Speaker 1: On the Bell Cast, the questions asked if movies have
Speaker 1: women inum, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands
Speaker 1: or do they have individualism? The patriarchy? Zef invest start
Speaker 1: changing it with the bec Del Cast. Jamie, Caitlyn, what's up?
Speaker 1: I'm going through puberty. Who aren't you like thirty six? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it didn't happen until now. Sorry, I didn't mean to
Speaker 1: shame you. Yeah, rude, okay, Um, but there's another thing.
Speaker 1: There's another player. Okay. When I go through puberty, I
Speaker 1: turned into a cat. Oh yeah, well that sounds fun.
Speaker 1: I love that. That's her friends Reactually they're like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's awesome. Well could you do it more? Actually, because
Speaker 1: I think it's awesome. Yeah, and you can take pictures
Speaker 1: with me, but you also you have to pay me. Okay, okay,
Speaker 1: girl boss cat access. I think that was a solid
Speaker 1: intro to end. No notes, won't take it a second time? Agree? Agree? Yeah,
Speaker 1: So welcome to the Bechtel Cast. My name is Caitlin Dronte,
Speaker 1: my name's Jamie Loftus, and this is our podcast where
Speaker 1: we look at movies from an intersectional feminist lens and
Speaker 1: uh and have a little fun and goof around and
Speaker 1: you know, turn into the animal of your choice, and
Speaker 1: it's metaphorical and if you get it, you get it,
Speaker 1: and if you don't whatever, whatever I do. Okay, my
Speaker 1: brain is in five places today. We're going to get
Speaker 1: around to talk about the Bechtel test in just a second.
Speaker 1: But I do think, Caitlin, that we should reiterate that
Speaker 1: you noticed a correlation between turning red and despicable me.
Speaker 1: That I do feel like is worth repeating at some
Speaker 1: point in the episode, and I think I'll do it
Speaker 1: during the recast. I should have said that off Mike,
Speaker 1: but it's really it's important to be that because we
Speaker 1: mentioned it. But there's a paywall, and I really feel
Speaker 1: like this should be publicly accessible in for me ship
Speaker 1: I agree, So there's a there's an opportune moment in
Speaker 1: the recap that I will bring it up. I trust
Speaker 1: you have rest assured. So anyways, Uh, we use the
Speaker 1: Bechtel test as a jumping off point for discussion. But
Speaker 1: but what is the Bechdel test? Kalin drawte. It is
Speaker 1: a media metric created by Quirk cartoonists Alas and Bechtel,
Speaker 1: sometimes called the Bechdel Wallace Test. There are many versions
Speaker 1: of it. The one that we use is this, two
Speaker 1: characters of a marginalized gender must have names, they must
Speaker 1: speak to each other, and their conversation has to be
Speaker 1: about something other than a man. And ideally it's two
Speaker 1: lines or more of dialogue and a narratively meaningful conversation.
Speaker 1: So it can't just be like, hows the weather? It's
Speaker 1: good to shut up and that does pass, but it's
Speaker 1: not important unless the movie is about whether you know
Speaker 1: weather denial? Um, okay, well, not really an issue for
Speaker 1: this movie, so we'll we'll circle back to that a
Speaker 1: while from now. But today we're covering I think it's
Speaker 1: been a little while since we've covered a recent release,
Speaker 1: but a pretty new movie was released on i think
Speaker 1: Disney Plus exclusively a couple of months ago, called Turning Red.
Speaker 1: And we have an incredible guest with us today. We
Speaker 1: sure do, so let's get her in here. She's a
Speaker 1: writer for Grand Crew and Animaniacs. It's Raca Shankar. Hello, Yeah,
Speaker 1: what's up? Hey, not freaking not freaking much? How about you, guys.
Speaker 1: We're good, just hanging out. That's beautiful, it feels good,
Speaker 1: feels right, hang out watching Pisar. It does feel good?
Speaker 1: I kind of. I hadn't watched a new Pixar movie
Speaker 1: in a bit. What was what a recent one I missed?
Speaker 1: I still haven't seen Soul. I haven't seen Sol either. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I saw Soul. Did you like it? I liked it?
Speaker 1: I didn't love it. I liked it. Did it pass
Speaker 1: the test? Oh gosh? I honestly never remember to even
Speaker 1: pay attention. And that applies to movies that I am
Speaker 1: watching for this podcast. I simply don't even pay attention anymore.
Speaker 1: Whoop um. Look, sometimes you just gotta watch movies for fun,
Speaker 1: and that's what we do whenever we're not getting ready
Speaker 1: for the show. This movie, though I made, This movie
Speaker 1: was Taylor made to be talked about on our show.
Speaker 1: So I'm very very excited. And Sonny is chomping on
Speaker 1: my recording table. So let's that's because he heard that
Speaker 1: this movie was made for the backdel test, and he's like, oh,
Speaker 1: I will say yeah for listeners. My dog's son. He
Speaker 1: is over today and he really finds a subject matter
Speaker 1: to quote him fucking nasty. So you might hear some
Speaker 1: you know, some objections in the background. Please disregard them.
Speaker 1: We're having him de ratipply. This is just taking longer
Speaker 1: than expected. Classic Bad Dog, Sonny My horrible in Cell
Speaker 1: Dog Rica. What's your history with this three month old movie? Yes? So,
Speaker 1: um when it came out, I think it only seemed
Speaker 1: like promotional arts, so I really didn't know what it
Speaker 1: was about. But a friend of mine is Chinese American
Speaker 1: and I am Indian American, and she was like, great, good,
Speaker 1: You're got to see this movie. I was like why,
Speaker 1: and she's like, I think it is tailor made for you.
Speaker 1: So I went to her house and we watched. I
Speaker 1: was like, oh, yeah, this is Taylor made for me.
Speaker 1: I was fucking obsessed with boy bands as a kid.
Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, it was a great, great movie for me.
Speaker 1: So that's my three month ish history where I didn't
Speaker 1: know what it was, but then quickly afterwards I learned
Speaker 1: what it was, and then I watched it it was
Speaker 1: something else. Um. My history with this movie is the
Speaker 1: I had seen this director's short film and really liked
Speaker 1: it before Incredibles two. Um, she made the one of
Speaker 1: the Pixar shorts about which I guess one an Oscar,
Speaker 1: which is like awesome, But I remember really liking that
Speaker 1: didn't realize that she was like writing and directing a feature.
Speaker 1: And then I went to my cousin's wedding a month
Speaker 1: and a half ago, and part of my um maid
Speaker 1: of honor duties was to babysit the best man's nine
Speaker 1: year old daughter for a couple of nights. And so
Speaker 1: I actually have seen this movie three or four times
Speaker 1: um because it was like she loved it. She was
Speaker 1: horrified by the fact that I was alive in two
Speaker 1: thousand and two and like knew what they were talking about.
Speaker 1: Like it was so I had seen this movie with
Speaker 1: the target audience and then also feel like we are
Speaker 1: the target audience, which is awesome, and I was pretty
Speaker 1: close to that. I was a little older in two
Speaker 1: and two, but not far off. We were all there
Speaker 1: like the it's yeah. So anyways, I've seen this movie
Speaker 1: a couple of times now and it was fun to
Speaker 1: like watch with the podcast in mind as well. So
Speaker 1: I'm a fan, Caitlyn, What's your History? I saw it
Speaker 1: a few days after it was released on Disney Plus.
Speaker 1: There was quite a bit of hype about it, and
Speaker 1: a lot of people were saying, this is the best
Speaker 1: Pixar movie in ten years, and so I was really
Speaker 1: excited to see it. I also love red pandas they're
Speaker 1: my favorite wild animal. Cats are my favorite domestic animal.
Speaker 1: But any video with a red panda, I'll just it
Speaker 1: is the best movie I've ever seen. Um, So I
Speaker 1: was excited to see it. I liked it a lot.
Speaker 1: I humbly disagree with it being the best Pixar in
Speaker 1: ten years, because what about cocaine. That's cars three? No, yeah,
Speaker 1: Caitlin's closet cars three fan. She really once said, eat ship, Wally,
Speaker 1: call me back with your cars three. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: You might not be able to see Caitlin's room, but
Speaker 1: it's sort of decked out in cars stuff. Yea. She
Speaker 1: has a Lightning mc queen bed, which is which is
Speaker 1: kind of disgusting, to be honest, but they make them
Speaker 1: for queen size mattresses. That's kind of awesome. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: had a custom made Oh my god, that's awesome. And
Speaker 1: the bed part is not where you'd think. That's what's
Speaker 1: kind of surprising. Yeah, it is like it's technically a bed,
Speaker 1: but it's also very much a sex toy. Well, can't
Speaker 1: believe you're blowing up my spot on um anyway, So
Speaker 1: I I liked it a lot, but that's annoying that
Speaker 1: it's like, oh, it has to be the best Pixar.
Speaker 1: It's a it's a good Pixar, it's a great par
Speaker 1: Just yeah. So I watched it with our mutual friend
Speaker 1: Bryant Jamie and we had a nice time. And that's
Speaker 1: my history with it. Amazing. Um. Yeah, I guess that
Speaker 1: there's really not much work, but there I guess to
Speaker 1: like before we start discussing like the plot of the movie.
Speaker 1: I think the first I heard of this movie, I
Speaker 1: maybe just like missed when it was like announced as
Speaker 1: coming out, But the first time I heard about it
Speaker 1: was when people were already like mad, They're like, why
Speaker 1: is there a movie about periods? I feel freaking sick
Speaker 1: right now. Like there was very much like a like
Speaker 1: I mean, and it would it was not you know,
Speaker 1: it was from the sources you would expect, but there
Speaker 1: was like some columnists that more conservative papers that were
Speaker 1: like why is this? Like you know, it was like
Speaker 1: yet another like Disney has gone woke kind of vibe,
Speaker 1: which did to be fair, I was like, oh, I
Speaker 1: didn't know it was about puberty. I thought it was
Speaker 1: just about pandas because that is kind of like. Originally
Speaker 1: I was like, Oh, this seems cool and I really
Speaker 1: like the or this director made, but there are so
Speaker 1: many Disney movies about turning into a random animal that
Speaker 1: I'm like, do I need to watch this? Yeah? I
Speaker 1: also thought it was just about turning into an animal.
Speaker 1: I thought it was like, oh, she has like a tick,
Speaker 1: like anytime she's mad, she'll turn into this pandas so
Speaker 1: the whole thing is like her releasing her anger or something.
Speaker 1: I had no clue is about periods, right, And I
Speaker 1: was like, Okay, this is actually like the first spin
Speaker 1: on this in a long time that I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: this is really cool, and I'm like totally in. I
Speaker 1: just remember feeling so Brave as a Pixar movie, right.
Speaker 1: I was just so betrayed when Brave turned into like
Speaker 1: why is my mommy a bear? And I'm like, why
Speaker 1: is your mommy a bear? That's not what I thought
Speaker 1: I was going to watch. Speaking of soul, and I'm hoping,
Speaker 1: I hope I remember this correctly, but the guy who
Speaker 1: ends up in the Afterlife goes back to Earth, but
Speaker 1: then it's either his soul or someone else's soul ends
Speaker 1: up in a cat so someone is a cat most
Speaker 1: of the movie. So there's that one too. They just
Speaker 1: love that. I mean it moves merch, I suppose, but
Speaker 1: it's just me. There's a lot of it. Yeah. Anyways,
Speaker 1: So anyway, should I do the recap? Yeah? And I
Speaker 1: can feel free to jump in at any point in
Speaker 1: the recap. It's a loose cap. I love it. Okay.
