0:00

Attention Bechtel cast

0:03

listeners. It's

0:07

me Caitlin and

0:09

and me Jamie and guess what

0:12

what? Wait? Shall we say it together? One? Two, three,

0:14

We're going on to

0:17

tour. That'll

0:19

sink in the ad eventually imagine

0:22

that, but with more enthusiasm because we're very

0:24

excited. We haven't gone on to work in

0:27

three human years.

0:29

That's twenty one dog years. Wow,

0:32

that's so true. I am

0:34

really good at math. So and

0:36

put a pen and dog because that's going to come

0:39

back in a few seconds. But for

0:41

now, we're going to just tell you some

0:43

preliminary facts about the tour.

0:46

It's on the West coast of the United States,

0:48

so we're going everyone else. So

0:50

we're starting in Los Angeles

0:52

Ever heard of it? With a show on

0:55

January at the

0:57

Alesion Theater the movie Get

1:00

and that's where the Dog comes back in because

1:02

it's and it is a dog coming of age

1:04

movie. It is a goofy

1:06

movie. We've got been getting

1:08

requests from this since

1:10

the beginning, and it's finally time to cover a

1:12

goofy movie. We can't wait, a

1:15

coming of age dog movie. Can you believe

1:18

it? Can you believe it? Then we are

1:20

going to be scooting scooting

1:22

on up on foot I believe Caitlin and I will be hiking.

1:26

Oh, that's why there's a bit of a gap all the way

1:28

to San Francisco for San Francisco

1:30

Sketch Festival. We've done it before. If

1:33

you've been before, come out again.

1:35

That's on February one. And where is that,

1:37

Caitlin. That's at the

1:39

Gateway Theater in San Francisco,

1:42

and we are covering George

1:44

of the Jungle. Sorry, sorry, sorry, George,

1:46

George George Jungle. Uh.

1:52

And then guess what, We're continuing

1:54

to scoot on up to Portland, Oregon.

1:57

We will be at Curious Comedy Theater and a theater

2:00

we love. We're doing two shows in Portland.

2:03

The first is with the wonderful

2:05

Sarah Marshall of You're Wrong

2:07

About and You Are Good. We're going to be

2:09

covering the Goonies. And then

2:11

at nine pm, Caitlin, what did tell me

2:13

more? Okay? Also,

2:16

this is on February twod oh ship,

2:18

did I not say that? Groundhog Day? But don't

2:20

think about the movie groundhog Day because that has nothing

2:22

to do with our tour. We covered that, we did it

2:25

already. Sorry bitch. Six years

2:27

ago. Okay, so first shows

2:29

at seven pm with Sarah Marshall the Goonies.

2:31

Second show is at nine pm. It

2:34

is a surprise mystery

2:36

guest and a surprise mystery

2:39

movie. It's

2:42

going to be a banger. I'm very excited. Come

2:44

to one, come to both, come to both. None of

2:46

my business, but it will be different,

2:49

different shows. And then finally we

2:51

are scooting on up, continuing our journey

2:54

on foot to Seattle. And

2:57

on February five, we're doing a

2:59

show at Laughs Comedy

3:01

Club and we are

3:04

covering the Goonies again

3:06

because guess what, it's hard work to do a

3:08

tour and it's a lot to do a

3:10

bunch of different movies. So well, yeah

3:12

it's we're doing Pacific Northwest Classics.

3:15

And so if you're in Seattle, come

3:17

on up for for the Goonies in Seattle.

3:20

And yeah, we're really excited

3:22

to go. We're really excited to see everybody again. Um,

3:25

we will have merch for you.

3:27

We sell exclusive posters

3:29

and stuff like that, designed by

3:32

Jamie, the one and only designed

3:34

by Mrs Jamie herself.

3:37

Yeah, we can't wait to see you and hang out. And

3:39

uh, it's been eighty four years

3:42

since it's been eighty four

3:44

years, really makes you think. So

3:47

what you're gonna do is go to our link

3:49

tree, which is it's always

3:51

so weird to say the link of link tree

3:53

because it's l I n K t

3:56

R dot E E flash

3:59

by actual cast and that's where each

4:02

of the ticket links will be to

4:04

buy tickets for our shows. We

4:06

love you so much. We're really excited. Get

4:09

your tickets now, because they are actually

4:11

genuinely going fast. Usually when I say that, I'm

4:13

lying, but this time I'm really not. This time

4:15

it's true, And yeah, brag. Our

4:17

tickets are moving fast, so you're

4:19

gonna want to grab them soon,

4:22

all right, and we'll see you there, West Coast,

4:24

see you there. On the Bell

4:27

Cast, the questions asked if movies

4:29

have women and um, are all

4:31

their discussions just boyfriends and husbands or

4:33

do they have individualism? The

4:35

patriarchy? Zef in best

4:38

start changing it with the Bell Cast.

4:41

Knock knock, Hello,

4:44

Hi, it's me your son Jamie. Oh

4:48

um, what I don't have any

4:50

children. I'm Tim Allen and

4:53

I'm mad. Yeah your

4:55

TV and films, Tim, Tim Allen, I'm your

4:57

son. Okay, Well, I

5:00

what do you want this is going. Well. There.

5:03

You know, what I want is maybe

5:05

narratively unclear, So I

5:08

think a relationship with you. I'm

5:10

not really quite sure. It's going to change several

5:12

times over the next seventy five minutes, but

5:14

we'll sort of land on. It has something to do

5:17

with your feelings from Vietnam.

5:19

We'll figure it out. I think

5:21

I want a relationship with you, even though you're

5:24

horrible. And also I

5:26

want a nice little

5:28

son. I want a nice little son on my own.

5:31

Cool. Welcome to the Bechtel Cast.

5:34

I think that went extraordinarily well.

5:36

My name is Jamie Loftus, my name

5:38

is Caitlin Darante, and this is our

5:40

show where we examine movies through

5:42

an intersectional feminist lens, using

5:45

the Bechtel test simply as a jumping

5:47

off point. What is the

5:49

Bechtel test, though, Jamie, my son,

5:52

Well, I guess that what

5:54

we just did technically didn't I don't. Actually

5:56

it's complicated. Actually you identified as Tim

5:58

Alan, so it doesn't pass. Okay. We use

6:01

it as a jumping off point for discussion, not the

6:03

be all and end all of anything, including

6:05

this show. But the version that we

6:07

use requires that two

6:10

people of a marginalized gender

6:12

with names speak to each other

6:14

about something other than a man for more

6:17

than two lines of dialogue, and it should

6:19

be narratively impactful.

6:22

Ideally, this movie, this

6:24

movie is a head scratcher in

6:27

uh, more ways than one. Are there women talking?

6:30

Yes, what's going on? I'm

6:32

never clear. We're not sure. Horny

6:34

mom when horny mom and

6:37

I was like, that's her mom there.

6:39

I thought they were roommate. That's her mom.

6:41

That's her mom. I do love a good horny

6:44

mom character call me, you know, throw

6:46

me in a garbage can. But a good old fashioned

6:48

horny mom. I'm laughing. I support it,

6:50

but not at this one, because this movie is

6:52

horrible. We have an amazing

6:55

guest to talk about this

6:58

incredible piece of cinema. Yes,

7:00

a returning guest from the

7:02

episode on what is that movie? Even called

7:05

Den of Thieves starting

7:07

the Phantom of the Opera himself. Yes.

7:10

Uh. She's a reporter and writer

7:12

of the investigative series entitled A

7:14

Tradition of Violence The History of

7:17

Deputy Gangs in the Los Angeles County

7:19

Sheriff's Department, which was published in Knock

7:22

l A. She's also the host of the podcast

7:24

also called a tradition of violence.

7:27

It's Sires Castle, welcome

7:29

back. Hey, thanks

7:31

so much for having me, and

7:33

thanks so much for indulging

7:36

in copaganda.

7:39

There's truly no one we

7:41

would rather talk to add

7:44

on this specific cursed subject.

7:46

Absolutely. So. The movie we're covering

7:49

today is called El Camino

7:51

Christmas from But

7:54

before we get into the discussion

7:56

of that, Sires, we just wanted to talk

7:58

to you about your investigative

8:01

work, your podcast. Yeah,

8:03

specifically about like adapting

8:06

this amazing series you

8:08

wrote for knock into podcast

8:10

format. So for people who haven't started

8:13

listening to a Tradition of Violence, set

8:15

us up. What's the show about? Yeah,

8:18

so, the show is about

8:21

these secret criminal

8:24

gangs that are operating inside

8:26

of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department.

8:29

I've been investigating these deputy

8:31

gangs for the past two years, and I

8:33

have uncovered twenty different

8:35

criminal gangs inside of the l

8:37

A County Sheriff's Department. They're

8:39

at different locations throughout Los Angeles

8:42

County, UM sometimes even

8:45

operating at multiple locations.

8:47

One single gang they have killed

8:49

at least nineteen people. The

8:52

figures are probably a lot higher

8:55

than that, but it's incredibly

8:57

difficult to hunt out a lot of this and

8:59

for me and because of UM

9:02

laws surrounding disclosures

9:04

around police information. UM,

9:06

but we do know they've killed at least nineteen people.

9:09

Um. All of those people were people of

9:11

color, seven of them were in the midst

9:13

of a mental health crisis. And the

9:15

podcast is digging into

9:17

who exactly these deputy gangs are, where

9:19

they come from, and why it is they

9:22

do what they do. It's like, it's

9:24

truly like the original

9:26

series at Knock is so incredible

9:29

as well and has had um

9:32

for listeners who don't live in the l A area or

9:34

are unaware of it has had such a huge

9:36

impact on l A and

9:39

I think like across the country

9:41

and beyond of just your

9:44

incredible work uncovering this and opening

9:46

people's eyes to what is going

9:49

on publicly funded right in front of them.

9:51

So for the podcast,

9:54

UM, I guess, how did how did you go

9:56

about expanding on that

9:59

work and like what were your kind

10:01

of goals in or like,

10:03

because it was coming out over a year later,

10:06

what has it been like kind of bringing this work

10:08

to this format. It's been a lot

10:10

of fun. It's been really

10:12

great being able to put a lot of

10:14

these stories in audio

10:16

form and having people be

10:19

able to hear directly from

10:21

the people that have been impacted by this deputy

10:23

gang violence. There's a lot of

10:25

stuff that I've uncovered in the year and

10:27

a half since publishing the series

10:30

that are also included in this podcast.

