God Awful Movies - 557: Average Joe

Episode Date: May 19, 2026

This week, Marsh joins us to marvel at how silly our legal system AND our game called football are.Check out more from Marsh on Skeptics with a K and the Know Rogan ExperienceIf you’d like to make a per episode donation and get monthly bonus episodes, please check us out on Patreon: http://patreon.com/godawfulCheck out our other shows, The Scathing Atheist, The Skepticrat, Citation Needed, and D&D Minus.Our theme music is written and performed by Ryan Slotnick of Evil Giraffes on Mars. If you’d like to hear more, check out their Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/EvilGiraffesOnMars/Report instances of harassment or abuse connected to this show to the Creator Accountability Network here: https://creatoraccountabilitynetwork.org/

This part of the movie is like when someone puts, we had our ups and downs in their anniversary post about their partner, you know? And you're always like, huh, what a weird thing to mention here in this public forum. I am not going to go into details, but I saw that done in the groom's speech at the wedding once. And actually not just the groom speech, but the father of the bride's speech as well.

And that was a rough old one. I wish my father-in-law had mentioned the ups. God Awful Movies Welcome back to the GAMCast Where each week we sample another selection from Christian Cinema Or they'll send us back to the science lab I probably used that one before

But it's a good one I'm your host No Illusions Heath is off this week Besiding 900 miles to my northeast Is my bad friend Eli Bosnick Eli how are you this fine afternoon sir Forgive me Noah I was just quietly praying to my God over here

All by myself Oh where are you Nothing, just a humble man. Tebow-esque over here. With a real quick prayer to my God. Unobtrusive. We'll find out why in a minute there. Also joining us, though, is the co-host of Skeptics with A K

and the No Rogan Experience and Cecil's best friend. Michael, Marshall, Marsh, welcome back. Oh, thank you. I would tell you how I'm doing, but first, I want to just tell you how much childhood was and I'll spend a long time telling you anything ever happens in my life before I get to that relevant bit. We'll get to the movie three quarters of the way through this record, yeah. And listener, as you may know, Cecil's decision to vacation in Quebec City with Heath this weekend and start a podcast with Marsh has really ramped up Eli's monthly antidepressant budget.

So if you'd like to help with that, there's no better time to do it than May. Get access to the patron-only matrion live stream on May 31st by becoming a Patreon supporter today. Check the show notes to learn more. And with that out of the way, tell us, Marsh, what will we be breaking down today? Okay, so we watched Average Joe. It is the story of just a regular guy from a troubled home who eventually became a football coach only to figure out that the one place on the entirety of earth

where his God could hear his prayers happened to be the middle of the 50 yard line. Oh, damn. I think it's something to do with like, I think it's lay lines or maybe the way that the bleachers act as like a refracting lens to focus the prayers up to heaven. At least I assume that's why he makes such a fucking deal of having to pray in the exact highly visible spot every fucking time.

Right. According to the lie, this movie tells. Yes. And Eli, how bad was this movie? Well, if you love plucky stories of underdogs, overcoming tremendous odds to fight for truth, justice in the American way, this movie has nothing to do with that. No.

A poor kid grows up to be a pushy Christian football coach, and he wins because Green Party voters are evil and stupid. That is the story that it's based on. So is there anything you guys want to nominate this one for being the best, of being the worst hat? Yeah, I'm going to go with Best, Worst, depiction of his wife's response to him at any given point. Because never have I watched a film that was so clearly coming from one person's

perspective in that marriage and with almost no input from the other. There are times his wife will have a stroke, for example, in the middle of this film. and the way we find out about that is she tells him how much of a bitch she was about that stroke that she had that time. There's a time that she nearly loses her job and it comes up as, I'm sorry, I'm so awful to you

about me nearly losing my job because of you. It's like every single time it's entirely through the lens of how mean she was to him about the thing that he was doing. It's amazing that their marriage survived this movie. This script, yeah. And I was going to go with something somewhat related. I have best worst bar.

brags. Okay, because this entire movie is like when you're at a bar and you just decide to lean in with the liar and you're like, really, really, you had all of those motorcycles at the same time, huh? And then you just let them get stupider and stupider with the bullshit that they're telling you. That's what the writer of this film did. Right? I was, I was shocked that there was no point in this movie where everybody didn't sit back and say, wow, that is an enormous penis. By the end of the conversation, he's ghostwriter. And you're just like, that's great. The skull and everything on fire all the time.

That is one big fish. Amazing. And on the topic of lying, I'm going to go with the best, worst, retelling. Right? Because look, this is your movie, right? And you won, right? So you get to depict this however you want. Right.

But it is so telling that they had. to retell the story of Coach Joe, leading children in prayer in a public place in a coercive manner in the exact opposite way that it happened so that their own audience would enjoy the movie. Yeah. Like, let's be clear,

because we're going to watch this movie, we're going to watch the story be retold is the crazy lie they made up, right? But this is so explicitly written out exactly what happened, how coercive coach Joe was. how public he was, how obviously illegal, everything that he did was. Right.

And for their movie, for people on their side, they had to change their story. I wanted Justice Sotomoyard or like run into frame and be like, here's a photo. Here's a photo real quick. I'm just going to have one from the descent. Put the photo of you being a liar just right here, right here in the center of the film. Yeah. And what's amazing is that even with all of those efforts, they never quite get there. Right. As well, it demonstrates we go through the movie, he still sucks in this movie, if you think about it for just a second. So bad. Right. He's not the theological bigot that he very obviously was, but he is an idiot and an asshole, right? Like he could be, he could be arbitrarily insisting on literally anything based on characterization. He might as well be like, and that's when I insisted to eat every hot dog in the school hot dog fan. Right. Because they trapped themselves in this crazy, like,

they have to spend the entire movie being like, Joe was just too full of gumption to not theocracy. Right, right. All right, well, normally when I have to listen to this level of bullshit in my stories, at least the dude sells me weed at the end of it. So I need a minute to steal myself. But we'll be back in a flash with all the, I bet that's not at all how that happened that is average Joe.

All right, everyone, welcome to the first ever writer's room meeting for average Joe. Thank you, Phil. her so much. So, Joe, tell us, what brought you on your courageous journey? So I prayed after the football game. Mm-hmm, of course, of course. And then they said, hey, man, can you not? And I was like, hell now!

And then the Supremi court said I could. Right. But is there anything else to your story? Like your spiritual journey? No, I don't really have spiritual journey. Okay. How was your childhood? Bad, I'm poor. Right, right. Okay. So maybe you face some trials and some tribulations that we could feed you?

Oh, yeah, yeah. My wife was a total bitch about her stroke. Oh, okay. All right, well, we can include that, I guess. Nice. She'll love that. I don't think she will. Call her a bitch on screen. Well, Kyle 420, I think it is you who are wrong and stupid and sent. Got him. Eli, Eli, what are you doing?

Yeah, dude, we've got to finish the podcast. Oh, hey, guys, sorry, I was just fighting on Twitter again. Again, this again, man. I know, I know, but guys, I've been saving so much time with rocket money that I can waste hours a day arguing with liars on the internet now, and they will not change their minds. But what's rocket money? Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps find and cancel unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, and helps lower your bills so you can grow your savings, which gives me time to make a difference to these people commenting under Pete Buttigieg's tweets. But does it actually work?

No, Marsh, have you met Eli? No, I mean, Rocket Money. Does Rocket Money work? Oh, oh. Oh, yeah. No, Rocket Money works. Users to create a financial goal with Rocket Money save over $70 on average within the first 30 days. And so far, Rocket Money has saved users over $880 million in canceled subscriptions. I've been using their automated savings to help grow my cash savings, and they automatically deduct from my accounts to keep my savings on track in a way that I can set and forget.

All right, Eli, I'm sold. Where do I sign up? Let Rocket Money help you reach your financial goals faster. Join at RocketMoney.com slash awful movies. That's rocketmoney.com slash awful movies. Rocketmoney.com slash awful movies. All right, Eli, yeah, thanks. Uh-oh. What's the matter?

Guys, arguing online just made me sad. Oh, no, did it? No, why didn't anybody warn me? Okay. And we're back for the breakdown. And since nothing interesting ever happened in this guy's life, we're going to open up on an admittedly fabricated shot of Kuwaiti oil fires. Yeah.

Yeah, so now he did serve as a Marine in the, in Operation Desert Storm and Desert Shield. So they decided to open the movie with him on the back of a Jeep in his underwear, lassoing camels in front of Kuwaiti oil fires. Yeah. And then he does the thing, the first time of many that almost became my best worst, which is he breaks the fourth wall to tell us this movie isn't anywhere near as cool as it looks. He's like, it didn't, this thing here didn't happen,

which is annoying because it literally just told us on screen based on a true story. And the first thing he says is, that's a lie, this bit, by the way. lying liar to you here. Not that truest story. I heard Marshall's going to watch this movie and I don't want a citation needed essay. So I think of it fucking get ahead of it. It's weird because it feels, here's the thing. It feels like whoever made this movie saw the big short, right?

And was like, huh, that's a fun device. I wonder if you could tell lies through the fourth wall. Yeah. Well, so, okay. So one of the things that really distinguishes. which is this movie is the fact that it's got the laziest writer that has ever lived, right? So breaking the fourth wall is, if you do it right, it can be very clever and meta and a lot of fun, or it can just be the laziest possible fucking way to get your point across, which is how

it's employed in this movie. And in keeping with that, one of the vehicles of this film, since the writer just has no fucking idea how to show us things happening, is that throughout the movie we're interviewing Joe and his wife, the actor playing Joe and the actor playing Joe's wife. And they're just going to like tell us stuff whenever the writer can't think of a segue. Yeah. This movie uses literally every lazy writer's writing convention, right? Yes.

Breaking the fourth wall, the interview. I thought they were going to wake up in that machine from the Assassin's Creed game. Well, no, I need to go forward. Something was going to be all a dream. Yeah. Yes, exactly. At the end, it's all a dream. Exactly.

Yeah. And it's when we go to, where we see him and his wife in the living room. And again, it's because it's set up in that kind of full interview way, they even like obnoxiously dangle the microphone in shot so you can see it. Yes. And you look around their house. And like in the background, there's a CD tower that I really wanted to zoom in and then judge their musical taste.

And I realize, I don't need to do that to judge their taste. They're very clearly doing a jigsaw while one of them drinks a can of Red Bull. I know everything about that tape. The jigsaw is the thing they need to be caffeinated for because it's quite high octane. The red bull is serving them on the jigsaw. Look, everyone can. stay awake during the edges, Marsh. That's the easy part.

But that's who has the staying power through the middle. It's all sky. It's all sky. This is just different shades of blue. It's terrible. Also, can we address the fact that the wife here is Amy Acker, aka Fred from Angel? Like, what is she doing in this film? This was such a weird.

It's funny because there's always a moment where a actor ghost Christian film that I'm like, well, maybe they just did one, right? Like when a friend tells you they did hard drugs for the first time and you can tell it's about to be a sad story for the rest of their life. That's how I feel about famous actors and Christian movies.

I'm like, well, you know, maybe Cliff was just like in town and you saw David Ar White at a pool party and said, sure, I'll be in your movie. They were just Christian movie curious. It doesn't say anything about who they are or their identity. They're just Christian movie curious in that moment. Just a bunch of Facebook reels

of soft white out of Underbelly, but it's Christian movie actors being like, I started out just wanting to do one Christian movie. So yeah, so And we get the beginning of my best worst, right? So we get him doing his like direct-to-camera thing. And he's like, well, you know, if you're going to make a movie about me, I don't want you to make me out to be some kind of choir boy.

I'm bad to the bone. Make sure you say that about 47 times an hour. And he's never bad in the way that. And look, I don't understand this brand of masculinity. And I'm not going to pretend that I do, right? But it's troubled child of abuse is never the thing that I picture when I hear a motorcycle rev and that's a startup, right? I'm never like, oh, I bet the public school system failed the fuck out of him. Look at his leather jacket.

There's no way his adoptive family was slightly mean to him that one time. Right, right. He goes, if you had told me saying a prayer at the 50 yard line was going to get me in the biggest fight of my life. and I completed that sentence as you would be deliberately misleading somebody about what actually happened in my life. Why would you lie about that? We won.

That's the other thing. You fucking won. If I won a big famous lawsuit to be my version of bigot, I'd be like, that's right. And that's why nobody who's the little spoon for their wife is allowed to vote anymore. So then we get our rock and roll title screen.

and we see him getting kicked out of school because, you know, how bad to the bone he is. Oh, yeah, and he's so bad to the bone that he can't remember which school this is that he's getting kicked out of. But that just means he can't remember so many. He can't remember what school he went to. He's the hero of the movie and he can't remember the school he went to and he's going to be how reliable narrator here.

