0:00

Welcome to Movie Crush, a production of I

0:02

Heart Radio. Hey

0:29

Everybody, and welcome to Movie Crush Friday

0:32

Interview Edition. The last

0:34

one, Oh everybody.

0:37

It makes me so sad. This will be the last

0:39

regular weekly Friday

0:41

Interview a dish for Movie Crush.

0:44

I do already have a guest lined up for August,

0:47

and maybe I'll try and put out like one a month or something,

0:49

but this is going to be the last one, and we are going to

0:51

finish like we started

0:54

with my friend, the great Janet Barney. She's

0:57

wonderful, she's funny, she's

0:59

kind, and she is supportive,

1:02

and she is encouraging, and she's

1:05

super talented and she's just the best. And

1:07

so Janet agreed to come back to kind

1:09

of book in Movie Crush and

1:12

talk about Spirited Away. We

1:14

uh, we get into some anime talk here. It's all

1:16

new to me, but it's something that Janet

1:19

knows quite a bit more than I

1:21

do about um because

1:24

she voiced Cora, and

1:26

uh, any fans of Cora know that that's

1:28

that's Janet's voice there. So we

1:31

talked about that a little bit. We talked about her new

1:33

podcast project where she talks anime

1:36

and Cora and among other things.

1:38

And we talked about Spirited Away, and it was a great

1:40

talk with my old friend. And

1:43

we also talk a little bit about the show ending. It's

1:45

a very better, sweet episode you guys, So I hope

1:47

you enjoy it. So here we go with Janet Barney

1:50

on Spirited Away.

1:55

How are you I? I'm doing all

1:57

right. I'm doing all right. I feel like my voice

2:00

has gotten less shrill when I answer that question,

2:02

which is a good sign, you know, like the higher.

2:04

I don't know if that's true for you or other people,

2:07

you know, but I do feel like, Yeah,

2:10

the more the more people like how are you doing, You're like,

2:12

I mean that pretty good. I feel like that's

2:14

a dead a dead

2:16

give away. Unfortunately, I always I also

2:19

use that voice comedically, so

2:22

maybe it's a little confusing, but usually

2:24

when someone sincerely asked me how I am, if

2:26

i'm if I'm up in that register, I'm

2:28

hiding a lot. There's a lot of deep

2:31

pain that has pushed

2:33

it's it's put the pain has pushed so high

2:35

up in my body that my vocal

2:37

cords have been condensed,

2:40

just a tiny whistle of a noise. Yeah,

2:42

how about you, I'm oh

2:45

ship, we are in trouble. This

2:48

is going to be a rough ride. Uh,

2:51

you look great. I like your pink hair. Thank

2:53

you, I um good. Thanks.

2:55

I really like it. And I feel like people are nicer

2:58

to me when I have pink hair. And I don't feel like people are

3:00

not nice to me. In general, they

3:02

are all people are nice. But there's

3:04

something about my

3:06

experience of having pink hair is that when people

3:09

see you from Afar, they've already

3:11

decided that you're fun, right,

3:16

maybe that you have a little bit of a like

3:18

it's a little punk rock. But it's like also

3:21

when you see what I wear, it's like I'm wearing

3:23

a child's T shirt basically. So it's not like I'm

3:25

like, I don't have like a you know what I mean. I don't

3:27

have like I wish I had a sleeve. I would be

3:30

so cool if I had a tattoo sleeve. But so

3:32

when you put all those things together, I feel like

3:35

initial, just any initial meeting

3:37

with people, I feel that the niceness

3:39

and familiarity level is it

3:42

has is vastly improved from what I just

3:44

have, like blond hair or whatever. I

3:47

only wish now that you had duped

3:49

to me with fake tattoo sleeves

3:52

cool because I would be and you were just like

3:54

cool about it or whatever, because I

3:56

I would swear to God, I would sit here and the

3:58

first thing that I would think is have

4:01

I ever seen Janet's arms? I

4:03

feel like I've seen her arms before? Why that

4:08

would be? I mean, there's a there's

4:10

a I really understand the level of

4:14

like when you start realizing

4:16

that you're getting so old that

4:18

you don't really want to maintain

4:20

yourself in a certain way for acting

4:23

jobs like that is you

4:26

know, there's there really starts to be the sense of

4:28

like I just you

4:30

know, I just don't care. I like

4:32

I don't care and they'll

4:34

have to work around it or whatever. Um.

4:37

And there's something very liberating about that. But it's

4:39

also like, or is that just you're you're

4:41

accepting that you're going to go into your retirement from

4:43

that business because you

4:46

know, I don't know that all of a sudden people are going to turn around

4:48

be like you know what, I love your sleeve.

4:51

Yeah, we're gonna start giving you sleeve roles.

4:54

I just turned fifty a couple

4:56

of months ago, Janet, so I know that's

4:59

a big one. Every birthday,

5:01

I said, every birthday. Day of I don't let

5:04

let the record show. I said it day

5:07

of you did. I

5:09

was just recording with John Hodgman, actually

5:11

literally eighty seconds before you

5:13

jumped on, and he said,

5:16

uh, he was talking about you with someone

5:18

else, about something like

5:20

a role, and he said, well, why

5:22

not, Janet? And then he said

5:24

he realized that's a great sitcom

5:27

starring you, called why

5:29

not Janet? And he said it's up

5:31

to you, now, me to go pitch this

5:33

to you, come up with a premise, and

5:36

then that's the show. It

5:39

feels like I wish that One Division

5:41

hadn't all due respect to one Division, which

5:43

I wasn't maybe not a huge fan of, but

5:46

but they worked real hard on it, and there was a lot about

5:48

it that I appreciated. Um, but

5:51

that had they not just recently

5:53

revisited the sort of old timey

5:56

sitcom, I would say, why not Janet?

5:58

Definitely seems like it was you out

6:00

competing And I use that term loosely because

6:02

no one had ever heard of it. But it was competing against

6:05

Mary Tyler Moore, you know, but

6:07

no one was watching it because Mary Tyler War was a

6:09

great show. I

6:12

guess the premise would be someone like

6:14

the character Janet, would be someone who

6:17

was a jack of all trades and kind of like

6:19

pretty good at everything. So

6:21

anytime something comes up, they go, why

6:23

not Janet? Sometimes

6:26

insulted? Wait,

6:32

I don't have to think about this that hard. I fully

6:34

know what it's insulting. It's a TV show,

6:36

it's fiction. This is all well and good.

6:38

I need to go because I gotta call Hodgman and find

6:40

out if I have a chance or whatever this thing is. I

6:43

gotta get and if a sleeve is going to be a

6:45

problem because I have a lot of work. I gotta

6:47

get downe in my arm with so in your mind, the rewrite

6:50

is the show is called of course it's

6:52

Janet. Yeah,

6:55

where it's got to be Janet? Yeah, gotta

6:57

be imperially Janet. PERI

7:03

that sounds like a little indie movie. Here's

7:05

the thing, why not Janet? Sure, that's fine, maybe

7:07

that's season one, But how do you keep refresh?

7:10

Throw a comma in there? Why not Janet?

7:13

And that's what the next season is about her taking

7:15

chances that she wouldn't

7:17

ordinarily take, living a little, living

7:19

a little larger, you know what I mean, take a chance, why

7:21

not Janet? And

7:24

then it could just be why

7:27

question mark and then not Janet

7:29

exclamation. I

7:32

don't even know what that means. I'm

7:35

just going to move the comma again and say

7:38

why not Janet? But

7:40

then that doesn't really that's that's

7:43

about that. That years was better. I mean it was terrible,

7:45

but it was still better than why comma not

7:47

Janet? Janet? That I

7:50

think this is all about beating the dead

7:52

horse anyway, and we've done that. What is

7:54

that background you've got there? Is that real? Or is that?

7:56

No? This is ah, this is just a

8:00

a tapestry. I mean, yes, I realized that

8:02

you're saying are You're not saying are you in the mountains?

8:04

Are you in the mountains? I wondered

8:06

if it was a screen. It's not a blue screen,

8:08

it is. That's

8:10

nice. Yeah, I got a bunch of these Society

8:13

six. It's just a place

8:15

where you can get various and sundry

8:17

goods that are being produced.

8:20

As you know, pillows, artworks,

8:23

floor mats, and tapestry

8:25

is among the options. Do a little landscape

8:27

photography filter and

8:30

I now have a

8:32

curtain next to the One

8:35

of these is hung next to our bed that's like a

8:37

desert, you know, Sonoran dessert looks like

8:39

my where I'm from, Tucson, Um, you know, storm

8:42

clouds, arrows, very

8:44

pleasant. It turned out to be a real

8:47

like everything I've done, I think during the pandemic,

8:49

and also every dream I've had during

8:51

the pandemic has been like transparently

8:54

like textbook embarrassingly

8:57

a two B do you know what I mean? Like, oh, how to

8:59

dream? The I was telling my therapist I had a dream

9:01

about I think I'm having some like you

9:04

know, like reintegration,

9:06

anxiety, reopening, all that. And

9:09

and then on a separate subject

9:12

later in therapy, I was complaining about

9:14

a disturbing dream I had had and

9:16

as I was saying and then all of

9:19

a sudden, I was in like it was almost like a fabric

9:21

womb, and I was like trying to get out

9:23

of the whole. She was like, oh, gee, I wonder I

9:26

want very direct short line

9:28

we could draw to another part of the conversation.

9:30

We found I was like, God, damn it. Everything I

9:32

do is like just teach it in the pre

9:35

count Yeah whatever. Yeah, it's so

9:37

that's having having like

9:40

fabric tapestries that represent

9:43

places I'm not traveling during the

9:45

pandemic. It's just so like, yeah,

9:47

okay, sure, super creative, Dan

9:49

a great job. Those are kind of fun though. I've had

9:51

those dreams. I had one when I

9:54

moved to New Jersey from college. And I

9:56

moved because my roommate

9:58

in college, his parents were

10:00

these, you know, I had, like corporate

10:02

CEO types that had this big house in

10:04

New Jersey and they were getting transferred to Australia,

10:07

and they said, why don't you come up here and live for a few

10:09

years rent free, And so I followed him up

10:11

there. But there was also, uh,

10:14

I hate to say this, it was a girl I was trying to get away

10:16

from in college

10:19

that was It wasn't like stalker

10:21

territory, but it was just it's gotten a little weird.

10:24

And so I was like, perfect time to move to New Jersey.

