How Did This Get Made? - Mindhunters

Episode Date: April 10, 2026

Val Kilmer, LL Cool J, and Christian Slater star in Renny Harlin's 2004 thriller Mindhunters—a movie about FBI serial killer profilers who act like the worst people in an escape room. Paul, Jason, and June break down how these profilers don't use any of their profiling skills, Christian Slater's death by Rube Goldberg nitrogen murder machine, the logic behind the training island, if Johnny Lee Miller was assaulted by a clock, June's desire for more fun Navy antics, and so much more. Plus, Paul drops a new sad childhood story about his LL Cool J album. • Go to hdtgm.com for tour dates, merch, FAQs, and more• Have a Last Looks correction or omission? Call 619-PAULASK to leave us a voicemail!• Submit your Last Looks theme song to us here• Join the HDTGM conversation on Discord: discord.gg/hdtgm• Buy merch at howdidthisgetmade.dashery.com/• Order Paul’s book about his childhood: Joyful Recollections of Trauma• Shop our new hat collection at podswag.com• Paul’s Discord: discord.gg/paulscheer• Paul’s YouTube page: youtube.com/paulscheer• Follow Paul on Letterboxd: letterboxd.com/paulscheer• Subscribe to Enter The Dark Web w/ Paul & Rob Huebel: youtube.com/@enterthedarkweb• Listen to Unspooled with Paul & Amy Nicholson: unspooledpodcast.com• Listen to The Deep Dive with June & Jessica St. Clair: thedeepdiveacademy.com/podcast• Instagram: @hdtgm, @paulscheer, & @junediane• Twitter: @hdtgm, @paulscheer, & msjunediane  • Jason is not on social media• Episode transcripts available at how-did-this-get-made.simplecast.com/episodesGet access to all the podcasts you love, music channels and radio shows with the SiriusXM App! Get 3 months free using the link: siriusxm.com/hdtgm Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

What is the movie? Where does it stream? What is the movie? Where does it stream? We saw Mindhunters, so you know what that means. Now it's time. How did this get made? We're going to have a good time, celebrate some failure. Not just be a hater because you know you wonder. How did this campaign?

Let's follow in the mediocrity of subpar art. Perhaps we'll find the answer to the question. How did this get made? Hello, people of Earth, and welcome to How Did This Get Made. I'm your host Paul Shear and today we are talking about the 2005 Rennie Harlan directed action film Mind Hunters. Now, in case you didn't watch, this is what you need to know. There is this FBI instructor played by Val Kilmer who's evaluating new recruits to join a serial killer profiler team. And here's the thing.

Val Kilmer's methods, a little unorthodox, often includes creating very realistic simulations of murder scenes using like sets and props and even actors. And for the final test, the group is brought to a remote island for simulation training. However, once they are there, they realize that they are being hunted by a serial killer, who might be someone that they actually know. Could it be L.L. Cool J., a last-minute addition to the team who was sent along to just observe? We will soon find out. But let's not get into any of that before we introduce my co-host. Please welcome June, Diane, Raphael, and Jason Manzukas.

How are you both? Wow. I mean, it does, I'm worried, is this podcast episode a test? Oh, are we in a test? Or is it a trap? Okay, this is a movie. What time is it is what I need to know. More clocks, please.

This is a movie that infuriates me on so many levels because very much like law-abiding citizen June, which you were not present for, a movie where there's a lot of traps and a lot of things. have to be like, how did this all come together? I'm going to put some of that on the side and just focus on the opening, which you see this man incredible approaching a car in the middle of winter and his hand touches, you know, the hood. And we see like a masked glove like by the woman's face looking as if like, uh-oh, this is a bad guy. It's a bad guy. And it's just Christian Slater.

And we're like, okay, well, that's going to pay off. Like, that creepy moment should definitely pay off. It doesn't. But now I'm going to put that on the side and go, now we're just in the real world. I want to make sure I'm clear on this with you both. We're in the real world. We are interviewing real people because we're on the road. We're in the middle of the forest.

And we believe that we're in the world. I mean, yeah. That's what the movie. Here's really like, once you start. pulling at the threads. This thing, this falls apart. God, so quickly. Because, you know, the entire cold open of the movie is this very high stakes, high

tension, thriller kind of beginning where... The end of silence of the lambs. Or seven or something like that, you know, like one of these kind of... We're going to find the serial killer and then they find the house. They go in. They can hear the girls. The kidnapped girls. They're there.

They do all of it. All the way through both of them being killed. Christian Slater and his partner. Catherine Morris, they are the only two people who, they don't wait for backup. They go barging right in, and boy, oh, boy, do they get killed. They get killed in such a crazy way because also, I will say, the way it's shot, I was writing down all these jokes. Like, oh, this is a haunted house.

It looks like a haunted house. It looks like something that I've paid $40 to $1.4. walk through and have people jump out at me. But I also was like, what am I seeing? I can't see anything. Like, the camera angle was obscuring enough stuff. I was like, is that person? Did he shoot himself in the head?

Are those girls like dummies? Are they real? I couldn't quite. And I was getting irritated. Yes. Only to reveal. It was all. Yeah.

And God, so many questions. It's very hard in a movie like this because you have to hang on to just what are the truth that you know. And like, what are, what is, what can I hold on to to, to orient myself and to come back to over and over. Yes. One of the things that I feel like was, was important with the amount of flies around the serial killers, you know, area.

A serial killers work. Lots of flies. Yes. Oh, and not just the flies, but the sound of the flies. The sound of the flies. That was very important. I would have loved to have seen a moment because we do see Valcimer breaking down the scene once it's revealed it.

It's all set. Dealing with like the fly rank. You know, like, guys, it was good. It was too much on the flies. We get a few. Paul, so roughly. Now, I understand we will get to the island in which the Navy uses it for simulation purposes. All sorts of like ops are there.

We're talking about Onega. That's right. But that's fine. That's an island. But this is a place, I guess, outside of Virginia is in Virginia somewhere where we, the cold open. It felt like it was on a Hollywood set. And I say that not like, you know, like the way that they had control of the lighting and everything. I guess it just is wondering, like, roughly how much does that cost?

It's got to be a staggering amount just to produce the escape room that Christian Slater and Catherine Morris have to go through must have cost millions of dollars. That's what I'm wondering. Millions of dollars. Because I want to just go back. When you're talking about the flies and how important it is that the flies are buzzing around the corpses and the dead people, you see someone go in and turn off the tape player that is. playing the flies sound effect. So it's all, it all falls apart.

It's so immersive. And the cake is real. I mean, because Val Kilmer does, as he's chewing them out, is eating a piece of cake that was left in the table where this serial killer,

I guess. Guarantee that was an improv from Val. Oh, guarantee. But like that's, you know, we're tax paying citizens. Like,

that's FBIS funded by our tax. Like, that's millions of dollars. Oh, but now that's like sending cash Patel to the Olympic. Now, It's like, what are we doing?

But here's the thing I want to go back one step on. Because I guess I just have to leave out the fact that they were in the middle of the wilderness interviewing subjects. It's like, so in this world, they had to find this house. Like that's part of the mission. I think so. Okay. So, okay, I'll buy that. But they are training to be profilers.

Profilers. Which is it, I know where you're going with this, Paul. It's the same question I had. Yeah. Okay. Go for it. Tell me. Well, yeah.

Okay, so to be an FBI profiler, and I don't know that much about this, but I'll speak on it anyway. It seems like you have to be doing some deep psychological work, lots of research, lots of, like, how does the human mind work? We're way past Psych 101. We're really, you know, we're on message boards about young white men who are categorically usually serial kills. We are doing that type of work. we are not doing the tactical sort of knocking on doors. They're not knocking on doors.

No, we're not clearing rooms. That's not our area. And it seemed to be that Valcomer's biggest issue was with their tactical powers. Yes. Not their ability to profile. Special Agent Moore, when is the situation secure?