Oh, right, good point. Also, and look, again, I don't understand this outlook. Is getting kicked out of school as a child supposed to be a bad? Like, that's just a very unfortunate child being. failed by the system. I have, I've never seen a child being kicked out of school and been like, I guess he's just a little bit too fuck hard for this third grade classroom. The phrase too cool for school isn't literally what the principal said when he included to.

That's never been the case. Like, you've got to get out of here. You're just too cool for us. Roll these cigarettes up in your sleeve and get out of here, you motherfucker. Yeah. So, and then we have to open things up. He gets kicked out of school and then we have to see him, his wife to be, which is made pretty awkward because I think they were like nine when they met

or whatever. My notes here say, you're not supposed to do a sexy slow motion montage with tweens, guys. Yeah. I know we're on YouTube now, but still, you're not supposed to. Yeah, they're working so hard to make this nine-year-old girl act sexy. I don't want to hear what the director was saying to her. This is the worst time that's happened since Leon and Natly Portman, Luke Besson. It's basically the Christian version of that.

Yeah. Right, right, yeah. And then we do this stupid meta thing again where she argues with his doodily do and we see the meat again. But the key here is that his best buddy said, hey, the new girl's cute. Go tell her I like her. And then he fell in love with the new girl, right? Yeah. That's how they met when they were nine.

Yeah. Well, and they've been together ever since. No, they haven't actually. No, not even. No, they literally married those people. Because look, here's the thing. When a couple's like, we met when we were nine and then they were. lacked each other. I'm like, okay, sure. I can get behind that. I mean, you want to

like, given who you're talking to here. Like, I mean, I didn't name. I'm not naming names. I'm saying it. I can get chill behind that. But if I then have to go through and I will, all your fucking Facebook fights, I'm, I don't want a slow motion montage when you met when you were nine. But yeah, but it's also like they met when they were nine and then they went off and we'll find out they married other people, some of whom we will just had all here about in the past It's not childhood sweethearts. We didn't see him for 30 years. Right.

So, okay, so, but now we follow him home. He's an orphan and he's been adopted by this family that's got like 30 adopted kids or whatever. And the movie really goes out of the way to try to make these people into bad guys, but it doesn't seem like they ever actually did anything bad. So, you know, it's just like they're bad guys because like they look all white trashy. Yeah. Do they make out that they lied to adopt him?

Is that what they're saying? he's that the parents said that he'd be the only one and then there's like five of them. He's like, oh, like my entire adoption was a lie. Is that what they're going for here? I think they say they lied to his adoptive or to his birth mother about what the adoption would be, not necessarily the family lied. Like those people who show up to Pokemon card packs with like a fake kid and they're like, oh no, this is for him.

Yeah. I'm not selling this on TikTok live. Yeah, right, right. But with a child. With a child. And yeah, I wrote in my notes here about the, like, their crime is being poor. I wrote in my notes.

Their crime is being poor. That is gross. I hate it. I totally agree with this. Because they're just, they're eating at the table and we're supposed to be like, that's not a big enough table. I guess.

Yeah. So, okay, so, but then he's skipping school. He's hustling at a pool hall. I wrote in my notes, I bet Marsh could whip Joe Kennedy's ass at billion years. I would love to give it a goal.

I'd love to take him on here. Yeah. But yeah, they're making out like he's such an awesome kid. He can play pool. And it's so hard that they're trying to say here like, oh, isn't this guy such a super awesome guy? He's going to be so heroic and such a great man.

You can see it already with the way he is. Like they're trying to like build this guy up so fucking much. Yes. Right. Yeah. Considered the fact that like this is a movie about this one time that this guy prayed at the 50 yard line and they ended up going to the Supreme Court over it. And we've started this movie with like,

he was an orphan and he fell in love with his girlfriend when he was nine years old. That's where this fucking movie starts. It is going to be a long. time before we get to anything relevant. Yeah. You know when CNN will like catch a famous internet troll and then they'll just be like, hey man, why are you so bad? And he'll be like, well, when I was seven, my bike fell over. That's, this is the cinema version of that. Yeah. Yeah. Like they even point out that he was sent to work as essentially what a child slave in the Crawdad industry from what it looks like.

I'm not quite sure what he's doing. He was pulping crab. Yeah. For big shrimp. Big fisherman. Big Crestation. Yeah. Yeah. But the fisherman turned out to be abusive and he got his ass kicked by the fisherman for talking back. Okay.

So does this movie think that corporal punishment on child discipline is a bad thing? I don't think this movie would think that. No, it does not. Yeah, they'd be fully on board with that. Yeah. I feel like the rod was not spared there, Coach Joe. You need to figure out your morals here. Also, that means that he was telling this story about what a badass he is in this fucking version

of psychosis. And then he was like, and then there was one adult who hurt me very, very badly. Well, but so, and the movie self-indulgently moves on from that because I don't want to minimize the abuse that this kid went through.

Of course. You know, it's obviously that's horrible and everything. Oh, the kid in the film absolutely gets abused. We have no idea whether Joe in the life did. He's given what we know of Joe Kennedy. Yeah.

He just kneeled near me and I thought, God, this is basically. We're right. Yeah, probably. Sotomayor puts a picture of him being absolutely fine. Oh, God damn it. So, yeah, but the way that this movie plays it is,

it's like, this guy beat me up. And then he was like, and then I knew that nobody would ever beat me up again. And we just, like, cut to him doing push-ups and stuff. And I'm like, okay. Cut to us being like, hey, would you mind not inflicting theocracy on children? And he's like, you're just like that fisherman who I needed all those stitches because of. Like, hey, buddy. I feel like there's a little bit of a difference between crab pulp guy and Jeff.

Blackwell. So, okay, but then some night in the future, though, he sees Denise running from her home. You can, like, hear her parents fighting and she goes out to, like, her pre-end shed, I guess. Oh, it's her shed. Okay, that makes sense. Okay, you need to pick an abusive household. I wasn't sure who shed this was, because I thought she'd only just moved there, and then he suddenly is with her in this shed.

And I thought it was his shed that she'd broken into to pray. Okay, I was very confused by the three. It could be. It could be. I don't know. That's his branch. On the front, it's like one prayer at a time. Yeah, right? So, and we've got like her parents yelling in the background, but it's like to a hilarious degree because at a certain point they've just been screaming at each other for like seven or eight minutes. And I'm like, I feel like you'd be yelled out by now. Wouldn't.

Oh, absolutely. Like several, I remember notes that several women are being murdered in Foley is what's happening during this scene. Right. They were playing a co-op game with my wife, to be fair. That's what you can't tell, but it would be cut over and they're playing it takes to. But yeah, so and then they talk and meet and I guess meet cute and. Yeah, they do the make me a bird so I can fly, fly far away seen from Forrest Gump. Really? The fictional movie, but worse because that writer was more talented.

This definitely has a lot of Forrest Gump vibes going on because he also, he will go to war in a moment as well. He's like too stupid, doesn't have an education. He's going to go after war and things. And he finds her after a lot. They've watched Forrest Gump and he's just thought, I could do all of that. And then people won't think I'm an asshole when I do the prayer thing. Yeah.

Oh, you know what? I wonder how often while they were like in the writers room with the writers and stuff asking him questions. Someone said, now are you sure that's not Forrest Gump you're thinking of? No, no, no. I made shrimp. Yeah.

Okay. And it says it says here that you got AIDS in Philadelphia. Now, I don't even think that. I think you danced on a big piano. I'm glad you had a positive experience, I guess. Well, it's okay, but then, but she wakes up in the shed and he's left her a little love note. And then we fall into like a montage of the notes that they wrote to each other when they were kids. Yeah, yeah.

Although we see that with like played out with them in the future, like them into the present rather talking about it. And I'm going to point out that his wife here has her shoes on the couch. okay, she deserves this guy, actually. Yeah, sure, sure. Okay, so, but then Joe gets expelled from school, and that's a big deal, damn it. So we see this kind of creepy scene where, like, the adoptive mom says to the adoptive dad, hey, you know, he's a problem. I need you to take care of it.

And that's all she says. And then the dad walks over to him and says, hey, you want to go camping with me, just you and me out in the woods together? And we're like, oh, fuck. Okay. Again, like, we're making light of it. This movie has been incredibly dark so far. we all thought dad was going to try to murder him in the woods, right?

Oh, yeah, yeah. That's how he went away, the whole Hansel and Gretel kind of situation. Yeah, absolutely. Right, but they just went camping together. That's what that was. Okay, so just I want you to think for a second about A, how boring a story we're telling and,

B, what an untalented writer we have telling it, that they had to make that time he went camping with dad into a plot point. Jesus. So, yeah, so, but that. That ends in a big dad hug, but then he learns that they're sending him away. They don't want him anymore. Yeah. So we have the big goodbye with the neighbor, Denise.

Right. He's like, tell everyone I call dibs on you. I like, I liked you. I like you. Tell everyone. Are those kids, are the actors of those kids, siblings? They have the exact same shade of hair. I think they've got like kids who are like brother and sister to play them as a youth.

That's my theory just watching because their hair is exactly the perfect same shape. All right, Heath. I mean, it is brought to you by the film commission of Louisiana, Marshall. Oh, interesting. Yeah, no, it's a good point. Good point. So, yeah, but they take him to another house and, like, there's a bunch of kids all, like, hanging out, like, making fun of him as he walks up, like, you know, he's the new fish

at this adoption prison. Yeah. Have you noticed every single one of the houses and buildings they go into in his flashback when he was a kid, like the 70s or whatever, they all have dirty walls and, like, wood termite eaten bits of wood on all the door frames. Every single one

that they go into is this exact same level of kind of... Is that normal? Was that a big thing in America in the 70s? Could nobody redo a lick of paint

in the 70s? No, no. We didn't repair stuff until Bill Clinton became president. That was our first time. It's too much lead in the paint at the time.

They're like, okay, we're at the lead levels that were allowed here. Right. We got a pint and we're going to all be very angry. Yeah. It's like that,

what's that thing with the big nuclear meltdown where they're going to be able to start cleaning it in like 200 years. Yeah, yeah. Right. Well, but again, it's just amazing laziness of everyone involved in the making of this film that no one could think of any other way to show poor other than smear some dirt on the wall. Yeah. But on his way in, some kid makes fun of his love

note from Denise, so he beats him up because he beat it up. Nobody bullied him when he was the bully when he was a kid. I was a child who fought other children. Why aren't you guys impressed? This is fucking impossible. His new foster family, I assume this is, his foster dad says, we don't handle things with our fists here. And I really wanted it to like cut to him being given a knife and pushed into a makeshift thunderbored him.

Yes. Much better movie. Yeah. So yeah, but no, instead he goes to Stackwood and learn about the importance of discipline or some shit. Do you know when someone's not religious? I don't know if this has happened to you, but you ever talking to someone and they hear you're an atheist

and they're like, oh, why are you an atheist? and you're like, oh, here's the fucking three easiest arguments that came to the top of my head. I'm bored of this conversation already. And then you realize they've never thought about why they're a Christian. That's how this wood stacking conversation goes. He's like, look, man, you can't be angry. And he's like, why? And he's like, no one's ever had a follow up before.

Just fucking shit. Stop me. Fuck. God. Yeah. But that night, he runs away. And he goes back to the foster family that unadopt. adopted them. But in the 24 hours he's been gone, they've moved. Great prank. The entire

house is completely empty. They've moved everything out. Like, wow, the 1970s real estate market really was jumping, wasn't it? Like, you could go like that. Wait a second. You're saying all the houses are missing the exact same amount of termite damage and all the walls are, honey, it's going to be such an easy moving in process. I'll be like, oh, boy, Phil. That's why they did it on all the houses, Mars, so that people wouldn't have to get used to all the, what's this new bait. Right. Yeah.

Yeah. It's all too smooth. This is weird. Yeah. Exactly. I love to because he goes to the house and he's like, mom, mom,

I promise I'll never be angry or fight or break anything ever again. If you take me back and the neighbor's like, oh, they moved and he's like kicking in the windows immediately after. I'm like, well, I didn't last. He kicks the windows and then starts walking around the house like shouting

mom. And it's like, did you think when the neighbor said they've moved? She meant your sofas. Like you meant your family's moved. It's not just the furniture. It goes in. The house is completely.

completely empty and he's yelling for him. I'm like, do you think this is a prank? They've got all the furniture in one room now. That feels like something that would happen in the biopic about Heath's life. It was just like, no, no, no. It was a good prank my dad did on me. And I had the neighbor tell him I moved and I freaked out so bad. Oh, I just assume you meant a room with no furniture and was just already a biopic of Heath's life.