10:27

So I moved to New Jersey and literally

10:30

the maybe the first night or

10:32

two that I was there, I had this dream

10:34

that there was a bear that like came

10:36

out of the woods and in a dress and

10:39

was and beat down the door of the house

10:42

and was and was chasing me around the house

10:44

to kill me. And I woke up and I

10:46

was like, I wonder who the bear was. That's

10:51

amazing and it does not help that

10:53

her name was Stephanie Grizzle, right, she

10:57

did it so easy. It's

11:02

uh so, I want to talk a little bit about

11:05

the new project that you've been working on because

11:07

it kind of takes us into the movie that we'll discuss.

11:10

Sure, uh, I want to hear all about

11:12

it. Well, So it

11:14

is a I always feel

11:16

like hesitant to say it's a rewatch podcast

11:19

because that's kind of not really

11:21

how I pitched it to Nickelodeon, But certainly

11:24

that is something that Dante Bosco and I are

11:26

doing together, which is, you know, we're not It's not

11:28

like a watch along where you know you have

11:31

to do you have to synchronize it and listen,

11:33

which I guess there are some that do that, but

11:35

you know, it's it's you know, we talk about everything that's

11:37

happening in each episode of Avatar

11:39

the Last Airbender to start. But

11:42

Nickelodeon's intention is for us to do that

11:44

with you know, all three seasons of Avatar

11:46

and then all four seasons of Cora and then sort

11:48

of if if we can and

11:50

if it's doing well enough, like to just

11:53

sort of always be doing this because there

11:55

are all these you know, Avatar books

11:57

and comics and um at

12:00

Our studios which Mike DiMartino

12:02

and Brian knets Go have founded,

12:05

and it's living under the umbrella of Nickelodeon

12:07

where they get to sort of make a jillian projects

12:09

over the next like series. I think it's like twenty

12:12

years um, as they kind of grow

12:14

out this universe. Um.

12:16

You know I I I'm such a fan

12:19

of them and would be a fan if I had

12:21

nothing to do with the shows, So having any

12:23

kind of credibility at all to

12:26

talk about doing the show with Nickelodeon and have them

12:28

get excited about it. And then we brought Dante on who

12:30

plays Prince Zuko in Avatar

12:32

the Last Airbender and general I wrote

12:35

in the Legend of Cora um

12:37

and as a friend of mine who have done many cons

12:39

with and really love

12:41

being with. And we're very very different. Um.

12:45

It's it's a great dynamic and it's been so

12:47

fun. We've recorded. Must say, we've probably

12:49

recorded like sixteen episodes, but we've only we've

12:52

just now launched last week and have

12:54

released three. So um,

12:57

it's that space of like, well I hope

12:59

he but like what we've done, because we've already done

13:02

all of those and we're not going to go

13:04

back and change them. So I was

13:07

so good. Let's back up a

13:09

little bit, like where, uh

13:12

where did you? Where were you situated

13:14

when it comes to these original

13:17

uh The Last Airbender and stuff like that, Like

13:19

were you a big fan? Was this something you had always

13:21

been into? And it's like that was at

13:23

the seed of it all. Yeah. Well, so when

13:25

I auditioned for the Legend of Cora, I

13:28

was a fan of The Last Airbender.

13:30

I was a fan of Avatar,

13:33

but was a recent fan

13:35

of it. I came to it as a an adult

13:38

um just through so many friends

13:40

of mine who were like, you have to watch our show, and then

13:43

I as as I was watching it, this audition

13:45

came through for the sequel series, and

13:47

I was so freaked out that

13:49

I tried to emotionally separate myself from

13:51

it. I actually had the thought like, oh, I wish I didn't know

13:54

how great this is, because I know

13:56

how great this second series is probably going

13:58

to be, and I stopped.

14:01

I sort of put a I

14:03

put the kai bosh on watching it until

14:06

I was fairly confident that I had

14:08

not gotten a part on the Legend

14:10

of Cora because it takes so long to

14:12

find out for some animation

14:14

projects. UM, I'm not sure why,

14:16

but for some reason, the casting process for

14:18

animation just tends to be

14:21

much more. It's like luxuriously

14:23

long. I

14:26

mean, I want to say and I'll have to ask,

14:29

uh, I'll have to ask. I mean, the guys won't

14:31

remember. But maybe like the Glodeon casting will,

14:33

I feel like months and months passed.

14:36

I mean I really felt like. I feel like it

14:38

was a long period of time from when I did the very

14:40

first audition to when I remember

14:42

when I got a call back I said

14:44

the words like, oh, that's not cast yet,

14:47

and then from that to like a chemistry

14:49

test again, I was like, wait a minute,

14:51

I have long since thought this job

14:53

was went to someone else, and then and

14:56

so so that, and whereas with casting

14:59

in live action, for the most part, you

15:01

know, it's like we're shooting next week. There's

15:03

a lot of kind of like this is and this is

15:05

the last piece is finding this

15:07

person and then we immediately start shooting. UH

15:10

and so UM I had returned

15:12

to UH to the last Airbender,

15:14

and then I found out I got the job. Um,

15:17

and just lost my mind. Yeah, completely

15:19

lost my mind. And it was immediately terrified, as

15:21

we've been trained to be in Hollywood, and

15:24

uh, like, how can this go wrong? When

15:26

will I be fired? This is too good to be true, all of

15:28

that kind of stuff. And so

15:32

I absolutely love it and it

15:34

has been it's just been a great opportunity

15:37

when it dropped on Netflix, and

15:40

both shows dropped last summer during the pandemic

15:43

on Netflix, and immediately just we're at

15:45

the top of Netflix UM

15:47

chart. I don't even know what that means, but yeah,

15:50

uh they were. They were just sort of consistently

15:52

like, oh, this is you know, in in all over

15:54

the world on

15:56

Netflix, these two shows were

15:58

yeah and and um

16:01

And so I thought, because I had talked about

16:03

doing something like this, because I do have

16:06

a lot of experience in podcasting, um,

16:08

having done the j V Club for nine

16:11

years, over nine years and uh

16:14

and I thank you. That's the first

16:16

time a smattering of applause has really

16:18

felt fantastic. Uh

16:20

and uh And you know,

16:23

I that was a real situation where

16:25

a few years ago I thought, Wow, if I could combine

16:29

those two things and get to do

16:31

something kind of meta about

16:33

these shows, I would love that and

16:36

I had mentioned it to Mike and Brian, but they were sort

16:38

of off starting the Netflix live

16:40

action thing. Um, and

16:43

that was sort of it was like nebulous

16:45

because it was like, well, yes, they have a relationship

16:47

to Nickelodeon, but now they're working on this other thing, and Nickelodeon

16:50

hadn't licensed. Like it's just all that sort

16:52

of where does this belong kind

16:54

of conversation and but when it

16:57

when it landed on Netflix, I was like, I

17:00

gotta I'm gonna have to try and pursue

17:02

this again. And so I did reach

17:04

out this time to Nickelodeon, and um,

17:07

the timing was was right for

17:09

them as well, and they were like, yeah, we want

17:11

to, We absolutely want to do this. We want to we're building

17:13

you know, out our podcasting world

17:17

and um. And so I've been working on it

17:19

for a really really long time.

17:21

It's been you know, like almost a

17:23

year, and it's

17:26

it's just been amazing. It's been amazing. It's

17:29

it's just a show that both shows are you

17:33

know, they just there's just nothing about it that

17:35

feels like limited or

17:38

you know, I mean, yeah, like there's this there's

17:40

also a SpongeBob SquarePants uh. Podcast.

17:43

I love everyone who did SpongeBob

17:46

I as people. I love the host,

17:49

um, I love Nickelodeon. They are

17:51

treasure to work with, at least in my personal experience.

17:53

I don't know how I would do a podcast about

17:56

SpongeBob, Like, I'm not sure what

17:58

I would and I'm sure tone only they're

18:00

very different. But with Avatar Lost

18:02

Airbender, we're talking about you know,

18:04

we're laughing and talking about like the silly

18:07

childlike adorable stuff.

18:09

We're talking about the quality of animation,

18:11

but we're also talking about you know, genocide

18:15

and you know children having

18:17

more responsibility than they're ready for,

18:19

and you know parental

18:22

frankly abuse and you know, it's

18:25

just it's very very dense. There's a

18:27

lot of layers to it. And so it's

18:29

just not something I've ever gotten

18:31

tired of watching or thinking

18:33

about. And um, and that's born

18:35

out in in doing the podcast. It's

18:38

a blast, that's awesome. So this

18:40

all makes sense to me now. I purposely didn't

18:42

like look into a bunch of stuff.

18:44

I know you've been posting a lot of stuff on

18:46

your social meds, uh, And I

18:48

was like, purposely like, I don't want to know what's going on, because

18:50

I just want to talk to Janet about it in person. Uh,

18:53

So I get it now, is it? Are you going episode

18:55

by episode? Is it one of those? We are?

18:58

But there's I mean, for example, there's

19:00

at least forty episodes to the first

19:02

season of our podcast, and there are only

19:04

twenties episodes of the first season

19:06

of The Last Airbender. So the three

19:08

episodes we've released so far, we started,

19:11

yes with the very first episode, which

19:13

is called The Boy in the Iceberg. We started with episode one,

19:16

uh, and we recap that. We also talked about

19:18

kind of what we were, what our own experiences,

19:20

we're working on the shows, and what to expect from the podcast.

19:22

But then the very next one is a is a sort

19:25

of deep dive conversation with Mike

19:27

and Brian who created the show, UM

19:29

talking to them about the mythology,

19:31

about their relationship, how they met at risdy

19:34

UM. And then that conversation

19:36

went on so long that it's a two parter, so

19:39

that just got released. And then the next episode

19:41

that's coming out next Tuesday is episode

19:43

is Us recapping Episode two, And then we

19:45

have episodes where we're just hanging with cast

19:48

members UM and in reviewing

19:50

them and talking about stuff we're talking to, um,

19:53

you know, like let's talk

19:55

about the martial arts techniques, let's talk about

19:57

this South Korean animation with

20:00

an animator, let's talk about the

20:02

music composition. Because the fan

20:04

base, my experience

20:06

with them has always been that they have a really really

20:09

uh deep interest in appreciation for

20:11

the craft of the making of the show.

