God Awful Movies - 562: Miracle at Manchester

Episode Date: June 23, 2026

This week, we welcome Marsh and Dr. Alice back to discuss a miracle in Manchester. But not THEIR Manchester. And also not a miracle.Check out more from Marsh on Skeptics with a K and the Know Rogan ExperienceCheck out more from Dr. Alice on Skeptics with a KIf 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/

You spent your PhD trying to keep cancer alive. Did you work for big farmer? Yeah, right, right. You have to keep it alive so then you can figure out how to kill it. Interesting. It's basically what the research is. Keep it alive and then do things to it to try and kill it. It's basically torture for cancer cells.

And she has a PhD in that. What we're seeing is you don't fuck with Dr. Alex. Cancer fears Dr. L. Awful Movies Welcome back to the GAMCast Where each week we sample another selection From Christian Cinema or we get the hose again

I'm your host No Illusions Heath and Eli are both off this week So I'm gonna be handling this one solo No, I'm not You already heard the like the teaser at the beginning So you know that as it. How fucked up would that be? I'm kidding. Marsh is here. Welcome back, Marsh. No, I'm not going to say anything this entire episode though

You can do it yourself. All my notes would just hear to prank you. You're going to do this entire thing, silent. All right. to a silent audience of me. All right. Well, also joining us as Marsh's co-host on Skeptics for the K and guest Maskist who will have her veteran card punched in no time, Dr. Alice. Howarth?

Alice, welcome back. Hello, thanks for having me. So tell us, Marsh, what will we be breaking down today? Okay, we watched Miracle at Manchester. It is the story of a kind-hearted veteran-turned mechanic who one day after a lifetime of searching, and thanks to his immense generosity, and kind acts,

manages to find his dream car a 1960s Ford Mustang. God is great. Also, a kid gets brain cancer, but that's kind of neither here nor there for this film.

So you prioritize it the way the filmmaker did, interesting. And Dr. Alice, how bad was this movie? Well, if you like Father-Sun movies that valorize veterans

and occasional casual violence, then you will love this movie. Yeah, well, that's what they were going for. Yeah. All right, so is there anything you guys want to nominate this one for being the best and being the worst at? Oh, yeah. So I've got to go straight to him with best, worst background hospitaling.

Oh, God. Because a lot of this movie will take place in a hospital, or at least that's what they want you to think. What it will take place in is a room that looks relatively hospital-ish and then a corridor that they've bought a desk, like a reception desk. And they've given some people, some of them have got white coats, some of them have got like the blue scrubs. And they're just going to walk backwards and forwards in the background as if they're hospitaling. And it's, you can see them having the, like, fake conversation. Rubab, rubub, rubub, rubub, rub, rub, rub, rub, rub, rub, rub. At one point, like, one of them goes down the stairs and then down the escalator.

Yeah, it's, oh, it's fucking hilarious. It's amazing. So I was going to go with Best Worst Collection of American Cl cliches. So Eli, in all of this prankosity or whatever, decided to do a movie called Miracle at Manchester and give me two British guests and it's Manchester fucking California or some shit. Yeah, okay. It's not our Manchester, which we're both quite close to. Yeah, right, right.

But honestly, this movie could not be more American. By minute five of the film, we had already seen a star-spangled store, a house-sized truck, ridiculously big portion sizes, religion in school, unaffordable health care, and baseball. It might as well have opened in a scene of a fucking sprawling cheese aisle or something. Yeah, it is pretty American. It does take a while before we find out that it's in Manchester as well. You've got to infer that from like context clues because the word Manchester's written on some of the buildings. Right, yeah, exactly.

It has nothing to do with any fucking thing. I don't think it comes up at all. I think they mention Manchester other than in the name. My best worst is the introductions. So, I mean, this is a terrible film for all of the cuts between all of the scenes. There are so many scenes that are so short. But in the first four minutes, we get introductions. of three different groups of people.

I think there's like eight people in four minutes and we get zero of their names, none of their names, until like way past halfway through the film for some of them. We're all doing find and replace to go back and put names under Mecky Mechanic or whatever that we'd had written in there. Yeah, yeah, it's crazy. In fact, like one of the scenes, we will get to,

but one of the people they introduce us to and it seems like it's going to be really important is this young family, and then they disappear for like 25 minutes of the film. And only the dad comes back as well. Although the family, the rest of the family

just completely gone, they apparently were important enough to put in the first two minutes of the film and then to never show again. Yeah. Yeah. It's nuts. All right.

Well, Eli's prank war this week was given the three of us childhood brain tumors as a comedy premise. So we're going to take a minute to plot our revenge, but we'll be back in a flash after that with all the doldrums that are Miracle at Manchester.

Hey, everybody. Welcome to the first writer's room meeting for Miracle. at Manchester. Shouldn't that be miracle in Manchester? Yeah. Yeah, but no, but we're going to make a little cross out of the T and at

for the title. But Manchester already has a T in it. Gosh, darn it, we didn't think of that. And the titles have already gone out. Oh, yeah, it's okay. I'm sure nobody's going to notice. Yeah, yeah, probably not. All right. So we're going to be telling the true story of

Bryson Newman who had a brain tumor. And then, after extensive medical treatment, multiple surgeries, radiation therapy, experimental medication, and a prayer circle recovered miraculously. Praise Jesus. I'm sure it was mostly Jesus, yes. Okay. Question?

No need to raise your hand, man. Oh, okay. It's just how are we going to keep that interesting for 90 minutes? Yeah, no, that's a great question. So, first of all, we are not going to make 90 minutes. Like, maybe 80 if we add some real life footage of the kid playing football and some, like, news, interviews, segments. Secondly, we're really going to focus in on the kid's car.

His car? Yeah. Yeah, no, some guy gave him a car. So I figured we could delve into that guy's entire life story. Really? Yeah, his relationship with his wife, his time and nam, his career is an auto mechanic, his medical history. Why would we do that?

Well, because otherwise we'd have to focus in on all the science that saved the kid's life while Jesus was twiddling his thumbs. So he was in Vietnam, you say. I think so. That's excellent. Hey, Noah, now that we've got a break, I've been dying to ask, what is that strapped to your back? You like it? It's my new Lisa mattress.

Okay. And it's strapped to your back because... Well, since we started doing video, I've had a lot more work to do and I haven't been able to find enough time to sleep. But luckily, now that I have this incredible legend. chill hybrid mattress from Lisa, I fall asleep in minutes every time I lay down. So I figured I'd just keep it strapped to my back. So anytime I have a few free minutes. Okay, I see. But isn't that really uncomfortable? No, not at all. I took the sleep quiz on Lisa's website and it only took two minutes to match me with the perfect mattress for my specific sleep positions and preferences.

Okay, yeah, sure, but it seems inconvenient. Oh, not at all. With free shipping, easy returns and a 120-night sleep trial, it was as convenient as it could be. We meant having it strapped to your back. Oh, yes, that is both uncomfortable and inconvenient. Right, yeah. Okay, but with all the work that I'm doing on the Nororgan experience, I'm in, actually. Yeah, where do I sign up? Well, you're in luck.

Their Fourth of July sale is going on now, so go to Lisa.com for 30% off, select mattresses, plus an extra $50 off with the promo code, awful, exclusive to our listeners. That's L-E-E-E-S-A dot com promo code awful for 30% off selected mattresses plus an extra $50 off. Lisa.com promo code awful. Sounds great. So, hey, what's 4th of July? Is that like an American holiday or something?

Well, these days it's like a day of morning. Shull. Yeah. And we're back for the breakdown. And we're going to open up on that sweet endorphin release I get when I see the Bridgestone Media logo. You know you're in for a treat. And then we can see the miracle.

at Manchester title. I think this is the first religious film for God-awful movies that I've done. Usually I get like documentaries and stuff and people drinking piss and other such. Well, it's not and people thinking. It's documentaries about people. Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, they're not like just drinking piss in the background of a totally different documentary. In fact, there's something probably us. Well, half the movies we do are documentaries. The other half are piss porn when we have that. So I feel like I had the really obvious question of like, what is the crucifix in the in the at? And what does the JC and JC film stand for?

Yeah, it could be anything. Could be absolutely anything. So we open up on a Catholic school, mostly like the football field and the baseball field. So it's a very athletic Catholic school. Yeah. Yeah. And this is where I realized it wasn't Manchester, UK. It was Manchester boring American state somewhere.

And I was so annoyed by that because I knew that. I knew that later, Dean Cain was going to be in this. And I wanted Dean Cain to have to do a mank accent. I was genuinely excited to see like the bloated corpse of 90s Superman trying to like channel his inner Liam Gallagher. And it was not happening. I also saw that just very weird aside. The executive producer of this film is Doug Manchester.

Really? Which feels like either a made up name or the branding of an urban infrastructure project. Like, oh yeah. We had Doug Manchester have created a. a brand new shopping center in Manchester, wherever. So, okay, so we start off, these kids are in the hallway at their Catholic school, and we learn right away that these filmmakers don't know how to mic people in a crowded hallway. So they just ask the two main actors, yeah, these two actors have to shout at each other

while everybody else talks at a kind of low level. Yeah, it's so good, just shouting over the background actors. I felt so uncomfortable for them. So we're going to meet Cancer Boy, this is Bryson. But we don't get his name then. No. We do not get his name for a while. No, eventually he will have been...

Bryson and his girlfriend, Alex. It was looking for a while, like, the only way we'd find this kid's name is when we saw his gravestone after he dies in terms. That's the first time we'd get his name. All right, so the first time I knew the girlfriend's name was just now when Dr. Alice said it. So she was Alex, huh?

Yeah, it's dropped in about two-thirds of the way through the film quite subtly. And then I think there's a conversation she has on the bleachers where it's mentioned for a second time. And that is it. There is two mentions of her name in the entire film. Yeah. And I don't like to comment too much on people's appearances,

but his girlfriend is very clearly meant to be like religious movie hot. Yes. She looks like Bible group Veronica Mars. Like she's Christian Bell, like Christian Bell. Yes. I don't want to comment too much. She could have at least run a comb through her hair. Like, there's times.

I think the real story, the real C plot of this film is her learning throughout the film to tidy her hair. Right. Because it gets less and less wild as we go along. I think we start where she's learned about backcombing, and then she starts to learn how to control the backcoming. Oh, sure, sure. No, so like honestly, everybody in this movie,

with the possible exception of the main kid of Bryson, just looked like they weren't quite, like they were a knockoff of a real person. Like they were at uncanny Valley High or something. But she says, walk me to my class, and then he walks her to a class, which is immediately next to where they are.

Maybe it was just bad editing, but yeah, it looked like he walked in three fucking steps. And then he's late for his class. Like, you didn't have to walk her very far. Yes. I really want his class to just be over the corridor. If I'm having to walk those three steps, I could have used those three steps to get to my room instead.