That is also a lot of it. And because of that, that's his montage. He was like, I would never live in a room with furniture again. so I can never be pranked by an empty room. Oh, interesting. This is getting sad now. But yeah, so but the cops show up and give him back to the Jesus E. Foster Dad.

And so then we have this moment where like this guy has to like get through to him. So he takes him out to this cliffside where there's one tree standing against all odds in an otherwise barren place. And that tree is like him tough and wooden. Yeah, and ugly. Yeah.

Like he says, can you see that tree? really wanted that to be the lynching tree and this guy, this is when he reveals he's a grand wizard. Oh, God. Just puts the head on society. I don't think I need to say the name. How'd you like to blame somebody? Okay, here's the best part about this scene, though, right?

Because it's supposed to be the setup Noah just gave us, right? Takes a amount. You see that tree? Except there's like a four sentence exchange where he's like, what do you see? And he's like, nothing? And he's like, well, no, there's a tree there. We all know you see the fucking tree. I don't see it.

And he's like, you do. You do. This is the very beginning of my metaphor. I need you to acknowledge. I got a whole thing. I can't see it. You're facing the wrong direction. Open your eyes.

So, yeah, but this is his thing for only God can heal him, just like the tree. And he's like, why would God care about me? Yeah, I mean, it's a good point. Good question. Excellent question. And then the next thing the guy says as well is, God doesn't make throwaways. And I thought, apart from all like the stillbirths and the baby cansts, There's some throwaways.

So then we cut to him in basic training. And we do, Sophia, a sign that really got Marsh riled up in the notes. Yes, yes, it did. Okay, so this is a sign. This is so fucking stupid. It's a sign that says good order discipline, and it spells out God. Except it doesn't spell out God. It reads good order de discipline because they've repeated the first letter.

They can't even do the really shitty poem, first letter, poem, right, even though they are trying to put the cross into a cross stick. They're still doing it badly here. Yeah. No, it's not quite right. Yeah, so now it's 1990. He's in basic training to become a Marine and he still writes to Denise regularly

so that we have some way to exposit our way through this stupid fucking Marine montage. It's so stupid. We're 22 minutes in the movie at this point. And so far all it has been is an explanation of how a white guy who grew up in 1980s America became a Christian.

Like we needed that conundrum soul. Right. Yeah. You're never going to guess where I ended up religion-wise. Can I take a moment to express some empathy for every actor who ever has to play a drill sergeant in a post-steers-and-queers world? Right. Because we're all comparing you to full metal jacket. Yeah.

And every guy is just like, you're fucking stupid. And I'm like, well, come on. That guy's name was literally Army. Yeah. You're never going to out do that. Yeah. That guy was there to teach the. actor what it was supposed to look like.

And they were like, hey man, you're fired. We're just going to fucking use this guy. But yeah, he gets drill sergeant did a whole bunch. And the marining montage, it ends eventually with everybody chilling in this field, having some crappy marine food, right? Yeah. And this is, he says about this as well, I decided to turn my love of fighting into a career,

which is a highly sanitized way of saying, the U.S. Army welcomes with open arms violent white guys with no education. That is what he said. Yep. Yep. Look, you don't have to have made it through elementary school to join the army. Okay? Come on over.

Sorry, Marines. Yes. So, yeah, but then the drill sergeant guy starts theatrically complaining about the food. You know, he's like, oh, they don't even give us good food. So I have no respect for the Marine Corps. Here, let's tear down this Marine Corps flag

and everybody's stomp on it. and everybody stomps on it except Joe. Yep. This is such a crazy. I feel like I'm on an episode. I'm sitting watching an episode of Be Reasonable and I'm hearing Marsh go, do you think people might ask

if anyone else in your Marine unit remembers the day you were the only brave one who stood up in freedom? Yeah, yeah, yep, yep. Also, the whole point is like everyone else is willing to stomp on the flag, but he won't do that because he would never put his own personal feelings about the head of the law and order of his country

and went on to be the guy who broke the constitution because of his religious belief. Yes. Yeah. It's amazing. So everybody's stomping on the flag and the drill surgeon says, are you too good to stomp on my flag? And he's like, sure, I can't disrespect that flag, sir, because I'm too fucking awesome. And he goes,

well then drop and give me push-ups till your arm falls off. So he drops and he gives him push-ups and I just, I, the dude whims out after like 15 fuck push-ups. I mean, I don't want me to brag or anything, but you're a fucking Marine. Do more than 15 push-ups before you start getting off. Well, you're an actor playing a Marine and they were not honest with you about how many push-ups who were going to be asked to do.

When you signed up for this on Backstage.com, they weren't like, and you could do a bunch of push-ups in a row, right? We won't have to cut away real quick. And it's like, we seem, I think at most, like, because his buddies all stop stamping the flag and decide to join him in the push-ups as well. And then he stands up at the end of all of that. they all just stand up, and he is visibly shaken. And he's done at this point cumulatively 40 push-ups, and he basically needs to be held up.

Somehow his legs have gone from doing push-up. That's how exhausted he is by it, a very modicum amount of exercise. That all sounds really realistic and makes a lot of sense to me, Mars. I don't know what I was talking about. The other day I bent up to pick a cookie I was eating and I passed out and just ate it on the floor.

I don't know. Get real. So, yeah, but then he pulls out his 14-foot dick, and he swings to the rescue of all those orphan nuns. Jesus Christ. The drill sergeant comes up to him and he's like, he's like, you pass the test. This is your flag.

No. And then everybody starts chanting about how awesome he is. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. Is that what happened? That's exactly how it's. Yeah.

All right. Well, it turns out that all those times I didn't get to the point of my citation needed essay until the second half of the show was just training for this movie, guys. because we've already made it to the break, but we'll back in a minute with even more of the pre-internet bar brags that are average Joe. Hey, podcast listener,

just wanted to step in and remind you once again that this month is Matrion, that time of year when we beg you extra hard for your money. When you support our shows on Patreon, you not only help make our jobs possible, you get tons of fun extras.

Like a commercial-free version of every single episode and access to over 100 full-length bonus episodes. 114 to be exact. That's 114 so far, but that's not all. At higher levels, you get to suggest the bonus movies we do each month, as well as free VIP tickets to live shows. Free finger foods.

This year, we're going to be counting down to the end of Matrion with a pajama party live stream on May 31st, starting at 8 p.m. Eastern Time, and the more new and increased pledges we get, the more stuff we'll do to celebrate. So head on over to matron.com today and join the fun. That's matron, M-A-Y-T-R-E-O-N.com. Matri-on, please. Keep it classy. Please.

Much better. Oh, man, soy sauce. Dude, stop. I made a commitment, no illusions. Hey, fellas, what are you doing? Eli's eating a shelf again. Sorry, he's eating a shelf. Yeah, when I get home from a long day of work and I don't want to cook or I can't decide what to eat,

I just eat whatever is on one shelf of my fridge instead. Okay, yeah, that sounds awful. It is. Especially because today, I chose the sauces and condiment shelf. Do you know that mustard goes bad? Yes, yeah, I did. But Eli, if you want a great meal without the hassle of cooking, you should try Factor. What's factor?

Factor's never frozen meals are ready to heat and eat in just two minutes, which means you get a great meal faster than you can drink that jar of food. poison sauce. I don't know, Marsh. I can drink hoison sauce pretty fast. I mean, don't those meal kits get kind of samey? Not with Factor. Factor has over 100 rotating weekly meals, including globally inspired flavors like Mediterranean and Asian. So there's always something new to look forward to. But have you actually tried it? Well, I have. Factor sent us a monster to try when they became a sponsor, and I've been a customer ever since. I love that I can get a great tasting meal that fits my heart-healthy diet in just two minutes. That's why I

No Illusions personally endorse Factor. All right, Marsh, I'm sold. Where do I sign up? Head to FactorMeals.com slash Awful 50 Off. And use called Awful 50 Off to get 50% off and free daily greens per box with new subscription only while supplies last until

September 27th, 2026. See website for more details. All right, Marsh. Thanks. So are you going to give up on your shelf now? Yeah, definitely. The next three were hot sauces anyways. What were the last three? Also hot sauces.

Got it. I'm going to throw up. Yeah, you are. And we're back for more of this shit. We're going to rejoin the action with Joe coming back home. Now he's all marined up. Right. He's there the local town bar to get his best girl.

Yeah, Denise. Yeah, he sees her as an adult, but she's pregnant. So great. And married. So great. It's amazing. And the movie plays this off like, I guess she left a couple of things. out of her letters. But that's

that's cheating. Yeah, unless they were never actually together. But in which case, if they were just like exchanging letters because they were friends and he didn't realize that, you'd think you'd still mention, oh, by the way, I'm seeing a guy, we're having a baby, we're getting married, like you'd mention that.

Yeah. I must have it, I laughed my ass off when I saw that she was pregnant. It was just because he's got the ringouts. Okay, this is the big romantic thing in their life. Because we were set up to believe they've been together since they were, like, since they were, kids. They were child and sweet-harts. And it's just when

he gets there, she's pregnant. I laughed so fucking hard. Yeah, it's like someone broke this part of the story to the writer who wrote the early part of the story. They were like, I wouldn't have done the fucking Forrest Gump child meat and greed if I knew she was going to get knocked up by another dude first. Yeah, she was sending him love letters

whilst she was banging other dudes. Total respect to her. Go for it last. Yeah, right, right. But yeah, then so he sees her husband and they leave together and he goes out to the river and throws the presumably very expensive ring into it. I'm like, give me a fucking break.

That's dumb. The ring she didn't know about. She's not even seen. Just take it back. At this point, all you're doing is burning the money that you spent on that ring. You're fucking idiot. Absolutely ridiculous cliche. But honestly, this movie is only stitched together from existing cliches, right?

So they had to have something happen. And then because life is stupid and this is life, he has to go like, so I married her cousin. We're like, oh, Jesus gracious. You suck. And then he goes a fourth wall break, turned to the camera and smiles. Like he's gone, ha, that got a. Got it. The old revenge marriage.

I'm the protagonist of this movie. Insane. Right. Absolutely insane. But yeah, but that revenge marriage didn't work out as good as you'd hope, I guess. His next line, the next line of the movie is, just as my marriage was falling apart. Is it? We never even met your actual wife.

Like, your wife is just a bit in between that scene and. this scene that we'll never know about. You know when a dude sucks and he has to skip over a whole part of his life because he sucks so much? That's that part of the movie. And hey, like, don't talk to her or ask her about any. She's making her own biopic and I'm the sad, scary part of her biopics. We don't want the biopics to cross.

Exactly that because, like, how is it? That's the only way that we got 22 minutes of. So I got in fights and got expelled from school, 22 minutes. literally zero seconds of, I met a woman, dated her, proposed to her, got married, fell on hard times, and decided we need to split up. Also, we'll see in the photo, they had a fucking kid together because it's a photo of them with a kid. And that kid is not a baby. That kid is stood up. Yes. Now, in Joe's defense, I feel like if I called my exes today and said, hey, they're making a biopic of my life. How much of your relationship with Eli Bosnick would you like shared with the world? They would say, you can have one sentence acknowledging our relationship as you shut a locker door. Yeah, yeah. Also, do you notice when he shuts the locker door, he abandons yet another wedding ring in it? Like, this guy cannot be trust with a ring.

He's a Marine, he's getting deployed. I don't know where he's been deployed to, but I sure as hell hope it's not middle earth. This guy cannot be trusted with a ring. Anytime he walks past the Zales, they're like, it's Mr. No. Recita's back. Yeah, right, right. So yeah, so, but then he gets deployed overseas. He goes to Kuwait.

He sees lots of action. Trust us. Trust us. Yeah. What we see is him in a hole surrounded by five sandbags. That's it. He's just like, yeah, he's like, yeah, right. Five sandbags.

Well, and him and his buddy are going like, we're under a lot of fire. We're very scared. Oh, my God. Look at that guy off screen with a gun. He's just out of shot. He's got a gun. Oh, no. Yeah.

And it's, they intercut this with her marriage. to her husband falling apart? Yes. And look, I'm not saying that that wasn't bad. I don't know her journey. I'm saying that what happened is, as they were telling this story, he started to talk about the people he saw die in Iraq. And she was like, and my marriage was dying face down in the mud.

Okay. Make sure you include that at this point in the movie. My guess is that she and her abusive marriage went through a hell of a lot more than he did in Operation Desert Storm. That's a guess. It's not necessarily true. Vote below. Who do you think that at it worse? Smiley face.