10:32

For example, UM, when I wrote the initial

10:34

series, I only knew about eighteen deputy

10:36

gangs, but since then, I've been able

10:39

to uncover two more UM

10:41

with the help of some really great UM sources

10:44

that I've been able to develop. And

10:46

the really unfortunate part is that

10:49

I have been able to connect a

10:51

lot more acts of deputy violence

10:53

to these gangs, which

10:56

is really awful and tragic

10:58

to see play out in data. But at

11:00

the same time, it also confirms

11:03

for a lot of people that have been talking

11:05

about this for generations,

11:08

things that they've been saying and no one has really been

11:11

paying attention to. There are a lot

11:13

of things like that that have been

11:15

confirmed by research. I

11:17

was reading yesterday a lot about weathering,

11:20

which is a phenomenon that happens

11:22

to Black Americans as a result of

11:24

stress. It's these tiny

11:26

little legions that you get on the brain, and

11:29

that's just because of

11:31

having to deal with racism constantly,

11:35

and it means that you

11:37

are a lot more susceptible to disease, You're

11:39

a lot more likely to die prematurely

11:41

or more susceptible to things like Alzheimer's

11:44

that kind of thing. And it's

11:47

really unfortunate and it's so important.

11:49

I think, like, it's really horrible to like know something

11:51

like that, but you know

11:54

how many people have told you like, wow,

11:56

like dealing with this stuff is really getting

11:58

to me. It's really having an effect on my health.

12:01

And I think it's so important to have

12:03

things that you can point to to say, yes, this

12:05

is true, this has been confirmed by research. God,

12:09

that is fascinating and

12:11

so upsetting and that I

12:14

I've never heard of that term before, Caitlin. Had you heard

12:16

about it? No, I wasn't familiar that.

12:18

I'm always like, yeah,

12:21

always really fascinated and

12:23

about how willing people are to dismiss

12:27

how the pressure and like

12:29

constant anxiety of racism

12:32

has absolutely no effect on your body.

12:34

Like it's just completely absurd.

12:37

So what what can we're going to

12:39

be um directing our listeners to

12:42

the podcast? Is there um aside

12:45

from to starting at the beginning, is there anything in particular

12:47

that you're like, you know, happy to have out

12:49

there on on this run, Um,

12:51

that listeners can kind of jump over to

12:54

what I'm really excited about in this podcast

12:57

and something that I didn't have a lot

12:59

of in my series, UM,

13:01

which is kind of surprising, Um

13:03

that this happened, and I'm really

13:05

grateful for it, is the voices of police

13:08

officers. A lot of the skeptics

13:10

that I get are like, well, you

13:12

know, of course, the families

13:14

of people that have been you know, murdered

13:17

by police officers, of course they would

13:19

say these things. But it's been really

13:22

exciting for me to get

13:24

so many deputies and

13:27

people ranking higher than deputy

13:29

to sit down with me and say, yeah, this is

13:31

true. I want to tell you about my

13:33

experiences with these deputy gangs.

13:35

I want to tell you about the time I was invited

13:38

to join a deputy gang. I want to tell you about

13:40

the time that I saw a deputy gang

13:42

member commit a murder, cover

13:44

up a crime, threatened me, dartned

13:47

me with death, and it's it's been

13:49

it's so powerful to hear those stories and get

13:51

that confirmation from the inside, because you

13:53

really can't talk about this without having

13:56

someone on the inside to really explain it because

13:58

it is so insular and so seek sort of.

14:00

And it's also really great, um to be

14:02

able to throw that back at the haters and say,

14:05

you know what, like actually a lot of

14:07

cops really support the work that I'm

14:09

doing, and you know a lot of cops

14:11

think the department should be completely scrapped

14:14

as well. God,

14:16

it's it truly is like, I mean,

14:18

you're the original series is incredible,

14:21

but getting to like here, you

14:23

know, like you've you've built it out in such

14:26

like a beautiful way that just

14:28

Yeah, hearing some of the audio that you've

14:30

collected, both in interviews and just like source

14:32

from other places in this series is like

14:34

it just brings a whole new dimension to how

14:37

fucking infuriating and deeply

14:39

illegal everything going on. Is. It's

14:41

one thing to read it and another thing to hear

14:43

it. Um. And we on the Becto

14:45

cast famously don't read, so an

14:48

audio medium is really

14:50

helpful for us. I can't lie. Yeah,

14:52

the original series, I did have to have my computer

14:55

read it to me like

14:58

a tradition of violence. Um.

15:01

But uh

15:03

and then that for like a couple of hours. But I

15:05

think I took it in. I gotta try that. It's

15:09

actually a really maddening

15:12

experience. It's to

15:15

hear your own words read with no emotion

15:17

back out to you. Um,

15:19

it's interesting. Try you should try. So

15:23

you know, everyone, we're gonna be linking to a

15:25

tradition of violence the podcast in the original

15:28

series on knock l a in the description.

15:30

But um, and thank you for talking

15:33

to us about it series. Um,

15:35

and for the rest of this episode, we're

15:37

gonna have some fun with some of

15:39

the weirdest copaganda these

15:42

eyes have ever seen. El

15:44

Camino Christmas? Was this a Netflix original?

15:47

Yeah? Okay, it feels

15:50

like that. Um,

15:53

okay, so El Comino Christmas. It is

15:55

a seventeen

15:57

movie directed by

16:00

David E. Talbert, who seems to only

16:02

direct Netflix Christmas movies.

16:05

So I was like, okay, so he's not a cop guy. He's

16:07

a Christmas guy. Didn't expect that.

16:10

He's also directed Almost Christmas and

16:12

Jingle Jangle a Christmas Journey,

16:14

so he's a bit of a Christmas

16:17

lad. It's written by

16:19

Oh, I mean shocking that people put

16:21

their names on this, someone named Christopher

16:25

Christopher Wayner and then also

16:27

Theodore Melfi, who had

16:30

previously written and directed hidden

16:32

Figures. I'm like, how do

16:34

we get from A to B here? Sure

16:39

it's and it's starring I

16:41

mean kind of kind of only all hitters.

16:44

Uh someone named Luke Grimes? Anyone knew

16:46

who that was? I didn't know who that was? Sure did not. Vincent

16:49

din Afrio. Dak Shepherd of

16:51

podcast fame. His wife

16:54

famously loves the Sheriff's Department. Just

16:56

want to put that out there. Wait,

16:59

can you give us quick context for our listeners?

17:01

Yes? Quit contacts on Dak Shepherd.

17:03

Um, so last Christmas? I believe

17:05

this was actually around the holidays.

17:08

Um, his wife? I'm

17:10

sorry? Who played? I can't remember her name?

17:12

Is it Kristin Kristin Bell? Kristin but almost

17:15

like Kristen Smart. That is not

17:17

his wife, Kristen

17:21

Bell. His wife, Kristen Bell took

17:23

it upon herself to go visit

17:26

deputies at the Lancaster Sheriff

17:28

station and post

17:30

about it on social media how much she

17:33

loves and supports the Los Angeles

17:35

County Sheriff's Department. So Kristin

17:37

Bell, also known as Veronica

17:39

Mars, huge supporter of

17:42

corrupt law enforcement departments.

17:45

How absolutely fucking vile

17:47

of her. I I

17:49

forgot about that, but it's like I feel

17:51

like she's very emblematic of like she's

17:53

like, I'm a liberal, I'm with her, but also

17:56

the Sheriff's department like

17:58

I'm with him, I'm with bea wava right

18:01

right. And they

18:03

did not see any gap in

18:06

this logic. I didn't make the Dacks

18:08

connection. So we've

18:10

got Das, We've got the dad from

18:13

that seven D show, yes, and

18:15

we've got Jessica Alba, We've got

18:17

Jimmy Oh yang ye, and of course

18:19

we have Mr

18:22

Marks Communist Manifesto, Wikipedia

18:25

himself, Tim Allen, A K. Scott

18:28

Calvin, Santa Claus Ak,

18:30

Tim Allen. Tim Allen is like a

18:32

known like right wing fucking

18:35

weirdo. But so

18:37

I wasn't shocked that he was in this movie.

18:39

But I was also like, Tim, your Christmas

18:42

cannon? Why, like, must

18:44

you smear the only thing

18:46

about you that I liked, which was Santa

18:49

Claus one? Well, El

18:52

Camino Christmas. There's also another

18:54

can I say another fun fact? Tim Mallan?

18:57

Please? Yes? Did you know that Tim

19:00

Allen is a federal informant and

19:02

he was convicted for

19:05

cocaine trafficking and

19:07

he was able to get out of it and start a Hollywood

19:09

career because he cooperated with the Feds

19:11

and turned on everyone and

19:14

that's why he's a movie star. So

19:17

lots of ties to law enforcement with this guy

19:19

cast. I'm just saying, the

19:22

Tim Allen cocaine saga

19:25

like never ceases to amaze me. Of

19:27

like how and also how like publicly

19:29

available that information always was.

19:31

That wasn't like something that came out later in his career.

19:34

I think he like talked about it in his stand up

19:37

at one point, like he was famously

19:39

a police informant, and everyone was like, let's

19:42

put him in a children's movie, let's

19:45

do that, and

19:47

then let's put him in another because Buzzing

19:51

and then Home Improvement, Oh my god,

19:54

he's a piece of sh it. And and bizarrely,

19:56

on the Betel Cast this holiday season, we

19:59

are covering who Tim Allen joints because Grace

20:01

Freud is returning to cover

20:03

the Santa Claus mini series. So

20:06

yes, and then no more Tim, No more Tim.

20:08

This is I'm putting my foot down.

20:11

I've had enough of this Tim Allen character,

20:13

who someone who's been famously bad his entire

20:15

career. Uh

20:18

SO series What is your

20:20

relationship with this movie El Camino

20:23

Christmas? Uh? Yeah, I

20:25

really didn't have much

20:27

of one before coming on this cast.