20:14

Um opposed to maybe you know, I'm

20:16

sure there are some fandoms that are more about

20:18

like, you know, this funny

20:21

thing happens on the show, or I want it. Yeah,

20:23

that's right, that's right. Uh

20:26

So, so there's that, and again that

20:28

feels unlimited, like we're having a problem

20:31

that we have so many people that we wanted to fit into the

20:33

first season that we're having. We're like, oh no, we're

20:35

not gonna have enough episodes? Can we Maybe we can add

20:37

some more? And then you know, um,

20:40

it's it's great, it's great. It's great

20:42

to nerd out on. That's

20:44

awesome. What about what is it about voice

20:46

work for you? Is it is it your kind of

20:50

I don't want to say favorite kind of work to do? I know,

20:52

you know a lot of actors talk about how

20:54

great it is to just go in there and your sweatpants

20:57

and not have to go through hair and make

21:00

I don't think I've ever in a single recording seen

21:02

anyone in sweatpants. I hate to out

21:04

us all because I've also joked that, but

21:07

I mean, yeah, everyone I

21:09

know, everyone I know looks like they

21:11

mind as well be going to a fancy dinner.

21:16

But is it? Is that true? Though?

21:18

As far as kind of shedding away

21:21

some of the things that you need to do for

21:23

camera, is that a big

21:25

part of it? In a big relief, It is?

21:27

It is. And you know, when I

21:29

started doing it, I think I was less conscious,

21:32

but still a little conscious because I was looking around

21:34

at all of these heroes of mine who have

21:36

been doing it forever. You know, when

21:39

like being friends with someone like Lorraine

21:41

Newman. You know, she does a

21:44

ton of kids voices on cartoons,

21:46

and I feel like

21:49

she's like, you know, put her arm around my

21:51

shoulder and was like, You're going to be grateful

21:53

you have these voice over jobs when you're sixty, you

21:55

know, Like so

21:57

that I think that feels really

21:59

good. That being said, I'm not, you know, a prolific

22:02

voice over actor like someone like her, or like

22:04

someone like you know, Tara Strong or somebody who's

22:06

just it does everything all

22:08

the time, is always working. Um,

22:11

because you know what, I'm a jack of all trades,

22:14

master of none. Why not Janet? Why

22:17

not Janet? She's producing a comedy

22:19

festival. She's she doesn't have time to audition right

22:21

now? Why not Janet? Yeah?

22:24

I just found out about Tara Strong. Whose voice

22:27

did she do? That? I just she

22:29

does a voice on Loki? She does like a

22:33

that's what I had just looked

22:35

up. You're totally right. And then I realized that she's

22:37

you know, and she does a voice in and

22:40

she does a voice and spirited away, So not

22:42

to worry. She does a voice and spirited away.

22:44

Yeah, she's the baby. Oh my god,

22:47

that funny. I'm not ready to talk about that

22:49

yet. Great, Like you

22:51

said that, you really said that in a

22:53

too soon kind of way, like I'm not ready,

22:56

I'm afrad. I'm not ready to talk about that. I'm not emotionally

22:58

ready to talk about that yet. When

23:00

does your podcast? Do you say?

23:02

Just launched the first couple of episodes.

23:05

It launched last Tuesday. Today

23:07

is the whenever we're recording this. I don't

23:09

know if you're I don't know if you want people that's

23:11

going to ruin. The will be a couple of weeks

23:14

old. So mid June we

23:16

launched. We launched the podcast in mid June,

23:18

and uh and we are. We

23:20

dropped every week. The only reason that we have

23:22

three out now is that we did, you know, sort of a bonus

23:25

on our opening week, and did dropped another one on

23:27

Friday. But in general, every

23:29

Tuesday, that's great.

23:31

I bet that's so much fun. I love it. I

23:34

love it, and I'm sure people are gonna

23:36

love it. Super fans from other communities.

23:38

We want to have them come in and talk about what it means

23:40

to them, so you have time

23:42

to become an expert in you

23:45

know, in that world, and then you can come and talk about

23:47

why you like it. I

23:56

mean, I guess we can go ahead and start talking about Spirited

23:58

Away a little bit because I my

24:01

background with anime uh

24:04

is not was not strong at all.

24:06

I didn't ever watch any of it, did never read any

24:08

of the the comics, and

24:11

it's just not something I was ever I

24:13

think maybe I was a little too

24:15

old. Well, but yeah, came

24:18

around. I was going to say that the same

24:20

is true for me in the sense that like, no one

24:23

was telling me about anime being

24:25

I knew it existed because I lived in

24:27

San Francisco and when you go to you

24:29

know, spend time in Japantown, as I did

24:31

because I worked right near there. Um. I

24:33

would always go into these like I'm sure I'm

24:36

gonna butcher this word, but

24:38

kinokunia these the books Japanese

24:40

bookstores, and they have you know, manga,

24:43

and they have like animy that you could

24:45

buy on a DVD. But that

24:47

seemed like something that people who

24:50

knew about it already knew everything about

24:52

it and it belonged to them, and no

24:54

one was saying, like, come over to my house and let's

24:56

watch this show and so and

24:59

and because um,

25:01

because it didn't become as as

25:04

widely available until much

25:06

later. I think you're right. I think

25:08

there are people younger than us who were

25:11

right there for like Crunchy Role, which

25:13

you know is streaming, and like is just all

25:16

kinds of exposure to anime. And then you know,

25:18

I waffle between saying anime and anime,

25:21

um, depending on like how seasoned

25:23

the person as I'm talking to. I feel like I have to say

25:25

it the right way. It's like it's like going in being like I

25:27

would like to order Ashila and totacos

25:30

Um. Which where do I fall on the seasoning

25:32

scale? I mean

25:35

zero, you fall in. Yeah,

25:37

I'm saying it anime for you, and

25:40

then for any listener who

25:42

is seasoned, I am

25:44

also I want to make sure they know it's

25:47

like a secret secret word only

25:50

slightly different. Yeah, because I'm a zero.

25:52

You would say anime and I'm like, what

25:54

do you quote? Brian Can

25:56

Let's go one of the creators of Avatar,

25:59

as he sort of talked about their influence

26:01

and vice versa, he was like, he pointed

26:03

out, he was like, I mean, it's just short for animation,

26:06

like they're they're the same thing. It's

26:08

it's really okay. Um, but

26:10

uh but yeah, So there's tons

26:12

of stuff that I didn't get and that I still

26:14

haven't seen because now the

26:16

library of of options,

26:19

even just on Netflix alone is just

26:22

endless. There are people who only

26:24

watch who are American, who

26:26

only watch anyway.

26:29

Um, and

26:34

when I go to conventions that are that are heavily

26:36

on that side, like rather than on

26:38

the kind of pop culture like oh look, there's an actor from

26:40

Guardians of the Galaxy to like that's

26:43

not Um. I always

26:45

feel like wildly intimidated because there's

26:47

always a ton of costplay that I just don't recognize,

26:49

and I have to be like, tell me,

26:51

tell me what you're dressed as. And you can see the

26:54

look of disappointment cross over their eyes, like, Oh,

26:56

I thought you were cool enough to know what this was, Janet,

26:58

thanks a lot for not knowing. You

27:00

know. Um so, but

27:03

but these are but but these movies

27:05

are are sort of

27:07

the most excess of the they

27:09

to me, they be they were, I think, and and it's true

27:11

for a lot of people. Um

27:14

that's the first exposure to what you

27:17

consider uh, Miyazaki is

27:19

like the first you know, anime.

27:22

I can't I really can't decide it's terrible. I'm say anime.

27:24

I'm gonna say anime. Uh. That that

27:26

that many people ever saw because

27:29

it was you know, Spirit Away in particular, was

27:31

you know, an Academy Award winner, and it was uh

27:33

it did very very well worldwide, and

27:36

and so I think it was kind of a gateway,

27:38

whereas like Avatar, the Last Airbender and Legend

27:40

of Kora are kind of a gateway um

27:43

animation to anime for some

27:45

people. Uh, so so is

27:47

and and for much longer and

27:50

deservedly so is is Miyazaki.

27:53

Yeah. The other thing that happened to was, um,

27:56

you know my adopted daughter Ruby.

27:59

I was gonna say, how are you feeling about her

28:01

being the right age to watch something

28:04

like this or this is? But

28:07

I'll get to that in a second. This is I'm not ready

28:09

to talk about yet. Jane,

28:12

by the way, just fully put her hand in front

28:14

of the camera. Uh

28:17

stop in the name of love fashion. Um.

28:20

So the reason I said my adopted daughter Ruby because

28:23

I'm not like uh Royal Tannenbaum

28:25

and like, that's how we introduced her to people, but

28:28

it's it's purtned into the story. So when we

28:30

adopted her, we went out to um

28:33

to where we adopted her from, and uh,

28:35

there's this process of getting to know birth

28:38

mom, and so we're getting to know

28:40

uh you know, I'm not going to say

28:42

her name just because I want to protect her identity

28:45

and stuff. But we were getting to

28:47

know her. And she's a kid, you know,

28:49

who's who's giving us a child and

28:52

very young and um was

28:54

way way way into anime. It was one

28:56

of her passions and I didn't

28:59

know anything about it, and I'm so you're in a situation

29:01

where you're trying to connect a little bit,

29:03

and because you're also even though they've decided,

29:06

you also always feel like you're sort of auditioning

29:08

to be like, you know, I'm gonna be a good dad and stuff

29:10

like that, and so I was sort

29:13

of not faking

29:15

interests, but like, oh, yeah, that sounds

29:17

so cool, you know, like blah blah blah, tell me about it.

29:19

And through those conversations it

29:22

really became clear what it meant to her, and it

29:24

wasn't just these cartoons that

29:27

she was watching. And I realized

29:29

for the first time speaking to her, how

29:32

much meat on the bone there was, because she was really

29:34

into it and really got into telling me about

29:37

how it's not like what you might think it is. And

29:40

so flash forward to

29:43

a year ago now

29:45

that Ruby is she's almost six and at

29:47

the time like five ish, getting to the point where

29:50

she can watch some of the stuff. I thought, you know what this

29:52

is, I think in a way sort of honoring the

29:55

birth mom to try and turn

29:57

Ruby onto some of this stuff and

30:00

and hopefully they will meet one day and

30:02

they can have, you know, something sort of in common

30:04

like this and so we

30:06

watched uh my neighbor Totorow

30:10

to start her out, and Emily and I and

30:12

Ruby watch it and we were all just like completely

30:15

charmed and entranced by how wonderful

30:18

that movie is. And got

30:20

her a tote robe stuffy a lovey and

30:22

she sleeps with it and it's just it

30:25

was so wonderful. And then moved

30:27

on to Spirited Away, which

30:29

for her age was a little bit more intense.

30:32

It's scary. It is scary,

30:34

isn't it all right? I was going to ask if

30:37

I'm wrong? She was She was fine.

