Loremen Podcast - Loremen S6Ep14 - The Beckoning Spectre of Llanuwchllyn

Episode Date: May 1, 2025

The wind whistles. The rain pours incessantly. It is also night time. Alasdair shelters in the only place he can in this bleak moor - under a big stone. But who's that fella coming down the track? The figure with a lantern and a slouch hat (look it up, it's the one with the fancy brim, not a beanie). Yes, it's James of course, with a terrifying tale from Wales! This episode was edited by ⁠Joseph Burrows - Audio Editor⁠ Join the LoreFolk at ⁠patreon.com/loremenpod⁠ ⁠ko-fi.com/loremen⁠ Check the sweet, sweet merch here... ⁠https://www.teepublic.com/stores/loremen-podcast?ref_id=24631⁠ @loremenpod ⁠youtube.com/loremenpodcast⁠ ⁠www.instagram.com/loremenpod⁠ ⁠www.facebook.com/loremenpod Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Lawmen, a podcast about local legends and obscure curiosities from days of yore. I'm James Shake Shaft. And I'm Alistair Beckett King. And today, Alistair, we're going to Wales. To the Moors. It's a wet summer's night. So wet you've put an H in there. Yes, and it's so wet that you've decided

the best thing that you can do is hide under a boulder. Oh. Yes, and then what's that coming towards you? Oh, Alistair. Hopefully it's help. A friendly face. It's the tale of the beckoning spectre. Ah.

G-g-g-g. So Alistair, I've got a real... Hello, Gels. Hello, Alistair. I've got a real spooky one for you. Okay, I'm ready to be spooked. I couldn't... I couldn't be more ready to be spooked. I've got a real spooky one for you. Okay. I'm ready to be spooked. I couldn't, I couldn't be more ready to be spooked.

This is from the book Haunted Wales. Wales the country. I was just about to ask. You know me so well. I wanted to see a spooky blowhole. Hey, my friend of the show, Peter Underwood, the president of the Ghost Club Society. I think is this the same book which has the story of Shelley's ghost? Oh, does that happen in Wales?

That happened in Wales. I think that's from Peter Underwood's Haunted Wales. Is it? I haven't got a, I don't know, unless you know where it happened, because it's all, it's one of them ones that's just done by place name is a gazetteer, which I believe means done by place name. I can kind of remember it, but it was so Welsh. Yes.

Uh, well, it had an act in it. I've had to, I've had to contact friend of the show, Jenny Collier, Welsh Valentine's correspondent, Jenny Collier for pronunciation for this one. So I'll be playing that in. Don't worry. And I think people who speak Welsh will know that that is not necessarily guaranteed that you're going to get it right. Yes. I would also, actually Alistair, I would like to caveat this story by saying

I love Wales, I love Welsh people. I fear by doing our Valentine's Welsh themed episodes on the most recent one, we might have offended someone because we referred to Welsh valentines without pointing out that there is actually a Welsh valentines that happens in January because we'd covered it on a previous episode. So it's kind of just a given now, but they obviously came in at that one as their starting point. And we're like, well, it already has a valentines.

Why are you being so wrong? I was like, oh darn. Fair, fair question. Fair question. The thing was we'd covered it so many times before and all the other ones and we didn't do it this time, which was silly of us. This is where the town is. Hlanwchlin.

Hlanwchlin, which is near, I've got, there's a couple of other place names I didn't get Jenny to say, which I, which with hindsight was a mistake. Hlanwchlin, which is near. Hindsight. Hindsight. Let's get more scouse. Which if you look at a map, it's basically as in Wales. That's North Wales.

I was doing North Wales maybe. Dolga Hau and Bala, which is an area once known as the Penmower Hollow. In that area, Alistair, there is a haunted river. Oh, sorry. Yeah. I realized you were pausing for me to react. Oh, yes. We got a haunted river here, Alastair.

Wow. The whole river. I think technically it's just a section and, and some else will get into that. Right. So according to Peter Underwood, friend of the show, there is a firsthand experience of this, which was published in 1825, and then Peter Underwood, friend of the show. There is a firsthand experience of this, which was published in 1825. And then Peter Underwood goes on to say that Elliot O'Donnell told me that he knew someone had had an almost identical experience in this wild place more

than a hundred years later. It's lovely when friends are friends, isn't it? Yeah. So that's two friends of the show being friends in real life. Yeah, two people who are actually friends with their actual people as opposed to people who've books we've read. Yeah, yeah, yeah, they're not really friends with the show, they don't know us at all. And in some cases, they're dead. I'm thinking both. I have interacted with Peter Underwood's grandson, shout out Adam. He sent us those books that we gave away.

