enjoy this unlocked episode
Speaker 3: on Ready or Not one oh, there's only one woman.
Speaker 1: In this one. Yeah, and the world wasn't ready.
Speaker 3: The world was not ready. It was only it was
Speaker 3: twenty nineteen, so we only could have one woman at
Speaker 3: that time. But yes, in the meantime, enjoy this unlocked
Speaker 3: episode the Bechdel Cast.
Speaker 1: Duddu do dude record scratch, Wait a second, something's not
Speaker 1: quite right at this wedding. It's Satan's Satan's at the wedding.
Speaker 3: Well, Satan should attend more weddings.
Speaker 1: Honestly, I prefer Satan showing up to a wedding than
Speaker 1: you know, God, if you believe in that, if you
Speaker 1: believe in either of those things. Given the binary like, yeah,
Speaker 1: let's go to Satan's wedding.
Speaker 3: You've heard of holy matrimony, Well what about unholy matrimony?
Speaker 3: And that's when the devil is there.
Speaker 1: And that's when the devil is there in his little chair.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. I love at the end of this
Speaker 1: movie when the devil shows up in his little chair,
Speaker 1: he's like hey, he is like, good job, giry, this
Speaker 1: is such a like this I am okay, we're covering,
Speaker 1: ready or not? It's wedding Webruary. Yes, yeah, you know this.
Speaker 1: I am adding this to the pantheon of a genre
Speaker 1: I like to call good for her cinema. Yes, we've
Speaker 1: seen We've seen good for her cinema many times over
Speaker 1: the years. I'm generally a fan of it. Sometimes it
Speaker 1: is like, what does this man think women are like?
Speaker 1: This isn't necessarily one of those movies. But sometimes you're
Speaker 1: just like, interesting, you know, gymnastics routine going on in
Speaker 1: this in this writer's mind, not this one that I
Speaker 1: don't know. Good for her cinema, I mean. And then
Speaker 1: there's also like, see there's well, what would you.
Speaker 3: Put on the letterbox list of oh boy, good for
Speaker 3: her cinema?
Speaker 1: I need your help because I think that the thing
Speaker 1: that for sure it is in good for her cinema
Speaker 1: if at the end of the movie it's most often
Speaker 1: written by men, I would say. And at the end
Speaker 1: of the movie, the conventionally beautiful protagonist smokes a cigarette
Speaker 1: that has survived the ordeal along with her to sort
Speaker 1: of be like, Wow, what a day. I'm talking the
Speaker 1: end of Heathers I believe has a good for her cigarette.
Speaker 1: This movie has a good for her cigarette. The menu
Speaker 1: from last year, as I recall a good for her
Speaker 1: cigarette and cheeseburger, which is another not like other girls
Speaker 1: skinny girl eating cheeseburger. Come on, like, this is just
Speaker 1: I'm trying to think of other times that a woman
Speaker 1: smoked a cigarette at the end of the movie because
Speaker 1: she's one poor things. I don't think Emma Stone smokes
Speaker 1: a cigarette at the end of that movie, but like,
Speaker 1: spiritually that's what's going on.
Speaker 3: Right, I mean the cigarette might just be an extra
Speaker 3: little flourish because I would put Knives Out on that list.
Speaker 1: Yes, the coffee is the cigarette. The coffee is the cigarette. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was thinking that as well. This movie, I mean
Speaker 1: has it and it came out the same year as
Speaker 1: Knives Out, which is right interesting anyways, Yes, I would
Speaker 1: add this to the pantheon of good for her cinema.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I like it, Sometimes I don't sure, because sometimes
Speaker 1: you're just like but ready or not. Whether you like
Speaker 1: it or not is certainly, you know, good for her
Speaker 1: cinema big time. And it's also a very recent strain
Speaker 1: of I think a recent early and dare I say
Speaker 1: good strain of rich people bad cinema, which we've been
Speaker 1: seeing a whole lot of in the last half decade. Yes, again,
Speaker 1: some of it is good. Some of it is clearly
Speaker 1: written by rich people, and you're like, what is the
Speaker 1: point of this? What is this? But again, I think
Speaker 1: this movie kind of stands out. I don't know, Caitlyn, Yeah, Hi,
Speaker 1: sorry for just bat. I just have been thinking about
Speaker 1: the good for her genre. No, no, I wonder if
Speaker 1: there is a letterbox list with that already.
Speaker 3: If not, let's throw it on ours. And then also
Speaker 3: you can follow us on letterboxed at Bechdel Cast Matrons.
Speaker 1: You know what else falls into good? You're right, the
Speaker 1: cigarette isn't a must, but there has to be like
Speaker 1: some sort of item, a little prop yes, fried green tomatoes.
Speaker 1: The end is a good for her. It's hannibalism good
Speaker 1: for her. Oh yeah, they cook and serve the bad guy.
Speaker 1: Good for her. Jennifer's body. I think what would fall into.
Speaker 3: I'm also forgetting how a lot of these movies end.
Speaker 1: The Vivich good for her.
Speaker 3: I mean, she's floating up in this good for her.
Speaker 1: Hover. This is a genre. It is a genre in
Speaker 1: like every genre, there's goods stay as bads.
Speaker 3: Anyway, let's talk about ready or.
Speaker 1: Not shell Yes, please, after you, after you, after you.
Speaker 3: I saw this movie in theaters.
Speaker 1: Brave.
Speaker 3: It's so brave of me to do. I enjoyed it
Speaker 3: quite a bit. I love a movie that takes place
Speaker 3: in a big creepy house. That's where a lot of
Speaker 3: Who Done It take place, That's where a lot of
Speaker 3: spooky movies take place. I just love the production design
Speaker 3: of like a big creepy house and all of the
Speaker 3: you know, like board game boxes that you see and
Speaker 3: stuff like that. So I really liked the production design.
Speaker 3: I like the story, and I like any movie where
Speaker 3: rich people get fucked over. So I was a fan.
Speaker 1: I didn't see this, and I have it's weird. I
Speaker 1: saw this movie. I remember really clearly watching this movie.
Speaker 1: I wonder if you have an experience like this for
Speaker 1: a different movie. I watched this movie in the first
Speaker 1: two weeks of Lockdown, where it was still like this
Speaker 1: is wild, what's going on? Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, And
Speaker 1: so all I had to say, I remember watching it,
Speaker 1: I remember liking it, and then I memory holed the
Speaker 1: entire thing along with you know, I think with many
Speaker 1: like with several months of my life. You know. So
Speaker 1: I watched it, I liked it. I got kind of
Speaker 1: burned out on this genre, and I feel like it
Speaker 1: kind of got a little far away from itself in
Speaker 1: some situation. I felt that way about The Menu if
Speaker 1: I'm being on it, where it's like I love an
Speaker 1: ensemble movie where we're taking out the rich people and
Speaker 1: there's distinct characters, they're broad stereotypes and we're just knocking
Speaker 1: them out, like I love. And this year is a
Speaker 1: great year for kill the Rich cinema because we also
Speaker 1: have Knives out comes out this year, This comes out,
Speaker 1: and it kept going for a couple of years after
Speaker 1: that because like last year it was like The Menu
Speaker 1: and Triangle of Sadness. I mean, there's like a lot
Speaker 1: of movies of this ilk that have come out in
Speaker 1: the last five years, but this is one of my
Speaker 1: faves I really because I feel like this movie is
Speaker 1: I don't know, with anti capitalist movies, I feel like
Speaker 1: it's like either you have to really go for saying
Speaker 1: something or it's fun. And because whenever it lands in
Speaker 1: the middle, it feels like, I don't know, a little
Speaker 1: dissonant or like not committing to one or the other.
Speaker 1: This movie is committing to fun and like the characters
Speaker 1: are incredibly broad. The way that they got their money
Speaker 1: is incredibly silly, and I just like, I because I
Speaker 1: really couldn't remember how the movie ended spoiler alert for
Speaker 1: those who haven't watched. But I was like, I feel
Speaker 1: like the curse is real. I would be so happy
Speaker 1: if the curse is actually real and the curse is
Speaker 1: actually real and everyone explodes, and it just like it's silly.
Speaker 1: It like it's clear that like it's a killer rich movie,
Speaker 1: but it's not getting into theory. It's just like, here
Speaker 1: are these rich people and at the end, they're all
Speaker 1: going to explode into a cloud of blood. And that
Speaker 1: is like such a good movie for me. That movie's
Speaker 1: always gonna hit for me. It's very cathartic, it's so fun.
Speaker 1: I honestly, I was like, I don't know, I have
Speaker 1: to rewatch Knives Out because I really really loved that
Speaker 1: movie when it came up. But I'm like, but did
Speaker 1: any did a single person explode into a cloud of blood?
Speaker 3: Not one?
Speaker 1: I'm not af I recall, I'm.
Speaker 3: Not at all a right. Should I get into the recap?
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's talk about it all right.
Speaker 3: We open on a flashback. We're in a big mansion
Speaker 3: on a dark and stormy night, and a family is
Speaker 3: playing hide and seek. It seems we see two little
Speaker 3: boys running around. One is named Daniel and then his
Speaker 3: younger brother who I don't think we learn.
Speaker 1: His name, not yet.
Speaker 3: They're running around and Daniel finds the man who's being
Speaker 3: sought in this game of hide and seek, or rather
Speaker 3: the man who's being hunted, because this isn't just any
Speaker 3: game of hide and seek. It's a scary game.
Speaker 1: It's yeah, fun, fun, fun fun. Yeah, it's well it's
Speaker 1: baby Alex that he's shoving into the cupboard.
Speaker 3: Yeah, y yeah, yeah yeah yeah, Well we'll figure that
Speaker 3: out eventually. But Daniel gives up the man's location and
Speaker 3: the family comes in. They like shoot him with a
Speaker 3: crossbow and then drag him away as the man's his wife,
Speaker 3: still wearing her wedding dress, watches in horror.
Speaker 1: They have they must have like friends in the c
Speaker 1: I A or something like how are these I mean,
Speaker 1: I know that, like probably the internal logic of the
Speaker 1: Vivie is like they're rich, rich people can get away
Speaker 1: with anything. They're like, I don't know, folks, ritualistic murder.
Speaker 1: And then we find out that they kind of live
Speaker 1: on a residential street. Uh fun short of I mean
Speaker 1: it seems like the ground driving. Yeah, but the grounds
Speaker 1: of the estate seem really big and she had to
Speaker 1: run very far to get to the street. I don't know,
Speaker 1: I truly think, and hopefully the listeners will not hold
Speaker 1: this against me. My favorite, the biggest like jump scare
Speaker 1: for this movie is when Samorrow Weaving punches a child
Speaker 1: in the face. Oh my god, I like and not
Speaker 1: to but like, I mean, she kind of did what
Speaker 1: she had to do. That kid was about to kill her,
Speaker 1: but I just was like, not expecting a child to
Speaker 1: get punched in the face. Anyways, let's continue.