30:39

She's always been able to separate

30:41

fact from fiction. And if she gets a little scared

30:43

and a thing, she'll just like snuggle up a little

30:45

tighter. But she's never it never freaks her out.

30:48

Later, she never has nightmares. He's always

30:50

been able to punch a buy her class. And you got

30:52

to start watching The Last Airbender with her, because

30:54

if she if she was fine with Spirited Away, she's

30:57

going to be totally fine with The Last

30:59

Airbender. And it is so

31:01

adorable. It's just wonderful. And I

31:04

want to watch so I can tell, but you gotta

31:06

watch my order. And Cora is scarier

31:08

so she can age up into Cora. So

31:10

you need to watch Airbender before Cora. I

31:13

mean many people don't know you don't have to watch

31:15

them in that order to get it um

31:17

at all. There are definitely people who watched Cora first

31:19

and then who watched the Last Airbender. I'm sure there are Last

31:21

Airbender fans who are like, I can't believe you just said

31:23

that, Janet. But from Mike and Bryan's own lips,

31:26

absolutely, you can watch one before the other.

31:29

Um. That being said, certainly

31:31

chronologically like the like

31:33

the Last Airbender takes place seventy years before

31:36

the legend of course, so there are absolutely there's

31:38

a value inherent to watching

31:41

The Last Airbender first. And uh,

31:44

it's just it's just better for younger

31:46

kids. I mean, I think it's it's there

31:48

are sometimes there are people who bring up their kids who are

31:50

like four, and they say, she's obsessed with Cora, And

31:52

in my mind, I'm like, I would not

31:54

have been able to handle the legend of four when I was

31:57

four. I mean, I couldn't handle you know, Bambi when

31:59

I was four. So I'm trying to

32:02

handle it out and barely handle

32:04

it now. Yeah, she has a hard time

32:06

with all those Disney movies because she's like, why is always

32:09

someone's always sucking dying in

32:11

these movies? And she should

32:13

not be saying why is someone always fucking dying

32:16

with that much vehemence in public?

32:18

In public, people are going to think that's a little weird.

32:22

I'm trying to watch your core show, though, and you're pushing

32:24

me away from it. I'm pushing away because

32:28

why not, Janet? Because you because

32:30

you will not regret watching the last year of

32:32

wnder first Okay, you won't regret

32:34

it. And it flies by, and there's and it's

32:36

almost sad how fast it flies by, because it's so good.

32:39

I just realized I have my notes on my phone for this, so

32:41

I'm gonna email those while we keep talking for

32:44

Spirited Away. I'm just I'm

32:46

I'm stuck on the idea and how charmed I

32:48

am by the idea of

32:50

you, you know, still feeling like you wanted

32:53

to impress the

32:55

the mother Ruby's mom. I think that's

32:58

so lovely. But I was sort of a man having

33:01

being like, let's talk more bad enemy. Here. Hold

33:03

this baseball? Mit uh, grab

33:06

this tr let me this princes us tr a child

33:08

size Hold on to that for a second, Like,

33:12

how else are you trying to you

33:14

know, what, how do how does one other than

33:16

just to try to telegraph

33:19

as many ways as possible what a great person you are?

33:21

Like, that's that's just that's

33:23

such a specific experience

33:26

that we don't hear about very

33:28

often. You know, the experience

33:30

I mean surely right, there's the experience. I'm not making

33:32

you talk about it, but the experience of

33:34

of your I'm going to be adopting

33:37

your child. Yeah, yeah, it's very

33:39

intense. And here's and here's how I want you to feel

33:41

about that and feel about me is

33:43

very intense. It is very intense.

33:46

Uh, one of these days I'm gonna do

33:48

I don't know if it's would be on stuff

33:50

you should know, because we may do a show on adoption, but

33:52

I'd probably refrain from getting super personal

33:55

there. But at some point I feel

33:57

like I want to like talk about that a lot, like

34:00

to the people on the internet

34:07

personal way I

34:09

do because I have got to share

34:12

it with nameless, faceless strangers.

34:15

Well, for the reason why is not to

34:17

do anything for me. But I think that there's so much

34:21

I think so many people are scared of something like

34:23

adoption because it's super, super

34:26

fucking scary that they might

34:28

shy away from it. And I think, I

34:30

think more people need to tell their story because

34:32

it is fraught with many, many complications,

34:36

but it's it's worth it because you know, and

34:38

I would say, you know, without I'm speaking directly

34:42

out of to quote Ira Glass

34:44

Modern Jackass Magazine, But I

34:46

feel like as people, as

34:49

more and more people of this

34:51

generation of future generations wait to

34:53

have kids, perhaps

34:55

adoption will become even more prolific,

34:58

just because it's just, yeah,

35:00

it's a better choice for all kinds of

35:02

reasons, within the context of like, well,

35:04

I'm forty eight and I've decided that it's really important

35:06

to me to be a mom. You know how what's

35:09

that going to look like? The more that's

35:11

out there supporting that as a viable

35:13

choice, if you know, if that's

35:15

if that's right for somebody, the more the

35:18

better. I mean, yeah, totally, I love

35:20

it. Maybe I'll do that one day, share

35:22

it with the internet. It's

35:26

not even a person. So

35:28

when we had heard a lot about I

35:30

had heard a lot about Spirited Away,

35:32

obviously because it's just such a huge

35:34

movie and a big award winner, and

35:36

what are you drinking? What is that? I'm

35:39

sorry to say, it's a much a it's a ice much

35:41

a latte, that's right, but

35:43

it's also did you say that in a dumb down way?

35:45

For me? How's it really pronounced? Mata?

35:53

Uh? It's a spirited away is something I knew about

35:55

because even though I wasn't a fan. You

35:58

can't be just a fan of movies and watch the Scars

36:00

and stuff like that not know about it. But

36:03

it was always in that category of like, oh, I'm not

36:05

into anime, so I'm not going to watch that like

36:07

a dummy, Like what a closed minded way

36:09

to think. And when we finally watched

36:11

it, I didn't know what to expect because Totoro

36:14

was so just

36:16

such a simple story and so lovely and

36:19

spirited Away was just so

36:21

like druggie

36:24

mind bending and out

36:26

there and grotesque and scary,

36:29

and uh, I was just

36:31

like what the At times I was like, what am I watching?

36:34

Is like it blew me away? Yeah, well that's

36:36

one of the reasons that I am so fascinated

36:38

by it and why I think it's so

36:41

it's so interesting to talk about because this is a

36:44

very very bad comparison. So I should

36:46

probably shouldn't even be doing it. But you

36:48

know how like they are like, this

36:50

is a very bad example, and it's of course I'm like, I'm

36:53

whitewashing everything in americanizing it. But because

36:55

I'm American, bear with me. Radiohead

36:59

is not a band I would have ever thought

37:01

would have become a huge

37:04

band all over the world, because

37:06

you know, Tom York is interested in making more

37:09

like his music was just becoming more and more experimental,

37:11

and the more experimental became and the less

37:14

sort of mass appeal you would think

37:16

it had their star continued to

37:18

rise. And that's not

37:20

always the case. Um,

37:23

because you know, there's all you

37:25

can snob out in pop culture

37:27

and go like, oh the you know, a lot of the time really

37:29

popular stuff is not necessarily great

37:31

because it's been watered down, or it's doesn't

37:33

have as unique voice or whatever. Um.

37:36

And so the fact that something like this

37:39

cross so many cultures

37:41

and and was beloved to

37:43

so many people in so many different age groups and is

37:45

still so strange, I think

37:47

it's really cool and and worth

37:49

noting. You know, I think that's a great

37:52

comparison. Actually, Okay, well that's

37:54

not bad. The

37:57

two white people are great it's

38:01

an Internet first Uh

38:05

yeah, I mean it. I think as Emili

38:07

and I were both watching it. Of course with Ruby, we

38:09

were both a little bit uh

38:12

not thinking I should we turn this off because she was

38:14

really loving it. But I think we were just I

38:17

didn't know it was so kind of

38:20

batshit crazy right

38:23

until we started getting into it. And it's

38:26

one of those that I watched it again, like just finished

38:28

right before I recorded with Hodgment again for the second

38:30

time. And I know it's a movie I'll revisit because

38:32

it's one that I know

38:34

you could probably see twenty times and

38:37

just visually still find new

38:39

things that just blow your mind

38:41

somewhere in the frame. Yeah, absolutely,

38:43

And I will say, I mean that's the

38:46

feeling that I have watching it,

38:48

is it taps so quickly

38:51

into the being

38:53

a kid and feeling out of your

38:55

elements somewhere, even if it's everything

38:58

I say is so American, even if it's them all,

39:01

uh like I keep getting awesome them all,

39:04

but you know, just that feeling of homesickness.

39:07

I mean, I felt it activates my

39:10

feeling of homesickness immediately

39:13

because it's so it is

39:15

so strange, and she's transported

39:17

so quickly and she's

39:19

so adorable, and the sense

39:22

of like loneliness

39:25

of feeling like I don't have

39:27

anything to hang onto, I've got no sort

39:29

of touchstone. I don't know what's happening

39:32

to me. Uh for it doesn't

39:34

pull its punches on that, to be sure.

39:37

And I completely understand why you would be watching with

39:39

Ruby and going like sort of constantly

39:41

just then watching realize you, oh, I'm just watching her.

39:43

I'm not even watching the screen. I just want

39:45

to make sure, however, she's responding

39:48

to this, because I promise you, if

39:50

I was four or five, six seven, possibly,

39:53

there were so many movies that my dad thought

39:55

I was ready for that he would turn have

39:57

to turn off because I would just be sobbing,

40:00

sobbing. And it's

40:02

those freaking mirror neurons, like when

40:05

when a child would be afraid in in

40:07

a in a moment in a movie, or even an adult,

40:09

I would just be racked with like

40:12

fear and sadness and I would have to take a break.

40:14

Would be like, okay, j do you want it now

40:16

here? There's all here are the categories. Do you want

40:18

to stop watching it and never come back

40:20

to it? Do you want to keep watching

40:22

it and power through the international

40:25

breakdown you're having, or do you want to maybe

40:27

we just take a break. Why don't we stop playing it

40:29

and then we'll come back to it. I had to do that with a Life of Pie.

