Blank Check with Griffin & David - Hotel Transylvania Trilogy

Episode Date: July 22, 2018

Griffin and David present a special episode covering the Hotel Transylvania films and tv series. But how do the monsters pay for staying at the hotel and do they ever leave? What is the recent history behind Sony Pictures Animation? Do the hosts open toys on mic and there is a bunch of dead air? Together they discuss Genndy Tartakovsky’s career, zinging, blah blah blah and more. Plus, a Burger Report: Masterpiece Theater edition! This episode is sponsored by WeTransfer and [Hims](https://www.forhims.com/blank). [Genndy Tartakovsky's POPEYE Animation Test](https://youtu.be/M1lzJuwJD9k)

What is this place? It's a place I built for all those podcasts out there lurking in the shadows, hiding from the persecution of humankind. For them and their families to come and be themselves, a void of torches, pitchforks, angry mobs, a place of peace, relaxation, and tranquility. So it's like a hotel for podcasts? Yes, exactly. A hotel for podcasts. Way to sum it up. Blah, blah, blah. Blah, blah, blah. Blah, blah, blah.

What is that? Why is that funny? It's a funny speech in the first movie. Yeah. No, the blah, blah, blah thing, I mean. Oh, yeah. You were all over Twitter saying, why is this funny? Why is it funny? It shouldn't be that funny.

Look, that could be the headline for this entire episode. I just sat someone down and I was like, yeah, they say he says like blah blah blah and he's like, I don't say that. They'd be like, huh? That's like the joke. It's like the big joke. It's kind of the biggest running joke. Hello everybody, my name's Griffin Newman. I am David Sims.

It's a Blank Check with Griffin and Dave. It's a podcast about filmographies, Directors who are given a series of blank checks after experiencing massive success early on in their career to make whatever they want. Sometimes those checks clear and sometimes they bounce. Blah, blah, blah. And then sometimes we just do this. Sometimes we do this. It has really nothing to do with anything.

Sometimes I throw a tanty. A little tant. I throw a little tant a tiny tant and I say I want to talk about the Hotel Transylvania movies

which you've consistently talked about on this podcast it's been a big running thing from the start very early on you'll bring it up once in a while back in the Star Wars days I was like

do you know this movie is fucking good yeah cause it was a big like stump speech of mine cause at the time everyone was like that movie looks dumb I think is fucking good? Yeah, because... It was a big stump speech of mine, because at the time, everyone was like, that movie looks dumb. I think it was that the second one was coming out

around when we were doing the Star Wars stuff. I think it was even before that. I think it was literally just off of... No, the second one came out September 2015. So, you know, we were doing Star Wars. And the first one's 2012? Yeah, that's right. They make them every three years.

Yeah. First one premiered at the Toronto Film Festival did you know that oh wow I think this one premiered at like Cannes right yeah it did that's crazy

it won the Palme d'Or but this is I mean you and I were talking after we saw three together we saw so we'll be talking about

the Hotel Transylvania series right yeah we saw Summer Vacation together and we were talking about how this trilogy is a weird arm wrestling match for a tour ship that's true so i guess that's the through line for our show right got two creative powers yes quite both alike in dignity in fair hollywood where we set our scene uh-huh uh you've got Adam Sandler right did you know that this is the first theatrically released film Adam Sandler has done since Hotel Transylvania 2 apart from like Meyerowitz which you can kind of count as but like it's basically a Netflix movie

dude just goes to Netflix like I don't think he's I can double check this I don't think he's done a movie no because Pixels was pre that was his last Pixels is 15 as well right and then you have Hotel Transylvania 2 and then yeah

apart from Meyerowitz which got a sort of limited release he's only done Netflix movies yeah that's crazy and Meyerowitz is a Netflix movie I think he's got another

Netflix coming out next year this franchise remains pretty much the last vestige of Adam Sandler's theatrical career. Right. And yet, you know what it does? Huge business. Make money. Baffle box office.

Exactly. It's not like it's not making tons of money. Second one outgrossed the first. This one is outgrossing the second. Yep. Yep. Yep. This one is outgrossing the second.

Yep. Yep. Yep. Which is weird because I feel like this has gone from being my weird little like Dark Horse franchise that no one even considered. And most people when I try to sell them out were like, what is this? When did this come out? Who cares? Right.

And now people are like, oh, those fucking movies. Right. Now it's just annoying. Now you see the trailer for it and you're like, they keep making this. I have to know it exists. Without having seen them, people like what is this some fucking bullshit it has to be bad it just sounds bad and then the trailer is just like i don't know like a bunch of hijinks and adam sandler is a vampire and these movies do not work well in trailers no no because when you see the gags that are so much about it It looks like Family Guy shit.

It looks like, except like not even, you know, transgressive. But also like Genndy Tarkovsky is all about like timing. Yeah. And so like when the gags are fast paced or when they're slow, it's all about like the rhythm around that gag. And when you just cut them back together, it's just like, this looks like just a calamity. Do you know what else is true about Hotel Transylvania 3?

What? It's the first time they've released in the summer. Yes. It's upgraded to summer blockbuster. The other ones came out in September which is like real doldrum time. It's a big deal that they were like such big September releases because everyone thought that was kind of like a punt. Yeah, right. And then it's like

they do well there. They take it to summer harder, you know, they're coming up against your Marvels, your Ant-Man, your, who else we got? Your Equalizers. Yeah, your mamas. Oh, by the way, happy Equalizer weekend, everybody.

Your Fallen Kingdoms. Yeah. Your Purges. And holding its own. Doing great. Dragging the boys. Yep. The Drac Pack.

Your Uncle Drew. Uncle Drew's. Did you see Uncle Drew? I haven't yet. You were talking about seeing it. I think, hurry up. I know. I don't think it's going to linger.

I just finished production on The Tick, and now I'm eagerly catching up with the 27 movies I need to see. Wait, that's what you've been doing? Yeah, that's why I haven't been here in months. Oh, that's why we've just been recording the ads alone, the two of us. I was kind of wondering what happened to Griffin. Yeah. You thought I was just late?

Yeah. Yeah. Right. Every time. Yeah. For six months. Right. It wasn't six.

It was like four. It was four. It was a gentleman's four. And yeah, really. Well, yeah. Is that you? That's your rating? Yeah.

Like D plus? Broken, by the way. I'm suffering from severe back pain and I vomited a bunch of it. Oh, boy. We should mention Griffin's in a full body boy. Griffin's in a full body cast. I'm in a full body cast. I saw the movie with Griffin yesterday and then after the movie was done,

I was just sort of thinking to myself, oh, maybe we'll go get some pizza or something. Griffin's like, I have to go. And I was like, oh, you gotta... And he's like, yeah, no, I've got to go home. And apparently you just went home and puked. I did. So, great, great.

I've been laid up most of the time. I injured myself doing a dialogue scene. Congrats. So, I'm so great great I've been laid up most of the time I injured myself doing a dialogue scene congrats so I'm doing great I mean I've injured myself like sitting in a chair I can't really make fun of you I mean that's what this was like

but the problem is that I also do physically demanding stuff on this show so it looks really lame for me to like to be fair it was dialogue

it was the straw that broke the camel's back or whatever it was the straw that broke the griffin's back. And yeah, so I saw this movie with you yesterday. I was in immense physical pain the entire time. Went to AMC with the recliner seats.

We reclined. I know, still hurt. And then I puked a bunch afterwards. And we talked some shit about Axl and Wonder Park or whatever these things are. So we go see this movie together, right? We're seeing a fucking weekday matinee, Hotel Transylvania 3. Saw a lot of the blankies on Reddit going, oh, God, how am I going to go see this movie by myself? I'm going to look like a creepazoid.

Wait till you hear Ben's story. He was telling me. Go on, go on. So we go to this theater and it's us and it's like four dads with kids, right? We saw fucking five dog trailers. A lot of dogs. Same at mine. Dog Days. All these dog movies. All of dogs so you got mine dog days all these yeah yeah and then this is kind of a stealth dog movie hotel transylvania three is the breakout

he's just pretty good the best you love that we'll talk about yeah Ben you saw it I believe you can tell well I went to the 11pm show last night which like it's crazy that they show this movie at 11pm it was weird

and I was like what theater which theater AMC 7 3rd same fucking place you might have sat in the same seats

sitting in the same handicapped seats in the back did it smell like us we took the handicapped seats it was back did it smell like us we took the handicapped seats it was empty it was the empty theater

but I was intrigued to see who was going to be there was mostly couples were you like a red carpet reporter like who's going to

show up yeah I was intrigued to see who was going to be there oh boy it was mostly young couples like in their early 20s

yeah there was a couple near me that was kind of like making out. They were hand-jobbing each other. Heavy petting. I was like, this is a family movie. But I could see, like say you're 21. The first one came out, you were like 14. Yeah, at this point it's kind of like,

you might have made out for the first time during a Hotel Transylvania movie. Now that's like a sexual fetish. That was like an activation point for you. I wasn't going there. God. No, but the first time you kiss somebody, it's in the theater, see an HT1. And then now you're like, look, I can only get it up for dragging the boys.

I get it. That's why I go to all the Terminator movies. I wonder why you wouldn't stop talking about your experiencing salvation. I loved it. But then there was a bunch of guys by themselves and i saw the ultimate creep he had a shirt one of those like well i left my other computer at the technology store and then he had the worst bald hair I've ever seen on a human being in my life. To try to compensate for?

No. I'm imagining it's just growing. There isn't a lot left, but it's just growing. It looks like someone took a fucking thin shit on his head. Thin shit. So anyway, we became friends. Yeah. And here he is. I'd like to introduce him to you guys. So anyway, we became friends. Yeah.

And here he is. I'd like to introduce him to you guys. Kind of sounds like your theater was full of monsters. Ooh. Yeah. Murray the Mummy. What is it? Frank.

How do you know their names? Wayne the Werewolf. Frank is is Franken the Frankenstein monster correct Griffin the invisible man which is the name of the

Claude Rains character right yeah yeah I'm forgetting someone who else we got who else we got well those are the main ones those are the main ones

I mean Mavis obviously Blobby Blobby right Blobby's cool yeah Johnny Johnny Stein

Johnny Johnny Stein the backpacker. Denisovich. His son, only in two and three. Bigfoot. Bigfoot. I mean, then we get into the supporting cast of this movie, which is just stacked. But you got like, yeah, because of the-

A Skellington. There's like a- Floating brain guy. I was going to say, floating brain guy's the best. Floating brain. There's like a suit of armor in at least one or two of them yeah shrunken head door knockers

the witches there's like a quasimodo John Lovitz is a quasimodo big part main antagonist of the first one one could argue Vlad of course Drax Dan

it was the chupacabra yeah we were we were like wait who's this blue creature and then he was like oh is there goats

one goat please and we were like oh it's kinda's this blue creature? And then he was like, is there goats? And we were like, oh, it's kind of hot. Yeah, he was kind of hot. What? Okay, so context. Let's dig into this thing. Sony Pictures Animation has been this weird ramshackle thing, right? In the like

post-Pixar, post-DreamWorks, every studio deciding like, oh fuck, we need one of those. Yeah. Sony and their animation department's always been this sort of like odd jalopy of a thing. Because after the big Disney renaissance, everyone tried to do their own hand-drawn stuff. Okay. And like Fox doubling down with Don Bluth. These different studios trying those things and they didn't fucking work.

I've said this before. It's a crazy thing to think about. The first, do you know what the first non-Disney animated film to make $100 million is? I'm pondering. Anastasia.

The Rugrats movie. All right, cool. Before the Rugrats movie, no non-Disney studio had released an animated blockbuster sure I mean

the Bluth ones did okay those were like doubles or triples I mean that was like a big deal was when Disney was bombing the Bluth movie started doing better

so it was like Land Before Time did better than Fox and the Hound but it was like still like low stakes to a certain degree

right I mean yeah Land Before Time made about 50 yeah you know that adjusted that's like 100 yeah but low stakes to a certain degree. Right? I mean, yeah. Land Before Time made about 50. Yeah. You know, that adjusted, that's like 100. Yeah. But no one had really cracked it to that degree.

Everyone had sort of given up. And then when Pixar took off, and then DreamWorks very successfully started piggybacking off of Pixar, they made that hard turn into CGI, because DreamWorks was going to be a hand-drawn studio. It was going to be Katzenberg trying to replicate what he had done at Disney.

Then everyone said, oh, we can just fucking do that. Get some animals. They raised one eyebrow. Cast some funny characters. Sounds good so far. Well, was DreamWorks

animation, they have like ants? What else do they have? Well, and then Shrek was like the huge breakthrough. They had ants though. They had ants. A very well-written movie.

And you see, if you think about it the ant is called z yes and it's like aunt z like that it's about him and also it's like here's the the title is ants with a z and the movie you're gonna see is ants with a z right that's what i'm saying and they made the prince of egypt right which which made a hundred million dollars that was right that's oh that that did. But that's what they thought they were going to do. They had this company, PDI, who they were having produce animated films for them.

And I think that was just a secondary kind of thing that was mostly just an ego battle against Pixar. And then those start really working. And then the other hand-drawn DreamWorks movies, Rotel Dorado, Sinbad, are bombing hard. Spirit. Spirit. Downing of the Simurans. Right. Okay, Sim are bombing hard Spirit Spirit of the Simran aka Simran

Stallion of the Spirit Titan AE bombed really hard yep so everyone's like closing up shot Stallion Spirit of the Simran

there's this thing that I find very interesting Spirit Stallion of the Simran Spirit Simran of the Stallion Simran Stallion of the Spirit I think I did that one already there's a thing

I find very interesting which is that with animation in the feature world, it feels like the die is cast by whatever the first thing is. Okay. So like Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, first big American. So we're going to do a lot of fairy tale, revivals.

For decades, that was the notion. That's what you do. Princesses. Sure. If another studio is going to make an animated film, that's what it's going to be. It's got to be a musical.

It's got to be a fairy tale or at least some sort of folk tale or something. Right? There's a similar thing with like Nightmare Before Christmas being the first major

stop motion film. Most stop motion movies are still about monsters. Right. Right. Right? Yeah. Because it's like

herky jerky and creepy. Right. And I think the same thing happened with Toy Story where it was like this is what the comedic sensibility of a CGI movie is

which is what like oh the characters are a little more adult they're a little more knowing it's placing sort of like comedic personalities into a weird world

I feel like another thing though is that's even more important is that they're star driven that's I said comedic personalities. You're taking the people's voices, not just literally, but also— When you're making Shark Tale, the little fish should look like Will Smith,

and the big shark should look like De Niro and all that. And Scorsese's like a clownfish or whatever it is. That's like the DreamWorks apex where they break it down into some sort of like really crass mathematical formula for what people want out of these movies. Oh, it feels like one of those things. And then other studios are trying to do that as well. Right. Well, get to your point. That's enough.

So Sony is throwing like a lot of darts at the board. Apparently, one of the things that came out in like the Sony hacks, there's a lot of really interesting shit. Re-Hotel Transylvania that came on the Sony hacks. Interesting. If you knew where to look, which I did. Where no one was looking? Is that where you were looking? Yeah.