So, okay. So, but we meet him. We know his big baseball game's coming up. And then we cut to this mechanic shop that looks like what I figured Dr. Alice just imagines all American businesses look like. Right, we just see American flags and American slogans and a veterans flag and just, it's star spangled all around. And then they bring in a guy who's talking to the mechanic at the shop and trying to make it obvious that he's a veteran by putting him in a camo jacket and asking about free work for veterans.

Yes. And it's an incredibly ill-fitting camel jacket. And I think the thing is, a veteran wearing an ill-fitting camo jacket. that's why you lost them. This is why you lost them if your equipment had just been better suited to the persona and the terrain. Yeah, obviously. But what we learn about this character is that he does free work on veterans' cars, right?

So he's retired from his job as an auto mechanic and now he's got a home garage where he does pro bono break jobs or whatever. Yeah, but he's not supposed to be doing this. No. At this point, it's unclear why he's not supposed to be doing it, but he does turn down. found the veteran and say that he can't do it, he's too busy.

And then says, but if you bring it around at three in the morning, we'll get it done. Don't worry. Which seems like just a dick move, right? Because his veterans probably got like a job to go to. It's like, oh, man, fuck, I guess I can come down. Could I, could I leave it here? And then it would just be here at 3 a.m. So I hadn't picked up at this point, because we don't get properly introduced this.

I hadn't picked up that he was doing this in his amateur time. I thought this was a professional garage. I thought, does this movie think, like, mechanics work on a walking system like a barbershop. You can just book it and get this guy a diary and book it in. And then for him to say, could you come back at three in the morning? That's an insane decision. That means he's got to wake up at 2.30 in the morning to start working on this guy's for free.

Yeah. Wild, absolutely wild. I don't think I want the break job that a guy does for free at 3 a.m. This is nice of him to offer and everything. But yeah. So, okay. So then we cut to this. family at dinner, this enigmatic family that will matter none tall into the entire fucking movie.

And I spent so long thinking about this family at this point, because I thought these are going to be the most important fact. This is the first time we see a child. And we know this is a film about, you know, children with cancer. Okay, this is going to be really important. So I was watching this scene for clues at what was going on. They're eating peni pasta with some very boring tomato sauce on it next to the world's largest cauldron filled with salad that none of them are eating. It's so absurd how much salad is. It's ludicrous. And none of them are touching it at all.

This is always the case. Whenever we watch these films, they always eat the pasta and no one ever eats the salad. It drives me mad. Except for Eric Roberts, who eats it with a knife and fork. He eats with a knife and fork, yeah, absolutely. So, yeah, so this family is odd. The girl is 10.

Yeah, she's definitely about 10. Yep. Which is very surprising, given what she says next? Yeah, right? She's like, what did you learn at school? I learned that butterflies are pretty. And I'm like, really, that's fifth grade material nowadays. It's common call.

That's the problem. It's common call, man. It's new math. That's what they changed. So, yeah, and also the dad is like 24. So, yeah. But also, he looked 16. And then the mom, I assumed,

I didn't think this was dad. Yeah. I thought this is mom, like young child and the young child's older brother. Big brother, yeah. So when the child turns to him and says, Daddy, I was like,

what the fuck has gone on with his family dynamic? Because the mom does look like 30-something. She looks like a mom. Yes. She looks a good. 10, 15 years older than him. Mom of a 10 year old, she looks like a mom of a 10 year old.

Yeah, yeah. Looks like the big brother of a 10 year old. Yes, exactly. But like, you've got the dad. So the family here, they think start, the little girl starts talking about miracles. And the dad, very importantly, will have no talk of miracles at his table. Oh, that's kind of his character. And I thought, well, given how big a portion of pasta that they're eating and how little salad they're eating,

the real miracle is that he's fitting into those jeans, to be honest. I'm really glad you mentioned that, Marsh, because. Because throughout all of my notes, he is not a miracle dad to me because basically the first thing he said is miracles don't exist. Yeah, exactly. She's like, oh, it's a miracle that butterflies come from caterpillars. She's like, there's no miracles. And then he storms off. And he gets so mad about that that he leaves the table.

Yeah, midway through dinner. Yeah, he storms off, hopefully. Right? He clears his dishes. Yeah. So, okay, so then we cut to Bryce's baseball game and it's fucking baseball, right? Like, strike one, strike two, whatever. And then he hits the walk off home run.

Yes, and I did write down, they show a striking out twice, and then we show like, just when he hits it for the home run, we cut away just as he hits it. And I wrote that before it actually happened. So he's trying home run, we're not going to see him make contact with that ball. I found this particularly remarkable, though, because by this point, we've had, it's four minutes in, we've had three different scenes.

This is the fourth scene in four minutes. We've been introduced to three different groups of people, and now we've got to watch three hits of a, I don't know what the term is. Sorry, I don't know baseball. We've got to watch three attempts in real time. It's so fucking slow. And also, like, the kids wearing a helmet now. So, like, you can't really tell that this is the kid that you already met.

So you're like, wait, okay, he said baseball. That's probably that kid. But which kid is him? Is he the one at bad? Is he the pitcher? We didn't fucking know. No idea. But, yeah, so he wins the game.

They're going to the state championships. Woohoo. Yeah, we find that out because there's a commentator that's talking all about it. The commentator, very clearly talking to a silicon dildo. That is exactly what he's. Yeah, right. No, he's the newscaster at the fucking high school baseball game. So they leave in celebration. And as they're leaving, as Bryce is leaving with his mom, we see Bryce's dad, who we've not yet met, standing in front of a ridiculously large truck.

It's an insanely large, like just you wouldn't get, we get big vehicles here now. We've imported them from you guys, but we wouldn't get them that big. That is enormous. It's ridiculous. You could fit three of my cars inside that truck. They're like, my car could sit in each one of the seats in that truck. That's how large it is. It's not a vehicle. It is a climate disaster.

Yes. And the thing is, just before they get to that, the kid is saying, just throw away a comment. Like a first act, throw away a comment about how we've got a headache. And I wrote, I'm sure it's nothing, kid, don't worry. We all get headaches in the first act of a film. It's going to be absolutely fine. And then we saw that his dad had this truck. And I said, oh, it's okay, kid.

Because if that headache turns out it be something bad, your dad is already ensuring that the world that you'll miss out on, wouldn't be worth seeing anyways. Absolutely. He's doing you a solid. So, okay. So then we head to fucking Jesus school for Jesus class. Yeah.

Right. We learn about Catechism 162. They get back into Catechism 162, which means they must have been halfway through it previously. The previous class. It's 91 words long, but that's too much to take in a single sitting.

I guess, yeah. And she's starting at the beginning again. So, like, I guess they're reading it with a different theory or whatever this time. Yeah. So, and like, this movie does this over and over again, because it wants to make religious points. It wants to be a Christian movie.

And so, like, over and over again, this just amateur writer has to go, how can I work this religious message? And what if someone stands at the front of her room and just says it to the camera for no fucking reason? While a different religious message is on the whiteboard, so they can, like, double up on the amount of indoctrination

they're pushing into these kids at any one time. Right, yeah. But she's teaching them about being charitable because they're not a bunch of fucking Protestants, okay? And then Bryson gets a nosebleed. This will be the first of about 11. I think something's wrong with Bryson's scenes. Yeah.

I like this one in particular because it starts with a pained look on his face. And the kid, three rows in front of him, is the person who notices that he's got a pained look on his face. I'm like, you've got eyes in the back of your head. Yeah, right, right. You're paying a lot of attention to your friend Bryce, bro. Yeah. And I do not care.

The only way I could care about this nosebleed is if this is a sign he's getting telekinetic powers. That's the only time I care about a kid with the nosebleed, I'll be honest. He's fighting a demigorgon, yeah. But the teacher's like gross, go clean yourself up, walk it off. And then we cut back to the mechanic with the heart of gold and he's trying to, he's at a junkyard, trying to help out another veteran who has to sell as much as he can before they foreclose on him. And that's a thing. He's there to try and help him out so that the guy's trying to sell all the cars because he's

in financial peril from the government. So, like, he really wants to get as much money as possible out of the cars that he has. That's a really important point to this scene at the start of the scene. Yes. The scene will go. Right, because he says, the mechanic guy goes, oh, wow, you have my dream car, a 67 Mustang. He's like, I'll give it to you for free. Okay.

I went slightly crazy at this point. You did. Because I did not know. I did. I did know what a 67 Mustang was. And he said, oh, and he didn't even say a Mustang. He just said, it was that the 67. It was like 67.

So I looked at the car. I couldn't recognize it. I used Google lens to look at what this car was. You only see the little corner of the car at this point because it was under a big cover, wasn't it? It's the very back of the trunk. And I'm fairly sure it's a 1965 Ford Mustang, not a 1967 Ford Mustang.

You can correct me if I'm wrong on this. I've put the two side by side. I'm 99% sure it with the one on the left. So as much of this is his dream car, he cannot recognize it from being stood in front of it. Right. And when he takes this for free, I wanted him to agree to buy the car,

but only if he can collect it at like 2.45am on the 5th Wednesday after a new room. And then he's like, all right, I'll take the free car, but don't tell my wife you gave it to me. And I'm like, I feel like she's going to notice. She will notice that. She's definitely going to notice because later in the film, we find out her bedroom is attached to the garage where the window looks into the garage.

Basically, her window opens to the garage. Yes. But also, I looked up a bit like, depending, on the condition. That car is worth between $25,000 and $50,000. Maybe this guy's junkyard is going under because he keeps giving away valuable vintage cars. Exactly. So, okay, so now we cut over to baseball practice where everybody's given Bryce and shit for having a bloody nose, right? They're like, oh, I bet you punch yourself in the face just to get out of class. He's like, fucking what? We also, we try to introduce this comic relief and then they just back away from it

because they know it's dumb, right? Because we've got the like the assistant coach that's ordered the baseball shirts that say touchdown on them? I can only issue. Do you think that actually happened? Because they do apparently both, like in real life he was playing like football and baseball. Do you reckon they only put that in because it was real? I couldn't check. I tried to check on this, but I spent all my time on 1965.

No, I get it. I get it. I get it. I get it in the minutia. No, like, honestly, I don't know. I think that they thought this was really funny and that like when they let, when we later saw the baseball t-shirts that say touchdown, that that would count as a callback.

Okay. But I don't know. It was very poorly written. But this is yet another, something's wrong with Bryce scene, right? Where we see his headaches and he's all... Dude some squinting. Yeah, he's squinty. And that's all we see.

