Quick Question with Soren and Daniel - Pop Culture Mystery Minute + The Cracked Sketch That Wasn't

Episode Date: August 12, 2025

The guys solve a pop culture mystery, fawn over John Malkovich, dive into the "clip show" nature of Happy Gilmore 2 and Mission Impossible: The Final Reckoning, and realize how much harder they made things on themselves while writing After Hours.Thanks to Shopify for sponsoring this episode. Sign up for a $1/month trial period at shopify.com/qq

I've got a quick, quick question for you all right. I want to hear your thoughts on what's on your mind. I've got a quick, quick question for you all right. The answer's not important. I'm just glad that we could talk tonight. So what's your favorite? Who did you get? When do I be?

Remember? What's it out? Where did all that? Oh, forget it. Sorry, baby Daniel O'Brien. Two best friends and comedy writers If there's an answer, they're going to find it I think you'll have a great time here

I think you'll have a great time here Welcome back to another episode of Quick Question The theme song is fading out, this is the show Where We Self Pop Culture Mysteries I am one of your pop culture detectives Daniel O'Brien, joined as always by Soren Bowie. Soren, say hello. Hello, everybody.

How are you doing? How are you doing, Daniel? I'm doing great, Soren. I have something for you. Oh. Oh, right off the bat. Is it an improv game? No, it's a pop culture mystery.

We're never doing the improv game thing again. It's listeners, this is, I take pop culture mysteries very seriously on this show. We all know this about me. And Soren came to me with a mystery a couple days ago. He texted me in the middle of the night, shivering, asking me if I had seen the movie Opus, which I had not at the time, starring Iowa Debray and John Malkovich, came out within the last 12 months. And Soren texted me and he said, it's about an aging rocker who makes a record after 30 years of seclusion, but the songs are good, like stuff I would listen to. And if you try to figure out who actually made them, they credited the pop star in the movie, a fictional person. and I thought this is a rich

a rich pop culture mystery and I'm gonna I put up I told my wife to get a hotel for a couple of days I put a huge pot of coffee on like an air pot of coffee like the kind that they have at the movie theater like a giant like two foot tall office style thing of coffee I was like I don't care what it takes I'm going to solve this mystery

and Sorin I solved it within I want to say 90 seconds of starting the movie the answer was in the credits

the opening credits oh shit thanks to Shopify for supporting quick question Shopify is a platform designed for anyone to sell anywhere

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QQ I turned it on with like my notepad out, ready to fucking go crazy on this and look for clues. And they were like, additional music by Nile Rogers and the Dream, who are two of the most famous and successful music producers in the history of time. Like The Dream has done all of Beyonce's albums since Sasha Fierce and Niall Rogers co-founded Sheik. He's ranked as one of the seventh greatest guitar players of all time. He did the song Good Times, which was sampled in rapper's delight and many other things. Yeah, okay.

So that's a pop culture mystery song. I can't, I'm just like, all right, this is, this is particularly humiliating for me because I work in the industry and that I have paid no attention to the credits is like a real disservice to my colleagues, to the people I would work with. I'm not going to pretend that I knew who Nile Rogers was by name and that's like a shame of mine but as I'm watching the movie and looking at the credits the opening credits like nothing has happened yet

and it says additional material by Nile Rogers and the dream I thought like that is is there a chance that John Maldovich's character is named Nile Rogers and they're front loading this mystery no absolutely not

they're professional successful music producers. Well, I still have some questions here. Why are we still crediting these to Moretti? It is a good question. Where did you see that it was credited to Moretti? On Spotify. Before I, I guess I should have, I said too much too soon about my methodology for solving this mystery.

What did you, yeah, please. Okay. So I watched the movie. movie and the first song that comes up is this one called Dina Simone and I was like I couldn't tell I couldn't tell if I was being tricked because everyone in the movie is singing along to the song it's a montage of a bunch of people really loving this music and so there's people like karaoke it's people in their car everyone is grooving to this song and I was like I think I'm grooving to this song I think I like this song the next song that appears is this like really sweet ballad um that they all the people who are invited to listen to this album together in the desert they're all listening to it alone in their rooms and like listening and so the film does a good job

of getting you in the mood for a particular song and then listening that one I was like I think objectively I really like this song I think this is a good song there's another one later that John Malkovich sings live to them I don't think is as good it's a very weird scene but I think it's supposed to be anyway he's supposed to be sort of a David Bowie

type of figure and so there's like a lot Nile Rogers co-wrote and produced Let's Dance by David Bowing. So it has, it's this pop star who has like an array of music that he is good at. And he's come back after 30 years to do an album. And so obviously it's supposed to be the very best music. It's supposed to be his opus. So it's supposed to, that's such a tall order for a film.