On the drive home. On the drive home. That's right. On the drive home. Sir, we did shut up. Cigarettes on the table, more at the door, different brands. Two cars up front. Four place settings, not three.

All should have alerted you to the possibility that there might be another suspect. I think... Sorry? What? What did you say? I think you enjoy watching us fail, sir. Better in here than out there. You know, this really happened?

The unsub was apprehended in under two minutes without a shot fire. Took you guys seven minutes and you killed your partner. Here's the thing. What they failed to do was not profile, but just not take in all the information. Like, oh, didn't you see there's four? 100%. Four plates on the table? They were operating like a homicide department.

Just like cops, clearing rooms, going through, looking for clues. He also wanted them to be a SWAT team. Like, I don't think that any of these skills transfer to, to profile. No. No. I mean, by the way, I'm going to say this. They're all bad. In a movie where the main idea is there is a killer amongst them and they have to profile each other, this movie fails at that. These are the dumbest motherfuckers that never use any bit of information. And even in the big end reveal, which we'll get to eventually, but it's not even like, oh, I profiled him. She basically just marked him with paint. I mean, it's really similar to, it's like a horror movie that's

happening, it's like a group of teenagers who happen into a house full of traps. Like they are, they are acting with the same kind of chaotic, we don't know what to do that teenagers would, but they are meant to be the best of the best and they don't work together. They don't use their brains, they don't use their skill sets to the best of their abilities. They are constantly just, it's seen after scene where they're just pointing guns at each other being like, It's you. It's you. It's you. It's you. It's you. It's like the movie The Thing with Idiots. Like the thing where it's like people who are not supposed to be profiles are smarter at figuring out who is an alien and who is not. And these are just normal people. And here's the other thing. They don't have a different skill set. They all are equal, which is an other odd thing. So this is a team where everyone is on an equal footing. Like no one's like, oh, you're the, you know, you're the ballistics person. You're the this person. They are all. They are all. also are like, each trap seems to be, so in the story of the movie, the killer is picking everybody off one by one or sometimes in pairs or whatever, and there's a watch that appears

or a clock that appears with the time of the next murder. So everybody knows, okay, in between now and then we have to figure out what's going on. But the timelines are like two hours. And the killer somehow has set up traps inclusive of draining an entire body of all of its blood and using all of that blood to write numbers all over the walls that are some sort of code. Well, at that point, they've been asleep for five hours and they drink the bad coffee. So he has five hours to set up a day's worth of... He or she. Oh, he or she, sorry.

And everybody is like, ignore the numbers. The numbers don't matter. Let's find the trap. And I'm like, the numbers definitely matter. They all work together. They never are like, you figure out this and I'll figure out that. They're all like just, it's like, it's the worst people in escape room. They're so, they get so angry at at each other for trying to profile.

Yes. They're like, enough of that. Shut up. Shut up. We got to kill somebody. Enough of the numbers. Enough of the letters. Now there's letters.

Fuck those letters. Fuck those numbers. It's like, wait. It would have made more sense if the thing had happened where it was like three profilers and three like soldiers. Tactical. Yeah. You know, like three, and the idea was oftentimes you guys are paired together in the field.

Yeah. Use your complimentary skill sets to solve these problems. They all brought guns. And here's the other thing that really cracked me up. Again, just to drive home how much this movie does not even embrace the premise of the film, which is L.L. Cool J is like at the very last minute. and it brought on to join the team to observe because, you know, people are like, to your point, June, why is Val Kimmer spending all this money? Well, is that how he, is that how he joins in the beginning?

I thought he said he was joining to observe. He's an investigator with the Department of Justice, he said. Right. Okay. Thank you, Jason. First, he says he's introduced as a police detective who just wants to tag along and see how they work, which makes a little bit of sense, kind of what we're talking about. Sure. And then it's, then the, the crew becomes suspicious of him because they find maps and information that he has about the island that they're on.

And then he comes clean and says, listen, I'm not who I said I was. I'm here investigating Val Kilmer, the Department of Justice thinks he has too much power, basically. Now, here's what I will say. I don't remember if this is him because they didn't write down who wrote this, but I, I'm going to bet that it was LL. Cool J., when he goes, you all think your profilers, I'll profile you right now. What you say about me doesn't tell you about me. It tells me about you. Now, I could say your little gambling means you have an addictive personality. I could say I know you're sleeping with one of the guys in this room.

I could say you take charge of your team because you never had a leader in your own life. And you. When push comes to shove, you crack under pressure. Your partners can't depend on you. You don't belong here. And when he's profiling one of the women in the unit, right? This is, I believe, Patricia Velasquez, that's the actress's name. He goes, and you're sleeping with one of the guys.

Like, well, that's not a profiler thing. Because at one point, he's like, you have daddy issues. You do this. You're sleeping with one of the guys. That's not like, it's more detective work. It's not like, it's not psychologically. That's not what she's made of. It's just like, oh, yeah, you are fucking somebody here.

That's okay. And that's fine. It's a fine thing, but you can't sell that next to you have daddy issues. You've always cut left behind. Your birthday is September 19th. Yeah. It's not, that's not what we're doing here. But that's like, those are the kind of like, this movie is making all the shortcuts and broad strokes.

It's not interested in any of these people going deeper and actually trying to crack the case, which was disappointing because that really stays at the same level the whole time. Everybody is just in. inactive panic throughout. And they never... But here's my question. Why? I couldn't understand why they wouldn't assume that Val Kilmer was the killer. Same.

They do at one point. At one point. But then they let go of that so quickly. And it's like... Well, only because they find his body. Well, at the end. But so many people die before then. And I'm like, why are you assuming it's...

Also, Val Kilmer clearly did not stay for a life. bottle mold because they really got to tell you, no, no, no, that's him. Even though he doesn't really look the way that we think. That's him. And there's a lot. The movie really wants to pull from all of those, you know, seven and those grisly kind of. And so, and they're even trying to make this idea of like, oh, the puppet master is the

serial killer. And then some of the bodies are strung up like marionettes and stuff, like almost like a puppet master would. But most everybody else just dies. In a trap of some sort. Yes. Arrows. In a escape room type trap.

Indiana Jones style traps. Can I ask a question? So. We're just here asking questions, June. So they are brought to this island by Val Kilmer to find an actual serial killer. No. No. What?

He was setting up a final. This is the final. This is like their final exam. And it's like another one of the fake setups. Well, I know it's fake, but in the world of the fake set up. Oh, yes. I'm sorry. No, that they are finding a serial killer and that that next morning, and Val Kilmer says it's going to strike tomorrow.

You got to find the crime scene. I was waiting for that serial killer, that fake story, to somehow fold in to our real story. Wouldn't that be great? Well, because you would think that Val Kilmer, who has left the island or we assume he has left the island, has started to set up these traps. Where are those traps? And I think the first body is his trap. But then we also don't know. Oh, I see what you're saying.

The first body they find. Well, who is that body? Well, that's a mannequin. I thought that was a mannequin. Okay, got it. I don't know. That's a mannequin. Val Kilmer's body also, to me, looks like a man.

I know, I know. Because you did also text me, who is that body? What's her number? What's her deal? Who is that body? I mean, look, I'm always like, I very much like, Like Corey Feldman, I want to help bring young girls to Hollywood and just teach them the roads. But when they see that body, there's a tape player that goes off Christian Slater, because of course he's the leader of the group, goes over, turns off the tape.

And then a domino setup gets started. And all the dominoes start to fall and things are happening. And they stop and stare. And they watch. No one activates. Why wouldn't they stop it? They know that the entire, this is before they even understand that there's a zero killer in their midst. They understand that clearly is set up by the world of the simulation.

Why wouldn't they stop it? Right. Even if they were doing the simulate, even if this was just pure, like, low, no stakes simulation, you know, no physical stakes. Right. You know, they don't think they're going to be hurt or anything like that. They're still doing an absolute dog shit. of assessing this situation, of clearing the rooms, of looking for traps. Well, I guess they're profilers. Why would they know?