Yes. He gets a headache. There's some ominous music. And then, right, scene over. And we're like, we saw the nose bleed guys. You know that we get it now, right? But of course, they're padding, padding the time. So then we cut back to who I have as,

Mecky the mechanic in my nose here. It's Ed. Ed is the character's name we learn in Act 3. This is the scene where we find out his name. Oh, is it? It's not the scene where I found out his name. We found out his name. We find out his wife's name in this scene. Yes, or his wife is Marilyn. Maryland. Maryland. And he's trying to hide his new Mustang from his wife. So he's like, oh, you should probably

leave early to get out of the traffic for work before this tow truck pulling. So stupid. Yeah. But then, of course, a tow truck pulls up with that Mustang. And why he's had too many surgeries to have a Mustang. It's so wild. Again, so I get the point that they were going for like, oh, you know, he's having to take it easy because he's been unwell. But he just can't stop helping people.

He's that kind of kind-hearted guy. But it is insane for them to say he had two major surgeries in the past month. Yeah. So he is like four weeks out of the first surgery. So he might only be two weeks out of the second surgery. Three at most, you got to figure. Yeah, it's way too soon to have had two major surgeries. And now he's up just walking around and buying Mustangs and working on cars.

It's ludicrous. And he goes, honey, think about it. You're a cancer nurse, right? And she's like, what a weird thing to say if you're not expositing in a movie. But yes, that is the profession that I have. And he's like, well, think of this car as my cancer project. And you think, oh, okay, so he just had cancer. He didn't.

Right. It's just, he's just like, because it's rusty. And Rust is like, car, cancer. Yeah. Which makes sense why you wanted Dr. Alice on this show. Dr. Alas is a cancer expert. And now we learn that fixing up a car is just like curing cancer. So your expertise can come in handy here, Alice.

Well, there you go. Yeah. So, okay. So then we check with Bryce at the hospital. Now, clearly this movie, whoever wrote this movie, their main source was this kid's dad. Right? Yeah. Because this movie is really.

told through his dad's lens and all of his dad's, like, grudges and whatnot get aired within this movie. Yes. So this scene is, like, when they first took the kid to the emergency room, dad doesn't think the doctor did enough to diagnose the fact that the kid had a brain tumor, right? And so the doctor in this movie is just hilariously flippant and dismissive of this stupid kid in his stupid health. Yeah. To the point that she listens to his heart through his. His shirt. Yes.

Yes. That is genuine to be with a step of a school. For one second. Yeah. Through his shirt while she's talking. Yeah. She doesn't even listen for long enough to be between two beats of his heart. She just listens in the gap between the two.

I'm sure there's a heartbeat there somewhere. You were saying, no, that this comes from the dad's perspective. It comes so much from the dad's perspective that the mother is in this film. Yeah. I will give you my house if you can tell me her name. I will give you right now my house. house if you say the mum's name or recall a single thing that she said she's present in this boy's life but not in this she just kind of hangs around in the background of scenes at times it's

such a weird thing and the kid like has all these scenes where he's like oh dad i love you so much and you're so important to me and not a single fucking one with mom yeah no and in this scene they kind of make it clear that it's odd that mom's not here so they do mention that well i did text her and sorry she's just not here yeah he's very much like putting into subtext her and my ex-wife was such a bitch. Oh, she was like, I would tell her about the kid and she would never be there. When she was there, she wouldn't say anything.

She'd be quite peripheral in the background interacting with, like, the extras who were pretending to be nurses. My favourite part of this scene is when, so Doc's being really dismissive, dad's getting really frustrated that the doctor's being really dismissive, but figures that he can't do anything about it, so they leave. And as they're walking out, Marilyn, the mechanic's wife, just walks in, says, excuse me, to get around, that looks at the chart and walks out again.

Yes, which is wild because we've established, the one thing we've established is she's an oncology nurse. Yeah. So was this kid with headaches taken to the oncology department in order to see whether he had headaches or not? No, oh, is she just like freelancing her way, like, you know, moonlighting her way around the hospital at this point. But of course, we haven't had enough.

Something's wrong with Bryson soon. So he goes home, we get immediately him waking up with a headache and dad takes him back to the hospital where the same doctor, is like, I don't want a doctor your stupid fucking kid. Oh my God. So, but she's like, fine. I'll order some fucking scans or something.

Jesus. So she goes out and she's talking to this other doctor about what an asshole this kid's dad is being about his kid being sick. Yes. And we know the dad isn't an asshole because while she's out there, we cut to the dad talking to his son and the dad just casually threatened to say, like he says, I want to

punch that lady doctor. I want to punch her. So he wasn't an asshole. He was just threatening violence on like female medical workers. And it is like I guess it would be bad regardless, but she's also like this tiny, tiny woman. So yeah, it's the fucking worst. Yeah. But then we immediately from her going like let's order some tests, we like speed cut to dad

dropping the sun off at school. Yes. It's now just somewhere else, sometime else, but the same characters. So there's no, that's the one thing this film cannot, one of the many things of home could not do. but possibly the thing it can do the least is scene transitions. Yes. No point gets it.

I have no idea the passage of time. But almost any part of this movie, except where they literally write the passage of time along the bottom on one of the scenes. All right. Yeah, but the dad's like, you need to rest. You know, you have something wrong with you. He's like, I can't miss the state championship. Daddy, I want to go to school.

So, you know, he drops him off at school. So then we cut to the guy, the veteran who he was doing the free work for, he's in the elevator on the phone, telling somebody about this great guy that did free work for him. And Miles, the dad who doesn't believe in miracles is in that very same elevator.

He's back. He's so back. It's great. I was so excited when I saw him again. I was beginning to think that I'd imagined him. I was genuinely worried. I'd start getting nose, like act one nosebleeded as well. I was like, oh no, I'm going to end up in the hospital. Yeah, I genuinely worried. Also, when the veteran walks in the lift as well,

That elevator is in the most kind of like completely clinically cavernous white building. And I thought, if that veteran guy has been severanced, I'm back on board with this. If he's taking that lift down into a different life downstairs, I'm back on board. It's also just minor stupid thing, but he like walks up a big fight of stairs to get on the elevator. What a stupid bucket movie. Okay. Then we check in on Bryson's dad at work. Yeah.

Right? I don't know what he does. I think he works for the school, right? I think he's a teacher. Oh, is he? Well, I don't know. They have this gigantic mansion so it doesn't feel like, you know, he's a teacher. But who knows?

But yeah, so he's talking to a coworker about his son's medical problems. Yeah. And he's like, well, you know, the stupid doctors won't do any stupid doctoring. And she's like, yep, that is how doctors are in the real world. Yes. She says, well, you know, I happen to know, I have a friend who is a neurologist or something like that. She's like, you should. The head of neurosurgery.

The head of neurosurgery. All at the hospital. Oh, okay. Well, in that case. The chief neurosurgeon. I'll put in a good word for you, I guess. It's so weird. I couldn't tell whether she was just showing off the social circles that she moves on. Or whether she'd been like hired to like tout for business by this guy. If anyone mentions their kid having any headworks, you know, just like give them my car.

I'm looking to buy a new car. So, but yeah, she's like, I think you should have him taken in for a CT scheme. he's like, really a CT scan. She's like, look, this isn't a movie about migrants. Okay? So then we check in. We're back, we're at school with Bryce, and we have this like slow motion, joyful youth scene.

Yeah, thorough at lunch. Yeah. And just to fuck with me, his girlfriend corrects his hair. She reaches out and she sorts his hair out and say, hey, beam in thine own eyes there, girl. Come on. But of course, this is yet another something's wrong with. scene. This time he passes out. Yeah. We cut to him at the hospital

again and now those damn doctors are laughing in the background while his son is sick. They don't know what the hell's going on, right? Do you think the scene transitions are so bad? Do you think it's a deliberate artistic plot that when he passes out, we don't see him again until we don't come back

until he wakes up. So like he is blacking out between scenes and we're just like blacking out with him. Right. It's like memento. We're feeling it as he feels. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah.

Also, it's a really weird thing as well. It's more a small detail, but when he cuts back to him at the hospital, he is so snuggled in that duvet. I've never seen anybody in the hospital, like curled up all like feet. Like, he's so snugly. Yeah. Yep. But Dad's had enough, damn it.

He calls the friend whose friend is the head of neuro surgery, right? Yeah. Okay. So then we got to, we check back in on Ed at his shop at his garage. And he's talking shit. He's doing some acting. Yes. Oh, isn't he?

Yeah. He's doing some terrible acting pretending to ring up a massive bill. Yeah. So, yeah, he's just finished with somebody's car and he's like, oh, you know, I got these parts and those parts. And he's adding all these numbers up. And he's like, well, here's your price. And it adds up to $1 because that's how he charges for his work. Yeah.

Doesn't he do that with like, does he have a cash register or just a giant calculator, like a store calculator? Yeah. Either way. So why is he gone out and bought an adding machine just for the bit? Because he's not actually ever charging anyone anything. That's just a prop for his gag. He must have spent so much money getting that. Like, he's underwater just on the gag alone.

But he loves veterans so much, so they salute each other. And just as this guy leaves, Miles, the atheist dad, shows up. Yeah, miracles don't exist, Dad, appears. This is the longest scene we've had so far, because there's two conversations in one scene. It's amazing. Yeah, one character leaves and another comes in. Whoa, hold on a second. So yeah, but we learn here that Miles is a news reporter

and he wants to do a story about the mechanic with the heart of gold. Yeah. We also learn that he is the son of a great reporter. And I thought he's a fucking Nepo baby. He only got a job as a reporter because of who his father is. It's like Marina Hyde at the Guardian all over again. Oh, she's a good writer. Oh, her dad was a baron.

Okay, that's probably how she got that job. It's like that with fucking Miles Himmel here. Yeah. And of course, because this is based on the true story and this is a real guy, they have to like shoehorn that in and who the fuck cares. It matters not at all to the movie because Miles matters not at all. But all of a sudden, Ed, the mechanic is like, oh, sorry to hear about your dad. And we're like, what the fuck?

What is this now? But he's too humble. He doesn't want any publicity for all the work he does, right? Yeah. So he says he's not a story. and then the veterans are too shy. And then the journalist just turns on his heel and walks away. He's like, oh, I guess there's nothing here then.

Great journalistic tenacity there. Your dad would be ashamed of you, Miles. Larry would never walk away. What did you want from him, Ella? Do you want him to start going through the guy's bins and hacking into his phone? Yeah. Do some fucking journalism, man. So, okay.

So then we check back in with Bryce's dad at the hospital when in walks. Dr. Dean Kane, the head of neurosurgery. Yes, yeah. And the thing is, the fact that we're back at the hospital, I wrote down, great, while we're at the hospital, and get my plot whiplash treated because we are just whipping between things. But, yeah, it's Dean Kane. And, Alice, this was your first, like, I was going to say a taste of Dean King.