Yes. Because you have the songs, you're going to play at least three. They're going to have to be good enough that you're like, oh, shit. hit like that he did it he really was successful and on top of that you have to convince the audience that like I would I believe this guy is a pop star that that John Malkovich is a pop star that you could listen to that John Malkovich could have just pivoted on his career trajectory and been like you know instead I'm just going to be this vocal phenom and and do this instead and those are all so hard to do it's hard enough to do you do stand up in a movie and it's

like, oh, well, we're just going to have to buy that this is a good stand-up because it's clearly not. There's never been good stand-up in a show or a movie. Maybe hacks? I don't know. Yeah, like other than that, like Marvelous Ms. Maisel, it's, get out of here. But to do something, do it in a completely different art form that stands on its own within a movie and make it good enough that it could stand on its own is next to impossible unless

I'm going to walk that back a little bit for musicals and for maybe some Pixar films Yeah Like those you can You could listen to those songs on your own And be like oh they spent just as much time

On each individual song As everybody else did on the entire movie Right I mean we've talked about this on the show before Where we were trying to figure out Who is the most believably good At their pop culture job In a movie We were talking about like

when a movie tells us this band is great or this actor is great or this artist is great and then the movie does the very tall order of showing you the art that they make and we need to and it's and it's not supposed to be funny it's supposed to be sincerely good it is you're right a really tall order and they i think they accomplish it with like the reason that thing you do work so well and you buy this as a pop tune is that it was written by the late Adam Schlesinger of Fountains of Wayne, who was just like absurdly good at writing catchy, timeless pop tunes. And probably that goes for the producing team behind Opus as well, where the people behind the movie were like, this guy needs to be, the songs need to be

like believably as good as what we imagine late era David, Bowie would be doing right now. Yeah. Yeah. And so let's hire the guy who worked with David Bowie and Beyonce. That makes a lot of sense. Do this. Yeah. So anyway, I looked it up. I think it was on Spotify. I think it was on spotify. No, first I looked it up on the internet because I was like, well, let's just find these songs. I found it on YouTube, it was just clips of it. And it was always like, some of it had lyrics and it was credited to Moretti. And I was like, well, fuck you. And so, and then I was like, well, let's go to the comments. And people were like, Love Moretti.

I'm like, what is going on? And then went to Spotify and Spotify and credited it as Moretti. I then found another version that did say Moretti and then followed by Dream, I think. Yeah. That makes sense. Because that's who made it. And he's a real person.

Then credit to John Malkovich's fictional character did not make these songs. Where is this Bubba Gump shrimp company bullshit? It's very confusing. It did make me, make me, I mean, it's very funny that you mentioned Bubba Gump Shrimp Company because I have been thinking recently, like, who is the funniest fictional character to convince someone in your life is real, just for them to accidentally slip up at a party. I think Forrest Gump is a pretty good one. If you can convince someone that, like, no,

Yeah, it's crazy. Like the real guy didn't look like that, and it's weird that we don't have more pictures of him. But yeah, like that's, they exaggerate a couple of things. But as far as like everything else, Forrest Gump is real. Just so that person can one day be at a party and drop a funny fact about Forrest Gump. I won't even be there to watch them be humiliated. You're just taking the pin out of her grenade and handing it to them. I mean, at some point, they had to put that down. Yeah. Hey, folks, starting your own business is scary. It's a really scary prospect because it's entirely impossible to just chunk it out, to not envision where it's going to be and how big you want it to be and where you want it to go. You have to go through these little tiny baby steps to get there. And it's like walking, I would say walking across a desert in baby steps. It's lonely.