They blow up the escape boat just by tripping a tripwire that was very visible. You know, they are supposed to be the best of the best, and they're in fact the worst of the worst. And I would believe that these are the FBI profilers under Cash Patel. A thousand percent. Versus in the 2000s. Now, I will say this, that I don't trust anything that Christian Slater does because he, well, first of all, he got some sweet, uh, CS butt cheeks out there. We got to see some sweet, sweet cheese. We got to see that Slater Tush.

Yeah, a little Slater Tush. I was, but he proceeds to have sex in, you couldn't make a more open area. And resonant. Right. It must have been so loud to have sex in like the community. communal shower, open stone communal showers of the, everybody must have hurt. And by the way, this is also a island that is used for military training. No one's ever lived there.

It's just from military exercises. But yet when one of the guys is in a bed, there's all these like posters of naked women up on the wall as if it was someone's bunk. Could I figure that out? Or did he decorated it? And then I was like, or did he decorate it? Or did Val Kilmer decorate? Did Val Kilmer set the scene?

Like how many people pre-production are going to the island to set it up? And by set it up, I mean create ultra-realistic serial killer murder sites. You know what I mean? We know the Navy had just been there because they left the sitting ducks, you know? Again, I was waiting for the Navy to somehow get folded back in and for them to find something that was going to be important from the Navy. I never happened. Nothing. Nothing important ever happened.

And, you know, spoiler alert for the movie, that Killer is revealed to be Johnny Lee Miller for reasons that I still am unclear on. Totally confused. Well, I guess the question also is, like, there seems to be, like, obviously this final, there's a competition element to it, right? Because apparently, according to Clifton Collins, like, Val Kilmer is, like, writing his recommendations on his desk, and he happened to walk into, like, his,

teacher's office and read the, like, read the rex and know that, like, that Sarah is not being upgraded. So there's a little bit of competition there. Can I say something about Sarah being upgraded, though, Paul? Yeah. Her, the, one of the reasons she is not recommended to be a profiler is because she panics. Now that's going to come back to us later on. She panics. But again, I have to ask, who cares? If your job is mostly in an office, Sitting in front of the computer, panic away. Like, we don't need to medicate for that. Just continue to panic.

And do you work through it? Or don't, she doesn't have to, in order to fulfill the duties of a profiler, she, I don't think needs to be in the field, you know, doing gunplay. She can be in the office trying to crack the numbers go. That's the, I think the point of having the team is like, oh, the good with guns guy goes and does that. The people that are good at puzzles get to do puzzles. and that's a cohesive unit. Nope.

Nope. Everybody does guns all the time. But if you are to treat the movie as truth, it is revealed that Johnny Lee Miller, the whole reason why he has done this is, yes, he is a serial killer, who has infiltrated the FBI's serial killer profiling program to figure out who the most worthy person is

for him to check. challenge, and that is her. So he's like, oh, wouldn't it be the best coup for me? Like, I don't want to just, I don't want to just deal with it. I want to find the best of the best. So this has been for him a long time. Does he say that? Because that's interesting, because I could not for the life of me figure out what the

genesis. He says something like that. But are you saying, Paul, that he wanted sort of the most challenging prey? Yes. Okay. So here's what's. so crazy about him that even the fact that he penetrated the FBI. Now, both of his parents were murdered in front of him? Or it seems like both, well, we will know they were murdered by him later. But

when we meet him, it seems that they were just murdered. That alone to me, at 10 years old, that alone to me, it's like, I kind of want the FBI flagging that on some level. Right. You would think at a certain point, someone would be able to say like, hey, why was this parents murdered. Let's just look into that a little bit more. But maybe he's very, very good. I don't know. You know what I wish for? I wish that he had been the one who killed her little sister.

Yes. Well, there you would have something. Yeah. And it's, and he put Clifton Collins Jr. In the wheelchair. And he, what if he had connections to everybody that they didn't know about? What, or like the idea that they float for L.L. Cool J's character

is that, oh, are you doing this as revenge because you didn't passed the exam. Like, you're trying to get back. Like, did you flunk out? The FBI didn't want you. Like, I couldn't figure out Johnny Lee Miller's, you know, it's just not enough time is given to it at the end.

Like, what, what his, like, he puts his whole deal. Does he change accent? I was, I was, I, his accent was so slight that I was like, is this, I couldn't quite figure out if he. Well, I mean, it's strange because he is a British person. Yes. His, his character is American. And then when it is.

revealed he is Southern. Yeah. When the final twist comes, he starts to affect like a weird Southern drawl that wasn't there before. And I was like, I don't know what this is trying to tell me. There are notes of that Southern draw early on. But boy, does it come and it goes. Oh, I thought it was a different voice.

No, it was like, this is the real me now. No, it was sort of there at one point, but it is, he's playing fast and loose with that accent. I was also sort of amazed early on. And maybe this is just a product of like, movies used to feature like four white men on a team and no one blinked an eye, but there were so many of them. And they all looked so similar to me.

I genuinely couldn't keep track of them. Agreed. I was happy when some of them got killed at the beginning because I was like, I don't know that guy's deal. Well, but I was upset that the first person who dies is Christian Slater because I'm like, well, I understand who that is. I was shocked. But the guy who is like, then there's a gentleman who is, that's Clifton Collins, who is

in a wheelchair. So I'm like, that at least gives me another marker. Johnny Lee Miller's American, and I know who he is, because I know him as an actor. But then there's another British guy who is the guy whose head just pops right off of his body. What happens there? When they all wake up from the coffee? He looked like a robot. I thought it was going to be revealed that he was a West World robot because you saw strings in there that looked like.

Oh, God, Paul. I would love it. Can I ask something about Christian Slater's death? Why? So he's being sprayed with... Step out of the way. Yeah. Liquid nitrogen.

Nitrous. nitrogen, some sort of, it's a T2 situation. Did you just say step out of the way, Jason? Yeah, yeah. Okay. So step out of the way. It was as though he couldn't move, which I did have a question about. Like, is it paralyzing you somehow? Immediately paralyzing you. And then my next question is like with the rest of the team did not move to also just take that container, take that blaster, turn it. Everybody watches, everybody watches all the traps happen from their beginning, they're frozen until they're They don't try and intercede in any traps execution. They just watch it as if they are trapped and they're not. But here's the thing.

That is one canister of liquid nitrogen that's shooting at his ankles. Now, yes, he could have easily just stepped back, stepped out of the way, done anything. Throwing the top of his body down. Right. I don't even want to get into the fact that that is completely impossible. That would never happen. But the movie also posits the idea that if it starts at your ankles, it would freeze your body up to your head in seconds. In seconds and crack you like a doll.

He breaks like an icicle that drops onto the floor. He breaks in like so many pieces after being sprayed. I mean, if you've not seen the movie, imagine like a birthday party helium canister is just blowing. It's not like in T2 where he falls into or whatever, a vat of nitrogen or whatever. This is a spray of nitrogen that freezes him and he's able to talk. He's like, stay where you are. He's still giving commands and I'm like, stop talking. Take a step to your right.

Take a baby step to your right or someone just move that or turn it off, please. Now, here's, because honestly, I have to say, there was a part of me watching this because so many of are witnessing the traps and just watching the traps happen, there is a part of me that's like, oh my gosh, that's the horror of this movie. That's the scariest part. Yeah, right. You couldn't even do anything. Yes, is that when confronted with someone in pain, someone suffering, an event happening

before your very eyes, like people will freeze and watch and not intervene. That's horrifying. June, we've seen that numerous times on scaretimes. tactics. The premise of scare tactics, the horror prank show is like they put people in these situations and they often do as they are told or freeze. But I think the whole point of this program is at the level they're at, they would have already learned to push through that immediate freeze.