Speaker 3: Yes, so we cut to thirty years later. It's the
Speaker 3: wedding day of Grace played by Samara Weaving aka Hugo
Speaker 3: Weaving's niece aka Nepotism and I love Spa.
Speaker 1: Weaving but aka Barga Robbie was not available. Let's be serious.
Speaker 3: So it's her wedding and she's getting married to her fiance.
Speaker 3: My fiance, some guy, a guy named Alex played by
Speaker 3: Mark O'Brien. We meet Alex's brother, Daniel played by Adam
Speaker 3: Brodie and we're like, hey, isn't Daniel the name of
Speaker 3: the kid from the beginning?
Speaker 1: Hold on, ready, or not here he is I this
Speaker 1: is ugh, this is like one of the I think, what, well, well,
Speaker 1: he's less villainous in this, but he's in the villain family.
Speaker 1: He really has a robust career of playing tremendous assholes,
Speaker 1: which is wild because I fell in love with him
Speaker 1: on Gilmore Girls, where he was like nice guitar boyfriend.
Speaker 1: I did not watch the OC, but I think he's
Speaker 1: kind of heart throbby in that show. And then he
Speaker 1: just like once Jennifer's Body hit, He's like, I'm actually
Speaker 1: a little stinker. And we've seen him in roles like that.
Speaker 1: I mean, I literally I saw American Fiction last night. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and he I mean, he's a bad guy in that movie.
Speaker 1: He's a bad ish guy in this movie. He's a
Speaker 1: terrible guy and promising young woman. He's an even worse
Speaker 1: guy in Jennifer's Body. He's just a bad guy. If
Speaker 1: he's in the movie look Out.
Speaker 3: He and Justin Long have made careers of if a movie,
Speaker 3: and especially a horror movie, needs a sleazy, douchey white
Speaker 3: guy with brown hair, they call Adam Brody or they
Speaker 3: call Justin Long.
Speaker 1: I hope they text about it. I hope They're just like,
Speaker 1: are you free? Do you want this one? Hope? Adam
Speaker 1: Brody was like, it's all good. I don't need to
Speaker 1: do Barbarian but yeah, you take it.
Speaker 3: Oh anyway, Also, someday we should watch the movie Tusk
Speaker 3: together because that's my favorite.
Speaker 1: Oh I've seen Tusks.
Speaker 3: Oh, I've seen Tusk.
Speaker 1: Yeah. That what an all timer. I mean, what isn't
Speaker 1: happening in Tusk? You know, nothing shortless because everything is happening.
Speaker 1: Everything is happening in Tusk.
Speaker 3: In any case. Alex and Daniel, their brothers, they come
Speaker 3: from this uber rich la Domas family who made their
Speaker 3: fortune in games.
Speaker 1: They're gamers. I love I loved the just like freezing
Speaker 1: that are pausing as we call it in the end
Speaker 1: the movie to see what the games they played, and like,
Speaker 1: my favorite was the board game family ritual. That was fun.
Speaker 3: I play.
Speaker 1: This movie is silly, It's so silly. I love it.
Speaker 3: Yes, Okay, so we meet the rest of Alex's family.
Speaker 3: His father played by Henry I don't know how to
Speaker 3: say this name.
Speaker 1: Sure Shurney could be.
Speaker 3: I had watched him the night before in Mission Impossible
Speaker 3: Dead Reckoning Part one.
Speaker 1: Yeah, thank god, just checking he plays Tony LEEDOMA.
Speaker 3: Yes, so he's mister Daddy, missus Mommy is Andy McDowell.
Speaker 1: Fun love her.
Speaker 3: And then we meet Alex's sister in law aka Daniels,
Speaker 3: his wife Charity.
Speaker 1: And she's a she's her hair is dark, and so
Speaker 1: you know she is gonna be up to no good
Speaker 1: in the world of this movie.
Speaker 3: I kept looking at her and being like, is that
Speaker 3: Olivia Wilde? But it's not.
Speaker 1: Yes, she is Olivia Wilde coded right.
Speaker 3: The actor's name is Elise Lavek.
Speaker 1: I believe she is like sci fi famous, but I
Speaker 1: wasn't super familiar with her.
Speaker 3: Got it. So we meet those members of the family,
Speaker 3: as well as Alex's aunt Helene, who looks very sinister.
Speaker 3: She's also the baldest woman in charge because she's got
Speaker 3: a short hair.
Speaker 1: She is the baldest woman in charge, and the baldest
Speaker 1: woman in charge is the first to explode into a
Speaker 1: cloud of blood. Yes, women can't catch up break and
Speaker 1: she's also we learn the bride at the beginning of
Speaker 1: the movie.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's I think supposed to be like a twist
Speaker 3: or a big reveal, but I was like, which is
Speaker 3: kind of like, well, yeah, dull.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like, there's only so many characters, right anyways.
Speaker 3: Yes, so we meet them, and then there's also a
Speaker 3: handful of housekeepers and a butler who we see.
Speaker 1: The butler is I sound like a pilled I like,
Speaker 1: but the butler is butlering. His name is Stevens. He's
Speaker 1: more than one Stephen. He like they're not. I like,
Speaker 1: how like, I don't know. It's so fun to just
Speaker 1: be like and and here's the trope, and here's the trope.
Speaker 1: And he's a butler and his name is Stevens. There's
Speaker 1: no twist involving Stevens. He just is being a butler.
Speaker 3: He has undying loyalty to the rich family that he serves,
Speaker 3: which is a thing that we see in movies all
Speaker 3: the time that I don't fully get. But yeah, he's there,
Speaker 3: and he is several Stevens.
Speaker 1: He's more than he's You're getting more, you're getting double
Speaker 1: trouble with you hire Stevens. Although I think that sometimes
Speaker 1: I think the more common butler trope, right, is that
Speaker 1: like he's doing something behind the scenes and it's kind
Speaker 1: of this class success where the butler did it. The
Speaker 1: butler killed someone, so not Stevens though Stevens is just
Speaker 1: you know, enthusiastically showing up at work.
Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, Okay. So they have the wedding and then
Speaker 3: that night Grace and Alex are summoned by the family
Speaker 3: to join them for a family tradition where anytime someone
Speaker 3: joins the family by marriage, everyone gets together and they're
Speaker 3: basically like, let's play a game hashtag Jigsaw eyes.
Speaker 1: I was like, the whole it's so Jigsaw codd yes,
Speaker 1: this whole situation, like, and with all due respect to
Speaker 1: the movie and the characters, like, we have seven people
Speaker 1: in a room and they've got like fifteen percent of
Speaker 1: the raw charisma that the puppet Jigsaw has. Like yeah,
Speaker 1: sorry to this family, but they're like, you cannot be
Speaker 1: more menacing than puppet on bike, Like.
Speaker 3: I wish, come on, I wish at the end when
Speaker 3: you get like there's like a burst of flame, you see,
Speaker 3: like a flash of mister LaBelle. That should have been
Speaker 3: Jigsaw sitting in the chair or sitting on his tricycle.
Speaker 1: If they would, I I feel like James Wan would
Speaker 1: have been amenable. He'd be like, yeah, whatever you saw.
Speaker 1: He seems like a really nice guy and he's isn't
Speaker 1: James Wan Australian. I think so and so is Tomorrow
Speaker 1: or earing I guess. I'm like, the directors are American.
Speaker 1: I don't know where I was going with that, but
Speaker 1: but he is in fact Australian and it's important to
Speaker 1: talk about that.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Anyways, Jigsaw is you know, the the I kept calling
Speaker 1: them like the little peepies because they kept forgetting their
Speaker 1: last names. But like the Peepee family isn't on Jigsaw's level,
Speaker 1: but they have. They've clearly seen Saw.
Speaker 3: And they're like, how can we do that?
Speaker 1: Yeah? How could we get her to understand what she's
Speaker 1: probably seen? Saw? One seems aw? Yeah yeah yeah, oh saw. Anyways, sorry,
Speaker 1: back to this movie, right.
Speaker 3: So the rest of the family gathers, including some people
Speaker 3: we haven't met yet. That's Alex's sister Emily and her
Speaker 3: husband Fitch. They also have a couple of young kids,
Speaker 3: and everyone sits down to play the game and the
Speaker 3: vibe is ominous, and then Alex's father launches into a
Speaker 3: story about how the let's play a game tradition started
Speaker 3: where his great grandfather, Victor Laudomas, met a man named
Speaker 3: mister Label who had this like puzzle box thing.
Speaker 1: He's literally jig. He's like Jigsaw.
Speaker 3: Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1: I also just like, first of all, don't approach a
Speaker 1: man with a puzzle box because he could be the
Speaker 1: devil Tom Hanks. And the da Vinci code.
Speaker 3: There, that too, that too, okay?
Speaker 1: Anyways, the da Vinci code was Apple.
Speaker 3: The Dvinci code was Apple also, okay, just because I
Speaker 3: already mentioned it. But the night before I rewatched Ready
Speaker 3: or Not to prep for this episode, I rewatched Dead
Speaker 3: Reckoning Mission Impossible.
Speaker 1: Oh yes, And I thought you were saying you rewatched
Speaker 1: the DaVinci Code. I was like, are you okay? Should
Speaker 1: we talk? Are you sick?
Speaker 3: What if you found out that? I just watch it
Speaker 3: for fun.
Speaker 1: Sometimes, Hey, I can't hang out tonight watching angels and demons.
Speaker 3: What are we gonna cover angels and demons?
Speaker 1: Though?
Speaker 3: All right? And so toward the beginning of Mission Impossible,
Speaker 3: Dead Reckoning, there's this part where Simon Peg basically he's
Speaker 3: like dismantling a bomb, but on the inside of the bomb,
Speaker 3: it's like that cryptext thing where you have to like
Speaker 3: scroll all the things, like good da Vinci code Apple thing?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Was it Apple?
Speaker 3: It wasn't Apple, but it should have.
Speaker 1: Been yeah, exactly. Never ah man, I just love that
Speaker 1: there was a time that a scary book gripped the nation.
Speaker 1: But the Da Vinci code was an apple, I you know,
Speaker 1: long lived. The lowest common denominator in rocks is awesome.
Speaker 3: Awesome anyway.
Speaker 1: So they're no Jigsaw, but they're you know, they're doing
Speaker 1: their best. They're trying to evoke Jigsaw. Yeah.
Speaker 3: So there's this puzzle box thing, and if Victor Laudomas
Speaker 3: can solve the box, mister Label will give him money
Speaker 3: to fund any venture. And Victor solves the puzzle box,
Speaker 3: which is how he was able to launch his card
Speaker 3: game business, which turned into a board game business. Now
Speaker 3: the family owns sports teams. I guess you can become
Speaker 3: billionaires with a gaming company.