Wait, no, we're on YouTube. Yeah, like button, but send us a fucking emoji. Wait, do they have the different emojis you can choose? No, no, we can do that. If they do that now as to who they have more sympathy for between him and her, whoever said him is going to have a rude awakening when we get to her stroke. So let's really get them to fully invest on backing him here. I guess you've got to watch the video all over again to read like that smash.

Hit the bell. Something about a bell. You've got to hit a bell. Do you? Okay. But so yeah, but Joe and his buddy get exploded and his buddy dies in his hands. And again, like that may have actually happened. And if that happens, I feel like a real asshole just being like, and then his buddy died in his head.

But like, given what we know about this guy, he was probably like doing secretarial work through the war. In her marriage as well, while they're sort of. watching her marriage fall apart, he shouted her, you'll never see your kids again. And I thought, how many kids that we will never hear about are these two people responsible for? They're just spawning left, right and center and never acknowledging their progeny. Well, and you know what? He's right.

Like, we as an audience never see her kids again at all. It really makes you wonder if like when the filmmakers went out into these people's families, like everybody, if everybody was like, no, I don't want any involvement in that fucking movie. I don't want my name or... They all fucking hit them. Right. So all of their kids, his ex-wife.

I mean, yeah, right. It's really telling. So, yeah, but Denise's marriage is so bad, she starts to doubt God. That's how bad it gets for her, guys. Yeah. Take a second with that. So then we get another one of those action-packed letter writing montages that we liked so much the first time. Yeah.

Denise escape her shitty husband. Third times the charm on that, apparently. Yeah. And then we fast forward 10 years. years because like nothing happened between these two people no for 10 years right well that's not strictly true because before the 10 years he is like a 20 something marine and then after the 10 years he is the actor who's going to continue playing this guy into his 60s so it looks like this is a rough 10 years for him in particular yeah desert storm was tough on people than we then we often let

To kill a lot of kids. Yeah. So yeah, but then so we fast forwarded now to 2003. She's getting off of work at her like hospital job or whatever. And he's standing in a dark parking lot to scare her as she walks by. Girls love that. And I really wanted her to be pregnant with another guy's kid. Like he's, oh, come on every time.

Triplets this time. You were gone three times as long. So yeah. So they see each other. and she's scared at first and now she's happy to see him. He goes, so like, you know,

what happened to you since the last time? I was like, it's been 10 fucking years, man, a lot. I would think a lot. Yeah, I changed my hair. That's pretty much it.

Actually, yeah, I had a bad shot. Oh, no, it's the beginning of the movie. And they have this great moment. Okay, so classic movie trope,

right, which is they've been writing letters back and forth. Right. And I never got your letters. Or I got all of your letters, right? And they pull out the thing and it's, oh,

you kept the letters. Except the writer of this movie is so stupid that in this revelation, Joe kept all of his own letters. He has a box of his letters to her. Hey, um, he's kept getting returned to send her. I don't know if you, I have my ex-girlfriend from like 15 years ago.

Her grandmother wrote her a birthday card. It lives in a plastic bag in this very room, because I'm sure the second I throw it out, she's going to call me for the first time in a decade and a half and be like, hey, I really need my grandma's birthday. I'm saying I get it, Joe. I get it. Yep, there you go.

Well, there's also a great moment where she tells him about her abusive husband. He's like, oh, I wish I had known I would have beat him up. And she's like, men who solve things with violence, just what I need more of in my life. Yeah, he says it's basically his job. And like, his job is not dispensing vigilante justice on guys who commit domestic violence. Not to be a downer, but statistically his job makes him three more likely to be the perpetrator

of domestic violence. And that's before you add in the conservative Christianity, which is absolutely an aggravating factor on that as well. Fair. She goes, so how was fucking my cousin? And he goes, ooh. Bad. Yeah, bad.

Ask me about Desert Storm instead. Yeah, right, right. Yeah. And then he shows all the letters that she wrote. And he's like, I kept every letter you ever wrote. to me and like they started writing letters when they were like nine and ten years old. Like how creepy would it be? Because they haven't seen each other in like 10 years.

They have never dated or whatever. How fucking creepy would it be if I had like still, I had all the letters that some girl wrote me when I was 13. Yeah. That's fucking weird. Yeah. If you have letters from a child, then you're the one on YouTube. Yeah.

Yeah. That is a problem. So, but yeah, but then they get married, right? We cut to their marriage. She's not even wearing a tie to his own fucking wedding. Yeah. And this is meant to be, I think they're meant to be 40 here. This is like 27 years later.

So this is 2005. They're meant to be 40. That means they're nearly 60 in the now shots. I can't tell if they've aged his character correctly or incorrectly for now. Like, is he meant to be, is he like way too old? He's definitely way too old for 30 or 40. But I don't think he's 60. I think they've just found this weird guy and figured, yeah, he'll just pass for anything above 28.

It's fine. I guess. Oldish, right? His resume was like, can play 28 to 80. Is it like the instructions you get on a box of Lego, like the age range is what he has in his resume. And they have this weird montage after the marriage where they're like, and that's when life really began, because of course this is his latest wife and this is the love of his life,

blah, blah, blah. But like, we all have this friend who gets married in his 40s for the 97th time and he's like, I'm in love now. You're like, fucking grow up, dude. No. What are we 90? Are you a love? Cool. How's your 401k for when you die?

Also, it's really shitty as well because they say, like, they were empty nests. The kids moved out and that's when life really started. And that is a kick and a dick to those kids. Right. Absolutely. Don't want to be in the movie. Then I guess I'll tell everyone my life started. When I was going to marry my first wife.

You would never invite me to Thanksgiving again. That was my choice. So, yeah. But then he gets a call. He's out marining one day. and he gets a call, it's bad news about Denise. It turns out that she's had a mini stroke. Now, you might think to yourself,

oh, wow, is the movie going to shift gears and really focus on her issues and her life for a minute? Nope, no, no. We are exclusively going to look at her stroke through how much of an inconvenience it was to him. Yes, that is absolutely, absolutely the case. She even says that, oh, yeah, I became a bitch,

but I'm pretty clear that it's my fault here. in the movie of his life. In his movie, his wife is saying, I'm sorry about that stroke that I had if it got in your way at all. That was entirely my fault. I was such a negative, Nancy, about the stroke that I had.

Yeah. And as I watched this couple scream at each other over baloney sandwiches in their kitchens, I couldn't help but think to myself, this is a man who understands the inherent unconstitutionality of the lemon test.

And I hope he is the one who reverses it. she goes because we back up to like the interview version of older them and he goes like are you sure you want to talk about your stroke and she goes i think it's an important part of the story and i wrote in my notes i don't think anyone involved in this fucking film would know an important part of the story if it clams itself to their face and laid eggs in their guts what the fuck you how how to how to fuck like you think an important part of the story of how he went to the supreme court over praying on the 50 yard is the fact that you'd had a stroke years later earlier? And then we had fights about it. Yes, right. What the fuck are we doing here? Yeah. And it's, and it's just them being asked. She says to him, I've been struggling for months and it's like you didn't notice. It's like, well, he didn't notice because we don't see any of that because he can't recall any of that because he didn't notice. Yep. And there's a point where he flips at her at at that point. And he said, well, you can't even look at me anymore. And I thought, is that because every time she does, she thinks, how are you only 40? Look at you. I'm Amy. I'm Amy.

I acted opposite David Baranias, and now I'm opposite you. A lot of people's wives look at them and think, how are you only 40? And it's actually, maybe it's a really cool thing that they think. They think about how lucky they are. There's a huge, like, you know, will their marriage make it moment? And I'm like, why would I give a fuck if their marriage makes it?

But all of that resolves on them in church, right? As though this movie wasn't boring enough already. but he's at church and he says, you know, I felt lost. And I'm like, were you looking for the fucking plot? Because I feel lost, too, man.

Yeah. He said he's losing the woman he loved to, this thing I don't understand. Like, what thing? The mini stroke that she had months ago, then maybe listen to her when she talks about that.

There you go. I understand. You had a heart attack in a vein. None of this makes sense to me. But yeah, so, but he has, like,

he goes up to the altar for an altar call thing, right? And he's praying out loud because it's, you know, wall moment or whatever. And he says to God, he's like, hey, God, if you stop my wife from being such a stroke bitch all the time, I promise to pray to you on the 50-yard line of any theoretical fucking

football field I may eventually have control of. He goes, surrender's never been an option for me. And I'm like, relax, dude. You don't need to tough guy God. I'm pretty sure he's won over already. Also, he can take you. He can absolutely take you. Yeah, I think so.

And we're meant to believe that it's at this point. that he found Jesus, but this point at the church that he's clearly been attending for some time by this point. So what was he doing there before that? Right. Considering his option. Yeah. He's just reading the Bhagavrad Vino

while the guy's preaching. I said, I'll think about it. This is like, this part of the movie is like when someone puts, we had our ups and downs in their anniversary post about their partner, you know, and you're always like, huh, what a weird thing to

mention here in this public forum. I am not going to go into details, but I saw that done in the groom's speech at the wedding once. And actually not just the groom speech, but the father of the bride speech as well. And that was a rough old one. I wish my

father-in-law had mentioned the ups. He just kept screaming, are you sure? It wasn't even his turn. That's crazy. I think every person who did a speech at the wedding, that was the theme of the speech, in fact. It was, wow. They're not together anymore. Turns out.

Oh, really? Oh, no, it didn't work out? No. I could have guessed. Well, I hope he undoes a really important law, at least. Yes. But yeah, but Denise was super impressed by how hard he jeezed guys. Right.

But like she says, I didn't think I could put my trust in a man until he put God first. So very clearly he's gone, okay, then I've done that. Are we good now? Right. This is my second favorite brand of defeated man. the man who pretends to find Jesus. It's second only to the generation of parents we had where the lady would figure out she was gay

and marry a woman and then that guy would just hang out and be Chris. And you'd be like, what's up, man? Remember when you started a life? And then some lady just clipped a carabiner onto her khaki shorts and ended that shit? How's your surf shop? Do you think about how guns taste all the time?

Oh, no. No, but it's fine. You can get really, really intricate model railway sets these days. Yes, exactly. No, you can. And he was always super chill because you know what? That guy, if he was capable of anger, everyone in his life would be dead. So you'd walk into the house and he'd be like, yeah, keep your shoes on.

I'm fine with anything. All right, so then we cut to Joe out jogging one day, as Marsh has noted with acid judgment in our notes, in the middle of the fucking road. in any room for traffic. Right in the middle of the road, you asshole, you absolutely asshole. Like, no wonder the coach for the local football team couldn't help but notice you. You were in his way. Right.

It was either notice you or your road kill at this point. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, right. He doesn't even get out of the way when a car comes by me. He makes the car squeezed by him. But apparently, so this is the way he tells this fucking story. He was out running one day when the local football coach looked at him and said, wow, that guy's too badass and tough not to be a football coach.

I'm going to recruit him. I shall stalk him for weeks on end and beg him to be my football coach. Okay. This is the weirdest lie that the movie chooses to tell because obviously the conditions of Joe's hiring came up in the Supreme Court case about his hiring and firing. His wife got him his job. Yes. She already worked for the school district. Why didn't they want people to know that his wife got, why did they make up an insane, you job?

you jog like a football coach story instead. Yeah, it's ridiculous. They don't even want people to know that his wife had a job because we will not find out she's got a job until a little bit later in this film when she says, you're jeopardizing my career. The last time we saw her,

she was working as like, I think either nurse or a diner, at a diner or something, she was in a uniform with a name tag anyway. So, like, I don't think they want to acknowledge that his wife had any role of significance in his life. That's why even her stroke doesn't fucking matter.

Right. But it means we have to believe that he ran so good that the local coach figured he could coach a football team, even though at no point, at any point in this entire fucking film, and we've seen every moment of his childhood, does he see a football? Not once does he like pick up a football? He's got no interest. And when he's saying to his wife, he wants me to coach the football team, I just wanted to say, but you know nothing about football. It doesn't cross your line once in like 40 years. Right, right. But yeah, but yeah. But the athletic director for the show. schools just can tell how enormous his penis is and really wants him to be the coach. And they're like, please, please, please come coaches, please. And so eventually he decides that he will. At one point, like, they're at church, right? And he's like, I don't know. I'm, I might be too tough for football. Because when I was a kid, we saw stuff with our fists, we didn't, none of this pads bullshit. I might just be too badass. What if they invent a helmet

that's safer, but looks like one of those babies that was born with a condition that means they won't live very long. I have to make my kids wear that. But yeah, but then she's like, hey, but maybe it's God that wants you to be a football coach. And he's like, oh, wow, I could do it and be humble. And this makes sense because she talks about how the players on the team are like kids from like broken homes and like difficult childhoods and stuff.