Seance! Exclamation mark. Yes. Yes. Anyway, that was very nice. Yeah. Lovely. Lovely bloke.

Anyway, 1825 Alastair. It's 1825. It's 1825. Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 has recently premiered. The ninth in the popular series, the Beethoven franchise. There are a lot of sequels happened in this year, it seems. So yeah, Beethoven's Symphony Nine, which that's owed to Joy. Oh yeah.

Colon, owed to Joy. Which sounds like the old German theme tune. And then there's Deutschland, Deutschland, Oberalys. And that, that, that, that Nazis blooming loved it. In fact, they play, which one did they like? Both of those, both of them, but they did like Ode to Joy. Did the Nazis like Ode to Joy? They didn't seem that cheerful.

I'm not an expert, but whenever you see a picture of them, they seem to be having a terrible time. I think it's one of them. So they could probably chanted it in a real sort of hooligan manner. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, much and they did just do happy birthday. The last French king was crowned, Charles X, which again is you know, the X in the ongoing French king franchise of Charles. Hold on, the last French king was crowned in 18... 25. 25. But hadn't the revolution already happened? Yeah, I think so. I think they went back to it for a bit. What? I think they went back to it for a bit. What? I think they went back to it for a bit and then they undid it again.

Did they? Yes. That's where we went wrong. We never undid it again. We went back to check. Maybe King's was better and then we just stuck with it. Yeah. So they got up to Charles X, which is a bit like Fast and Furious X or Fast X.

It was the House of Bourbon. Charles X, colon, last King of France. The House of Bourbon? It says of France. The house of Bourbon. It says he was the, from the house of Bourbon. I don't know if it's Bourbon, like the biscuit. I'm thinking of the biscuits. Bourbon, like the whiskey. I don't know.

Probably like the biscuit. Bourbon. Bourbon. Bourbon. Bourbon. Like you, you couldn't, you couldn't go to a corner shop and buy a packet of Bourbon. It's neither, it's not Bour and buy a packet of Bourbon. It's not Bourbon like the biscuit or Bourbon like the drink, it's Bourbon like the Netflix

logo. And of course Alistair, the Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderberg-Bech, Frederick William, he changed his name from Frederick William, the Duke of Schleswig Holstein Sunderbergh back to... Something shorter? Frederick William... no, to Frederick William. Frederick Wilhelm, Duke of Slashwick Holstein Sunderbergh, Glücksburg. Oh, sorry. Did he change his name to Frederick William Frederick Wilhelm?

I said William because I misread my own handwriting. It was Wilhelm all along. It was always own handwriting. It was Vilhelm all along. It was always Vilhelm. It was Vilhelm all the way down. Now he is a guy. I'm going to send you his picture. I should have done the secret envelope thing like you did. James, I'll let you in on a secret.

There were no envelopes. I was just telling you to look at the picture and then you pretended to open them. So I can pretend this is in a secret envelope as well. Oh yeah. Okay. Here's the seek. I'm just going to text you the secret envelope. Okay.

I'm just unwrapping that now. And Frederick Wilhelm Paul Leopold. Frederick Wilhelm Paul Leopold. Yes. The Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderberg. And I don't know how to describe this, this guy, but it's like a small child's head has been put on a toy soldier's body. I think he looks like a shaved Joe Wilkinson.

Actually, you know, there is something about. There's something about the Wilkinson about the nose. Something about Wilkinson of the nose. Yeah. And I'm going to steal a joke from one of the rural concerns. The other podcast I do is listeners from Rob. His neck is so long, his food is out of date by the time it reaches his stomach. Which is a lovely place.

Whose neck did Rob say that about originally? I don't know. I can't remember actually. It was, yeah. So something in a discord. Really good zinger for a giraffe. Yeah. So that guy, uh, whoa, he's got, he's got, he's got a lot of neck.

He's the sort of person that he has got a lot of brass neck, really sticking his neck out. Do you have the phrase wind your neck in, in the South? Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Wind your neck in. He needs to wind his neck in. You might say that in front of him and then sort of stop, stop yourself halfway through and look embarrassed.