20:29

I picked this movie because I really wanted

20:31

to talk about a law enforcement

20:34

film, because you know, sitting

20:36

and having these intersectional conversations

20:38

about police representation in our

20:40

media is really important, especially

20:43

with two people such as yourselves. Thank

20:46

you, And this

20:48

is like this movie in particular

20:50

is like such an all

20:53

over This movie feels like it

20:55

was written by a hundred different people, all of whom

20:57

had different political views. Like it's so

20:59

confus saying yeah, with all

21:01

due respect, this is one of the worst movies

21:03

I've ever seen, not I can't

21:06

wait to not even just like story

21:08

content and politics wise, but also just

21:11

like looks like shit, it

21:13

sounds like ship, it sounds

21:16

the music is playing louder than the people

21:18

almost the whole movie. It's so

21:20

frustrating. Did you really want to hear what they were

21:23

saying? Though, Jamie's a

21:25

good point. Maybe it was a vengeful

21:27

editor that was like, oh, I don't need it dot

21:31

MP three horrible dialogue. Yeah,

21:34

I had never heard of this movie until you suggested

21:37

it for this episode. And

21:40

I mean, I'm glad I've seen it now, just because

21:43

I enjoy hate

21:46

watching things from time to time.

21:48

So this allowed me to indulge

21:50

in that there's so much you would

21:52

love my recommended list on

21:55

Netflix. Is

21:58

it all like Cursed Cop again? Yes?

22:02

Um? Shall

22:04

we shall we get into it? Shall I do the recap?

22:06

Yeah? Best of luck? Yeah? Right, Actually,

22:09

let's take I'm going to need to take a quick

22:11

break first, and then I'll gather my thoughts

22:13

and we will come right back.

22:24

And we're back, all

22:26

right. So l Camino

22:28

Christmas. We open on

22:30

a violent shootout. We see

22:33

members of the Sheriff's department,

22:35

We see vicent As liquor store,

22:38

but we don't really know what the situation is

22:40

yet. We cut to thirty

22:42

nine hours earlier. It's

22:44

a few days before Christmas. We are

22:46

in El Camino, Nevada, which

22:48

is not a real place I

22:51

discovered upon some research. I got

22:53

so confused because I assumed

22:55

that this was taking place in California

22:58

for some reason. And then and

23:00

then it turns out it's Nevada. I

23:03

figured that out a half hour into the movie.

23:05

It took me a while, so,

23:09

my god, I'm really down to my last four brain cells.

23:11

So this was a challenge. So

23:13

we're in the small town of El Camino,

23:16

Nevada. We are at the Sheriff's

23:18

department precinct. Sheriff

23:20

Bob played by kirkwood Smith

23:23

is yelling at Deputy Carl

23:25

Hooker played by Vincent Dinafrio

23:28

for being bad at his job. Carl

23:31

is an alcoholic who is

23:33

drinking and or drunk in pretty much every

23:36

scene we will see him in. Meanwhile,

23:39

this guy, Eric Norris played

23:41

by Luke Grimes has arrived

23:44

in El Camino and he goes

23:46

to a motel for

23:48

a room. Behind the front desk

23:51

is Bill is Bill

23:54

ok Bill. I

23:57

was like, what is his last name? I don't know, I don't care,

23:59

but that's like

24:01

you're like, you know what, that's

24:04

not worth it. That's Dex Shepherd's character,

24:07

who we also saw in the first

24:09

scene as a sheriff's deputy. So

24:11

he works as a hotel clerk

24:13

and a cop, which tracks. I

24:16

mean, a lot of cops I know have these

24:18

weird little side gigs that they do interesting.

24:21

I did not know that what are

24:23

what would be like an example of a of a

24:25

classic cops side gig. Classic

24:28

side gig of course, as private security or private

24:30

investigations. Um also bodyguard

24:34

security services. But

24:36

then you get the cops that are like real estate

24:38

agents or nutritionists

24:40

or trainers. Even though

24:42

that was allowed to be. Vienueva

24:44

actually owns a crossbit gym gross

24:49

two on the nose. Yeah,

24:52

predictable. Um

24:54

okay, So then we cut to Kate

24:56

played by Michelle Milett

24:59

and her young son Seth. They

25:01

cross paths with Eric

25:04

at a diner. We

25:06

also meet a news reporter named

25:08

Beth Flowers played by Jessica Alba,

25:11

who is heavily gregnant.

25:15

She's heavy with Greg and she's

25:18

wait was that intentional? Oh? Yes,

25:22

every any person who

25:24

is pregnant is actually gregnant anant

25:30

expecting a Greg any second now. Yeah,

25:32

she's about to explode with the little

25:35

Greg. We also

25:37

meet a camera operator played

25:39

by Jimmy oh Yang. I don't think we ever learn

25:41

his character's name. I don't know if he had

25:43

one. Yeah, I don't think, Yeah he

25:45

was. He was there to quip I. Look, I'm

25:48

very pro Jimmy oh Yang um

25:50

getting money same, which

25:52

I hope is the only reason he did this because

25:55

the movie is just

25:58

so god awful. It's trash. Yeah,

26:00

they're like local reporters that I think. Okay,

26:02

this was one of my favorite bad elements

26:05

of the movie, where the local

26:07

reporters are like resentful that

26:09

they've been given a fluff piece and

26:12

she describes it as like, oh,

26:15

like a local Like she

26:17

specifies that they're handicapped for no reason,

26:19

and she emphasizes that word in a way

26:22

that feels extremely ablest. Yes, yeah,

26:24

you're like the subtext to this line is very

26:27

gross and also confusing. But she's like, oh,

26:29

it's like a local person's passion

26:32

project, which is later revealed to be

26:34

a really straightforward nativity

26:36

play. I'm like, yeah, this passion project

26:39

was this? Do they know that this story

26:41

exists already? Like the Church of Christ?

26:44

I was expecting, like, you know, like Glengarry

26:46

Glenn Ross or some ship. But

26:49

they're like, no, it's just an activity play and

26:51

that's their passion project. The

26:53

writing in this movie is so funny

26:55

horrendous. Yeah, okay,

26:58

So meanwhile, Deputies Bill

27:00

and Carl are tailing

27:03

Eric, this you know, newcomer to town. They

27:05

think that he might be involved in meth

27:08

manufacturing or running because they see

27:11

him with a jug of drain oh, which

27:13

is like the first of many funny

27:16

What is that called when there's a product product

27:18

placement moments? There's so

27:20

much product placement. Bud Light Lemon,

27:22

bud Light Lemon, you say

27:24

the full name every time visit

27:27

din Aprio, who's the evil

27:29

characters like, get me a bud Light Lemon.

27:31

I love that bud Light Lemon. And

27:34

then Tim Alan brings it over. He's like, here's that

27:36

bud Light Lemon you asked for and then he

27:38

SIPs it and he's like, pretty good.

27:40

There at least yeah, like ten different

27:43

direct references to different brands

27:45

of alcohol. It's just like

27:48

very funny. Like but the

27:50

drain No got me good because they literally

27:53

prefaced the drain O spawn by being

27:55

like, this is a main ingredient in meth and

27:57

then it's like, cut to a bottle

27:59

of rain No. Drain No, make

28:01

your meth with it, like only

28:05

the best meth amphetam no

28:09

store brand for me. I make

28:11

myth amphetamine with original

28:14

branded drain No so

28:17

bad, so

28:21

they're telling Eric. Then

28:23

Eric goes and knocks on the door of

28:26

Tim Allen because Eric is looking

28:28

for a guy named Michael Roth.

28:31

Eric had found this fifteen year

28:33

old letter and the return address

28:36

on the letter is Tim Allen's address. We

28:38

don't really know who he's looking for or why,

28:41

but he's like, I have this letter and this

28:43

is the return address. But Tim Allen

28:46

is very hostile. He's possibly

28:48

drunk because he also is

28:50

an alcoholic. He says, I'm not your daddy.

28:53

He says, I'm not I'm not your daddy. Leave me alone.

28:55

But then he's like, if you buy me a beer,

28:58

I will tell you about the guy who

29:00

lived here before me. So Eric

29:03

takes Tim to a bar, but

29:06

which you shouldn't do in the movie and you shouldn't do with

29:08

Tim Allen in real life. Real life. No,

29:11

tim Allen continues to be a piece

29:13

of ship at the bar. He doesn't tell

29:15

Eric anything, so Eric storms out.

29:18

As Eric is returning to his motel,

29:21

Deputy Bill and Carl stop

29:24

him and arrest him because they find

29:26

weed that Tim Allen had

29:28

left in Eric's car, and they're also

29:31

like, you have drain o, so you're making meth.

29:34

And they're like, and you don't even know anything

29:36

about your car, so that means you're a criminal.

29:39

And then which again this

29:41

doesn't marry right. This

29:44

is great representation of how

29:46

police actually function. In my

29:48

experience, Like up to this point, this

29:50

is incredibly accurate. I must say

29:53

I was kind of surprised at the specificity

29:56

of like a totally like bogus,

29:59

like we'd charge as an as an

30:01

excuse to arrest someone that they just

30:03

wanted to arrest anyways. And then also how

30:05

it's like and we'll get into this in the discussion

30:08

later, but how at the beginning it's

30:10

established that like Vincent

30:12

Dinafrio's character is not arresting

30:15

enough people, and so

30:17

his motivation going to is

30:19

like he just needs to make arrests so he

30:21

appears productive. Yes.

30:24

Yes, this was also the thing that tipped me off

30:27

that they were not in California, because I was

30:29

like, oh, we does not illegal

30:31

in California, but it's legal in Nevada?

30:34

Is it okay? Was it? I

30:37

have the answer? Please tell us, Jamie.

30:39

The reason why this movie

30:42

feels like it takes place on another planet is not

30:44

only because it's bad. It's because the script

30:46

was written in two thousand and seven. Oh,

30:49

this was in development for over ten years,

30:51

so I think Mr. Hidden Figures was really embarrassed

30:54

that it actually came out at some point.

30:57

They developed this for ten years

31:00

humiliating. I mean, I think you can see

31:02

that what a labor of love it was for

31:05

everyone involved. A passion project perhaps,

31:08

So yeah, the passion

31:10

project that just ends up being a bad Nativity

31:13

play. So

31:17

okay. Anyway, So so they've arrested

31:19

Eric and they bring him into

31:22

the whatever like jail cell

31:25

and Deputy Carl beats the ship out

31:27

of Eric. But the next morning, Deputy

31:29

Bill, that's again Dax Shepherd,

31:32

let's Eric go. But this is something

31:34

that Carl doesn't know about. And

31:36

Carl spots Eric driving

31:38

away, so Deputy

31:41

Carl chases after him.