Speaker 1: Sure, I don't know. I mean I think I'm thinking
Speaker 1: more of like toy novelty stuff. You definitely can, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean, look at mister Beattie Babies. He owns the
Speaker 1: Four Seasons well, and he almost went to jail. I mean, wow,
Speaker 1: I know someone read specscript about the Beanie Baby's guy
Speaker 1: in Quarantine and if it was you and it was
Speaker 1: me and and Caitlin, there is a whole ass movie
Speaker 1: that they made that. I still haven't watched because I
Speaker 1: resent it because al Gore's daughter wrote and directed it,
Speaker 1: and I'm just like, I resent this nepotism at like
Speaker 1: a cellular level. Sure, why does al Gore's daughter get
Speaker 1: to make the Beanie Baby's movie?
Speaker 3: I know, I'm sorry.
Speaker 1: Mine was called mister Baby and it was good. No
Speaker 1: one understands me anyway.
Speaker 3: Okay, so we get this explanation of why they play
Speaker 3: this game, and so they honor this whatever mister LaBelle
Speaker 3: slash great grandfather agreement by playing a game.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's Jigsaw, He's Jigsaw.
Speaker 3: As per tradition, whenever a new person joins the f
Speaker 3: a blank card is inserted into the puzzle box and
Speaker 3: then it randomly selects and prints the name of that
Speaker 3: game onto the blank card. So it could be Chest Checkers,
Speaker 3: Old Maid or Hide and Seek, which is the game
Speaker 3: that gets printed on Grace's card. And when they see that,
Speaker 3: everyone has a very like oh shit reaction, and Grace
Speaker 3: is like, tih, what's going on?
Speaker 1: She is like, Grace is, let me know if this
Speaker 1: resonated for you. She feels like a Joss Whedon character
Speaker 1: to me, where like it's very Quippy's She's like, guys,
Speaker 1: what the hell, Like, what the hell's going on here? Like,
Speaker 1: I don't know, it just felt very and I don't
Speaker 1: even mean I mean, obviously we we've covered the Josh
Speaker 1: Whedon issue. That's not even what I'm suggesting. I just
Speaker 1: it just felt like she's Joss Whedon code it down to,
Speaker 1: like the the con verses and the like saying fucking
Speaker 1: he fuck, fuck dick ball bluh, blu bluh. But it
Speaker 1: just felt very Joss Whedon codd.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I see that, but I think that that's just
Speaker 3: like part of a larger like men who want to
Speaker 3: write women in a way where they're like bad asses,
Speaker 3: but they don't actually really know how to write women's
Speaker 3: So we just keep getting this version of women over
Speaker 3: and over.
Speaker 1: Yes, and there's a few versions. There were a few
Speaker 1: instances where it really stuck out to me where it
Speaker 1: was like, I don't know, the movie came out in
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen, but you're like, this feels dated. Like at
Speaker 1: one point, the sister just yells cock, where's my gun?
Speaker 1: I'm like, who says that? Who says? What are you
Speaker 1: talking about? Anyways, it's not even a criticism I'm just like,
Speaker 1: women aren't yelling cock Like, they're just not doing that.
Speaker 3: Speak for yourself.
Speaker 1: I just like, I've never heard that as an exclamatory.
Speaker 1: It was very jarring. Yeah, you'd say like fuck or shit, right,
Speaker 1: which plenty of characters do. But she she and it
Speaker 1: sounds like I don't know. I had this whole fantasy
Speaker 1: where like the actress was like, can I say anything else?
Speaker 1: And they're like, no, no, no, this makes sense. Please
Speaker 1: say the word as scripted and cock, where's my gun?
Speaker 1: All right? Whatever?
Speaker 3: Sure? Okay. So the point is Grace's card gets Hide
Speaker 3: and Seek printed on it, and we're like, wait a minute.
Speaker 3: Wasn't Hide and Seek the game that they were playing
Speaker 3: at the beginning where that guy was violently dragged away
Speaker 3: and it was all very scary. So Grace has till
Speaker 3: the count of one hundred slash the length of a
Speaker 3: creepy hide and Seek song to hide somewhere in the
Speaker 3: house and then the family will try to find her,
Speaker 3: and that's all that's explained to her. So she goes
Speaker 3: and she hides in a dumb waiter for a little while.
Speaker 1: She's quipping in there. She's like, what I do my
Speaker 1: random wedding night. I guess I'm just in a dumb waiter.
Speaker 1: Joss Whedon coded And here's.
Speaker 3: Here's my question, though. Does it pass the Bechdel test
Speaker 3: when she talks to herself on multiple occasions throughout the movie? No, no,
Speaker 3: but she's kind of responding. She's asking herself questions. She
Speaker 3: is and then she's responding.
Speaker 1: I mean, we can't say that. You know, Grace is
Speaker 1: not a very active character. That's I certainly wouldn't suggest it.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I mean I think it passes it
Speaker 1: at a few other points anyways, But like, I don't know,
Speaker 1: I just kept thinking. I just kept writing down Joss Whedon.
Speaker 1: Woman quipping to herself alone in a room like it's it.
Speaker 1: It evokes in early twenty tens energy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I'm like, why did she keep talking to herself?
Speaker 3: Maybe people do that, I docare well, when you find
Speaker 3: out that one.
Speaker 1: Of the directors is the co founder of like a
Speaker 1: SKA band, You're like, more of these choices are kind
Speaker 1: of making sense to me in a way that is harmless,
Speaker 1: Like no shade to actually I am a fan of
Speaker 1: a local sco thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I remember when you were like, I'm gonna buy
Speaker 3: a trombone and get into ska.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like you know, I'm like down to skank at
Speaker 1: the SKA show. But when you're like, yes, I believe
Speaker 1: that this movie was co directed by a SKA guy.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense?
Speaker 3: No, I see it.
Speaker 1: I feel like there, I mean, no one is skanking,
Speaker 1: but like.
Speaker 3: The energy is that yeah a bit anyway? All right, Okay,
Speaker 3: so she's hiding. Meanwhile, each member of the family grabs
Speaker 3: an old timey weapon because they play the game exactly
Speaker 3: how it would have been played in great grandfather's time.
Speaker 3: The only person who doesn't grab a weapon is Alex
Speaker 3: because he's upset and he doesn't want anything to happen
Speaker 3: to his wife.
Speaker 1: I think it's so interesting or I guess. One of
Speaker 1: the less effective things for this movie for me was
Speaker 1: like how long the movie is using production elements to
Speaker 1: try to get you to like sort of stay on
Speaker 1: Alex's side, where it's so obvious that he's like, I mean,
Speaker 1: he's bad, and I feel like she is like kind
Speaker 1: of responding to him in that way. But sometimes the
Speaker 1: music will come in where he's like, Babe, you don't
Speaker 1: understand it had to be like this, And then there's like, dude, ude, dude,
Speaker 1: and you're just like you think I'm gonna fall for this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't know, no, I know.
Speaker 3: Okay. So Alex is upset about this whole thing, and
Speaker 3: he sneaks off to find Grace and tell her exactly
Speaker 3: what's going on. But before he can get the words out,
Speaker 3: Grace sees firsthand what this is all about because Emily,
Speaker 3: Alex's sister, who is like super coked out on drugs.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she like drinks a pint of cocaine somehow.
Speaker 3: Yes, So she acts a dundley shoots one of the
Speaker 3: housekeepers thinking she's Grace, and other family members come in
Speaker 3: and they say something about a ritual, but it won't
Speaker 3: count because the person who dies has to be the bride,
Speaker 3: and then they take the housekeeper's body away, and Grace
Speaker 3: has overheard all of this, so she's like, oh my god,
Speaker 3: what the fuck is happening? And Alex explains that hide
Speaker 3: and Seek is the one bad card and the family
Speaker 3: has to play the game and they think that if
Speaker 3: they don't kill Grace by sunrise that they will all
Speaker 3: die because of some curse or something.
Speaker 1: I've got to say, I like jig saws reasoning for
Speaker 1: doing it better. Jessa is not responding to an ancient curse.
Speaker 1: He's like, I heard that you were late feeding your
Speaker 1: dog dinner. Now you're gonna eat five thousand pounds of
Speaker 1: dog food in the acts two minutes, I'll drawing quarter
Speaker 1: you and you're just like, there's not I just love
Speaker 1: how petty he is. Anyway. I think I just want
Speaker 1: to watch Saw again. Yeah, I'm like, Jigsaw, this is
Speaker 1: literally none of your business. It's so wild that you're
Speaker 1: inserting yourself.
Speaker 3: He really does not have, I would say, a strong motivation.
Speaker 3: A lot of the time this family is you know,
Speaker 3: you can't empathize with their motivation, but they are motivated.
Speaker 3: Jigsaw's just sort of like I just felt like it.
Speaker 1: Right, which is like, I mean, he is pretty strongly
Speaker 1: motivated by feeling like it. Like you can't you can't
Speaker 1: say that he's phoning it in at any point. He's like,
Speaker 1: you know, renting warehouses and so forth.
Speaker 3: He's putting in the work.
Speaker 1: I love him. God, what an angel. I love him.
Speaker 1: He did what he had to do. Okay. Sorry.
Speaker 3: So Race learns all of this stuff, and she's furious
Speaker 3: that Alex knew this was a possibility and he didn't
Speaker 3: warn her, and he's like, yeah, oops, but let's get
Speaker 3: you out of here. So he tells her to go
Speaker 3: to the kitchen while he goes to the security room
Speaker 3: to unlock all the doors so she can escape through
Speaker 3: this like surface kitchen exit. And so she sets off
Speaker 3: toward the kitchen. She rips off part of her wedding
Speaker 3: dress and we're like, wow, girl power, and she's like
Speaker 3: making her way to where she needs to go. She
Speaker 3: has some close encounters with the family along the way,
Speaker 3: including with Alex's brother Daniel, who doesn't seem interested in
Speaker 3: killing her, and he gives her a chance to get away.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's Adam Brody ing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like he is.
Speaker 1: Like and Adam Brody as himself where he's just like
Speaker 1: got a glass of scotch and he's like vaguely nihilistic
Speaker 1: and like someone needs to towel him off. Yeah, but
Speaker 1: he's hot, But yeah, what is that?
Speaker 3: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Why can men be a hot when it seems like
Speaker 1: they need to be toweled off? I mean, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'm not sure it's just me. Maybe it's just me.
Speaker 3: I do I like Adam Brody, I hope he's not
Speaker 3: a bad person, irl, because I enjoy him on screen. Meanwhile,
Speaker 3: Emily accidentally kills another housekeeper and the family is freaking
Speaker 3: out because they haven't found Grace yet, and they're like,
Speaker 3: how is she outsmarting us in our own house. Meanwhile,
Speaker 3: Grace manages to get her hands on a gun and AMMO,
Speaker 3: and then she finally reaches the kitchen, but Steven's the butler,
Speaker 3: is there, so she has a scuffle with him. The
Speaker 3: AMMO turns out to be display only, so she can't
Speaker 3: shoot him, but she smashes a bottle of boiling water
Speaker 3: into his face and then run away. In the security room,
Speaker 3: Alex manages to get the doors unlocked, but then his
Speaker 3: father comes in and knocks Alex out and then handcuffs
Speaker 3: him to a bedpost. This is also where we get
Speaker 3: the reveal that Aunt Helene is the young woman from
Speaker 3: the beginning whose husband got killed in that game of
Speaker 3: hide and seek, and we're like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I was born Yester put that together? Oh, is
Speaker 1: the is the boy in the cabinet the husband?