40:31

Like the year that came out. I knew I couldn't

40:33

see it in the theater. I was like, Nope, not going to see

40:35

in the theater. Finally got around

40:38

to it and I and I was like, I got

40:40

you know, forty minutes in and

40:42

I was crying so hard that I was like, I'm gonna have to walk

40:44

away from this, Mike, get a cup of

40:46

tea, like, get myself back

40:49

together. I know I'm going to finish it, but

40:51

I cannot do it in one sitting. Um

40:53

And this absolutely would have been the case

40:55

for me. I would have the minute she's scared,

40:57

the first time it starts crying, I would

41:00

have been like, Okay, why don't we stop this,

41:02

why don't we bike ride? And

41:04

then we'll come back and we'll be

41:06

ready, will be stronger and tougher. We will

41:08

have processed the first few minutes, right,

41:10

you know. Yeah. The good thing about kids, or at least

41:13

my experience with Ruby, is that they're they're so

41:15

just brutally honest

41:18

and like she'll let us

41:20

know. First of all, we

41:22

don't even have to check in um.

41:24

And also like just the little

41:26

things that you find a five and a half year

41:28

old saying watching a movie like

41:30

Spirited Away along the way, you know the

41:32

running commentary, which is, I

41:34

wish I could have heard it. It's the sweetest

41:37

thing because it's the basest, most

41:39

honest take on something. Yeah, through

41:42

those little eyes like um,

41:44

it really helps you point because it can seem

41:46

like a convoluted story when you read a plot summary

41:49

of it. It sounds crazy

41:51

and hard to follow. And it is, like

41:54

you said, as you're watching it, you're going, like, I

41:56

am so engrossed in this. But if you asked

41:58

me what is this movie about? Out, I

42:00

would give the most cursory answer, knowing

42:03

it was a waste of time because no one will

42:05

get the sense of what it is just by saying, like a

42:07

little girl gets lost in a bistical bathhouse,

42:10

Like right, it's over. You

42:12

can't talk about it, you know, but it is

42:14

about Like it's one of those

42:16

movies that an adult can go and research afterwards,

42:18

which is what I did. What's it about? And they're

42:21

all these I know, I'm excited to talk about

42:23

those themes because I too had

42:25

to be like, okay, I

42:27

I know I'm missing stuff. It was that feeling,

42:30

and even that is a little kid feeling, right

42:32

of being like, I know this represents

42:34

something specific and I cannot

42:37

look I can't eyeball it and say, well,

42:39

clearly, that's the difference between the working class and capital,

42:42

like you quite able to fudget

42:44

A little bit of this stuff is sort of obvious,

42:47

But it's a movie that you can

42:49

research and dive into. But the beauty

42:51

of it is it's also a movie that can

42:54

exist in so simplistically for a five and

42:56

a half year old. Absolutely, and she scared,

42:58

she wants her parents. She loves Haku.

43:01

Yeah, we all love HACKU. We all love hack.

43:03

He's a dreamboat. First of all.

43:04

I think him, I love him

43:06

or be him. I'm not sure a

43:10

handsome little Japanese dragon boy in our life

43:12

to take care of things, that's right. Oh he's

43:14

such what a splendid dragon he becomes,

43:17

yeah, very splendid dragon. Um.

43:19

But let's talk about some of those themes because I

43:21

did some research, and you know, some of the

43:23

more obvious things is the

43:26

class distinction, and like

43:29

you know, obviously these parents literally become

43:31

pigs after they drive up in their

43:33

autie. And then at first

43:35

you're like cash and credit cards and you

43:38

know, it's it's it's pretty black and white. But as

43:40

the movie goes on, there's there's so much

43:42

going on that I found myself wondering,

43:45

all right, the three green heads,

43:48

um, one of them has a full mustache and the

43:50

other two do not, Like what

43:53

is that? Like?

43:57

Okay, one of these mustaches is different. If

43:59

I activate that one, I will get out of the escape

44:01

room faster. Uh, It's

44:03

true, It's true. We think

44:06

everything, which is a testament to it. I

44:08

think absolutely, What are

44:10

the themes have you found? Janney, I

44:13

was setting up to go, Well, there's also and

44:15

who could forget? She said, hope,

44:18

holding up her face. Well,

44:20

I think the other another really big

44:22

one is no face, right, Like wondering,

44:25

like trying to understand, especially from

44:28

you know, the sense you get of

44:30

that character before he

44:32

kind of transforms um

44:34

and trying to sort of understand like, okay,

44:37

is he something it's

44:39

it feels like he's mirroring his environment.

44:41

But is that a very specific

44:44

reference or is it just the sort

44:46

of idea of how malleable

44:49

we all are and how we need you

44:51

know, some we we do need that touchdown,

44:53

We do need that guide that who is

44:55

going to remind us, you

44:57

know, what the who we are or

45:00

or what the best version of ourselves

45:02

might be. Um, which

45:04

actually don't know if that's like fully answered.

45:07

I think. I mean it's talks talks about

45:09

the idea of him being you know, like

45:12

reflecting the characters who surrounds him

45:14

like and then becoming the things you consume, which

45:16

makes you become even more of

45:19

the thing that you've consumed, like if you sort of

45:21

uh, it becomes this kind of cycle. Um.

45:24

But that's such an interesting character. And I will also

45:26

say that that is an oft cosplayed character

45:29

because when you look at the characters and spirited Away

45:31

are like, oh, a lot of these would be a real challenge

45:33

to pull off and pay homage

45:36

to. If you're like trying to get around

45:38

in a convention center, you put on your black

45:40

cloak and you paint a beautiful no face

45:43

mask. You have anonymity and

45:45

you you know, provided you're not eating people,

45:48

um, you stay pretty small and

45:50

you can you can navigate yourself across

45:52

the coun floor. Yeah, and what was the

45:54

magic trick that Miyazaki uses

45:57

to somehow get different emotions

46:00

out of no face and almost

46:02

seemingly expression. But it doesn't change.

46:05

I mean, it's all it's all in our own heads. As a viewer,

46:07

I think, yeah, and this and just the I

46:10

mean I I realized that I

46:12

was leaning forward so

46:14

hard when he's just going

46:17

uh huh huh,

46:20

like you really are like I'm with you,

46:22

I'm with you, I'm okay, I'm right

46:24

here, like I'm trying to understand. I want to understand.

46:27

Um that that that that could have

46:29

such a strong effect and be so simple.

46:32

You could say that for the whole movie. But that's definitely

46:34

an example of like, oh,

46:36

how do I help you? What do I do you need

46:38

from me? You know, there's

46:41

a lot of that in this movie. I think because

46:43

you identify so strongly with all of the characters

46:46

to want to jump through the screen

46:48

and lend a hand. Yeah. Um,

46:50

And and it's hard as a

46:53

person of my age coming into this stuff at the first

46:55

time. I can't not compare it to

46:57

Disney. And that's totally

46:59

fair. Well, look, Disney had to, I mean, they

47:02

that was like Pixar who kind of helped

47:04

Shepherd in the movie on the American side.

47:06

So were you thinking of the brooms the brooms uh

47:09

and the little set care Well, I just mean sort

47:11

of period, like just the different

47:14

different animation styles, the fact

47:16

that there's and you know, I love the Disney

47:18

stuff. I love the Pixar stuff, and there they

47:21

do have substance, but there's

47:23

so much more meat on the bone with

47:25

this stuff than your typical

47:27

Disney thing. And I think part

47:30

of that is all the symbolism that you may not

47:32

quite have it with the Disney movies. Part of it is

47:35

it's not wall to wall pop music.

47:38

Um, you don't always know, you don't know to look

47:40

for the pidd and penises and

47:42

the Little Mermaid. And

47:45

I love the music of all.

47:47

I mean, I can listen to and now I have to and

47:49

have enjoyed listening to Frozen and

47:51

and uh and Frozen two

47:54

and uh, what's the one on the Island with the

47:56

girl? It was so great Mowanna, Like,

47:59

I love all those songs. But there's something

48:01

really refreshing about seeing a movie like this with

48:03

just that wonderful score and

48:05

not feeling like they're trying to sell a soundtrack

48:08

on top of it. Well, it's funny because there are elements

48:10

of it. I brought up the brooms

48:13

um from Fantasia with a little soot

48:15

creatures, because there are some

48:17

sort of like you could compare some of it

48:19

to Fantasia, which is, you know, not

48:21

something that Disney continuously

48:24

repeated. But it was this very

48:27

strange, special experiment

48:29

that did have all of these different styles

48:32

and all of these and was you know, so largely based

48:35

in the music. And it was entirely based

48:37

in the music and and some you know, more

48:39

mature sort of themes um.

48:42

But I'm

48:44

sure he did. I'm sure he did. I have absolutely

48:47

Again, modern Jackass magazine do not

48:49

know what I'm talking about. It seems unlikely

48:52

that he wouldn't have been

48:54

exposed to that. But I mean, that's the thing

48:57

where it's like, well, if that was a mild influence

48:59

or inspiray, shin, you've taken it to

49:02

the nth level and so

49:04

far out, you know, just surpassed

49:06

whatever your influence was profoundly

49:10

um. And I realized also by the way

49:12

that I was lying, this was not the first

49:14

anime that I ever saw. I did I

49:17

I saw, I saw. I know that there's something

49:19

else that I saw, in addition to having

49:22

seen something called Barefoot Gen

49:25

which is UM anime that

49:27

I watched in an ethics in film class

49:29

when I was in college. And it

49:31

is a horrifying,

49:35

heartbreaking, shattering as

49:37

it should be UH anime

49:40

about a little boy and uh

49:42

in the bombings in Hiroshima and Nagasaki,

49:45

and it is fucking

49:48

horrible. It will

49:50

haunt you forever. I there

49:52

are things in that movie I can't unsee

49:55

and it is chilling, And

49:57

it was definitely something that

50:00

you know, it's so well done,

50:02

but boy is it. I mean, it's like, you know, the

50:04

only comparison is the Wall I guess

50:07

you know, and that it's just you're like,

50:09

oh, yes, the things that can be achieved

50:11

through anime in terms of depicting

50:14

human horrors that we put

50:16

each other through no no bounds.

50:19

So if anybody wants to see

50:21

something that will shatter their soul and make

50:23

them never question whether Americans

50:25

should be hated by other countries

50:28

for decisions they've made through time. It's

50:32

it's really something, It's really something well

50:34

anime definitely feels like it's much more

50:36

willing to walk through the door of

50:39

of making a movie that really

50:42

teaches kids something

50:44

much more deeply than sort

50:46

of the Disney stuff. I mean, there are plenty of less

50:49

Every Disney movie has it's lesson, But

50:52

I don't think they're dumbed down. They're just very

50:54

sort of down here and basic. I

50:57

can't wait to have this conversation after you've watched

50:59

The Last Bender, because you're

51:03

twirling your hair. Guess what you will

51:05

not say that about those Oh

51:07

okay, you will be like, wow, I

51:09

can't believe Ruby loved it for this.