And she's talking about and so maybe you're in the right place to help them. And I thought, well, how does she have an inside knowledge to the emotional lives of the players in the team. Now I understand it's because she worked for the district. But the time they hadn't established that. So it just seemed like she's fucking psychic or something. Doing distance readings for these footballers. Look, these kids are on a football team

in the South. They're probably not having an awesome childhood. It's not even the South. It's Washington, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. So, okay, but he's not quite sold on it yet. He's not quite sold on

the idea of being a coach yet. So that night he goes home and he decides to eat an entire box of Lucky Charms in one bowl. That's why Heath isn't on this episode. He is doing the same. He felt that was too, judgy. Yeah.

And it's, it's bad because he has to make his own, he's forced to make his own food at this point, and he has a very feral meal, essentially with this massive ball, and mixing bowl from a seal. And I was going to criticize that, except yesterday,

my wife came home for an event. I'd already eaten and she had to make her own meal. And it was the most feral collection of foods you've ever seen, brought together on a small place. Yeah. Whatever wave of feminism I think I'm a part of, minute Anna doesn't cook or let me order

takeout. I realize just how useless I'm just salting crackers in a bowl covered in fake cheese with just going all right, is this food? Did I do a dinner? Can I sleep now? Nicola, that's eight olives from a jar of olives. It's eight crackers

and then one tomato chopped four ways. And then three bits of cheese like unevenly cut off a block. That isn't a meal by anyone's standards. Okay, here we are. But it's a great word problem. Yeah, right. So, okay, but so he's eating his box of lucky terms,

and he starts flipping the channels on TV, and damn it, if he doesn't see a TV show about a coach using his position as a football coach to sell Jesus to children. Yeah. Now, I want to point out, like, later on, he will claim, and of course throughout the Supreme Court case, he will claim that this was never about turning kids Christian,

but even in his own story, he was inspired to do it by watching somebody use their, position as a coach to turn kids Christian. He did it based on facing the Giants. We watched that movie. Yeah. Oh, yeah, we did, didn't we? He's fucking cool that the same thing we made fun of also changed

how the First Amendment is interpreted in the United States today. He even says, like, win or lose, I'm going to give you thanks every game. And I'm surprised he didn't add. And I promised to do that in public, in defiance of the Constitution, amen. Yes. And I will not dismiss

my students back to the locker room until I'm done doing it, which is by necessity a coercive action for them to join me. Yeah. He's like, all right, God, I get the message. I'll get to the plot. And so then he stops the athletic director the next day to tell him that he's in. So, okay. So then we see a football for the first goddamn time, literally halfway through the fucking movie about football.

48 minutes in. Like, they are leaving so little time. in this movie to cover the legal issues. What do they think this is? A Michael Jackson biopic. Come off. So, yeah, so they bring him in and like all the kids are just slacking

except for one kid who's working hard and shows like, I think that kid who's working hard should be the team captain and they're like, whoa, he's a fucking gene. Yeah. The one kid who's doing anything properly. Right. Yes, exactly. Any football-related thing. Yeah.

Well, and his first act as captain as coach. is to like fucking demantle the first captain, the captain who was like slacking off. So to be clear, his first act as coach was to embarrass a child in front of his entire sports team. Yeah. And to pin it all on this other kid who's basically been silent.

So he's very clearly not the most charismatic kid. I really hope the silent kid completely fucks it. Like totally collapses under the pressure. Yeah. Right. Also, he's the kicker. If you made the kicker of a football team, the captain,

they would murder on the Orient Express him. I don't know much about sports. I think so. But I know that if you try to make the kicker, the captain of the football team, he's getting murder on the Orient Express. Yeah, in my world, every one of the football players is a kicker.

It's insane to be anything like it. But you carry on, you carry on. It's true. It's the one guy can use his hands. And his feet, though. Yeah, yeah. There's a lot of kicker. So, yeah, so, but then we skip all that boring football crap,

and we go to them losing, and we get to the important thing, right, Joe, coach Joe, after they lose, goes to the 50 yard line and praise to God because he can't do it from the sideline. God wouldn't see it. Exactly. Also, I just have to point out because this football team sucks and always did suck that they never talk about the sports because he's not a very good sports coach of the sports. Oh, yeah. So the sports will literally just be like, oh, thank God, the sports is over.

It doesn't matter who won or lost. Anyways, weird Jesus. What's going on? Yeah, right. So, okay. So, well, yeah, surprise, surprise, when you hire a person who doesn't, like, who's never played the sport before he's not great at it. Yeah, like this movie cares about the football scenes the same way, views of heated rivalry want to watch the hockey scenes.

That's not what they're there for, it's not what they're interested in. Yeah, exactly. So, oh my God, there's so much hockey. So later on, so Captain Kicker is getting dumped, right? And his girlfriend has decided to dump him in front of the entire football team, was just cold fucking sloated, right? I really wanted the coach

to go over and give him a pep talk about finding one of Liz's hot cousins to fuck instead. I really wanted that to be the pep talk. Hey, at least she's not pregnant. Am I right, brother? You should head on out to a wreck. So,

but yeah, but then all the kids make fun of them. So Joe decides to coach him with some coaching about how they need to be a team and not make fun of each other and derp-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-d-. Okay, I have a couple of things to talk about about how poorly written this is. first of all, we already had a,

everybody do this one thing, except for the one good kid who's going to do the good kid thing scene with him, with childhood Joe. Now we're seeing it again, which is, it's not only terrible and trite and boring, it's repetitive. We've already had this scene in the movie.

The other thing is the scene where he's making fun of the captain kid to convince all the other kids to like change their minds and join in with them and unite them as a team, It lasts a little too long The making fun of him part at the beginning So I was like, is he trying to activate his X-Men powers Like Kevin Bacon? Like I feel like he's trying to activate his X-Man powers. Yeah, but ultimately the team learns they're our team

And they have to stick together And the old captain realizes that Leruso's all right. Right. But the thing is even when they decide to stick together And like pull all the way, It makes him pull weight to the kid, the captain can't pull him by himself. so that the old captain rallies the entire team around to help and pull the weights

and then organizes that and coordinates it's like, okay, he's clearly the better captain. Like he's, right, obviously he should be the fucking captain. Kicker kid was just trying to do an impossible thing. He was just like, can't move the earth. Yeah, right. So, and then, like, and then he's got his hands are all fucked up from trying to move the earth, right, by himself and shit. And he walks up to the coach, he's like, hey, my hands are all fucked up.

And the coach goes, rubs dirt in it. hands matter in football man you gotta this also it seems like a do you like apples situation right like I'm not the first one to point out that unless everybody in the do you like apples conversation from goodwill hunting responds in exactly the correct way that conversation makes no fucking sense

I feel like that's true of this inspiring moment as well right like what if the other kids hadn't joined in the country's just going to be like oh wait, no, you're still captain and then you guys, here's what you were supposed to do. Oh, you're gone. Yes. Right, right, yeah, exactly. Do you think it's a what if they didn't join in?

I think it's a, they didn't join in, but he's the one who's telling the story. There's no way there it is. Right, the reality of it is you just stood there, humiliating that kid for like five minutes and went, fuck, y'all didn't do that right. Run some lapsed. Now everybody help. Yeah.

All right. Well, we've at least introduced the relevant sport that this movie is about. So I guess it's the end of Act 2. So let me give Act 3 the heart sell, I guess. Will the movie happen? Am I going to have to incite this goddamn incident myself? Why didn't this screenwriter give up when they realized they didn't have a movie's worth of movie?

Find out the answers to all the questions you possibly could have had about any of this story in the last 30 minutes of. average Joe. Good game, coach. Hope you don't mind that I pray now that the game is over. No, no, that's not a problem at all. In fact, our assistant coach is going to join you. Always happy to welcome a fellow Christian.

Oh, no, no, he's not a Christian. He's a devout member of the work church. Coach Bosnick? So, I'm sorry, the work church? Yeah, W-E-R-K. Yeah, work. And this here is a... Yeah, this is how we praise, yeah.

Right. I don't want this to be legal anymore. Yep, I figured. Please make him stop. Can't and won't, coach. Can and won't. This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp. Hey, Eli, are you ready to do the rest of the podcast?

One second, Marsha, I'm finishing up my sig. You're finishing up your sick? Yeah, I'm a man, Marsh. When something bothers me, I need to brood and I need a sig. Okay, first of all, you're not smoking. That's a candy cigarette. And secondly, if you're going through a hard time, you should like maybe consider therapy. Therapy?

For a man, Marsh, that's as ridiculous as the cartoons that come on these packs of my sigs. Yeah, that's because they're candy. But, yeah, everyone can use someone to talk to now and then. If you're considering therapy, you might want to try BetterHelp Online Therapy. What's better help online therapy? BetterHelp does the initial matching work for you so you can focus on your therapy calls. A short questionnaire helps identify your needs and preferences, and their 12 plus years of experience and industry leading match fulfillment rate

means they typically get it right first time. If you're not happy with your match, switch to a different therapist anytime from their tail and recommendations. So if I need a therapist who's secular or is willing to affirm my queer identity? Yeah, they could help you find that. You don't have to be on this journey alone. Find support and have someone with you in therapy. Sign up and get 10% off at betterhelp.com slash awful.

That's better, h-e-l-p.com slash awful. Looks like I won't be needing these for much longer after all. What was bothering you anyway? Candy store said I needed to stop swearing while I was buying my sags. Okay, yeah, that sounds reasonable. My fucking sigs! They're sugar sticks. And we're back for still more of this shit.

We're going to open up now on a very telling montage of what it actually meant for these kids that played on his team to be all the way in coach Joe's good graces. Oh, yeah, yeah. And even like the voiceover at the start of this is Joe's wife saying when Joe started coaching, it expanded our family. And I thought, yeah, but where are your actual children? Like, where are your actual children? I know they're older now. I know they've left. But you are in zero contact with your actual children.

But yeah, these kids are basically a surrogate kids at this point. Well, right. And so, again, you know, this movie is trying to minimize the level to which his prayer was coercive. But we see here that, like, the kids that he really likes, he buys him sweet Nike's. Yeah. And they come over to his house for pizza and movie night. And I wonder if the kids that actively don't share his religion get that same treatment. Yeah.

I bet they don't. Also, as a teacher, can I tell you how fucking wildly inappropriate would be? I mean, not just my house. house, although my house would be a great prank to pull on my students. I invite my students over and they're just like, um, I quit. Yeah, yours is bad because it's an unsafe environment

for minors. Yeah, just generally speaking. Hey, A, Marsh, I need you to specify that it's an unsafe environment for all people, not just my students. All people, minors include. It's a hazard is what it is. It's primarily a hazard. We're on YouTube now. It's important. Minors have never been safe around me.

Don't worry. I took care of it. of it, Noah. Everybody gets it. Did you do the Chiron like I asked the monies have never been? Yeah, no, I did the one that Anne told me to do it. You know, he says, I never thought of my job as teaching these kids how to play football. And I'm like, well, there's your first

problem. I have the problem. I do need you to think about that as your job. He goes, he goes, no, I was teaching boys how to become men. And I'm like, well, see, that's really problematic because men is just, you're defined. that, right? Like, I don't think that you mean, you know, masculine presenting person who is older. I think you have your own weird fucking definition of what that means. And that's what you're trying to instill. Yeah, 100%. We even see that he tries to teach one of the kids how to use the washing machine and he can't do his own laundry. And then the wife has to come along to be like an oh you when he can't use the washing machine. And but like, it's such a fucking stupid trope. That's such a damage. Like you're a husband, you're an adult. Learn to wash your own clothes. It's embarrassing. You can't, look, you know for a fact that Joe is one of those men who doesn't clean his own ass in the shower because he thinks that's gay.

You know. Yes. Yes. Thanks for making me think about that. Noah washes his own ass. He had a weird reaction just now, but we need to clarify as Fuzzle and a thunderstorm. He washes his ass every time. I was thinking of Joe Kennedy's ass.

He doesn't want to wash Joe's ass. I was going to say, you put the weird emphasis on his. own house. Like Noah watches other people's art routinely. That's actually what he does when he's not on air. That's why he's so busy.

We do give Heath a satisfying scrub once a year. Now he's married now, so probably. That's why Noah's house isn't safe for minors. It's different reasons. Right.

Well, hey, man, that's how you train for this fucking job. All right? You wash a lot of asses. You guys think J.L. Be fun? We are nailing this YouTube thing. We're doing so.