Speaker 3: But her husband being killed as a part of the
Speaker 3: family tradition seems to have radicalized her in the direction
Speaker 3: of yes. This family tradition is very important and it's
Speaker 3: actually good actually, so she's like really into it. Yeah,
Speaker 3: sure it makes sense anyway, So Grace finds her way outside,
Speaker 3: but someone is out there with a flashlight looking for her.
Speaker 3: So she hides in this stable where all of the
Speaker 3: goats live, and I'm like, okay, black Philip.
Speaker 1: Yes are you there? Good for her cinema Also a
Speaker 1: through line of goats, Satanic goats.
Speaker 3: I mean, Satan is in the Vivich Satan is in
Speaker 3: Retty or not? There's goats.
Speaker 1: Why is no one talking about this? I know? Oh
Speaker 1: oh sorry? End of Midsummer another good for her shot. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the smile. Yes, they'll keep coming, they'll keep coming.
Speaker 3: Her cigarette is her big flower crown slash.
Speaker 1: She's surrounded by the cigarette.
Speaker 3: Okay, so she's with the goats and then the person
Speaker 3: finds her and it turns out to be one of
Speaker 3: the little kids. His name's Georgie, and he shoots Grace
Speaker 3: in the hand with the gun that he found that
Speaker 3: his coked out mother dropped. So he's a bad boy, yes,
Speaker 3: And Grace falls into this pit of dead bodies from
Speaker 3: previous sacrifice, so she manages to crawl her way out
Speaker 3: of the pit and she's running and she reaches this
Speaker 3: iron fence that she squeezes through, but Steven's, the butler,
Speaker 3: catches up with her in a car. They scuffle again,
Speaker 3: but Grace manages to get in the car and she
Speaker 3: drives off, and the car has one of those buttons
Speaker 3: where you can like push shit and it dials nine
Speaker 3: to one one. So she hits the button and talks
Speaker 3: to the operator and he's like, oh, actually this car
Speaker 3: was reported stolen, so I have to shut it down.
Speaker 3: So the car stops. She gets stuck again. She can't
Speaker 3: go anywhere, and then the butler appears and shoots her
Speaker 3: with a tranquilizer gun. She wakes up while he's driving
Speaker 3: back to the house and she kicks Steven's in the
Speaker 3: head and he wrecks the car. She tries to escape again,
Speaker 3: but then Daniel is right there. He knocks her out,
Speaker 3: and then Grace is brought to the house and the
Speaker 3: family prepares her for a ritual where they will offer
Speaker 3: Grace up as a human sacrifice, and they're drinking from
Speaker 3: a goblet, which turns out Daniel has poisoned because he
Speaker 3: has a change of heart and he wants to try
Speaker 3: to help Grace.
Speaker 1: Yay Adam Brodie fun. I mean I wish he had,
Speaker 1: you know, wish he had turned a little sooner, but yeah.
Speaker 3: That would have been helpful. But yeah, the family is
Speaker 3: like puking up blood and it gives her a chance
Speaker 3: to run away. But then Daniel's wife, Charity is like
Speaker 3: stop right there, and she shoots and kills her husband.
Speaker 1: Right, which is I mean, he was bad to her,
Speaker 1: but for sure, you know, like he you know, I was.
Speaker 1: I was mixed on that where I was like, well,
Speaker 1: I guess we as the audience are like Daniel's the
Speaker 1: best person in the family that we know, but also
Speaker 1: it sounded like he was very absent and very dismissive
Speaker 1: and like didn't like her very much. True, and like
Speaker 1: I've also it's like what did they did? They just
Speaker 1: like played Jenga on their wedding night, Like she just
Speaker 1: drew a good card and they're like we're playing GoFish. Ye.
Speaker 3: Yeah, seems to be the case because there's a scene
Speaker 3: early on when the other like people who've married into
Speaker 3: the family were like I played old Maid.
Speaker 1: Yeah I liked. I liked who's like the fitch Fitch?
Speaker 1: I mean he is very much the comic relief character.
Speaker 1: But I've liked a lot of those jokes when he
Speaker 1: was replying, I remember this from the trailer, when he's
Speaker 1: like that family shit, when people are like, what are
Speaker 1: you up to?
Speaker 3: Ch It's good he's youtubeing how to use a crossbow,
Speaker 3: et cetera, pro Fitch.
Speaker 1: I liked the Fitch jokes for the most part.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so Daniel has helped Grace escape and but like
Speaker 3: everyone's coming after them. Meanwhile, Alex has used the chain
Speaker 3: of his handcuffs to all through the bedpost. I don't
Speaker 3: understand the physics of that, but it works.
Speaker 1: I was just like the power of Satan compelled him. Whatever.
Speaker 3: Sure, the point is he's free. Now we cut back
Speaker 3: to Grace. The rest of the family's trying to stop her.
Speaker 3: She's fighting them off, and then she kills Alex's mom,
Speaker 3: and right then Alex comes in and he doesn't like
Speaker 3: that his wife killed his mom. So he has a
Speaker 3: change of heart in the other direction, his mommy. He
Speaker 3: has a change of heart in the other direction, and
Speaker 3: Alex wants Grace to be sacrificed, and so the family
Speaker 3: grabs hold of her again. They pin her down. They're
Speaker 3: about to do the ritual. They're all like Heil Satan
Speaker 3: because turns out mister Labail is the devil. But Grace
Speaker 3: gets free just as the sun rises, and so they're like,
Speaker 3: oh my god, we're gonna die. But it seems like
Speaker 3: nothing is going to happen at first, and then they
Speaker 3: all explode into blood because you know, they didn't fulfill
Speaker 3: their end of the bargain and kill her before sunrise.
Speaker 1: That is so satisfying. It was truly excellent to just
Speaker 1: watch Aunt Helen be like, ah, right, I'll do it
Speaker 1: like it's it's it's great, and I like that. I
Speaker 1: mean just the little I mean they're not little, they're
Speaker 1: really broad jokes. But where they the filmmakers decided we're
Speaker 1: not gonna make you watch three kids explode. But then
Speaker 1: they leave the room and then you just hear like
Speaker 1: you're like, whoop. It is very funny. This movie is
Speaker 1: silly billy.
Speaker 3: It is yeah, it's true. Okay, so all the family explodes,
Speaker 3: Grace steps out into the daylight. She's finally safe. The
Speaker 3: house is burning down behind her as emergency responders show up,
Speaker 3: and then the movie ends with one of them being like,
Speaker 3: what happened to you, and she's like in laws the.
Speaker 1: End, and then we're like, okay, good for herson.
Speaker 3: Okay, where shall we start?
Speaker 1: Oh, let's start with I mean, well, I guess just
Speaker 1: a quick rundown of who made this movie? I guess. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I already kind of blew the sco thing. Sorry. This
Speaker 1: movie is written and directed by men, which, while I
Speaker 1: really like this movie, feels was deeply unsurprising.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So we have a directing pair Matt Bett Nelly Open,
Speaker 1: that's mister Scotty, and then Tyler Gillett. As far as
Speaker 1: I can tell, he was able to avoid SKA I see.
Speaker 1: But they are most I think they first popped off
Speaker 1: for the movie VHS, which I saw in college. Well
Speaker 1: or they like directed a segment of the movie VHS. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and they are now most famous for the new Scream movies.
Speaker 3: Got it?
Speaker 1: They directed, Yeah, Scream five and Scream six and didn't
Speaker 1: support Melissa Barrera. And that's interesting, isn't it? But those
Speaker 1: are those are the directors. So we have a pair
Speaker 1: of like horror guys essentially, and I think that honestly,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be I'm guessing that they got Scream off
Speaker 1: of this movie, which makes a lot of sense to me. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: And it was written by a writer named ur Christopher Murphy,
Speaker 1: who I didn't I wasn't able to find anything out about.
Speaker 1: Guy Busic, you know, also just kind of works with
Speaker 1: these guys and worked on a comedy horror series right
Speaker 1: before this movie came out called stand Against Evil that
Speaker 1: I watched. It was a fun show and also so
Speaker 1: very like I love Janet Varney. Anyways. So that's the
Speaker 1: team we're working with here, a very hot horror comedy
Speaker 1: literate team, but a very male team. And we are
Speaker 1: centering a woman, and that's gonna go a whole lot
Speaker 1: of ways historically. And here let's talk about Grace.
Speaker 3: Yes. So, something that I've talked about at length on
Speaker 3: the show is the way that women tend to be
Speaker 3: written in horror thriller movies, especially ones written by men.
Speaker 3: Tend to manifest in a few different ways, most of
Speaker 3: them hit me, hit me, hit me, robbed me the
Speaker 3: wrong way. One that we talked about a lot, for
Speaker 3: example on the iconic Human Centipede episode who as well
Speaker 3: as others.
Speaker 1: Who could forget our very first hilarious prank.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So that one is one where women are written
Speaker 3: in such a way where they seem generally unaware of
Speaker 3: the danger around them. They're overly trusting, they're not cautious,
Speaker 3: even though they've been given many, many reasons that they
Speaker 3: should be cautious of what's going on. And it just
Speaker 3: tends to ignore the fact that the world is a
Speaker 3: dangerous place for fem presenting people, and many of us
Speaker 3: are like kind of living constantly on edge, especially if
Speaker 3: we're you know, like going into a stranger's house, right,
Speaker 3: who is gonna sew you into a human centipede? So
Speaker 3: a lot of those female characters written by men ignore
Speaker 3: the level of like caution, yeah, hyper awareness, that's one thing,
Speaker 3: and or they're written to be just like unreasonable. They'll
Speaker 3: just make unreasonable choices that sort of go against any
Speaker 3: survival instincts or just anything like that, just like making
Speaker 3: choices that don't make sense.
Speaker 1: Or like observed. I can't think of like a strong
Speaker 1: example of this, but sometimes it feels like there's because
Speaker 1: I don't even think that it like you know, comes
Speaker 1: from a misogynist place, but it does come from like, Okay,
Speaker 1: so you have observed women navigating in the world, and
Speaker 1: you've just like misunderstood, Sure, why they're doing what they're doing,
Speaker 1: and you're like prescribing it in this way that is
Speaker 1: just not It's not how it goes, right.
Speaker 3: So my point here being that I feel like, for
Speaker 3: the most part, Grace is not written that way in
Speaker 3: this movie. I agree, Yeah, you know, she has no
Speaker 3: reason to be that suspicious aside from just like being
Speaker 3: among rich people, which you know would probably put a
Speaker 3: lot of people on edge. But at first she's given
Speaker 3: specific reason that she thinks she, you know, will be
Speaker 3: in danger.