Oh dear. His, I showed, also showed this picture to my wife because I was that bemused by it. And she laughed at his neck and said, his, his collar is double breasted. He does have a double breasted collar. I just, it seems like he's commissioned this picture. He must've been happy with it. Yeah. It even sort of shows that he's got a comb over.

He's got like a bit of a brushed forward comb over and he looks like a shave Joe Wilkinson, a mostly shaved Joe Wilkinson. He's got a massive neck. It's like he's got a massive neck. It's like he's got Check out the neck on this lad. A huge collar. And then normally you'd think that that would sort of be pushing around your chin quite a lot if you had a collar that big, but he's got like the artist has drawn a normal amount of neck

sticking out from this massive collar. There is a sliver of neck. Yeah. Visible above the enormous collar. There is a sliver of neck visible above the enormous collar. So, I mean, I fear we are alienating our giraffe listenership here. Everybody is beautiful, but yeah, this guy, wow. Yeah, just kind of long necked freak. Fredrick Wilhelm, Duke of Schleswig-Holstein, Soderbergh, Glücksberg. I mean, you could put all of that on the label inside his collar, so he lives his uniform. But interestingly, Alistair, and I say this, and I actually mean it, this royal line later

becomes the royal house of three countries, right? I'm going to give you one. You might be able to guess another one, but I have got, I would, unless you already know, I would say that you would never guess the third. All right. I'm up for this. Okay. So one of them is Denmark. Denmark. Okay. There are two others. There are two others. That he, this Frederick Wilhelm Duke of Schleswig-Holstein, Soderbergh, Glücksburg, Zline became the royal house of. Okay. All right. Well, it's been in the news.

Isn't Greenland a Danish colony? No, it's not that. No. All right. And a neighboring country, another European country like Luxembourg. No. No. A bit more, a bit more obvious.

Sweden. Not quite. Belgium. No, no, no. Go higher. Norway. Class, you know, that's the vibe. Denmark, no, no, go higher. Norway. Class, you know, that's the vibe. Denmark, Norway. Yes, makes sense.

And then the third one, I would give you a prize if you get it. All I will say is also in Europe. It's also in Europe. Italy. No. What's the opposite of Denmark? Sicily? No, that's not a country. It might have been a country then. Don't know. It's currently part of Italy. Cyprus? No.

Moldova? No. I'm getting, that's your guesses. Not sure it was around. Is that the number of guesses? Okay. Greece. I was going to go with Greece.

I'd already done my Mediterranean one with Italy. Greece? That's an odd. That to me feels like a very odd combo. Maybe there's a reason. I'd already done my Mediterranean one with Italy. Greece. That's an odd, that to me feels like a very odd combo. Maybe there's a reason, maybe it's not that odd a combo, but it seems incongruous. But a Danish is a pastry and sometimes if you leave them in the bag, a bit of Greece develops so there is a connection. Right. So, but this is, so we are in 1825.

That is the context. Dukes are walking around with that amount of net. Heads scraping the chandeliers, tinkling the crystals as they walk into a room. Their enormous heads swaying. Beethoven's. Women swoon just trying to lean back far enough to see. And it's accompanied by the soundtrack of Ode to Joy and people are going, this new music's really hip. And I'm presuming old people are going, it's just a noise.

Why do the old people sound like the Beatles? Well, it's just noise. It's just a noise. That's my, yeah, anyway, by the way, also I learned this around the Beethoven's ninth thing, he was fully, Beethoven was fully deaf by this point. And the audience to show that they were applauding also waved their hand keys. Oh, that's nice. So he'd properly know that they, they absolutely loved it.

Although you can see people clapping, but it's still very thoughtful. So set against the background of this on a wet summer night. That is when this particular haunting usually happens. It's when darkness... Set against the background of these events that all happened in other countries in the same year. Yes, in other places. We're in... In other completely unrelated places. We're in Wales, remember?

We're in Wales, Llanwchlin. We're not in, you know, Greece, Denmark or Norway. We're in the dark countryside where when darkness and heavy rain make a lone traveler or walker wary of the uneven road. And this is from Peter Underwood's description. He eventually finds himself scrabbling and stumbling and making his way with extreme difficulty and he basically decides, this is me talking now, he basically decides, he gives up and he thinks, I'm just going to sit under a boulder because I'd rather sit under a boulder and die than fall down a cliff and die. Interesting.