Speaker 1: So it is two thousand two. We meet Maylan Lee,
Speaker 1: a thirteen year old girl in Toronto. She goes to school.
Speaker 1: We learned that she is very high achieving and smart.
Speaker 1: We meet her best friends Miriam, Priya and Abby. Her
Speaker 1: opening monologue is so cool, Like I was just like, yes, okay,
Speaker 1: in good she's just like talking to camera, which I
Speaker 1: don't think really ever happens again, but I loved it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there's like voice over sprinkled in and now, but yeah,
Speaker 1: it's a fun opening montage. Whenever I see voice over
Speaker 1: only in like two random places, and like, was this
Speaker 1: a studio note or they're like they're not going to
Speaker 1: understand unless you put in aggressive voice over here. That's like,
Speaker 1: and this is a video of my mom and she's
Speaker 1: standing next to my dad. They are married and they
Speaker 1: are my parents or whatever, and I love them so much,
Speaker 1: but it's complicated, Okay, movie starting like yeah, which is
Speaker 1: kind of what's happening, but also it was like it's
Speaker 1: done in a fun enough way. Yeah, I don't mind
Speaker 1: it totally. Yeah, I didn't mind it at all. There's
Speaker 1: definitely like more egregious examples of that and other things. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think do you remember that movie, Oh my god,
Speaker 1: what was that movie that sucked about Fox News ladies? Oh, bombshell,
Speaker 1: bombshell that movie. I think it's like the worst example
Speaker 1: of that that I always think of, where like it
Speaker 1: was so it might have even been like a reshoot
Speaker 1: where there's just two times where Nicole kim and starts
Speaker 1: addressing camera in like a three hour movie, and they're
Speaker 1: really far apart and you're just like, this is really distracting.
Speaker 1: That's so funny. I don't know, I am ragging bombshallow
Speaker 1: movie nobody remembers five years later, but here I am.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's not undeserved anyway. So May's friends have
Speaker 1: a crush on this guy, Devon, who works at a
Speaker 1: local convenience store, but May likes the members of this
Speaker 1: boy band for Town, as do her friends. As well
Speaker 1: and as we. I mean, that's where their song slab funny,
Speaker 1: I mean could be the best Phineas Eilish right, a
Speaker 1: song of all time Billie Eilish and Phineas My jaw
Speaker 1: dropped the first time I watched the movie with my
Speaker 1: nine year old friend Maya, and then like that who
Speaker 1: wrote the songs? No wonder, I feel like we did
Speaker 1: become friends. There was no one else for me to
Speaker 1: talk to at the wedding, so we became buddies. But
Speaker 1: like the first I was like, wait, billy like and
Speaker 1: it makes so much sense because they're so fucking at
Speaker 1: g and they're legitimately good. I can't stand when like
Speaker 1: movie bands don't write a song that I actually love. Yes,
Speaker 1: and this one's purpose one is great. I would listen
Speaker 1: for fun and I will I have listened for fun um. Okay,
Speaker 1: So they love for Town and they all want to
Speaker 1: go to this upcoming concert, but the tickets are very
Speaker 1: expensive and it doesn't seem feasible. May goes home after school.
Speaker 1: Her parents own and operate a temple that honors their ancestors,
Speaker 1: particularly their ancestor son Ye, who was a guardian of animals,
Speaker 1: especially red pandas May helps her mom, Ming clean and
Speaker 1: give tours of the temple, May works very hard to
Speaker 1: impress and honor her family, to the point where there's
Speaker 1: some concern from May and her friends that she is
Speaker 1: not really her own person. Then one day May start
Speaker 1: stoodling some flirty drawings of her I loved this secreence
Speaker 1: son and that guy Devon from the convenience store, which
Speaker 1: her mom finds and thinks that something is going on
Speaker 1: between them. So Ming goes to the convenience store and
Speaker 1: screams at Devon, which obviously absolutely mortifies May. So the
Speaker 1: next morning, when May wakes up after some nightmares, she
Speaker 1: has turned into a giant red panda. Okay, Kafka vibes.
Speaker 1: That was me feeling like an absolutely genius writing down
Speaker 1: Kafka vibes. Wow, Jamie, Yeah, it only took me on
Speaker 1: my fourth watch to be like, oh, cofa vibes. I
Speaker 1: forgot that Metamorphosis was also about periods in a big ways.
Speaker 1: I think a close read would really like would reveal
Speaker 1: all that this about getting your period for the first time.
Speaker 1: Is that book series that was popular in like the
Speaker 1: late Animal The Animals? Yeah, yeah, that's also the vibe.
Speaker 1: They turned into animals if I evil like the York
Speaker 1: the Yerks, they are coming into your ears, but they
Speaker 1: couldn't always control when it happens get out of control
Speaker 1: and turn into a sexy animal. Yes, and Tobias got
Speaker 1: stuck as a hot Bias did get stuck as a
Speaker 1: hot Wow. Thank you for outing yourself as someone who
Speaker 1: knows the particulars of animals. I don't. I've never read
Speaker 1: an animalph Sorry, Oh, it's never too late to start. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I kind of wonder what it would be like to
Speaker 1: read them now, because at the time I felt like
Speaker 1: they were like, very horny coated. But I bet that
Speaker 1: they're just horny right interesting, and I didn't enough information
Speaker 1: to understand. Well, so good, Okay, So May has turned
Speaker 1: into a red panda. She freaks out. Her mom is like, oh, no,
Speaker 1: have you gotten your period? And May is like sort
Speaker 1: of and we're like, yes, this is the metaphor, and
Speaker 1: May sometimes you're like, what is the metaphor? The metaphor
Speaker 1: has to change. Sometimes it's a few different things. I'm
Speaker 1: always having fun, but sometimes I'm like, I forgot what
Speaker 1: the metaphor was, right. So May tries to calm down
Speaker 1: and take deep breaths, which turns her back into a human,
Speaker 1: although now her hair is bright red. Yeah. She goes
Speaker 1: to school as a human, trying to act calm, knowing
Speaker 1: that that should keep the panda at bay. But this kid, Tyler,
Speaker 1: is mocking May about the incident at the convenience store,
Speaker 1: and she gets angry and humility aided, which makes her
Speaker 1: start to turn back into the red panda. Tyler is
Speaker 1: Tyler triggering, You're just I knew kids like that at
Speaker 1: that age, and do you have any exit? Because I
Speaker 1: was thinking of one specific kid named Jeffrey. Every time
Speaker 1: Tyler was on screen, I was like, oh my god,
Speaker 1: I can't. He used to be like, why is there
Speaker 1: so much hair in your arms? And I was like,
Speaker 1: because I'm Italian and and he's like, well, it's gross,
Speaker 1: and then he would just want And mine was this
Speaker 1: kid named Nick Delawya, So I can't be if you
Speaker 1: full name dropped him. Yeah, and he's going to listen,
Speaker 1: So anyway, okay, um. She has to stay calm so
Speaker 1: that she doesn't turn into the red panda, but then
Speaker 1: her mom shows up at school. Things spiral out of
Speaker 1: control again and May turns back into the red panda
Speaker 1: which her mom sees. Then May escapes from school and
Speaker 1: through the neighborhood back home where she can hide, and
Speaker 1: her mom arrives home. Here's a little thing. A friend
Speaker 1: of mine cited this, like the mom showing up at
Speaker 1: school as like an example of like I think she's
Speaker 1: like the meanest Disney or Pixar villain, and I was
Speaker 1: I could not believe he's like she mortified her daughter.
Speaker 1: I was like, Okay, listen, this might be this might
Speaker 1: be some cultural relativism. My mom didn't show up at
Speaker 1: school with a pad, but she's done plenty of things
Speaker 1: that were fucking absolutely mortifying, like calling looking up in
Speaker 1: the directory every Indian family and then calling them like
Speaker 1: I'm Raka's mom, like we should be friends. And that
Speaker 1: absolutely killed me and mortified me, I know, And I
Speaker 1: was like, I don't think she's the meanest villain in
Speaker 1: all of Pixar for that. It just feels very like
Speaker 1: she's just I don't know, she's just extra. That seems yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the it was harsh I've seen I've seen some
Speaker 1: criticism around her character. And then it's also like which
Speaker 1: which will get to is of like her big a
Speaker 1: character that like is like the Tiger mom Trumpe, which
Speaker 1: is on the trup I've ever heard of? Oh interesting,
Speaker 1: But but then I also like, whatever, we'll get there
Speaker 1: in a little bit. But also like once I listened
Speaker 1: to I watched a ton of interviews with the director
Speaker 1: because I sort of just like, was like, I really
Speaker 1: like her, and I kept just letting the videos play.
Speaker 1: But the director DOMI she it sounds like this story
Speaker 1: is like super particular to her specific life, and it's
Speaker 1: like this is what her mom was like, and she's
Speaker 1: not trying to imply that all Chinese Canadian moms are
Speaker 1: like this totally, which is so fair. Yes, right, sorry,
Speaker 1: I totally interrupted, simply I know that's why we're here.
Speaker 1: Not meanest. The meanest Pixar villain would be who Randolph
Speaker 1: from Monsters incorporating maybe climate change wallet true that we
Speaker 1: can't forget. I would say, as a Car's three expert,
Speaker 1: whoever the villain of Cars three is? I It was like,
Speaker 1: I don't, I've never seen I was. I was gonna
Speaker 1: say you, if you could name the villain of Cars
Speaker 1: three off the top of your head, I'm like, you
Speaker 1: might actually be the number one Cars three experts. Does
Speaker 1: I would not Who is the villain in Cars one?
Speaker 1: Fossil fuel? Honestly, I think the cars movies stink. Whoa hate? Okay,
Speaker 1: you're gonna have to trash that here. See people say
Speaker 1: that and then they see Lightning McQueen literally driving around
Speaker 1: Disneyland and they lose their minds. Do you not get
Speaker 1: thrilled when you see Lightning McQueen driving around? No one's
Speaker 1: in the front seat. I have not seen this, so
Speaker 1: I know. Okay, well, let me tell you. He is shirtless,
Speaker 1: he is hot. It looks incredible, better than in the
Speaker 1: animation Ripped. It is kind of like to like wax
Speaker 1: poetic at this, but you're sort of like, this is
Speaker 1: the coolest thing I've ever seen. And then sometimes help
Speaker 1: park and you can take a picture with him, and
Speaker 1: you can take a couple if it's not busy. Look, okay,
Speaker 1: the movies. I don't couldn't tell you a single thing
Speaker 1: that happens in the movies besides tractor tipping, which is hilarious.
Speaker 1: Are those cows? Yeah, that's that's cars, cows, cars, cows, tractors.
Speaker 1: That's interesting. Oh okay, so May's mom ming arrives home
Speaker 1: and explains to May that this is happening, that she's
Speaker 1: turning into a red panda because long ago, their ancestor
Speaker 1: son Ye had asked the gods to turn her into
Speaker 1: a red panda to be able to protect her family.