31:43

They both end up at Vicente

31:45

liquor Mart, where Kate

31:47

and her son also are, where

31:49

Tim Allen is and

31:52

where the owner, Vicente is, and

31:55

Carl comes in guns blazing,

31:58

and Tim Allen, who is is

32:00

ex military and he

32:02

has a gun on him. He shoots

32:04

Carl in the leg, and then

32:07

in this kind of scuffle, Eric ends

32:09

up with both guns. For some

32:11

reason, I kept forgetting his name was Eric. I

32:13

just kept writing down his name in my notes as

32:15

drain Now. Mr

32:18

drain Now was like drain Now has got a crush,

32:21

draina needs a dad, whatever,

32:23

drain No has two guns now, and it turns

32:26

into a hostage situation where

32:28

Eric a k A. Drain No is holding

32:31

everyone there hostage and

32:33

Sheriff Bob and Deputy Bill arrive.

32:36

Eric tries to escape, but

32:39

the cops have him surrounded. There's

32:41

more shooting. Meanwhile, Beth

32:44

Flowers aka Jessica Alba figures

32:46

out that something is going on, so she and Jimmy

32:48

O Young show up on the scene to report

32:51

about it. The shooting kind of calms

32:53

down and everyone in the store

32:56

is like, Hey, Eric, why are you

32:58

holding us hostage? Just turn

33:00

yourself in and he's like, pass

33:04

And it takes us at least. It took me a while to understand

33:07

why he's holding hostages, but I

33:10

guess it's because he's trying to clear

33:12

his name from his arrest last

33:15

night, and he's like, I'm not

33:17

gonna let everyone got

33:20

What was your take on why Draina was holding them

33:22

hostage? I couldn't. Yeah, I wasn't

33:24

even clear if he was really holding them,

33:26

because it seems to me like the hostage

33:29

situation was sort of like Carl

33:32

was really the catalyst for that. He's like, you're holding

33:34

us all hostage, and a

33:36

couple of times Eric drain No even

33:38

said like, I'm not holding anyone, you can go,

33:41

But then the cops started shooting, so

33:43

of course no one would want to leave at that point.

33:47

So I I wasn't even really

33:49

clear if he was like even holding them, and and

33:51

Carl was really the one saying like he's

33:53

got hostages, he's got hostages, and

33:55

they overpower him and shut him up as

33:58

a result of that. So like, did writers

34:00

even know if Eric was

34:02

motivated to hold these people

34:04

at hostage? I don't know. To me, it really seemed

34:07

like he ended up with the guns in his hand. The call

34:09

had gone out, and no one was

34:11

able to leave at that point. So right,

34:14

and he was viewed as having escaped.

34:18

I guess because right that

34:20

was another well I don't know if we want to get into this

34:22

in the discussion, but like the

34:25

way he left the jail was not clear.

34:28

It was not clear if he had been

34:30

released, if he was an escape ee

34:33

unclear. I mean, Dax Shepherd's

34:35

like, I'm gonna go take a dump. I'm gonna

34:38

leave the door open, I'm gonna give your

34:40

keys, and if you're not back when I get

34:42

back, well then shrug. I don't

34:45

know what happened, right,

34:47

But it's like, is he setting him up to

34:49

be an escaped convict or is

34:51

he actually being like, my partner is

34:54

a piece of ship, and I feel bad for you, so I'm letting

34:56

you go. Unclear, because there's

34:58

paperwork that needs to happen, and like, if

35:00

you've booked him as an arrest ee, you can't just

35:02

let someone like walk out. You need to process

35:05

them or they're still going to be in the system,

35:07

which presents the whole right.

35:10

I interpret it as Dax Shepherd

35:12

is extremely incompetent at

35:14

a cop, and so he was just like, well,

35:17

I'm just gonna let him go, and he

35:20

so he wasn't like setting him up necessarily.

35:22

He was just like, well, I'll just let you

35:24

go. It was just a weird charge.

35:27

I was sort of unclear on that too. Yeah, because

35:29

the dad from that seventy show, like mostly

35:31

what he's doing is calling Dak Shepherd

35:34

of a fucking fool all the time,

35:37

where he just like every word out of his mouth, he's like

35:39

Dax Shepherd, who by the way, sucks

35:41

at everything. Like so it's

35:43

like we're definitely supposed to think that and

35:46

he does. But also it's like you don't know how

35:48

he but like even even

35:51

uh fucking fools who don't know anything

35:53

have feelings, and I'm like, I don't know how he feels about

35:55

anything. It was really so confusing.

35:58

Yeah. Yeah, And also we didn't

36:01

touch on this yet, but like Carl, Yeah,

36:03

like Carl incites this event

36:05

to the point where he like you know,

36:07

shoots a gun in the air and then says shots

36:09

fired too. So he's also like

36:12

accusing drain no of additional

36:15

things he didn't do. He's making it sound

36:17

like drain oh was shooting

36:20

when it was Carl who shot

36:22

I think twice before getting

36:25

into the store. Right, So, a

36:28

semi hostage situation

36:30

unfolds, but it's not because Eric

36:33

is actually holding anyone hostage. It's because

36:36

this corrupt cop, Carl, instigates

36:39

this whole thing, and gun violence

36:42

ensues. Gunshots are fired by

36:44

a bunch of people, and then so now it's

36:47

just too hostile of the situation to

36:50

like de escalate safely kind of

36:52

thing. So that's what's going on inside

36:54

the liquor mart. The cops outside,

36:57

namely Sheriff Bob and

36:59

the beauty Bill, are trying

37:01

to figure out who is inside and

37:04

who is the gunmen who took

37:06

the other's hostage quote unquote. They

37:09

do suspect Eric as the gunman, and they

37:11

figured out who else is inside the store,

37:13

except that they don't know that Tim Allen is

37:16

inside, and that will become important

37:18

later. And after

37:20

a few hours, the cops decide to ambush

37:23

the store to take down the gunman

37:26

and save the hostages. But

37:28

right before this happens, Carl

37:31

shoots Eric with a secret

37:33

gun that he had the whole time. It's kind

37:35

of a plot gun, a plot gun that

37:37

he was hiding in his butt crack

37:40

question mark. It's so poor

37:42

and it's like also knowing anything about like

37:45

this stage of Vincent din Afria's career,

37:47

I'm just like I feel for him that

37:49

like he's oh, it's just it's just all

37:51

such a bummer. And once we're

37:53

in the liquor store, it's like pretty

37:56

much paid advertising

37:58

all the way. Like there's in the bat background of every

38:00

impactful shot, there's like Tito's

38:03

vodka. Oh my god. My

38:05

favorite scene is um to

38:07

Valin and his and dren No to Vlin

38:10

and Dreana were talking about Vietnam

38:13

and it's cutting back and forth between

38:15

a shot of like pop Tarts

38:18

and like instant Ramen, and

38:20

the labels are so prominent that

38:22

he's like, you were never there for me pop

38:25

Tarts, I couldn't be there for you

38:27

instant Ramen, like it's

38:31

really it's really special. Um So, Vincent

38:33

Donofrio shoots Draino with a secret

38:35

plot gun he has in his but yes,

38:38

exactly, this movie rocks Eric Eric.

38:41

Eric shoots Carl back and

38:43

fatally kills him. That's

38:46

not how you say that. But the cops

38:48

here the gun shots and open fire

38:50

on the liquor store. Vicenta gets

38:53

shot. Everyone is freaking out.

38:55

Silent Night is playing on the soundtrack

38:58

because it's Christmas Eve. You also haven't

39:00

mentioned the single mom in a while,

39:02

which is showing how much the story

39:05

Uh yeah, correct.

39:09

And then Tim Allen

39:12

starts telling a story about the Vietnam

39:14

War and Eric is like, I

39:17

already know because I read your letters

39:19

because you're my daddy, and Tim Allen

39:22

is like, yes, son, I

39:24

should have been there for your mom or something. Meanwhile,

39:28

Jessica Alba's Gregnancy has

39:30

reached critical mass and she goes into

39:32

labor on air as she's reporting,

39:35

Honestly, I didn't think they would do it. I was like,

39:37

Okay, if a movie is like written

39:39

and directed by like sis

39:42

guys, if there's a pregnant character

39:44

that's Tchekov's Greg, and

39:47

that Greg is gonna like rock

39:49

it out like a T shirt gun at some point in the movie,

39:51

they can't help themselves. You can't let someone

39:53

leave the movie is still pregnant, even if it takes

39:55

place over the course of thirty seven minutes

39:58

or whatever. The FuG She

40:00

is so gregnant and in labor.

40:03

The decks shepherd later hands her

40:05

water bottle and then she throws it at someone

40:07

else, and then she says it hurts so

40:09

bad because that's

40:12

how being in labor is.

40:14

God Jessica out and it's like Jessica

40:16

Alba is like a parent. She knows that

40:18

this isn't how kids. Yeah,

40:21

she knows that this isn't how Greg Nancy works.

40:24

I mean, I know it hurts very bad. The way

40:26

she was acting though, it is, but the way they had her

40:28

positioned, I thought she had also been

40:30

shot. And I was like, oh no, wait, she's the pregnant

40:33

character, so of course she's giving birth. Well,

40:35

because this movie is I

40:38

think, in theory a comedy, but

40:41

It took me so long to figure that

40:43

out because the comedy totally

40:46

it's just a very very weird movie.

40:48

There are attempts at comedy in it, but it rarely

40:51

lands or makes sense or there's

40:54

just like so much tonal dissonance and

40:56

it's absurd. I don't know what you're

40:58

talking about. It made total sense to

41:00

me, and

41:04

I was cracking up there. I did laugh

41:06

whenever it cut to pop tarts. Um, I

41:08

laughed at the parts that you're not supposed to be laughing

41:11

at. So so

41:13

then the FBI shows up and

41:16

Kate and her son leave

41:19

the store, which they probably could have

41:21

done the whole time. Yes, I think so. No

41:23

one was ever going to shoot them, So

41:26

now it's just Eric and his

41:29

dad, Tim Allen, and Tim Allen

41:31

decides to take the fall for

41:33

this, and he acts like he's the gunman

41:36

who took the hostages in

41:38

order to save Eric,

41:40

but not before he makes

41:43

a weird pass at the second most prominent

41:46

woman in the movie, which is a

41:48

cardboard cut out of a PBR model.

41:53

Good stuff, incredible

41:55

writing, flawless, no notes. Okay,

41:58

So he goes outside with the

42:01

cardboard cutout of this sexy

42:03

lady and then he pulls out

42:05

both guns. So the cops shoot

42:08

down Tom Allen and kill him. But

42:10

that's his like redemption thing.