They would have already learned the skill sets and tools to not just be observers to these tragedies, but to in fact either intercede or. or get to it before it happens. Well, the opening scene is that. I mean, the opening scene is saying, hey, guys, don't freeze, be smarter. And yet they aren't. And I thought that his death was so bad

in the sense that he didn't do anything. I was like, oh, clearly, he's the serial killer. Like, he has set up some sort of contraption to make it look like his body broke into glass. Now, I will say this. You know, I know that you both love interior design, and I would love to show you that if you like interior design, you can actually purchase a broken Christian Slater.

And I think, Scott, can you pop that up there? This is the body. It comes on a special mount. It's on an auction house right now. Oh, my God. Yeah, the legs are separate. You can do the whole thing. Yeah, you can get in there.

Part of his face is peeling off. But again, that's a great centerpiece for a living room. That's the kind of thing that I feel like we should use our money to buy and then have it in the, how did this get made house? I would love it. Because I think a lot of people don't know that we all live together now. Yeah. I know. And it's so nice.

We all live together now in a content house. By the way. It's kind of just about how did this get made. I have become obsessed on Instagram. There is a wax museum that is auctioning off every one of their wax figures. And they're pretty conservative. Like they're not expensive to a certain degree where it's like all of a sudden. I'm like, can I get this Tom Cruise?

Can I get this Conan O'Brien? This Jay Leno. The Jay Leno one. The Jay Leno one was the one that I was so close to. Why? Why is the Jay Leno one the one you want? Because I think anyone would love a little Jay Leno in the house. Wait, it's not little, though, is my guest.

No, he's a life size. It's life size, yes. Because then you know what's going to happen. And June, this is for you. If you allow Paul to buy the wax figure of Jay Leno, he's then going to start saying, hey, I need an antique fire truck to go with the Jay Leno doll. I'm going to have to get a lot of cars. I really, sometimes I think about it.

Like, if I wasn't in his life, what his living order is. I mean, it would just be, you know. It's tricky. It would just, yes. He would be living in a house of horrors. Well, especially when you see, like, if you can get a Jay Leno for a thousand bucks, why not? Like, that's what life has opened up to. Without you, June, I feel like the 15-foot skeleton that comes out at Halloween is out year-round.

And is perhaps inside the house. We, well, we have seen many a time. Now, I will say, and I will take all the slings and arrows you want to throw at me, but that skeleton was brought to this home by Warren. That was my idea. But, but I will say that that skeleton is very static. And it has a point of view, and it's very beautiful. And our neighbors have to have one.

Yes. You know, so that's a different thing. And I think that's a beautiful spook and a beautiful scare. Yes, agree. What I worry about with Paul. I want a shirt that says a beautiful. spook and it's a big skeleton over somebody's edge. But what I really worry about with Paul, and it's honestly scary to think about is just

what if given no boundaries. Yeah. You know, what he would come up with, what items, what figurines, what stickers, what it is tricky for me. What kind of, I don't even, I can't even imagine. Oh, just the kinds of auctions that he would be registering for and what they would be I think what's always hard for me is when Paul comes home with things framed because it's like, it's like it's really hard because I'm like, well, God, it's already. And I have not done this for a long time.

He haven't done it for a long time. Yeah. I've been, I've been. You've been really good. But like it's really hard because it's like it's framed. And so when something gets framed, it feels like it's got to go up. I know exactly the piece that you're talking about. And, you know, in retrospect, in retrospect, those are things I would get now.

I mean, times changed. Like the most chilling, so to you, June, the most chilling words out of Paul's mouth are, I'm having the art hangers come tomorrow without you knowing why or for what, to hang what? Listen, I think at this point, we've been together for so long, like, I don't fear that happening anymore, you know, but we definitely, we definitely had a transitional period. There were moments. Now, back to this film, Mind Hunters. Can I ask you guys a question? Because like we've said, this is a, this is a Rennie Harlan movie who is like a real Autor of this schlocky era.

And then, you know, like we said, Val Kilmer, L.L. Cool J. There's Johnny Lee Miller. There's recognizable names. There's like, it's got a vibe that it's clearly expensive. They clearly spent money. I've never heard of this movie. Never. Never.

When I clicked it up, I was like, and I don't recognize any of these images. any of this art, I don't know what this is. And you know what I was so disappointed by, when it started and even being in that bar scene, I was like, this is right up my alley. Yep, right. Like, I love. This is going to be fun.

This is going to be so much fun. And I was so excited and I love the idea of they're all trying to out-profile each other. And, like, I was just like, oh, finally something for me, something for the girls, you know? But then, boy, did it devolve. Well, it really is. It's the kind of movie that structurally,

needs the team to come together, but they never do. It's as if the movie never starts. It's just that people just start dying. Nobody ever knows why. Nobody ever... It also doesn't do that thing, which some movies do, which is let us the audience in on information that the main characters don't have.

So that we know the trouble they're in before they do. They don't let that happen. It's pure discovery and chaos. spreads where, you know, when the island is brought up in the outer banks, Croatine or whatever. Yeah. Croatoan, whatever that was. Yep.

And then, first of all, what the fuck was that? That doesn't even fold back in. It was just to me. You would think it would be important information dump, and it's not. It doesn't matter ultimately. It is not why he's. Yeah. not why he's doing this. He's doing this to find the perfect

it has nothing, no bearing on the rest of the plot. But again, when it's mentioned, I'm like, oh, okay, this is the movie that we're getting like revenge or figuring out a mystery of what happened on this island. Okay. But you can't like give us, you can't give us busy work because if you're going to take a moment to explain an island and a mysticism around it or a story like, we're like, well, that's important. It's not like life.

Like, you know, it's like, well, every bit of information here is going to be building to a larger point. Which, again, why set up Christian Slater as the creepy guy? Yeah. And then also you kill him in such a way that it's like it would have to be insane for him to even have survived. Oh, I used a robot. I did this. So it's like, it very... Or if he had just not been standing exactly where he was standing.

That's the other thing is like these traps are... It's like the game mouse trap. They are so random and but require such specific situations to unfold perfectly to the second that is just preposterous. Like just people moving through the world would not fall into these rhythms and this exact setups. But I guess the thing that I keep on coming back to is even like where's the mystery? Like kill people in a way where they're not definitely dead. when you get like three harpoons to the chest, yeah, you're dead. So you start taking people off the table in a way where it's like, oh, I don't know.

Because I thought at one point when Clifton Collins like crawls into the freezer room, by the way, they do collect Christian Slater's body and put it like in like they, they morgue it up. I'm like at this point, do we need to collect all the pieces. I feel like we should be solving this. Like something's going on here. Like we don't have time to get the gurney, to load up the gurney, to build up the gurney, to bring it into the thing. It seems like he's going to be frozen for a bit.

I guess you're right. He was frozen. So that's kind of sort of. Why didn't Clifton Collins just stay in the free? Like here's the other thing is once everybody's so suspect of each other and once people are really dying, everybody should just hide. Oh my God. Why did he get out of the freezer?

Everybody just go hide on your own. He was told to hide. He should wait it out. Yes. Wait it out. But the thing that the thing that actually really made me insane. And I wanted to throw the remote at the very end when L. Cool J and Sarah are there. And there is a helicopter in sight, but they've just, you know, they made it out.

And she says, when do you know the situation is cleared, resolved something? Basically, like, don't party until you're on. When do you know the situation is cleared? And they both say to each other on the ride home. Yeah. And yet, but they're not on the ride home yet. They're not on the ride home. They're not on it.

One more twist. Yeah. There's going to be another twist. The chopper just blew up. Yeah. They're not in there. Now, was that intentional to think, like, I didn't think so, Jason? I didn't think so.

I don't think the movie's smart enough. Well, but I think that movie. It really made me angry. I was like, how fucking dare you. You don't even need that helicopter to take off. Just put them in there somehow. Yep. Right.