Speaker 1: So she developed this ability to harness her emotions and
Speaker 1: transform into a red panda, which she passed on to
Speaker 1: her daughters, who passed it onto their daughters. But after
Speaker 1: many generations, when the family decided to move to a
Speaker 1: new place and you know they're living in this modern society,
Speaker 1: this blessing became more of an inconvenience. But the good
Speaker 1: news is there is a cure where on the next
Speaker 1: Red Moon they can perform a ritual that will seal
Speaker 1: May's red panda away. Um. For example, Ming's panda is
Speaker 1: sealed in a necklace that she always wears. But the
Speaker 1: thing is, this is where a few like plot things
Speaker 1: get confusing for me. There are like and I like,
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to be like Mrs Cinemason's here, but
Speaker 1: they were like, I don't understand why Ming. It didn't
Speaker 1: occur to Meng that this could have been what was
Speaker 1: happening earlier, even though she plays it off like she's like, oh,
Speaker 1: I just thought you were too young, but like she's thirteen.
Speaker 1: I agree. I thought she was using that as a
Speaker 1: cover first to be like like I thought she wasn't.
Speaker 1: It was like not something known. It was like not
Speaker 1: everyone in the family gets I don't know, like or
Speaker 1: it was going to be a secret from her mom
Speaker 1: really like skip certain people or like something like that. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was just like she would have seen this coming.
Speaker 1: She knows it's going to come. Which also makes me
Speaker 1: wonder because it's a possibility that it could happen kind
Speaker 1: of at any time. Why she would do something like
Speaker 1: show up at her school with pads, which would did
Speaker 1: she knew trigger her daughter into turning into the panda?
Speaker 1: So yeah, that got a little I'm like, huh for me,
Speaker 1: but it's fine, But you're like, man, it's it's a
Speaker 1: it's a but I do have one more thing. Her
Speaker 1: friends are about to show back up and they're like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, you turned into a panda, and I'm like,
Speaker 1: hold on, did not everyone at school see her turn
Speaker 1: into a panda two hours ago? I watched this scene
Speaker 1: very carefully a couple of times because what happens is
Speaker 1: when when may turns into a panda in the classroom,
Speaker 1: a burst like a plume of pink smoke obscures her.
Speaker 1: But even though she lets out a pretty loud roar
Speaker 1: and you you think you would be able to sense
Speaker 1: the presence of a very large animal right behind you,
Speaker 1: no one turns around to look, and everyone's attention is
Speaker 1: still on ming outside. Okay, I feel better, so it
Speaker 1: does sleep again. We do visually understand why no one sees,
Speaker 1: although there's like maybe one or two girls, one or
Speaker 1: two students at the school who sees her as a panda,
Speaker 1: but most people don't anyway. So the thing with the
Speaker 1: panda is that strong emotions release it, and the more
Speaker 1: May releases the red Panda, the more difficult it will
Speaker 1: be to steal it away come time for the ritual.
Speaker 1: And it's also said that this is her only chance
Speaker 1: to steal it away, But then later in the movie,
Speaker 1: all the characters who have a red panda spirit steal
Speaker 1: it away again, so it isn't ther only chance anyway.
Speaker 1: It's because May May has triggered a societal collapse with
Speaker 1: the sheer power of her panda. Right. I don't want
Speaker 1: to be too nitpicky about a movie that I really like,
Speaker 1: but I do have some little nitpicks, is all. Anyway,
Speaker 1: So there's this one chance to seal the red Panda away,
Speaker 1: which is the next Red moon, which is a month
Speaker 1: away on May. And here's the Despicable Me connection. So
Speaker 1: have you seen Despicable of Me? Unfortunately no, that's okay,
Speaker 1: spoilers ahead, please, that's okay. I know that I know
Speaker 1: my minions, but I haven't seen their origin story. That's okay,
Speaker 1: that's okay. So in Despicable Me, the first one from
Speaker 1: there's a plot point where Grew has to just whether
Speaker 1: to go to his adopted daughter's dance recital or to
Speaker 1: steal the moon, and both of these things need to
Speaker 1: happen on May, which is very close to So I
Speaker 1: just think it's I observed. I noticed this fascinating phenomenon
Speaker 1: where in one movie there is a moon related event
Speaker 1: that conflicts with the formative child dance recital, right, which
Speaker 1: was also like music and dancing based. The same thing
Speaker 1: happens in Turning Red, where on just one day before
Speaker 1: there's a moon related event double booked with a dancing
Speaker 1: singing concert performance coincidence, Despicable Me happens and you can't
Speaker 1: really tell what year is happening. So if it's happening
Speaker 1: in two thousand and two, May's ritual takes place on
Speaker 1: like a Friday, Grew literally steals the moon on a
Speaker 1: Saturday day. I was just going to say, could you
Speaker 1: imagine for town had to bump the concert to the
Speaker 1: next day. Oh my god, May goes to do this
Speaker 1: moon ritual. Oh it got stolen by fucking Grew. What
Speaker 1: if that's how they introduced the multiverse. They're like, wait,
Speaker 1: oh my god, third act, no moon. No moon took
Speaker 1: the moon, it grew. That's oh my god. That was
Speaker 1: literally inches away from happening. It was literally inches away.
Speaker 1: Actually it could have. And then and then you know,
Speaker 1: if the days were switched or happened the same day,
Speaker 1: all the events of Turning Red would be moot because
Speaker 1: there would just be a massive weather event and everyone
Speaker 1: would die. Yes, you can't not have the moon. This
Speaker 1: is like the st Elsewhere universe. How like there's all
Speaker 1: these shows that exist that couldn't exist in theory. Some
Speaker 1: of the events of st. Elsewhere true. That's the that's
Speaker 1: the group Grewniverse, the growniverse diverse. Oh okay, okay, so
Speaker 1: back back to turning red. So the next red moon
Speaker 1: is on, that's when this ritual will be. Then May's
Speaker 1: friends Miriam, Priya, and Abby come over and discover May
Speaker 1: as a red panda, but they are quick to understand
Speaker 1: and embrace May as a red panda, and they tell
Speaker 1: her that for Town is coming to Toronto for a
Speaker 1: concert on of May, which is one day after my birthday. Okay,
Speaker 1: that's kind of a coincidence they didn't really talk about, right, Okay,
Speaker 1: so that's gonna, I mean, kind of jealous as an
Speaker 1: August baby that you would get to sell rate your
Speaker 1: birthday before the moon was shrunk right under the wire. Yeah. Um.
Speaker 1: But so so May knows she won't be able to
Speaker 1: go to the concert because she'll get so excited it
Speaker 1: she will turn into a red panda in front of everyone.
Speaker 1: But she discovers that being with her friends, or even
Speaker 1: just thinking about being with her friends, has a very
Speaker 1: calming effect on her and it neutralizes the panda, although
Speaker 1: she tells her mom that what neutralizes the panda is
Speaker 1: like her love for her parents, and we see this
Speaker 1: scene where she does some like tests which would could
Speaker 1: possibly kind of like release the panda, but She's able
Speaker 1: to keep it at bay because she's thinking about her friends.
Speaker 1: So she's like, all right, I can go to this concert.
Speaker 1: But when May asks if she can go, her mom
Speaker 1: says no. And then Ming's mother, May's grandmother calls and
Speaker 1: says that she's going to be coming from Florida to
Speaker 1: help with the ritual, which gives Ming an awful lot
Speaker 1: of anxiety. Meanwhile, May's friends parents also do not let
Speaker 1: them go to the con sert. But the girls, the girls.
Speaker 1: Sorry to the girls, sorry to keep bringing up despicable. Sorry,
Speaker 1: we're really it's for listeners. We are recording this the
Speaker 1: released day of Rise of Grew, so we just kind
Speaker 1: of have Grew on the brain. You gotta see the movie.
Speaker 1: I mean it's streaming out. Okay. He has three daughters.
Speaker 1: He calls them the girls. I was ant, solutely shocked
Speaker 1: when you said any of these men had children. Stunned
Speaker 1: beyond Bullie. Grew is a father, and make no mistake,
Speaker 1: he's a bad one. Wait a minute, he Grew not
Speaker 1: a minion. He's the man. He's the cruise. Steve Carrell,
Speaker 1: Oh my god, I thought Grew was a minion this
Speaker 1: whole time. Know the minions are Kevin, Stewart and Bob Oh.
Speaker 1: I knew Kevin and Stewart. I thought the third one
Speaker 1: was grew. Okay, that's interesting, So okay, see now you
Speaker 1: can maybe see why I was shocked. I was like
Speaker 1: one of the medians to have three daughters and has
Speaker 1: to go to Honestly, it might be a better movie altogether, probably,
Speaker 1: but I'm pretty sure that Minions cannot reproduce. But they
Speaker 1: don't want to get into it franchise wise. It gets
Speaker 1: too messy. Yeah. Kind of conspicuously absent from the series
Speaker 1: is how they reproduce where all the six year olds
Speaker 1: the movie is made for they need to know. I
Speaker 1: don't want to know, they simply must. Yeah. Um okay.
Speaker 1: So the girl, the friends, they are hell bent on
Speaker 1: going to this Fourton concert, and then some classmates catch
Speaker 1: May while she's in red panda form. But they think
Speaker 1: it's really cool and they think she's so cute and
Speaker 1: offer money to take pictures with her, And so the
Speaker 1: friends and May in particular, devise a plan to earn
Speaker 1: the eight hundred dollars they need to buy the concert
Speaker 1: tickets by seting their classmates take pictures with panda. May
Speaker 1: and like they start selling merch and we see this
Speaker 1: whole montage and after a couple of weeks they've almost
Speaker 1: earned enough money. They just need a hundred more dollars.
Speaker 1: But that kid, Tyler threatens to tell May's mom that
Speaker 1: she's been flaunting the panda all over school, but he
Speaker 1: won't tell anyone if she comes to his birthday party
Speaker 1: because if she comes, everyone will come. And he's like
Speaker 1: trying to be popular. Uh, And May demands that he
Speaker 1: pay her two hundred dollars for her appearance, and Tyler agrees,
Speaker 1: And then you're like, where does Tyler going to get
Speaker 1: two d And then you see his house, You're like, oh,
Speaker 1: I guess it's around has very rich parents. But just
Speaker 1: as May is heading out to go to Tyler's party,
Speaker 1: her grandmother and Aunties show up and delay her, and
Speaker 1: her grandmother warns Slash reminds May that the more she
Speaker 1: lets this beast out, the harder it will be to
Speaker 1: contain at the ritual. But May goes to the party
Speaker 1: any anyway to let the panda out one last time.
Speaker 1: And at the party, Miriam is like, well, what if
Speaker 1: you don't do the ritual and you just keep the
Speaker 1: Panda because her friends have noticed that May has started
Speaker 1: to become more her own person and she's not constantly
Speaker 1: bending over backwards to impress her mom. Meanwhile, oh no,
Speaker 1: Ming finds out that May snuck out, and she discovers
Speaker 1: all the money and the merch that they've been selling,
Speaker 1: so she storms off. Then back at the party, the
Speaker 1: girls discovered that they got the wrong date for the concert.
Speaker 1: It is not May eighteen, the day after my birthday.