Your voice for Peter Underwood is very similar to your voice for you. It is. Yeah. I think he's got quite a long face, Peter Underwood. And I feel like he would have had a similar voice, although actually he is in recording, So I could check that. We could just check what he sounds like. Or we could assume that he just sounds like a big old giant.

Hello, are you a ghost? The ghost would have to tell him. Exactly. Otherwise it's what? It's entrapment. It's entrapment. Yeah. If you're a ghost, you got to tell me.

It's ghost entrapment. After a few moments or perhaps as long as an hour, witnesses cannot ascertain the period of time with any degree of certainty. The weary traveller is roused by catching a glimpse of light. It's the glow of a swinging lantern. And within a few more moments, he is confronted by the figure of a man, a short man, dressed in a shaggy overcoat and wearing a slouch hat. And I'm picturing for a shaggy overcoat, one with the character shaggy printed on it. Yes, it's a leather jacket with patches of Scooby-Doo. Embossed Scooby-Doo. Or Shaggy the singer. Now, if you Google slouch hat, you either get one of them sort of big Australian military hats,

you know, the ones that are sometimes stuck right up on one side. Yes. Yes. A very bonzer hat. That's a slouch hat or a beanie, a big beanie. It's not going to be a beanie, a beanie in the 19th century. If you showed someone in the 19th century, a beanie, they would have died instantly at the sight of a beanie.

They'd say, why are you, why are you wearing a sock on your head? Yeah. They would have thought you were a little goblin or gnome. They would have from the top of their very high collar looked down on you. Yeah. It's got to be the, it's got to be the Australian one. Yeah. So he's got one of them and he's quite short and he's got a, he's got a strange and unreal quality about him and he does not speak a word, but the figure

intimates that he will guide the tired traveler to a place of shelter. I don't know how, using just sign language. You can mime follow me, but I don't know how you mime a place of shelter. I will guide you to a place of shelter. But the traveler will invariably follow this strange, unspeaking man, gratefully accept the mute invitation and follow the dark figure and his swinging lantern. And then the traveler finds themselves led across a wide moor covered with gorse and strewn with boulders and picking their way through the little pools.

They find that they're following the guide along the side of a deep gully at the bottom of which, Alastair, flows a river. Oh, like the spooky haunted river from earlier. Could well be the haunted river from earlier. That's self-same haunted river. It was Chekhov's haunted river. Wow, I can't wait for big long necks to come back into the story. Oh yeah. Oops.

If a play has a giant neck on the wall. I don't know. He follows the guy with the lamp and then the guy with the lamp suddenly disappears and the puzzle traveler peers over over the edge of the chasm and sees the guide making a descent towards the river below, so he's gone over, he's gone down the cliff and he's found a little path and it's almost invisible but the traveler is like, well, I'm, I'm in the middle of basically a moor or I try and scrabble down this cliff and follow this traveler. So they follow him and they almost catch up with the guide.

So when you say disappeared, he doesn't actually disappear. He just gone over the edge of the guy. Okay. He just climbs down. Well, it makes sense to follow a river, doesn't it? Better following a gone over the edge of the guy. Okay. He just climbs down. Well, it makes sense to follow a river, doesn't it? Better following a river than just wandering in the mall. That's true. If you lost the thing is he has to scrabble down this hill and to the valley and the valley

is even gloomier and is wrapped in an indescribably eerie silence broken only by the ominous and low roar from the dark and deep river. They make their way along the river and they come across a ruined cottage, which is old and decrepit and full of mystery, yet strangely free of moss or any kind of vegetation. That is strange. That is strange. And the traveller will find himself drawn towards the cottage, but suddenly, as if by some sort of magic they're stuck, stock still. They're held rooted to the ground by some kind of weird and compelling force.

Like tantalus, they're trapped there with the shelter in sight, unable to eat it. Yes, exactly. And they'll say, they'll try and call out to the guide and then suddenly they feel very afraid. Oh, you there, you there guide help me. I appear to be stuck. I'm stuck by some kind of weird and compelling force. If only I were a German aristocrat, I could use my neck. I could reach it out, Inspector Gadget style, and at least get it under the eaves. If only.