The same day you're shooting the helicopter coming to the island. Just shoot that the other thing, too, like the two of them leaving off. Well, wait. So now you're just a line producer of this movie? I'm just trying to make. We've got the chopper for one day. We're going to do in the morning. We're going to, because of Southern exposure, we're going to be looking.

Oh, my God. Paul just wanted to do the one-liner for this movie. Are you giving us day out of dates for this? I sometimes look, and this is the problem that I have now is like, not only am I looking for like that, I'm like, but why didn't they do? They could have done it. They had it. Were they running over that day? Like, when I start to look at it, when I look at it as a line producer, I really, that's,

That's another level of movie watching. Like, I do think of that often. I'm like, well, how did they get over there? Why would they do that? One of the things that I think could have been a theme for the movie that is not. And it is actually the theme of the movie is after the cold open when Christian Slater and Catherine Morris are downloading with Val Kilmer and he's like, basically, here's how you fucked it up. This and that and this and that. You missed this clue. You missed that clue.

You took longer than anybody else. Blah, blah, blah. He's dressing them down. She's like, I don't understand. What could we have done to save the girls? Right. And he says nothing. Girls already dead. They couldn't have been saved. This test was to get you used to not winning. Right. And I was like, oh, whoa, wait a minute. I know. I struggled with that as well. That's what this is about? This is about not winning. The best? Okay, so there's something, and I think I rewounded and watched it twice because there was something very disturbing about, and really unsettling about Val Kilmer's, like, world view on crime. Because I think what he was saying is, hey, someone gets murdered, you find out, just a regular old murder, you'll find out in 48 hours if you can get them.

But if you can't, then it's done. Then it's done. You'll never find them. It's very unlikely. Put that over there. They're never going to get. that's never getting solved, which I was like, okay. And then he's like, but if it's a serial killer, his point of you almost seem to be,

you want them to actually kill someone. Because then you can start building a profile. Start building a profile. But they never ever. Wait, and it almost seems like you want more and more people to die so that that profile gets clear. I think that's the kind of shit that LL Cool J is investigating. And as he should. And, and by the way, then that would also make Val Kimmer the best killer for this thing.

He should be a serial killer. That's the whole thing. Because what this movie devolves to is this moment, the least exciting I'm pricking my finger to get blood out. I was like, what is it? I'm watching a montage of people like, Plink, put a little blood to thing. Terrible. Now, as a line producer, how quickly do you think they were able to shoot all that? Maybe it wasn't even their hands.

You could bring that really quick. You actually, yeah, you bring it, you shoot that on another stage while they're doing, well, they're setting up some arms. Oh, that's a skeleton tour. That's a, yeah. Do you guys think on this island? Okay, this is an island, a remote island that is used as a training facility for the Navy. How did all these cats get there? Well, I feel like cats are on islands, right? Isn't that like a thing that Alcatraz has a bunch of cats? I think, oh, does it? Okay. I think, yeah, I think there is something about cats. When they wake up in the morning and the cat is dead, hung. Oh, I didn't like that. And there's a badge stuck into it. I was like, that's the moment that I was like, this crew needs a joke story. Okay.

You know, because I was like, what rank is that cat? I didn't know the cat was one of the agents. Is that the cat's badge? I do want to also just talk about that from the point of view of it doesn't make any fucking sense because Sarah is brushing her teeth in the bathroom. And the lights are off. And then when the lights come on, the cat is literally hanging behind her. So I don't even understand how she approached the sink without seeing a cat hanging from the ceiling. Why don't, why don't you have to have a brushing your teeth?

Just have her walk into the room and see the cat like, ah! Yeah. Like, why are we? Everything is, everything is needlessly stepped out. You know what it would have been cool if the Navy, knowing that the FBI was coming, had also set a bunch of traps. Oh, interesting. Wait. So you're saying, okay.

So I just want to get that. But fun traps. Right. So basically the Navy is like, hey, you motherfuckers kick us out of our island once a month or once a year. So we're going to sabotage it for you on top of your sabotage. Here's the way I would rewrite it. So there's this like real kind of rivalry between the Navy and the FBI. Got it. Who's going to use the island.

Classic rivalry. And so they've set up all of these. It's heated, you could say. Yes, it's a heated rivalry. They've set up all of these traps. but they're fun, right? Okay. They're sort of like more like pranks,

but they keep on derailing our crew because they don't know which is which. Right, so it could be like a pranker or a serial. And then the Navy ends up being able to figure out that they're in trouble because some of their traps either didn't go off the way they expected it or something happened, which like the Navy is, by the way, actually, as I'm saying this,

who was watching those cameras? cameras that were on. Val Kilmer. But no, but he didn't he take off the island? Oh, we guys, he didn't take off the island. That's what they reveal is that he stayed on the island and with other FBI agents and was running the op until, presumably, Johnny Lee Miller goes, finds them, kills them all, and strings him up because Johnny Lee Miller is the puppet master.

But at the, but at the same point in this, okay, sorry. At the same point, it never happened. It never even started. And so his crew was immediately killed. And I guess the question is, so when was his crew immediately killed that night? Wouldn't it have been fun to cut into the control room and get to see Val Kilmer holding court and being like, let's do this, let's cue that, let's set up this, let's do that. For a little bit of that beginning of Act 2, have there be like a little, you could still believe, oh, wait a minute, maybe Val is the big bad.

Yeah. And he's, you know, because the team thinks he flew off the island, but we, the audience, no, he's still there. And maybe this is his thing. Maybe he's trying to eliminate them. Maybe he thinks they're coming for his job, or maybe he's just lost his mind or any of the things that you cast Val Kilmer to represent should be present. But in fact, none of it is.

None of the kooky crazy Val Kilmer stuff. He just gives a speech at the beginning and that's it, you know? And none of the fun antics of the Navy. No, and no Navy pranks. And so, but again, I guess what I'm looking at, too, is like, from, again, not to look at it from a line producer's point of view, but if I'm a, if I'm a military line producer, I'm like, well, we just wasted all this money. Like, because I clearly Velcomer had a, I think military line producers love wasting all the money. All right. Well, I mean, I'm just looking at it from a bunch. I'm like, this guy made me rent out this island and they didn't even get there. All the profilers are dead. Now I got to do it again?

See, for me, I'm looking at this from. of a wardrobe department. Okay, got it. Okay, so tell me. Yeah. And I'm like, you know what? We could have differentiated who a lot of these people were with wardrobe changes. You know, like, have someone be in like a Mets jersey or something that is truly identifiable

so that you can really start to tell some of these guys apart. Well, because you want a little bit of like personality in these guys. Now, at the end, I mean, they keep on blaming L.L. Cool Jail J. It can't be more clear that it's not L.L. Cool J, right? Like, it's, like, he passes every test, but yet Sarah beats the shit out of him. But wait, why does, I may be revealing that my own dumbness here, why does L.L. Cool J shoot that one guy in the, like, he shoots Johnny Lee Miller in the street, then that's Sarah's. I didn't understand why. I didn't either. Okay, oh, thank God, that makes me feel good.

Unless L.L. Cool J. figured it out. If L.L. Cool J has figured it out, he, thinks I'm I'm killing the killer. But then you would need a moment when she starts beating the shit out of him. It's like, hey, I figured it out. It's not me. It's him. And he starts to prove it. Again, the only profiler in the mix, if he does do that.

But here's a question I have, though, is like, is she, so she is able to find out that El Ocould is not the killer because she puts that special like blue light on his hands. Which is, by the way, not profiling. on the clock. Right, and that powder from, but the powder she uses is from the writing on the backs of their jackets, which really frustrated me because they've all touched those jackets. Correct.

And not only that, not only that, Johnny Lee Miller, when he picks up his hands and it's revealed that the liquid or the whatever is on his hands, it's all over his hands. Right. How did he not notice? I don't know. That clock must have been slick with the liquid. Like grabbing at it on every level.