Speaker 1: It's on May, the day before Grew is going to
Speaker 1: steal the moon. Okay, it's really I thought the like
Speaker 1: throwaway joke as to why Abby messed it up was
Speaker 1: really funny every time, and she's like to lead it's
Speaker 1: pretty good, pretty good. So the concert is on, which
Speaker 1: is the same night as the ritual, so May freaks
Speaker 1: out and ends up getting really aggressive towards Tyler, which
Speaker 1: is the exact moment that May's mom shows up at
Speaker 1: the party. So Ming be rates May's friends for being
Speaker 1: a bad influence on May, and May doesn't challenge her
Speaker 1: mom and throws her friends under the bus. But we
Speaker 1: all we understand that it's because May is very freaked
Speaker 1: out by her own aggressive behavior and she's still you know,
Speaker 1: kind of I need my mom's approval. So we cut
Speaker 1: to Ma. May's friends go without her to see four
Speaker 1: Town while May reluctantly preps for the ritual. But then
Speaker 1: May's dad Jin, who has been a character the whole time.
Speaker 1: I just didn't know how to fit him into the
Speaker 1: Record's dad. Yeah, he's like known for his cooking, and
Speaker 1: he's nice, and he's very nice. He finds a cam
Speaker 1: quarter and watch his footage of May and her friends
Speaker 1: having fun. They're singing, they're dancing to Foretown, and he
Speaker 1: has a heart to heart with May about her red panda.
Speaker 1: Then it's time for the ritual, where her family gathers
Speaker 1: around in a circle and sings from the heart, which
Speaker 1: causes May to kind of project into this astral realm
Speaker 1: where she kind of reflects on her experience with her
Speaker 1: panda and decides to not let go of it and
Speaker 1: to keep it, which enrages Ming, but May's like, I
Speaker 1: don't care, I'm I'm leaving and I'm going to the concert.
Speaker 1: And Ming, who's panda spirit again, lives in this like
Speaker 1: necklace amulant thing breaks during this kind of altercation with
Speaker 1: May and her panda is unleashed like a Godzilla situation. Yes. Meanwhile,
Speaker 1: May gets to the concert, she apologizes to her friends,
Speaker 1: they forgive her. They start having a great time at
Speaker 1: the concert, but then Ming as her panda, which is
Speaker 1: enormous and very scary, crashes the concert. So May and
Speaker 1: Ming start fighting and yelling at each other and like
Speaker 1: physically fighting, and May's family shows up to do the
Speaker 1: ritual again so that they can contain Ming's panda, and
Speaker 1: then Grandma and the Aunties all break their pieces of
Speaker 1: jewelry that contain their panda spirits so they can help,
Speaker 1: and they start doing the ritual, but they're singing isn't working.
Speaker 1: So May's friends start singing four Town, and then four
Speaker 1: Town shows back up and they start singing I Love
Speaker 1: the four Town is like not really bothered by what
Speaker 1: is happening. The power of music is too strong, truly.
Speaker 1: They're just like kind of like cyborgs that have been
Speaker 1: programmed by the music industry to like saying at opportune
Speaker 1: moments and I love and oh god, that feels very real.
Speaker 1: It's right, it's maybe it's commentary on boy band culture.
Speaker 1: This is like lou Pearlman commentary. You know it did
Speaker 1: all feel. I mean like, yeah, peek Loue, pearlmant God,
Speaker 1: where's I think there was a loop Pearlman biopic in
Speaker 1: production for a while. I don't know if it's going
Speaker 1: to happen. I love to watch. But when like the
Speaker 1: when the boy band all of a sudden had angel wings,
Speaker 1: I was like, there was something like that was reawakened
Speaker 1: in me that hadn't that had been sleeping for years.
Speaker 1: We're like, oh, yeah, that used to be really it beautiful, Yeah,
Speaker 1: matching outfits and wings. Yeah. So because the rituals was working,
Speaker 1: now May finds herself in this astral realm again where
Speaker 1: she encounters her mom when she was May's age, and
Speaker 1: she's crying and talking about the pressure to be perfect
Speaker 1: and to gain her mom's approval, and May is like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I get it. I can relate, but it won't always
Speaker 1: feel this way. And then May also tells her mom
Speaker 1: that you know, I'm changing and I'm figuring myself out
Speaker 1: and you just have to let me be my own person.
Speaker 1: I like to gyrate. You're like, yeah, good for you.
Speaker 1: We see some other tender moments between Ming and her mother,
Speaker 1: between May and son Ye, and then the other women
Speaker 1: in the family contain their red spirit, their red panda spirits,
Speaker 1: but again May decides to keep hers, and that's the
Speaker 1: big climax of the movie. Then we cut to the
Speaker 1: aftermath of all of this, where May and her mother
Speaker 1: still spend time together, and May brings out her panda
Speaker 1: at the temple and it attracts and more crowds, but
Speaker 1: May is also free to be herself and to be
Speaker 1: with her friends more. And then the movie ends with
Speaker 1: voiceover from May saying that we've all got an inner beast.
Speaker 1: We've all got a messy, loud, weird part of ourselves
Speaker 1: hidden away, and a lot of us never let it out,
Speaker 1: but I did. How about you the end, Benny, and
Speaker 1: get to hear the whole song and it's good and
Speaker 1: it's okay. So that's a movie. Let's take a quick
Speaker 1: break and we will come back to discuss. And we're back.
Speaker 1: Where do we want to start here? There's like, there's
Speaker 1: there's a lot to talk about. H I let's go home. Yeah, nope.
Speaker 1: I mean this movie is doing a lot of things,
Speaker 1: a lot to really cool things. It's subverting a lot
Speaker 1: of tropes. There's a lot of like meaningful inclusion and
Speaker 1: representation that historically we have not seen in major Hollywood films.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of like interesting themes and metaphors being explored. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't I don't know where to where to start.
Speaker 1: Should we start with periods? Yeah, because that's like, okay.
Speaker 1: The Panta represents a lot of things at different times.
Speaker 1: It represents literally getting your period, it represents just general
Speaker 1: puberty changes. It represents her connection and her isolation from
Speaker 1: her culture. Like, it represents a lot of different things.
Speaker 1: But as far as periods go. So I'm not gonna
Speaker 1: like read you all of the whatever like ridiculous comments
Speaker 1: that a bunch of people made. There's at least one
Speaker 1: review when this movie came out where it was like,
Speaker 1: I don't know, I feel like this doesn't really happen
Speaker 1: very much anymore, but it did happen here where it
Speaker 1: was like a white guy film critic that was like
Speaker 1: I couldn't relate with this movie, and so, um, what
Speaker 1: the heck? Uh? No stars. There was someone I don't
Speaker 1: know if this is the same person that said, like
Speaker 1: this seems way too specific to the director's experience. Yes,
Speaker 1: which I mean, it is true that this movie is
Speaker 1: very specific to the director's experience, but like that doesn't
Speaker 1: make it unrelatable to other people. It's yeah, so fucking
Speaker 1: boring to be like, oh, this is too specific to
Speaker 1: an experience I've never had. I'm like, I've never had
Speaker 1: any experience is in a movie? There is. The whole
Speaker 1: point is like you see yourself in other people. Why
Speaker 1: the funk are you watching movies? Are you stupid? That's
Speaker 1: my unnuanced take. No, I mean, it's like it's ridiculous.
Speaker 1: And it's also like if that take were true across
Speaker 1: the board, then no one would watch movies at all,
Speaker 1: because that's like what most of them are. Like, you
Speaker 1: don't hear people say you should like that about sucking
Speaker 1: licorice pizza, But like Paul Thomas Anderson has been making
Speaker 1: movies about the three square blocks he's grown up on
Speaker 1: for like decades. You know, it's like and no one
Speaker 1: has a problem with it, and they are usually pretty
Speaker 1: good movies, and it's like, yeah, I mean, you know
Speaker 1: what the issue is here, but yeah, like, uh, all
Speaker 1: that stuff is really frustrating. I mean, and we can
Speaker 1: sort of get back to like how specific the movie
Speaker 1: is to DOMI. She's experienced as a kid growing up
Speaker 1: in like literally like she was born in n and
Speaker 1: grew up in Canada with Chinese family. Like this is
Speaker 1: her story, except I don't think she turned into a panda.
Speaker 1: But also she could be burying the lead. We don't
Speaker 1: don't know, we don't know, we might never know that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's going to come out twenty years later. It's actually
Speaker 1: a documentary turning around. Is is a biopic? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's gonna get the idiocracy treatment. Um, But like just
Speaker 1: in gen I just wanted to do kind of like
Speaker 1: a quick rundown of like, first of all, like this
Speaker 1: movie does reference periods in a movie that's directed at
Speaker 1: young audiences, and that never happens true, But even so
Speaker 1: it's really not referenced that much, and the criticism that
Speaker 1: is like pushed back against it makes it seem like
Speaker 1: that is what the whole movie is about. Is basically
Speaker 1: one scene and like maybe like kind of a winking
Speaker 1: reference in the title, you could argue, but like it's
Speaker 1: that one scene with Ming, you know, thinking that May
Speaker 1: has gotten her period for the first time and bringing
Speaker 1: in a bunch of different paths and like showing her
Speaker 1: holding pads, which is a big deal. For movies. I mean,
Speaker 1: I can't think of one where that would happen and
Speaker 1: DOOMI She has done all these really cool interviews talking
Speaker 1: about what she watched growing up. She references being like
Speaker 1: a big Lizzie McGuire head, which I really appreciate, and
Speaker 1: saying like, oh, I saw so many like experiences that
Speaker 1: I had had in middle school on that show, but
Speaker 1: they don't you know, you couldn't reference menstruation at all
Speaker 1: on a show like that. In that era, you could
Speaker 1: reference almost everything. But I feel like unless you found
Speaker 1: your way to de grassy Um where it's in the pilot,
Speaker 1: you wouldn't know. And so that that is a big deal,
Speaker 1: especially because the way periods are shown in movies, at
Speaker 1: least like very influentially, are usually really negative. Like the
Speaker 1: Carrey scene is like the first thing that comes to
Speaker 1: mind where it's like presented as traumatic and horrible and
Speaker 1: sends you on the road to setting your classmates on fire. Um,
Speaker 1: I mean accurate though, And then the other scene that
Speaker 1: I was trying to I was like, Okay, what we're
Speaker 1: like really influential movies with scenes that like directly mentioned periods,
Speaker 1: and the only other movie I think of was super bad.
Speaker 1: It's like, which is a scene that like, Still I
Speaker 1: went back and rewatched him, Like, the scene still doesn't
Speaker 1: make sense. No one would do this right. And of
Speaker 1: course what was the grossed out by the period? A
Speaker 1: girl leaks period onto like Jonah Hills pants or something
Speaker 1: and he's horrified. Um. I just watched The Florida Project
Speaker 1: for the first time, and there's a scene where the
Speaker 1: mom she like wants to give like a big fuck
Speaker 1: you gesture to someone, so she pulls her pad out
Speaker 1: of her underwear and then sticks it to the window
Speaker 1: of the people that she's saying fuck you too. Okay,
Speaker 1: that's fun, that's representation. Yet no notes. I actually I
Speaker 1: remember a scene in Niptuck that um we all loved
Speaker 1: um that show, and it was the daughter was nine
Speaker 1: years old and her older brother scared her by telling
Speaker 1: her what a period was, so she thought she had
Speaker 1: to put a tamp on and now she went and
Speaker 1: put it in and left it in toxic got tss.
Speaker 1: I remember this episode was convulsing and went to the hospital.
Speaker 1: And I have never ever fucking forgot that because I'm like,
Speaker 1: I'll never leave a tampon in for more than twenty
Speaker 1: five sacands, I swear that's fearmongering from big tampon. Yes.