Speaker 1: And I like that they plant like that. This is
Speaker 1: kind of a whirlwooden romance. She doesn't really know the family,
Speaker 1: like right, it felt like everything was kind of planted.
Speaker 1: The only thing that truly I mean, maybe this is
Speaker 1: just like some old money shit that I didn't have.
Speaker 1: I was like, why are they like they're supposed to
Speaker 1: be having sex on their wedding night?
Speaker 3: Yeah, and they try to, but you.
Speaker 1: Know, but I wouldn't want my like mom quite so nearby,
Speaker 1: you know, right. Anyways, whatever, maybe maybe rich people watch
Speaker 1: their kids consulmate their marriage. I don't know who can say.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't know a thing.
Speaker 3: I wouldn't know. But the point is that as soon
Speaker 3: as danger rears its ugly head. Grace is hyper aware
Speaker 3: of it. She responds reasonably, and for the rest of
Speaker 3: the movie she is making choices that track with what's
Speaker 3: going on there. There are a few examples where I'm like, Okay,
Speaker 3: why didn't you pick up the gun that got dropped
Speaker 3: right beside you. Why didn't you run over Stevens the butler?
Speaker 3: You didn't kill him. He's trying to kill you. The
Speaker 3: whole family's trying to kill you. Make sure he's dead
Speaker 3: before you run away, right, things like that that.
Speaker 1: I was like, Okay, I wish totally. But then also
Speaker 1: I was like, well, this is her first go I
Speaker 1: kept being like, well, it is her first go round
Speaker 1: being haunted. True fair as far as we know, because
Speaker 1: we I mean, I think that it is interesting and
Speaker 1: usually I'm more sensitive to this. We know basically nothing
Speaker 1: about her, yeah, other than she was raised without a
Speaker 1: lot of money. She was raised by a foster family
Speaker 1: that she loved. But I feel like it is like
Speaker 1: the undertone of that suggests in a way that I
Speaker 1: don't think is you know, fair and the foster like
Speaker 1: the issue of foster families is so rarely discussed at
Speaker 1: all in movies, but it feels it feels like, oh, baby,
Speaker 1: she is excited to be, you know, brought into family
Speaker 1: and then quickly is like, oh, they fucking suck never mind,
Speaker 1: but yeah, exactly Like I like that we get those
Speaker 1: details about her, and it's not like we know too
Speaker 1: much more about the rest of the family other than
Speaker 1: like jig Saw is going to kill them, like you know,
Speaker 1: and the incident that we see at the beginning, but
Speaker 1: we don't know really extreme amounts about any character, which
Speaker 1: in an ensemble like horror comedy, I'm fine with the
Speaker 1: thing that I was most like eager to see play
Speaker 1: out that I was like, ooh, how are they going
Speaker 1: to stick the landing on this? But I think that
Speaker 1: I've only seen Scream five five Cream as it was
Speaker 1: as it was stylized. But I feel like, I mean,
Speaker 1: that's like literally this exact same team, and I felt
Speaker 1: like that was done pretty well too, where I understand
Speaker 1: why Grace wants to give Alex a chance to help
Speaker 1: her at first because he is literally her only ally,
Speaker 1: but I feel like the moment that she bails him
Speaker 1: and the moment she has information that is like, I
Speaker 1: have no allies except maybe Daniel it's good. I feel
Speaker 1: like a lesser movie would be like, but I love him,
Speaker 1: I have to trust him, and she has at that moment.
Speaker 1: But I think that that made sense and was earned.
Speaker 1: But once she realizes she can't trust him, like she's
Speaker 1: out right.
Speaker 3: Especially there's a scene in like the Servant's Corridor or
Speaker 3: whatever when she's like, what the fuck is going on?
Speaker 3: He's explaining the situation to her and she's like, you
Speaker 3: didn't warn me, like you knew that this was a possibility,
Speaker 3: and right, you didn't tell me any of this. And
Speaker 3: he's like, well, you were the one who wanted to
Speaker 3: get married. And then she immediately pushes back and she's like, oh,
Speaker 3: so this is my fault. And so I like that,
Speaker 3: you know, she's pushing back, and that was like, to me,
Speaker 3: a clue or like kind of like a bit of
Speaker 3: foreshadowing that he isn't the ally that he's seems to be,
Speaker 3: or that he'll he has the capacity to, you know,
Speaker 3: turn to the dark side kind of thing. Yeah. I
Speaker 3: just appreciate the way that she's written in general. But
Speaker 3: the other thing, the other thing you'll see for men
Speaker 3: writing female characters in horror movies is that women characters
Speaker 3: will be written to avoid violence or even though someone's
Speaker 3: trying to kill you, oh, I'm going to take the
Speaker 3: upper hand and not kill the bad guy who's killing me.
Speaker 1: The most recent example I could think of was is
Speaker 1: going to see Phantom of the Opera brag in theaters
Speaker 1: freg again brag Yeah, And how you know the peak
Speaker 1: of that is like, you know, like she kisses the
Speaker 1: Phantom instead of murdering him, which would be reasonable, right,
Speaker 1: And where it's like, yeah, like there's expected You're supposed
Speaker 1: to show a moment of like a woman's secret weapon
Speaker 1: is empathy, which can be true, but so can murder, Like,
Speaker 1: you know, let's keep our options open.
Speaker 3: It depends on the situation, so right, And this is
Speaker 3: not even true across the board for her character, because
Speaker 3: she does attempt to kill people. She does kill Alex's mom,
Speaker 3: she does punch a child who had just shot her.
Speaker 3: But I feel like the movie isn't very consistent with
Speaker 3: how it handles that with her character because the moment
Speaker 3: where like she gets in the car she has the
Speaker 3: opportunity to run the butler.
Speaker 1: Over, She's not gonna like rehabilitate him in this moment.
Speaker 3: All she had to do was put her foot on
Speaker 3: the gas pedal, but instead she puts the car in
Speaker 3: reverse and then drives away without running him over.
Speaker 1: So that I guess I as someone without a driver's license,
Speaker 1: I feel like I cannot comment on.
Speaker 3: As someone who's had a driver's license for over twenty
Speaker 3: years now brag. Wow, yeah, okay, okay. So I if
Speaker 3: I was in that situation, because when I saw that
Speaker 3: moment in theater.
Speaker 1: It would be so you would rise to this occasion
Speaker 1: like no other.
Speaker 3: Thank you so much. When I saw this in theaters,
Speaker 3: I was so frustrated really by that specific moment of
Speaker 3: her not running him over, because I got.
Speaker 1: To be honest, I would be dead. It didn't occur
Speaker 1: to me, Oh.
Speaker 3: My gosh, he's right there in front of the car.
Speaker 3: He was just trying to kill her. She was trying
Speaker 3: to kill him too, by like strangling him, and you know.
Speaker 1: She's on FaceTime, which is like, well, oh well once
Speaker 1: they get to the FaceTime thing. Yeah, I enjoyed that.
Speaker 3: Right, and that all worked for me. But I was
Speaker 3: just like, run him over. And this is maybe just
Speaker 3: me fixating on a moment, but I also think that
Speaker 3: it's some little hint of men writing women in such
Speaker 3: a way where women are too polite and too pleasant
Speaker 3: and too delicate to do anything that might be considered
Speaker 3: like morally gray or even an act of self defense.
Speaker 3: But again, the movie doesn't do that with her entirely
Speaker 3: because can she punches a child and of course, like
Speaker 3: taken out of context, that's obviously a horrible thing to do.
Speaker 3: But I guess I just don't know why the movie
Speaker 3: isn't more consistent with Grace's character in that regard. But
Speaker 3: also I don't know, maybe I'm just being too hard
Speaker 3: on the writing and on that particular moment of the movie.
Speaker 1: I don't know, I don't know, but I think in general,
Speaker 1: like and again it's it's tricky to like, it's hard
Speaker 1: to not compare this to how poorly this is ordinarily done.
Speaker 1: So maybe like you know, there's always like certainly things
Speaker 1: could always be done better. I think again, taste wise, like,
Speaker 1: even though I liked a lot of the one off
Speaker 1: jokes in this, you know, it's just like a trope
Speaker 1: that I find kind of a little grading where it's
Speaker 1: like it just feels yeah, very Jossweed encoded in a
Speaker 1: way that I just don't care for, where it's like
Speaker 1: overly hippy, it's whatever I want to divorce, like whatever.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Not for me, that's not a gender thing,
Speaker 1: because certainly Adam Brody is equipping all over the place,
Speaker 1: everyone is at the Twilight coating of nice dress, Converse shoes.
Speaker 1: I could keep rattling off the ways in which this
Speaker 1: movie feels like it was almost certainly written in the
Speaker 1: early twenty tens, even though it was released in the
Speaker 1: late twenty tens. But that's not what this show is about.
Speaker 1: But I do feel absolutely certain that that's the case.
Speaker 3: Sure.
Speaker 1: In any case, I do like Grace, and I also
Speaker 1: think that, like Tomorrow, Weaving gives a great performance, like
Speaker 1: almost better than the movie deserves. She was in the
Speaker 1: trenches and you could feel it. You could feel it.
Speaker 3: Her uncle el Rond from Rivendale was like, tomorrow, here's
Speaker 3: how you act. And she's like, thanks, uncle.
Speaker 1: I got it. That's exactly how napotism works. Ye. Melanie
Speaker 1: Griffith like took Dakota Johnson aside. She's like, today is
Speaker 1: the day I teach you how to act?
Speaker 3: Well, Okay, hang on a second, now that you mentioned
Speaker 3: Dakota Johnson.
Speaker 1: Madam Webb, her Web connects them all. I think we're
Speaker 1: gonna I think I hope it's good and we can
Speaker 1: cover it on the show. I mean not good, but
Speaker 1: like good bad.
Speaker 3: Well, what I was going to say was, Okay, it's
Speaker 3: Wedding Webruary, Madam Webruary. Is that anything.
Speaker 1: Yes, we're going to release a third episode this month,
Speaker 1: and we're gonna go see Madam web I'm gonna go
Speaker 1: see I'm gonna go see Madam Webb tomorrow alone or
Speaker 1: with people, doesn't really matter to me. If you if
Speaker 1: you're free tomorrow night, I was gonna go see Madam Webb.
Speaker 3: I might be, so I'll join you. I do have a.
Speaker 1: Want of spield Web.
Speaker 3: Okay, sorry, I have a whole spiel on Wedding Webruary,
Speaker 3: and just like wedding representation in this movie. I'll get
Speaker 3: to that in a second. But oh yes, because I
Speaker 3: was talking about her not killing the butler and she
Speaker 3: had a chance. I do want to talk about how
Speaker 3: all of the first people to die in this movie
Speaker 3: are the like, yes quote unquote help yes, the working
Speaker 3: class people.
Speaker 1: I have that note as well, and they're also given
Speaker 1: like they're all essentially the same character.