Can you tell me Sony's first animated film? Open Season. How do you know that? I know this shit! This is the only value I have in the world. Values. That's putting it strong. It's all I got. Can you name the stars of Open Season? Yes, I can. Values. That's putting it strong. It's the only, it's all I got. Can you name the stars of open season?

Yes, I can. Martin Lawrence and Ashton Kutcher. I believe Deborah Messing is the female. Correct. And the villain? I don't know who the villain is.

Gary Sinise. Really? Steppenwolf's own. And he played Steppen the Wolf? Correct, yes. No, he plays like a hunter or something.

Isn't it about hunting? I think so. Who knows? It's open season. I didn't see it. And that was one that was just sort of like Marge didn't do very well. Yeah, then they had Surf's Up.

Right. You know, Oscar nominated. It's got penguins. It's kind of cute, right? A lot of these things I haven't seen and that sort of were like box office like doubles or triples at best. And then they had Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. Which is

kind of a breakthrough. That's a good movie. Does well critically well received. Launches Lord Miller into their feature film career. Then it's a little patchier. Can you tell me the next one? Well in between you're missing Monster House. Oh that's

not on this. Maybe because I guess it was produced by the Zemeckis Image Works rather than by Sony Pictures Animation. Was it just like released by Sony? Right. Yeah, it was released by Columbia. So next thing after... It's two years later.

Not Smurfs. It's the Smurfs. Right. They count those. Yeah. And then... Those two and then... They're hybrid, obviously.

There's also... Goosebumps they file as a Sony animation. They do. That's sort of weird. Yeah. There's Arthur Christmas. Which is fine. Is that CG or is that clay?

That is CG. To look like clay. Ardment. Yeah. And then the Pirates, which is... That's really good. That's cute. Yeah.

And then in 2012, America gets a gift. It's a check-in to the Hotel Transylvania. I'm done. Now, this is why this context is important. Because you asked me right before we recorded, is this based off some fucking book or something? And it's quite the opposite. Okay. This is one of those things that we often mock as just like this fucking industry.

Right, right, right. Where some guy went in with like a 20 minute presentation on a franchise okay oh wow wow okay that's what hotel transylvania is i'm gonna get the guy's name for you he wrote and directed like two movies in the 80s and other than that like this is now his breadwinner is it todd durham yes yes okay i'm, I'm reading about this guy. Studied comedy writing. Right. Tales of the Third Dimension and Hyperspace in 1982 and 84. He comes in with the pitch.

Doesn't write the movie. He gets a story credit. The movie's written by Robert Smigel, who's like a Sandler mainstay. And Peter Bainham, who's a... Who's a British comedy mainstay. Yeah, he's a funny guy. I think he worked on Borat. Yeah. But he also worked on all the great Chris Morris, like Brass Eye, Day to Day. Yeah, he's a funny guy. I think he worked on Borat, but he also worked on all the great Chris Morris

Brass Eye, Day to Day, all that stuff. So yeah, funny. This guy just comes in and goes, here's the pitch for a franchise. Here's six movies, here's four TV shows, here's action figures, here's video games, here's apps. It's one of those things you hear where it's just like he sold them just an empty box.

It was like, it's a hotel full of monsters. Here's all the different things you could make out of it like he sold them just an empty box it was like it's a hotel full of monsters here's all the different things you could make out of it it didn't even really pitch storylines yeah you know it was just like you could put these characters in anything yeah and you could open a hotel and you could open a hotel hey for humans it does feel like it's a big miss that sony doesn't't have a theme park sort of connection and can't have a Hotel Transylvania at a theme park, like a hotel. Right. Or a Motel Transylvania or whatever.

Get a bunch of ghouls and zombies walking around. Here's my first question. Yes. It's not really a hotel. They all seem to just sort of live there. Correct. It's a residential hotel, I guess. Yeah. It's kind of like just a housing community seem to just sort of live there. Correct. It's a residential hotel, I guess. Yeah.

It's kind of like just a housing community. It's sort of like the Florida Project. Like, you know, like, are they always on vacation? Like, does the werewolf have like a job that he's busy? Like, you know, is he taking a break? That's what's odd. It's also odd that in three. They go on a vacation.

The entire hotel. As Dracula points three, they go on a vacation and the entire hotel, as Dracula points out, they live in a hotel employees and customers alike. Oh, do you, David, do you want them to go do their taxes and go over their income in the movie? Come on.

Genuinely be interested. You want to see them go? How much is going in and how much is going out? Like, how are they? How does the mummy pay his rent yeah it's more like he's a mummy it's like hostile transylvania like look the the werewolf has like 5 000 children like how's he supporting all them and he's paying like you know 300 a night for a

bedroom but this was the crux of what's going on the crux of the pitch. Look what's going on. The crux of the pitch was the idea of where do monsters go when they need a break? Sure. That was his pitch? Right. Here's a hotel with all the monsters. He actually stood up and he was like, where do monsters go when they need a break? And everyone was like, huh? Slide.

Who's this guy? He had the clicker in his hand. He's wearing the turtleneck with the little glasses. Oh my God. Like, cause to me. And one more thing. It's a weird pitch. it's like i feel like the pitches should more just be like we all know adam sandler click you know he had just the dracula

voice click all right he does dracula okay they live in a hotel or something all right where's my 100 million dollars like but this is the thing it takes almost six years for adam sandler to become part of this thing okay that's weird that weird. That should have been... He pitches it and they're just so desperate for shit. Sony's like, how do we do that Pixar thing? This guy comes in and he goes, you'll make sequels. And they go, sequels? We want those. Sure. Good. Like, that was the pitch was, these

movies will be successful. And they were like, great. Buy the pitch from him. And they go, wait, we need a script. Uh-huh. Okay. So, okay. Genndy Tartakovsky is the fifth director announced for this movie all right it becomes this joke within like sixth sixth sixth yeah it becomes this joke within the dumb animation blogs that i read for losers that it's like this fucking sony movie that they bought in like 2003 they're never gonna make it every two years they announced someone new

as the director of hotel transylvania here's here who they had. I'm not going to say all their names, but first they had like one of the guys who worked on Open Season. Then they had the lady who worked on Open Season. Then they had the guy who made Surf's Up. Then they have a guy who literally doesn't even have like a link for his name that I've just never heard of. And then finally, yes, Tartatovsky. His feature debut, but he's well-known, obviously, for his work on Dexter's Lab. Which is the first Cartoon Network animated series.

Samurai Jack. Which is him reinventing himself as sort of an action dude. Off of that, Lucas reaches out to him, gives him Clone Wars. Clone Wars. He also worked on the Powerpuff Girls, although he didn't create it.

He went to college with all those guys, so he would direct on all... That first bunch of Cartoon Network original series... It was all the same... They were all kind of bosom buddies, and they all worked on each other's shows. And then he, after Samurai Jack and Clone Wars, which are kind of these mainstream breakthroughs for him

because they were more serious, and they were so action-heavy, Hollywood got kind of interested in him outside the animation community. And there was like, oh, we're going to make a Samurai Jack movie. Never materialized. New Line set up that they were going to do a Samurai Jack animated film, and also Brett Ratner was going to direct a live-action Samurai Jack adaptation.

They were going to do both of them. Then neither of them got off the ground. Like six years later, when J.J. Abrams had gotten really big, he was like, I'm putting Bad Robot's name behind Samurai Jack. We're going to make a Samurai Jack movie. Never happened. Jim Henson courted him. He was going to do a Dark Crystal sequel.

Active pre-production for years. Never happened. All these things he's like kind of signing on to, it's not going, right? He does another show for Cartoon Network called Symbiotic Titan that got kind of dumped by them. I've never even seen it and was canceled. Terrible name.

Yeah, canceled really quickly and he was at a point of frustration after that and Sony comes up and poaches him and goes, how do you want

to make a movie? Here's the stable of things we have. Here's this fucking Hotel Transylvania thing we bought that we haven't been able to make work

and he goes, I like monsters. He read the script they had. I don't know if it was part of the original pitch or it came through in one of the six other directors, five other directors, but the notion of the Romeo and Juliet thing,

the human who lands, falls in love with Dracula's daughter, that was there. And he said when he read it, that was like, it was very much a almost Twilight adjacent, serious romantic movie about the monsters. And their two big moves were, let's get Genndy Tartofsky.

He's one of the best animation directors alive. No one's letting him make a movie. Let's get him on something. And move two was, Sandler is still Sony's big guy at this point in time. Of course. Along with Will Smith. Who had already done Shark Tale. Right.

Those were their two guys were Will Smith and Adam Sandler. Yep. Those were Sony's big in-house movie stars. And so they said, we could hand guys were Will Smith and Adam Sandler yep those were Sony's big in-house movie stars and so they said we could hand this to Will Smith I'm sorry

we could hand this to Adam Sandler sure he can bring all his cronies with him sure that's our whole voice cast that'll give it a comedic sensibility

plus a pop star plus a pop star it was originally announced as Miley Cyrus and then they replaced her with Selena Gomez I think when Miley Cyrus got too extreme

got too twisted said she wanted to focus on her music, like her dead pets. Yeah. And so they were like, that's the comedy. Let's get Tartakovsky. He's a brilliant visual filmmaker. That's the movie. We're just going to—chocolate peanut butter, two great tastes, taste great together.

That was the notion. But I think this movie was seen as kind of damaged goods. And certainly within the animation community, it was scoffing of like, look at this Hail Mary pass. They're throwing Sandler on this thing. They're going to turn it into like a shitty grown-ups with monsters. And I feel bad for Tartakovsky that he's stuck on this thing. I remember when the trailer

came out, I was like so depressed that he had directed this movie. I was like, this looks so dumb. I find it so annoying this guy can't get a real movie made. I missed a flight when I was in LA. Sure. The next flight I could get on was 12 hours later. Right.

I had all my luggage there. I was at LAX, which is sort of far off, away from anything. So I was like, fuck, what am I going to do for 12 hours? I found a local movie theater. See a movie. Right. Get in and out, see a movie right get in and out see a movie so I said oh right

there's this animated monster film that just came out from a director I really like I should go see that and I went and saw

Frankenweenie alright Tim Burton okay was deeply sort of meh on Frankenweenie pretty meh movie

his animated movies are pretty bad and I was like fuck Frankenweenie got these good reviews. That's such a bummer. Gets an Oscar nomination. More time to kill.

I don't know. I guess I'll sneak into Hotel Transylvania. But after Frankenweeney, my expectations are basement low. Right? And I sit there watching this and I go, I'm here. Downtown Griffey Nooms. In downtown LA. I'm watching an American masterpiece.

Boy. How's everyone sleeping on this fucking thing? This movie's breaking ground for character animation and CGI. Yeah. Okay. Because he's bringing back the principles of classic cartooning. You've said this on this very podcast. To a medium that has been pretty rigid so far.

And I love me my Pixar. It was nominated for a Golden Globe. And was snubbed by the Oscars. It was. I don't think it was going to ever get an Oscar. No, but see what else got nominated that year. Okay, I'll try and find out. It is that kind of crappy year.

It was a bad year. Because it's the year that Cars 2? Well, was Cars 2 nominated? No, it wasn't. But it was the year of Cars 2 where Pixar was... No, no. Brave? Brave won that year.

Here are your nominees. This is the year Paranorman should have won. They're actually pretty good. Yeah. Brave's probably the worst. Yeah. Brave, Frankenweenie, which is also not great. No.

Paranorman, which is great. The Pirates, which is a lot of fun. I really like. And Wreck-It Ralph. Oh, wow. Yeah. which is a lot of fun i really like and wreck it ralph oh wow which is a a great time and i think everyone thought ralph was gonna win no i he was gonna wreck it i thought i was gonna wreck it i think people honestly didn't know what was gonna win and i think a lot of voters are just like braves the pixar one sure like yeah check whatever i i genuinely believe most of them didn't see it yeah for sure

they were like it's the pic she's like a girl the princess with an arrow great yeah you've got big red hair sure it wins and then you have that really awkward speech where like the first director who was fired is like shoved off stage by the second director uh-huh real weird yeah who's like i made I made this movie inspired by her daughter. Yeah. So, the point is, and I'm not going to nerd out about this too much, Ben is already putting his head in his hands. The big thing is that CGI animation, as opposed to hand-drawn animation,

is more an art of manipulation. Okay. Right? Because when you're drawing, you can draw anything you want for any frame. And that encourages a real sort of boundary stretching of how these characters can move.

Sure. Certainly when you get to the most expressive animation, you get to sort of like Bob Clampett and Tex Avery and Chuck Jones. Sure, Tex Avery. And these guys who really distort.

I know Tex Avery. He's laughing at me. Movement and pose. Yeah, yeah. These things that Tarkovsky. Squash, stretch, right. But this notion of creating tension through physicality only. Movement and pose. Yeah, yeah. These things that Tartakovsky... Squash, stretch, right. But this notion of creating tension through physicality only.

Whether it's comedic tension or dramatic tension. That's Tartakovsky's whole thing. Because Samurai Jack, Clone Wars, that's all about tension through pose. It's just in service of action and dramatic storytelling. But it's also very minimalistic animation. Those characters don't move a lot until they suddenly do. But there are those long stretches where it's like Mace Windu just posing totally still. He loves that stuff.

Right, before shit goes crazy. Right, right, right. But then this is the other side of him, which is using the same sort of principles for a purely comedic thing, which is throwing as much elasticity and movement as possible. And that thing that I love, I talked about with the funniest moment in the history of cinema when Violet squirts the water out of her nose very funny

this notion of based on your mood your entire physiology can change the shape of your skull your body can totally distort this sort of very expressionistic physicality right because CG animation is about manipulation.

They build a physical model and then they just move that model. It's like stop motion. It's like you're moving a thing. Most people don't push animation in that kind of way in the world of CGI of like, okay, if Drac is angry, he's going to get two feet taller.

Right, yes, you're right. See, I'm glad he talks about this shit because I never think about it. But it's funny. It's funny when Drac suddenly is like all skinny for one moment because he's like, you know, I don't know, feeling like ashamed or whatever. Right? Yeah, but why do you feel like other franchises or other movies don't. I think A, that's a Pixar thing in terms of them setting the standard because Toy Story at the time was trying to be sold as, look, it looks real.

There's a reason why Toy Story was about toys because they knew at that time the best thing that CGI could replicate was plastic. Yeah, the humans in Toy Story as we've mentioned before look like demons. They're so scary. They look a little better with every movie. They also look a little better with every movie.

But they also get more stylized with every movie. They stop pretending that they're going to make them look even vaguely human. But there was always in Toy Story 2

the Wayne Knight character where they're like you know look how like his hair and his eyes and like we're making you know it's all getting more and more detailed

and all that. Yeah. They give up on all of that. Yeah. But you do watch the first Toy Story and even just in terms of like the quote unquote lighting in the that. Yeah. They give up on all of that. Yeah. But you do watch the first Toy Story and even just in terms of like the quote unquote

lighting in the movie. Right. They really try to make it look like it's a live action movie. Yeah. They're trying to replicate that style which then other Pixar movies

get more sort of expressionistic in their cinematic language. Okay. But the models stay pretty rigid and like Pete Docter talks about like

when he was making Inside Out he was like I want to go back to old school cartooning. I mean, Inside Out is a far better movie than Hotel Transylvania. It is. But in terms of animation, if he's trying to do the same thing, it fails wildly. Yeah, that's not a movie that does that.