I don't think there's an extradition treaty. I think I'm fine. I don't think they can get me enough to Brexit. So yeah, but now all the kids want to pray with him on the 50-yard line, completely uncoerced by the coach who coaches them and teaches them to become men. The key goes, hey, coach, can we pray with you? And he says, it's a free country. And I'm like, well, for now.

And I really wanted there to be one of those fourth wall breaks there saying, this isn't actually how it happened happened really. Obviously this isn't how it happened. I pressured them in reality, but this is good for the mood. It cuts to Justice Sotomayor and she's doing the four-the-law break. Yeah, right, exactly. I wanted one kid to come over and be like, hey, coach, can I argue with your prayers as you say them out loud?

And I'd be like, no, it's not that for you. Oh, that's why this is coercive because I'm establishing. We're not doing an equal establishment. Don't argue with my prayers. Yeah, but then we get this whole like, of all the kids loving him and praying with him and everything. And it ends with his team, you know, winning again and praying on the 50-yard line. And this time, like, the opposing coach sees him out there.

And he's not too sure about all this Christianity. It's great as well because during this montage of him doing the coaching, we see what his coaching involves. And it exclusively involves him saying, who are we? What are we? It's like he's got CTE. He's lost all this short term. Who are we?

What are we? where are we? What day is it? Who's the president? Man, horse, woman, camera. But then we cut to Denise at her office, right? And at this point we're like, oh, she's got an office. What the fuck does she do for a living? Right?

And the movie really doesn't establish this in any meaningful way. We have to like figure this out in retrospect. She works as the HR director for the school district that he's working at. So when the school district starts getting complaints about him praying on the 50 yard line, like normally it would be her that would deal with that. Yeah. Right. Right.

So her boss comes in and, you know, gives her a talking to. And then we head back home with like her having just told him what's wrong with what he's doing. Right. Yeah, exactly. And he's like, I can't pray in private. Who would want me to pray in private? And I wrote in my notes, yeah, fucking Matthew. What does he know?

Yes. She says to me. I'm like, you know, it doesn't matter where you pray. And he says, it matters to me. It's like, yes, to you. It's just about you. It doesn't matter to anyone else. It's just a you thing here.

Right. And she says, well, you know, it looks like you're forcing those kids to pray. And I'm like, no, no, that's not the fucking word. Coercing is the fucking word, right? Nobody said that he was forcing the kids to pray. He was coercing them. He was the one that decided how much playing time they would get, whether they would go to the fucking pizza parties and get the fucking shoes and all this,

whether or not the person who had set himself up as the manmaker would make men out of them. Obviously, he was fucking coercing him. There's no realistic way to argue otherwise unless, of course, you're going to go against the photographic evidence that Elena Kagan is going to enter into the fucking record. Yeah. Right. That's why we have the word coercion as opposed to Forced, right? Yes.

We were like, okay, well, that guy held those people at gunpoint. I think Forced works for him. But we need another word for when it's a little bit. bit trickier. Yes. Right. Well, and then he goes, I guess I was wrong about it being a free country. And I'm like, but that's this, like that's for everyone, though, for everyone is a free country. That's the part you don't fucking get. I'll make it wrong that it's a free country. Yeah, right. Right. Yeah. And keep in mind at this point in the story, there have been multiple complaints. They're not even talking about like one coach had a problem with it. They're like, hey, look, another person called about your

husband and his 50 yard line prayers. Yeah. Right. There's also a moment, and I, a, why the fuck does this better moment? She goes, look, nobody cared for years, but now they do. You know, I was like, nobody gave a shit until they knew about it. And now, I used to fuck the bread in the grocery store all the time. And then that one girl from the grocery department noticed. And now I'm the weirdo.

Right. So, okay. And then he goes into the closet to pray because he's fucking funny and clever. And she has to pretend to find that endearing as well. Well, it's the hardest she is acting in this entire film as pretending that is an endearing quality of his. Yeah, the fact that he walked away mid-conversation. Yeah.

So then we get back to the football and did the Wolverines win again, but will he pray? Right. Are there enough players on the pitch here? Because it looks like there's only about five per team. And I swear one of them has a build that I can only describe as less Eli Manning and more Eli Bosnick. Okay.

Oh, yeah, okay. A lot of football players are full-bodied, Marsh. You wouldn't understand. Your skinny little Paley's running around the field, you wouldn't understand what's required. I don't think Paley was British. For a linebacker. He's the soccer.

You know I'm that. He lost. He was skinny. That's good. I mean, Eli did a sports reference. That was relevant. That's good. Yeah, I did a football.

I managed to get football. You come fucking, come fucking for me. The guy you're referencing is literally dead now and has been for some time because he's from the 1950s. But other than that. And I forgot to say, send flowers.

Honestly, I would have bet any amount of money that Palet was alive right now. Is David Beckham alive? He is alive. He is still going. Just became a billionaire. Good for him. Nice.

So if you have some extra money, it's Matryon. David. David. Hey. So, okay. So, but he goes out, he prays on the 50 yard line, just like they told him not to. He tells the kids, he's like, you can't come pray with me this time.

You know, it's good. Uncle Sam's going to get. Oh, shucks. We want. He's not. Banging him. Baging him. Kids love praying.

Yeah. But yeah, so he goes out to the 50 yard line and everybody's like, don't do it, don't do it. And then he backs down and he doesn't do it. And I'm like, oh, God wasn't that important. Joe. Joe. It's like I can tell my dog's going to miss the P-pad, right? Like those circles way too wide and I'm like, Marjorie.

Joe, Coach Joe. Yeah. Center of the pad. So yeah, but then he goes out to his truck and he's all huffy and he's all huffy and he's He's like, you know what? I am going to go out there and brand the 50-hour line, but everybody's already gone. So it doesn't matter.

Yeah, no, we're fine with that, man. Why don't you just do that then? Absolutely fine. Also, it's weird. There's huge floodlights on this. There's like a full stand to the side of the state. Is it normal for a team like this to have such resources? Because they've got floodlights, a large stand,

lots of people in the stands watching them, but they had to recruit their coach by just seeing which men run around town regularly and see which one have the best running for. Is this normal for American football? I mean, you would be... An overfunded football team with a coach who just got out of prison is pretty much the American standard. Yeah, no, I'm going to send you a picture of the high school football stadium in my town and it's going to make you cry.

It's on fire. You know, we don't have health care. Madness. Absolutely madness. Yeah, the nice thing about poor towns in England is that they're poor across the board. Yeah, university pool. You go to their soccer pitch and there's just like a homeless guy standing there with copies of big issue. as the goalposts.

We don't have goalposts. We just have an accumulation of dog shit. That's just like built up over time. Right. To the height of the goal poles now. Yeah. There you go. Yeah.

So he goes out to the 50-year line and he goes, and I quote, God, forgive me for wussing out. That's his actual goddamn line. But then we cut immediately to another football game and wouldn't you know, they win again just as time expires. Okay. I know this is just a poor movie-making thing,

but when he prays this time, see everybody leaving while he's doing it. So it just looks like nobody gives a fuck about his. Chariots a fire moment. He's like, do, do, do, do, do, do. And just in the background someone's like, we got to get out because the traffic's going to be fucking nightmare.

Yes, right, right. One road in our town. But they literally do the fucking slow motion badass strut out to the field. Jeff Blackwell and Nick Fish trying to dive under his knee on the line. Make him stow. There's just hilarious dramatic drum hits. Boom, boom.

They got a fucking timpani go in there. It's just amazing or whatever. I bet they didn't tell timpani guy what he was doing that day. They were like, he was just going to do a couple. And he was like, oh, what for movie? And they were like, doesn't matter. It's very dramatic moment.

Think of it as a war scene. Is it a war scene? Play the music, man. Think of it as a war scene. Kind of war, spiritual one. So, okay. And then, but he goes back to his truck, and he gets on Facebook and he goes,

I, he posts, I think I might get fired for praying. And I'm like, what a dishonest summary of your concern. Yeah, he's like one step away from tagging in Fox News as well at that point. At Fox News, I'm being fired. Yeah. It's so funny. You mentioned that, Marsh, because actually it turns out he didn't just post the Facebook.

He did actually reach out to several right wing media outlets because this was a test case created by right wingers. Yeah, it wasn't it, though. Did you notice that on his Facebook feed, it's just his own post as well? It's like, this is a guy who's got. no friends on Facebook. Just no one gives a fuck about you. Like everyone's conservative football coach. It's just him.

And he's got his phone set to like massive font as well. And that's because this actor is like 60 or something. He's all by this book. That's actually a great size font. Noah. It's actually helps you stay focused. Yeah. So,

okay. So the next morning he wakes up and he gets a call from his kid who like at this point we have not acknowledged exists and we never will again. Caleb. He's got a name. His kids acquired a name. He had to move out and grow into an adult before we even get a name for him.

Caleb. Yeah. So Caleb calls it. He says, hey, dad, you're on Sports Center. You went viral. And they turn on the TV and everyone on all the channels is talking about Joe

and his prayer on the 50-yard line. And of course, this is the movie's first chance to really get into what it thinks about all of this. So the movie just stops dead and we watch a pundit on their TV on their like imaginary TV channel. Explain why Joe is so fucking write about this?

Yeah. And then he gets a phone call from a journalist and he immediately snaps into wildly aggressive. It's like, hello? I'll kill you and everyone you've ever met. Fuck you, bam. Yeah. I'm such a good guy.

I'm the hero of this movie. I'm a hero of the film. I'm a hero of the film. You remember when the fisherman beat me up at the beginning? That's why I'm allowed to behave this way. Right. Yeah. Yeah.

And so, but then he gets, he's got a meeting now with a lawyer from the first Liberty Institute. And even in their own movie, the lawyer from the First Liberty Institute looks evil. I don't know. I didn't look up who acted. I'm wondering if this is really the guy, right? Like if this is really his lawyer. And it's not helped by

the fact that he woke up that morning to the phone call from Caleb and watched the television and then he immediately, while still in his pajamas, answered the door to this lawyer, and it's pitch black, which makes it seem like this lawyer destroyed the sun. Like the sun has gone away so it doesn't shine on this legal team. When they killed,

then when they fired coach Joe, the sun went out and there was a big earthquake. The dead have like risen from the grave to walk past his house at the same time as well. It's me, Pele. Was that during the podcast or before we started recording? I hope it was during the podcast. It's a good callback.

Eli doesn't remember. So the lawyer, but the lawyer's like, yeah, you should be, it was. You're good, well done. So the lawyer's like, I'm the one that smokes all the weed. This is just happened. So the lawyer's like, I think you should fight for Jesus. And he's like, I've been fighting my whole life.

And I'm like, well, mostly you've been sucker punching children for making fun of your love letters. So this is different. So that's true. But like, it isn't that different to most of the fighting he's done in that it's needless, entirely avoidable and brought on exclusively by his own ego and selfishness. So it is right in his wheelhouse this fight. No, you're right. Yeah.

He goes, and the lawyer goes, now, whatever you do, Don't ask your wife about this. He goes, like, I wouldn't dream of it. Now, I would never. The reality of it is, like, she works for the school district. That's who they're going to be suing. So it would complicate things if you talked to his wife beforehand, et cetera, et cetera. But the movie's just like, he's just like, yeah, no, I have absolutely no issue whatsoever.

Just bringing this on my wife. Yeah, like, don't worry about it. You've seen no evidence of me discussing anything with my wife at any point. Right. It's just very much not who I am as a guy. I can understand why you'd think I would discuss something with her as a partner, her, but mostly I just think about when she's cranky. That's the only way in which she asked me.

Also, it's such a weird detail to point out, but if you followed this case, one of the original claims that they made that they dropped was that it was punitive towards his wife, like that the district punished his wife. And then they were like, actually, we didn't and we made all of these steps to make sure it wasn't punitive to its wife. So the reason they're retelling the story this way now is because they had to walk back those claims, right? So it's like, well, it was probably really tense for her at work.

Even if it wasn't illegal, they were probably, didn't sign her birthday card big. It was bizarre that they kind of actually had to go out of their way to show that they didn't mistreat her in anyway. And then just, but she just kind of felt like it was. You know when the vibes are bad? Yeah. You know when you go and there's just everybody doesn't like you and you're like and you and they all go on vacation and you're like, it's not that I could go. I just like a invite.

Yeah. But so then we get the scene where like she shows up at the cafe to yell at him for, for not talking it over with her beforehand. And he's like, I didn't think it was going to be a big deal. And I'm like, didn't you though? Did you really not think it was going to be a big deal? And she says to him, coaching might be a part-time thing for you, but this is my career. I said, that's a really good point.