Speaker 3: Yes, no characterization, I mean the butler stands out because
Speaker 3: he's actually given lines and he's integrated into the plot
Speaker 3: quite a bit more. But there are three like maids
Speaker 3: slash housekeepers who are all just basically the same person.
Speaker 3: We don't know anything about them. They're the first three
Speaker 3: people to die. They all get accidentally killed by someone,
Speaker 3: so Emily the sister accidentally shoots the first housekeeper. We
Speaker 3: learn her name is Clara, and they're like she was
Speaker 3: our favorite.
Speaker 1: Right, which is a class I mean, I feel like
Speaker 1: they're trying to do a class thing there, but I
Speaker 1: just it didn't hit for me. And it also takes
Speaker 1: a very long time for a man to die in
Speaker 1: this movie.
Speaker 3: Yes, right, Yeah, the optics of a movie being about
Speaker 3: like taking down the rich, but the first three people
Speaker 3: to die are working class women.
Speaker 1: I felt this way. I mean, and I haven't. I
Speaker 1: only saw the menu, just the ones, so maybe I'm misremembering,
Speaker 1: but I remember feeling like that not like other girls'
Speaker 1: ness of the main character also sort of applied to
Speaker 1: her class, where like she is not like the other
Speaker 1: poor girls, like or not like the other poor people
Speaker 1: for reasons because she's the star of the movie. But yeah,
Speaker 1: it was interesting that like in a movie that has
Speaker 1: a clear vested interest in saying something about class, that
Speaker 1: the working class characters are picked off pretty abruptly, especially
Speaker 1: three you know, three women that well we learned I
Speaker 1: think their names, they're interchangeable, and yeah, and then you
Speaker 1: get Stevens, who I yes, you have more of him,
Speaker 1: he's the working class person that lives the longest. But yeah,
Speaker 1: I was, I was. I thought it was like kind
Speaker 1: of a miss and a missed opportunity to leave Grace
Speaker 1: entirely by herself, because that could have been an opportunity to, like,
Speaker 1: you know, if we keep some of those characters in
Speaker 1: the mix, that's a chance for them to connect. That's
Speaker 1: a chance for her to like form an ally shop
Speaker 1: even if it doesn't work out, Like but I think
Speaker 1: it was. I don't remember the name of the last
Speaker 1: was it Dora? I believe Dora.
Speaker 3: And then there's a one in the middle who I
Speaker 3: think is the only person of color in the movie
Speaker 3: who's not like a background actor at the wedding. Yeah,
Speaker 3: she I don't even think has any lines, nor do
Speaker 3: I think we learn her name.
Speaker 1: She's credited as Tina, but I didn't remember hearing that either,
Speaker 1: So yeah, we get those three housekeepers killed right away.
Speaker 3: And this is something I've talked a lot about recently too,
Speaker 3: that I and maybe there is truth to this, And
Speaker 3: I just don't know because I've never met anyone rich
Speaker 3: enough to have servants. So brave of me for that
Speaker 3: to be the case. But the characters who are like
Speaker 3: the servants to the rich people in movies are almost
Speaker 3: always written to be these like unwaveringly loyal employees to
Speaker 3: the rich families that they serve, even if the rich
Speaker 3: families are doing horrible things the way they're doing horrible
Speaker 3: things in this movie. And I just I'm sure there's
Speaker 3: some sort of like aspect of the help being dehumanized
Speaker 3: in a way that it sort of conditions them to
Speaker 3: think that they have to be so loyal to the family.
Speaker 3: I'm sure there's something there that I just don't have
Speaker 3: a full understanding of because I, again I don't know anyone,
Speaker 3: but like you're acting like I do, well, But I
Speaker 3: just like it's more just like, is there truth to
Speaker 3: this slash? Why are servant characters always written to be
Speaker 3: this way? Because we were talking about this and like, yeah,
Speaker 3: I feel like we talked about this in the Beauty
Speaker 3: and the Beast episode, and we talked about this in
Speaker 3: the Haunted Mansion and what a Girl Wants and stuff.
Speaker 1: I think that there is most likely not true that
Speaker 1: I mean, and even if there is, you know, like
Speaker 1: a long term loyalty to one's employer, it's certainly not
Speaker 1: like one dimensional in this way. Like that's a complicated thing.
Speaker 1: And I don't know, like there's still movies that are
Speaker 1: doing that where they're like our servants are like our family,
Speaker 1: and you're like, well, but that's not true, like there's
Speaker 1: an exchange going on. But yeah, I don't know. I
Speaker 1: guess I would chalk that up to how every character
Speaker 1: in this movie is fairly one dimensional. But again, it's
Speaker 1: like if Grace is the only person Grace and Alex
Speaker 1: and Daniel are kind of the only characters that get
Speaker 1: a like shades of gray shown in their personality. Yeah,
Speaker 1: for what this movie is and what it seems to be.
Speaker 1: You know, however, Goofily trying to get at to knock
Speaker 1: off our working class characters so quickly is ridiculous. It's
Speaker 1: like weird.
Speaker 3: It just feels antithetical to what the movie's trying to say.
Speaker 3: I think what it would have worked better is if
Speaker 3: and if you have like one like hyper loyal servant
Speaker 3: character and that's Stevens, Like fine, but it would make
Speaker 3: more sense to me if the three working class servant
Speaker 3: women are like, fuck this family, I don't want to
Speaker 3: be complicit in the awful things they're doing, and they
Speaker 3: try to help Grace or.
Speaker 1: At least, yeah, some gradient among the three women, because
Speaker 1: like there are three people are gonna feel different about
Speaker 1: this situation. I think, yeah, Like I'm not bothered if
Speaker 1: you know, because there's sometimes two the other direction where
Speaker 1: it's like all women are loyal to women, which is
Speaker 1: just demonstrably untrue. Sure one is like no, I'm saving
Speaker 1: my ass tonight, like best of luck to you, Grace,
Speaker 1: But yeah, like another person that's like, let's work together,
Speaker 1: which probably would have been really helpful for Grace and
Speaker 1: clearly the servant because it did not work out for them.
Speaker 1: I don't know. Yeah, like if there was some I
Speaker 1: also just feel like that would have made the movie
Speaker 1: a little It would have resolved some of the like
Speaker 1: second act, like she's getting out of a lot of
Speaker 1: like there's a lot of set pieces that she has
Speaker 1: to get her way through, which is great. But it
Speaker 1: would have been cool to have someone with her for
Speaker 1: a little bit of even if they don't make it
Speaker 1: to the end, because she's the final girl and this
Speaker 1: movie is not trying to get around the final girl trope,
Speaker 1: like and that's fine, but yeah, it just why even
Speaker 1: have Like it just felt like the working class the
Speaker 1: three women specifically were put there for it to be
Speaker 1: shocking when they suddenly started dying, like that is sort
Speaker 1: of the only function they serve, and in a movie
Speaker 1: about class, that is like not a logical Like, that's
Speaker 1: not a thoughtful choice.
Speaker 3: Right, Instead, another pitch for a different way to handle
Speaker 3: it would be if you need bodies, bodies bodies to
Speaker 3: start dying in this movie, which stands a reason it's
Speaker 3: a horror thriller where violence is happening and you want
Speaker 3: to see people die along the way, just bring in
Speaker 3: more of the rich, bring in some cousins, bring in
Speaker 3: some other random family members who can be in on this,
Speaker 3: and then make them more minor characters who are the
Speaker 3: first ones to die. That would have worked better for
Speaker 3: me too. Yeah, anyway, so I guess it boils down
Speaker 3: to I appreciate that this movie's obvious agenda is like, yeah,
Speaker 3: rich people are scared and soul lists and they'll go
Speaker 3: to whatever lengths, whatever horrible lengths, to hold on to
Speaker 3: their wealth. And again, it's very cathartic to see them
Speaker 3: die at the end, and I'm glad that, like no
Speaker 3: one was spared because they're all complicit to some degree.
Speaker 1: Yes, that was something that I was like, really, God,
Speaker 1: I hope that it's not the sort of thing where
Speaker 1: it's like there was one really good guy and you're like, no,
Speaker 1: there wasn't. Come on, yeah, be serious.
Speaker 3: The other spiel they have ties back to the theme
Speaker 3: of wedding webruary.
Speaker 1: Let's web it.
Speaker 3: Let's madam web this together. So most movies that feature
Speaker 3: weddings frame a wedding frame the idea of people getting
Speaker 3: married as this amazing, celebratory thing that's so happy and
Speaker 3: nothing will ever go wrong. And this movie is more
Speaker 3: of a kind of cautionary tale of having a wedding
Speaker 3: or of getting married, and a cautionary tale of how
Speaker 3: doing that significantly changes a person's circumstances, or can significantly
Speaker 3: change a person's circumstances. You know, you get you inherit,
Speaker 3: these in laws possibly and a dynamic can change in
Speaker 3: your relationship.
Speaker 1: Or that just like you could be marrying. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess this comes up in movies, but
Speaker 1: not in wedding movies. We're at the air where it's
Speaker 1: like you married the wrong person and that's okay, you
Speaker 1: can get out of it, like that's you know, or
Speaker 1: I mean in Alex's case, it's like getting married does
Speaker 1: not fundamentally change what a piece of shit you are,
Speaker 1: Like right, you know, it's like not because yeah, I
Speaker 1: think that, Like you know, weddings and just married in
Speaker 1: general are often presented as this cure to a state
Speaker 1: of being whatever that is, and I feel like what
Speaker 1: that quote unquote means has changed over time, but still
Speaker 1: it's like, well, this will fix things and it never does,
Speaker 1: like it never that, you know, if you want to
Speaker 1: get married, get married, but like you're I feel like
Speaker 1: the successful a successful marriage indicates two people who know
Speaker 1: that they're going to be the same people after this day,
Speaker 1: and Alex is clearly I think Alex is getting married
Speaker 1: because he thinks that like she can fix him or whatever,
Speaker 1: and then once he realizes that he can't, he turns
Speaker 1: on her.
Speaker 3: Right, So yeah, speaking personally as someone who has very
Speaker 3: little interest in getting married, brag. I appreciate a movie
Speaker 3: that does present getting married as a cautionary tale. And
Speaker 3: I'm not saying that everyone who gets married is going
Speaker 3: to have awful in laws who are going to try
Speaker 3: to kill you, but sometimes but it does.
Speaker 2: No.
Speaker 1: But a lot of.
Speaker 3: Movies just present and the concept of marriage in this
Speaker 3: very sanitized, fairy tale way without recognizing the effort it
Speaker 3: takes to maintain a marriage, or the compromises that come
Speaker 3: with getting married or anything like that. And I think
Speaker 3: there is a gendered aspect to that, because for sure,
Speaker 3: girls and women in particular are often sold the fairy
Speaker 3: tale of wedding and marriage, and they're kind of encouraged
Speaker 3: to have unrealistic expectations about it, Like fairy tales and
Speaker 3: brom comms and all those things are targeted toward a
Speaker 3: specific demographic because in so many societies throughout most of history,
Speaker 3: marriage is slash was a way to turn women into property.