Is that what it says in the book? Word for word. That's pretty much what Peter Underwood says. And then that enigmatic figure stands unanswering almost like a statue. And suddenly he removes his hat with a sweeping gesture, revealing a white mask like face totally devoid of any expression. That's very scary. That's like a Japanese horror story.

It is, isn't it? And, and then it goes very... Every Japanese horror story is someone's got a scary face and I'm terrified every single time. Or a scary, not a face at all. Yeah. Yeah. Something's weird about the face.

And then it goes all anime at this point as well, because the guy stains still for a few more moments. And then suddenly seems to take on... The background's moving. It's cheaper to animate. And then takes on a curious gliding movement and floats from the bank over the river and disappears into the deep shadows. Just kind of ethereally floats away with his white alabaster. Like Team Rocket.

Yes, very much like Team Rocket. And then the travel of field strength returned to his limbs and then he becomes cold and full of terror. He goes to look at the car. He looks at the cottage and he's like, and this is me talking again. There's no way I'm going in there. Yeah. Yeah.

Better not. Better not. So he runs full of terror, scrabbles up the side of the river bank, away from that awful place. After something like two hours of wandering, first in one direction and then in another, he comes across an inn finally and finds shelter for the rest of the night. And that is a real inn. It's not a spectral inn.

It's not a Elfin pun. Very good. It's not an Elfin inn. It's a real inn. And the next morning, the landlord tells him the story of that cottage. And would you like to hear that story, Alastair? Yes, I would. In a broad Welsh accent, if possible.

Okay, well then. The landlord tells him that that ruined cottage, he describes, has long been regarded as badly haunted. Oh no, badly haunted. Badly haunted. And it was occupied by a man named Evans. But I'm not making up. That doesn't really narrow it down.

And his wife and the story goes that the wife at the suggestion of the husband enticed a wandering peddler known as Black Dave into the cottage. And when she and her husband discovered that he had a little money, they waited until he was asleep and then the wife sat on him while her husband cut his throat. I would have just said they cut his throat. I wouldn't have led with and then the wife sat on him and then because then the listener

is going is how bad is that? And then the throat cutting happens. For me, the throat cutting is the big issue. Well, how about this then? They waited until he was asleep and then the husband cuts the man's throat whilst the wife sat on him to hold him down. And it wasn't silly. That still seems a bit silly. It does seem a bit silly because he sat on him. It's like she's going to sort of put her knees on his biceps and pump his arms just just, uh, you know, like an older brother,

then spit in his mouth. Why are you stabbing yourself? Well, you cut your own throat. Stop murdering yourself. Stop weighing your body down and chucking yourself in the flooded river. We are, we are having a laugh, but this is, I was about to say a real person, probably not, but still very sad, very serious, a real ghost story. This is a bad haunting. Yeah, it's very serious. Yes. A real ghost story. This is a bad haunting. Yeah, so they then weigh the body, they do actually weigh, they weigh the body down with stones and threw it into the flooding river.

Do you think that's where the story ends, Alistair? Yes. No, it isn't. Whoa! Because within days the cottage mysteriously caught fire and Mrs. Evans was burned to death. Mrs. Evans taking the brunt of it. Well, her husband was also badly burned and also did die. So he was also burned to death.

But just in a way, you might say they were both. He had enough time. He lingered long enough to make a full confession of the awful crime. Right. Yeah. So I guess he was done low and slow. That's not that's not fair. That's not, that's not fair. That was the character laughing at it, not me. So I think I'm all, I think I'm, I think I'm all right.

Absolutely safe. Yeah. You've, you've Ricky's you've aged yourself out of a corner. Out of the Jimmy car into the Givais soon afterwards, stories of ghostly happenings began to circulate around the cottage and the river valley and local people would not venture there after dark. But every now and then a traveller would find themselves encountering a dark, silent little man who bids them follow him. Wow. That's a really scary story. Who do we think the little man is

then? It's the little man, the victim, the peddler. I think that's Black Dave. Yeah. So why, why is he trying to, I suppose he's probably upset about being sat on and slit, slit throat slit. Yeah, I think he's, I guess he's leading people to the cottage to say, this is a bad place. Don't forget the terrible. He's taking them there as a warning not to go there. Kind of. Yeah. It's a bit like on social media when people are like, look at this awful thing.