I'm going to say exposure to Dean King. I'm sure I've seen him around in places. I recognize his face, but yeah. So, yeah. So, and then Dr. Dean Kane breaks the news that his kid has, cancer, but he does it backwards. Right. Because he's like, he's like, hey, I'm going to be the one that's going to do the surgery to take your kid's cancer out. And the guys might, like, my kids, what?

No. He's like, ooh, did it backwards again, didn't I? It's absolutely insane. I mean, I get you don't get to be head of neurosurgery for your bedside manner. That's what we're learning here. But maybe he just got the job because his dad used to be a damn fine head of neurosurgery and that's how it works in this town, apparently. He goes, well, you can come in and see him. He's being prepped for surgery. And I'm like, wow, I feel like you would need dad's permission for that.

Yeah. Yeah. He's being prepped, but his dad didn't know. His dad's in the hospital the entire time. So did they, like, smuggle the kid out? Did they, like, distract the dad? Like, look over there and then take the kid out. So, all right.

Well, I guess we all need to stop and see if Dean Kane is planning to do any surgery on us, I guess. So we're going to take a quick break. We'll be back in a minute with even more of. at Manchester. Mrs. Appleton, you wanted to see me? Dr. Dean Kane, come in, have a seat. Yes, ma'am. Now, I asked you in here to talk about your bedside manner again.

Oh, has there been another complaint? Did you open up a conversation with a dad who didn't know his son had cancer by saying, I'm your son's cancer doctor? Yep, sure did. And you don't see how maybe that was an indelicate way to introduce yourself? Right, because I should have said, oncologist. No, it's like the discussion we had last week about not telling your patients that you'll give

them a hint, it rhymes with schmancer. That they'll think that they have answer. And how you broke the news to the Oldham family that their son didn't survive his surgery? Well, okay, but two kids are easier to fit in the backseat than three. That's just math. And Mrs. Barnhopper, who you told about her diabetes diagnosis by slurring the words, Diabetic says what together? Well, you know, but she did say what afterwards. I was worried she would. But it was accurate because she said that.

I don't really see what the issue is. Yes. Well, I'm afraid we're going to have to let you go regardless. Fine. Fine. You know what? I wanted to be an ice agent anyway. Watch this.

Watch this. Are you trying to shoulder roll over my desk? Three more tries. Three more tries. Please leave. And we're back for more of this shit. And we're going to rejoin the action by checking in on Miles the atheist reporter dad. hanging out at the Larry Himmel Memorial Newsroom?

With quite a plaque. Like, that plaque that they zoom in on of the Memorial Newsroom is incredible with the little etched out, presumably Larry Himmel. And his wife just sat on his shoulder in the background. Yeah, really creepy. Like the bad devil angel psychomachia thing. It's crazy. I honestly can't tell if that's, is that his wife or is that him?

But, like, it does look like he's wearing a necklace, though. Like it actually is a real necklace And a pearl necklace And a pearl earring But I don't know if that's just at the top of the tie But it's it's very Because why would his wife be tiny I don't know

That's so bizarre Maybe she was just like a real hen pecker Or something notoriously I don't know it's crazy This is a real plaque by the way This is like this part of the story is real This is actually his plaque Yeah

I knew he was a real guy I actually bothered to look him up Because I'm like Why are he showing the Larry Himmel Memorial Newsroom And then I saw he was a real guy Oh and we're going to speed see for a minute here, right?

Because this entire scene is Miles sitting in the newsroom. We see the little plaque and his boss comes in and he's like, Miles, I need a story. And he's like, I'm working on one boss. And then the boss walks away and that's the fucking scene. Yeah. Yeah. He asks him what he's working on.

He says, this, I think it's good. I'll let you know when it's done. Like, that's it. No follow-up. No follow-up. I have no questions about that at all. I'm sure this is fine. Oh, I can see that there is words on your computer screen.

So, yeah. Yeah, so that's that scene. And then we go back to the hospital so dad can check on Bryson. And there's a like, hey, everybody, could you guys all stop doing your doctor stuff for just a minute so that I can have a solo piano moment with my son? And they're like, oh, yeah, no, no, we love to stop prepping people for surgery. Yeah, he's meant to be getting prepped for surgery at this point. Apparently prepping for surgery at this point doesn't involve shaving his head. They do other things other than shaving his head.

Are they going to do keyhole surgery via the nostril? Like you're going to have to get his hair out of the way. And you're going to do that first before you do anything else. Otherwise, there's going to be hair everywhere. So he's not a pet. You don't have to knock him out before you shave him. And what are they doing? Yeah, because they're just kind of standing around.

One's holding his hand. The other's just sort of looking at a chart. And I'm like, I don't think you guys are prepping him for surgery at all. Do you think they misunderstand? preparing for surgery and thought it was like emotionally preparing. Oh, there you go. Deep breaths. You can do it.

And he's still really determined that he wants to play this game in two weeks. He's having brain surgery and he thinks he's going to play a baseball game in two weeks' time. I feel like they've underprepared him for surgery. But we don't know what universe this takes place in, though, because the other guy had two major surgeries. True. That's true. Walking around and fixing cars. So, like, we don't know how time passes in that.

this beautiful. No, that's actually... Well, apparently, passes really fucking quickly with the speed of these scenes. That's why we don't have time for these long-ass scenes. Yeah.

So we've got now in this scene, we've got Bryson, we've got his dad, and we've got his mom, right? Who just is a fucking under five in the background. Yeah. And all three of them are trying to cry,

all three of these actors, and none of them pull it off. Yeah. But eventually, Marilyn, the nurse, she shows up and she's like, all right, well, that was you guys's chance to try to cry. You didn't get it.

Time to do doctor shit. And then we cut to Ed checking out his Mustang. Yeah. Talking to his car. Yes. Talking dirty to his car. I mean, this is dirty talk he's doing here. Yeah.

And he's like, you know, I'm going to take out every little piece of you. And I'm going to clean it up. Good. And I'm going to shove it back in. Yeah, shove it in it. And then we cut from that to the brain surgery scene and we're like, why the fuck did we just see Ed guys? Are we all seeing Ed?

Guys, are we all seeing Ed together? It's a metaphor, Noah. He's working on the car engine while the surgeons are working on his brain. Well, you're right. Yes, exactly. So eventually it becomes a whole C brain surgery is just like working on a car.

It's just like a head mechanic, right? That's what we're doing with the scene. But for just a second, it's just like, what happens? Yeah, like we just went over there from it. Whenever we are seeing the surgery, the thing that struck me is, brain surgery these days, surprisingly clean and bloodless. This is, it's amazing what they can do now.

It's not a drop of blood to be seen. Even when he's pulling the knife around, the knife is totally clean in his hand. What have you done with that knife? He's just wiping it on his pants, I guess, down there. We can't see it, yeah. Well, it probably is what he's doing given he ends up getting staff. That's true. What I really want to, because we've just seen Ed talking dirty to the car,

I wanted to be cutting to Dean Kane talking dirty to this kid's head or to this kid's tumor. I'm going to get you all the way out. Oh, you're so big. You shove you over there. So, but yeah, but Dr. Dean Kane comes out to the waiting room after the surgery

to let everybody know that they got the tumor. You know, it was cancerous, but it's all good now, right? And when you say everyone, you mean everyone. This waiting room is so full. There is, like, I don't know if you noticed. this on the first watch round, but like, there is a woman sat on the same seat that another woman is sat on, and she's just perched between her legs. Okay, so later on in this movie, there's going to be a scene where, like, there's supposed

to be a crowd leaving a football game, and there are fewer people in that scene than there are in this waiting room. It's nuts. It's amazing. And Tinket just comes out to the entire one, like, we got it. Like it's Obama announcing the killed bin laughing. Everybody leaves. Oh, okay, we were all here for this again.

I feel sorry for the other guy who had surgery that day. Nobody showed up for me though, yeah. But okay, so then we get marijuana. She goes back to work. She wakes up Bryce's dad in the waiting room. Right? Dr. Dean Kane has an update. Yes.

And Dean Kin, I zoomed in. I can't prove it, but I know like in my heart of hearts, Dean Kane's medical badge, the photo on it, is his professional headshot. I'm not a recent one either. I think this is like headshot from New Adventures of Superman, Lewis and Clark time. I think that's what he still got on there.

I can't prove it, but I know it deep down in my heart. I feel it. That's the one he's using on IMDB. Yeah, I think he's like laying on a fucking bearskin rug or something in that one. Yeah. So yeah, but he shows up with an update. And it's, again, this is being told through the dad's perspective, right?

Yeah. And so the doctor is telling him, hey, man, like we got the tumor out, but it looks like there are still some shit in there that we're going to have to go after. And the Dan's treating it like he just, you know, like, hey, look, man, you quoted me one price on this fucking job and now you're giving me a, I didn't want to add undercoat to him, you know. Yeah, I could have seen a guy who would have taken this kid's tumor out for free in the middle of the night for one dollar.

He didn't make a whole deal of it, but he'd have charged me one dollar. He's just as good. But yeah, now the kid, as Alice mentioned, like, he's got a staff infection. And it's probably from having so many people coming and going while he's being prepped for surgery. Oh, that's right. Yeah, no, we don't know about the extra cancer yet. We just know about the staff infection now. Oh, spoilers.

Yeah. So, yeah, so, but dad's all upset that there's more work to be done. We have a long sequence of the girlfriend looking at his empty chair at school and remembering those earlier scenes. With the Dalai Lama over her shoulder. What the hell is the Dalai Lama doing? Yeah. In the fucking Catholic school? I would say the Dalai Lama.

is probably the most appropriate bit of decoration in that room. We will come, we will get to see the room later. And when you see the rest of the things that are in that room, you got like, oh, well, of course, the Dalai Lama's there. Okay. It's the other things that don't make sense. I promise you, that room is insanely decorated. Now I am super excited as to what Marsh paused on.

So now for once, this movie is going to fucking anchor us chronologically, right? It comes up and it says one month later. And we're like, okay, now I know. I can't duck a breath. Yeah. Poor Ed's probably had two more surgeries by now. And we come back to the stupid t-shirt thing with the touchdown baseball shirts. And they try to make this a moment.

Like the dad says to the guy who got the t-shirts, you know, I really appreciate your friendship. And it's like, Dad really appreciate the friendship of that guy, I guess, whoever he is, we don't know. No idea who this guy is. In a film full of people who don't have name, he is the main. most unnamed of all of them. Somehow he has less names than the rest of it. Well, and of course, like so much of this movie is like all of the people involved in it are like half of the audience, right? So like this guy, whoever this is based on was like, well, there's a part for me in the movie, isn't there? And then there's a part where I tell you how much and meaningful you are

and I love you. And yeah, it's a whole thing. He's like, oh, I hope it makes sense in the movies. Like, we're not really worried about that. Anyway. He goes, you know, I've been praying for you guys. And I'm like, well, so far you've been doing a shit job, man. He's had cancer and a staff infection. He's about to get more cancer. He seems very confused about the staff infections. When you're a kid and you get it at home, it's just, it's totally fine.