Speaker 1: But all this to say that a lot of the
Speaker 1: what very little representation of menstruation there is in media
Speaker 1: has mostly been like, oh my god, it's horrible. It's horrible,
Speaker 1: or there's some like weird like delicate flower kind of
Speaker 1: like you have blossomed in to a woman kind of
Speaker 1: weird ship as opposed to just like it's a thing
Speaker 1: that happens when you're still a kid, and you still
Speaker 1: react like a kid around it, and it doesn't make
Speaker 1: you like a woman now necessarily, it just as a
Speaker 1: bodily thing that happens. It's just a bottle function. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Like and I and I really liked that, Like Ming
Speaker 1: treated it like she's like anxious because she's like, oh,
Speaker 1: I wasn't ready, But like she doesn't treat it like
Speaker 1: it's you know, like scary. She tries to be calming
Speaker 1: about it. It seems like maybe they've talked about it
Speaker 1: before this scene, Like it just feels like it sets
Speaker 1: a better precedent for people who get their period for
Speaker 1: the first time, because yeah, I don't. I got my
Speaker 1: period super late as a late bluemer in every single way,
Speaker 1: and I thought I had shipped myself because we didn't
Speaker 1: have sex that at my school. I love every time
Speaker 1: you tell this story on the pod, which is I
Speaker 1: think maybe ten times so many times. Look if there's
Speaker 1: and if there's a perfect time for this story, this
Speaker 1: is the episode. Yeah, but that was that was like
Speaker 1: another criticism that I saw in this like first wave
Speaker 1: of like you know, right leaning weirdos who were like
Speaker 1: this is too much, where they were like, this is
Speaker 1: too young an audience to be talking about periods too,
Speaker 1: and which also got backlash because it's like you can
Speaker 1: get your period as young as like eight years old.
Speaker 1: My friend got it when she was nine, and it's
Speaker 1: like if you are someone who menstruates, there's no rhymeries,
Speaker 1: it's hormones, Like it just happens when it's going to happen. Yeah,
Speaker 1: So so I'll have to say, like I think it
Speaker 1: is like a huge deal. That's like a cool thing
Speaker 1: that there's going to be a generation of kids growing
Speaker 1: up knowing this of like all genders, because I do
Speaker 1: feel like it's like addressing it even if you're if
Speaker 1: you don't menstrate, it's just a way to be like, oh,
Speaker 1: that's what that is. And I don't even think the
Speaker 1: scene fully explains what that is. So I don't know
Speaker 1: whatever it's so fucking mad about. If you like went
Speaker 1: to the bathroom during that scene, you wouldn't be like,
Speaker 1: this is a movie about like it's like just kind
Speaker 1: of about like puberty in general exactly because the movie
Speaker 1: is so much more about And yeah, you can map
Speaker 1: on like going through puberty and getting your period onto
Speaker 1: the red panda, Like that's a clear meta for but
Speaker 1: there's also again a number of other metaphors or just
Speaker 1: like themes that are driving this narrative far more than
Speaker 1: the menstruation thing, such as I mean, there's this and
Speaker 1: this is kind of connected to puberty in a way
Speaker 1: that when you're going through puberty sometimes your emotions are
Speaker 1: confusing and you don't really have the maturity to start
Speaker 1: drawing people as mermaids, And you don't know why that
Speaker 1: theme was really impactful. You know, there's a lot going
Speaker 1: on in our development and a lot and you know
Speaker 1: a lot of it is mental and emotional, and so
Speaker 1: there's this kind of theme of emotions and like the
Speaker 1: pressure to suppress emotions versus letting yourself feel the entire
Speaker 1: range of your emotions, so like that's part of what
Speaker 1: the movie is about. There's also a very strong, if
Speaker 1: not the strongest theme of the movie, which is the
Speaker 1: idea of honoring your family versus honoring yourself and finding
Speaker 1: a healthy balance in that, where you can also kind
Speaker 1: of extend that to a generational saying where kids coming
Speaker 1: of age in a different cultural landscape than their parents,
Speaker 1: and how that almost always creates generational conflict. And then
Speaker 1: there's also the like aspect of Eastern and Western philosophies,
Speaker 1: where you know, many Eastern philosophies prioritize family and community
Speaker 1: over the individual, versus Western cultures tending to prioritize individuality.
Speaker 1: And how May coming from a Chinese immigrant family, I
Speaker 1: think she's second generation, if I'm understanding correctly, I think so. Um,
Speaker 1: I think it might not be like explicitly stated, I
Speaker 1: don't think. Yeah, it's a more just kind of like
Speaker 1: basing it on, like who speaks with what accent kind
Speaker 1: of thing. But even so, like her May growing up
Speaker 1: in Toronto, where aside from her being at home with family,
Speaker 1: she surrounded by Western ideology, and how that creates tension
Speaker 1: between her and her family and also her and her friends,
Speaker 1: because like she's being pulled at both ends in these
Speaker 1: two different directions, and so like, that's what the movie
Speaker 1: is about. That has to be relatable to so many
Speaker 1: groups of people, exactly whether or not you have like
Speaker 1: a familial obligations thing, just the idea of like, oh
Speaker 1: I feel this way where my parents, in this way
Speaker 1: where my friends. That's what being a teen exactly. And
Speaker 1: I love that a huge focus of this movie is
Speaker 1: on friendship, and specifically female friendship, and specifically like teenage
Speaker 1: female friendship, because so few movies are about that. And
Speaker 1: I love that this movie examines how your friends, especially
Speaker 1: at an age like thirteen, which is like maybe the
Speaker 1: worst age you can be. Like, how the people who
Speaker 1: understand you the most and who can bring you the
Speaker 1: most comfort as you come of age and navigate life
Speaker 1: are your friends. Like that is such a relatable thing
Speaker 1: for people, especially of that age. So I think that's
Speaker 1: a great point too, because something this movie does that
Speaker 1: I really liked was just like, oh, I was a
Speaker 1: big boy band head, and that is kind of viewed
Speaker 1: as like ditzy girl interests, you know, like not serious
Speaker 1: fandom or whatever, and it's like this movie doesn't make
Speaker 1: any political commentary on it, but it's kind of just
Speaker 1: by virtue of existing, honoring the things a young kid
Speaker 1: might care about without casting any judgment on it exactly.
Speaker 1: And it's like, oh, she wants to sit in her
Speaker 1: room and doodle, she wants to talk all day out
Speaker 1: to her with her friends on the phone, and that's
Speaker 1: might be seen in one way by like media, but
Speaker 1: like you see that it is crucial for her like
Speaker 1: development and her well being to do all that stuff right.
Speaker 1: They talk about how going to this concert is going
Speaker 1: to be a major milestone and it's going to basically
Speaker 1: it's like symbolic of their step toward becoming women. Like
Speaker 1: they're literally me and my cousin's going, Okay, I'm gonna
Speaker 1: tell another story I've told the podcast. That was how
Speaker 1: me and my cousins fault when we went to see
Speaker 1: the Backstreet Boys the night before eleven, And then it
Speaker 1: turns out that that was not the event that was
Speaker 1: going to make headlines that week, but the one I
Speaker 1: reflect on more frequently. Yes, but I really liked how
Speaker 1: like this movie because we've talked about stuff like this
Speaker 1: before where sometimes it's like in movies with like kids
Speaker 1: and like young teens, and I'm like thinking non judgmentally
Speaker 1: because they were important to me. But like with Mary
Speaker 1: Kay and Nashley movies, it's like you have twelve or
Speaker 1: thirteen year old kids and there's like they have romantic interests,
Speaker 1: which does make sense for a kid of that age,
Speaker 1: but it also like it becomes important to the plot
Speaker 1: that they have a boyfriend by the end or whatever happens.
Speaker 1: But this movie, I feel like, does something cool that
Speaker 1: I've never that I can't really think of seeing at
Speaker 1: least many times where it's like they are having like
Speaker 1: a this weird awakening that a lot of kids had
Speaker 1: when they saw boy bands, and now boy bands are
Speaker 1: fully back, so it's happening again, but there's no like
Speaker 1: romantic plot that's important to the movie. It's like they're
Speaker 1: allowed to like I don't know, I feel like you
Speaker 1: can't at least it like matched my experience kind of closely,
Speaker 1: where it's like being thirteen and like not being ready
Speaker 1: for an actual anything, but like projecting like a mad
Speaker 1: person onto like every cute older boy or like boy
Speaker 1: band or even like May May when she like has
Speaker 1: a crush on the store clerk who's like clear, like
Speaker 1: she doesn't think anything is going to happen, but it's
Speaker 1: just like the idea of it. I don't know. It
Speaker 1: reminds me of like summer camp counselor she has another
Speaker 1: crush too on some kid named like Carter Michael Murphy
Speaker 1: or I don't know, Chad Michael Murray, Michael Carter Michael Murphy.
Speaker 1: It's something and every time she sees him she gets
Speaker 1: all googlely eyed and like, yeah, that's a very relatable
Speaker 1: experience because again, when you're like going through puberty and
Speaker 1: your hormones are just like firing on all cylinders and
Speaker 1: you're like horny is hell, And I like love that
Speaker 1: this movie is about like teenage horny nous. Don't you
Speaker 1: know how to do anything and you don't know what
Speaker 1: it is right, You're just like what do I do
Speaker 1: with this? But it's just there and it's consuming many
Speaker 1: of your thoughts, which is again like seen as something
Speaker 1: by society is like oh what team girls being horny?
Speaker 1: That can't be a what that's horrifying or that can't
Speaker 1: be a thing. But it's like a very real thing
Speaker 1: that this movie handles very responsibly, And I just I
Speaker 1: love to see it on screen. There's this bit called
Speaker 1: Larger than Life by Maria Sherman, and it's like an
Speaker 1: encyclopedia on boy bands through the ages and like what
Speaker 1: purpose they serve and like why we have come back
Speaker 1: to them after decades and decades, like there is always
Speaker 1: some sort of boy band force. And one of the
Speaker 1: things the author says that I found really interesting because
Speaker 1: like boy band's being elemental and like figuring out your
Speaker 1: sexuality or at least starting to think about it. And
Speaker 1: it's like it's a safe avenue to do that because
Speaker 1: so like what both of you are saying. It's like,
Speaker 1: I'm not going to be with Ja C Chase, but
Speaker 1: I can look at him and feel like he's talking
Speaker 1: to me in a way I don't feel like the
Speaker 1: boys in my school were. And that's my like safe
Speaker 1: mental avenue to like figure out my ship a little bit.