No, no. And this is like... I'm trying to think of any Pixar movie that does. A, I think Ben, the reason why... I think Coco came the closest with the way the skeletons move. Sure. Where that gets a little cartoony. They're pretty cool. I think A, it was viewed as being out of fashion.

Oh, that sort of kid stuff that's not cool. In this sort of like post-Shrek, like, you know, these movies have to be kind of edgy. They have to be kind of snarky. Or the Pixar thing of like, they have to be really emotionally grounded and heartfelt and sort of like intellectually challenging, that sort

of physical comedy seems out of place. You know? It seems at odds with what they're doing. It's like putting, you know, too much like Jerry Lewis slapstick in like a James L. Brooks movie or something. I think that's what they think. I think the other thing is it's super technically complicated

because you can do that kind of animation with hand drawing because you just have to have the ability to imagine and draw those poses. To be able to make the models for these characters, which are sort of set in stone in the computer, contort into these ways is insane.

And that's the thing that people don't get about these movies, is they're like, oh, these movies are kind of cheap, they're kind of like silly and plasticky looking. They had to make so many technological breakthroughs on this movie to make it look this simplistic. There's even shit like, clothing and CGI is a nightmare,

as is hair. So a big thing that's been developed over years and years and years are these computer programs that just sort of like automate it. If you automate the way that if you personally animate the movements of the characters, the program will correspondingly move the fabric the right way. Where that gets fucked up is when Tartakovsky comes in is like, I want Drac going like this and this and that. And there are tests you can see online where they try using the automated AI for the clothing. And his, like, cape ends up in the middle of his forehead, like, poking out his ear.

Sure. Like, shit like that. Also things like motion blur, which we're used to seeing if people move really fast. Sure. If you're watching a movie. Right. And his big thing is this, like like someone standing up straight and then the next frame suddenly they're like

curled up in a ball on the floor. If you don't have motion blur in between those things, it looks like strobe lighting. But also, it's hard to do motion blur because people aren't moving realistically. So he'll do shit like where if a character's moving really fast,

he'll literally have, if you go frame by frame, two or three of that character so that the motion blur is registering as you can see their movement because they're scanning across the space. If that makes any sense? Yeah, it's like they're in two places at once. It's insane, insane shit he's doing. So he gets the script.

So we're called together. Smigel gives it a rewrite. The Sandler boys come on it. They're going to take care of that stuff. I think Sandler doesn't view this as really one of his movies. He's like, I'm loaning my friends and my name to this thing. I got my buddy to rewrite it. Some good jokes.

And I'm not going to get hands on an animated movie. This isn't a Happy Madison movie. It's money. It's like he's making a fun kids movie. Right. So they record all that stuff and Tarkovsky just goes buck fucking wild on the animation. They create new

programs called like Gendy Blur to be able to like do all this shit which now other animation studios use. Yeah. The movie's coming out in September. Everyone thinks it's like a dump. It looks kind of dumb. Sandler's star is getting a little bronzed after years of being always consistently

a hundred million dollar guy he's had a few flops in a row now yeah let me actually find out Jack and Jill was the first Happy Madison movie to not make a hundred million dollars and that's 2011 and then That's My Boy had come out this year

and that's a big flop that only makes 36 but he did make it with Sandberg who was again in this movie. He was like Sandberg's gonna be my guy. I'm gonna make Sandberg. I'm gonna pass him down the torch.

And I think more than that Sandberg's into it. He's just like I like Adam Sandler. He's funny. Like I want to do like old Adam Sandler shit. Right.

I remember that was his pitch for That's My Boy. It's like yeah he's like dirty. It's dirty again. Yeah it's like and then everyone saw him and was like, we hate this. I haven't seen it, so I don't know. And I think the notion was, much like Kevin James, it was like, we're going to go from

you co-starring in a couple Happy Mass and movies to you getting your own Happy Mass and movies. Right. And then that sort of didn't happen. Sandberg just did the show instead. Right, but this was part of the like Sandberg wedging into the world of like, no, I'm carrying him with me into this animated thing too. And then they sort of hand it off to Tartakovsky

who does all this crazy animation shit that I think no one gets and no one's paying attention to. Sony Animation is run by Hannah Minghella, Anthony Minghella's daughter, who has no background in animation, was a Sony exec. And they were like, animation's profitable. Can you do this? Sure. Sony Animation notoriously has no corporate culture.

There's like no sort of like brand loyalty. They have the lamest logo too. Right. Yeah. They tried to get Lord Miller to take

over after Clyde with a Chance of Meatball and like be the Lasseters the non gropey Lasseters. Right. And they were like we don't want to run

this animation department but it's why they keep on attaching them to all these things why they're doing the Spider-Man movie now and all this shit. So it was just like

this odd duck movie I think people weren't paying attention to. They were mostly trying to sell on Sandler. And then it comes out in September and does weirdly well. And everyone's like, I don't know, it's some dumb kids movie. Does a hundred, well we'll talk about it. Maybe we should do three box office games. We will.

Great. How you doing Ben? I'm good. You're almost done, right? Yes. The key here is that for for me, these movies, on an animation perspective, are kind of like Busby Berkeley musicals. Okay. Where Busby Berkeley was the fucking master of the musical sequence. Sure.

And those Gold Digger movies are so much fun to watch and hold no water as films. Sure. There's not much of a story. movies are like so much fun to watch and have hold no water as films sure there's right they're mostly just like here's an incredible artist in the mode of the thing he does really well yeah and the plots are kind of excuses to put things together you have great performers they're funny jokes they're really entertaining but they're not even striving for anything more yeah and this feels like him using this premise and he loves monsters and the visual possibilities of monsters as just like let me do everything I wish I could do in an animated film.

I don't like CGI. Let me make CGI work the way I want CGI to work. Isn't it so sad, though, that all these great animators like Bird and Tartoski are like, well, I don't really like CGI, but I guess I have to find a way to make it work for me. Like, you know, it's like...

And he keeps on talking about how he's like, just make them, let them make their own fucking shit. And he keeps on talking about how he's like, trying to get hand-drawn films made at Sony. Yeah. And not only can he not get that done, but his own projects can't get done at Sony. It just feels like them being like, yeah, no, definitely.

Definitely. And then like a year later, they're like, we love money. Do you want to do like, Hotel Transylvania 2? Like, are you into that? Yeah.

Like, I love, we just really like money. Like, I feel like they make a lot of money. And Tartos is probably like. Like, I love, we just really like money. Like, I feel like they make a lot of money. And Tartakovsky's probably like, well, I've got this great, and they're like, no, yeah, yeah.

But like, what if like Dracula's runs a hotel again? I don't know. They've announced and canceled, I think, three different Tartakovsky movies.

That's so sad. Lauren Faust, who is the creator of My Little Pony, the new series that everyone loves, got announced to do a movie. They canceled that as well.

They keep on bringing in his sort of people, people with real strong animation backbones and real voices and visions, and then shit canning their movies. Yeah. But this first one, I think, is the interesting... It was such a bummer when he was announced to direct three. It was just such an obvious bummer, even though the three turns out to be good like it's just because he he does

one everyone's like oh wow this is successful he signs on for two but the clear deal is he signs on for two they're letting him set up two other projects right one's an original thing called can you imagine i think uh yeah gets canceled yeah the other one was he really wanted to do popeye gets cancelled. The other one was he really wanted to do Popeye. He like fucking loves Popeye. Like 2D Popeye? CGI making it look as 2D as possible. There's a test online you can see that's crazy.

I would prefer it was 2D but he like was all about like I love physical movement. Popeye's the perfect vehicle for that. I'm going to make a fucking Popeye movie. Sony had been squatting on those rights forever. That was just like a brand they bought because they were like I don't know Popeye has name recognition. He wrote a Popeye movie. Sony had been squatting on those rights forever. That was just like a brand they bought because they were like,

I don't know, Popeye has name recognition. He wrote a Popeye movie and this is one of the big things that came out in the Sony leak is all these emails from Amy Pascal being like, I don't fucking get it. Like she doesn't get the script that he wrote? Any of it.

She's like, wait, why do we like Popeye in the first place? Is his character cool? Do kids like him? And she's like emailing Lord and Miller being like, can you watch this thing and tell me if there's something i'm not getting and they're like he's a really fucking good animator what he's doing here is really interesting and she was like i don't know if

kids want to see this i'm watching it it's crazy it's insane right i i can see why sony was freaked out by this yeah like because yeah this was his full cgi test like he had a full script and they did a story real screening with like the storyboards and temp voices to see the whole movie pre-animated and they were just like I don't fucking get this thing it's crazy everyone should look it up it looks insane

but all this shit gets shit canned after two when he says I'm 100% not going back for three I've done my two movies I had a bad experience doing Hotel Transylvania 2 he actively says

Sandler took that movie over and I just kind of wasn't into it like he says this in an interview and in the emails where they're talking about canceling Popeye

A. Pascal's like on one hand I don't get this fucking thing on the other hand like Gendy's a trooper he really handled that Hotel Transylvania 2

situation really well Sandler was a nightmare on that. Like, A. Pascal in emails is going like, Sandler would come into the room and give him animation notes. Sandler shouldn't be noting him on animation. It's one thing that he no longer had control over the script. It was like, Sandler

tried to get his hands on everything on 2. And he was like, maybe we should do him the solid, but I don't fucking get this Popeye thing. And they announced Hotel Transylvania 3. They were going to get a new director. He goes on vacation with his family on a cruise ship. And he's like, fuck. You know what? I could do it on a cruise ship.

But I wonder now, will they let him make something totally of his own? Because he got this sort of like... I'm just wondering if they're just like, oh, this is doing really great. Do you want to do Hotel Transylvania I'm just wondering if they're just like oh this is doing really great do you want to do Hotel Transylvania 4?

I guarantee you they're going to back the truck up into his backyard Hotel Transylvania 3 Summer Vacation 2? But this feels like Going on another cruise?

Like this franchise was like sloppy sixth it was like a cart before the horse what if we make six of these and no one could figure out how to make one

he took over and said what if we take out all the pretenses of this being like a serious thing and make it like mad magazine yeah like you just make it like so dense with gags and visual humor and like kinetic design and all of that but one does have like a pretty good emotional spine in a very simple straightforward family movie kind of way yeah i think the Mavis plotline works really well. Mavis fucking rules. Mavis really rules. Let's just be upfront about it. Mavis is cool. She's awesome. She's a nice person.

Right. So Hotel Transylvania 1. She's doing well and she has a nice family. Hotel Transylvania 1. We just shat all over Sony and poor Tartatops having to do this shit, but it's like, spoiler alert, the movies are pretty good. Yeah. And spoiler alert

are you looking to transfer files? Wait a second are you talking about making the creative process easier for everyone? Yeah. Oh that's what WeTransfer does my friend. Look you don't want to get hacked like Sony. You want those emails getting transferred

cleanly. WeTransfer built their site to be the simplest way to share big files around the world for free all the way to transylvania or a cruise ship oh bermuda triangle there's there's no sign-in there's no offer codes there's no password to forget you just upload send and you get back to making what you make wow so in spirit, there's a spirit in the studio who's telling us, we're skipping the rest of this 60-second ad, getting right back into the podcast. WeTransfer.com. You make WeTransfer. Yeah, just go there.

Send your files around. Yeah. Yeah. That ghost is spooky. Yeah, right? So the first altar to transylvania is yeah dracula single father yep we start the movie with him tending to his daughter correct it's a very cute opening yeah and he's going full tilt on on the animated wackiness right right right being silly but also it's just like nice to open a movie with like

three minutes of a guy being a good dad okay i mean the whole movie is him being he's a he's a decent dad i know but they don't saddle you with the tragic backstory at the beginning i like that they don't start with the wife's death yes that's true it's not like finding nemo where like it leads with horror right they just like open on a fun note of watching him chase her around they both have powers and she's on the ceiling and all of that right Right. And he just starts dreaming of a sanctuary, a place where they can be

safe from the outside world. That's the big notion of the first movie. Yeah, but like, it's like a five-star hotel. It's expensive. It's very expensive. This is,

honestly, my only problem with the whole franchise is I'm like, it's the hotel of it all. do they have to pay? Like, is it a sanctuary?

Right. What currency are they using? Is it the euro now? Is Romania in the EU? I have to think about that. Or Hungary or wherever the fuck it is. Transylvania should be between those two.

The moment where I went like, wait, what the fuck is going on in this movie is when he starts playing the hotel and there's the one goblin who's like his like architect construction. That's right. You know, the guy I'm talking about, though. Yeah, I do. He's like always standing sideways and like shambling and his head's at a tilt.

And yeah, the movie gets through all this very quickly, opens up the hotel and we go to years later and it's now Mavis's 118th birthday. Right, right. But she's looks like a 20 year old or whatever because i guess she's 18 oh she's 18 oh 118 of course right right right she's a grown-up it's like her uh bar mitzvah or college age right yeah you know like right um they're throwing this big party for her and she's always wanted to go out into the outside world. Right. And the thing they keep on selling is the very simple but effective inversion of monsters are being hunted by humans all the time.

We can't go in the outside world. They're going to attack us. Yeah, I guess. Except isn't it more, isn't the concept more like that's how it was back in the 1890s when monster hunting was all the rage? They don't know anymore because they've been so afraid.

They've been hiding in this hotel. They've all been, again, living in a hotel that is somehow paid for. But I'll say this, the first one does open with all the monsters arriving with their luggage and shit. And then do they never leave?

Right. I keep looking at Ben like he's going to tell me. Is this the season when they all come to visit? Right. It's like a Hotel California kind of situation. When you're here, you never leave. Yeah, when you're here, you're family. So it's like a... Olive Garden?

It's like an Olive Garden type of situation. It's like somewhere between Olive Garden and... Would you say the characters are welcome? Is it like a USA Network situation? It is. It is. And it's sort of like TBS because it's very funny. is it like a USA Network situation?

It is. It is. And it's sort of like TBS because it's very funny. So, because we learn, of course, his wife, voiced by Jackie Sandler.

Of course. The great Jackie Sandler. As Adam Sandler's want to do. Yes. Adam Sandler's love interests who do not have a big part are often played by Jackie Sandler.

Yep. Same as any crazy night. Right. She was killed by human mob yes but yeah now it's like the 21st century

and like no one gives a shit about this anymore right isn't that the implication but here's just like screenwriting 101 faint praise but just effective

and I feel like I so often see movies botch this right he doesn't want her to go into the outside world. Right. So he sets up a fake town.

Right. Populated by zombies. Which is a sequence I love. It's very funny. Because another thing I love is that when she first sees the townspeople, they look like real townspeople. Right. And then it's once the shift of the town starts crumbling,

you see that they're masks. But it's literally that they built two different models. So at first you're seeing how she perceives them them and then you're seeing the actual reality of what they look like um we're not going to do the whole plot of every movie right no but i'm saying this is what i like about this movie a thing i like about this movie is that uh the fire started by the town collapsing is what brings johnny to the hotel right sure drac is the creator of his own he makes his own bed. Right.