And also because this movie doesn't care about women, we still do not know at this point what that career is, which just more underlined the fact that he did not think about or give a fuck about her career. Right. It's not even in the movie. He goes, I'm doing the right. right thing and she goes the right thing for who? And the writer's like, fuck, why did I write that? And the scene ends. Why would I say that? And it's, it's so bad because like, we've seen her.

We didn't need to see this, but we did see this. We saw her get trapped in an abusive relationship where the men in her life didn't value her. Yes. And then they showed what her marriage was like to Joe. And it's like, you just, why would you not show the first one if it wasn't foreshadowing this and cueing us for the fact that she gets trapped in these things because the men take advantage of her? Yeah. It very clearly looks like this again. Right, right. So, okay, so now it's time for more not football happening off screen or whatever. But now, like, people are showing up at the games to protest Joe's coercive prayers. And I'm like, good for them. Yeah. And his advice is to just focus on the game. But the thing is, if he'd have done that, this wouldn't have been happening at all. Yeah. Fun fact about this. I love that they've

rewritten this side of the story because the only protester Joe ever dealt with was a mom from a another team he was playing against. It was like, hey, actually, we're Jewish, and that's super offensive. And he screamed at her so much that they called the cops. So just while they're creating this moment of fiction here in the movie where sign holding protesters scream at Joe, just keep in mind that in reality, a lady was like, hey, could you not? And he was like, I'm going to kill you.

This is what you get for killing my side. Yeah, exactly. I wouldn't be kneeling here if you guys. Didn't have so many Pharisee questions. And also, like, it's fictitious because, like, mostly everybody was coming out in support of him because he's in the majority, right? Like, like, there was distraction, but it was people who were, like, supporting his Fox News fucking crusade or whatever. And secondly, even in this bullshit retelling, it makes him look bad because it shows what he's willing to sacrifice him. What he's willing to sacrifice is these children's athletic experience.

Yep. And his wife's career. Yeah. And his wife's career. Right. Exactly. Exactly. And we see that, like, you know, the boss sure is mad at Denise, but he keeps his cool and is professional the entire time.

But you can tell the, really, the vibes are bad. Right. But then we get the scene where, like, the old guy that told him about that old twisted tree way back in Act 1 shows up and he's all proud of him for fighting the good fight for Jesus. Yeah, it's so bad. He's basically like, oh, you remember that really bad metaphor from ages ago, that one time you saw us talk? I'm going to remember that again. you know, God tortured that shitty tree for reasons,

therefore continue violating the Constitution? Hey, Christian guy from the thing that I lived in or something, is there a way I could have defended and destroyed the Lemon Test without being beaten into unconsciousness by a fisherman

or was that a necessary? No, that was a crucial part of it. It had to be no way about doing it without fish. That's the only way you get standing is by being beaten up on bullied by a vision. Unfortunately. Otherwise, it goes in the shadow docket.

And then we never get any precedes. We really know. So, yeah. So, but it's really funny too, because it's such a lazy, like, you know, he was a fighter as a kid and now he's fighting for his, it's such a lazy thing. But they stop the movie dead and have like six different people say it out loud at some fucking point, right?

But yeah, the old man explains God abused him on purpose. So he'd be ready to fight against religious freedom or whatever. And then the team wins because God's on their side. so he prays on the 50 yard line again. Then we see a bullshit scene where his wife has to fire him. Hey, why would they have a scene that they're going to admit is a lie halfway through the scene? Marsh, did you walk on to set and like start to raise a single finger? And they were like, turn to the camera, turn your camera and say that didn't happen.

And she was like, I'm just kidding. Just kidding. This would very obviously be illegal. So it wasn't this. But can you imagine? Yeah. Someone's got a framed picture of Sotomayor on the wall in the, in every scene like,

okay, fine. Well, but so here's the reason that they did this. And it's actually very insidious, if you ask me. So he's like, you know, and then my wife had to fire me. And she's like, as the head of HR, I have to fire you. And then they both turned to the camera and go, nah, it didn't happen like this. And then they just carry on.

But like, what actually happened was that he didn't get fire. Right? They just, they failed to renew his contract, which is something that happens all the fucking time. And honestly, given how much of a distraction. he'd become was the right fucking thing to do. Yeah. Right?

So rather than actually admitting up front, no, he wasn't actually fired, they create this story so they can say, okay, that's not how it happened and then not have to tell you how it fucking happened. Yeah, that's a very good point. We were just lying. What's the truth? It doesn't matter. What matters is that what we just said isn't not true.

Yes. Now it's 2011. We've not been time to do the truth now. We've run out of time because of the lie that we show. We've got to kick off. We spent an hour talking about this guy as a kid. I don't know why we did that. We've got nothing.

We have no time for the fucking court case. Remember when that fisherman punched him? Crazy. So, yeah, but then we see him in a federal appellate court in 2011. And he's like, yeah, the judge is ruled against us just because of today's political climate. And I'm like, in that we were still doing the First Amendment during that political climate. There's a great bit where he's like, again, doing the fourth wall break. he's in the courtroom and he turns the camera and said,

I had to sit there and listen to this lawyer, Spue lies about me. And he says that over the lawyer explaining what the case is against him, so we never get to hear any of it. Yes. Which is something you only do if you're right. You don't let the case be made against you. Right.

Obviously, yeah. And so then we cut to Denise's consequences that he condemned her to without asking. And again, it's just like, you know, a lot of people whisper where she walks by sometimes. somebody told her that she should have been fired too. She wasn't. Imagine. Also, he wasn't fired either.

How fucking hard it was not to actually break the law around Denise the entire. You're getting death threats and horrible calls from psychopaths all over the country. You got to let go. And then Denise walks in and she's like, we're doing a pizza party for Carol's birthday. And you're like, yeah, no, I have a little bit of a busy day, Denise, because I have to move my family. because your husband got me a bunch of death threats, but then I'll come grab a slice. And they bullshit into her,

like, being the one who's being put upon. Because she says, once people learned that Joe was my husband, it got ugly. But it wasn't a secret that he was your husband. It's not even a secret in this movie that he's your husband.

The only secret part of it is, like, he is not acknowledging you 90% of the time and not treating you like an evil. It might be a secret to him that he's meant to be a husband to you, but not to anyone else in the film. Well, and also it's such, it's so telling, like they show like her getting like these fucking ransom note death threats or whatever.

But they don't acknowledge the real problem, which was that everybody involved in this was getting fucking death threats from the Fox News viewers that were mad because he got fired for loving Jesus so much. Because they had misconstrued what actually fucking happened to the point where people thought that the only way they could defend their faith and their freedom of religion was to make death threats against the people who ran this fucking little goddamn school. Yeah. Also, I don't believe that she got death threats. I think what the movie's doing is... I don't think Jeff Blackwell was sitting there with a magazine being like, fuck. Damn, I need a why. There's not a lot of ads with whys in them.

I think all this movie's doing is, and then they were death threats. He used to say he got the death threats. They were death threats. What more do you need to know death threats were issued and received? Well, you know, because when she was working in HR, they would all send the death threats to her. To the mail. Yeah, she had to file all the death threats. Yeah.

That's a problem. Chris, I got a death threat for you. Sorry. She also, and again, this is my, into my best worst. She says to the camera, suddenly I became a target and I became resentful. It was like, yeah, the second time the movies had her explain that it was her fault that he tweeted her so badly. It was all his fault, all her fault for this. Yeah.

Yeah. So then she confronts him about it. And she's like, you know, my whole life is ruined because you can't just pray in the fucking locker room. And he's like, no, actually, I'm the good guy in the. movie. And she's like, I have no idea how you could possibly be the good guy in this fucking movie. Yeah. And he's like, you don't know who's, you don't know, you didn't pay the director. I paid the director. I'm the good guy in this movie. That's how they're works. Is your name on the check? Average Joe, not average Denise.

But she says, are you sure this isn't just about the attention? And he like stares off to the other side. He's like, why do we keep writing these things? It's crazy because it's so obviously about the detention. Yeah. I don't want attention, says the guy in the movie average Joe, is just spent an hour going through your shitty childhood. Which is about how badass he is. Yeah. So, but now they're taking it all the way to the Supreme Court, I guess,

right? Because he says, well, you know, given the last ruling, you could get fired for the tiniest religious display. And I'm like, well, you wouldn't, though. I mean, and not if you were a Christian anyway. You wouldn't. Yeah. There's this great moment where the wife's like, okay, but like a lot of, if that was true,

why would a bunch of Christians disagree with us? And he's like, let me answer a different question. No. So let me not answer a question at all. I would like to say, apropos of nothing, I'm fighting for them. Not their rights. I'm fighting directly against their rights.

Yeah, no, I'm fighting against their rights. But yeah, no, he's fighting for the Constitution, damn it. And the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights and Federalists 1 through 26, 29, through 68, and 74. Whatever. But then we just get, we get like a fucking him and Denise just not getting a long montage. I feel like in reality that montage

could have been a hell of a lot longer Yeah, right? Yeah, their marriage. So, and then this lazy Buckin' writer needs a moment to address some of the questions

that the skeptic might have at this point. So he's texting with an internet troll and he's like, would you like to meet face to face in the next scene so that you could present some questions that the skeptic might have?

And I can lie about the, I'll lie and all the answers to those questions. And yeah, could this be Thomas who doubts his integrity? He said, it was so lazy. It's so fucking lazy. And it's great because even with like this internet troll, I go to such length to show how super reasonably he is

to this person criticizing him. But we've already seen him threaten someone three seconds into a phone call on two occasions. Like he said he also said at one point how much he wants to punch a lawyer in the throat. You've already destroyed this guy's character. You can't now build him up to be this son, and Mahat Magandi who's meeting violence with peace.

Right. But he decides to meet this guy and he's like, you know, you should have forced them kids to pray. And he's like, I never asked the kids to pray. And the guy's like, what, but what you did wasn't just legal. It was amazing. Yeah, right, right. He says, it was never about those kids.

And I'm like, well, that's the first honest thing you've said in the entire goddamn movie. But then, you know, doubting Thomas goes, well, you weren't trying to convert him. I'm just so Yeah And Thomas says So it really is just the principle of it Is it?

Yes. Yeah. Okay. And he's like, Yes. All right. That's fine. I'm sold.

Good enough for the questions. Oh, well, in that case, he goes, you know, I guess you're like Peter. And in his own fucking movie,

he goes, Peter who? Yeah. To which Thomas offers this incredible analogy, he goes, well, if Jesus was Batman,

Peter would be his Robin. Mm. And I'm like, they did fuck. You're right. Okay. His analogy is if Jesus is Batman. And actually, that's an accidentally good analogy, because if Jesus was Batman, he'd also have the alter ego who's hugely more powerful, Bruce Wayne, which mean he had the power and resources to do all of the good in the world for the people who needed it. And he could be doing that if he wasn't obsessed with needing to be personally involved at an individual level. Like, it is actually a pretty good analogy for how him being Batman is a complete weight. of people's time. The Holy Spirit is Alfred and then, fuck, this kind of falls apart. Red Hood. Red Hood is Mormonism.

It's Joseph's. Oh, all right. All right. I get it. So yeah. But he's like, you know, you're actually a better Christian than Peter the Apostle because you didn't deny Jesus. And your penis is enormous.

My God, you're a penis. So great. So fucking funny. This, yeah. But then Thomas is like, well, you know, I know a lot about Christianity. but I had a bad experience at church so I don't believe in God. And he's like, well, that's a terrible reason

not to believe in God. And I'm like, I agree. Yeah, right. But wait, no, he's got a great metaphor. Yes, he does. I don't know about you guys, but this brought me right back to religion. You ever have a bad experience at a restaurant?

And the guy's like, of course. He's like, okay, too quick. But just because you don't have a good experience at a restaurant doesn't mean you don't continue to give that restaurant 10% of your income and 100% of your political power. Yeah. He says if you've had a bad experience at a restaurant, you don't stop going to restaurants. Like, no, but you stop going to that restaurant. You stop going to that restaurant completely, obviously.

Well, but here's where the analogy breaks down is it's like if you stop, if you had a bad experience at a restaurant, so you stopped eating all together, which is what he's saying. And then nothing bad happened to you. You'd be like, wow, this eating shits has been a scam the whole thing. Okay. Say that every restaurant you went to, it turned out they didn't actually have food there. Would you keep, you have to keep going to new foodless restaurants. Yeah. And then even if those ones also don't have food. You can't. Yeah.