Well, so when did she turn back those clock? I mean, I don't know. What was the cigarette made out of, by the way? Oh, it's got acid in it. I mean, they say it had acid. I mean, but the amount of acid. How did he insert acid into a cigarette in like minutes? And by the way, not even like he's put so much acid in the cigarette that if the, if the cigarette

touched the ground at burned through. So that would mean that if she touched it to take it out, her fingers would have just melted off, right? Yes. How did the cigarette exist in a pack of cigarettes without the acid just dripping straight through the paper packaging? It seemed to have been activated by the lighter. I guess so.

I was also thinking the whole time, like as soon as shit started to hit the fan at 10 a.m., I was like, sweetie, go have a cigarette. Yeah. Like, it is not that, like, please, fuck the patch. Like, go have your cigarettes. You are about to die. Wow. Okay.

So you're in that. Also, these are, some of this stuff, too, is if this movie was at all fun, I wouldn't be looking so critically at it. If I'm confused. I would be willing to be like, oh, and I loved it when she lit the cigarette and it was acid and she melted into the thing because that caused this to happen. It was so fun and it really paid this off or whatever. No, because it seems so random, each thing seems so random.

And I know that every kill is tailored to that person's particular weakness. Hers is cigarettes and this person's is panic. And he's trying to push everybody's buttons. But it's not really there. It's not satisfying in any way, you know. Well, I think that, you know, look, does this movie work? Absolutely not. Is it well acted?

Probably not to the degree that I need it to be because I'm not ever feeling the only time I felt tense in this entire movie and not frustrated was the moment when Christian Slater came up to the car window. I was like, uh-oh, cool, what are we going to see? That's the only tension moment in the movie, because the rest of it is really like kind of bare-knuckle brawling. It's like there's no, like, you know, that famous scene in one battle after another where, you know, they're doing a blood test. So cinematic, so cool.

Love it. And it's like the same thing. Rennie Harlan, Paul Thomas Anderson. But it's like, how did you make the most exciting detective? moment is a machine telling you who is the person. And guess what? The machine's wrong. Yeah. And the machine is, how? How did he get the machine

to be wrong? Because he put blood under her finger nails. But he put blood, he moved the blood, I guess. It's really, wow, okay. It's unsatisfying in a way that like, you know, when you pull at the threads of the reveal of at the end of usual suspects, you know? And it's like, oh,

wow, he really did all of these things and you kind of get glimpses of all of the ways in which he kind of was able to do it or you it all kind of falls into place none of that is present here no like it's a it's a big reveal without any supporting data or any supporting imagery that helps us understand how johnny lee miller how and why john i guess we're meant to believe he's just wants to kill here's the other Well, he wants the best person. He wants a good opponent. Wouldn't it be

Val Kilmer? You would think. Right. He seems to know the most. But I think that I was also really shocked that as soon as they suspected someone of being the what do they call it? Unsub. Oh yeah, unsub.

By the way, the original title of the film Unsub. Unsubscribe. Oh, my. I mean, by the way, they're like, oh yeah, the studio thought that Mind Hunters is better. You think unsub? What are you going to see this week? Unsub?

Unsub. Unsub. So is it a submarine? Is it a submarine movie? Unsub actually makes me believe every bit of bad writing that we have having a problem with. It's like if you after writing a great script, they're like, unsub. Like no. No.

That level like you didn't do it. You didn't do enough work. Okay. But if they all, as soon as they accuse someone of being the unsub, the entire crew, immediately pulls their gun out on them. And it looks like they're about to shoot them. And I'm like, I know you are like a member of law enforcement on some level. Like, how about detain them?

How about arrest them? How about take a set of handcuffs and handcuff them? Like, I guess they do that with Al-Col-Dry. But I'm like, it seems like the immediate response is you have to die now. Yes. Immediately. Like, everybody panics all the time. Well, they are panicked.

They are. And they are meant to be the. elite. And at no point are they like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. We are the best of the best. We need to get our act together and work together to solve this problem and get out as a

group. And in fact, it's it truly is everyone for themselves. Everyone is acting so weirdly selfishly. They're not a good team. And maybe you could, maybe if we rewatched it, you would see Johnny Lee Miller. No, Jason. Don't give it that. Sowing Discord or

something like that. But it's just not in the, it's not there. Well, can I just say this? If I was going to go back in the movie, the only thing I would be watching is Johnny Lee Miller's jacket because clearly he's held everything in his jacket. His jacket is, oh, I got remotes. I got transistors. Like, he would be buzzing.

He is, he is wearing, like, I've seen this before, like, Jason, you might have seen this on some travel websites. These, like, travel jackets where you can put them on, but you can also shove your computer back. So it looks like a jacket. It's got like harnesses and 43. pocket. Yeah.

Charging cables. Has he killed since he was 10 years old? I have to imagine, yes. Yeah. Wouldn't it have been great if it turns out that the, that he is responsible, he is the case study that Christian Slater and Catherine Morris, that house, that that's his murder. It will, like the, the person they're studying in profiler class is in fact part of the class, you know?

They should have made. They should, yeah, they should have been the most elusive serial killer. And it's like, let's recreate his last crime scene. Let's do this. I will say this. She doesn't even profile him at the end. The way she gets them at the end is through, I mean, literally just fingerprinting. Like, it's, there's nothing about it.

She doesn't go, of course, you did this and you did this. She just figures it out because of the fingerprints. So it's like, she doesn't get a win. She's not even good. And he just confesses. Right. She doesn't do anything. She does, she's looking, she is looking at L.L. Cool J's hands. Does not see the glowy substance, looks confounded.

And he holds his hands up to her. Dummy. I really believe, it's me. Had he not done that, she would never have checked his fingers. I think she would have thought she was the murderer. I think she might have been like, oh no, did I do it? She would hold her gun out on herself. I'll take myself out just in case.

Oh, my God. That's the best ending. And then he's like, I killed my parents and nobody ever asked me. Nobody ever said, did you do it or why? Nobody ever asked me. He just wants to be recognized as the murderer, I guess. Again, I want to talk about this from the other perspective of saying, L.L. Cool J. jumps on board.

I'm here to monitor because he's been spending too much money on props and renting houses and fly sound effects. And then what you reveal is, I wanted to be with the best of the best because I am a serial killer. So he coordinated his appearance there because he is a master of serial killer. And he's like, I needed to do a cat and mouse. But yet there are no clues. It's really just countdown clocks. But again, it's like there's no reason to feel excited about any of these choices. Also, I just never understood where the clocks came from.

If you had told me like, oh, yeah, my parents died at the strike of midnight, or I killed them at the strike of midnight, or I was assaulted by a clock. Like, I don't know. I needed some. I was assaulted by a clock, another great t-shirt. I needed something. Why he cared my clock so much? Imagine the scene that we never saw, which is Johnny Lee Miller packing to go to the island. It's like, it's a dozen watches.

It's 500 cars. By the way, all those, they're all not automatic, but they're all manual clocks. So, again, if you're next to Johnny Lee Miller, all you're hearing is, like, he is a walking time bomb, literally. Also, one of the traps is like, I think, three crossbows. Like, that one guy gets hit with three arrows. Didn't need that. That are fired. I don't know from what, but I got to assume crossbows.

Okay, but here's my question about that trap. The initial trap, before that. That trap set off is someone getting electrocuted in the water. Oh, my favorite line in the whole movie. Which was? Like so. Like basically it's like this action scene where he's trying to get to get to reach down. Oh, my God.

First of all, that was a very long sequence of watching him shoot out a cement wall. And he says the breaker room's behind there. And as he's shooting, I'm. Like, is he just going to try to shoot his way in there? Are we going to be watching this for hours? I thought so too. It was so drawn out. And then you realize, no, he's just shooting sort of like footholds for him.