Yeah. Right. Which I feel like movies botch this all the time now with too much coincidence. Fair enough. Especially in family movies where it's like you want this shit tight. Yeah. And it's like Drac's got a lesson to learn. So he's got to let go.

Yeah. These are tight movies. So they're all 90 minute movies that like kind of, you know, get their message across pretty quickly. I don't know. So Johnny. It's just a bunch of jokes. This like stoner backpacking like teen tour kid yeah he's like what is he he he's like

a sort of a parody of like a crunchy 2000s yeah like post-college travel the world he's a california dude yeah yeah but like he's like lame in a cute way, right? It's like, he likes like DJing and what else does he like? I do think it's to the movie's advantage that he's hard to stereotype because they do make him very specific. Yeah. Like they don't just settle into like six obvious stereotypes. Right. He's called like, I think his name is Lofran.

Here's one problem I have. It's not a problem, a question. He presents as very Jewish. Correct. But then his parents are not. Play very waspy. They're waspy. Yeah. It's not a problem, a question. He presents as very Jewish. Correct. But then his parents are not. Play very waspy. They're waspy.

Yeah. And like, you know, obviously the joke is just that they're like very straight laced. Right. But like, you know, he's got like the big red hair.

He's voiced by Samberg. Like he has a little like redhead kid who's like, you know, kind of anxious. Denisovich. Yeah. Yeah. Denisovich.

I read them as Jewish. But they're not though. He's from Santa Cruz. Oh, Denisovich. I read them as Jewish. But they're not, though. He's from Santa Cruz. Oh, no Jews in Santa Cruz? He's like a hacky sack guy. He's like a hacky sack guy. Right? That's what he is.

He's a hacky sack guy. Right. He's like into the jam band. Right. Yeah, he likes like- Or like bad electronic music scene. 311. He loves his backpack.

Is that what they're called? His favorite thing in the world is his backpack. Loves his backpack. Like has a weird romantic attachment to his backpack. He looks like sublime. Yeah. I guess that's an earlier generation. No, I mean like.

You're right. The older, like the newer generation would be into like EDM or whatever. Yeah. Which he kind of is. Sure, he likes DJing. But he walks in and Mavis zings with him, which is the key concept of this franchise,

the notion of zinging. Do you think that was in the original presentation? I don't know. And you see, when people fall in love in these movies, their eyes flash pink, and they've zinged. Wait, David. Oh, no.

Did you just see? Oh, no, Ben's eyes just went pink. Who's he looking at right at you david ben just zinged oh hey benny hey but here's my question here's my question and this is a real question yeah can is zinging one way well because in three he zings and it takes her a while to zing correct but she does eventually I think it can be one way. I think they sort of present it as being like a less creepy version of the imprinting from the Twilight franchise. Oh, God.

That's creepy. Super creepy. Undoubtedly. Where they imprint on babies and go, hey, dibs. So this opening with all the monsters coming through. You really love this. Oh, sure. Right.

Well, this is like his idea, the sanctuary, the, you know. But I just like the chaos of this thing. Like it reminds me of, I already said Mad Magazine. But the way Mad Magazine, it's like here's the article or the comic strip you're reading on these two pages. But then they're all the little Sergio Argonaz drawings in the margins but also like those mad parodies where it would be like the first double spread yeah where all the characters are lined up and they all like have one joke about themselves that they say like one after the other like you know i'm this and blah like yeah that's what this feels like and he's reducing everyone to like you know and adams brought all his friends i'm gonna run them down we got apart from selena gomez Gomez, right? His best friend. Kevin James as Frank.

Right, like a very blue-collar Frankenstein who also just is quietly afraid of fire. Yeah, he kind of has the least bits. He's just sort of doing Kevin James. Kevin James is not trying hard, to be clear. There is no effort. His delivery is funny in the first movie. Fire bad.

Fire bad, and his arms fall off sometimes. Yeah, he falls apart. He's got a gambling problem. And he does. Fran Drescher plays his wife and she's like the bride of Frankenstein. She's the only, thankfully the only nagging wife stereotype

in this film, which Sandler usually is rife with them. In this movie, they reduce it to one. Yes. Then you got Steve Buscemi, who's always in Sandler movies. Yeah, my favorite character. He's good.

Yeah, he's good. As Wayne, I also like the way the wolf is animated. He's the werewolf. Well, this is like every, all the main characters in this movie have totally different shapes. Yeah, right. You know, Dracula's like a teardrop. Yeah, Dracula's very similar. Murray is like a circle.

Right. Frank is like a cube. He's a cube. And Wayne is like a circle right frank is like a is is like a cube practically right and wayne is like a inverted triangle yes he's like an upside down triangle but he's just all like exhaustion sure the bit they latch on to is the fact that they have like an insane litter of wolf children right have a million children the most like which is haggard father it's funny that they're like what should our werewolf bit be and it's like because werewolves famously turn into humans right never turns never turns into human though their bit is just like that he's like a dog yeah and i guess dogs have lots of

children but like even that you're kind of like not really my single biggest gripe with these movies is they should have said that he's a wolf man rather than a werewolf sure like the classic werewolf i keep on going like when does he ever turn back he's not a werewolf no he's a wolf man rather than a werewolf. Sure. Like the classic. Because werewolf, I keep on going like, when does he ever turn back? He's not a werewolf. No. He's a wolf person. He's a wolf man. Right. Yeah.

And like, they have like 500 children. Like they have like this sort of like ever growing brood of children. Winnie's the only one who's ever like kind of individually developed. The rest are just like monsters. Yeah. Yeah. Right. They're funny though.

They're like the minions of this world. Right. But I like that they literally are just like a storm. Like they're just like monsters yeah yeah right they're funny though they're like the minions of this right right but i like that they literally are just like a storm like they're just like molly shannon plays his wife i mean another thing another criticism is the way the women don't have a lot to do apart from maybe this is a cool character the wives quote unquote are like nothing to do uh then you got david spade as griffin the invisible man and his bit is that he's dav Spade. Again, not trying too hard. What do you think they're making, $100,000?

Right? More, right? Yeah, probably easily. Yeah. Just like a day's work. I mean, Sandler makes millions off these movies. Well, obviously. He's like producing a bunch of shit. I think Kevin James probably gets like a million or two.

Gomez probably gets like a million or two at this point. Yeah. David Spade's probably getting like a couple hundred. He's probably making decent money by the third one though. Decent coin. So he's making a thousand dollars to just be like, hey, you didn't see me? A thousand?

Yeah. Just for that one line. Watch where you put your finger. Yeah. Yeah, that line is. A thousand dollars. Yeah, right. Is like a.

More. It's probably like $25,000 for like, hey, I'm standing here. No, he doesn't. Yeah. And his joke is that he's invisible. And sometimes he's like, yeah, you didn't notice how I look. And it's like, no, you're invisible.

That bit's good where they make fun of Johnny's red curly hair. And he's like, hey, I have red curly hair. That's kind of funny. And then Murray the Mummy. Excuse me. And then Adam Sandler's greatest of all friends. CeeLo Green is Murray the Mummy. That's right.

CeeLo Green was in this first movie. And then cut. And then he got replaced. Why did they get rid of him? Did he do something really terrible? Can't tell if you're doing a bit or not. Do you remember? He did like four terrible things and they were all kind of like part of like a sort

of a human centipede of badness. They're all kind of linked. Like pre-Me Too. Like it was like one of the first times we kind of canceled a guy like that. Yeah, we were just like, oh no. It's almost like we kind of think he's crazy. Yeah. I think he's crazy. I'm want to say fuck you that guy see look great cut all of that uh and then he's replaced by uh keegan

michael key in the second impression right yeah because like and again like it's weird that that's the mummy what's the mummy spit uh he He's got kind of like an accent. He's a party dude. Yeah, right. I also don't understand how CeeLo Green got roped into it because everyone else is so in the extended Sandler family. Literally, Sandler just did his most dialed, right? So it's like Kevin, sure, David, okay, Bashami.

Yeah, John Lovitz. John Lovitz plays Quasimodo. Molly Shannon, I think. Molly Shannon, Sandberg. And then it's like, oh, CeeLo Green. I Lovitz plays Quasimodo. Molly Shannon, I think, has been a couple. Molly Shannon, Sandberg. And then it's like, oh, CeeLo Green. I call him a lot, I guess. Why CeeLo Green? Was it just like that he was hot that year?

So hot, yeah. Like, that was just, it was like, oh, we should cast, like, a famous musician, too. Because even if you go into, like, the deeper supporting cast, it's like Chris Parnell. Yeah, Parnell's in all of them. He's the fly in the first two. And the fish in all the fish in the third one. She's funny Chris Parnell. Parnell's in all of them. He's the fly in the first two. And the fish. All the fish in the third one. She's funny as the fish. But even like Taron Kellum and like Paul Britton do some of the background voices in the first one.

Like it's like all people in his sphere except for CeeLo Green. Yes. Rob Riggle, I think, is a... Is the skeleton man, I think. Skeleton, yeah. Yeah. The first one, the basic crux of it is that uh they've zinged yeah so she falls in love with a backpacker right right and uh drac doesn't want anyone knowing there's a human

oh i don't want her to do that he doesn't want anyone to know there's a human at the hotel so he dresses him up like a frankenstein to try to get him out right then everyone starts falling for him kind of what's fun about the movie though though, is that they're in on it together. Yes. And it's because he doesn't want Mavis to find out that the fire was all his fault. Right. So that's why he has to ally with Mavis' essentially love interest. It's pretty tightly plotted.

It's not that complicated, but it's just like... And then the message of the movie is humans and monsters aren't so different after all, which is obvious because they're all voiced by fucking Adam Sandler people. And the voice job is just them sounding like people. But I think the key to this first movie is the fact that Selena Gomez is giving a real performance.

Yeah, she's good. It's not that what she's doing is super complicated, but there is a surprising amount of integrity and depth to what she's doing. And she makes the longing this character feels for the outside world pretty palpable. She wants to see a sunset and stuff. I had no experience with Selena Gomez before this movie

outside of knowing that Selena Gomez was a thing. I don't think I'd seen her in anything. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. See, I don't even know that song. And I saw this movie and I was just like, she's really kind of killing this thing. She's making this character kind of interesting. She was the Wizard of Waverly Place

you know but Miley Cyrus who I have no problem with as an actress she was in Spring Breakers she's in that right oh she's really good in Spring Breakers

you've seen Spring Breakers I've seen Spring Breakers I forgot one of the finest American films but so I'm just sitting here watching it loving this animation

getting kind of caught up in the Mavis storyline I walk out of it and I go like that wasn't a hack job that wasn't a paycheck for tarkovsky he was giving it his all it's a sweet movie what do you think ben you watched them all i did when griffin and i saw the movie yesterday we were like i've been watching them or does he just not want to do that no i did they're fun family movies yeah they got big monsters in them and i and they have big monsters like obviously there's always a lesson to be told,

but it's not hitting you over the head with it. No, they're pretty tap, but they don't like bend themselves over backwards trying to shoehorn shit in. And I think there is like just a level of like creativity and artistry to the animation itself that is lacking from like other sort of equivalent franchises like this. Well, because I watched Samurai

Jack, so then also immediately and, you know, loved Dexter's Lab, Powerpuff, like a lot of the shows. And the Clone Wars. I didn't watch Clone Wars, but still, I like his work. And you recognize it. You're like, oh, it's not getting lost in this thing.

Right away. And also, the three of us are all, like, early Sandler defenders. Yes, we all like early Sandler movies. That's right. And working with a director who's got some, like, pacing and some, like pacing and some like genuine

like visual craft ups the sort of Sandler comedy as well. Like I feel like this movie feels less lackadaisical than like when, I mean you and I have been watching these Netflix Sandler movies and I'm of two minds of them

because I watched something like The Week Of and I'm like, I kind of love that this movie is so low concept. Sure, right. That it's just characters and bits. Which is kind of love that this movie is so low concept that it's just characters and bits.

Which is kind of what these are like too. Right. But there's more craft in these, which is a nice balance. I was talking to somebody how like,

if you think about this as a high budget comedy essentially. These are huge. These are huge comedies. Yeah, you're right. They're like $90 million comedies.

Because other animated films tend to fall into other genres as well. Right. And these are just straight up fucking comedies. Which was his big thing. I just wanted to be funny.

So all that physical comedy stuff, it's executed so well and masterfully. And there's a lot of money going into this too. The thing Tarkovsky says is the most satisfying thing for him was seeing the first movie in theaters and watching audiences laugh at purely physical bits. He felt like that had sort of fallen away from animated films. And it's like they're laughing just at the way Drac is moving. I think that, but I also think that reinforces perhaps the stereotype

of these movies is like, oh, they're just like they're dumb. Because it's like physical humor. Like people not even seeing them, but like the trailers just make it look like a lot of like, and then he falls over. So is this like the same as Minions just make it look like a lot of like and then he falls over like is this like the same as Minions or whatever is it just like a cacophony and then the big gag is that he says

blah blah blah which like what is why is what does that mean I don't know what that means why is that funny they do a weird amount of like yeah explain it to me I don't know but I'll say the other one that I find really funny is the Frank very casual fire bad thing. Yeah, that's funny.

That Frankenstein's still terrified of fire, but he says it in this very, like, you know, fire bad. Yeah. Kind of thing. And they're both just, like, very Mad Magazine, like, oh, this is a postmodern take on a monster. These are monsters dealing with their reputation the things that we all make fun of them for in the schoolyard when we're like six I genuinely I look at these movies and I go

like this would have been a better approach for Universal than doing the Dark Universe them trying to make an animated family film with all their monsters and their designs would have made more sense like there's more

value to the monsters now because of these movies that Universal has because kids actually know them again. In a way that Universal is totally whiffed. Because they're like, I don't know, it's about the humans fighting the monsters? Yeah, well. I mean, look, we all love the Dark Universe. But these movies are like largely riffing on

the Universal movies. The Dark Universe. The original universal movies. Sure. Dark universe origins. So this movie comes out and it's a big hit and they're like, Oh, sequel. And Sandler's like,

wait, that's, that's a real thing now. That's a real movie. Sure. And his last two movies are bombed. And he goes like, I'm going to fucking get him.

I'm all over this. But first, box office game. Okay. I don't care. I don't give a shit. September. We're doing three. Yeah.

Box office game. September 28th, 2012. This movie opened at $42 million. Big surprise. People thought like 20 tops. Yeah. It was a new September record at the time. Correct.

Yeah. People were really, it beat Sweet Home Alabama's like, then like 10 plus year reign as the September best movie ever. Right. And then the record was beaten by Hotel Transylvania 2. And it was Sandler's second best ever behind what?