And you fight it off. And then you get in a hospital and it's really bad. And it's like, but that's because hospital acquired infections are really bad. Like, MRSA is staff, is a resistant film of staff? He's like, I had to step and fish in the news. I walked it off. I don't know what the hell is wrong with my kid. And it's not intended, but like the guy who's saying,

the guy is being the Jesus advocate to the dad. Because apparently the dad's lost his faith. And we don't really see him go through much of a crisis of faith. This is meant to be that crisis of faith. The most crisis he gets is his dad picks his phone up and says, I'm going to go listen to this voicemail. And I thought, yeah, that's how I get out of conversation with video people too. I think I've got a voicemail I need to listen to.

Right. He actually did have a voicemail. so it's not quite the way you do it. But yes. A voicemail from the head of neurosurgery, his kid's cancer doctor, which means either he didn't take the call or heathed it through to voicemail.

Or he didn't have his phone on, like, noisy. When your kid is in the hospital, and he died with a staff infection. All of these are bad dadding. Yeah. Yeah, because the voicemail starts with, I've been trying to get hold of you. Okay, so this is at least the second call, if not the first.

Right, right. He's like, I'm trying to get hold of you. am the guy who treats your kids cancer. It's very important. I'd like to talk to you face to face. I'm like, oh, I'm sure it's fine, man. I'm sure you're sure it'll be good. Well, it must be fine because if it was bad,

Dean Cain's doctor would have just said it over the phone. Like getting kids dying right now, I think. But before we can get to that, we have to have this award ceremony where they give cancer kid an award for being the best assistant coach on the team. Putting the team before himself by getting cancer, apparently. It's a weird way to do it, but you know.

Yeah, and the kids were in this stocking cap at this point. I was like, okay, this kid wasn't going to shave his head for this bullshit role and they didn't have the bald cap. But they did have the bald cap. I don't know why they chose to go this way. Okay. So then we cut to mom and dad at Dr. Dean Kane's office getting the bad news, right? Yeah.

Double enthusiastic brain cancer. And Dean Kaine's reaction here is basically to like, look, my bad. It's cancered back. Look, my bads. I was sure. I was sure I had cleaned that whole thing out. Yeah, but I didn't check the other side. And then the mom yells no with all the enthusiasm that I have when I lose a pinball, you know?

Oh, damn it. I think this is why mom's not in the film very much at all. It's just because she can't act. Oh, that's just like, we did some scenes with her. They all came out terrible. We had to call. of them. She sits there just looking pained for the entire conversation and says nothing else.

Yeah. The dad goes, well, you told me my kid was cured. And the guy's like, well, I didn't, I don't think I used those words. I mean, but he's like, oh, no, but you did use those words because it went viral on TikTok. Yes. This kid who, based on a true story, this kid had cancer a year before TikTok even existed. Yes, right. I've decided to just point in a bit of TikTok.

Yeah. And the Dan has this, like, I will not let my kid have brain cancer kind of a moment here or whatever. Like, he's going to scare it off like a prom date. Yeah, like he immediately goes like from. Oh, it isn't true. Instantly to, okay, it is true. But like, we're going to get through this. And dad moves through denial to acceptance faster than this movie moves through scenes.

That is how quickly he goes through the stages of movie. He's like, you people are unbelievable. and he storms out. And I'm like, okay, anger. Also anger. Also, this is the first of many times that we will see Marilyn, the oncology nurse, freely sharing Bryson's medical details as work gossip. Yeah, just like, wallow announcing his latest like prognosis to just anyone who walks by. One of her friends is like, oh, what's his problem? She's like, oh, well, you know, his son has double enthusiastic brain cancer and he's probably not going to make it. Here's his chart. But this is also when Maryland notices all those make-a-wish posters.

Yeah. She's never, she's never heard of them before, isn't I'm calling her? I wonder what this is all about. Okay. Do they have an age limit, like a firm age limit on Make-A-Wish? Because this kid, like, the actor seems too old for Make-A-Wish that it seems almost sarcastic to try. 16, 17, yeah. I think the kid in real life.

So I looked up, actually, I did look this up. You were allowed to be up to your 18th birthday. Oh, okay. There are kids who are like 17 and like 360 days, and they get to do a make a wish. And that feels too old. I don't like want to take anything away from them. They make the wish at that point. That wish might take a year.

Okay, it probably doesn't take a year because like, they don't know what's having a year. But like they still are going to be 18. It's a bit weird. Spoiled-ass cancer kids. And the other thing is, they never, they never make a wish for more maker wishes. It's like stupid cancer kids. That's like maker wish number one. His wish for more wake-a-wish.

Obviously. So that night, Bryson wakes up with a headache, of course. Yeah, wearing a sleeping in a god-awful hat. Yeah, in his little stocking cap. A huge hat. That has all of that actor's hair under there somewhere. But we see dad, he goes downstairs and he finds his dad

drinking and crying in front of the fireplace. Right. But with the world's largest glass of whiskey as well. well, like a ludicrous paw of whiskey. He has a fish bowl of whiskey and he's sitting in front of the fire push and he's like, Dad, what's the matter? And I'm like, you didn't fucking tell him when you got home. Like, you're easing him into this.

Yeah. Like if that kid doesn't wake up in the middle of the night, do you not tell him he still has cancer? At what point were you going to break the cancer to his kid? It's insane that they haven't told this kid he still has cancer. Yeah. But Bryson doesn't want to have more brain cancer, damn it. And the dad is like, he's, you know, more crisis of faithing. Like, he's like, well, you know, I've been praying and praying and it keeps not helping.

And I'm like, well, yeah, that's what just what prayer does. Yeah, it'll do that. It was great because he said, like, I hate this is happening to you and I wish we could trade places. And I thought, oh, please let this twist into a freaky Friday type of movie at this point. That would be amazing. Like, greatest film ever if it does that. He prays and bang, God says, does. Yeah, yeah, there you go.

Yeah. So, yeah. But then we watched Bryson comfort his dad, not for the first time or last time in this movie. Again, the extent to which this movie is like, yeah, the person who really suffered from this cancer was the dad is insane. Yeah. And then we cut to Marilyn waking up. And normally I would leave this scene out, but this is where we see that her bed is sitting basically immediately beside the garage. The dad's working on these cars in.

Yeah. And he thought he could smoke in a car at 3 a.m. at the beginning of the movie. And presumably test if the engine works multiple times as he's trying to go fix it, like three inches from her way of a sleeping head. It's okay. It's a Mustang. They're famously quiet cars.

Oh, right. That's right. We hear it later. It is quite quiet. So, okay, so now Bryce is getting ready for another surgery. And this is where we learned that they did have a bald cap for this kid. Me and you both had, oh, wow, they do have ball cap money. Yes, right.

Or maybe they only had, they were like, they were. like, look, we can do, we can get three goddamn scenes with the bald cap, right? We're going to have to find a solution the rest of the time. Yeah. Yeah, bald cap for any of the amount of time in the film and we get less Dean Kane. And he said he'll only do one day, but we can't scrimp on the cane. Yeah. So, but all his school buddies are there to comfort him.

And then Marilyn comes in and she's brought along a couple of people from the Make a Wish Foundation. Yeah. And so you beat me to it. I wrote Wish for More Wishes in my notes, but Marshall. Oh. Damn it. And I'm like, it's like I obviously, you know, you would wish you didn't have cancer though. Like the whole presentation on this is stupid, right?

They should like, they should say up front, they should be like, okay, first of all, no wishing for more wishes, no wishing that you didn't have the debilitating disease, right? And I think the third one has to be no evil wishes because they don't want to have to do something genuinely wrong just because this one kid's dying. Right. Hey, the kid, two fucking beds over took my Legos. Yeah, so, but all his friends are like suggesting different wishes that he's like, hey, do I have to decide now? And they're like, no, it'd be a pretty dick move if we made you decide now. But also, kid, like, you probably shouldn't wait too long. You probably do want to kind of, don't put it on the long term to do list.

So, okay, so now dad is at the hospital chapel trying to pray. And also at the school, the priests are helping. the kids deal with the problem of the brain tumor with their friend by appealing to their bullshit religion as well. I think dad praying is the first time we hear his name because he says, hey God, it's me, Rick. Oh, okay. Yeah. Which is, I don't understand why people, why that happens in films of telling God,

because I thought God knew everything. Yeah, I feel like God knows who's talking. Yeah. He doesn't need you to name yourself, but at least we know the guy's name. now, three quarters of the way through the film. God definitely has like prayer ID. Like as soon as you start praying, it's like, oh, okay, it's a, it's that's Rick. Yeah.

And it's great. So we're in the school classroom as well. Now, this is the Dalai Lama classroom where the priest is sort of praying for them. And I looked around, okay, on the walls of this class for teens in the year 20203 is an inspirational poster from their idol and hero John Wayne. That's on there on the wall. Below that is a poster for, you know, that teen favorite pop combo. rush. There is a rush poster and I had to actually Google to check that it was definitely the

band Rush and not just some of the things saying Rush. And I found if the logo is exact to one of the posters for Russia, it's definitely Rush. And am I crazy in the notes here? I've put a screenshot of one of the pictures on the wall. If you scroll down and see it, that's Kramer from Seinfeld. I'm pretty sure that's Kramer from Seinfeld. It's Kramer from Seinfeld that they framed on the wall of this religious studies class. It's not, there's not like a like a quote there or anything. It's just a picture of frame or frame portrait. Like a painting. I think that's what that is. All this is especially odd when they went to the trouble of writing in the TikTok scenes.

We've made this really modern, but now we're not going to bother with the rest of the film. Right. Yeah, exactly. I also, there's a great line that the priest throws in there while he's talking about how Jesus can cure cancer. Mostly he doesn't, but he can. And he goes, look, either this is just a book of stories or Christianity can cure cancer. And I'm like, yes. Yes, it is one of those two things. We can agree. When he said, either this is a book of stories, I'll write, I'll stop you there. Whatever all is coming, we don't need it.

We do not need it. I'll save you sometime. You can do a scene transition. You love those. Do another scene. Yeah. I also like this bit because he specifically, this priest specifically says that he's going to heal Bryson from the top of his head to the bottom of his feet, which is a really good

idea to start with the head because that's where the cancer is. Right, yeah, yeah. Like, you don't want to leave out the rest of the body because we know that God is like a genie, and if you're not really specific with your wishes, he'll fuck you over. Right. He's like, look, we're going to get to that ingrown toenail, but we're going to start at the top here. God, if it is said from the tip of your toes to the top of your head, he might have died in the brain tumour before it ever got up there, like slowly, like powering up in a video game as it like slowly zoops up his body. Yeah, exactly. And it's great. So in this montage

of prayer as well, the dad starts praying and like, he's edging around the problem of evil and praying to God, like, sort of like, oh, oh, why would you do this? And then we pan down and he's doing it loudly over his sleeping son. Which is such like way to send a vaugh to confidence. Like, why did you kill my son? Why are you definitely going to kill my son dying? Sorry, Bryson. Did I wake you kidding? And he did.