Speaker 1: It was also a jay Z girl, Thank you. I
Speaker 1: have a poster of jac girls don't speak up enough. Yes,
Speaker 1: we are hiding, we are hiding. We are afraid. It's
Speaker 1: because his song. It's because his solo song. All day long,
Speaker 1: I dream about sex. It's embarrassing. I used to wait,
Speaker 1: here's my anecdote. I had that album which is called
Speaker 1: schisip Nick, which is disgusting and horrible. But I used
Speaker 1: to listen to that song and I would scream the
Speaker 1: word cupcakes over the word sex because I didn't want
Speaker 1: my parents stay here. That's so cute. Oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: Well I love that. My friends and I would do
Speaker 1: something similar with Nellie's hot in here. We'd be like,
Speaker 1: so put on all your clothes, and then my mom
Speaker 1: would be like, awesome, great her song. All the long,
Speaker 1: I dream about cupcakes. He should release that might be coming,
Speaker 1: and he hasn't released the second album, so that would
Speaker 1: be what he has been working on. He's been working
Speaker 1: on it for two days ago. Oh gosh. But yeah,
Speaker 1: that's fascinating about like culturally, boy bands just being a
Speaker 1: thing to help people be horny and figure out their
Speaker 1: horny nous. Yeah, they're just projection boards. And I liked
Speaker 1: I really like that San where May is like the
Speaker 1: animation and that scene is so funny, like that where
Speaker 1: she's drawing like these weird pictures of mermaid boys and
Speaker 1: she's like, what's happening? What am I doing? And she's
Speaker 1: like ashamed, but also like can't stop and you're like, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's and there. So I watched there was like a
Speaker 1: Disney Plus documentary about the making of this movie. I
Speaker 1: really like went down the Domy Sheeth hole. I was like,
Speaker 1: I want to be her friend, um, but she had
Speaker 1: like notebooks like this, and then shows it on screen
Speaker 1: of like anime pictures. She drew of her crush when
Speaker 1: she was like in middle school and her mom kept it.
Speaker 1: And there's like a scene where she's like zooming with
Speaker 1: her mom and she's like, hey, do you still have
Speaker 1: those sketch books? And her mom was like, I know
Speaker 1: exactly what you're talking about, and then went to the
Speaker 1: other room and grabbed it and was like two thousand
Speaker 1: and two, and like there were all these like, you know,
Speaker 1: very adolescent, weird drawings of like cute boys. I was like, wow,
Speaker 1: I don't think my parents kept that stuff. I hope
Speaker 1: they didn't, but it existed. I remember a crush of
Speaker 1: mine got a wart on his thumb and this was
Speaker 1: like kind of national news for me, and that became
Speaker 1: like my fixation to draw, Like I wonder when this
Speaker 1: will go down? And I would draw it like all
Speaker 1: the time, and and like when I was in first
Speaker 1: grade anyway humiliating for him. I used to have like
Speaker 1: my like kid fantasies. I remember, like they would be
Speaker 1: so specific that I would always appear in them exactly
Speaker 1: as I was. Like. I didn't change anything about myself,
Speaker 1: which would have made it easier, but I had like
Speaker 1: a specific memory of like I would have the same
Speaker 1: like fantasy about like talking to Daniel Radcliffe at like
Speaker 1: basically a bridge retain party at night, and it was
Speaker 1: like the same thing. It would just be my little
Speaker 1: thought that would help me off to sleep. But there
Speaker 1: was like one time where I had conjunctive itus and
Speaker 1: my eyes were really gross and I had to defy
Speaker 1: the fantasy. So he's like, I don't care that you
Speaker 1: have conjunctively I still like you. Absolutely, yes, huge, huge,
Speaker 1: And in that moment I felt truly seen, Yes, even
Speaker 1: though I for I could not see. I had my
Speaker 1: eyes full of crust. That is a beautiful story. Um,
Speaker 1: let's take another quick break and then we will come
Speaker 1: back for a more discussion. We're back, all right, And
Speaker 1: what shall we talk about next? Should we talk about
Speaker 1: May's relationship with her mom and the generational issues in
Speaker 1: this movie? Yeah? Yeah, I mean we sort of started
Speaker 1: talking talking about it already, But I like that. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's rare for a Disney Pixar movie specifically to center
Speaker 1: a mother daughter relationship, shocking that a mother and a
Speaker 1: grandmother are alive. And I do like the connection that
Speaker 1: May and her mom have. And I also like that
Speaker 1: it's like established early on that they like each other
Speaker 1: and they like spending time together, but there's like just
Speaker 1: certain things they can't talk about. I felt like real
Speaker 1: where like it's established, like like I really like working
Speaker 1: at the temple with my mom, Like they have a
Speaker 1: whole system of how they clean and how they host
Speaker 1: and all this stuff. Um, but then there's like certain
Speaker 1: topics that you can't go there. And it's like which
Speaker 1: I thought was like a cool balance and and and
Speaker 1: you don't see that in like big Disney movies very much, Right,
Speaker 1: It's another thing that's relatable. And Yeah, I liked that
Speaker 1: the relationships that are focused on, at least the familial
Speaker 1: relationships that are focused on in the movie are mothers
Speaker 1: and daughters going back generations and generations where they like
Speaker 1: honor their ancestor son ye who like was this powerful
Speaker 1: figure who like wanted to be a red panda because
Speaker 1: she wanted to be able to protect herself and her
Speaker 1: daughters during wartime, so she like asked for red panda
Speaker 1: powers from the gods. And then which is like a
Speaker 1: good idea to specifically idea. I can't say I would
Speaker 1: have thought to do that, but now I've been like,
Speaker 1: a weapon would be awesome. She's like, no, I want
Speaker 1: to turn into the cutest animal imaginable, but also be
Speaker 1: like very fierce because she was able to fend off
Speaker 1: bandits and protect her village and save her family from ruin.
Speaker 1: So I love that. That's like the origin story. And
Speaker 1: then you know this gets passed down and then we
Speaker 1: again focus in the movie on Ming and May and
Speaker 1: how again there's yeah, there's just like kind of cultural
Speaker 1: differences that are creating tension between them, the air generational
Speaker 1: differences um that are again relatable for an awful lot
Speaker 1: of people, but are all there, Like there are a
Speaker 1: lot of like culturally specific things that get touched on
Speaker 1: in the movie, but still there's a relationship that is
Speaker 1: very universally relatable, which I thought was really cool and
Speaker 1: not many movies pull it off very well, but I
Speaker 1: thought this one did. Adding to that too, like as
Speaker 1: someone who's grown up with two thousand aunties and uncles.
Speaker 1: I've never seen aunties in a children's movie of any
Speaker 1: kind in America, So it's really cool to see that
Speaker 1: because your aunties are not necessarily related to you. They
Speaker 1: might just be your family's friends, and like that bond
Speaker 1: forms from like being the only people of your race
Speaker 1: and that speak your language around and so they all
Speaker 1: just become people like these are the people that are
Speaker 1: away at my house, that they're all by Auntie or whatever.
Speaker 1: So it's really cool to see that too as a
Speaker 1: as an important relationship or something that mattered, Like you
Speaker 1: needed all of them there to kind of do that
Speaker 1: thing at the end. So I like that. Yeah, coming
Speaker 1: together as family, Yeah, I thought that was beautiful. I
Speaker 1: did see and I think we hinted at this, but
Speaker 1: I saw a lot of critic ism about how people
Speaker 1: a lot of people felt that this movie leaned into
Speaker 1: the tiger mom stereotype. I read it one review in
Speaker 1: particular by a fourteen year old film critic who it
Speaker 1: was from teen Vook. The critics name is Tabitha Yun.
Speaker 1: Her reviews entitled Turning Red made me feel understood as
Speaker 1: a Chinese American teen um and Tabitha, you know, discusses
Speaker 1: a lot of ways in which this movie, you know,
Speaker 1: she feels very seen by it and specific scenes that
Speaker 1: she really connected with. But she does call out the
Speaker 1: use of the tiger mom stereotype um, which I certainly see,
Speaker 1: but also because DOMI, she is very much pulling from
Speaker 1: her own experience and her own family dynamics. I don't
Speaker 1: think it's necessarily fair to criticize someone for playing into
Speaker 1: tropes when that filmmaker is just retelling their own experience.
Speaker 1: I watched this with my Chinese American friend and her
Speaker 1: parents are immigrants. My parents are immigrants, and it was
Speaker 1: funny because we were like, she's so much nicer than
Speaker 1: my mom. Like, because like I do think there is
Speaker 1: something like the tiger Mont's experience is definitely like a
Speaker 1: watered down, very like myopic view of how an Asian
Speaker 1: person parents, for sure, But there are just certain things
Speaker 1: it was like that was relatable to me in some moments.
Speaker 1: It's hard because it's like, this is some people's experience,
Speaker 1: but it's not other people's experience. Like I protect my
Speaker 1: parents are not strict, but they are like I cannot
Speaker 1: talk about a huge swath of topics with my mom
Speaker 1: because she will be co upset and so it's like
Speaker 1: that part was so relatable to me. So it's like
Speaker 1: I totally get what this young film critic is saying
Speaker 1: where you don't want to lean on that stuff, but
Speaker 1: it's so tough because also there's like no representation of
Speaker 1: that in the Pixar universe to begin with. So it's
Speaker 1: like if there were a bunch of movies with Asian
Speaker 1: families and they were all doing that, it's like, okay,
Speaker 1: it's like there's only one. Oh no. And again, I
Speaker 1: do feel like her mom like kind of learned to
Speaker 1: listen to her daughter and learn from her daughter, and
Speaker 1: like that is sort of not part of that trope
Speaker 1: so much. Uh yeah, that's just what I thought. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it's more nuanced than just like the flat trope.
Speaker 1: And I also feel like that, I mean, because the criticism,
Speaker 1: Like I mean again, first of all, like I don't
Speaker 1: really get to have an opinion from from a fu
Speaker 1: Irish Italian family like there um, but I did feel
Speaker 1: like the more I learned about how particular this story
Speaker 1: is to dom she, its like I understand the criticism
Speaker 1: and it is a valid criticism, and I feel like
Speaker 1: it just speaks to a bigger problem than what this
Speaker 1: movie is, because where you're saying like a lack of
Speaker 1: representation in general, where it's like, well, Domi, she is
Speaker 1: like telling people of her story, so you can't tell
Speaker 1: her she's wrong to do it, and that puts a
Speaker 1: lot of pressure on her as like one Chinese Canadian
Speaker 1: filmmaker to represent every you know, first generation kit. So
Speaker 1: it's like yeah, yeah, I feel like it just like
Speaker 1: speaks to what a what a significant pressure there is
Speaker 1: on her specifically, which isn't fair, right, And and Demmy,
Speaker 1: she has spoken a lot about her intentions with this
Speaker 1: movie and the way she characterized the mother daughter relationship.
Speaker 1: Um she was speaking on immigrant children and specifically Asian children, quote,
Speaker 1: they have to figure out what world they belong to,
Speaker 1: how to honor their parents and their family's expectations, but
Speaker 1: how to carve out this independent identity for themselves in
Speaker 1: this new world that their family is not from. I think,
Speaker 1: especially for immigrant kids, Asian kids, and for May in
Speaker 1: the movie, I think she has to come to realize
Speaker 1: that there is no perfect relationship with your parents, and
Speaker 1: that is always going to be messy. We really wanted
Speaker 1: to explore the nuances of Asian parent child relationships and
Speaker 1: dealing with change and of intergenerational conflict and how it
Speaker 1: can shape who we become unquote. So like that was
Speaker 1: her intention. That's very clearly what comes through in the movie. Yes, yeah,
Speaker 1: and I and like I agree that you're saying earlier
Speaker 1: right there where it's like you get more context for
Speaker 1: Ming's behavior than you ever would with like a truly
Speaker 1: like distilled version of that troupe because you get like
Speaker 1: a look at her relationship with her mom and how
Speaker 1: like totally this is clearly like a generational trauma issue
Speaker 1: that like doesn't exist in a void. And it's almost
Speaker 1: a little like, oh, you're allowed to change traditions to
Speaker 1: suit you. You're allowed. It's like a permission kind of thing,
Speaker 1: because like I just do someone that was like, oh,
Speaker 1: it's almost saying it was okay for her to be
Speaker 1: mean to her daughter, because there was a long line
Speaker 1: of that, like listen, first of all, I feel like
Speaker 1: there's a different if you're being mean to your daughter
Speaker 1: at being a strict parent. I don't know whatever, uh,
Speaker 1: but yeah I thought that was like nice, Yeah, like
Speaker 1: nice contact, nice backstory, nice like humanity given totally. Um.