Longest Yard. Longest Yard, which like that shouldn't exist. These numbers like made no sense everyone thought this was just like I don't fucking know you know so number two

at the box office this weekend is directed by a director who we have discussed one of his movies on this podcast not in this episode but we've covered

one of his we have done one episode on one of his movies the movie's about time true The movie's about time. True. The movie's about time? Yeah. We've covered one of his movies.

Not a miniseries. We've covered one of his movies. No, it was a special episode for his new movie last year. I would classify this as being sick. Looper. You classify it as being sick? Good. Ben's throwing the horns

you like it you like Looper hell yeah yeah Looper's pretty good Looper Looper open to 20 makes you think

makes you think made 66 yeah so doubled its budget it's a pretty good movie and then he gets to make Star Wars yeah but takes a while

I know doesn't make a movie for six years I know yeah yeah was he gonna make a movie I think he had a couple things he was working on.

I don't know if he ever publicly announced. Number three is from a director who's, we have covered one of his movies. What? Once again. Only one? Once again. Yes. A special one-off episode.

This movie is okay. The next, the movie we discussed. this movie is okay the next the movie we discussed and I've been pitching doing uh his like more recent movie I really want us to cover it because I'm obsessed I'm a diehard

you're a diehard for his most recent movie are you being sincere what's what what are your favorite movies the last five years Assassin's Creed don't listen to him oh god come on come on give me a hint um okay uh it's a cop movie la cop movie it grosses 41 million dollars total it has kind of a great performance in it. It's not a bad movie. It's very him. Oh, oh, oh, oh.

It's End of Watch. It's End of Watch with Jake Gyllenhaal. Yes. Michael Peña. I believe Anna Kendrick. Yeah. And what movie of David Ayer's have we discussed? Suicide Squad and Ben wants to discuss Bright and Brighter.

And Brightest. Bright, Brighter, Brightest. Number four. Wow. These are some movies yeah whew it's a different time

number four is is the rare this movie stars a really famous director and it's the rare movie he's in trouble with the curve

trouble with the curve the Clint Eastwood baseball pitching scout movie yes he's blind he's blind. He's blind? He's going blind.

He doesn't want anyone to know, so he has his daughter go with him, and she's learning how to scout as well. It's like Amy Adams. Justin Timberlake, John Goodman. This is a film that came out in theaters. And I think it was his main first AD directed it, but I've heard that he kind of took over directing it.

Interesting, okay. Trouble with the curve. I believe it's the last movie he acted in. But now he's about to start a new drug mule. Now he's doing like a drug mule make America great again. Do you know this? Do you know that Clint Eastwood's doing a 90-year-old drug mule movie that he's directing

and starring in? That gives me mixed feelings. I got coke in my butt. I kind of like that, actually. I like Donald Trump. I don't know if he likes Trump. Isn butt i kind of like i kind of like that actually yeah i like donald trump i don't know if he likes trump maybe isn't he he's kind of like trump's kind of a bad guy but maybe we need a bad guy right like that's kind of his take right now i don't know obama and then he turned into a chair america is run by sorcerers. Number five is a film that was like one of those sat on the shelf for a long time and then its star got super famous.

So it kind of got dumped and made some money. Oh, fuck. It has a really stupid name. I know. It's the Jennifer Lawrence horror movie, right? It's called The House at the End of the Street? Okay. Which made $31 million horror movie, right? It's called The House at the End of the Street? Correct. Okay. Which made $31 million. Yeah, which is crazy.

And that was literally just off. They were like, Jennifer Lawrence is famous now? Oh, we got this movie. It's about like a house at the end of some street or something. And they were like, sure. September, release it. Yeah. So often when we play this, I am like, who are these people that go to see these movies? Yeah, it's true. People are just

like, well, gotta see something. Might as well see what's at the house at the end of the street. Let's see what's at the end of the street. Guess what? It's not good, I think. It's a bad, bad house, I think. It's a dead end. Yeah, don't go. There are like 3 million people saw it. Here's the craziest thing about this. Number six, opening this

weekend, Pitch Perfect. Crazy. Opens to 5 million dollars. Now, it's like a semi-limited release not even 330 theaters like oh weird but like what's that about no idea they were like yeah let's platform this like it's 1982 like i whatever it worked i guess yeah eventually sure anyway so that's hotel transylvania one you're now you like this movie love it big fan i watch it a lot i i do you watch it oh so you watch the first one a lot i watched the first one a lot i hadn't seen two again blah blah i haven't watched two again

since it came out which i enjoyed but i think is a total gentleman six right i mean i think i'm basically kind of a gentleman six on all of them but like that's that to me that's a positive i like that one i just think the the actual sweet the actual i think it's got a sweeter script i think it's got a tighter story and I think the craft is at it's highest in the first one okay but alright but now listen now you're saying okay Hotel Transylvania 2 which came out in September 2015

same weekend practically you know there's a scene where they say like we should check the bluetooth and then there's just a bluetooth with eyes that just comes up onto the screen. Two does this joke about five times and every time it's great. I just,

I laugh and laugh. And then I'm like, like, like my spirit exits my body and like looks at me laughing and is like, really? Like it was just like a blue tooth. Like that's the whole joke. I also rewatched that joke four times in a row.

Really funny. The way the tooth moves is really funny. The color of blue, the shade is really funny. No, but there's that. There's the joke where they interrupt Jack when he's painting, and it looks like he's doing a cubist portrait, and then you see the guy's painting, and he's a cubist monster. Yeah, that's funny.

That was funny. There's one where the guy is using the app to modify his face and smudge it, and then you look up and see his face face and his face looks like a smudge. There's like shit. They do a lot of that. And it also has more of the literal family guy cutaway things. It does a lot of that. This is the worst thing since Murray opened

the hot dog stand. And then it's like they're bandaged or whatever. They do a couple of those. They do like, maybe Wayne shouldn't be the tennis instructor. Yeah, yeah. They do shit like that. I'm realizing how much Sandler's Dracula is kind of triumph the comic insult on.

Sure, sure. But I mean, it is his old Dracula voice, right? Yes, right. The Bluetooth? It's the best. So dumb. The other thing that's funny about it is it's not like that's canonically a type of monster it's a sentient

large tooth exactly that's the thing of any color and no one explains like what is this oh bluetooth there are gags

in these movies though that I think are just so purely satisfying in just a like fucking like tee it up knock it out of the park kind of way like that

just like quick efficient right to me so like you had alright so here's another thing listeners Griffin proposes that we do this episode like 8 months ago knock it out of the park kind of way like that. Just like quick, efficient. Right, to me, so like you had, all right, so here's another thing, listeners. Griffin proposes that we do this episode like eight months ago. And then I was really worried

that you guys were going to hate it. He's texting us, the two of us, being like, I hope you like these movies because I don't know, they're kind of a lot and you're going to have to watch them all at once. Like Griffin's nervous about us seeing these movies. Terrified. What were you so worried about?

They are 90 minute children's films. Like, they're pretty easy to watch. Right. But I also just thought you'd be like, what is this goofball McKillicuddy bullshit? Yeah, but I was,

I guess you just sold me enough on, like, the animation. And I just like Tartatovsky anyway. But I like monsters. That's the other thing. Monsters fucking rule. I love monsters so much. Yeah, they're cool. They're ingrained in us. Like, we all know the trop thing. Monsters fucking rule. I love monsters so much. Yeah, they're cool. They're

ingrained in us. We all know the tropes. We know these characters. And I love them visually. I love the different scales of things in this movie. The fact that you can have the lobby of the hotel and here are tiny little creatures and then here's just a foot. Yeah, they're all floating by.

Right, right, right. I also just, so I kind of like the second one. What I'm saying is you'd really, you'd really like rock bottom my expectations, but the second one's just like Borscht Belt jokes. It's just silliness. And then when like Mel Brooks shows up at the end, I almost felt like this is thematically appropriate

that he's here. Yeah. Cause like that is all they were doing. It's just a bunch of like young Frankenstein. It's a Sandler sketch young Frankenstein knockoff shit. You know what I mean? Yeah. What do you think about the lesson in two, though?

Do you like it? He's saying the lesson is bad. I barely remember that there was a lesson. It's very pushed aside. It's not like a... It's really just about the bits. To sum up the plot of two, it's five years later.

Yeah. They have a kid. He's a little five-year-old i'm sorry the first 10 minutes of this movie spans seven years yeah that's right because it opens with their wedding then it cuts to one year later which is mavis announcing that she's pregnant right then it cuts to nine months later when she is in delivery sure and then it jumps five years to five years and it's a bitch denise who is a little... And the whole movie is Dracula being... He loves the kid, but he's like,

I wish he was a vampire. I hope he's a vampire. And he has to become a vampire before he turns five or else he's not a vampire. And maybe this is wondering if she wants him raised around monsters. Right, maybe this is like, maybe we should move to the suburbs or whatever. So what's the lesson of the movie?

I guess because I saw this for the first time a few days ago and so obviously it came out before our current political climate but it just felt very, I want it to be the way it used to be kind of like vibe and then like learning to come over, like get over that.

It just, I didn't, I wasn't into it. Well, there's, yes, there's a traditionalist streak in this movie, which is like he's kind of a traditionalist, and then when Vlad is introduced, it's like, no, this is the real traditionalist guy. This is the guy who's kind of real old school. Right, and Sandler has always whispered, conservative, conservative, conservative.

A little bit. Is he super Republican? He doesn't talk about it, but that's always the sort of notion. I always thought he was kind of one of those guys who's like, I just like being rich I don't give a shit he seems more apathetic about anything going on in the world

but I think this is also a movie that like every 15 minutes it completely latches onto a new narrative conceit right the first bit is all what you're talking about and then it's like some hotel stuff. Right.

Then they go to the camp. There's like a bunch of camp stuff. Right. The stuff with Johnny and Mavis in California is like literally a concentrated 15 minute stretch. It's a little chunk of the movie. It's like making fun of the suburbs. Right.

Yeah. And then Vlad and his bat monsters who are sensibly the antagonist of the movie are not introduced until the last 15 minutes. And also Vlad's like so clearly not a villain anyway because it's Mel Brooks and he's being funny and then he has these like gargoyles. So then the villain is like Bella who's this Bella Lugosi bat monster Voiced by Rob Riggle

Yes and that sequence with them fighting the bats at the end feels like everything he wanted to do on Popeye That feels very like oh I'm gonna do like crazy wind up punch jaws contorting and like the wake of the punch sort of stuff. I just remember seeing that. They had canceled Popeye, and I was like, this is where he put all that energy.

Right. Clearly, he just went, I want the end sequence to be a big fist fight because that's not the kind of action sequence they have in these movies. I just can't remember anything about this movie already, but I just remember that I just sort of laughed a bunch. It's totally fun to watch. The script has zero narrative propulsion.

It was written by Smigel and Sandler. So Sandler actually got a writing credit. Who rarely takes writing credits on his movies. Blah blah blah.

Tark it comes out. I think. Yeah. Does he say that in the movie? He does. Well he says he doesn't say it.

Blah blah blah. Three is the one where he actually says it. Three is the one where he actually says it offhandedly right at the start and everyone's like, hey, he actually said it.

And then they feel like that joke is over with. Yeah, and then they play I'm in love with a monster for the 15th time. I love that dumb song they play every 15 minutes in all of these movies.

What else? I'm trying to think. The kid's so cute. The kid's really cute. Dennis is very cute. The thing with him and Winnie is really nice. Yeah, the little wolf girl.

They're like friends. But it definitely is. It's more of a verbal gag scream cheese no isn't it too no because they give it to johnny when he's still pretending to be a frankenstein he has to pretend that he likes oh you're right but then it's also into it is into though because it's at the wedding scream cheese is pretty cool it's a cream cheese that's cream um johnny is kind of a fuck boy oh wow anti johnny we're into johnny like johnny but he i'm just saying if it's a kid's movie yeah it's definitely like uh men shouldn't behave that way especially a dad should be more responsible he's like he's like basically another kid i don't like that i feel like that's a bad lesson i think it is the comedic conceit they come up with traditionalists well no you're like your dad should wear a suit come home i'm surprised I was going to say, that's a bad lesson for kids. The comedic conceit they come up with. You're the traditionalist. Well, no.

You're like, your dad should wear a suit. Come home. I'm surprised Cal Dracula wasn't wearing sweatpants. You're like fucking the Mr. Banks

in Mary Poppins where you're like singing a song about how everything has to happen a certain way. I'll say, I have heard that complaint about these movies

that like the Dracula character is constantly trying to make other people, especially his daughter, behave the way he wants them to yeah I guess so but then he always prevents the fool he always learns not to do that I guess they do kind of like now that Johnny no longer

has like the narrative function of like he's the outsider now they've accepted him for two and three they make the joke essentially oh he and the kid are the same right he and the kid are kind of allies in this in the second one, which I like. This is one thing I like about the movie, is that...

Oh, Johnny's working with Drac again because he wants Drac. Because Mavis wants to move to the suburbs. It's the classic dilemma of the new parent, right? Like, oh, maybe we should... I'm sorry. I just had a moment where I stepped out of my body for a second and just felt such joy

of the fact that I've gotten us to the point where we can get into discussing the plot nitty gritty of Hotel Transylvania 2. I'm going to get zero listens for this one. All right. So Mavis is, you know, she wants to move to the suburbs because that's new to her. Yeah. And Johnny is kind of like, I've done that.

You know, that's the thing. Johnny, he's a wayward soul. He's a backpacker, right? He doesn't like the suburbs. I think it's more he just doesn't want to work because he's found a place that somehow just exists without money. And he also has like a job too that's like a total sham job where he's like, yeah, you're the executive vice president

of DJing. But I also love that like... He's got it made in the shade. The Transylvanian shade. I don't know. I also love, I said this yesterday after we saw three, but that like

they're kind of just like a happy married couple. There's jokes in 2 and 3 about date night. Because they want to fuck once in a while. I don't know. They got Denny Savage.

They never get into ball and chain annoying jokes. Johnny's usually kind of a voice of reason. It's sort of like he's like look man like this is how it is. Like he has the kind of like Californian outlook of sort of like everyone should just do what they want to do man. Like you know. I like that he's a

complicated character. Ben's like fuck this guy. Ben doesn't like Johnny. Because yesterday we were like Ben probably loves Johnny right? Yeah we were like talking yeah so much of yeah. But that's, you know, it gets to this point of everyone accepting everyone the way they are.

It's got fun jokes and it's fun to watch. Yeah, I had an okay time watching Hotel Transylvania 2. No subtitle. No subtitle. Yeah. This is a weird subtitle

for the movie. Yeah. Box office game? Box office game. September 25th, 2015. Okay. So we got Hotel Transylvania 2 opens 48 million 48 like practically the same yeah it just like did well yeah number two also opening this weekend

is a film you auditioned for boy comedy sort of like a light you know uh sort of... The Intern? Yeah. Guess what? We'll talk about it very soon. We're going to be talking about it real soon on this here podcast. I auditioned for that movie so many times. Is that the only one? Are there any other Myers movies you auditioned for?

I auditioned for It's Complicated as well. Wow. Like three times. That sounds like a complicated process. It was very complicated. I auditioned for three different casting directors because they kept on firing casting directors because they weren't finding people.