51:11

But the whole time during that episode, I kept thinking,

51:13

God, this is so you know, there's

51:16

some deep, deep stuff in there. I

51:25

guess one of the big themes is that's

51:27

sort of talked about the parents feeding

51:29

their faces, and there's so much grotesque sort

51:32

of what was it called the stink

51:34

distinct distinc spirit. There's

51:37

so there's so much over consumption

51:40

and purging. Were so the theme

51:42

of regurgitation and like

51:45

X explanation, I guess

51:48

so, I mean it just that happens

51:50

over and over and over. Yeah,

51:53

there's a lot of puking, like

51:56

the idea of being like I'm gonna sit down with a you

51:58

know, bag of pop corn and some snickers

52:01

and just you know, it'll drive

52:03

you towards vegetarian is well, I

52:05

don't know if that was any of the point of

52:07

it. Um. I love the Uh.

52:10

Just that whole first bathing sequence.

52:13

Uh, from the moment it started till the moment

52:16

it ended was just so fucking weird, amazing.

52:18

Yeah. Uh, because

52:21

you're trying to figure out, as the first time watcher,

52:23

like what even is what

52:25

is going on at

52:28

this bathhouse? And

52:31

like I think you spend most of the movie

52:33

trying to figure this out, and and you think,

52:35

boy, this is nuts. And that's in the first third

52:38

ish of the movie, and it just gets

52:40

crazier and crazy. Yeah

52:43

it doesn't. It's so unapologetically

52:46

bizarre and it's

52:48

not like things get wrapped up in a

52:50

way that that like,

52:53

using just this as one example, you know,

52:56

the main character Yukuba,

52:59

right is or you, Bubba. I don't want to say

53:01

that wrong, So I hope that you can edit that out. Um

53:04

yeah, no, I beg you, I beg

53:07

you. I don't need the hate mail. I do not need the

53:09

hate mail. Um yeah,

53:11

yeah, Bubba, thank you. But the fact

53:13

that she has we find out, you

53:15

know, towards the end of the movie,

53:17

while not really maybe it's halfway through, but that

53:19

she apparently has a twin sister, and

53:23

yeah, and and a twin sister, Zeniba.

53:25

And then when we meet we go to and then

53:28

Zeniba says, it has this wonderful

53:30

she has this uh

53:32

they all have this kind of wonderful experience

53:34

with her, and she call

53:37

me, call me granny. Then when

53:40

sen goes back to see

53:45

she calls her granny. And that's

53:48

right at the end, and you're and you're like,

53:50

oh, wait a minute, and but nothing

53:53

is that's it, that's your that's your your

53:56

experience of is that is she is

53:58

she one? And the same is

54:00

is there's nothing helping you along other

54:02

than that she calls granny. And then you sort of project

54:04

back and go, well, it does

54:07

fly away every day.

54:09

Where is she going? I need it? Well year

54:11

old to explain it to me. Yeah, exactly,

54:14

like for real. But

54:16

I mean, but that's the other ideas, like there's

54:19

no one is ever any one thing. And

54:21

I mean, as much as you would think, oh, this person

54:23

stands for this, so this person represents this. Everyone's

54:25

constantly transforming. People have more

54:27

than one name. Um. You

54:29

know, So there's like, I mean, there's

54:31

as much transformative stuff that just keeps

54:33

happening over and over as there

54:36

is puking, yeah,

54:38

as there is barfing out sludge uh

54:41

in. In my research, I did find that u

54:43

shape shifting is such a big thing in Japanese

54:45

culture, So I mean this movie

54:47

is just full of it, like things morphing into different

54:49

things all over the place. Yeah. I

54:52

don't know that I've ever seen a movie with so many

54:54

original looking creatures.

54:56

It's you know, when you're used to when you're

54:59

raised an America and you're you've seen

55:01

only Disney, you see kids

55:03

and adults and like a talking animal,

55:05

one talking parrot or something right,

55:07

right, And that's sort of the extent of it. Maybe

55:10

some of them get a little more creative

55:12

than that, but like, nothing that comes

55:14

close to touching this. And also why

55:18

when you're watching it, why

55:20

why are some people presenting as human?

55:24

Why are some people? Why are some creatures

55:26

sort of human what you know?

55:29

And then other creatures nothing like them?

55:31

The big giant baby. You

55:33

know, some things are have almost no shape

55:36

at all and just totally just

55:38

sort of shadows with like a little bit of

55:40

a hint of maybe two eyes. And

55:42

then some are fully articulated

55:44

and have giant bushy mustaches and

55:46

multiple arms and little claw nails

55:49

and they're the good right, or

55:52

they're the tiny little black little

55:55

little guys are so cute,

55:58

little city dusk guys. Yeah,

56:00

I think you know, there's so many little

56:02

things about the movie that make it stand

56:05

out above the rest. Like one of my favorite sequences

56:07

at the end, when she's taking the train with

56:10

no phase and instead

56:13

of just having the train on the tracks, the tracks

56:15

are underwater and that just

56:17

like all of a sudden, everything

56:19

is reflected and it's just a little decision

56:22

like that where you know, whereas

56:24

it could have just been a train track is just it's

56:26

amazing. Yeah. And those all the backdrop

56:29

painting is just yeah,

56:32

so stunning. I mean it hurts your heart how

56:34

beautiful some of those renderings

56:36

are. And um,

56:38

you know, I had that there are these moments where I would

56:40

be like, oh, I'm going to look away to you

56:42

know, pick up my glass of water, and

56:45

then I would go what wait, and then you would and

56:47

then I would rewind. And it was like on that, especially

56:49

specifically on the train, it was like, oh, the

56:51

blank space quote

56:54

quotes that they're that they're going through.

56:56

You don't want to miss that because there's this sort of

56:59

open landscape that's just might as

57:01

well be an abstract painting. But it's just beautiful.

57:03

It's just beautiful to the eye. Yeah.

57:05

I mean, the whole third act is just full of so

57:08

much emotion

57:10

and heart. I think there's a

57:12

lot of like sort of figuring

57:14

it out of the story and a lot of fear

57:17

of what's going on through the first two thirds,

57:19

and then that last third it really

57:21

goes into much more as far as if you're used

57:23

to watching Disney and more traditionally

57:26

able to digest it thing like

57:28

linear even it's just like a sense of was

57:30

a standard linear storytelling style

57:32

sort of Yeah. And then like oh

57:35

my god, when she's flying with Haku

57:38

and she remembers the story

57:40

about the shoe, yeah,

57:44

and he turned and she remembers that he was the spirit

57:46

of the river and he changes back, it's just like

57:48

the music swelling and oh, I'm like getting

57:51

choked up just thinking. I know, I'm like crying

57:53

in my house at a on a what's

57:56

this a Wednesday at

57:58

noon? About to record Ricogman

58:00

and I'm finishing up that movie. I'm like, I gotta pull it together.

58:03

Yeah, And you know, Ruby's

58:05

like, why are you guys crying? Like

58:08

this is very sad to remember he was a river and She's

58:10

like, but that's happy, and I'm like, oh,

58:13

so simple. It really active. That

58:15

was That was another thing that I was not expecting

58:18

was um and this is you know, perhaps

58:21

speaking of going deeper than necessary

58:23

for movie crush, but uh

58:26

it I felt I'm

58:28

I'm so used to crying during movies. It's

58:30

it's a non issue. I mean, that's that's that's

58:32

expected. Um. But I

58:35

had the

58:37

the feeling that for those of you

58:39

who have experienced a loss that has

58:41

resulted in tremendous grief of

58:43

some kind, I had that

58:46

like you can't take

58:48

a deep enough breath kind of feeling

58:50

where grief is like, oh I don't have

58:52

lungs anymore, only grief, and

58:55

it just there's a sense of

58:58

there's a really scary, out of control role

59:00

feeling about grief sometimes and crying

59:02

and feeling like, you know, you really

59:04

understand why there are

59:06

cultures that that have keening and

59:08

that wail and and that

59:10

that that that is a necessary

59:13

part of of grieving because

59:15

they're speaking of regurgitating. There

59:18

is a sense of needing to get

59:21

something foreign that's lodged

59:23

inside of you out so that

59:25

you can continue to be a person and survive.

59:28

And that started bubbling up in me, and

59:31

I was so unprepared for it. And

59:34

it like everything with this movie not

59:36

like everything you can definitely draw, as we said,

59:38

we're identifying certain themes, but

59:41

at the same time, it's just abstract enough

59:44

that you can't necessarily you don't

59:46

have to necessarily point to any one thing because

59:48

it's just this feelings are just being

59:50

washed over you. And then

59:53

and the music and the visuals and the sense

59:55

of emotion even not

59:58

expressed through this specific fick experience

1:00:00

of a character um that

1:00:03

I was like I couldn't necessarily say,

1:00:05

you know, because Brandon was like I was like, oh no,

1:00:08

like like, oh, this has become something

1:00:10

else now for you, and sort

1:00:12

of like how what what

1:00:15

was what was there a trigger? And

1:00:17

I was like no, I don't know. It

1:00:20

was almost like a sneeze, you know what

1:00:22

I mean. It was just like this is just happening

1:00:24

to me. I'm just it's just happening,

1:00:26

and I can't say, oh, I it was that moment.

1:00:28

This moment reminded me of my mom dying, Like not at

1:00:31

all, but it has just been. It

1:00:33

was just down there. I was like, I'm ready here, I come.

1:00:35

Guess what I

1:00:37

really I really was like, God, I gotta

1:00:40

I gotta get this under control. Like I have to

1:00:42

sort of tell myself, like you can breathe,

1:00:45

you can breathe. You know, it's okay to have

1:00:47

this ceiling. It feels good, absolutely,

1:00:49

I mean it always feels better, like

1:00:52

throwing up. The moment

1:00:55

when the nausea stops and

1:00:57

you've realized that you have you fear

1:00:59

body feels amazing. Going

1:01:02

from feeling so intensely difficult

1:01:05

on some level, Is it

1:01:07

is that's its own high of just

1:01:09

saying, oh, I feel so much better,

1:01:11

this is amazing. Yes. Yeah,

1:01:14

I've had those moments through movies, specifically

1:01:16

where it I don't even

1:01:19

know and if it, like you were saying, if

1:01:21

it was something specific that was inside

1:01:23

me that I clearly needed to get out but I

1:01:25

wasn't in touch with. But where I had found myself

1:01:27

just un inconsolable

1:01:31

and and just in

1:01:33

a different state of upset than

1:01:35

I had ever been at the at the end

1:01:37

of a movie or something, and it happened a

1:01:40

couple of years ago, and I can't remember the movie,

1:01:42

so like, that's not even the important part. It's

1:01:45

this. It's this literal physical reaction

1:01:47

that happens. Like we said,

1:01:49

there are no lungs anymore. It's

1:01:51

like your your throat closes, and

1:01:53

it's uh, it's very cathartic feeling.