42:14

Then we flashed forward to a hundred and eighty

42:17

two days later, very specific

42:19

number. Vicente has lived. I

42:21

feel like that had to change. That

42:23

had to be a script note. He was

42:26

so dead and like extremely he's

42:29

fine and on vacation, and

42:31

the epilogue it is I mean, I'm glad his character

42:34

lived, but that is not how that was

42:36

shot at all. That he was

42:38

also thirty two million dollars richer,

42:40

and he made a comment of if you do the math,

42:43

that's eight million per bullet, which

42:46

is just again that note about comedy

42:49

and tone. I just I'm like,

42:51

I didn't even catch supposed to be miserable,

42:55

right, God, I'm

42:57

not sure. Okay, So it's a hundred.

42:59

It's six months later, but they call it two

43:02

days later. We check in with all

43:04

of the characters, such

43:06

as Deputy Bill is running for sheriff.

43:09

Beth Flowers is a reporter in Austin,

43:12

Texas. Now Kate's mom

43:14

is dating a weather guy from l

43:17

A and laughing at his horrible

43:19

joke. Vicente is still alive,

43:21

and he got this huge settlement out of being

43:24

shot by the cops, and Eric

43:27

is hanging out with Kate and

43:29

her son at a diner. The

43:32

and his daddy died, but now he's

43:34

daddy. Now he's daddy. Like the Santa

43:37

Claus, They're gonn only be one daddy. It's like the Santa

43:39

Clause. It's like

43:42

The Godfather. There's a lot of

43:44

parallels. You gotta take down the first daddy

43:46

and then you're now you're the one. You're the daddy

43:49

exactly, the daddy now. And then the movie is

43:51

like, all right, it's over, and then it cuts to like my

43:53

movie credits and

43:57

Vincent din Afrio singing a

44:00

dorble rendition of a Christmas song. Alright,

44:02

let's take another quick break and we will come back

44:05

to discuss, and

44:13

we're back. Okay. Um, so I

44:16

already like started to get into this, but um,

44:19

in your professional opinion, what

44:23

is this? What is going on

44:25

here? And and how

44:27

professional opinion? What the yeah

44:32

with the respect, what the fund is happening

44:34

in this movie? Is there? Because it's

44:37

like you're you mentioned at a few points like that

44:39

is actually like a pretty realistic

44:42

thing that a sheriff. Remember

44:44

the sheriff Department made do. How do you feel

44:46

this movie did in terms of that,

44:49

in terms of representing

44:53

how a lot of

44:55

Sheriff's Department officials,

44:58

a lot of police officials treat

45:00

their job and relate to the people in their

45:02

profession. I thought it was pretty spot

45:05

on. The constant drinking that

45:07

Carl is doing on the job, his

45:09

manipulation of active

45:11

crime, scenes of evidence of

45:14

beating people, and custody that are handcuffed.

45:17

I've seen all of that before multiple

45:19

times. The sheriff himself

45:22

when he arrives on the scene. This is all taking

45:24

place at a gas station, and the sheriff is

45:26

chain smoking throughout this gas station

45:29

constantly. Um. He even makes

45:31

a remark about that they're going to send

45:33

in the gas and gas all these

45:35

people out of the structure. Um. That gas

45:38

was actually used in Waco, Texas,

45:41

when the Branch Davidians were in this

45:43

stand up, very similar standoff, and I thought

45:45

a lot about the Branch Davidians watching this, Actually,

45:48

I was like, who is the Koresh of this Yeah,

45:51

of this liquor store. Yeah, And

45:54

when they did that to Koresh

45:56

and his followers, that gas,

45:59

Um, that gas highly flammable, and we

46:01

saw what happened to those poor

46:03

souls in Waco, Texas. They were all burned

46:05

alive. And again this is happening

46:07

at a gas station and he's starting

46:10

to bring in this highly flammable gas. And

46:12

then at the end when Billy is campaigning

46:14

for sheriff and he is in uniform,

46:17

illegally campaigning Um

46:19

whilst on the job. That's another thing

46:21

that we saw throughout this past election

46:23

cycle when our now sheriff

46:25

soon to be ex Sheriff, Alex Nueva Um

46:28

did this multiple times throughout

46:30

the election cycle. So as far

46:33

as Oh my God, and my favorite

46:35

part in this movie, before Karl dies,

46:37

he guilt trips everyone in the store

46:40

and says, who was the one you came to when

46:43

you had a problem? Um? Ostensibly

46:45

as a member of the sheriff's department. You

46:48

know it's your job to do something

46:50

when you know a woman comes to you and says

46:52

that she's a victim of domestic violence. Right,

46:54

You're not a hero for doing your job

46:57

correct? Well, that was like what the

47:00

things that pain for me? Where I was like, is he implying

47:02

that he did a good job in that situation

47:05

because it's like the sheriff's

47:07

department also has a horrible record with preventing

47:09

domestic violence. It seems like they are causing

47:12

it more often than they are preventing it. Right,

47:15

And he implied that he really didn't do anything.

47:17

When he talks about the man that was hitting

47:20

Katie, he says, I ran him out of town,

47:23

which to me doesn't sound like, Oh, I

47:25

you know, pursued a case scott evidence

47:27

and saw him prosecuted, so the full it's done on the

47:29

law. Instead, he behaved like a vigilante

47:32

and ran this person out of town where

47:35

he you know, I'm assuming he's

47:37

probably gone on to victimize another woman in

47:39

another city. Right, Oh

47:42

my gosh. So my question is,

47:45

while a lot of the behavior and actions

47:47

of the deputies

47:50

and sheriff tracks

47:52

with real life sheriff

47:54

department behavior, how

47:57

does the movie feel about these

47:59

characters though? Because at certain points

48:01

I'm like, oh, they're they're showing us

48:03

like, look how corrupt Carl

48:06

is and isn't that horrible? Look

48:08

how incompetent Bill is and isn't

48:11

that embarrassing? And shouldn't we have, you

48:13

know, better people on the force. But

48:15

then the movie, especially the way it ends, it

48:18

like does a lot too, I think encourage

48:21

the audience to empathize with, especially

48:23

Sheriff Bob and Deputy Bill,

48:26

because it checks back in with them and it's

48:28

like, ha ha, aren't these moments funny? Where

48:31

Bob is getting hypnotherapy

48:33

question Mark to try to stop smoking and

48:36

Bill is like having a goofy

48:39

moment with this woman who keeps

48:41

having raccoons on her property. I'm

48:44

like, how does the movie actually feel about

48:47

law enforcement? And is

48:49

it coming from the right place? That is something

48:51

I was never clear on both

48:54

times I watched this movie. You

48:56

watched this movie twice? I did

48:59

that that is the appropriate response.

49:03

Well, in my defense, I also

49:06

only have four brain cells left, and I have

49:08

to watch a movie twice. You can't catch all the gorgeous

49:11

nuance of this film on

49:13

only one watch. Yeah, you need to see it

49:15

twice. Yeah. I felt I had some

49:17

similar like, I mean, this movie

49:19

is so like this movie felt like it was written by

49:21

so many people that from

49:24

scene to scene it felt like it's loyalties

49:26

would shift, like in one way

49:29

or another. Because even like the

49:32

because I agree series that like the guilt

49:34

trip that Carl does at

49:36

the end is like very in character

49:39

of what a real life member of a

49:41

sheriff's department might do, but then like the

49:44

music that backs him sort of makes

49:46

it sound like think

49:49

about that. Yeah, this

49:51

changes everything when right, It's

49:54

so bizarre and but it's also

49:56

like Tim Allen's character is

49:58

like against the sheriff and is like almost

50:01

the voice of reason in the scene, which is

50:03

like very He's also a Vietnam

50:05

veteran who like lovingly recalls

50:08

like bombing the fuck out

50:10

of a village that I had

50:12

to That is one scene that I did rewatch

50:15

to be like did I Did I get that

50:17

right? Where the story he

50:19

tells, And please either of you correct

50:22

me if I misunderstood this, because I was just

50:24

like, this can't be it he's

50:26

talking about He's he's very romantically

50:29

recalling being in Vietnam.

50:32

He's in some sort of leadership position.

50:35

He sees a village full

50:37

of innocent families and says,

50:40

let's not murder this village.

50:44

But then the Vietnamese armed

50:46

forces instead kill

50:48

not just the village but also a bunch

50:51

of Tim Allen's buddies. And

50:53

so Tim Allen is like, I really

50:55

wish that I had just killed those innocent

50:58

people like that, I

51:02

think, so that's

51:04

what I had sunk for me. Yeah, just

51:07

a baffling way to make us

51:10

and we're supposed to like really like

51:12

him and that it's just so dissonant

51:15

and bizarre, right because this is like the

51:18

beginning of his redemption arc. And

51:20

then he's like, well, I wasn't

51:22

there for you as a daddy. Maybe

51:25

if I had just killed all those innocent people,

51:27

I would have been a good father to you. I

51:31

I think is is this is

51:33

the takeaway? And then he's

51:36

like, well, I threw my life away, but

51:39

I can still redeem myself if I go

51:42

outside and take

51:44

the fall for this hostage situation out

51:47

my guns for some reason, and

51:49

then get shot down. And then as

51:52

he's dying. I didn't mention this to recap, but

51:54

as he's lying there bleeding out, he says

51:56

something. He's like looking up to heaven

51:59

presumably, and he's like, well,

52:01

I hope it's better up there in

52:04

heaven. Like what does he say? It's something

52:07

like that you're not going there to him, straight

52:11

to hell, bro. But

52:14

then there's other moments it's

52:16

so hard. There's other moments where at

52:18

least in regards to how the other

52:21

characters in the gas Station view

52:24

the sheriff's department, where I'm like, all

52:26

right, they're nibbling at something there where

52:29

like I feel like, very

52:31

often in movies that feature

52:34

cops, sheriffs, any sort of like

52:36

violent law enforcement, it like

52:39

underestimates the average person's

52:41

ability to understand how obviously

52:44

corrupt the authorities are. And

52:46

it sort of is like everyone is just like

52:49

completely loyal and they're like gets a

52:51

police officer, it's a sheriff. They

52:53

would never hurt me. And the

52:55

characters in this movie,

52:58

while terribly written, do seem

53:00

to like constantly acknowledge

53:02

how corrupt the sheriff's department is. Like

53:04

it seems like everybody is kind of aware

53:06

of it, to the point where even Tim

53:09

Allen like calls out the hypocrisy

53:11

of the sheriff, and like, I

53:13

thought that was interesting, where like Vincent

53:15

din Afriel was saying, like, oh,

53:18

Tim Allen, you're a drunk, and Tim Allen's

53:21

like, well, I don't drink and drive or drink

53:23

and arrest people like you do, so,

53:27

which is like, yeah, facts, bro, He's

53:30

kind of he kind of nailed it. It

53:32

was so confusing I'm just an asshole

53:35

when I'm drunk. You I

53:38

do like when Tim Allen, I guess,

53:40

gets so drunk that he passes out for what

53:42

seems to be a large portion of

53:45

the hostage situation because

53:47

he's just snoozing, snoring on the

53:49

ground. That bud light lemon, That

53:52

bud light lemon, right to sleep,

53:54

the bud light lemon, the past blue ribbon,

53:57

the fed vodka, the pop tarts,

53:59

that chetos. Oh, there was also

54:02

the romance scene near the cheetos. I

54:04

really like the cheeto romance scene. You know

54:06

what really gets me going is a nice

54:09

hot cheeto. Oh, perhaps

54:13

even a flaming hot cheeto. Um

54:17

we I guess talk about the

54:19

women in the movie, Yeah,

54:22

it'll be a short discussion, so

54:25

we've got well. This was another thing that

54:27

was I think was a pretty boldly

54:31

gross precedent that this movie seems

54:33

to want to explore, Which is that um

54:36

our main character. Oh God, I've

54:38

kept writing drain No's girl, Kate.