And then the new casting director would be like, we just thought you were an obvious choice for this. Like, so did the last person. Nancy, not a fan of old downtown Griffey Nooms. It was a part that they shot and then cut out of the movie. But they delayed the film production because they couldn't cast this part. The joke was that she tries to get on dating apps

and get back into the dating scene and then she gets there and the date is like a 19 year old. Oh, that's a good joke. And it was like a big you know, it was like a big six page scene in the movie in like the first act and they couldn't fucking find the kid and they kept on going back to it and then they just

cut it out of the movie. Daryl Sabara got the part. Spy kid himself. He has spy kids and world's greatest dad fame. Yeah. But just cut it out of the movie. Daryl Sabara got the part. He of Spy Kids and World's Greatest Dad fame. Yeah, but they cut it. Anyway. So that opened to 17. So, you know, got thumped. Yeah.

But that is more of your classic September movie. Right. You're kind of like, you know, broad, you know, appealing to an older audience. I'm still surprised that movie didn't do better. It didn't do well. No. It didn't get... I don't know what it was about, actually. I'm not sure why movie didn't do better. It didn't do well. No. It didn't get...

I don't know what it was about, actually. I'm not sure why. We'll talk about it on that episode. I like that movie a lot. I like it, okay, but it does star, you know, as stupid noodle brain man who I fucking hate so much.

I hate those parts of it. That movie has two workaholics too many in it. Yes, it does. Yes. All right, so number three. Yeah. It's a sequel in what becomes a trilogy

Casper's we heard at the beginning It is in my opinion the best of the three Oh wow In this film I mean you may not have seen this film Yeah he's never even heard of it There's three of them There's three of them which is kind of crazy

The first one did really well This one did okay. The third one came and went. It's no question of a fourth. It's done. No, it's done. Is it star driven? No. It's brand name driven. It's an established property.

Is it a horror thing? No. It's a teen thing. It's a teen thing. It's a teen thing. There are three of them thing it's a teen thing there are three of them that came and went that makes me think I probably saw it maybe

I don't know I don't know it's a good one I like this one this one's like a decent movie not a book series what? not a book series?

yes a book series it is a book series this kind of reminded me of like the sort of middle Resident Evil movies which are also really good so oh is it Maze Runner? The Scorch Trials? Welcome to the Scorch Trials welcome to the Scorch

yeah I haven't seen them I recommend them the third one is a bit of a bummer though so like doesn't really like first one's solid second one's pretty good

yeah West Ball West Ball decent action director yeah number four is another one where you're like

Jesus it's really it's the both times it's these movies where you're like oh yeah people like they went to them they said one where you're like, Jesus, it's really, it's the Ben, both times it's these movies where you're like, Oh yeah, people like went to, they went to them.

They said one for one for this. They saw the trailer. They're like, wow, he looks terrible. I got to see this. Wow. This doesn't star anyone famous.

Like it stars a bunch of people who are kind of famous. Great. But the guy looks terrible on it. No. Okay. So this movie, uh, it had opened last week, limited in like big format,

and now it's expanding wide. It's a kind of a disaster movie. Everest? Everest. Yeah. From the director of 101 Reykjavik. Balthasar Kamikasar. I misread.

I saw the wrong one. Oh, yeah. Oh, the next one is the one where he looks terrible. Yeah. Not bad. I've seen it. I like Everest. It's okay. He came up on our Reddit recently. looks terrible. Not a bad one. I've seen it. I haven't seen it. It's okay.

He came up on our Reddit recently. What? To do a mini series about it. People were like, what's the fucking deal with that guy? Because he sort of felt like he was groomed to be a big budget studio journeyman. And then he sort of capped out somewhere small. Wahlberg likes him. He's done a couple Wahlberg movies.

He got offered, I think, Fast and Furious 7 and turned it down. He was on those short lists for a while. He's stylish. And now did Adrift. That's right, which was okay. Yeah. He does these okay movies. He did Two Guns where, you know, why have one gun when you could have two?

Two Guns. More like two stars. You know, fucking Denzel Washington's in that movie. I know. The first 10 minutes of that movie rule. Oh, really? Yeah. It's really funny and they're really good together.

And then it becomes weirdly plotty. Yeah. Well, that happens in a lot of that movie rule. Oh, really? Yeah, it's really funny, and they're really good together, and then it becomes weirdly plotty. Yeah, well, that happens in a lot of Denzel movies. Yeah, that movie just has way too much fucking plot. Anyway, and then number five, yeah, this is, yes, the premise here is, what if this famous actor looked terrible? So bad. And it's kind of this famous actor's last film role that got him any praise.

Now he is one of the most universally despised people in Hollywood. Wow. So he got Me Too'd? Yeah. I mean, kind of. Yeah. Kind of. Not quite, I guess.

But, you know, yes, he had a case in the public eye that you know of you know abusive behavior recent feature in Rolling Stone 2 oh okay so it's a depth stir it's a depth stir yeah a guy we're never going to talk about on this podcast thankfully it's not like we're thinking

about a miniseries thinking about a fucking director who's worked with him 8 billion times it's not like we're going about a fucking director who's worked with him 8 billion times. It's not like we're going to have to dodge through that minefield for months on end. A guy who's very depressing to think about and infuriating to talk about.

Depster's The Last Time. Oh, oh, oh, oh. This is such a bad performance. Oh, boy. You think this is a bad performance and people were like he might get the honor you think he's gonna get the oscar this time uh black mass black mass i'll make your cake recipe the whole trail is gonna be about a fucking cake or some bread i can't remember what the recipe is god give me this recipe god give me this fucking recipe motherfucker where does this rank as worst like clearly i am

from boston crime movie it's like yeah yeah yeah a hundred terrible i watched it on a plane it sucks i think black mass is one of the worst films the last 10 years i will stand behind it i think it's a piece of shit you know what it's a cinematic wikipedia entry it's just a series of things that's the thing and then all it's really got going for it is this like kind of like freakish like skeletor job they did to yeah and you know then you google whitey bulger and you're like you didn't look that bad like a person it's the same you didn't look like a scorpion it's the same thing as like foxcatcher where you look at the real guy and you're like he didn't look like fat nosferatu and it was clear that these actors were just like i want to transform into a monster and then see what is what is the

recipe for i can't remember it's it's the steak it's the steak what's his name david harbour makes right and he's like just a little bit of recipe right he's like you gave it up that easy why are you a fucking rat and they're just like he's like give it up like a dog like a dog make america great again okay i'm out he chokes like four women in that movie it's a gross movie and it's just not good i mean it's a piece of shit scott cooper anyway maybe he'll want to be on the podcast sorry scott yeah he's a big listener okay um all right so that's Hotel Transylvania 2. Then, and then. And then.

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Hotel Transylvania, the series. Oh, yes. It's on Disney XD, maybe? I don't know what it's on. So last year I was doing press and we were flying around a lot and I was running out of stuff to watch on airplanes. I tried watching some of it. It is not my cup of tea.

I think it's totally fine if I was 10 I probably would be all over it and in on this franchise it's like Monster High I don't know if you're familiar with Monster High I'm aware of it which was like a big doll brand

that was like oh they're monster girls and they go to high school together it's very much in line with that it's like Hotel Transylvania the teen years okay They go to high school together. It's very much in line with that. It's like Hotel Transylvania, the teen years. Okay. None of the adults are really in it. It's Mavis-centric, right? It's Mavis-centric.

Like Dracula's on business. Right. He's not in it. So his sister comes and takes over, who's like a school marm. Oh, weird. It's like a scary kind of like- Aunt Lydia. Yeah, she's like a Mrs. McGcgonigal kind of oh this sounds

awful yeah i'm not a huge there's a chicken yeah i guess wendy right so it's like blobby's daughter and hank einstein who's hank's son frank's son and there's uh a mummy boy and we got we got to talk about this we're moving off of the show. Whatever. Who fucking cares? Not my thing. I don't care. That's my answer for that. Not my thing. So we haven't talked about Blobby. Okay.

He's Blob, right? Like from The Blob, right? Correct. What does he do? He's got eyes. He wobbles. He wobbles around. There's that joke in 2 where they're on the big chase and he flies out the cliff and he's

like, you'll be okay. It's Blobby. It's Blobby. Which is like weirdly funny again there are a lot of things this movie that doesn't sound funny sort of right it's kind of cute um bobby is like background in the first one sure clearly he liked animating him or or samler thought it was funny or whatever it. So they write him into to a bunch where he invites himself into the sort of boys outing with the drag pack. Right.

And they put him in the little sidecar and he's just constantly getting like hit and smacked and getting like invincible leaves and branches. He's like a fucking Terminator robot who can like, you know, disassemble into particulate matter and reassemble and shit all right so in the third movie this is what i want to lead with we'll talk oh yeah yeah it's not set in a hotel anymore it's on a cruise ship yeah he vomits uh-huh i just want to lead with this well first he's swaying back and forth he's turning different colors he turns yellow and

then purple i think yes i believe so and then he he vomits and creates new life. Baby blob. He creates a baby through vomiting. Yeah. That's all. Yeah. Just weird. And then also later.

Do you like that part? About that part? Yeah. What did you think? That was cool? Yeah. Okay, great. Also later.

I thought it was kind of like symbolism for. Oh, Ben. We're not in the four hymns ad anymore. Come on. Later, he also takes some blob out of his tummy. Yes, he does. Makes a pair of sunglasses for himself, pair of sunglasses for the little baby blobby.

Correct. But then also later, he makes a puppy out of his blob. Yes, he does. And that has sentience. Sometimes he can create other life with new eyeballs that came from seemingly the ether. Eyeballs suggest sentience.

Right. If it has eyeballs, it's its own thing. Other times it's just inanimate objects. Right. But there's a sequence where it's like, he's like invulnerable. We're like, what's her name? Van Helsing. Oh, the love interest in this movie, Erica Van Helsing.

Erica Van Helsing is trying to kill Dracula. Catherine Han, one of her finest actresses. Right, there's this long sequence where she keeps missing Dracula and hitting Blobby. And he just bounces back. You were losing your mind a little at Blobby. Blobby's crazy. Just like the rules

of Blobby are only denser and stranger as it all goes on. That dude crazy. He's a little weird. Maybe someone should think about what's up with Blobby. Also, again, denser and stranger as it all goes on that dude crazy he's a little weird yeah like maybe someone should think about like what what's up with blobby like also again again honestly how's he paying his rent yeah and here's another thing okay it's money at a blob oh shit that's pretty impressive actually really good answer but all right all right so all right here's the premise of hotel transylvania 3 which as we should make clear, was written by Tartakovsky.

Yes, and Michael McCullers, who was an SNL guy, who I think they brought on to appease Sandler, and then Tartakovsky got a co-writing credit. Really, this is kind of his movie. Yes. They kept Sandler at bay. They did. And Sony no longer has a relationship with him.

That's the other thing. That's the thing. He left for Netflix anyway, so what does Sony fucking care? They don't need to appease him anymore. We'll pay you to show up and do your thing. And he doesn't. And you know what? Sandler's fine in the movie, but he definitely is more toned down. Like, there's less of his silliness.

He's still good. And if the second one is more like that sort of verbal gag, this one is really about movement. So visual. Like, this is all fucking just crazy movement. So here's the premise of Hotel Transylvania 3 Summer Vacation. HG3SV. You know, he's stressed out. He wants to go on

a date maybe. He's very lonely. He's a little lonely. Hasn't zinged in hundreds of years. His daughter, Mavis, misinterprets this. Mavie Wavy. Misinterprets this as like he needs a break. Yeah. So she books him on a surprise cruise okay also books tickets for everyone that's the question here's my question i get

putting him on the cruise but did she in the hotel say to everyone who's paying to be at the hotel i assume hey do you want to buy new tickets for a new hotel experience on a boat while you're on your endless vacation because mavis johnny dennis and drac going on a cruise ship makes total sense drac extending the invite to but he doesn't because it's a surprise to him. Right. So everyone's there though. Even Mavis extending the invite to, let me get his five closest friends. Murray, Frank, Griffin. You know, like let me bring them in. The floating brain guy, the skeleton

couple. Everyone's fucking the big foot guy. He can't even fit on the boat. You just see his leg. Because other monsters found out about the cruise because there was targeted advertising to other monsters. That's a good point that is so smart because they're watching tv so smart and then you see right an ad for monsters right for are you a monster like come on this cruise but like okay then what the fuck where's their

brand loyalty yeah they don't like the hotel yeah they all decide to is this and they're also they're leaving a vacation to go on a different vacation like we packed our bags from our home to go stay at a hotel and now we're gonna repack our bags who has ever done this who has ever left one vacation to go on another vacation spontaneously it's crazy marie the mommy i retort the answer is marie the mommy right sure um no it makes no no fucking sense. It doesn't make any sense. This is like an update on the George Carlin bit

A Place for My Stuff. Yeah, sure. It's also, it's a weird thread in this movie that like at the end of the first one when they go into the town to try to get Johnny, right? Like Johnny's gonna fly

and he realizes that he's crushed Mavis by sending her love away. Because Johnny denies, he says that he could never be with a monster, right? Right. So he goes and chases after Johnny. They have to go out into the real world. And when they go into town, they realize there's a monster fest. And these people now love monsters.

They're not scared of them anymore. They're excited. They're huge fans. Frank gives a big speech about how they need their help. And they all help Dracula get to the plane, turns to a bat, gives this thing, right? Right. The second one just takes place in a world where now it's like monsters and humans are really cool with each other.

Right, there's this thing where like, like the walls are falling down. Right, there's no segregation anymore. But we never see humans. Apart from Johnny's parents. Right, come in. And then the like 15 minute California section where Johnny's parents bring over other mixed couples.

Yeah, and the joke is right. Like, oh, we're progressive. One of the guys is just a weirdo beardo. Right. And like, what was I going to say? You know, the premise of Hotel Transylvania is still that it's a hotel for monsters. Right.

Like, it's not like it's not a hotel for monsters anymore. And it's not like they don't just all hang out with their monster friends. Well, I think they mentioned they've expanded it and are trying to attract more humans yes because that's what johnny is that's his job but he's not working very well he's not good at his job he's blazing it at his job blazing it for 20 it's just like this fucking millennial just like you know barely working hard and everything just leave millennials alone Ben Hotel Transylvania 3 right so can we talk about

the most important part of the movie what is it Bobby vomits and creates another Bobby I like that a lot the most important part of the movie is Gremlin Airline this is so good I've seen it a long time it should have been the whole movie

I was so happy about it. A hundred percent. And like, the best thing about it is there's no intro. It's just, we're like, we get it.