So we get a little montage of Bryson in the MRI scanner and we watch him vomit. Like, yes. We see the girlfriend. She's very sad. I wrote my nose probably because she doesn't have a name. But apparently it's Alex. Is this scene that we hear her name? Oh, is it?

Yeah. And her hair is looking better and I thought, is she leaching his life force? Is that how this is working? When he's dead, she's going to move on to another one. Right, right. Obviously. She's 400 years old and just moves around schools, just leaching. Like, wherever you see a cancer kid, she's been there. Better film, much better film. Absolutely, yeah. So yeah, but then she tells him that, you know, he has to get better so he can take her to the dance. She's suddenly really sassy out of nowhere. Yeah. That hadn't been a part of her. character till now. Yeah. So then we get Dr. Kane checking in with dad, right? And this is yet another moment where like the dad, the character in the movie is an absolute piece of shit to the man who's trying to help his son. Yeah. But this movie is just really sympathetic to him because it's being

told from his perspective. Yeah. And by a guy who's just so goddamn blind that he doesn't realize that he's an asshole. Yes. Yeah. Absolutely. And there's so many ways you can see that because he's talking to, even when he's talking to one of the doctors before Dean King walks up, he says, oh, you know, my son's always been the kind of, that's just the kind of kid he is, you know, sports and cars. And it sounds like the kind of birthday card that your dad buys you when he absolutely does not take an interest in your life. Like I've got a son, yeah, it's got some sports,

it's got a car on the front of the baby, a golf club. Who knows, he might have swung a golf club. You have that happy whatever birthday it was last week. Sorry, I forgot. He goes, he's a sports kid. And I'm like, that's the opposite of what Eli is. see, whatever he's the spectrum. But he's like, hey, do you think that my son could at least go to a single baseball game?

And Dr. Dean King's like, well, of course he can. Why would you not be able to go to a yes, obviously. Okay. And then we cut to all of the kids, all of the baseball kids, lifting weights, right? Including one kid who's literally single smallest weight. Oh, it's so funny. It's like a five-pound dumbbell. They're like senior citizens at the swimming pool doing the aqua aerobic class with like a tiny

little weight and they are able to bench more than this kid. And I say that as someone with no arms with absolutely nothing to me else. So yeah, so we watch Pete Hankseth get really jealous of these kids form for just a little while. And then we see that the friend from the very beginning of the movie, he's like, hey, I just got a text that Bryson is going to be at our game tomorrow. I want to do something for him, all of us together. All right? Yeah. So, okay.

And the thing that it turns out, they all shave their head. heads in solidarity with their cancer friend. Yeah, yeah. We see that at the start of the game. Before we see the game, we actually do also see the cheerleading squad doing some cheerleading, and I'm just going to say it is the least energetic cheerleading. It's a pretty lame

cheerleading. There are actors who only have that cheerleading costume for other jobs that they do who are better at cheerleading than the cheerleading in this time. It's less cheerleading and more like warm wishes leading. Kind regards leading.

So Miles, the reporter is there. Suddenly, we've not seen him for at least a third of the film at this point. He just pops back up again. He pops up and like the game's over, right? Like, okay, football game, whatever. Three shots of a game. And he starts talking to the reporter or sorry, the reporter starts talking to the coach. Right.

And he's like, well, you know, I hear that the cancer kid is here. He's like, yeah, you know, cancer kid's very safe. He's like, well, you know, as you know, my dad died of brain cancer as well. And I mean, this sounds nitpicky as fuck, but his dad died of pancreatic cancer. It's like such a weird lie to tell in the movie. Oh, wow. That is a weird lie.

Why would they tell that? They could have just said also died of cancer. Of cancer, yeah. Of cancer would do it. It's not like the court you go, oh, really? What kind? What kind of cancer? Name three cancers.

And the thing is, right, they have built up, Miles's role throughout this movie. And then he talks to the coach. And then it's like, okay, he bags an interview with the cancer kid. And I wrote, this is going to be interesting. I can't wait to end of scene. End of scene. We don't get to see it. Yes. He's like, can I do an interview?

And he's like, yep. And then we cut to him at the hospital. It turns out he likes to draw too. Jesus fucking Christ. And we got like dad sleeping on the floor now because that's how dedicated he is to his son. Damn it. Yeah. We see the girlfriend gives him

some rosary beads. And it's a set of rosary beads that a Mexican cartel leader would call a bit much. Like, oh, right, they tone it down. And they talk about Joseph as well. Somebody says, everyone knows St. Joseph was a carpenter and the father of Jesus. And I didn't know Joseph got a sainthood. Again, it's all about who you related to. It's all nepotism all the way through. Isn't it, though? Isn't it just? All right, well, God's all prime for a miracle at this point. so I guess it's time for us to take another break, but first, let me give Act 3 the hard sell. Why the hell is the mechanic guy in the movie? Why the hell is the reporter guy in the movie?

Couldn't they have found something relevant for these people to do during Act 2? Find out the answers to dumb Jesus questions instead when we return for the dawdling conclusion of Miracle at Manchester. So, Miss Illusions, I see you're applying for a home improvements loan? I am, yes, uh-huh. Okay, and you've listed your profession as online content creator. Yep. Seems a little vague. Thank you.

Yeah, no, that's what I was going for. Okay, you know, I'm afraid we all going to need just a bit more specificity. Sure, yes. I create digital media products distributed online for entertainment and educational purposes. That's not less vague. That's just more words. Yeah, sure. So, okay, so I facilitate the construction, distribution, and promotion of internet files, including, but not limited to files.

I'm going to interrupt you there. Okay, so let's just make this simple. What did you do today exactly? I made fun of a kid with cancer. Sorry, you what now? But it was, it was Christian. The cancer? The kid was Christian.

So you made fun of a Christian kid for having cancer? No, no, I made fun of a kid with cancer for being Christian. Wow. Okay, okay. Well, what did you do the day before? I planned out how best to make fun of the kid with the cancer. Yeah, I see. Yeah.

I do not see. Yeah, I'm not going to get that loan, am I? No, I'm actually calling the police. Yeah, no, I think you should. And we're back for still more of this shit. We're going to rejoin the action with Ed, who we haven't seen in a half an hour, 40 minutes of goddamn movie.

He's getting up early for some early morning car working. And I guess, like, we've never established that Marilyn works the overnight shift, but apparently she does. Yeah. So he's decided since he's up at 3 a.m. anyway, he'll take lunch to his wife, right? But on a previous 3 a.m.,

she was waking up in the, middle of the night while he was working in the... Or maybe it was her night off, but... She's working days, she's working nights, she's working all sorts of different shifts. Who the hell knows? Yeah, we do not know her shift pattern at this point. It could be absolutely... I don't think they know that.

I assume Dean Kane is at the hospital at all times in this movie whenever they eat it, like an NPC, yeah. Yeah. And what's funny about this is that, so you're like, what a sloppy way to introduce this, right? Because he shows up at the cafeteria and Bryce's dad is there. Yeah. And we're like, oh, okay, so this is.

the sloppy way of putting these two guys in the room together so that they can become friends. But they don't. Nope. They don't meet at this moment at all. No. In fact, nothing happens that's relevant to the movie in any way. Nope. So, okay.

Other than she mentions the kid, like that is the only thing is this is how he hears about the kid. Right. This is how he knows that there is a kid with cancer. Yeah. Yeah. So, okay. So now the Make-A-Wish.

people are back to talk to Bryce, tell him he's, you know, he's taken too fucking long. Okay. There was one of the make-wish people, she had like long, darkish hair, and I had her as Kara Santa Maker-Wisher. But I thought I should have done, but I had her as Karasanta Maker-Wisher. Well, I described he was looking at about the same age as Bryson, so I don't know if Kar will take that as a compliment or not. So, yeah, but, and of course, he's been drawing this whole time, and we see at this point that he's drawing a 1967 or possibly.

in 1965, Mustang. Yeah, yeah. And so the Make-A-Wish people show up, and they're like, so what do you want more than anything else? And they're like, he's like, can I give my Make-A-Wish to my dad? And they're like, no, man, he's not a dying kid. Yeah. Does charity, come on, come on, fuck off.

Yeah, they wanted, he wanted the Make-A-Wish Foundation to buy his dad a truck. A truck. He's not going to do that. He just had a new truck. We literally just seen him get a new truck. Yeah. But also, it was a specific Ford Truck and a Rock. Is this movie?

sponsored by Ford? Or is it just that Christian movies will only feature cars made by American anti-Semites? It's either Ford or one of those David Dukes of Hazard cars, nor the other type. Well, what's amazing is that like right after the Ford reference, Dad walks in with some Chick-fil-A. So yeah, maybe it's that is it. There's a great moment because he's like, oh, I'm sorry, if I had known you guys were here, I would, I would have brought more food. You want me to go back out and get you some. And I so wanted Carissaena make a wisher to go like, no, I don't support their stance on LGBT

rights. Yeah, that would have been amazing. But this sounds like, can I get okay, so my dad can't have the wish, but can I wish for a new truck for my dad? And they're like, dude, come on, don't be a dick about the thing. Okay, you can. But can I first talk you through just the basic economics of this charity. So you can have that truck. But here's all

of the other cancer kids you're depriving over the wish. So you want the truck, do you? Oh, there you go. Yeah. I'm like, man, asked him to meet a fucking celebrity or something. Jesus Christ. Also, how would you afford the gas and the insurance on this? You're a kid. Yeah. Jesus. So, okay, so the make a wish people, they go to leave, but they borrow his sketchpad real quick, right? And they're looking over the sketchpad. They're saying, like, I wonder what kind of car this is that he's been driving. Well, wouldn't you know it just then, Maryland, the oncologist walks by. So I guess they're doing this in the middle of the night.

Well, she's working a double, maybe. Oh, okay, yes, probably working a double. But the reluctant car expert, Marilyn, says, well, that is a 1967 or possibly 65 Mustang. And they're like, oh, okay. So, okay. So now she goes to Ed, and she asks Ed,

she's going to ask Ed to give Bryson this Mustang that he's working on. Yeah, good job. She told him about Bryson, like literally three seconds ago. Yes, right. Well, you remember the last scene you were in? Over lunch, yeah. I want him to tell that cancer kid to go, fuck himself. It's his dream car and it's worth 50 grand. It's such a dick thing to ask. I mean, like, honestly, it's such a dick move to ask your husband, hey, would you give that car to a dying kid with cancer who's dying?