54:41

Kate is a young

54:43

single mom. Of what we learned

54:45

in the scene where they're introduced, it seems

54:47

of a boy with autism or

54:50

his doctor is suggesting, I think your son

54:53

maybe on the autism spectrum,

54:56

and Kate immediately denies

54:58

this, does not want to

55:00

listen, and we are supposed to be

55:02

firmly on her side about this, correct.

55:05

She is coming in with an extremely ablest

55:08

stance because she seems to

55:10

be horrified at the thought that her

55:13

son would be on the

55:15

autism spectrum, because like neurodivergent

55:18

in anyway, because she's basically like,

55:21

he is normal, and it's like, well, what do

55:23

you mean when you say that, Kate? Well,

55:26

the way the doctor describes autism

55:28

spectrum disorders is extremely able

55:30

ist too, because she says something like, you

55:33

know, children can seem perfectly

55:35

normal with only minor anomalies,

55:38

and it's like, that is not how we

55:40

talk about neurodivergence.

55:43

Doctor. Also, what are you a doctor

55:46

in? Like? It was also very unclear

55:48

what the appointment had been for. That

55:51

scene was horribly done, and

55:53

then I was like, God, I hope that because

55:55

it seemed like the reason this even

55:58

came up is because her son seth

56:00

question mark, was non

56:03

verbal and it hadn't begun speaking.

56:05

I don't know how old the character is, it doesn't

56:07

matter. Five we learned he's five years old. He's

56:10

five, okay, So he's five and

56:12

and he's nonverbal. His mother

56:14

is not willing to talk to

56:16

a doctor about this, but the doctor is also horrible.

56:19

The story plays out there held hostage for

56:21

no reason. They could have left it any time. And

56:24

then it's like implied by the movie

56:27

that drain No becoming a father

56:30

quote unquote cures Yes,

56:33

Seth non verbal and

56:36

then all of a sudden he's speaking in full sentences

56:38

because drain now is his daddy. Now. It's

56:40

just like fucking absurd and gross.

56:43

That is the logic of the movie. Could

56:46

I track it? No, But is

56:48

what the movie seems to be suggesting

56:52

really bizarre? Um. And then we already talked

56:54

about Jessica Alba's characters able

56:56

is um, yeah, so that's horrendous.

56:59

Well, and the fact that all three women who appear

57:01

in the movie are just like defined

57:03

by mommy, like their mommy, the

57:06

single mom. She's there to be mommy. Her

57:09

mommy is also there to be mommy. But but

57:11

that moms. Oh yeah

57:15

about horny mom really quick, well, there are three

57:18

what a horny mom? There

57:20

are three stages of mommy nous. There

57:23

is currently gregnant mommy. There

57:25

is young mummy who has a small child

57:28

already. And then there's older horny

57:30

mom mommy. And also she's technically horny

57:33

grandma as well, another beloved

57:35

trope on the Pectel cast exactly. But

57:37

and she's she's so horny she can't

57:40

parent. Like that's how horny

57:42

this woman is. Like I have to go bowling with

57:45

Dennis the dental hygienist and

57:47

we're like, what do you have a sexy

57:49

bowling shirt? I

57:53

will say, of all the actors in the movie, I

57:55

feel like horny Horny Mom was did

57:58

the most with the least. No

58:00

one is doing anything in this movie but horny

58:02

Mom. She tried to make the best of it. Did it work,

58:04

No, but she tried. She tried. Same

58:07

with the Sente given nothing sent

58:10

justice for Vicente. Um.

58:12

I want to shout out a few of my favorite moments

58:14

in the movie. I mean, speaking of Kate

58:17

and the lack of characterization she is

58:20

given. One of the most absurd scenes

58:22

to me in the movie was it's toward

58:24

the beginning, she's working at the

58:27

liquor mart, behind the counter, the

58:29

only person working there. She's behind the counter.

58:32

She's supposed to be like, you know, making

58:34

sure things are running

58:36

smoothly. Eric comes in. It's

58:38

about it as much as the movie knows about running

58:40

a store to working

58:43

at store and you know, etcetera,

58:45

etcetera, YadA YadA,

58:47

YadA. Um. Eric comes in. Kate

58:51

is behind the cash register, but she's

58:53

turned away, facing like one eight

58:55

degrees away from the entrance, the

58:57

cash register, the counter. She's

59:00

also hunched over a book and listening

59:02

to music on headphones, so he has

59:04

to be like, hey, excuse me. He grabs

59:07

her. This startles her and

59:10

she's very piste off about it, but it's like, yes,

59:12

he shouldn't have grabbed her, but you were

59:15

doing your job so badly,

59:18

like you were turned

59:20

away from everything you should have been turned

59:22

toward, and anyone could have come

59:24

in and just like stolen everything.

59:27

Like okay, Caitlin, I will say, that's

59:29

not the comment, because I have done

59:31

that job like that. Have

59:35

I absolutely worked at a desk, not facing

59:38

the people I was supposed to be serving, actively

59:41

blocking them out. Absolutely, I

59:43

understand the I actually support

59:45

her doing her job that way, that being badly

59:48

studying microbiology. Yeah,

59:51

that's not like other girls. He's

59:53

a woman in stem. She has

59:55

literally a woman in stem. Will that become relevant?

59:57

No, she's a mother. I

1:00:02

just was I like that they just threw that out there for no

1:00:04

reason. I was just confounded

1:00:06

that she was so mad that he startled

1:00:09

her when she was doing

1:00:12

her job. Not well anyway,

1:00:14

I guess I just I hate Drano so and ran

1:00:16

such a Yeah, he's he's

1:00:19

the worst. Also, like I

1:00:22

love when a whole movie could have been a text

1:00:24

or something like that, Like he could

1:00:26

have just like emailed Tim Allen and

1:00:28

this whole movie would not have happened and

1:00:30

it would have made more sense. But whatever. Yeah,

1:00:34

but it's I kind of forgot that they told

1:00:36

us that Kate is like going to school

1:00:38

for anything, because it's never

1:00:40

relevant, Like her problems are she

1:00:43

is, I mean a real problem. She's a single

1:00:45

momb struggling to get by, okay, but

1:00:48

that's the only thing that's ever really relevant.

1:00:50

Is like that she has a young son that

1:00:53

she struggles with caretaking for it because

1:00:55

she doesn't have a lot of money. Enter horny

1:00:57

mom who's not helpful. But it's all problems.

1:01:00

And then and then on top of that, they

1:01:03

throw in and she loves Drain.

1:01:05

Now she's got a little

1:01:07

crush on Drain. No, but she's so I

1:01:09

guess my point is for this scene is that the

1:01:12

writers for some reason wanted to establish

1:01:14

conflict between Kate

1:01:17

and drain Oh, but the way

1:01:20

they do it just makes her seem to

1:01:22

me, just makes her seem very unreasonable and

1:01:25

like illogical, and I'm

1:01:27

just like, so that

1:01:29

is what The way that she's characterized in that moment

1:01:32

is what bothered me. But yeah,

1:01:34

the movie, my favorite woman

1:01:37

was the cardboard one, and

1:01:39

everyone talked to her. It is true,

1:01:43

including oh yeah, Vicente is like, don't

1:01:45

worry my dead wife. I'm

1:01:48

not going to cheat on you with cut

1:01:51

out, cut out lady. She's

1:01:55

kind of the hottest lady in town. Everyone's literally

1:01:57

in love with her. Everyone

1:01:59

loves her. I got that that

1:02:02

scene the way that they because that's the only

1:02:04

characterization Vicente gets. Everyone

1:02:07

gets like a sentence except for Dreano

1:02:09

and Tim Allen, who gets the rest of the movie, but

1:02:13

Vicente, Like it's the kind of scene where it's like,

1:02:15

well, no one else is in here, and we need

1:02:17

to know that Vicente is mourning

1:02:19

his wife so that the sheriff can guilt

1:02:21

him about it later. And that's

1:02:24

the only thing we ever learned about Vicente other

1:02:26

than he's a real sweetheart

1:02:28

and gets Seth a toy. And

1:02:32

also I wrote down at some point I was

1:02:34

like, hopefully Vicente is like keeping

1:02:37

track of how much they are eating and drinking

1:02:40

the Sheriff's department. I'm

1:02:42

glad he got thirty two million dollars and that clearly

1:02:45

rewritten ending. But um, what

1:02:47

about the three d dollars worth of

1:02:49

bud Light lime they drink in the one

1:02:52

hour they were in there? Right, Also, there's

1:02:54

that scene where Carl comes in and he like buys

1:02:56

a bunch of stuff and then he just throws down maybe

1:02:59

like seventies recents and he's like,

1:03:01

that's all I have. Yes, he's strong

1:03:03

arm robs the sense. Yes,

1:03:06

add that to the list of corrupt cop

1:03:08

things that Carl does. One

1:03:11

of my favorite scenes is when Tim

1:03:13

Allen is also. Also,

1:03:16

the way the movie depicts alcoholism

1:03:18

is questionable. Anyway,

1:03:21

the sent kind of sponsored it. No, like

1:03:24

we're gonna make a movie about alcoholism and

1:03:26

just have a bunch of con for

1:03:28

various alcohol friends. That's

1:03:31

great, that's yeah. Both of the

1:03:34

like Vici din Afrio and Tim

1:03:36

Allen are both ruined by

1:03:39

alcohol, but they're also like, but they

1:03:42

love this blud light, lie you want to ruin your life?