You know what I mean? It's like, what if an airplane was terrible and a bunch of gremlins and all they do is want to destroy you? That's the Mad Magazine thing. It's like,

we're going off of the common collective pop culture knowledge base and we're just riffing on it. It's really funny because here's how they're introduced. There's an establishing shot of a plane. I think it's called

Regular Airlines. Yes. And it looks, it's just in the air and then we pan left and it's Gremlin Airlines and it's like a fucking Zeppelin that's falling apart or whatever. It's like the flight of the Phoenix. And there are a bunch of Gremlins. They look like the

Gremlins from Gremlins they're tearing apart the plane as they're flying they like what else do they do stewardess does everything you're not like to unbuckle your seat belt like she's slamming people's like feet with the cart i also love that it's like all this really funny aggro assholey behavior and also constantly coming around with the drink cart which i like they their listing as the same level of irritation. Like getting physically attacked is as bad as having someone come by and offer soda for the 15th time. It is the perfect example of what Tartatowski's doing,

which is like, why don't we just load it with funny, funny jokes, weird visual jokes, just like every frame will just be chaos. It'll be like all this fun stuff happening. The landing is so funny. The landing, they just dive bomb into the water. It's funny. It's all funny. And she be like all this fun stuff happening. The landing is so funny. The landing, they just dive bomb into the water. It's funny.

It's all funny. And she's still got the drink cart going. Yeah, it's fucking, it's good. And then they land in the Bermuda Triangle, which is where

this ship starts. Right. And you realize it's Erika Van Helsing, great granddaughter of Abraham Van Helsing, the lineage of these monster hunters.

Right, because there's this prologue where you see the Van Helsing's like over and over again trying to kill Dracula. Oh, which is also fun. to kill dracula this wily coyote bit of him constantly being this close to killing dracula and getting injured himself um and she now has created this cruise ship for monsters sure try to get them all on there so that her great-grandfather who is still alive is now a steampunk cyborg man. Yes, that's also funny.

Yes. Right, that he's a weird robot and it takes forever for the steam thing to move. Three is insane. Three is a lot. Three has weird ideas. It does. Because the way they want to kill them.

For example, they go on a second vacation. They do dismiss that almost immediately. They now acknowledge the joke and they're done with it. But the notion is, the MacGuffin of the movie is that the only way to kill a monster is to unleash whatever killed everyone in Atlantis because apparently Atlantis was a city of monsters. I guess so.

So it's the Kraken is the only monster that can kill other monsters. Van Helsing's idea, I guess, is right. And Atlantis is now a casino? Well, that's funny. But who goes there if no one is aware of Atlantis? None of it makes sense. Because that's the thing I kept wondering. It's like, I know that this particular cruise

was like a magnet for the monsters. Yeah. But the way it's run feels like it happens all the time. And Erica alludes to growing up on the boat. Yeah. So, like, has it always existed like is she doing this to other monsters what's going on here do the fish know about it there's these fish with legs which is another insane gag you only ever see them in profile shit right right it's a classic animation thing where they're not three-dimensional right they're

all voiced by chris parnell they're all the. And they're like butlers and stewards and all this stuff. Right. And the best bit with them is that they have the kids club, which Wayne and his wife cannot comprehend the idea that people will take their kids off of their hands. Right. And give them free time. I'm trying to, yeah. And then these fish are just constantly being attacked by these wolf pups.

That's funny. Yeah. That's a funny sequence. Yeah. When they're like explaining the. That's funny. Yeah. That's a funny sequence. Yeah. When they're like explaining the concept of daycare. Yeah. Which like

it's a five star hotel. Why isn't the original hotel a daycare? And here's another thing. The fuck? Sorry. David, can you write a Yelp review?

I'm just noticing some flaws. We were texting the other day about these movies and you were saying what a good businessman he is. He is a good businessman. And now I feel like you're looking into it in terms of that he made it financially sustainable.

But then when you're like, wait a second, wait a second, what is the business model? Right. And who's paying? Doesn't he just own the castle anyway? It's impressive that he's a hotelier

while being a single father, but also the business maybe isn't that sound. But it is kind of like, it's like every room has to be tailored to the specific needs of the monsters. There's the bed with the little fleas. Right, right. Does he have to pay the zombies?

Or is it? Yeah, right. Has he just brought them back from the dead? Three lacks zombies. It does. In a major way. Because the fish are sort of the replacement for the zombies.

Where's the three also opens with a wedding? It does. It opens with the puffer fish wedding. Right, yeah. That's weird. Yeah. But yeah, the plot is that Erica is supposed to kill Dracula, but Abraham wants it to happen with the Kraken.

Erica also 100% looks like a Popeye character. She does. She looks like Famous Studios. She's got the pointy chin. The eyes, what you were saying, the weirdly flat eyes. Yeah. But then we also met a new friend in this movie. My boy.

Hi, Bob. Bob, a.k.a. Tinkles. So this is great. It's two jokes that I like. Rush is throughout the movie. Okay, so for one, obviously Ben's all over Tinkles. Because the joke of Tinkles is that the kid got a dog uh but there's like a short the dog it was a short on the dvd for two but the dog is like 40 times

the size of him the dog is like the size of a house yeah and it's like a pug it's sort of like or some kind of like a little silly dog but it's. And they get on the boat and no pets allowed, so they put a trench coat and a hat on him. And then they go, this is Bob. And suddenly the dog can speak, but can only say, hi, Bob.

Right, which is weird. There's no internal logic in this movie. They don't explain how he says that. They don't explain anything. Yeah, that's true. They don't, like,

well, whatever. But yeah, I love the dog, the big dog joke. I love always the you put him in a trench coat and everyone thinks he's a person joke that's like one of the top 10 greatest jokes it's always good it's always good and then they have the perfect payoff in this which is when when his hat falls off everyone's like wait it's funny that the ruse worked the hat is small so the hat's like a symbol I might bump it up a star this is funny

the third one is just airplane like the third one is just like there's no real narrative like integrity to this thing it's just funny shit weird visual also has a ton of slobber. Yeah, there's multiple times that he coats a room in slobber.

What are the two things? Big? Wet? Shit. Fuck. Fuck. God damn it. He's blowing this wide open.

Jesus fucking Christ. Holy shit. Asshole. I know everything's different. Everything's different, no. So what else we got? So there's the plot here also. You got Mavis is sort of having to deal with the fact

that her dad might have zinged with someone new. And she's, it's kind of flipped now. The only zing once, I thought. She's the one who's worried about him. Right. He gets really goofy once he falls in love with Erica. They have him turn into like Charlie Brown

squiggle mouth, which is another visual I always love. His like head droops all the way into the center of his chest. And he just goes, beep, beep, beep.

Another thing, just inexplicably funny. Inexplicable, not really returned to. Kind of dumb, like incredibly effective. And eventually Erica realizes that Dracula

isn't so bad. He keeps trying to save her life when she's getting the tentacle thing, the tentacle statue. Which is a sweet sequence. And then also turns into a dance routine where she keeps on stepping on these traps. We should mention that all of these movies end with dance sequences. Like another thing about Dracula is that he loves dancing.

He loves like break dancing. Because in the first one they're playing the party and Frank and Murray and all of them their band is going to play which sucks and then Johnny sort of like takes over and then

in the final party sequence after Johnny's done his like musical number he hands the mic to Drac and Drac raps for like two or three minutes and then dances like a motherfucker.

Yeah, the rapping I could do without but the dancing I like. Yeah, and then the second one they play I'm in love with a monster three more times. What's the dance sequence

at the end of Oh. You didn't just fucking have a dance party. What are you talking about? There's no explanation. But the third one like it goes like insane

because they this Kraken who originally was like a lounge singer like crooner played by Joe Jonas played by Joe Jonas which is weird. Once

Okay. So they show up in Atlantis. Atlantis is like a honky tonk casino town which I think is funny. played by Joe Jonas played by Joe Jonas which is weird once okay so you're they show up in Atlantis Atlantis is like a honky tonk casino town right which I think is funny I'm laughing yeah

I'm larfin I'm larfin yeah Kraken right oh he's so scary it turns out right he's got a microphone Atlantis

that's the bit but then Van Helsing opens up the thing scroll sheet music scroll the sheet music very important

right plays the sheet music activates very important. Right. Plays the sheet music. Activates the Kraken. Makes the Kraken evil. Johnny's flipping out because he's like, I love good EDM. This is, I like that it's more than that they have to stop the Kraken. Yeah.

Johnny is actively mad that music is being used to do something bad. He's warping the thing that he loves. And Trine's already had his whole philosophical speech which he took from some Kung Fu equivalent show about finding tranquility within oneself. But now he gets really fucking worked up about this thing. He's got his backpack. He's got all the DJ equipment. Jack's like, you just had all of that on you.

Right. And they're trying to find the song to calm down the Kraken. And they play Don't Worry, Be Happy. They play, what's the other one they play? Uh, fuck. What's the first one? Oh, Good Vibrations.

Yeah, Good Vibrations. Then Don't Worry, Be Happy. I like that the songs get worse. Yes. Because the idea is it has to be such a filthy earworm that you just cannot get rid of. And then a thing that I never believed I would consent to existing in a movie that I like. I would consent to existing in a movie that I like

that I would in any way approve of a film that uses the Macarena as it's deus ex machina so he plays the Macarena but right it is woven

densely into the plot because listen I'm gonna talk for a second one there's that idea that it has to be such an inescapable earworm right

that like it dominates this this fucking satanic kraken music it just has to be such an inescapable earworm, right? That it dominates this fucking satanic Kraken music. It just has to be pure joy, positively. Two, it compels you to dance. Big part. And it compels the sheet

music, the very sheet dances to the Macarena and tears itself in twain. I love that so much. These movies are insane insane the sheet music is so into the macarena that it dances itself into shreds yeah i have another thing to say about the macarena please one i found i looked it up today turns out it's about a lady called macarena do you know that that's what the lyrics are about get her attention hey macarena you're just talking about how nice she is like they have like a crush on her two all right macarena big hit 20 years ago

right yeah the dance whatever i don't care about the dance the like sort of you know you know jungle beach beat you know which is kind of what made it a hit yeah it's fine yeah it's catchy yeah people don't give enough credit to the two old guys who sing the song they're great or wearing suits yeah they're just

these two old guys in suits Los Del Rio yes they're just a couple old guys you know I think they've like been

doing this shit for a thousand years two nice men cat calling an innocent woman they choreograph dance they're like I think they're Spanish you know and they're just two nice men catcalling an innocent woman. They choreographed dance. They're like, I think they're Spanish, you know?

And they're just- They must be dead by now, right? No, they're still fucking going. They're kicking ass. That's the other crazy thing. Antonio Romero, Mungay. Yeah. And Rafael Ruiz Perdigones.

That song is fully- It was a cold read. Good job. Not sure if I nailed that. That song is fully 20 years old now.'m not sure if i nailed that song is fully 20 years old now yes and it was originally just the the them singing part and then someone comes in remixes it with the beat and the dance gets added and that's when it okay but it's such a weird thing to put into this movie because i feel very weird because kids don't know what it

is or do they i don't know maybe they do, but I feel like there are other songs like that that kids now know as like memed like, like, you know, never going to give you up and things like that. Shake it off.

I don't think kids like have a knowledge. I don't think people have done postmodern like Macarena references. I think it's still out there in the ether a little bit, but yeah.

It's a very weird choice. Here's what the choice is I think to them. They're like, well, parents will get it because it's the Macarena. Kids will like it because it's a dumb song that. Here's what the choice is, I think, to them. They're like, well, parents will get it because it's the migrant. Kids will like it because it's a dumb song that's easy to like.

I mean, people liked it 20 years ago. That shit up in the 90s. I guess it's like the I like to move it, move it shit in Madagascar, which I hate. And so for some reason I watch it in this, I'm just like, okay, Jendi gets a pass. But do you think they just called like whatever, like Crazy Frog, and he was like, I need like two million. And they were like, no But do you think they just called whatever, like Crazy Frog, and he was like, I need like two million. And they were like, no. They just sort of kept calling.

That's not how he said it. He said, I need two million. They called like the Vega boys. I was just like, they called Lou Vega. And then finally, like Los Del Rio were like, oh, of course. You can have it. 100 grand. I'm from Spain.

And they were like, great, great, perfect. Like, it's Tartarowski. It's the Macarena. Start making them do the Macarena. It's a crazy movie. You and I both turned to each other

the second it ended and went, they're not going to make him make a four. Are they? I don't know, man. And it's going to make so much money,

and I feel like, Gendy, you got to walk away. Right. I don't know, like, what now, but the guy makes three huge hits. If Sony won't let him

make his real movie now they're never going to. Move on. Yeah. Go work for a different company. I don't know. Do you know that in his fallow period where he was

trying to get a future made and couldn't that he also did like storyboards for live action movies? Like he designed a bunch of the action sequences for Iron Man 2. He's got such a visual sense.

Yeah. But like big directors were bringing him in to like pre-vis shit. You want to talk about Mother's Ball? You were looking up Mark Mother's Ball? Oh, I thought we should mention he did all three films. Good scores.

He does great scores. I like his Ragnarok score a lot. Do you want to hear the coolest fucking thing in the world? I was catching up with old Gate Lockings. He did a Maron about a year ago. Who are your tracks? I don, sure. Who are your tracks? I don't know. Yeah.

Who are your blobs? Who are your cone hats? But he, energy domes. But he said when he started doing commercial jingles. Mother's Ball you're talking about.

Because his into scoring was Pee Wee's Playhouse because he was friends with Paul Rubens. He didn't think he was going to be a composer. Did that was like, oh man, I love this.

And then started doing commercial jingles. And Merrim was like, so why do you want to do commercial jingles? And he was like, well, I just found out about subliminal messaging. And I thought this is a good vehicle to do that. And he was like, what do you mean? He was like, well, I would get hired to do these commercial jingles. And I did like Hawaiian punch. And, you know, the end of the theme went like, do-do-do-do-do-do.

And I put into the mix me saying sugar is bad for you and he was like really? and did you get in trouble? and he was like no I did that for 15 years

for 15 years every commercial jingle Mark Mothersbaugh did he would put subliminal messages in that went against the product that's so cool right? sugar is bad for you

that's awesome cool and they said bad for you. That's awesome. Cool. And they said they finally got onto it and we're like the end of the road, buddy. Straight up one of the cooler people. Oh, Mark Mothersbaugh is alive right now. He's a nice guy. I made it through a whole

episode. Yeah, of the children's cartoons. Okay, can I do a merchandise spotlight? No, we're doing the third box office game. Yeah, fine. Do a nice guy. I made it through a whole episode. Yeah, of the children's cartoons. Okay, can I do a merchandise spotlight? No, we're doing the third box office game. Yeah, fine. Do a merchandise spotlight. We're going to get the two things ready at the same time. Third box office game. It opened to what?

49? 44. Oh, so it was a little lower. A little lower. But then I think it's been making more. Midweek it's been making. Yeah, it's been doing. What the fuck is this?

I don't. It looks like soap. I can't tell what it is. They're called Hotel Transylvania Monster Mayhem Trunks. Oh, is it like there's little toys inside them? Yeah, there's a key. Oh, wow. And a little trunk.

And you get a monster and stickers inside. Do we each get like two? Correct. You got like eight of them. How many do you have? Six? Did you get six? Bought a six pack from Amazon.

Are they going to be all different like they should all be different hopefully they're uh how many they're like fucking 30 different characters now i gotta pre-warn you here's the bad news some of them are characters from the cartoon show oh fuck that i don't want the rooster wendy blobby who's like fucking oh Oh, so now Blobby has a daughter who can talk? She can talk? Yeah, it sucks. She's like a nerd. Okay, so you got the little key on the side. Give me your scissors. I don't have any... Oh, there aren't. Yeah.