Don't read this. But they've done a little screenshot of it. Yeah. Isn't this terrible? Here's a picture of it. Yes, exactly that basically. But a murder man. So he quote tweeted the whole in.

Yeah, literally. Yes. Not literally. Figuratively, yes. No, he literally quote, literally. Yes. Not literally. Figuratively, yes. No, he literally quote tweeted it. Wow. That's probably what he would do nowadays if he had ghost social media such as Inscagram.

Very good. Just X. Yeah, that is quite a spooky letter. I want the listeners to know, James didn't hesitate for a second before Inscagram. Sometimes there's a long pause that we headed out before a pun while we try and think of one James just came up with that. That was live. That was live.

Yep. You heard it at the speed it happened. Wasn't like some of that pre-prepared 1825 stuff. So there you go. Terrifying, right? Absolutely. Chill. You're really actually a frightening story.

Yeah. I feel like I got a little bit too focused on her sitting on him. Yeah. That under, I did think that undermined it, but then it's that, it's that, you really actually a frightening story. Yeah. I got a little bit too focused on her sitting on him. Yeah. I did think that undermined it, but then it's that, you know, when they put a mattress on a person to hold them down kind of thing. Yeah. It's important that she was part of the attack.

That's the point. I think she is complicit and active in the murder. So you're ready to score me? Yes. I would love to score this tale. Yes. Okay. This chilling tale this tale. Yes, okay. This chilling tale of many accurately voiced Welshmen. Okay, Alistair.

Section one, category one, names. Oh, very formal. Names. Okay, you made a real effort. You contacted Jennifer Collier and got her to record how to pronounce the words. And then you repeated it, but in your voice. Llanwchlen. Exactly.

Llanwchlen. Dolchlau. Bala. And Penmawr. Hollow. Can you hear the phlegm? Listener. I must be tough being Welsh with a cold.

I don't know if you noticed the Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderberg-Lukesburg, nay the Duke of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderberg-Beck. I wondered, I'll be honest, I wondered why he was in the story. We got Black Dave. Yeah, which is a very sort of 80s pub nickname, I think. We got a Welshman called Evans. Yeah, yes is a very sort of eighties pub nickname, I think. We got a Welshman called Evans. Yeah. Yes, we do. And his wife, Mrs.

Evans, the idea of a slouch hat. We've all learned now what a slouch hat is if we didn't already. And knowing our audience, probably quite a lot of you did already know what a slouch hat was. Now I'm thinking about it. I don't know if it is the one the Australians are wearing. That's what it comes up as on Wikipedia. You don't think it would hide your face though, would it? But he's short. This guy's short, so it would.

Yeah, maybe. But when he approached, the other guy was crouched under a boulder, so he'd be looking up at him. Oh yeah, that's a good point. But maybe he's just sort of, there's something uncanny about how he manages to always move his head to his slouch hat. Yeah. Yeah. He just conceals his features. Yes. Very good names. What's, what's foreign Welsh? I can't remember. Petre? Yeah, I think so. Petre. It's peddwar. It's peddwar. Or peddwar? I don't know. I've lost commitment to saying it correctly. That was not Jenny. That was Google. That was robot Jenny Collier. It's

pedoir. It's pedoir out of pimp. Pedoir out of pimp. Yes. Great. Okay. Thanks. Fair enough. I went for it. I went hard for it and I got it. I'm happy with that. So that brings me to category the second supernatural. I can't fault it to be honest. A very, very spooky tale with murder and a ghost. I'm not sure that the river itself was haunted. It kind of feels like the land was haunted. The river was hardly involved. The cottage was maybe haunted. Well he sort of, he disappears off into the shadows, doesn't he? He sort of fades off into the shadows across the river. He floats off onto the river and then into the shadows and sort of melts away. And that's where his body was weighted and disposed of.

Yeah. But he also disappears, quote unquote, when actually all he did was go downhill. So, but it was very supernatural, worthy of a bit of creepypasta on the internet, and a classic Japanese style urban legend, bit of horror with the face not being there or whatever it was. It's a white mask like face totally devoid of any expression. So you got that. That's what my face is like. That's not that scary.

Well, yeah, there's a reason we don't have video on the social media clips for this podcast. Yeah, there's the reveal of that. And then he sort of, that real uncanniness of him, like sort of raising up and floating off sort of dancing off. Like, have you seen that? It made me think of the anime, have you seen Perfect Blue? No, I haven't. Sorry.