1:03:45

Have you considered bud light line?

1:03:48

Bud It's the same logic of the drain

1:03:50

o spawn, Like, it doesn't

1:03:52

make any sense. Also, do you put draino

1:03:54

down your toilet when it's clogged? I've I don't

1:03:57

know if that's a thing anyway, right, I didn't

1:03:59

think so it's for your sink? Is for the

1:04:01

train train?

1:04:05

That's what I thought. Trainer is worthless?

1:04:08

Yeah, I gotta I

1:04:10

honestly, I don't know why I assumed the movie

1:04:12

was smarter than me in that moment where I was like, I

1:04:14

guess you can use it for that too. Well,

1:04:17

speaking of repairing things, Kate

1:04:20

can fix the cooler in the

1:04:22

store, but Vicente can't. So a woman

1:04:24

can fix it, a man can't, And that's feminism

1:04:27

anyway. One

1:04:30

of my favorite lines of dialogue, or like exchanges

1:04:33

of dialogue is when Vicente is talking

1:04:35

to Tim Allen and he says, why don't you

1:04:37

find yourself a nice lady? You

1:04:39

wouldn't need all this liquor, And Tim

1:04:41

Allen says, this is how this works.

1:04:44

I give you money, you give me booze. It's

1:04:46

simple capitalism, and we're

1:04:48

like incredible dialogue,

1:04:51

perfect, so good, and

1:04:53

then Vicente, keeping in being

1:04:56

a sweetie pie, is like, all right, you

1:04:58

can have a free six pack for what

1:05:00

for what you just yelled at me. There's

1:05:04

so confusing the sentate. I mean, I think that,

1:05:06

like, well, the Sente is the one of

1:05:08

the only this is like a majority white

1:05:10

cast, and I think it's like telling

1:05:13

how non white cast members are treated.

1:05:15

We don't even know what Jimmy O Young's name is. He

1:05:18

certainly has no arc. Jessica

1:05:21

Alba does have an arc,

1:05:23

but it's completely defined by the fact that she's about to

1:05:25

explode with Greg like so

1:05:28

really not much for her as well. But I

1:05:30

think Vicente especially we should

1:05:32

talk about because he's the only I mean he

1:05:35

is. I think that when when Karl

1:05:37

dies, it's meant in the movie

1:05:39

to be like and that is kind of his just desserts

1:05:42

here. He he deserves it. Why

1:05:45

we kill the Sente but then bring him

1:05:47

back to life? I just did. I did not like it,

1:05:49

but did not like that they brutally

1:05:51

killed Vicente. Could not make

1:05:53

kids or tales of that. I

1:05:56

think another I mean, another example

1:05:58

of the movie be actually depicting

1:06:01

police behavior is being

1:06:04

very realistic is when Carl says

1:06:06

something very racist to to

1:06:09

Vicente, which is again like very

1:06:11

par for the course for law

1:06:14

enforcement overall, but

1:06:17

the fact that we know very

1:06:20

little about Vicente. He's pretty

1:06:23

incidental to the story and

1:06:25

then is brutally shot in

1:06:28

that final shootout, but then

1:06:30

comes back to life and meets

1:06:33

a sexy lady on the beach for

1:06:36

him. But I also feel like it's suggested that she only

1:06:39

likes him after she learns that he's worth dollars.

1:06:43

I'm not sure anyway justice

1:06:45

for a Vicente and may make the joke about

1:06:47

how many millions of dollars per times

1:06:50

he was shot by a sheriff

1:06:53

like that. The

1:06:58

director of the movie, David Etel Albert,

1:07:00

is a black filmmaker,

1:07:03

which I was surprised to learn based

1:07:05

on the way that characters of color are

1:07:08

represented on screen. No kidding,

1:07:12

did not know that. Yes, so

1:07:15

I'll say I would recommend his other his

1:07:17

subsequent Christmas movie, Jingle Jangle. I

1:07:19

thought it was a delight. I

1:07:22

still need to see it. It's good, but it's

1:07:24

a good one. Um, yeah,

1:07:26

I it's I I mean,

1:07:29

someone needs to be held accountable for this

1:07:31

movie's existence. It's

1:07:34

very unclear to be like, I'm

1:07:37

normally I'm very

1:07:39

quick to blame the director, but in

1:07:42

in this case, he is very clearly

1:07:44

already like there's some sort

1:07:46

of situation where he has to direct one Netflix

1:07:48

Christmas movie a year or got him locked

1:07:51

up at Netflix and they're you

1:07:53

gotta do this opaganda

1:07:56

Christmas film. So I'm curious that

1:07:58

maybe how much he I'd be curious to

1:08:00

know how much he wanted to direct this

1:08:02

movie. And then

1:08:05

it also seems like, I mean, Theodore

1:08:07

Malfie, who is he's a

1:08:09

white writer, even he had

1:08:12

thoroughly backed off having written

1:08:14

this because he wrote it ten

1:08:16

years before it was ever produced, and

1:08:18

then hopefully like read a fucking

1:08:21

book at some point, and it

1:08:24

sounded like by the time the movie was made even

1:08:26

he like no longer stood by what

1:08:28

he had written. It just seems like was

1:08:31

anyone involved in this project voluntarily?

1:08:34

I don't know. I mean, I think Dak Shepherd

1:08:37

was. I think I think Dak

1:08:39

Shepherd. I mean, maybe maybe the cast. I

1:08:41

don't know, but it just was very bizarre.

1:08:44

Is also produced by Theodore

1:08:46

Malfie's wife, like it was a whole

1:08:49

family affair making this bad movie

1:08:51

interesting. I couldn't

1:08:53

find any information about it because

1:08:55

well, obviously we I always begin

1:08:58

my research on scholarly journal Wikipedia,

1:09:02

and this movie has one of the

1:09:04

sparsest Wikipedia entries

1:09:07

I've ever seen, because it's like, no one

1:09:09

did press around it. No one wanted to draw attention

1:09:11

to the fact that this was released. People wanted

1:09:13

to forget about it, but my Netflix algorithm

1:09:16

wouldn't let it happen. Series

1:09:19

is Neflix algorithm trounced

1:09:22

this movie's determination to not exist.

1:09:24

I mean, I guess it's like, I'm glad

1:09:27

it's not popular, right

1:09:30

again, never heard of it till we

1:09:32

recorded this episode, um

1:09:35

series. I guess I was interested in your

1:09:38

final word on this in terms of, like, as someone

1:09:40

who I know his consumed

1:09:43

a lot of copaganda, it's

1:09:45

in your algorithm. You can't escape.

1:09:48

How does for its five

1:09:50

trillion faults we just discussed, how does

1:09:52

El Camino Christmas stack

1:09:55

up against your average

1:09:57

coppaganda, my average compagandor average

1:10:00

Christmas copaganda? Because

1:10:02

there is that sub genre. Please

1:10:05

unpack that well. I mean, you got

1:10:07

the Classic, you got die Hard, you

1:10:09

got die Hard too. Al Camino

1:10:12

Christmas isn't it there? I mean there are

1:10:14

a lot of like feel good

1:10:16

Christmas movies involving the police,

1:10:19

which is a whole other conversation.

1:10:22

I picked this one because it was recent. I incorrectly

1:10:25

assumed that it took place in Los Angeles.

1:10:27

Um, but it seems like, you know, I

1:10:29

wasn't alone in that assumption, and

1:10:32

the way it was sure it was shot in Burbank,

1:10:35

it probably was. How

1:10:37

does it stuck up? Man, I gotta say

1:10:40

it's I like it because I don't

1:10:43

like it. Let me rephrase that. I appreciate

1:10:46

that there are moments where

1:10:49

the police are portrayed in

1:10:51

ways that are accurate

1:10:54

to people that are interacting with

1:10:56

the police and our representative

1:10:59

of you know, a lot of people's experiences.

1:11:02

What I did not like is

1:11:04

that it didn't go anywhere with

1:11:06

that, and those instances

1:11:10

they attempted to laugh them off in a

1:11:12

weird way, like the comment

1:11:15

about the bullet. I think there was also

1:11:17

a remark made about Eric being beaten

1:11:19

up in custody, which

1:11:21

is just why I

1:11:24

don't know what that is

1:11:26

supposed to serve. Hey,

1:11:29

maybe there is a way to do comedy

1:11:32

about the police where they are well,

1:11:34

actually I know there is. I think, like what a

1:11:36

lot of things that are happening on Reno I

1:11:39

think are really smart and are

1:11:42

possibly a good way to talk about the

1:11:44

police in a comedic lens. I

1:11:46

love that show, although I haven't seen it in a

1:11:48

while, but I was a huge fan for

1:11:51

a while. Yeah, from what I it's been

1:11:53

a while too, but from what I remember, what I

1:11:55

did like about that show is like, yes, this

1:11:57

is how the police behave, and like, this is

1:11:59

funny, we can laugh at it, but there are a

1:12:01

lot of real things that play here. I

1:12:04

feel like this was like attempting to do something

1:12:07

like that, but Whift incredibly

1:12:13

truly. Yeah, I was, I was. I

1:12:16

was. Nothing about this

1:12:18

movie was a pleasant surprise necessarily,

1:12:21

but I was fully

1:12:23

going into this with the I

1:12:26

mean, even Tim Allen's involvement. I

1:12:28

was just like, well, this is going to be explicitly

1:12:31

pro cop all the way down. I was surprised

1:12:33

that it even approached a criticism

1:12:35

of the sheriff's office or or

1:12:38

the idea of a sheriff. Again,

1:12:40

it's like, because the movie is so poorly written,

1:12:42

it's really hard to know how

1:12:45

we're supposed to be feeling. But it did

1:12:47

feel like there were a few flavors of

1:12:51

corrupt sheriff presented poorly

1:12:53

but presented where it's like Dak Shepherd

1:12:56

is like an incompetent Carl

1:12:58

is drinking and inciting

1:13:01

violence and making false arrests, and

1:13:04

then the dad from that seventies show is

1:13:06

the one who's like setting those precedents of like you're

1:13:08

not arresting enough people, and it is, you

1:13:11

know, And so it was like a

1:13:13

lot of it seems like, as

1:13:15

far as I know from listening

1:13:17

to and interacting with your work series like

1:13:20

classically shareff fee things to do. But

1:13:23

yeah, but it like goes nowhere and we

1:13:26

still are supposed to like them enough at the end

1:13:28

that you want to see him go to a hypnotherapist

1:13:30

and stop smoking. So not successful.