Speaker 1: Here's another quote from Domici that I wanted to share
Speaker 1: about this. She was speaking about just kind of the
Speaker 1: conception of the movie and how the idea for the
Speaker 1: movie came from quote, wanting to make a movie for
Speaker 1: that thirteen year old Tommy who was struggling with her
Speaker 1: body and her emotions and fighting with her mom every
Speaker 1: day and wanting to understand what was going on at
Speaker 1: that time, but in a fun and unique and magical
Speaker 1: way unquote. So it's like one. She executes this well
Speaker 1: in the movie too. Again relatable because I was fighting
Speaker 1: with my mom every day too when I was thirteens.
Speaker 1: Simply what you do, It's just simply what happens. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I just I'm my tireless Domi, she defender. After watching
Speaker 1: that documentary, I like her so much and and I
Speaker 1: like tell like the whatever at the climax of the movie,
Speaker 1: like so much of stuff is like focused on like
Speaker 1: how May is like struggling to balance her Chinese culture
Speaker 1: with like her Canadian culture, and how there's like not
Speaker 1: really one person that she can talk to about everything
Speaker 1: and like that, and then it's like then you get
Speaker 1: the ritual music syncopate with for town, you're like synergy
Speaker 1: and you're like this is hot and ship this is
Speaker 1: what I walked up a It's like it works and
Speaker 1: it's yeah. I like that it's culturally specific and still
Speaker 1: super relatable because that's like what good kids movies should be, right.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of specific references to Chinese culture
Speaker 1: that Hollywood movies have historically shied away from, and not
Speaker 1: speaking just of like Chinese culture, but like any culture
Speaker 1: that's not like white American Hollywood tends to shy away
Speaker 1: from any stories or references of that nature because you know,
Speaker 1: Mr Hollywood is afraid that it will alienate movie going
Speaker 1: audiences who Mr. Hollywood perceives to be white men based
Speaker 1: on the movies that Hollywood has historically turned out. So
Speaker 1: you mean Mr Hollywood, Mr Hollywood is Sunny. Actually is Sunny.
Speaker 1: That's he's rubbing his paws together. It makes me sick
Speaker 1: to look at Sunny is actually running Paramount plus right now,
Speaker 1: Oh my god. But yeah, it was just like very
Speaker 1: refreshing to have this story with these specific cultural references
Speaker 1: that a lot of people were able to see themselves in.
Speaker 1: But the story overall is just very universally relatable, and
Speaker 1: it does feel like more movie are, like like for kids,
Speaker 1: are headed in this direction where it's like recently also
Speaker 1: have like cocoa and um incanto, which, like every child
Speaker 1: in the world is it's a trigger word for them.
Speaker 1: They will. My mom sent me a video. My mom's
Speaker 1: a second gardye teacher, and she sent me a video
Speaker 1: of her just like saying the word incanto at school
Speaker 1: and all the kids were like like they was like
Speaker 1: they had just done a line of coke, Like, uh,
Speaker 1: we will cover incanto of the show at upoint, Yes
Speaker 1: we will. But I like that there's more space being
Speaker 1: made for like culturally specific kids stories and also that
Speaker 1: they're like doing really fucking well too. Like I do
Speaker 1: wish that this I mean, I think it. I don't
Speaker 1: know if this I don't really know, like production wise,
Speaker 1: whether this movie was always intended to go straight to
Speaker 1: streaming or if that was a COVID thing. I do
Speaker 1: wish that this movie got a general release because I do.
Speaker 1: I feel like I feel like maybe, with the exception
Speaker 1: of Encanto, a lot of like Disney Kids movies at
Speaker 1: least that like feature like non white protagonists go straight
Speaker 1: to streaming and don't get the theatrical releases right, so, uh,
Speaker 1: perhaps a bit of side either. I don't really know
Speaker 1: um what the COVID situation is there, so I could
Speaker 1: be wrong, but I was like, why didn't this movie
Speaker 1: get a huge release? It would have done well. I'm
Speaker 1: not sure what Also I have Tyler is the devil.
Speaker 1: I don't think he should have gotten a redemption arc.
Speaker 1: He should have gone to detention. I like that we
Speaker 1: see and this one. I think also maybe the reason
Speaker 1: that a lot of people had kind of perceived Ming
Speaker 1: as a tiger mom. I think that might have been
Speaker 1: sort of enhanced by the fact that May's dad Jin
Speaker 1: was very like understanding, I'm cool and I'm nice, and
Speaker 1: I'm like also sort of barely in the movie, but
Speaker 1: when I am here, I'm super nice. But then the
Speaker 1: flip side of that is like, when was the last
Speaker 1: time you saw like a father talked to his daughter
Speaker 1: about puberty and like accepting yourself. That is I'm edge alerting,
Speaker 1: but I'm like, I think it's good. I think dad
Speaker 1: being nice about Panda good. Actually, I like I really
Speaker 1: liked that scene, like after he finds the video Kim, Yeah,
Speaker 1: like the video camera footage. It's really cute. It makes
Speaker 1: me cry. I like that you see him make dinner
Speaker 1: for the family, Like how often do you see the
Speaker 1: dad making dinner rather than the mom? Yeah, and then
Speaker 1: that's that's another like fun thing about the story that's
Speaker 1: like the food is really culturally specific and like, oh
Speaker 1: my god, it maybe funk absolutely listen Pixar, should I
Speaker 1: mean rat Tui too. Let's go do another food movie.
Speaker 1: Come on, ra there we go where Guini has to
Speaker 1: help the rat do something and he has to step
Speaker 1: on the rat. Remy dies immediately. And maybe I also
Speaker 1: do want to see the movie Raka Kuni with There's
Speaker 1: a reference to anything everywhere all at once. Where's that
Speaker 1: spin off? It's in the works. Let's talk about friendship
Speaker 1: really quick. Um, we've kind of covered this already, but
Speaker 1: I really liked May's relationship with her friends. Again, I
Speaker 1: guess this is really really closely pulled from Domi She's
Speaker 1: life and Miriam is basically an analog for her best
Speaker 1: friend in Toronto growing up, and they were very close
Speaker 1: and I guess they're still friends, which is really sweet.
Speaker 1: And I liked that it's like they are so close
Speaker 1: and like when I don't know when you're thirteen. Those
Speaker 1: are like the people that, besides random boys you don't
Speaker 1: actually know, the only people you think about. Like I
Speaker 1: just I liked their closeness. I wish that you got
Speaker 1: a little more of Priya and Abby because it did
Speaker 1: sort of become like the Miriam Show in terms of
Speaker 1: like friends stuff. I wish that they had more moments. Yes,
Speaker 1: I agree, especially because I think specific being around. I
Speaker 1: love that she had like a core group that had
Speaker 1: a bunch of Asian friends in it. I think that rules.
Speaker 1: That was what my friend group felt like too. It
Speaker 1: was funny too because I think Abby is Jewish and
Speaker 1: it was like all of my white friends were Jewish
Speaker 1: and then all of my other friends were Asian. Oh
Speaker 1: I thought Abby, Abby is Korean? Who Who's Miriam? Yes,
Speaker 1: I should have said Plaid, Sorry, but I just love
Speaker 1: I love that dynamic. But I felt like one of
Speaker 1: my best friends growing up with Chinese American and we
Speaker 1: could just talk for just forever about like my parents
Speaker 1: doing this that's really similar to something might like. It
Speaker 1: made me feel normal. I don't know what I would
Speaker 1: have done without that experience, and I feel like that
Speaker 1: is the benefit of having that that story wise, not
Speaker 1: even just from the director's life, like that core group
Speaker 1: is just like do you experience like how can we
Speaker 1: talk to each other and make each other feel more
Speaker 1: safe and normal? So I'm with you there. It would
Speaker 1: have been cooler to see like more conversations like that
Speaker 1: because I feel like they don't really they happen a
Speaker 1: little bit of like my mom doesn't get me, but
Speaker 1: it's mostly it's mostly for town in Panda. It would
Speaker 1: be cool if they were talking to me about their
Speaker 1: own parents. I think there would have been room two
Speaker 1: to even if it was briefly just to like check
Speaker 1: in with each of May's friends families and like just
Speaker 1: to kind of see, yeah, what their families are like
Speaker 1: and what their home life is like. But um, yeah,
Speaker 1: I we we've talked before about because we've covered a
Speaker 1: number of coming of age stories on the show, but
Speaker 1: it's a genre that is so white historically and really
Speaker 1: like upper class to others. It's like, what's this movie
Speaker 1: does do? It's like fancy house party for thirteen year
Speaker 1: old and yeah, sure, sure it happened, But yet to
Speaker 1: have a coming of age story that focuses on character
Speaker 1: of color. Most of her friends are of color, and
Speaker 1: the movie doesn't center whiteness. Said all is really I
Speaker 1: mean shouldn't be remarkable, that should just be a thing
Speaker 1: that already exists. But as we've said, there is uh
Speaker 1: severe lack. I mean, this is the first Pixar feature
Speaker 1: film directed by an Asian woman, and the only Pixar
Speaker 1: movie directed by one woman at all. I think that
Speaker 1: there's been like a woman who co directed, but never
Speaker 1: like because the director of Brave she got like fucked over.
Speaker 1: Yeah she got ye, but I don't remember if she
Speaker 1: ended up with soul director credit or not, or maybe
Speaker 1: it was okay, yeah, no dummy. She is the first
Speaker 1: in many categories. And also there's like a majority, um,
Speaker 1: most of the people working in high positions on this
Speaker 1: show are on this movie are also women. She co
Speaker 1: wrote with Julia Cho who is a famous playwright. Um,
Speaker 1: so they We're Together is produced by women. There was
Speaker 1: like the if you're interested in learning more, it's all
Speaker 1: covered in that forty five minute documentary that happens. If
Speaker 1: you watch all of the credits of Turning Red, it
Speaker 1: just starts, um, but it it covers like all of
Speaker 1: these like women in high positions making this movie during COVID.
Speaker 1: Some of them are like trying to raise young children.
Speaker 1: They're talking about like how it's been This is like
Speaker 1: a really unique project in animation to have so many
Speaker 1: women at the top of a project. And I know
Speaker 1: everything Disney makes is essentially propaganda, but this felt like
Speaker 1: propaganda that I liked propaganda. Yeah, it was making me smile,
Speaker 1: and so it was. Yeah, It's like it's it's a
Speaker 1: rarity on so many fronts because Picks, I feel like Pixar,
Speaker 1: there have been like public scandals that have to do
Speaker 1: with like how few women or people color or a
Speaker 1: Pixar and it's like caused huge issues in the past.
Speaker 1: So totally it seems like Toomi, she is like the
Speaker 1: new wave and I thought it was cool that her.
Speaker 1: She says in the documentary that her mentor is my
Speaker 1: favorite Picks are director Pete Doctor who did Monsters Incorporated.