Yeah, here. There's a corkscrew. You got a little key. Is this for Snooki? You gotta put the key in the thing. Oh, you pop it open. I got Mavie Wavy! Hey, Mavis! I got Mavis. Look at that.

Who doesn't like Mavis? Everyone likes Mavis. She's the best character, right? Yeah, she is. I like Mavis and Wayne. Those are my best monster friends. Yeah, Wayne's pretty cool. That's Beshemmy.

Yeah. Okay, alright. Who did I get here? Oh! The mummy! I got the mummy! Oh, no, he's got like a hat! It's likehemmy. Yeah. Okay, all right. Who did I get here? Oh, the mummy. I got the mummy. Oh, no, he's got like a hat.

No, it's the boy. It's his son from the TV show. His name is Pedro. He sucks. You see, I was expecting there to be more things

in the chest. There's just one thing. Yeah, I think some chests maybe have more. What does it say? One monster, one trunk, key,

and collector's gun. Okay, yeah. Yeah, I thought there was like a sticker or something. I don't know what to tell you. I mean, it's okay. I can handle it. Apologies.

I can handle the disappointment for sure. How are you guys out there doing? Do you like this? Everyone loves it. Do you like this part of the podcast? I thought we were going to play the box office game while this was happening. Oh, okay, okay. So yeah, it opened at 44.

Yeah. Number two is a Marvel movie. Oh, fuck. Well, okay. It just opened. This just fucking happened I know Ant-Man and the Wasp

oh okay I single fucked to something else I got the shitty ant character oh there she is my take on Ant-Man and the Wasp

really good yeah it's actually great I think it's good I think it's almost underrated I didn't like it what? you're a dumb idiot yeah

wait what's this that I got I don't know what this is by the way this must be from the TV show when I got? I don't know what this is. By the way, when I said dumb, I did wonder though about almost like, like, you know, logistical stuff.

The mobile little tiny house. No pipes. Where did the poop go? Well, for one, okay, so other people have asked me this question. One, I'm like, here's a question,

one I have for these people. How often do you think they're pooping? It's a lab. Like, they don't have to spend all their time in it. You've already had this conversation with people yes i have you i'm friends with jordan hoffman oh right um um two it's called composting three this man has invented shrinking

technologies he probably just shrinks all the poops and puts them in a garbage can that's a really good point and the other thing is people like how it's powered and people didn't point it like there are giant batteries on the wall that you see in a couple shots like because he can fucking enlarge them because he's got cool shrink technology that's a good point he shrinks the now i'm not saying i wouldn't have enjoyed a sequence in which you see him shrinking the poop sure and then throwing it away in a doggy bag or whatever right and maybe it would be grossing a little more if he had included that in the film. I got Bat Mavis.

Oh, that's a good get! Yeah. Oh yeah, because we didn't talk about they can turn into bats. Yes. The vampires. I got this. I have no idea what's going on here. Okay, so one of those is the shrunken head. Oh, that's who it is. Right, right. But then the other thing is some of these come with pieces of... It's like Johnny's

blue... No, it's Hank. It's Hank who's Frankenstein's son on the cartoon show. That's the other weird thing about the cartoon show is all these people have kids and then the movies, they're just negligent parents who never see their children. Yeah, I don't know. I don't like the cartoon show. Who'd you get? You got the bat? I want

Mavis. I'm mad I didn't get Mavis. I got Mavis. Wait, you opened both of yours. I got the mummy kid. Right. And then, Ben, did you open both of yours? No, you're opening your second one now. Maybe he's going to get Tinkles. What if he got Tinkles?

Tinkles would be good. Yeah. What if... Yeah, I don't know. Aunt Lydia is a dumb aunt character. Wait, what is this? Oh, that looks like the blob nerd child i think you got wendy dude we got six of these and like four of them are from the cartoon i'm looking at this little guy that i came with and they tell you the odds of getting characters and the odds

are stacked to getting characters from the cartoon show which is dumb like if you want like captain erica it's like a 1 in 42 chance you get captain erica same with drac it's a 1 in 41 chance you get drac this is like some pyramid scheme yeah fuck this i've made a terrible mistake how much did these cost it didn't cost much i got six of these for 20 okay but like you know you could have just gotten anything else. It's American money. I could have spent it on food. Why didn't you like Ant-Man? I don't know. I might have been in the wrong mood to see it. God, I loved it.

I saw it again. Really? Yeah, it's probably my favorite Marvel in a while. It's so fucking funny. I'm just feeling frustration with the Marvel thing. I like Peyton Reed. I'm feeling frustration with the Marvel thing. But it doesn't have any Marvel thing. It's just like a great comedy where things get big and small.

You know, this is the thing though. I didn't laugh at like a single joke in the entire movie. No. You didn't laugh at the Michael Peña stuff?

No, and I thought I would. I was right there. Maybe some of the Baba Yaga stuff. That was good. Yeah. That's great.

Baba Yaga though. I think the best part of this is actually just the little trunks. Yeah, the trunks are pretty solid. The trunks look like kind of Muppet monsters.

They have teeth and shit. Anyway, Skyscraper is number three. I gave it away. Skyscraper. Oh, yeah. Skyscraper. Yeah. What do you think? Didn't see it. You should make less movies. I've been on the record.

I've said this. He makes too many movies. He does. He's overloaded right now. Did you now juicy skyscraper i did it yeah neither did i all right number four incredibles 2 we already saw that yeah number five is another sequel is doing very well not quite as well as its predecessor it's really chill is it it's a very chill sequel yeah so chill i don't know what he's talking about Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom yes why are you saying it's chill? Just like good time. Just have fun. Did you see Jurassic World Fallen Kingdom?

I've not. I've seen so little recently. I'm just finding out. No, I haven't seen it yet. I've been debating whether or not I ever will see it. It's not very good, but I recommend seeing it anyway. Because it's kind of weird. It sounds weird.

The second half of it is not great. The script is bad yeah but the kind of weird haunted house idea is not the worst idea in the world like there's moments where i was kind of into it because it's so silly that's also more what i would want them to be doing with dress yes the problem is the first half is garbage turn your fucking phone i'm sorry romley's texting me how's romley She said she wants to start a podcast. Okay. Go for it, Romley. Have fun.

We got a competitive advantage. It's called Two Friends. You can't do that. We can find a friend to do it with. We already quoted the market. First Purge. You see that? I don't know. That was the text.

I haven't responded yet. First Purge I haven't seen. I've seen almost nothing. I'm going to run down some movies. Just a yes or no. Sorry to bother you. No. Sicario, Day of the Soldado. No. Oh, you're missing out. nothing i'm gonna run down some movies just say yes or no sorry to bother you no uh sicario day

of the soldado no oh you're missing out um uncle drew you didn't see it no that's top of my list um uh i hate sports but i love old age makeup and i love getting the team back together movies right which is what it is yeah it i mean i i'll say i watch that it's it's solid it's not like quite as good as i was hoping yeah I wish it was secretly a masterpiece. I mean, it is like... A lot of the performances in the movie are from NBA players. And they're actually all pretty good.

I mean, the movie definitely makes Lil Rel Howery and Nick Kroll do a lot of the work just because it knows they will be able to do it just fine. But, you know yeah you know like there has to be like emotional scenes between kairi irving and shack and like shack has to pull his weight there you're selling so hard on this is a newer actor yeah but it's still like kind of good i just wanted it to be goofier and i feel like these like branded movies like that are based on

it this can't be that goofy like i just sure it should be kind of a dirty movie and it's like not really allowed is there any pepsi shit in the movie no no not at least nothing that i really detected um but it's not bad and i will say i saw it at a you know winter screening and it's the only time at a screening when the security guard there's always a security guard at the screen he's like making sure we don't like yeah film no like was so into the movie that he sat down next to me and told me how much fun he was having and watch the whole movie with me. We both like laughed.

That's a movie this summer. Um, and oceans eight, you were cut out of this one was cut out. Have you seen, uh, won't you be my neighbor? I have seen that.

Um, I, it's okay. Yeah. I also think, uh, that should have gotten the Judd Apatow seven hour treatment. Sure. I mean, he's okay. Yeah, I also think that should have gotten the Judd Apatow

seven-hour treatment. Sure, I mean, he's fascinating. He is. He's fascinating and his career was so long and there's so many things that he touched culturally

that it feels like the movie has to be packed because it has to get through things quickly. I also think they just literally didn't talk to enough people. Yeah, I think you're right.

I was watching and I was like, there are really only like 10 people they interviewed. Yeah, you're right. For a guy who, like his legacy lasted decades but then you know see there's this other movie that's based on a story that's so true like you wouldn't believe it it's like the truest story ever tag tag hanging in there can you believe it can't tags made money 51 yeah there'd be a lot of quiet like 51s this summer you know also no one talks about quietly a piece of shit what tag

not that good gonna be honest with you know it's a box house performance that no one's talking about uh book club is tiptoeing to like 70 yeah book clubs made 67 yeah 68 sorry i'm checking yeah yeah that's pretty and zero worldwide i guess it'll roll out later i'm gonna start the oscar campaign now for steinbergen no candace lebron james bergen she's good she's getting buckets that whole movie three point shots from midcourt yeah she's she's doing great buckets yeah we've got uh oh deadpool 2 kind of softly disappointed still did really well well look it's like it feels, but then you think about the fact that there are Deadpool movies that make $300 million. Yeah, and you're right.

It's insane. And it's like, holy shit. Right. Yeah, Hereditary. Hereditary did great. Hereditary was actually kind of an amazing hit. That's, I think, my two of the year. My number two.

Wow. Yeah. Not me. I loved it. It's good. I like it. Big, big fan. What's your number one of the year?

You were never really here. Oh, yeah, that's good, too. Yeah, I love it big big fan what's your number one of the year you were never really here oh yeah that's good too yeah I love it and my number three is Hotel Transylvania 3 have you seen Leave No Trace I haven't seen that yet

that I recommend yeah you love that love that is that your one right now what's your number one again First Reformed right that fucking

I saw First Reformed I like First Reformed a lot but I think I really I recommend Leave No Trace because I feel like it won't last in theaters quite as long it's really really good and it's very very understated so it's kind of worth being in a theater with it

and it's just wonderful oh Three Identical Strangers yeah I mean that's another one where it's like it's a holy shit story I don't think that's a very good movie but if someone asked me should I see it I'd be like yeah you know it's a very good movie but if someone asked me like should I see it I'd be like yeah you know it's a pretty fun movie to watch

yeah you know it is genuinely nuts it also like isn't resolved which is not the fault of the filmmakers but the movie ends

at this point where it's like oh there's all this information we're gonna get at some point in the next 20 years yeah that's true

that's true and then 8th grade is worth seeing I need to see everything I know you'll see it I'll see it all Ben what's your favorite of the year? yeah That's true. And then 8th grade is worth seeing. I need to see everything. I know, you'll see it. I'll see it all. Ben, what's your favorite of the year?

Yeah, I also liked... You liked Annihilation? Did you dig that? It feels like a Ben movie. Yes. I'm trying to think of what I saw that I really liked when looking at my movie past history. Casper Spirited Away. I thought Hereditary was really cool.

Yeah, I loved it. But you wanted it to end with Satan going ah ah ah ah like that that was your big note yeah

that's his big note yeah but I don't know yeah it's weird that Satan hasn't been in any of the Hotel Transylvania

movies maybe yeah maybe they fucking swamp thing dude where's that fucker at oh yeah you wanna get him in

get him on board yeah maybe his quote's too high there's like a fishy guy in the first one who does that weird little dancey thing Sony wants to tiptoe around. Where's that fucker at? Oh, yeah. You want to get him in? Get him on board? Yeah. Maybe his quote's too high. There's like a fishy guy in the first one who does that weird little dancey thing. Do you want to talk about it?

It's a gif. I've been sending you guys Hotel Transylvania gifs a lot recently. Yeah, it's been great. I'm a fun person to be friends with. Yeah, you are.

It's really fun that we did this episode. It probably was like two hours and 15 minutes long or something completely ridiculous like that. Was it way too long, Ben? Oh, I'm sorry.

I got distracted. Cool. Cut it out. How long are we going? Long enough. Was it way too long, Ben? Oh, I'm sorry. I got distracted. Cool. Cut it out. How long are we going? Long enough. Okay. It's time to wrap it up. Two hours and change.

Okay, done. End of episode. Done. Out of here. Thank you all for listening. Next week, business as normal, only.

Next week is Ice Storm. The Ice Storm. With special guest, Emily Ishida. Mother of blankies. Great. Now six-time guest? Who knows? Who knows? We'll never know. We'll never know. I think we say it at the beginning of the episode. storm with special guest emily yoshida mother blankies great now six time guest who knows who

knows we'll never know we'll never know i think we say at the beginning of the episode probably tune in for that thanks to our sponsors hymns and we transfer yes uh and stay tuned for a dramatic reading of some burger reports um please remember to rate review subscribe go to blankies.red.com for some real nerdy shit thanks to Ant for good for our social media Joe Bowen and Pat Reynolds for artwork, Lane Montgomery for a theme song

and as always blah blah blah Thank you for calling the Burger Report hotline. 802-8-BURGER. Please leave a message with your FAMO type of burger and location, and we will try to put it on the podcast if we can. That's 802-8-BURGER. Welcome to Burger Report Theater. This is the bit.

We read Burger Report submitted via the written word dramatically okay here's one this is a text we received text we received i am writing in with a burger report yeah i saw now disgraced kurt schilling eating a burger. Get this. It was a wrap instead of a bun at Lux Burger in Providence, Rhode Island. Just want to fill in some details there. Now disgraced Kurt Schilling. He was like a pitcher, right? And then he's like, now he's like a racist, I guess.

I don't know. It's like a, you're looking at me like a bad guy on Twitter. That seems to be a weirdly popular career trajectory these days. Yeah. He went from like, you know, kind of semi-famous athlete to racist. Yeah. I shouldn't slander him because I forget what bad thing he did, but he's like one of those people on the internet

who's tweeting all day and everyone hates him. I don't know anything more than that. That's a career move. It's a career move. Well, good thing the next big report is about someone who has never done anything bad. Go ahead. Take it away.

June 19th, 6 or 7 p.m. That's when the text was submitted. I didn't read the dateline because it was just when we got the message. I'm sorry. Let me start over. You threw off my rhythm. June 19th, 6 or 7 p.m. In 2015, I walked into a Shake Shack not too far from the U.N.

with a couple of my friends. We ordered and then noticed there were intimidating big men, presumably security guards, guarding every exit of the restaurant. A group of men It's actually crazy. The day before he had a meeting with Obama at the UN. So I know for sure he was in town. He was eating a hamburger with absolutely nothing on it. Just a bun and the meat. If you need any greater evidence that he is a threat to our democracy, there it is.

There's the smoking gun. Just a bun in the meat. Vladimir Putin is a fucking monster. Blah, blah, blah. Blah, blah, blah.