Speaker 3: So you had to trick women into thinking that marriage
Speaker 3: was awesome actually.
Speaker 1: Exactly, that it's special, that it's like special and it's
Speaker 1: your day and like you are not big exchanged for goats,
Speaker 1: this is your like yeah, and that you get and
Speaker 1: and you know as time goes on, and that is
Speaker 1: although it's like still I don't know, like when my
Speaker 1: parents were married, it was only very recently that like
Speaker 1: my mom could get her own credit card, Like it
Speaker 1: is still like there's elements of that exchange that are
Speaker 1: present in marriage, but and and in different parts of
Speaker 1: the world it works differently more so or less so.
Speaker 1: But even in the places where that is not the
Speaker 1: case anymore, there's like this commercial aspect to it now
Speaker 1: and like where it's like you have to got I mean,
Speaker 1: how much did those twenty seven dresses cost her? Anyways? Uh,
Speaker 1: Like now it's like an event and it's I feel
Speaker 1: like where some of the thankfully some of the women
Speaker 1: as property has been lost legally over time, although that's
Speaker 1: being regressed as well. It's been replaced with this commercialism.
Speaker 1: And like you're saying, like selling the fantasy starting from
Speaker 1: when you're very young, yeah, and that fantasy is not
Speaker 1: sold to boys and men in the binary children's entertainment universe.
Speaker 1: I feel like you are sort of conditioned to be
Speaker 1: like more like I am provider.
Speaker 3: I am like.
Speaker 1: There is still this ownership that comes with how men
Speaker 1: are conditioned to see hetero marriage right, and women it's
Speaker 1: like it's my big day and like whatever happens after today,
Speaker 1: I don't know, but that's I mean. But also, you
Speaker 1: know we talked about we we love to attend a wedding.
Speaker 1: We love to attend a wedding.
Speaker 3: Invite us to your weddings. Slash will officiate them.
Speaker 1: It's also yeah, I think it is like yeah, I
Speaker 1: always say I agree with you. I think that this movie.
Speaker 1: And I also like that we don't even really go
Speaker 1: We don't go to the wedding. We go to like
Speaker 1: the photo shoot and then the after party. Like the
Speaker 1: movie very intentionally does not care about the wedding, right,
Speaker 1: And that's fun. You never see a movie about weddings
Speaker 1: where it's not leading up to the wedding.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's great. Yes, So again I just appreciate even
Speaker 3: though this movie is a very like heightened horror movie
Speaker 3: version of this kind of cautionary tale, I appreciate it
Speaker 3: nonetheless because of how most movies again present it as
Speaker 3: a very fairy tale, sanitized Oh, it's the wedding is
Speaker 3: the best day of your life, and who cares about
Speaker 3: what happens after that? As long as you just have
Speaker 3: a really nice wedding, and I like that the movie
Speaker 3: doesn't take that approach.
Speaker 1: I agree, I agree, thanks, And yeah, it's a fun
Speaker 1: I've never seen a wedding movie like this. You know,
Speaker 1: I don't necessarily need another, but I think it's it's
Speaker 1: unique in that way. In other ways, it's you know,
Speaker 1: doing a fun the same thing. Yeah, I want to
Speaker 1: talk about the other women in this family. Sure, we
Speaker 1: don't know very much about them. I mean the anti
Speaker 1: k Doll character. Again, I feel like maybe this is
Speaker 1: like a writing thing where her being awful was like
Speaker 1: supposed to be a twist where you're like, but like
Speaker 1: I knew, like the doy I don't know, we get
Speaker 1: a little bit from her where she I mean, she
Speaker 1: and Daniel are kind of like doing the same thing
Speaker 1: where they're like, we like you, we like you, we're
Speaker 1: rooting for you. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: the board game dynasty must stand. And I don't know,
Speaker 1: I guess there's really not I don't have that much
Speaker 1: to say about her. I wish I had a little
Speaker 1: more to say about her. I also think she would
Speaker 1: have been a cool character to like turn against people
Speaker 1: too late. I don't know why, Like, did the person
Speaker 1: who ends up sort of switching and like beginning your
Speaker 1: redemption arc before being killed have to be a brother.
Speaker 1: There are so many women in this house, but you know,
Speaker 1: I think there's an opportunity for like especial because you know,
Speaker 1: his mother has seen this happen over the years and
Speaker 1: is the quote unquote an outsider. She's buried into the family,
Speaker 1: So it would have been cool to see another woman
Speaker 1: who is an outsider feel a type of way about
Speaker 1: it and maybe, you know, at least offer some sort
Speaker 1: of solidarity. Even if it does, I don't know. I
Speaker 1: just feel like, especially because it's like they had Andy McDowell,
Speaker 1: I just wish that they had done more with that character.
Speaker 1: I don't know I did. That was all I really
Speaker 1: had to say about it. I just wish that there
Speaker 1: was more to talk about.
Speaker 3: Yeah, there's kind of not much to talk about any
Speaker 3: of the other women because with Daniel's his wife Charity,
Speaker 3: you learn that she has the way she describes it, well,
Speaker 3: she barely describes it. She just says, like, you know
Speaker 3: what my life was like before this, Because he's Daniel's
Speaker 3: criticizing her for like not flinching the second she learns
Speaker 3: of this family's like you know, nefarious history and their
Speaker 3: yeah goat sacrifices and all that kind of stuff, and
Speaker 3: she's like, well, as long as I'm rich, I don't
Speaker 3: give a shit. And so that's her character.
Speaker 1: And you know, there.
Speaker 3: Are people like that who come from humble beginnings that
Speaker 3: definitely you know, suddenly have access to wealth and then
Speaker 3: they become an evil person. Seems to be the case
Speaker 3: for Charity. But that's kind of all we know about her.
Speaker 1: I also don't know like why they Like I had
Speaker 1: questions about why these two were married at all, Like
Speaker 1: they don't like each other, which is I mean, that's
Speaker 1: like ninety percent of married couples. But like, I do
Speaker 1: feel like in a movie you should get some sort
Speaker 1: of taste of like why things aren't working or or
Speaker 1: just yeah, because with Charity, the only explanation you get
Speaker 1: is this sentence of like, I am not going to
Speaker 1: go back to being poor, which is certainly like you're
Speaker 1: saying an attitude that exists. But why did they get married?
Speaker 1: You know, because at least we can tell from the
Speaker 1: you know, very kind of dry opening scene of this
Speaker 1: movie that like Grace and Alex like each other. They
Speaker 1: seem to you, that's why they appear to have gotten married. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's why a lot of people do it. Not all,
Speaker 1: but but but many. M Yeah. With with Daniel and Charity,
Speaker 1: I'm like, was this arranged? Like why?
Speaker 3: I mean, my guess is that they did love each
Speaker 3: other for some time and then they got married, and
Speaker 3: then they grew to resent each other and hate each
Speaker 3: other the way.
Speaker 1: We're just supposed to go on our like what we
Speaker 1: know about what happens with married couples is they like
Speaker 1: each other for a while.
Speaker 3: And then they don't anymore.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I mean, I don't know. I just felt
Speaker 1: like it was, especially because our sympathies are with Daniel,
Speaker 1: that it kind of turns us against Charity in a
Speaker 1: contextless way where again and again, like the same missed
Speaker 1: opportunities as Andy McDowell's character.
Speaker 3: True, and then the thing that makes the least sense
Speaker 3: to me, But maybe maybe there's something to contextualizes. I
Speaker 3: don't know. But the way Aunt Helene, what is that
Speaker 3: you see her in the beginning, She's the bride whose
Speaker 3: partner is being human sacrificed, and you see how traumatizing
Speaker 3: that is for her and how upset she is by it.
Speaker 3: She seems to love her husband and is very sad
Speaker 3: that he gets killed. The next time we see her,
Speaker 3: she's been radicalized in the other direction, and she's like, no,
Speaker 3: this tradition is so important and it's for the greater good.
Speaker 3: But like, we don't understand how she has that turn,
Speaker 3: or like what prompts her to arc in that direction
Speaker 3: as a character, so.
Speaker 1: And that it's like we're like owed by the narrative
Speaker 1: if they're gonna go out of the way, Like, her
Speaker 1: behavior makes more sense to me if we don't even
Speaker 1: see that beginning scene right, like you're just like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is the like and again playing into like cooky
Speaker 1: older woman stereotypes. Right, Everyone in this movie is a
Speaker 1: stereotype to some extent. But it makes more sense to
Speaker 1: me if we don't know that she's been through this
Speaker 1: tremendous trauma, because then I'm like, you need to tell
Speaker 1: us how she got from A to B. You just
Speaker 1: have to.
Speaker 3: Yes. I agree also with Aunt Helene. I feel like
Speaker 3: the trope is present of an older woman, especially one
Speaker 3: who is unmarried and who doesn't have children. That type
Speaker 3: of woman equals scary, creepy Crone because even though she
Speaker 3: and Andy McDowell's character are presumably roughly the same age
Speaker 3: and the actors are similar in age, Aunt Helene I
Speaker 3: feel like, is styled to look older. You know, she's
Speaker 3: got like the short white hair, and then just like
Speaker 3: considering she's often presented as this like startling jump scare
Speaker 3: or just a creepy presence in general. Ye, that feels
Speaker 3: pretty intentional to me.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think I think that there is like a
Speaker 1: certain kind of visual coding to that as well. That is,
Speaker 1: and like also the way that that character is written,
Speaker 1: as we just talked about, like kind of falls apart
Speaker 1: under light scrutiny, and it seems like in favor of
Speaker 1: having her be the like I'm gonna use the word
Speaker 1: kookie because it just is like this void of like
Speaker 1: the kookie Aunt that is like chosen in favor of
Speaker 1: giving us a character that was set up, and the
Speaker 1: visual choices support that sort of like we're just gonna
Speaker 1: do the kookie Aunt aesthetic instead of thinking critically because
Speaker 1: it's like this movie is challenging somethings and then other
Speaker 1: things are just like there as you would normally see them,
Speaker 1: which I feel like is like men maybe true, just
Speaker 1: throwing that out there, but yeah, yeah, that that definitely
Speaker 1: felt dissonant, and also like both of those characters are
Speaker 1: under like it just sure what is their relationship like
Speaker 1: because these women have known each other for thirty five years.
Speaker 3: Presumably what I don't know.
Speaker 1: There's just no insight into The only insight you really
Speaker 1: get is like Alex and Daniel, which is another thing
Speaker 1: that like Emily is left out of this sibling dynamic.
Speaker 1: She's like turned into a you know, like very stereotype,
Speaker 1: like you know, she's always high and she's jittery and
Speaker 1: she's killing people. Where you know, Alex and Daniel get
Speaker 1: you know, it's still the tone of the movie, but
Speaker 1: they get some sort of arc as siblings. They get
Speaker 1: some sort of arc morally, Emily is like there for
Speaker 1: comic relief, Like why is that.
Speaker 3: Every scene she's in she just like snorts some more
Speaker 3: coke or eats some pills.