Speaker 1: So he's been her mentor for a long time and
Speaker 1: she like pitched him the idea and she tells this
Speaker 1: anecdote that's really cool where she was like, I don't know,
Speaker 1: should it be less culturally specific or like, are they
Speaker 1: less likely to choose this idea to be turned into
Speaker 1: a feature if it's culturally specific, and he I guess
Speaker 1: he was like, nope, double down and cool she did
Speaker 1: and the movie got So that's awesome. Who love it? Um?
Speaker 1: Does anyone else have anything they want to talk about? No?
Speaker 1: I just can't believe that growstall the moon literally the
Speaker 1: day after and it's not addressed. That's the ship that
Speaker 1: they didn't want to put in the documentary. They're like,
Speaker 1: it's too dangerous. The whole grow situation, the whole weird
Speaker 1: how that was kind of left out? Okay, because I
Speaker 1: heard that Steve Carrell was having public tantrums about the
Speaker 1: whole situation, could not let it go. Kevin wouldn't leave
Speaker 1: his trailerk Kevin's was being a complete diva about it.
Speaker 1: He was like, just pushed the date by a week
Speaker 1: and they said, no, oh my god, Kevin Kevin culture wild. Um,
Speaker 1: So yeah, I think. I mean that's about all I
Speaker 1: have to Oh the last thing that was just very
Speaker 1: two thousand two specific. Also, this made me laugh where
Speaker 1: there are so many things about this movie that are
Speaker 1: a first for Disney Pixar, but there were a few
Speaker 1: random internet articles that were like the first Disney movie
Speaker 1: to take blaze in Canada, and you're like, all right,
Speaker 1: like that's whore. That is cool, and it feels like
Speaker 1: when people are like Trailblazer Jill Biden is the first
Speaker 1: Italian American first lady, and you're kind of like great,
Speaker 1: I get like that's awesome. I actually do think it's
Speaker 1: cool because, like I mean, all of Hollywood and like
Speaker 1: Disney Media is is like very America centric, So I'm like,
Speaker 1: what about our friendly neighbors to the north. The denizens
Speaker 1: of Toronto were thrilled, and I guess that they really
Speaker 1: like nailed it in terms of like I guess, even
Speaker 1: the name of the stadium they perform att used to
Speaker 1: have a different name, and they did it correctly and
Speaker 1: it was all nice. In conclusion, the best thing that
Speaker 1: happens in this movie is may making a power point
Speaker 1: presentation to get what she wants. Um I have done that.
Speaker 1: I did that because I wanted to do something abroad
Speaker 1: and my dad said no. The answer to the power
Speaker 1: point I've It's never been yes, You've always I don't
Speaker 1: know what what happens in your brain. That's like this
Speaker 1: will show them I'm a professional. It's like, actually, you
Speaker 1: just proved to your parents you're a fucking wheenie. So
Speaker 1: that's all that happens. You just did homework for free
Speaker 1: and for work, just like you do at school, like
Speaker 1: a chump, and then like we should walk out today. Well, um,
Speaker 1: as far as the Bechtel test goes, this movie passes
Speaker 1: very very handily. Yeah, no question about it. Between a
Speaker 1: number of different combinations of characters. Yeah, it's kind of
Speaker 1: an easy one. We don't need to break it down.
Speaker 1: It happens between almost Men don't play a big role
Speaker 1: in this movie really, except for the I do think
Speaker 1: for some reason, four Time passes the Bechtel test for
Speaker 1: me personally. I think because they're talking about us, like
Speaker 1: they're talking about like them, like girls, and you know
Speaker 1: they're they're they're passing it for us, and I think
Speaker 1: that's nice. Absolutely. I agree. Yeah, so let's do the
Speaker 1: nipple scale. Nipple scales zero to five nipples based on
Speaker 1: how the movie fares when examining it through an intersectional faminess.
Speaker 1: Lens enjoyed watching rica s face onine. We said the
Speaker 1: Nile nipple scale. I was like, oh, I'm sorry, do
Speaker 1: you have questions? Pretty self explained? I think I first
Speaker 1: thought it might be like a pie chart of like
Speaker 1: one nipple and like how much of the nipple you
Speaker 1: feel it? I mean, you can interpret it that way
Speaker 1: if you want to. The nipple scale is quite fluid.
Speaker 1: For me, I would give Turning red. I would give
Speaker 1: it for half or maybe even maybe. I just need
Speaker 1: to talk through this. I think all my grapes with
Speaker 1: the movie are just kind of like a little tiny
Speaker 1: plotty things that I had questions about. But as far
Speaker 1: as like what we analyze on the show, I don't
Speaker 1: really have any complaints. I like the hell, that's how
Speaker 1: I have to frame it too, because there I love complaining.
Speaker 1: Then give it a five already. I think it's a
Speaker 1: five nipples. Yeah, five nipples, no reason not to. I'll
Speaker 1: give one to May one two Ming, who's voiced by Sandro.
Speaker 1: I don't think we mentioned that, So I shout out
Speaker 1: Chinese Canadian legend, and then I'll split the other three.
Speaker 1: I'll give one to each of May's friends. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: do five to I. I like with the like astrosk
Speaker 1: of like I understand the criticism around the Tiger Mom trope,
Speaker 1: but because it's like this is Domy, She's story, and
Speaker 1: she's been pretty explicit about it, and so like with
Speaker 1: that in mind, it's like I think that that the
Speaker 1: takeaway from that is like you just need more movies
Speaker 1: about Chinese, American, Chinese, Canadian, etcetera families Like that is
Speaker 1: the thing. Totally. Yeah, I love this movie so much.
Speaker 1: Um I am now DOMI she stand and I'm going
Speaker 1: to give it five nipples kind of that's just the beginning, middle,
Speaker 1: and end. I would say it would have been cool
Speaker 1: like in this movie too. It was like, I don't know,
Speaker 1: I don't want to say that, like boy bands are
Speaker 1: a hetero construction. They're not, but it would have been
Speaker 1: cool to like see you know, like preteen queerness. Like
Speaker 1: I think that that would have been Yeah, there was
Speaker 1: room for it. Maybe there's the quietest suggestion because Tyler
Speaker 1: is also at the concert. The quietest suggestion because we
Speaker 1: don't that doesn't mean anything whatever. But I also wondered
Speaker 1: if there's a moment at the party where Miriam and
Speaker 1: there's like a kind of goth emo girl they have
Speaker 1: a kind of that it was pri and the goth girl.
Speaker 1: Oh sorry what did I say? You said? Miriam? Oh,
Speaker 1: I think it's Pa and the goth girl were dancing,
Speaker 1: and then the other three girls were like whoo, like, oh,
Speaker 1: I didn't even Okay, that didn't I didn't notice that
Speaker 1: I was talking about. I think there's a moment where
Speaker 1: they're doing like charades, and then one of them is like,
Speaker 1: I'm thinking of a different moment at the party. There's
Speaker 1: a charades moment and that actually might be pre two
Speaker 1: now I don't totally remember, but it's one of the
Speaker 1: friends and then like the goths girl who like have
Speaker 1: a little like moment. Yeah, I noticed that too, So
Speaker 1: maybe that's a suggestion, but it could be certainly more overt.
Speaker 1: That's such a Disney move of like Josh Gad touches
Speaker 1: another man's hand and homophobia is solved. You're like, give
Speaker 1: it a rest. Anyways, that said, like, that's like a
Speaker 1: very very small gripe for a movie that is so
Speaker 1: fucking great. So I'm gonna give it five nipples, give
Speaker 1: one to May, three to the friends, and I'm going
Speaker 1: to give the last one to Dad's cooking. Yeah, rka,
Speaker 1: how about you. I will give just as someone who
Speaker 1: hasn't given nipples before. I'll see Moore and a half
Speaker 1: because I think everything you said was true. It like
Speaker 1: really takes a lot of boxes without even having to
Speaker 1: think about it. You're not scrounging your memory to remember
Speaker 1: how it satisfies. Like two people from a marginalized gender
Speaker 1: talking to each other. It happens the entire fucking movie. Um,
Speaker 1: and I think that's really exciting and cool. And if
Speaker 1: I have to give my nipples out, if I don't
Speaker 1: get to keep poured them, um, I mean that's also
Speaker 1: on the table. No, I should be generous. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: give Okay, I'll give to to May because I think
Speaker 1: she earned it. I think she did a lot of work. Um,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna give one Toming because she's done a lot
Speaker 1: of work too. I'm gonna give one to the friends,
Speaker 1: and one and a half to the aunties and the grandma.
Speaker 1: Hell yeah, oh yeah, we did sleep on. Look, the
Speaker 1: elder generations need nipples as well. That's what I was saying.
Speaker 1: It's true, It's true. Well, thank you so much for
Speaker 1: coming on this show again. Thank you for bringing us
Speaker 1: this movie today. Thank you, thank you guys for having me.
Speaker 1: What a blast. Oh my gosh, where can people check
Speaker 1: out your stuff? Follow you online? Plug away on Twitter.
Speaker 1: I'm at ka l Shankar so R e k h
Speaker 1: A L s h A n k A R And
Speaker 1: on Instagram, I'm at RecA Underscore s R e k
Speaker 1: J Underscore s and you know, hire me watch Grand
Speaker 1: Crew on Hulu Anemaniacs next year. I was like when
Speaker 1: to say, I was, okay, Yes, what a treat. Animation rocks.
Speaker 1: It's great. We love innovation and you can follow us
Speaker 1: on Twitter and Instagram. At betel Cast. You can subscribe
Speaker 1: to our Matreon at patreon dot com slash backtel Cast,
Speaker 1: where you get two bonus episodes every month, plus access
Speaker 1: to the entire back catalog of bonuses, which is now
Speaker 1: over one hundred. So if you're running out of main
Speaker 1: feed episode, scoot on over to the Matreon and there's
Speaker 1: a lot more. And if you're compelled by the whole
Speaker 1: groove situation, it's Minions March on the Matreon this July.
Speaker 1: And so we did cover Despicable Me, where this revelation
Speaker 1: originally came to pass, amongst other things. So head over
Speaker 1: there you don't want to miss good for you, yea.
Speaker 1: You can also get our merch at public dot com
Speaker 1: slash the Bechtel cast Um. All right, shall we how
Speaker 1: do we close this episode? Go to the I have
Speaker 1: to go to the Four Town Reunion concert in Vegas,
Speaker 1: and oh my god, wait, one of the members of
Speaker 1: four Town isn't Q and on Now that was my
Speaker 1: Backstreet Foe experience. But Brian, Brian, Oh no, he was,
Speaker 1: Brian was Brian and Nick were my boys. And then
Speaker 1: Nick's a creep and then Brian's Q. He was on parlor.
Speaker 1: We should have we should have gone with a J.
Speaker 1: We see, we should have known. AJ has been through
Speaker 1: some stuff and came at the other end. He is strong. Well,
Speaker 1: Kevin has always been a father to the whole group.
Speaker 1: How is my problem with him? Originally he's a father
Speaker 1: to the whole group, I know. But also it's fun
Speaker 1: to reflect on because I'm like, I really thought Kevin
Speaker 1: was a senior citizen because he was twenty six years old. Yeah, absolutely,
Speaker 1: all right, Four Time Reunion Company. Okay, well, yeah, let's
Speaker 1: let's go to the concert. Bye bye,