1:01:57

I always wondered if like primal screen therapy would

1:01:59

be something that would benefit me. I

1:02:01

mean, that's you, I get it. There are

1:02:04

cree creepy seventies

1:02:06

therapy that you see in like cult documentaries.

1:02:09

I'm sorry to say, I'm like, now this

1:02:11

I don't have a problem with. It's like, wait a minute,

1:02:14

that that's the thing that most people are pointing

1:02:16

to, going like, well that's wrong, and it

1:02:18

looks very healing actually exactly.

1:02:22

Oh goodness, um the

1:02:24

I'm surprised Disney didn't try to rip this off at

1:02:27

some point, not this movie specifically, but after

1:02:29

Spirited Away. I'm surprised they didn't say,

1:02:32

well, let's try our hand at anime, or

1:02:34

maybe they did and I wasn't aware of it. I

1:02:36

don't even know. Yeah, I don't. I

1:02:39

mean I think you know, like Big

1:02:41

Hero six sort of again,

1:02:43

now I'm sort of conflating Pixar and Disney,

1:02:45

and that's not fair to Pixar into

1:02:48

sense, um, it's

1:02:51

not fair to either. Look is that fair to either?

1:02:53

Um? I have I I feel the same way about

1:02:55

Disney stuff as as you do anything. I still want to do

1:02:57

voice work for both, and I'm

1:02:59

and I am available, and I do and I am

1:03:01

a princess. I'm a princess, princess princess. Uh

1:03:04

No, I mean, it's just it's just a different

1:03:06

The experience that you expect to have is different.

1:03:09

And that's not to say that there aren't Disney movies

1:03:11

that have had um, really

1:03:13

lasting impacts on me, and that I absolutely

1:03:15

cherish an adore. I think to

1:03:18

some degree there is

1:03:20

a sense of I don't want to fetishize

1:03:23

the otherness of being from a different

1:03:25

culture, but the experience

1:03:28

of of watching, you

1:03:30

know, I mean, even like something like Aladdin

1:03:33

is still told through the lens

1:03:35

of American storytelling,

1:03:38

Like that's okay, this is how we understand this is

1:03:40

this is the Disney way of understanding this thing

1:03:42

that you know is now like problematic

1:03:44

yet also very beloved and important.

1:03:46

For other reasons to people, and I get all

1:03:49

of that, um, but I think there

1:03:51

there's you know, there's just something

1:03:53

to be said for like we should all

1:03:56

like we should all be so lucky as to have the

1:03:58

opportunity to see art from all over the

1:04:00

world that just feels really important and

1:04:03

um, and it might connect you

1:04:05

with something inside yourself that you

1:04:07

haven't had access to through art because

1:04:10

some some some way in which you've you've

1:04:13

digested it, like there, it hasn't touched

1:04:15

a certain part, you know, um that

1:04:17

maybe something else will. Yeah.

1:04:20

I mean anytime I'm traveling or

1:04:22

here in Atlanta at the High Museum,

1:04:24

anytime I see like something, you

1:04:27

know, the art of Zimbabwe coming for two weeks

1:04:29

whatever, whatever, I always try and go

1:04:31

because you know, and a lot of times

1:04:33

it's not something that resonates with me, but sometimes

1:04:35

it is. But it's just like, well, you

1:04:37

know, now I know what that's like. Now now

1:04:39

I know what that country is putting out there, absolutely,

1:04:42

and and that definitely goes I think

1:04:44

for my Unsurprisingly,

1:04:46

things that maybe would be more accessible

1:04:49

or thought of as children's entertainment

1:04:51

on some level if they are like

1:04:54

Miyazaki or if they are like you know Hungarian

1:04:58

like puppetry or I mean pupp treat

1:05:00

to great example, speaking of the Center for

1:05:02

Puppetry. You see the way,

1:05:04

if you see the way all these

1:05:06

different cultures handle the same idea

1:05:08

of like a doll that's moving on behalf

1:05:11

of a person, like it has some sort of human

1:05:13

traits and characteristics. Um,

1:05:15

it's it's amazing what you can

1:05:18

what you find is universal. And then also

1:05:21

those moments that you feel like, oh, I'm

1:05:23

seeing something that comes from some totally

1:05:25

other place in terms of you know, like

1:05:27

literally and and metaphorically,

1:05:30

and that's it's you know, it's exciting

1:05:33

and it is uncomfortable. It can be uncomfortable.

1:05:36

Yeah, and it doesn't even have to be another culture

1:05:38

or country. Sometimes it can just be something and

1:05:41

there's a little off track, but it can be something that

1:05:44

you just never previously were turned onto. Yeah.

1:05:47

That One of the maybe top

1:05:50

two three museum exhibits

1:05:52

I've ever seen was the Alexander McQueen

1:05:55

one in New York that I was

1:05:57

like, I don't know anything about fashion

1:05:59

and how fashion and couture and

1:06:01

I know nothing about that stuff. So I go

1:06:04

to the show and I'm just like blown

1:06:06

away and then all of a

1:06:08

sudden, I'm not all of a sudden some huge

1:06:10

fashion guy, but I wanted to watch the documentary

1:06:13

about this guy, and I wanted to know more about his life.

1:06:15

And it's like, you know, Emily

1:06:17

and I went to the opera once in l A. We've never been in the opera.

1:06:19

It turns out we don't like the opera. Fair enough,

1:06:22

fair you gotta you gotta try that chip. Yeah,

1:06:24

I got a couple of operas of it. You would like, Oh

1:06:27

yeah, I don't know, being like a weird opera

1:06:29

dealer, all of a Sunnen got a couple of I got a couple of

1:06:31

operas. I think you met. Like we went to see La

1:06:33

bo M that Bas Lorman put on stage

1:06:35

in l A when I lived there. I was like, this is

1:06:37

gonna be the one. It's bos Lorman, it's operads,

1:06:40

and we just couldn't get into it.

1:06:42

There's a there's a German opera company

1:06:45

um that did a version

1:06:47

of the Magic Flute that was like, um,

1:06:51

Tim Burton nineteen

1:06:54

like Tim Burton meets the nineteen twenties meets

1:06:56

opera. It's they used a bunch of film

1:06:59

projection and um,

1:07:01

and it's just strange and dark

1:07:04

and unlike anything I had ever seen

1:07:06

before, and I was like, oh,

1:07:08

I love opera. And then I went and saw something

1:07:10

more convention I was like, oh, no, I appreciate

1:07:13

opera. I appreciate opera. I

1:07:15

just love that opera

1:07:17

in that specific way,

1:07:20

and says Janet, you need to take a little break. Do

1:07:22

you need to finish this later? Do you

1:07:24

want to power through? Oh,

1:07:26

that's what intermissions are for got

1:07:28

it, gotta gotta got it. It's your opportunity

1:07:30

to leave with grace. Yeah,

1:07:33

it's your opportunity to realize you left the stove on

1:07:36

and that's fine. Um.

1:07:38

Well, just to wrap up Spirited Away, I

1:07:40

think the ending with um it kind of

1:07:42

struck me today. Well, like the

1:07:45

supposed goal is for her to be reunited

1:07:47

with her parents, but it's not. Um,

1:07:50

it's not one that if you grew up on Disney, your conditioned

1:07:52

that that is like the end

1:07:54

all be all. Like as a viewer, you're not like,

1:07:57

you're kind of like, do you really want her to go back to Yes?

1:08:00

The movie yeah, And it pays

1:08:02

off in exactly that way, like its

1:08:05

ending is so abrupt you don't

1:08:07

go to see started very quickly and yeah,

1:08:10

like I don't know where she hero was going to live

1:08:12

she see the new home. I feel sorry

1:08:15

for her that she is back with the parents

1:08:17

that were greedy enough that they

1:08:20

I mean, because at the end of the day, they

1:08:22

were the ones who made the decision to you

1:08:24

know, we don't have an understanding of them having

1:08:26

been magic into gorging

1:08:29

themselves on this food. Um,

1:08:32

that seems to be a decision that they fully made

1:08:34

on their own. And um, and

1:08:37

it's yeah, it's so funny, Like here, I immediately

1:08:39

Michael Chicklist just says one of those voices that I just, you

1:08:41

know, immediately know it's him. And I was

1:08:44

like, oh, that's Checklist. That is

1:08:46

full on Checklist, Like they're really they

1:08:48

really did it because they picked this like just

1:08:50

very like I'm just a regular

1:08:52

guy, you know voice as his.

1:08:55

Yeah, and and and then I had to look

1:08:57

up that it was Lauren Holly who did the female voice, because

1:09:00

it wasn't quite as iconic sounding.

1:09:02

But yeah, but

1:09:05

and Suzanne Plushchett is the ISA,

1:09:08

which is like, you have to smoke a

1:09:11

lifetime. She had to. She really devoted

1:09:13

a lifetime of smoking to that role. Um,

1:09:16

with her incredibly raspy boys,

1:09:19

but of course it was perfect. Um but

1:09:21

yeah, she's she comes back and you

1:09:23

really have a sense of like, oh, yeah,

1:09:26

the regular world cool,

1:09:28

cool, cool, and you know as

1:09:31

she's going through that, and then they're like, well, you're

1:09:33

gonna be going to do school and she's like, I think I'll be okay.

1:09:35

Credits it's just very

1:09:38

over, yeah, not a lot of sentiment

1:09:40

attached, like you're used to hear in the

1:09:42

States, Um, well in fact, and she's

1:09:44

like she's so she's feeling emotional

1:09:46

in her mom's like don't stop clinging, like

1:09:49

oh boy, okay. Yeah, it's like

1:09:52

can we go back to the to the spirit world to

1:09:55

Yeah, it's a little bit of the Goonies effect

1:09:58

of like the kid

1:10:00

has this big adventure and then as reunited

1:10:02

with the parents and then it's kind of like, oh, adventure

1:10:05

Land was so much better. Yeah.