Speaker 1: Which is also like weird, I mean in a way
Speaker 1: that I don't even know how to feel about. But
Speaker 1: like very like rich lady stereotype, like using uppers all
Speaker 1: the time and you know, be pleasant and be appealing
Speaker 1: and blah blah blah.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't even know how to compute that in
Speaker 3: this context, but the point is, Yeah, why isn't she
Speaker 3: brought into the fold of the sibling dynamics. She's just
Speaker 3: sort of like she's the koked out mommy who's dealing
Speaker 3: with trying to raise a family. I guess, even though
Speaker 3: you barely see her interacting with her kids. I don't know.
Speaker 1: I didn't even realize she had kids until it was
Speaker 1: like surprised. That was the kid that Tomorrow Weaving punched
Speaker 1: in the face, was like her kid. Yeah, and that
Speaker 1: is only there to teach Daniel that this is actually
Speaker 1: fucked up, you know, Like I don't know. I yeah,
Speaker 1: especially like I I love a sibling movie. I love
Speaker 1: siblings at odds. Sure, Succession is my favorite television program.
Speaker 1: But this, yeah, she feels very intentionally left out, to
Speaker 1: the where sometimes I forgot she was their sister. Same
Speaker 1: so that's not great. Yeah, yeah, I would have liked
Speaker 1: to see her more meaningfully included. Shout out to Melanie s. Grafano,
Speaker 1: though she is currently on Star Trek's Strange New Worlds,
Speaker 1: which is a really awesome show starring Hot nepotism Ethan
Speaker 1: Peck as Hot Spock number two because Zachary Quintal is
Speaker 1: obviously also well Spot. You know, all of this boxs
Speaker 1: are hot. Sure he's Gregory Peck's grandson, question mark, Okay, Yeah, anyways,
Speaker 1: nepotism is everywhere, guzy, Madam Webb in any case, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I felt like that there's every woman. I mean, and
Speaker 1: I want to be fair and say that, it's like,
Speaker 1: it's not as if there aren't male characters that are
Speaker 1: underwritten or dimensional to some extent. Everyone is, but it's
Speaker 1: just as like who is given a little more tends
Speaker 1: to be the male characters outside of Grace getting the
Speaker 1: edge time and time again. I thought Fitch was funny.
Speaker 1: He family is shit.
Speaker 3: He's also like deliberately written to be very annoying so
Speaker 3: that you're when he dies, you're like, finally, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: certainly there was more room for a little bit more
Speaker 3: character development all around. But yeah, you know.
Speaker 1: But it's also like, I don't know, I honestly like,
Speaker 1: if you're not watching for that, like this is a
Speaker 1: fun movie to be like brain switched off. The entire
Speaker 1: family fucking explodes at the end, Like, uh, it's awesome,
Speaker 1: It's so awesome.
Speaker 3: Yes, that's all I had to really say about it
Speaker 3: at this time. I'm sure I'm missing something, but well.
Speaker 1: I mean just to state the like, this movie takes
Speaker 1: place in the rich white people world, and we're also
Speaker 1: contained in an environment, so it's like not a movie
Speaker 1: that is even really open to any sort of diversity.
Speaker 1: I feel like by design, but certainly worth mentioning. And yeah,
Speaker 1: I like, you know, in spite of the flaws that
Speaker 1: we have, just you know, taken apart at length, I
Speaker 1: enjoy this movie. I think it's fun, same and it
Speaker 1: reminds me why I like Samorrow Weaving because I feel
Speaker 1: like that I can't think of another movie she's like
Speaker 1: the lead of She's in a lot of stuff, but yeah,
Speaker 1: I feel like she's rarely the sta Anyways, I like her.
Speaker 1: I like this movie. It passes the Bechdel test, yeah, sparingly,
Speaker 1: but it does.
Speaker 3: Not very much. There are a couple conversations between Grace
Speaker 3: and Becky, who's Alex's mom aka Andy McDowell. Those conversations
Speaker 3: are almost always about Alex, I think, so I don't
Speaker 3: know if those count, but.
Speaker 1: They were like two line it was. It was minimal.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I'm inclined to be like the whole thing
Speaker 3: is pretty much about Alex. But Grace and Emily talk
Speaker 3: about Grace's wedding dress and how Emily has been stalking
Speaker 3: Grace on Instagram, and so that passes.
Speaker 1: Stalking another woman on Instagram. Yeah, that does pass the
Speaker 1: bactyl test. I do it every day.
Speaker 3: Well, you don't have to stalk me, Jamie.
Speaker 1: I'm right here, Sorry, I'm doing it anyway. Called one one.
Speaker 3: I won't be stopped, Okay, And I contend that Grace
Speaker 3: talking to herself does pass the Bechdel test.
Speaker 1: But anyway, I guess, well, I mean, and I can
Speaker 1: find passing the Bechel test to be annoying. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it does like it does, and I think
Speaker 1: spiritually it does. But there were more opportunities, like we're
Speaker 1: talking about, like, so let's let's I mean, well, let's
Speaker 1: get into the true metric, the one true metric.
Speaker 3: Yeah, nipple scale wise, I would give this movey. I
Speaker 3: will go like three, I think, yeah, maybe even three
Speaker 3: and a half, somewhere in that range. I do appreciate
Speaker 3: the commentary on rich people are scary and isn't it
Speaker 3: fun to see them explode? I appreciate the way that
Speaker 3: Grace is written, especially compared to so many other women
Speaker 3: in horror movies that are written by men and men
Speaker 3: just having a fundamental misunderstanding of how women move through
Speaker 3: the world, what motivates their choices, etc. This movie didn't
Speaker 3: really do that, so I appreciate it. It is a
Speaker 3: very white movie based on just the premise that is
Speaker 3: put forth, but that doesn't mean there weren't other opportunities
Speaker 3: to be more inclusive. Again, there was, oh, a woman
Speaker 3: of color as one of the housekeepers, and she didn't
Speaker 3: have any lines. She It just like pans to her
Speaker 3: as she's being brutally killed, and then that's all we
Speaker 3: get from her.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I mean I think that and that that
Speaker 1: applies to race, class, like everything. There there were opportunities,
Speaker 1: but yeah, they just needed to be centered on these
Speaker 1: rich white brothers. Yes, more interesting opportunities were afoot.
Speaker 3: But truly so, I'll give it three point twenty five
Speaker 3: nipples and hopefully this kind of paves the way for
Speaker 3: a little like for more kind of like nuanced examinations
Speaker 3: of like taking down the rich. This is a very
Speaker 3: fun one. This is a very heightened, silly version of
Speaker 3: that story. But I also feel like it missed some
Speaker 3: opportunities either way, three point two five nipples, and I'll
Speaker 3: give one to Tomorrow. I'll give one to Hugo Weaving.
Speaker 1: Awesome.
Speaker 3: And then I'll give one nipple to the actor who
Speaker 3: plays Tina the housekeeper, who's the woman of color who
Speaker 3: doesn't get any lines or I think a name that
Speaker 3: we hear on screen. The actor's name is Selene Cy.
Speaker 3: So I'm giving one nipple to her, and I'll give
Speaker 3: my one quarter nipple to mister Labail the devil. I
Speaker 3: love mister Labail slash Jigsaw. It should have been Jigsaw.
Speaker 1: I'm going to do it. So I'll keep your short
Speaker 1: and see, I'm giving it three nipples there, I'll go
Speaker 1: in to Jigsaw. Okay, I think, yeah, this is a
Speaker 1: fun movie that uh I think maybe like a little
Speaker 1: of my own, like you know in twenty nineteen Big
Speaker 1: Dress Conference Shoes, really come on, be serious, serious, you know,
Speaker 1: it's just really it feels like was this movie produced
Speaker 1: by a man named Trip and someone from the Vanderbilt family,
Speaker 1: which is another thing we talk about all the time
Speaker 1: where you're like, oh, interesting that a literal Vanderbilt is like, oh,
Speaker 1: the rich people are bad. Movie am I right, guys,
Speaker 1: like we're all hanging out here. Shut up, you know,
Speaker 1: like fuck shut up anyway. Yeah, I just think it's
Speaker 1: fun that the producers of this name were named Trip, James, Vanderbilt,
Speaker 1: William and Brad, Like, come on, you know it's written.
Speaker 1: It was. The movie is written by a guy.
Speaker 3: Named Guy and I'm.
Speaker 1: Really turning on everyone at the end, and was directed
Speaker 1: by a ska musician. And and do I like the movie, yes,
Speaker 1: But do I think that it like outside of its
Speaker 1: female protagonist. I think that this is like a thing
Speaker 1: that a lot of male writers and filmmakers tend to do,
Speaker 1: is like I'm gonna get one woman character right, and
Speaker 1: then the rest may like you know, and on and
Speaker 1: on and on. But if you're looking for a fun
Speaker 1: slasher movie, holy shit, Like the end of this movie
Speaker 1: makes any issue I had leading up well worth it.
Speaker 1: The whole family fucking explodes into a cloud of blood
Speaker 1: my favorite kind of death. It's great, It's so silly, silly,
Speaker 1: Billy's uh tomorrow weaving fun, three Nipples to Jigsaw, long
Speaker 1: live ska music.
Speaker 3: Wow, And there you have it. Listeners. That is our
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Speaker 1: A month, always has been, always will be.
Speaker 3: And that gets you two bonus episodes every single month,
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Speaker 3: bonus episodes, most of which again are behind that paywall
Speaker 3: because we have things to buy, such as food.
Speaker 1: I was like, such as rent. So yes, thank you
Speaker 1: so much for listening, and double thanks if you are
Speaker 1: Matrian subscriber who is revisiting this episode. We will be
Speaker 1: back next week with more piping hot, fresh content and
Speaker 1: let us know if you liked ready or not too.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you can handle two women in
Speaker 1: a movie this week, totally understand if you have to
Speaker 1: see Project Hill Mary and you can only handle Ryan
Speaker 1: Gosling and a rock at this time. That is where
Speaker 1: we're at culturally, and let's not just let's we don't
Speaker 1: need to talk about it. Yes, we will see you
Speaker 1: next week. Bye bye. The Bechdel Cast is a production
Speaker 1: of iHeartMedia, hosted and produced by me Jamie Loftus.
Speaker 3: And Me Caitlin Dorante podcast is also produced by Sophie
Speaker 3: Lichtermann and.
Speaker 1: Edited by Caitlin Durante. Ever heard of Them?
Speaker 3: That's Me and our logo and merch and all of
Speaker 3: our artwork in fact are designed by Jamie Loftus, Ever
Speaker 3: heard of her?
Speaker 1: Oh My God? And our theme song, by the way,
Speaker 1: was composed by Mike Kaplan.
Speaker 3: With vocals by Katherine Voskrasinski.
Speaker 1: Iconic and a special thanks to the one and only
Speaker 1: Aristotle Ascevedo.
Speaker 3: For more information about the podcast, please visit linktree slash
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