It's quite grim. I would not necessarily recommend it. It is, I think the story goes that Darren Aronofsky had owned the rights for it for some time. There are a number of shots that are used in the film Requiem for a Dream, which again, is very grim and I would not. Not that cheerful. It sounds good, doesn't it?

A dream, whatever a Requiem is, you think that will be a good thing if you didn't know what that meant. But let me tell you, it's not. It's harrowing. This has only been compounded by the fact that it stars Jared Leto, unfortunately, which is... Oh no!

Yeah. Anyway, that has a bit where there is a sort of spectral character that kind of dances off floating like, like if you've played New Zelda, those little magician things that dance around. I haven't played New Zelda, I'm afraid. Okay. Well, anyone who has will know exactly what this sort of weird dancing on air kind of thing, dancing off into the air.

Spooky. Terrifying. Terrifying. So what was it? How does Perfect Blue compare to Grave of the Fireflies in terms of very devastating Japanese animation? It is, yeah, pretty grim. devastating Japanese animation. Yeah, pretty grim.

It's a bit more sci-fi fantasy, but then it also has some quite grim, trigger-y stuff that we don't talk about on this podcast. Oh, all right. Okay. Okay. Pretty bad then. Yeah. Yeah.

It's no Spirited Away. It's no My Neighbor Totoro. Totoro. Please, please. If you won't at least learn that Katsu means cutlet, at least learn how to say Totoro. Sometimes you have that thing where you think you've had a brilliant idea and then you search for it. I thought my neighbor, John Totoro.

Oh, and then you Google it and there's millions of them. So it's a five out of five for Supernatural. Has to be. Five points for spooky, five points for unexplained. Yes. Five points for my neighbour John Totoro. Yeah. Oh, brilliant.

Okay, third category then. Too Ode to Joyous. The sequel, Too Ode to Joyous. The sequel to Ode to Joy. Yes. And then Throde to Joy. Actually, it's Ode to Joy Tokyo Drift. And then, yeah, it's Ode for Joy, which doesn't make sense. And you think they should have done that Ode to Joy with two as the two.

It kind of works. You could see it on a poster, Ode 4 Joy. And then it's just ode, but the E is a five, which also doesn't work. Does not work. The next one is the Joy, then it's the ode to Joy, and then it's Joy X. I think that's right. We had Charles X, of course, the sequel, the sequel King in the sequel Royal dynasty in France, in France, in the controversial series.

Yeah. French Kings. Yeah. They should not, they should never have rebooted it like back to the future. They should have just left it as it was. That makes it sound like I don't like back to the future. I do like back to the future. Any listener of this show knows I love Back to the Future.

In a way you might say that Louis XVI was the first victim of council culture. Has anybody thought of that? Just trying to make our podcast way more successful and popular by just saying incredibly stupid things like that. Are we pivoting to one of them podcasts? Yeah, let's be one of them podcasts. We can call ourselves Factblast. But Alistair, I have feelings.

Well they don't matter or care about facts. In a way Friedrich Wilhelm, Duke of Schwyck, Holstein, Sunderonderberg Luxburg was his own sequel to the famous Frederick Vilheim Duke of Slash Vig Holstein Sonderberg Beck. Yes. Steven Soderheim, Steven Soderheim and the artist Beck. So what was the score for 202 Joyous? I think, I think I know which way it's going. Yes.

Uh, well it can't be one because that isn't a series. Great. Also, it's more than two. Yes. I forgot that Elliot O'Donnell had a sequel story to this story because he, they rebooted it a hundred years later when someone had an almost identical experience in the wild place. A spiritual successor, you might say.

Yes. Yes. A spiritual successor, you might say. Yes. Yes. A soft reboot. I'm going to say it's a three because that's the best number of sequels. More than that is too many. Apart from Jurassic Park 3, that's bad. I haven't seen any of them apart from the first one. May as well keep it that way, I'd say.

I feel like they should have learned their lesson from the events of Jurassic Park. Yes. I'm sorry if that's incredibly controversial. Oh, you might say that, um, the dinosaurs, uh, Mr. Hammond from Jurassic Park was the original victim of cancer culture. Yeah. Yeah. But he's just an entrepreneur who just put his grandchildren trying to offer people, trying to let children lose in a park full of dinosaurs.