1:10:08

Yeah, I think, um, we

1:10:11

are and we are. Yeah, you're right. We're conditioned

1:10:13

to feel like if it's a it's a movie we think

1:10:15

of for young people, there's

1:10:17

more a sense of like I

1:10:19

have to be taken care of all the way through, and

1:10:22

part of being taken care of all the way through means

1:10:24

that there's something beautiful and wonderful

1:10:27

and and uh and and safe

1:10:29

and great about being back with

1:10:32

your parents and yeah, I

1:10:34

think he wanted the parents to be different

1:10:37

or like, if they were here in the United

1:10:39

States, the parents would have transformed somehow

1:10:42

and been different. And then you

1:10:44

know, but this means accuses like nah,

1:10:47

yeah, back to it. Yeah, kid,

1:10:50

they wish they could have eaten more of the those

1:10:52

beautiful dumplings. I know, those

1:10:54

dumplings that they eventually probably threw up. Well,

1:10:58

Janet, this was great. I think we were going to record

1:11:00

a separate thing to go into the

1:11:02

final mini Crush, but I think since

1:11:05

we're here and we're just chatting, uh,

1:11:07

this is the last Movie Crush episode

1:11:10

officially. Uh. You started

1:11:13

the show off with show number one, and

1:11:15

everyone was like, oh, you

1:11:18

started with Tron the

1:11:23

best movies of all time. You can't listen. You

1:11:25

came around, did you? I don't

1:11:27

know, but you you, if

1:11:30

I recall correctly, you begrudgingly

1:11:32

acknowledged that there was personal history

1:11:35

that made my choice really

1:11:38

justifiable. Have you been hanging on to

1:11:40

this for three and a half years? I am this is

1:11:42

a reckoning, Mr, this

1:11:45

is a reckoning. Now it's

1:11:47

not even about the movies. It's about having these great conversations

1:11:49

with with people who are friends

1:11:52

of mine sometimes and people who I don't know that

1:11:54

I can connect with about movies

1:11:56

and art and culture. And um, you

1:11:59

were the first person to have on because it was it

1:12:02

was just a no brainer for me to have

1:12:05

someone on who has done a lot for me and

1:12:07

my personal creative

1:12:09

life. And I know I've told you that before, but you

1:12:11

have always challenged me to do things I didn't think I could

1:12:13

do. And uh, I

1:12:16

know that will continue through the years with um

1:12:18

sketch Fest coming back back, which I'm so

1:12:20

excited about. But I wanted to have you

1:12:22

on here is the last guest, and that you were actually

1:12:25

the fact you were already scheduled. And

1:12:28

then it's kind of been in the back of my head about ending

1:12:30

the show, and then it kind of hit me

1:12:32

out of the blue. I was like, wait a minute, Janet's

1:12:34

coming on. It's like, I think this is

1:12:36

it, Like this is a sign you'll just bookend

1:12:39

it. An I can't thank

1:12:41

you for that. That means so much

1:12:43

to me. I I can't even tell you why. Um,

1:12:47

I that means that

1:12:49

just means the world to me, chuck, um, because

1:12:51

I've been wanting to do the show again and

1:12:54

um and then dem old Cole like became

1:12:57

you know the guy who comes on the show. So oh,

1:12:59

I goes, he's you do He's gonna talk about defending your life. Great,

1:13:01

now I can't talk about defending your life either, Thanks,

1:13:03

Cole. Let's just keep cross him off all my favorite

1:13:05

movies off less. Uh no,

1:13:08

it's and it and it really you know, as

1:13:10

you know, we were going to record earlier than this,

1:13:13

and my mom passed away, and I was

1:13:15

just sort of take, you know, pulling back because

1:13:17

at any moment, I didn't know when that feeling

1:13:19

was going to bubble up, and it felt

1:13:22

very very unpredictable, and it felt like a

1:13:24

lot to put another person through. If

1:13:29

I understand now, you know, you could have had the

1:13:31

juicy your episode. If if we've done it,

1:13:34

then uh and so and and

1:13:36

so I'm really really glad that it

1:13:38

that it did work out, because I don't know that you

1:13:40

would necessarily have have thought,

1:13:43

you know, oh right, I you know, Jan

1:13:46

is probably wondering why I didn't follow up with her after

1:13:48

her mom died to say are you ready yet? Are you ready

1:13:50

yet. Um, well, i'd certainly

1:13:52

is trying to give you space, and I knew it would come around at some

1:13:54

point. Well, I just and then too, you

1:13:57

know, I I just miss you guys. I

1:13:59

can't believe of how much love

1:14:01

I have and such a deep connection I have with friends

1:14:04

that I mean, I can but um, you

1:14:07

know I I I love you guys

1:14:09

like you're my next door neighbors and we've lived next

1:14:11

to each other for ten years. I it's so insane

1:14:13

how much I would yeah, and and

1:14:16

so you know, my it

1:14:18

really it's very touching to me that you would

1:14:21

that you would have me on and have it be the last episode.

1:14:23

I don't I thank you and

1:14:27

and and if you're and and if it's

1:14:29

and if it feels good and like, yes,

1:14:32

I'm I was ready to be do you know it's not like that. Obviously,

1:14:34

no one's saying it's not a show that you that

1:14:36

you would have done forever that someone else was like, we're

1:14:38

a Paula blug buddy. Sorry, you

1:14:41

know, to feel like that's the nice thing that's

1:14:43

sort of representative of one of the nice things about

1:14:45

podcasting is that you can go I

1:14:48

think I'm good like this was great.

1:14:51

This was great. On your terms, I'll probably do some

1:14:53

episodes here and there when I feel like it. No,

1:14:55

this is the last episode. What

1:15:01

are you talking about? Don't undo what

1:15:06

it? Asshole. I can't believe I did that. No,

1:15:09

I've told people that I will do one off episodes here and there.

1:15:11

But how about this. Of course, after every

1:15:14

one of those potential last episodes, I will have you

1:15:16

on to get and

1:15:19

we'll have this moment again. Won't

1:15:22

beat contrived? Mean a lot to me?

1:15:25

You know what. I'll even watch whatever movie

1:15:27

it was that your other guests wanted to talk about, and you

1:15:30

just tag me on and we'll just do one minute's

1:15:32

worth where I tell you my opinion of the movie, and then

1:15:34

we spend the rest of the time saying, well, right,

1:15:38

you're wonderful, this is great. What

1:15:40

a run? Can

1:15:43

you believe it? Uh?

1:15:46

So, thank you, Janet Barney. Where what's

1:15:49

what's the name of your podcast? Where can people find it?

1:15:51

Uh? The Avatar podcast is

1:15:54

Avatar Braving the Elements. Uh.

1:15:56

It is available anywhere you get podcasts. It is

1:15:58

an I Heart Radio UH partnered

1:16:01

presentation. But you can find it anywhere

1:16:03

Stitcher, Apple, all that good stuff and

1:16:06

it comes out every Tuesday, and I

1:16:09

do that again with Dante Bosco and uh.

1:16:12

And then obviously the j V Club has been around,

1:16:14

Chuck's been on it more than once. I talked

1:16:16

to people about their awkward teenage years. UM

1:16:19

one of my favorite shows. It's a very it's

1:16:21

very very fun again like movie Crush, It's like,

1:16:23

yeah, the premises, we talked about this, but

1:16:26

it's really just about getting to know someone

1:16:28

and getting a chance to hang out. Um. And

1:16:30

then and then I do an improvised space comedy

1:16:32

podcast called Voyage to the Stars with Kirsten

1:16:35

vangs Nous from Criminal Minds, Felicia Day,

1:16:37

Colton Dunne, Steve Berg and

1:16:40

oh you didn't. Oh we've been like, we've just finished

1:16:42

recording our third season, but only two seasons I

1:16:44

think are out. Um. Yeah, we were

1:16:47

on a We're on a mad cap adventure, a

1:16:49

bunch of people thrown together. I am not even a person.

1:16:51

I'm an AI on a ship that eventually gets

1:16:54

a robot body. Uh and

1:16:56

uh, and have a bunch of uncomfortable

1:16:59

space missive tuers that UM most

1:17:01

often results in as accidentally destroying a planet

1:17:04

as we try to navigate back to Earth. I

1:17:07

got to check that out. You should look because it's of course

1:17:09

a ton of your favorite people are the guests

1:17:11

of it too. All right, Janet, Well,

1:17:13

I can't wait to see you hopefully next

1:17:15

January sketch Fest and hug your neck and get

1:17:18

Brandon and Emily and all of us together again. Yes,

1:17:21

please, I need it. My soul needs it.

1:17:23

My soul needs it too, And I'm

1:17:25

so glad again to have been the very very

1:17:29

final, final

1:17:31

final episode of the movie Crush.

1:17:34

Final episode. All right, I'm gonna let you have

1:17:36

the last even word, So go ahead, what's

1:17:38

your final word? Final

1:17:40

episode? One word by

1:17:44

Janet? All

1:17:51

right, everybody, that was it. I hope you like that

1:17:53

as much as I did. I

1:17:56

had such a good time talking to Janet. She's just

1:17:58

you know, she's she's the best. I've

1:18:01

said it before. I know you're tired of me saying that she's the

1:18:03

best, but she really is. If you knew her,

1:18:05

you'd say the same thing. So big thanks

1:18:07

to Janet for for coming back and wrapping

1:18:09

up the regular weekly interview

1:18:12

editions with me. Thanks

1:18:15

to Janet for kicking off the show three

1:18:17

and a half years ago with Tron

1:18:20

and uh boy, It's It's been a lot

1:18:23

of fun in between, and book ending

1:18:25

this with Janet means a lot to me, so big

1:18:28

thanks to her. So I hope you all enjoyed

1:18:30

it, and I hope you take care of yourselves. This

1:18:32

is not the end. Look for episodes

1:18:34

here and there, everyone, They'll be coming

1:18:36

at you with some regularity.

1:18:39

But I love you all and I thank you all. Look for

1:18:42

a very special supersized mini crush

1:18:44

coming up soon as soon as I

1:18:46

can lick this covid and get everybody in the can

1:18:49

that I wanted to And you're really gonna

1:18:51

enjoy that. One's a lot of fun. So be

1:18:53

well, take care of yourselves, get backs,

1:18:56

and continue to wear those masks everyone.

1:19:00

Movie Crash is produced and written by Charles

1:19:03

Bryant and Meel Brown, edited and engineered

1:19:05

by Seth Nicholas Johnson, and scored

1:19:07

by Noel Brown here in our home studio

1:19:09

at Pontsty Market, Atlanta, Georgia. For

1:19:11

iHeart Radio. For more podcasts

1:19:14

for my Heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app,

1:19:16

Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your

1:19:18

favorite shows.