No, but I'll loan it to him for what a Dean Kane say. I'll loan him to the 80% chance that I'll loan him to the 80% chance that I'll I'll load it to him for six months. So, okay. So meanwhile, Bryson is at the hospital wondering why his religion doesn't work. Right? And he says, Bryce, he prays to God, dear Jesus, I'll always love you. He says, I just want you to know Jesus.

No matter what happens, I will always love you. And I want him to add, even if you did put a tumor in my head that might kill me at 15 before I ever got a chance to ring that Christian bell if you know what I'm saying. he's like he's like but jesus i love you and i don't doubt you at all and that's going to be important for the miracle thing later when we have to blame kids who don't get miracle out of the cancer for dying of their own cancer so he's like but i believe in you fully and totally please don't torture me forever after i die amen it's so funny he's delivering it to the little jesus on the crucifix on the rosary beads so like the little he delivered at the little tiny

jesus on that and i just wanted to cut to the jesus and he gives like a little wink He can't do a high five because his hands are kind of busy. No, right, yes. A wink would be good. Hey, you know what? You have to come to me. We can still do a high five. It's up there.

It would be high. Literally don't leave me hanging. That's what I said to the entire time. So, yeah. So, but then the next day, Bryson's asleep. Dad's watching him sleep as dad is want to do, apparently, when the hospital CEO shows up. I'm so confused as to why the CEO appears here.

He just comes to introduce Ed the mechanic. He's got nothing else. He's got nothing else. Here to introduce at the mechanic. A stranger. Yeah, exactly. Yes, who he doesn't know, right? No.

Or at least that we know of maybe seeing him at the office parties or something. I don't know. But yeah. And also, why wouldn't Marilyn do this? Yeah. Who he already knows. But so he's like, yeah, I wanted to introduce. you, this is Ed, Ed, Rick, Rick, Ed.

I'm going to go back to very important work, I would assume. So they wake Bryce up and he's like, hey, hey, kid, I'm your nurse's husband. I want to give you my 67 Mustang. And he's like, wow, it would suck if I died before I could drive it. And he's like, right? Yeah. By the way, he's wearing a fucking shirt now that says Ed's mechanic shop or something. I'm like, the whole fucking movie, I didn't know you're.

goddamn name. And when I finally figured it out, now you're wearing it on your fucking shirt, you dick. It's like this movie

has a fog of war. Like, until you discover the name, you can't see it. But then once you've seen his name, they were wearing the band of the map. Yeah.

Exactly. So, okay, but then we get another MRI montage, right, where we get him and he's got his friends, which we see that Bryson and Ed are

becoming very good friends, right? That's a lot of, this montage, which is a bizarre thing to try to develop an hour and three minutes into an hour and 21 minute movie. Yeah. Which is why it has to just be a montage of them like designing the car together and picking colors and all of that.

Right. Yeah, that's all we got. And later they're going to say, I love you to each other. And we're going to be like, really? Okay. So, and then we get the make-a-wish people show back up. They've brought him an iPad. Yeah.

Which is cool. It's not a truck cool. No, it's fine. It's one of the big ones. No, it was. It was a very big iPad. It's funny because like if you're expecting a four Raptor, this is pretty fucking lame. Otherwise, yeah, that's pretty cool.

It felt like they were really throwing Make a Wish a Bone, right? They're like, they did get him some nice stuff. It's not really Make a Wish is Make Up a Wish. Because he didn't wish for the iPad. You've made that out. It's Make Up a Wish. Or Makeup Wish. Yeah, exactly.

So, and then it's time for the girlfriend to sadly pray on the bleachers. Yeah. Right. When suddenly the teacher from Catechism class shows up, I was so fucking proud of myself for remembering who the hell this character was. I did not remember. I had a down as a lady we have never seen before. Yes. She taught us Catechism 162. But she's like, you know, the girlfriend, Alex, she's like, yeah, you know, the tumors come back and there's nothing they can do for him. well, except this experimental trial in Florida that they can do. But other than that, there's nothing that we can do. And, of course, the catechism teacher is like, well, there's nothing we can do. And she looks up.

Yeah, she's trying to be so reassuring. But she gets to this point where she's just like, well, I know that it's all going terrible now, but God is still in control. And it just sounds like she's saying that God is torturing this family for its own amusement. Like, Alex, the girlfriend literally says, no offense, but why hasn't God helped? and the teacher shrugs. Don't think about that. Don't think about that.

Mysterious ways. It's amazing that this scene, like the literally saying, like the point of this scene is, well, God is good even if he isn't curing Bryson's cancer. And then from there we cut directly to a room full of cancer kids.

Like you let me into the editing suite and I got to control what we got to see just after the God is good line. Yeah. Well, I also love this fucking, the evidence that the catechism teacher offers. She's like, think about it, Alex, you're a cheerleader.

How many football games have you sat there and used your prayers to magically influence where they won, you know? She's like, oh, yeah. And I'm like, well, presumably she also prayed at the games they lost too, right? Yeah. But yeah. So then there's a moment with dad, Wheel and Bryce through the hospital late into the night and he wants to give his iPad to another kid.

And of course, we get this because we need to know that Bryson is pure of heart. and that's why God miracles him. But it also kind of feels like, it's kind of lame. The make-a-wish guys didn't get me the truck, and I don't give you shit about this idea. But it's also because after the whole cancer thing and the end of this movie that the real Bryson started a charity to give kids in hospitals iPads.

So he's got the iPad and he wants to give the iPad away to these random kids. But like when he's saying, Dad, would you be mad if I give my iPad to a kid? We've literally never seen in the movie. Right. I'd be mad if you gave it away to someone that you've only said by name and you didn't even bother showing who this kid is or developing

any kind of rapport between Bryson and this poor cancer child. This movie is so desperate for anything to happen and it's so short on runtime. Why would you not develop this friendship for this kid? Jesus Christ. And then we have this moment which is

amazing to me. So, Bryson and the dad are going to have the dad, am I going to die conversation. And the kid playing Bryson is a good enough actor to pull this off and the guy playing the dad is not. So we get to watch that mismatch for a while and that's a lot of fucking fun. Yeah.

And I could tell that this was so badly done and so boring because Alice's notes and I was speculating about characters we haven't seen for a while. She's drifting around two of them. I've literally written, when are we going to get back to Miracles don't exist, Dad? Right. Because we haven't seen him for ages. No. He's meant to be really important.

He was the second. It's like right in the first like couple of scenes. Yeah. So, okay. So now it's the next day or someday I don't know who gives you shit. We know it's not one month later or they would have told us. Yes. So but dad gets a phone call, right, about Bryson seeing all his buddies one more time before he has to go after this experimental treatment in Florida.

Yeah. Right. Dad's going to take him for a surprise. A surprise piggyback as well. because he enters the scene piggybacking this kid around, which is weird. He parades him in front of the entire school on a piggyback, which is a weird thing to do.

That would be so humiliating. Can you fucking imagine? So what we're seeing here is they've brought Bryson into the bleachers where all the other kids have gathered together and they're all going to pray for him. And there are not that many kids. Like in the title scene, there's a lot of kids. In the bleachers scene, there are not that many kids.

Like there's maybe a class and a half worth of kids. Yeah, 61 kids. Yeah, it's like a standard waiting room. A standard waiting room for a number of kids. So, but yeah, but they bring him in. They put him right in the center. Everybody's in a red shirt except for him, right? He's in white.

And then they have this big group prey. And all, when they go to pray for him, everybody, like, reaches their hand towards him at the same time. Yeah. Which is creepy as fuck. It's so creepy. And they, they say, the priest says something about like laying hands and it looks like they're saluting Hitler.

Yes. Yes. They're all hiling. Yes. And Alice, you did a cancer PhD. You did a PhD in curing cancer. Did you ever try just? I didn't do a PhD in Curing Cancer. I did. It was to do with cancer. I mean, look, if Eli was here, your PhD would have been something completely unrelated. And that would have spanned off an entire universe of.

Yes, right, right. By God-off of movie standards, that was a really accurate description of your education. No, credentials, okay. Admittedly, what I am showing is here, I literally read your PhD thesis. You did read my thesis. So what I'm showing is I didn't understand it. But nevertheless, you did a whole PhD in cancer. Did you ever try just laying your hands on the cancer cells or getting everyone in the lab,

just lean over and be like on the cells to try and cure them? No. But to be fair, a good chunk of doing my PhD was trying to keep the cancer cells alive. So. Oh, interesting. The opposite, too. Exactly. There was a lot of like genuinely.

talking to myself to try and keep them alive when they were getting infections of things. Did that help? No, of course not. It helps me psychologically. It drives you crazy doing a PhD. You spent your PhD trying to keep cancer alive. Did you work for big farmer? Yeah, right.

You have to keep it alive so then you can figure out how to kill it. Interesting. It's basically what the research is. Keep it alive and then do things to it to try and kill it. It's basically torture for cancer cells. And she has a PhD in that. What we're saying is, don't fuck with Dr. Alice. Cancer fears Dr. Alice.

There's an amazing bit during the prayer as well, because the priest is doing the laying the hands thing on. But when he's doing that, he introduced it by sort of saying, look, essentially, I don't know if this is going to work that we're going to try, but we're going to try it. So it's essentially he's saying, like, either we can cure this kid's cancer with our magic or we can't. let's find out.

Yes, right. The grand experiment begins. Dr. Alice can't be bothered to check so. It's at this point that I think I realize, and I don't know if this is true or not, is this priest the friend, the random friend that gets brought up, the emotional, like, I don't know. Maybe it is. Maybe it is.

I think that's why we've got the really goddy friend actually turns out to be the priest, but I didn't go back in check, so I've no idea. Might be. We'll never know. We will just. genuinely never know. It's impossible. I don't care. No. Yeah, I will have erased this movie from my mind all together afterwards. So, and then when they get done with the prayer that we, we zoom in on Price and Bryce goes, very Jesusly, he goes, it is done.

But what is done? Okay. So now we cut to his 11th MRI. And then we see Dr. Dean Kane looking over his brain scans and he looks really mad at the brain scans. He does. He's like hopefully scrolling on it. Yes. And I think he's meant to. to be confused as to what's happening here, but he looks genuinely angry at the tumor for some reason. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. So, okay, but they're about to, they're getting ready to fly him

to Florida for this treatment. He says he's getting his own plane. Yes. Yeah. She's just bonkers. Make a wish really made up for the iPad thing. We felt bad to get about that iPad. How many Pepsi points do you have? So Bryce is like, hey, dad, um,

are you mad at God for Torrid? me. And he goes, well, yeah, no, yeah, actually now that you mention it, yeah,

I am kind of mad at God for this. This is some shitty stuff to do. He's like, don't you think that God has a plan? And he's like, well, it's obviously not a very good plan.