Hand and footholds so he can boulder, like, so he can free solo from one room to another so he can throw the circuit breaker so that he and Clifton Collins Jr. won't be electrician. I tell you, when he started to free solo, I was like, I can't take that. Wouldn't the lights in the water flip the circuit breaker on their own? Wouldn't that surge flip the circuit breaker and turn it off? That's what I was like. I don't know. I think that that's an old building and I feel like there's circuitry.

But here's my question, though. So initially the trap was you're going to be electrocuted by the water. But then, and nobody was, nobody, I think, happened to be. Right. But then there's a double trap. Well, there were two watches, remember. Oh, I don't remember, Jason. So before that trap, before that trap, they found two watches.

So that was a jukelet. So which says this is the next one's going to be a double murder, which it looks like it's going to be for a. I see. So you first think it's LL Colre and what's his face. You think it's going to be those two guys that are in the water. What's that? But then it is just one. Yes.

Oh. Because they survived. The first one didn't go off. But again, it would have been three. If both L.O. Cool J and Clifton Collins Jr. had died in the electrocution and those guys shut the water off and got the crossbow arrows, three people would have died. Right. He could have been done. The movie, like, it's all it's like he could have like, so I guess at any given point, the movie could have been over. Yes.

Or at any given point, the movie could have started. Both could have started and finish. The movie exists in like liminal space. Okay. It's time out of time. It really is. So, but here's my question, though. I know he references this and there's a flashback to Johnny Lee Miller at the front of the line, on the front lines heading toward that boat.

But what is the justification for why he was in the front when the bomb goes off on the boat? I think so he can set off the bomb. Even though it was a very simple tripwire. Retroactively, now that we know he's the bad. I think he needs to blow up that boat so they can't get off. He needs. So I think he's purposefully sabotaging. He was the closest one to it.

I know, but he's also crazy. That's true. But I think he probably figured it all out. I mean, he seems, again, say what you will about Johnny Lee Miller. He's planned a lot of stuff. And he, and with very, who knows how. Why are we drilling down on three murders versus two? Yeah.

He did plan a lot of stuff and a lot of stuff worked. He's pretty effective. Yeah. And when I say it's like the game Mousetrap, that is what it's like. It is like everything feels on the verge of being a Rube Goldberg machine, a Rube Goldberg murder machine, which is the name of my punk rock band. I love that. And it really is like so convoluted, you know, like the one, the crossbow one, that makes the most sense. Turn this wheel.

Crossbow, go. Great. Okay, I love that. some of the other ones are so weirdly like truly nonsensical. Why train his blood? Why? And why write all of those numbers in the blood to communicate? He's a real sickle, guys.

You ever profile of anybody? I mean, I know a lot about this world. But they don't, they have no interest in solving any of the mysteries. They just want to find the traps. Here's the thing. But here's the thing. They should have really started. not just pointing fingers and trying to shoot each other and blaming each other,

but really started to try to find out a lot about each other. Well, right, because that's the movie. Absolutely. And it's like, well, Johnny Lee Miller, like, why did you, what were your parents like? Like, what happened? And also, why did he kill them? Yeah, yeah. Because he's a sicko.

That's all we need to know. We just need to know he's a killer. A 10-year-old sicko, Paul? Hey, I don't smell him. I don't smell him. I just tell him. Oh, boy. Oh, God. I'm just telling you what the what is.

Look, obviously we had opinions about this movie. People are there are the different opinion. Wolves of Glendale, play us in. Paul and Jason and June talk a lot about what makes a movie good or not. But everyone knows they're actually full of sheep. We need a second opinion. What's what they're talking about? We need a second opinion.

Give me a second. Give me a second. We need a second opinion. So, surprisingly, Jason, earlier in the podcast, you said, I didn't ever heard of this movie. Many people have not. This is one of the lowest scene films that we've done in a long time. I know this because only 735 reviews for a movie that came out 20 years ago. That's pretty low for us.

77% are five-star reviews. And, yeah. And, you know, look, this is... So the people that found it loved it. Well, yes. And, you know, and a lot of them are just taking a lot of anger out on the people who didn't like it. You know, they don't listen to those couch potato critics who gave it one star. It's better than that, right?

We've read of those a million times. But I'm just going to kind of hit ones that I thought were a little bit better. like Patricia Fentress, who titled her review, Gotta Say, I outright love this film. Dot, dot, dot, dot, and you will too, I'm sure. Now, Patricia writes, this was an amazing movie. I have to be honest, when I saw the DVD on the shelf, I wasn't too sure about it.

The cover caught my attention, and so did the title. So I picked it up, took a look at the cover, and a little better saw one of my favorite rappers and actor was in it. And I said, hmm. And I took a look at the preview in the back. And after reading the preview, I was still left a little unsure. But I was interested because LL Cool J was in it. I thought about it for a bit because I was a little disappointed in some of LL's earlier movies, you know, Deep Blue C, caught up and H2O. But I said, hell, I'll try it. And after watching the movie, I am glad I picked it up because it is for sure going into my growing DVD archive for good.

If you like LL Cool J, like I do, you will for sure love his acting in this one. And if you like really good whodunits cop movies, movies that keep you guessing and scratching your heads, or movies leaving you saying, I would never have thought of that, or I never knew, or saw that coming, or really did decent action movies or thrillers, then this is a movie for you. You will for sure love this movie. Or even if you want to try to get into one of those kinds of movies, this is kind of a great one to start off with. It for sure left me floored with my mouth open saying, no freaking way. How in the hell?

And just left in awe. I cannot say how much I enjoyed this movie. It is a must see. Wow. I mean, not just an incredible review, but it beautifully acted. Yes. I mean, one of the best. I mean, really, I will say, like, you brought that to life.

Yeah. And because you're just listening at home, but if you were to be watching Paul really find the new answer, find this, the truth of inside of this performance. That's all I can do. You know, this is the way I kind of am able to get my acting out. You know, it's like they don't pay me to act. They pay me to wait. I'll act for free whenever you get a chance.

It's so interesting, I will say, now that I'm. thinking about it. L.L. Cool J, I think, stealthily becoming how did this get made also? Absolutely. And by the way, I love watching him on screen. Oh, he's so watching. He's so endlessly watchable. You know, my parents made me destroy my L.L. Cool J. album

when we were on a Born Again Christian moment, because they had heard about L.L. Cool J. And it was the bad album, you know, so it was early. LL and and man I was a real rough moment because I saw my like I in my mind if I could wear like the black leather pants and the big chain I would have a Kengel hat I would have done all that stuff

and you didn't you couldn't convince your mom that ladies love cool jane I mean I was trying to I thought that she would be open to that but no she wasn't um and that's heartbreaking you know and I and I makes me so mad like as a parent now I'm like I wish you had just never gotten those albums to have a kid get them and then have to destroy them. Oh, yeah. I had to destroy three albums. Three albums were destroyed on three different occasions. One was poisons.

Look what the cat dragged in. Okay. I had to break that album over my knee and then throw it in the trash tan. A vinyl? A vinyl. Like, also, just take it from your child and walk away with it. Like, the fact that you had to do the act. Take it out of circulation.

Yeah. And it was a low garbage day, so I saw it in the garbage for quite some time. Like, you know, so that was tricky. You have to stop. You have to stop. This is heartbreaking. This is too much for me. Well, and then the other one was in excess suicide blonde. That was a CD because my mom thought it was promoting suicide.

Oh, okay. Even though that song is not about promoting. It's not at all that. No. Because I was like, in excess makes no sense. That CD was just taken from me. I didn't have to destroy it. But I had the case but never had the CD again.

And then the LL CoolJ was tricky because LL CoolJ was a tape. To tape over it? No, it was a tape that was like bought at the store, so it wasn't like that. And I had to smash it with a hammer. I remember where it was on my front porch. I honestly cut, cut. Stop the recording. I cannot take any more.