1:13:33

What I think it is is

1:13:36

what little criticism there is about

1:13:39

a sheriff's department is mostly directed

1:13:41

at Carl, and

1:13:44

he does seem to be the most corrupt one,

1:13:48

but he's the baddest apple exactly.

1:13:50

The messages like, well there's one bad apple,

1:13:52

so you know, you can't let it spoil

1:13:55

the bunch. But but

1:13:57

the movie is like, well, yeah, Dax

1:13:59

Chef Bird's character is

1:14:01

incompetent, but you see him improving,

1:14:04

he's getting better at police work because

1:14:06

he's like, yeah, I ran the license

1:14:08

plates and then and then

1:14:11

Sheriff Bob is like, wow, good job,

1:14:13

buddy, great cop work.

1:14:16

Like that's like cutting to the end of a movie

1:14:18

about a chef and then he's like, look, I

1:14:21

turned the heat on. And they're

1:14:23

like, hey, that's good

1:14:26

decks, good job, you

1:14:28

get to keep your job. It's

1:14:30

a mess um. But

1:14:33

does the movie pass the Bechdel test? I

1:14:36

actually it doesn't, think it does

1:14:38

it? Does it does? Okay?

1:14:41

Is it with horny mom? There are a few scenes between

1:14:43

Kate and her mom, whose first name we never

1:14:45

know, but I feel like she's a oh okay,

1:14:48

okay. So she They

1:14:50

have several conversations about, you

1:14:53

know, the mom going on a date with a man and

1:14:55

oh, mom, I need you to watch my son. But

1:14:58

there is a brief exchange where her

1:15:00

mom was like, hey, you should ask for

1:15:03

a raise. If you want something, you got a

1:15:05

growl for it. And then Kate says, I'm

1:15:07

waiting for the day you tell me I'm adopted,

1:15:10

and then her mom says, you just keep

1:15:12

on waiting. Wait. But

1:15:14

does that pass because she works for a

1:15:16

man? I mean there

1:15:19

is some subtext that you

1:15:21

could argue maybe it doesn't, but he's

1:15:24

not explicitly I guess the spirit

1:15:27

of that do Like, I mean, look,

1:15:29

the point is and this is a fun

1:15:31

place to to just remind our

1:15:33

listeners as we have to every so often.

1:15:36

Although the film twitter Um

1:15:39

Gestapo will never will never listen

1:15:41

to this part. But a movie passing

1:15:43

the Bechtel test doesn't really

1:15:45

mean that much. It's

1:15:49

really not that important, and

1:15:51

the movie cannot pass the Bechtel test and

1:15:53

it doesn't make it bad necessarily.

1:15:56

It's just a basic metric to get

1:15:58

a discussion started of Hey, if

1:16:01

this is a whole movie and women never

1:16:03

speak to each other, that feels

1:16:05

weird, like that's why the comic

1:16:08

was written. But but that said,

1:16:10

I take you back everything I said. This is a feminist

1:16:12

classic. I agree

1:16:15

with the whole thing. Hey fixes a cooler

1:16:18

Yeah. And also I will say my my

1:16:20

favorite part it like knocked

1:16:23

this this memory loose where

1:16:25

when drain No like he tries

1:16:27

to do like a little flirty gesture

1:16:30

by paying for like their breakfast

1:16:32

at the local diner, and it brought

1:16:35

me back to this memory I have of being

1:16:37

at an eye hop in Boston

1:16:40

in where

1:16:42

I was eating dinner with my friend after

1:16:45

work and someone an

1:16:47

admirer I never learned who it was, sent

1:16:50

a single over easy egg over

1:16:52

to the table, and

1:16:55

I think about it all the time.

1:16:57

I was like, was that my husband?

1:17:00

Her wife? Like who was that? Who

1:17:02

did that? And why a single

1:17:05

egg? That is some nutty

1:17:07

ship it was. But I

1:17:09

found it. The twisted

1:17:12

part for me is I found it so romantic.

1:17:14

I was like, really, I

1:17:16

thought it was kind of hot that someone did you

1:17:19

are the hot dog girl. I don't know. I

1:17:22

think it's the horny ist egg and over easy

1:17:25

egg goes like wow, the egg that comes like,

1:17:27

it's just it really made

1:17:30

me think. And so when

1:17:32

drain No did that, I was like, damn, maybe it

1:17:34

was drain Now, maybe it Mr

1:17:37

Egg. If you're listening, send another. Jamie

1:17:40

loved it. If you're listening, please do not

1:17:42

contact me. Leave

1:17:44

us alone. I don't want to hear

1:17:46

from you. Alright, alright,

1:17:49

well it's time for our nipple scale, in

1:17:51

which we rate the movie on a scale of zero

1:17:53

to five nipples based on looking

1:17:55

at the movie through an intersectional feminist

1:17:58

lens. I would give it a half

1:18:00

nipple for generous.

1:18:03

I know, for the

1:18:06

as we've discussed, not well executed,

1:18:08

attempts to provide some

1:18:11

kind of meaningful critique on corruption

1:18:14

and incompetence in a sheriff's department.

1:18:16

But it does try a little bit, which

1:18:19

was more than I was expecting. But again

1:18:21

it doesn't land. The criticism

1:18:24

is flimsy, everything

1:18:27

else about the movie being

1:18:29

extremely ablest, the way

1:18:32

people of color are characterized

1:18:35

in the movie, the way the women are characterized

1:18:37

in the movie. It's just all extremely

1:18:40

lazy and horribly written. Again,

1:18:43

one of the worst movies I've ever seen. Um,

1:18:45

I'll take it down to a quarter nipple because

1:18:48

I just want to give something

1:18:50

to Vicente, justice for Vicente.

1:18:53

But that's it, I guess, like with that framing,

1:18:56

Yeah, I guess given the quality and cast

1:18:59

of this movie the I fully expected this movie to

1:19:01

be thoroughly pro

1:19:04

sheriff and so introducing

1:19:07

even the remotest criticism, I guess

1:19:09

exceeded my expectations. I do still feel

1:19:11

like I have to give it no nipples though, because

1:19:13

it's so bad. But I

1:19:15

guess as an asterisk to that, I

1:19:18

think it intentionally

1:19:20

or not, did show like

1:19:22

you're saying, showed some actual

1:19:26

sheriff behavior, but didn't

1:19:28

really go so far as to be actually

1:19:31

critical of it in a way that was cogent um

1:19:34

so and as far as representing

1:19:36

that any marginalized person that

1:19:39

was horrible. I guess if

1:19:41

I had nipples, I would give it to the pop

1:19:43

tarts, but I

1:19:46

don't have any to distribute,

1:19:49

so it's going to be nothing for no one hey

1:19:51

listeners. So normally we would have our

1:19:54

guests also give their rating right

1:19:56

about now, but there were some technical

1:19:59

issues and our s s audio dropped

1:20:01

out. From this point on, UM, I think

1:20:03

Sires gave the movie somewhere between

1:20:06

zero and one nipple. But more importantly,

1:20:09

we want you to check out Sires's

1:20:11

podcast, A Tradition of Violence

1:20:14

that examines deputy gangs and

1:20:16

their violence and corruption all

1:20:19

happening within the l A County Sheriff's

1:20:21

Department. UM, So please check

1:20:23

this podcast out. You can also read Serisa's

1:20:25

series A Tradition of Violence published

1:20:28

in Knock l A. Sires

1:20:31

has done and it continues to do, an

1:20:33

incredible job reporting on this

1:20:35

topic. So please check

1:20:38

out A Tradition of Violence

1:20:41

And then for us, you

1:20:43

can catch us in all kind of the normal places Twitter

1:20:46

for as long as it exists on Instagram. At

1:20:48

Bechdel Cast, we have some tour

1:20:51

announcements that will be out by the time

1:20:54

you hear this episode, so we'll probably record

1:20:56

something separately for that we can

1:20:58

take it to the shows. You

1:21:00

can follow our Patreon a Matreon

1:21:03

five bucks a month get to you two additional

1:21:05

episodes a month, and this month, we are of

1:21:08

course doing the Lindsay Lohan Christmas

1:21:10

movie, which I have seen some of the green

1:21:12

screening in and it is um. I

1:21:15

can't wait. I can't wait, I cannot

1:21:17

wait. I think she any the lead actor are

1:21:20

possibly filming from different states,

1:21:22

um, and certainly nowhere near snow. I

1:21:24

can't wait. I'm so excited. So scoot

1:21:27

on over to the Matreon for that.

1:21:30

At patreon dot com slash spectel Cast.

1:21:32

You can also go to the public dot

1:21:34

com slash the bectel Cast for

1:21:36

all of your merch needs. It's

1:21:39

the holiday season, it's it's time for

1:21:41

gift giving, etcetera. You don't know

1:21:43

what to give your loved ones as a

1:21:45

gift. What about a podcast they've never listened

1:21:47

to? Could be interesting? Uh?

1:21:51

Or if you're like, hey, loved one,

1:21:53

you're not sure what to get me, Well,

1:21:56

hint, hint, the Bechtel Cast sells

1:21:58

merch you out, just some ideas.

1:22:01

We won't know if you don't, so I don't worry about it,

1:22:03

don't don't lose any sleep over it. And

1:22:06

here's me Caitlin again, jumping

1:22:08

in with just a reminder about

1:22:10

those tour details. We're

1:22:12

doing shows in l A, San Francisco,

1:22:15

Portland and Seattle in

1:22:17

late January early February. The

1:22:20

ticket links, the exact

1:22:22

dates and venues and movies and all

1:22:25

of those details that can all be found

1:22:27

on our link tree which is

1:22:29

link tr dot e slash

1:22:32

becktel Cast, and you can

1:22:34

check our Twitter and Instagram for those

1:22:37

details as well. We helped

1:22:39

to see you there, Thank you for

1:22:41

listening, and catch you next

1:22:43

episode.