Yeah. He does have a plan, Bryson, and it's to kill you. That is his plan. And like, it's all going to plan your death. Yes,

it's a shitty fucking plan. I mean, keep asking questions like that and it makes it clear to me that God has a point, actually. Yeah. I see it now.

I see it now. Yeah, I get the plan. This all makes sense. Mysterious words. Yeah, I get it. Oh, yeah, yeah. So, yeah, but Bryce prays that God will show him himself to his dad,

and he prays about how awesome his dad is and how much he loves his dad. And your mom also is fine, I guess. And we get, like, a montage of him doing some classic dad work, because he's not really done any classic dadding in this movie. No. Apart of him sleeping on the floor of the hospital. And that is some classic daddy. Being asleep was classic dad stuff.

Yeah, absolutely. His unconsciousness was part of the classic daddy. So we've got to look back at all the times. He threw a ball with his kid. But then it just cuts back to Bryson finishing the prayer. And I thought, was that a tumor-induced hallucination? Has his tumor just grown there? Like what happened to brain.

Yeah. He's like, God, please make dad more chill about me dying. Amen. And then Dr. Dean Cain shows up with the latest scans. and like, the tumor's been miracle to way, guys. It's gone. Based on a true story. Yeah.

They don't even have to go do that experimental treatment in Florida anymore. In fact, the entire hospital is gathered around behind him at this point. Yeah, this is my favorite bit of background hospitaling because there's just some random people we've never seen before stood behind looking happy about this news. Like, we just wanted to come and be there while you hurt this news. It's great. Yeah, because not only is the tumor gone, apparently the area all around it is healed as well. And also we checked and God also added two inches to the size of your penis too. That's the same this way.

It's truly. So, yeah, so they're all happy Maryland calls Ed. I wanted Ed to be like, okay, well, then I don't have to give him the car then, right? You didn't have cancer anymore. It was a cancer car. And now he's done. He's fine. He's fine.

But no, it's dead. Ed says, I knew it. He's like, did you though? Ed, did you? Like, fucking how did you? How could you possibly have known? You're not even goddy. Right?

That we know of. And also, if you knew it, why didn't you tell the fucking kid, you dick? What a dick thing not to tell the kid? All right. So now they're all going to go to the dance together, right? So we get everybody getting their prom pictures. I guess it's not prom, but they're getting their pictures taken together in their nice duds, right? When Ed pulls up in the admittedly amazingly cool Mustang.

Yeah, the 1960-something Mustang. Yeah. Yes, the 1960 from a Mustang, yeah. For the 15-year-old to drive. Yes, right. Yeah, it doesn't seem like a good idea. A vintage Mustang. Yes.

This is where I did some digging because I was like, okay, maybe he can drive this a bit better because you have automatics in the States. And I was like, but would an old Mustang be automatic or manual? And apparently most of them would have been manual. Absolutely. So the fact of the kid can drive this is utterly bonkers. Yeah, right. No, that's a great fucking point.

Yeah. and Ed turns to he gives him the Mustang, gives him the keys to the Mustang and he turns to the kid and he goes, Bryson, I love you. And I'm like,

that's weird for us. From our perspective, that's just weird because you only met him four minutes ago for us. So yeah, so he pulls away with it, he gets him and his girlfriend

get in the car and he goes to pull away. I wanted the Mustang to break down immediately, but it didn't. Or him just stole it and crunched the gearbox. Yeah, right, right. Exactly.

Oh, How do you drive this? Why are there three pedals? There's too many pedals in this one. Why would you give me this? I'm 50. And yeah, no, he just drives away really smoothly. Yeah, he shows up at the dance and he's roaring the engine and everything. And I'm like, all right, he's got it all figured it out. Alice is just jealous how smooth that was because Alice is learning to drive.

He went from first to second really smoothly there, Alice. There was no jerking at all with it. I remember the first time I drove my manual car and it was nowhere near that. It's okay. And then fucking Miles shows up to do the voiceover. Why the fuck would Miles do the voiceover? Where the hell has he been? I think he's basically only been in this entire film

only to explain why there's interview footage of the actual story, like why there's film footage of him being interviewed. I guess it's wild because he's doing a voiceover at the end. Okay, he's not related at all. He's a totally uncillary character. If you want to make him that important, make him voiceover all the way through from the bit where he's having

like Penny Pastor with his family just having to do a bit of voice me if I have the breakfast yeah just do bits of voice like voice over throughout the film and now it all works that you found the story yes obviously but but yeah now Miles believes in

God and Butterflies again I guess right and then because we've only made it to like an hour and 14 minutes they pad the runtime with like real life footage of this kid playing football and shit. And, like, I guess a lot of it was just to make us feel like assholes for having written jokes about this the whole time, especially when they show footage of the actual

kid. And one, he's a lot younger looking than the actor who is playing him. And he's wearing glasses with an eye patch over it because very clearly, when you have a brain tumor, it isn't like Bryson in this, like, oh, I had a nosebleed that one time, and I squinted once. It's actually much worse than that. So when you see, oh, yeah, no, you didn't. I can see why you didn't do that all the way through the movie because we could not do this movie if that's what the kid looked like all the way through.

Yeah, don't kidding. Stupid eye patch kid. We couldn't do it. But also like during the little montage of shots in headlines and stuff like that at the end, like they show that he did get the experimental treatment in Florida. So yeah, I looked that up because I had that note as well. But I think actually it said he was going that month forward. The headline is like experiment treatment starts this month. And apparently the day before, he found out that he was fine. Now, obviously, he found out it was fine because of the other

stuff that was being done to him. Yeah, that's right. Yes. Multiple surgeries and the radiation and the medicine. And like Alice, you look this up to, like the type of cancer he had is actually relatively treatable. Is that? Well, it's, it's medulla blastoma, which is, it's not a great cancer, but in younger kids, the prognosis is reasonably, most of the time the prognosis is okay. Yeah. Because we know what to do and we do all the treatment and all of that stuff. He's a bit older. So, you know, I wouldn't want to say something about his personal case without knowing his medical history. But, yeah, it is something that we know about does happen in kids and we can treat.

Yeah. And the thing is, this movie did know his medical history and still didn't want to say anything about his personal case from a medical perspective. And that seems telling to me. Right. But the dad's like, you know, the doctors, they said they couldn't explain at all what had happened. and, well, I think we can explain what happened. I'm like, well, yeah, but you would be wrong. I can explain.

The Smurfs did it. See, there I just explained what happened. That's easy. The doctors want to be correct when they do it. But then the real kid tells us that a lot of other kids still die of cancer. So their God isn't real or sucks. But it would be real nice if you could help them give those kids iPads. So in summary, I have to ask Dr. Alice, is this best?

better or worse than watching people drink their own pee? Honestly, so much worse. There's so many scenes. And genuinely, when Bryson was talking to his dad and finding out that he still had cancer, I wrote in my notes, I have nothing to say about this. This is such a nothing scene. I don't, like, they're talking about life and death stuff, and I still have, like, it's so dull and boring.

So much bouncing around. I knew you would never believe, we were doing you the favors of giving you the pee-drinking documentaries, but we were, we were. We were looking out for you the whole time. All right. Well, that's going to do it for a review of Miracle at Manchester, but that's not going to do it for the episode just yet,

because we still need to descend one more level. So Dr. Alice, tell us what's on deck? How the hell should I know? I don't like, just a great question. And since Eli didn't put anything into the calendar, I also don't know. So be sure to keep up with our social media for an announcement. but shortly after this episode debuts, Alice, Marce, thanks again.

Oh, no, thank you. This was a pleasure. Yeah, it was fun. And don't forget to check the show notes for links to Skeptics with a K and the No Rogan Experience. Yeah, and also Alice and I were the editors of The Skeptic magazine in the UK. So you can check out original skeptical journalism. Just go to skeptic.org.com. And we promise that we will never run an article written by famous pedophile

Roman Polanski in 2026. What the fuck was that? Wouldn't have thought a skeptical magazine needed to make that clear, but yet here we fucking are. I guess that's where we are in the world now, man. So with that to look forward to, with something to look forward to, not sure what it'll be.

That's going to bring episode 562 to a merciful close. Once again, a huge thanks to Mars and Alice for all their help today, but an equally huge thanks to all the Patreon donors that help make the show go. If you'd like to count yourself among their ranks, you can make a per episode donation at patreon.com. And thereby earn early access 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 and all your various social media platforms. And if you enjoyed this show, be sure to check out our sibling shows, the skating a citation dated and D&D minus and the skeptocrat, available wherever podcasts live. If you have questions, comments, or cinematic suggestions, you get email, godawful movies at gmail.com,

Tim Robertson takes care of our social media. Our theme song was written and performed by Ryan Slotney, the group of drafts on Mars. All the other music was written and performed by our audio engineer and Morgan Cargain was using with permission. Thanks again for giving us to check your life for Heath and Wright, Neil and Buzzigam, Illusions, Promised to work hard to earn on the next week. Until then, we'll leave you with the American Graffiti Club.

Bryson went on to live a happy, healthy life. Before becoming one of the 4,000 American teenagers who die every year on the road in road collisions. Never should have given him that Mustang, man. Oh, yeah. God went on to ignore most of the other tumors. And not a miracle, Dad. Still doesn't believe in miracles.

Still not sure why he made the movie. But he believes in butterflies. And salad. Yes. Staying regular. That's what he believes. Miracle at Manchester makes it sound like some sort of pretentious club in like a venue. Yeah.

With the at sign. Did you get cocktails at Miracle at Manchester last night? It's all right. Yeah. Miracle at the Manchester. Sorry, I'm being really slow at getting down there. All right. Use the side drag down thing.

Yeah. I can't see most of my screen. I've got too many lights. I don't know. The professional kit that you guys have. It's really difficult. It's not look like that from our English. All right.

Everybody's ready to go on the Lisa mattress ad then? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. And Alice did not know who Dean Kane was. She just, she knows that I've written Dr. Dean Kane and she had no idea what that was. I recognized his face, but I didn't. Right.

I don't watch films. I envy you. He's not in films. No, you wouldn't find him in films. I mean, films, but like this, yeah. I see him in films. You see him in your dreams. You see him on the inside of your eyelids when you go to sleep.

He's right there with like Sorbo and Eric Roberts in terms of how many. I think Eric Roberts, we figured out the other day. I think Eric Roberts is probably the person we've seen in the most movies. But, yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. He's close. Not the person you've seen sober in the most of you. No.

I think I saw him several once. This content is scanned credentialed, which means you can report instances of harassment, abuse, or other harm to their hotline at 617-249455 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.

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