That was a, that was that, the LL Cool J was the one that hurt the most because I just loved it so much. Do you think there's a listener? Do you think there's anybody who listens to this podcast for whom they discovered it at a young age and their parents said, you can't listen to this? Like, are we the LL Cool J to anybody out in the audience? Were you a young person who was told this is for grownups or something? I've talked to many people. who tell me that they listen to this with their kids, but then their hand is very closely on the volume button. Because they never know when it's going to be.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. But they are, they are taking that risk. Yeah. Okay. Because we're not a dirty, dirty show, but every, like, I think it's less about cursing and more about the sex. No, it's really just language, you know. But I'm so, I'm so curious if there's anybody, if you're out there, you know.

Let us know if your parents. Let us know. Let us know if we were ever forbidden. in your household. I will read you one other review just because it was pretty good. This is from, we had to go to IMDB to find more reviews because Amazon was a little empty. We went to IMDB and found this one by Sweet, Lovely, Crazy Butterfly, who also reviewed in 2005. Both of these are from 2005, these reviews.

I have been reading comments where people say some situations are over the top and that they act silly and do stuff that are hard to believe. Well, seeing as they are professional profilers and must have great minds, what did you expect? Of course, the whole plot was a bit dramatic, but hey, the dude is crazy and brilliant. What did you expect? It's a fantastic movie, and I fail to see why people are so into putting down great movies. I bet some saw it twice just to find something wrong. Then again, I agree. some actors could be different, but the whole team fits perfectly.

So why the hell are you complaining? In my opinion, the best part was when they all fall asleep because of the coffee. And when Sarah changes the time to stay 15 minutes behind, really clever stuff. And Nick's death was the most well thought out, in my opinion. Dot, dot, dot, that, great job indeed. 10 out of 10. What if one single person had said, I don't drink coffee? You know what I mean?

Like, oh, I'm just going to hydrate. I'm just going to drink water. Yeah, yeah, I don't need to get to. Just one. Yeah, I have a weird reaction to caffeine. I don't do coffee. You know, like, I've never been in a room with whatever it is, six or seven other people. And every person is like, yep, coffee.

Let's go. I was right in my thought that this was shot primarily because a lime producer saw an easy way in. It was because this is a place, a fake village that they were able to. get used by the Dutch government. So it's a fake village where riots are simulatory. The Dutch government. Yes. Wow.

Yeah. And so you can actually see a lot of Dutch writing if you look closely at the post or some of the wall. Funny. I love, see, that's, boy, I like that. There's something interesting about that. But there's also something that makes no sense. It's really hard to put a serial killer story inside of all.

only law enforcement. Like, there are no civilians being killed by Johnny Lee Miller, right? Like, he's only preying on FBI agents, right? A hundred percent, that would be, yeah. And that's weird, because you don't have that it could happen to anybody fear. He is purposefully going after the best of the best. So it really doesn't make any, you would think that he would be levered. killing innocent and there should be something he's doing with endangering innocent

if they were in a trap situation where they had to find a serial killer in the in the I mean again not that not saying that even as a joke but put them in a live situation where there could be a lot more here's what it is here's what it is even with the circumstances that there are that we have the Navy is still there there's there have been a series of deaths on this naval base on this island that that the Navy so far has been unable to figure out, so they're bringing in the best of the best profilers. And they've got to figure out,

and then you find out it's one of their own. And he's been going and killing Navy people and who knows? I don't know what, but that they're, I guess then they are not innocence really either. I'm trying to, it doesn't matter. Here's what I will say. So much work has been put into getting this script back, but everyone agreed to this movie and worked their asses off.

L.L. Cool J., lost 40 pounds, traveled with the Philadelphia Police Department for weeks to figure out how to play this character. Clifton Collins Jr., he decided to just take a wheelchair out to Hollywood Boulevard and acted in this way to make sure that he was playing it accurately. Here's the two things that I thought you would really like. Gerard Butler was supposed to play the Johnny Lee Miller role,

but then dropped out. It was like, I'm out. Would have been great. Now, the original cast that they wanted, it was supposed to be Ryan Philippi, Reese Witherspoon, and their boss was going to be either Christopher Walken, Martin Sheen, or Gary Busey. Not bad. Not bad. Not bad. And of course. And everybody younger. That's like a younger skewy. Which I think is a little bit more fun. The other thing that was interesting is apparently there's an

alternate ending where LL Cool J kills Johnny Lee Miller's character. And I have a feeling, just reading that now for the first time, that that's what we see at the And, oh, no, I guess it's a... Well, Johnny Lee Miller's wearing a bulletproof vest? I don't know. That's how he gets away with that. But, like, what if L.L. Cool J had just shot him in the head? No, one's doing headshots.

No, yeah, nobody's putting one in the brain, uh, a la Johnny Casper in Miller's Crossing, uh, always put one in the brain. Nobody's doing that. Or John Wick, you know, body shot, body shot, headshot. You see this? What are we doing here? And now, you know what? You may like mine.

hunters, but I'm going to stick with Ali Walker, Julian McMahon, and Robert Davy. Those are my profilers. Four seasons. Four seasons. Any final thoughts on this movie? This was, I will say, because we're getting there, not worth it. No. You know, not really worth it at all.

My favorite, the thing that I loved the most, I love this era of boxy Volvo that when they, in the opening cold open, the whole thing takes place in a old school boxing Volvo station wagon. I was like, give me this. I love it. I had one of those. Oh, you did?

Yeah. For a little spell, we had one of those. Wow. You bring them back. Yes. People think people, like, I feel like car companies think we want these sleek looking, you know, curvy lines on cars. They all look the same now.

Yeah. And we don't want that. We want unique looking cars. Even if they're not the most aerodynamic. Who cares? I mean, who cares? If the movie did anything, it did that, which is to make us think about car design and representation in the automobile industry. I don't know what to say about this.

Again, I think it was just hard for me because I was so excited and I thought it was for me and then it wasn't. The setup put so many interesting things into motion, including values. Kilmer. I was like, fuck, Val Kilmer's going to be in this. And I was excited about Christian Slater. Everything that I thought was going to happen didn't happen, but not in a good way. I agree. I will say one other thing, because it did remind me so much of law-abiding citizen, that if you've not listened to our episode a few weeks ago from last looks, somebody from the film, I can't name who, they asked to be anonymous, gave us some great details about some of those those gimmicks and effects and what went in behind them and a whole bunch of stuff.

Oh, that's cool. And also sent me a picture. And Jun just will mean nothing to you. But the rap shirt was the gun from the funeral gun, the one that like pops up, the robot gun. Yeah. That's that was the rap. That was the rap. Yeah, they knew what they were making.

All right. Fun. Well, pleasure seeing you both here as always. Wow. We really did it. We really did it. Thanks so much for listening to How to This Get Made. If you have a correction or omission from this episode that you want us to hear,

well, you can leave us a voicemail, 619, P-A-U-L-A-U-L-A-S-K, that 619, Paul Ask, or write a comment on our Discord at discord.g-G-G-S-D-T-G-M. Tune in next week to listen to our Last Looks episode. Will we respond to all of the best messages that you have left for us? And we'll announce next week's movie that we'll be covering on the show. Plus, Jason is always joining me on Last Looks to chat about our favorite TV shows, movies, music, books, whatever is on our mind. Sometimes we just hang out.

And if you need even more, how did this get made before Friday's new episode, know that we re-release classic episodes from the vault every single Tuesday. If you listen on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, please make sure you are subscribed to our feed and you have automatic downloads turned on in the show's settings. That really helps us, and we appreciate it. So make sure you got those automatic downloads turned on. And lastly, I got to give a huge thanks to our behind-the-scenes team. I'm talking about our producers.

Scott Sani, Molly Reynolds, our engineer, Casey Holford, and our social media manager, Zoe Applebaum, we will forever be thankful to the one and only April Hallie. That's all I got, people. See you next week on Last Looks. Bye for now.