There's a good, if you look at it, when he's, he's, when you're a kid and you watch it, you think John Hammond is like super rich and stuff. But when you actually look at it, he's doing everything on a budget. He says no expense spared, but he's actually all being really cheaply done. That's a, that's very interesting. That's very good. It's a very good film. Honestly, I think people forget it's, it's very interesting. That's very good. It's a very good film, honestly. I think people forget it's, it's very witty, full of clever

little details like that. Jurassic Park one is great. End of, end of that's that. And the podcast. That's yeah. Well, in that case, it's five out of five for this category, because we both agree Jurassic Park is a good film. Okay.

Then sorry, sorry. If the woke listenership I'm going, sorry if the woke listenership... I'm gonna go with the woke listenership Alistair, that is our key demographic. Sorry if that's too dangerous for you. Alistair. Too, too, too edgy. I've got to pull you back before you... Sorry, is that gaffer tape over my lips?

You lose... Am I being silenced? You're gonna lose the sense of irony if you go too far down into this well. That is true. Yeah. A lot of these guys start out joking. Exactly. That's the problem.

But Alistair, to bring things back on course with a callback to my least scoring category, it's it from Stephen King's It. It's William Shatner's mask of Michael Myers from John Carpenter's Halloween. Okay, right. I've seen Halloween. Yes. I don't watch a lot of slasher films because I don't like them, but I do quite like John Carpenter so I watch Halloween, it's very good. And Michael Myers from SNL is a serial killer who escapes from an asylum and he's

chased by again the character in the film Halloween not the voice of Shrek. Yeah, for the legal reasons for legal reasons is not the voice of Shrek. And although he doesn't actually say anything so he might have the voice of Shrek because he doesn't say anything. So he might have the voice of Shrek because he doesn't say anything. The serial killer, Michael Myers was one of the worst victims of him. I can't even say it. I can't even say it as a joke. My larynx won't let me say it. Serial killers are like onions.

They make you cry. All right. Okay. They stink and make you cry. What I like about that film is Donald Pleasence, who clearly despises the film and thinks he's above it or that it's beneath him, but he's still doing a brilliant performance in every single scene while being visibly depressed about his career. Yeah.

Yes. And he wears a mask, which is terrifying, but is quite famously a Halloween mask that you can buy of William Shatner's face. William Shatner's face. Of William Shatner's face. You could say that it was a white mask-like face totally devoid of any expression. I see. Yes. Which, because it's doing the same quality of acting that William Shatner would normally

do with his human face. Except without eyebrows. Yeah. Or the wig that the hair and makeup department made for him. Do you know that he kept stealing those? The wigs? Yeah. Or the wig that the hair and makeup department made for him. Do you know that he kept stealing those? The wigs? Yeah. Really? And just wearing them normally.

You would. They're very expensive. So the hair department were like, Shatner keeps stealing the wigs. What are we going to do? They probably didn't have that accent. Shatner. Shatner. Welcome to Hair and Makeup Department on Star Trek, the original series.

We got a big problem. Shatner keeps stealing wigs! Not only are they splitting the bastard infinitive, they're bloody... he's stealing wig. Oi! Neemoy! Where you going with them ears? Pull them down! Hey, what about finding Neemoy?

What is that a sequel? That's the sort of the spiritual successor to my neighbor, John Totoro. All right. Well, you've confused and baffled me with this category. Yeah, it's so I think it's going to be high in, in an O2. It's it from Stephen King's. It is it's William Shatner's mask is Michael Myers from John Carpenter's Halloween. You know, James, I think it is.

So on William Shatner's mask. I think it is William Shatner's mask as Michael Myers from John Carpenter's Halloween, of course, I think it is that thing that you said. Yes. So five. Yes. There you go, lovely and spooky, wasn't it? Very spooky, very scary. So if you would like to hear some bonus episode stuff taken from that episode. Oh, oh, it was too hot for the internet. Go to patreon.com forward slash Lorin Podd and join us.

And if you don't want to do that, but you want to help the show in a different way, please give us a nice review on one of the places that you can give podcast reviews. And thank you very much for Joe for editing this. Thank you for listening to us. Thank you to all the law folk who already support us. Yeah, cheers Law Folk. Dolgellau, Fala and Pen Mawr Hollow or Hosslow, but I think it's hollow. What's this about you doing a Welsh episode without me?