There's still food somewhere. If you stop going to foodless restaurants, you won't get food after you can go to any restaurants anymore once the restaurants closed. You can't get food once the restaurants closed. When you're full, you won't have enough food from the restaurant. My beliefs are childlike chemistry. Yeah, right, yeah. So then we cut it.

There's like a meeting at the school about all Joe's bullshit. And Denise walks in and she's like, oh, sorry, I didn't get the email about the meeting. And they're like, well, actually, you're not at this meeting. It's about your husband. And she goes, oh, awkward. Not awkward. Just obvious conflict of interest. Of course, you're not invited to that at all.

And like, she takes that personally. And it's great because as she goes out the door, it's a door with a little kind of window in it. And she pulls the most toddler-esque sad face. I think she sort of goes, and then goes, that's one for the YouTube. But she does that. Do you want to stay for the meeting? It's like a crying clown face.

We hate your husband a lot. Wow. Why would you tell us all his weakness? She just goes, colon open bracket. She just immediately turns into a colon. Right, right. Right. So, okay, but then she goes home,

and he's just found out from his lawyer that the Supreme Court turned him down, but they gave him a roadmap map as to how to argue this case the next time so they don't have to turn them down, which is horribly unethical if you're actually just trying to get to justice. Honey, it's a great thing. So the Supreme Court, they turned down our case because we're idiots. But luckily, a bunch of voters in Pennsylvania wanted to send a message.

And so what happened is two 19-year-old theocrats then gave me explicit instructions about how they could destroy the First Amendment. And that's what we're going to do. Yeah. Yeah. This movie is trying to make it seem like God moves in mysterious ways. But they're trying to mysterious ways a rich Christians orchestrated a coup on the judiciary. That's not mysterious ways.

It's really unmistreous. It's not mysterious at all. Yeah. And she's like, wait a minute. Do you mean we have to start all of this over from the very beginning? He's like, yeah, isn't it great? And she's like, you're an asshole. And then they have a fight.

And the fight turns into like, she's like, you know, you've put me through hell for three fucking years. and now we've got to do it all again. And he goes, you know, you could have been more supportive of me in his movie where he's the good guy. Hell is a dry heat. You could have mentioned that more often. And he's like, you know what? I'm leaving you.

And we're like, wow, you suck as a human being. But just as he goes to leave her, the porch railing breaks and he falls down. And that's God smiting him for not standing by his wife. Sorry, kid with leukemia. give me a second. I got to wrap up a fight between Coach Joe and his wife, click. Yeah. All right.

Oh, you died. Okay. But like, he definitely broke that porch, like, railing. Like, they're trying to make it seem like, oh, that porch railing was loose and he fell and that's how he hurt himself. But we know for a fact that he's a violent asshole with a short temper. Right. There is no way he didn't storm out of that house and do something that then hurt himself and damage the stuff around him because he's like toxic masculinity. Kick the fucking thing or something.

Yes. Right. So she comes out to grab him. and help him even though he doesn't deserve it. And he goes, look, I promise God if he fixed our marriage after your mini-stroke, I would do whatever the voices in my head told me. And I'm like, is your

marriage fixed? It doesn't look fixed. But yeah, no, I guess at some point in the writer's room, somebody says, well, hey, try to keep that part where I slipped on the way down the front steps in the movie, because that part was harrowing. That was one of the harrowing parts of my life. Honestly, I think it's very much just keep the part

where I explained to my wife why that thing was broken. I promise you my explanation was the right one. I just slipped. So, but then they try to convince us in the interview bit that that was actually a miraculous rail slippage. That was God intervening.

And it's bullshit. Like, God didn't intervene. It's just Joe remembered how to manipulate his traumatized wife, who's traumatized from various other bouts in her life. Yep. Of having a violent man in her life. Absolutely, yeah. I wish my wife had one bugaboo that I could just be like, oh man, it was the sandman

again. Let me tell you. I actually just talk to him and he wants to load the dishway. He wants to keep the dishes above the dishwasher. It's supposed to in the sink. Yeah, no, it's crazy. I was just in my heart. I opened my heart to the sand man and he said. I don't think that this.

It's really kind of an awful moment when you're like, yeah, she was abused and traumatized. And Eli's like, oh, that's on sweet. I would just like an advantage. I would like an advantage in an art. First of all, I'm a YouTuber now, so I'm S-O-B. Second of all, you guys haven't been losing. a fight that you're right about about how to load the dishwasher for five and a half of year. I have PTSD.

I have post-traumatic suds in the dishes because she puts it in the sink and she uses the sink. We just have a demarcation. I load the dishwasher. Nicola washes everything that doesn't go in the dishwasher. And I do that every two days and Nicola does it every couple of weeks. And it's perfectly fine. It's absolutely great. See, you wish she had a weakness.

Find a weakness. Spiders. Do a spider thing. I talk to the spiders and they love it when you don't clean. We're all working together here. She is in this house, Eli. She could hear you say that. Yeah, right, right.

She could walk here in minutes. All right. But then he gets a job as a grave digger because he's a manly man, right? Apparently they still do that with shovels. I didn't think they would do that with shovels now. But he gets the call while he's out digging graves that the SCOTUS is going to take his case, this time around. So then there are six minutes left in this fucking movie.

I shit you not. Six minutes. For the only thing that matters. For the only thing that matters about this guy's life, six minutes. Also, like, he hears this call. He jumps out of the grave that he's been digging for some time. And he runs home and he gets home and he's like out of breath. It's like, did you run to work?

Because you just left your car at work. Drive forward. You fucking idiot. I'm hoping another person will see me and ask me to be a football coach. I kind of like that. It's the only way I know how to get that job. I need the gig. This is the only application I have no idea how many times I had to run around that graveyard before they stay.

He seems to have a lot of energy. So, okay. So, yeah, but so he gets to the Supreme Court. He prays on the courthouse steps. But then we learn that he's not actually going to be allowed to go inside because of COVID protocols. Such a fucking, what a tiny thing to bitch about. And by the way, I wasn't allowed inside because it was a deadly pandemic caused by my belief system. Yeah.

I really feel like this movie is winking at also wasn't the whole restrictions about COVID thing bullshit. Like, right? Right. Absolutely. None of these characters are wearing masks at this point. Noah's book just slides into frame next to coaches. Yeah,

slides back out again. So, and then, of course, they're like, well, I guess we'll just have to let God finish this fight. And then we cut ahead three fucking months because, of course, the Supreme Court doesn't, like, give you a guilty or innocent verdict that day. or whatever. And he says in narration, he's like, I bet you were hoping to see the Supreme Court case that this movie's about. But no, we chose camp in that flag stomping scene.

Remember the flag scene? And then the football scene, I did that one. Yeah. So, but then we get like this fucking rock and roll montage of him waiting for the Scotus decision to come down. Yeah, and like hopefully digging graves and like, Russell, wrestle, wrestle, rust. And it's the same.

It's the same plot. The same grave plot in the same cemetery by the same tree that he was at early which means it's taken him three months

to dig this hole and he's still going. How deep is this grave? I mean maybe it was this is like a very Christian area during COVID. He's digging a mass grave, isn't he?

That's what that is. He has to keep open the grave and put in there. There's Mrs. Jenkins. Shoveling a bunch of grandmas in there, yeah.

Yeah, I think he had moved to Florida by then. It makes sense. Yeah. So, okay. So,

but then now he gets the call and it's time for everybody to like wait together in the same room or something and they get the call and wouldn't you know it they won on a party line vote because justice is just a pretense now. Yeah. Hooray, no more First Amendment. Yeah, they read the like what they think is the most reasonable sentence from Gorsuch's opinion. And can I just say if Neil Gorton, there's no belief I have that if Neil Gorsuch agreed with me, I would not immediately reverse my opinion on it. Yeah, if Neil Gorsuch is like, it's fine, leave the dishes in the sink, actually. Wet them and what happens is the water will start to loosen the stuff that's on the other fans.

That's what Neil Gorsuch would say. He would agree with that because he's a fucking idiot. So, yeah, but then, like, so they win. We get the triumphant Neil Gorsuch quote. And then we, I guess we have to see that, like, they didn't get rich from this, right? Like, they didn't profit much. So we see them all, like, they're sitting around like a kiddie pool with their feet in it, drinking some lemonade and eating some pizza. Very proud of themselves.

And then they close on this, they've been doing this lazy fourth wall shit the whole time. So he turns to her at this point. And he goes, you think they'll make a movie about us? And she goes, only technically. And then we get the weirdest fucking American graffiti clothes of all time. So I was making my way through this. and Marsh had already watched it. I was messaging him the whole time.

I'm like, this is amazing. How the fuck did you make it through this and everything? And he kept telling me there was this light at the end of the tunnel in the form of the weirdest American graffiti clothes I would ever fucking see. And he did not disappoint. Marsh, you want to tell us what happens at this point in the film? Yeah, you got a guy from Duck Dynasty tell you why this case mattered. And the thing is, you just had 90 minutes in which they could have told you this case mattered

and you didn't manage to do that. So you've got to get a, you've got to dig a guy up from a swamp, Willie Robinson, and digging him up from a swamp to try and explain the legalese of this. You don't get a lawyer to do that. You get a guy that the views of this film can relate to and that is the guy from Doug Dynasty. Yeah.

Hey, wake up. Wake up a guy from Doug Dynasty is explaining why the lemon test is an inherent failure of the First Amendment. It's fucking incredible. They get to the end of the movie and somebody's like, oh, fuck, guys, we forgot to explain what the movie was about. God damn it. Where's really?

Where's really? He literally, like, he might as well. It's hard eye contact with the camera saying, And now you can get your nativity scenes and put them any way you want. And that's just going to trigger a whole other review. So, like, I don't want to put words in your mouth. But please go ahead and do that as much as possible to really test this new precedent. Put your crosses on public property now.

End of movie. Yeah. Also, you can do it if you're Jewish, too. I mean, we'll kill you. But I'm going to go crazy. And then it cuts to a song where the line is, be bright. Literally, he's like, you can put your cross on public property. and then the song goes, be brave.

And I wrote, yeah, be brave is often what Eli thinks when he's thinking about the Supreme Court as well. Be brave, it comes into his head quite a lot. Be brave and then a map. Yeah, right. No, it said stand up and be brave. And I was like, well, if you would have stood the fuck up, then this wouldn't have been a problem in the first place.

Mars's joke is better. And well, that's going to do it for our review of average Joe. That's not going to do it for the episode just yet because we still need to start this gauntlet over again next week. So, Eli, tell us what's on deck. Set in a fantasy world of the future, a record producer, Bougolo, seduces young folk singer duo Bibi and Alfie

into becoming part of his stable of musical stars who he keeps in line with sex and drugs. We'll be watching The Apple. Sounds Christian? Oh, it's Christian. Okay, so with that to look forward to it, we're going to bring episode 557 to a merciful close. Once again, a huge thanks to Marsh for all his help.

A huge thanks to May for being such a good, given us money month and the hugest thanks of all to the Patreon owners for help make this show go. If you'd like to count yourself among their ranks, you can make a per episode donation at patreon.com slash godawful and thereby are an early extant to an ad-free version of every episode. You can also help a ton by leaving a five-star review and by sharing the show on all your various social media platforms.

If you enjoyed this show, be sure check out our sibling shows, the scathing a citation needed D&D minus and the skepticrat, available wherever podcasts live. And also check out Marcia's other shows, skeptics with AK, and the No Rogan experience, which I forgot to mention at the top of this like I normally do. you have questions, comments. If you have questions, we're the only show. Godawful movies at gmail.com. Tim Robertson takes care of our social media.

Our theme song was written and performed by Ryan Selotney of a bitrast on Mars. All the other music was written and performed by our audio engineer Morgan Clark and was used with permission. Thanks again for giving us a chunk of your life this week. For Heath Inwright and Eli Bosnia, I'm the Willutions, promises to work hard to earn no trunk. Next, we can tell then. We'll leave you with the American graffiti clothes.

After overturning the First Amendment for Joe Kennedy, the Supreme Court would go on to rule that a roller derby team could abolish women's right to vote, and that an ultimate frisbee championship required Trump to be allowed a third term. You know, fuck it. Isn't it right? Abusive fisherman guy got eaten by a whale. I needed that character to have some come up.

Right? Coach Joe's new Muslim football coach took full advantage of his brand new rights, and then nobody meant anything that they had said before. Nope. Not at all. This content is scanned credentialed, which means you can report instances of harassment, abuse, or other harm to their hotline at 617-249-254. or on their website at creator accountability network.org.

This podcast is a production of Puzzle and a Thunderstorm LLC and was created without the use of generative AI. Its contents may not be used for AI training. Copyright 2026. All rights reserved.