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Um Forrest is really funny What was the last time you watched that movie Um maybe four or five

years ago I love Forreston I don't care Okay so there's I rewatched it again recently too and I was like

again thinking I like a lot of this I like the nom stuff I like so much of it and some like really there's some very small jokes in it and then there's just one

where I'm like what the fuck is this doing in this movie do you don't it's not coming it's not registering for you yet it's when he's on his runs across the country

one of his multiple runs across the country and the guy's like I got all these yellow t-shirts and I don't know what to put on them and so Forrest Gump is like running's like oh man you just stepped into some shit

and Horace Gump goes it happens and then he takes he gets sprayed by a truck a truck that goes by by mud such a long walk and then he has to takes one of the yellow shirts like take this shirt

nobody buys this color anyway and Forrest Gump wipes his bearded face on it and gives it back to the man and there is a circle with a cartoon eyes and mouth smile in the shirt from Forrest Gump watching

Woffer doing his face that's even too much of a weird cartoon cartooning joke for our show. Like, we wouldn't do that because it's like, well, that's silly. You know you're conflating two things there, right? There's the bumper sticker salesman who's looking for a slogan. Oh, right.

And Gump says it happens sometimes, and then shit happens, we see it as a bumper sticker. And then there's the guy who sells t-shirts. He wants to put Gump's face on a t-shirt to sell them. And then he wipes his face. It's a perfect smiley face. And he says, have a nice day. And the guy is like, I'm going to. sell these smiley face have a nice day shirts that we know now to be iconic are we not selling are we

not selling shirts that have a smiley face and say shit happens on them is that common in pop culture is it possible i'm mistaken it is a very uh cartoony move like a literal and and figurative cartooning move for that movie to make i i don't know why we decide that's more cartoony than him Then Forrest Gump, surviving a storm and becoming a millionaire and meeting multiple presidents and being a war hero and running across country multiple times. For some reason, he wipes his face and becomes a perfect smiley face and just like, no. I can't. I can't. My just mention of disbelief just shatters. And I'm like, what is this?

Did this guy really live? I'm going to go look it up on Spotify. So, one thing I, we are really glossing over with Opus. I do want, I do want to hear if you liked it or not. But also, I, I am blown away by John Malkovich. Yeah. Who has the weirdest voice in all of human history of all actors, save maybe Christopher Walken, very strange delivery on everything he does, a strange, attitude, a strange voice, that when I hear him sing, I'm like, yeah, it's a singer.

Yeah. Like, yeah, that sounds great. He sounds, he kills it. And that, I'm going to have to find the song, remember or something. Yeah. I think he is, I think Malthovich is like singularly great in everything he has ever done.

And he's one of the actors that like my whole family really likes a lot probably because we all saw of mice and men when we were. That was like a big movie in our households because we liked that story. And we loved Gary Seneas from Forrest Gump, incidentally. And John Malkovich was just so good in everything. thing. And I also remember my world being rocked. Because you grow up liking an actor, especially when I want to be an actor. And like, Malcovic is like a really good, solid character actor who can do anything. He's a good bad guy. He's a good this. He's a good that.

Reading the play Dangerous Liaisons in high school, a very horny show. With like famously horny and sexy people. And then in drama class, knowing that we were going to watch them movie afterwards to because that's how you fill time in school was you read a thing and then you watch a movie of a thing and then you and suddenly two weeks has gone by and you've learned nothing and knowing that like this character that I've been reading was going to be played by John Malkovich with like long Fabio hair as a 14 year old was like I don't think I think he's a really good actor I don't think he can be why are we testing his sexy man What are we doing?

Why are we driving this engine until it breaks? Like, why are we trying to put John Malkovich in rules where, like, let's see if he can do it? Just a 90s, a 90s move that you probably couldn't get away with now and like, no disrespect. Everyone's beautiful all the time. But like the two hot lead adults are John Malkovich and Glenn Close. When I was like, make it. Sidney, what are we doing here? Come on.

Make it for kids. Somebody along the way agreed with you. Because they were like, let's redo it as cruel intentions. They did. And you're like, here's Ryan Felipe. There's go. There's Sarah Michelle Geller. I'm like, that's right.

That's what I read on the page. Not like sexy because he's tall and smart. Get out of here. You guys didn't, just to clarify, you didn't as a school do dangerous liaisons, did you? No. No, we just didn't know what circumstance is he wrote it. Okay. No, that would be irresponsible.

We just read and watched it. I'm going to write that one down. That's a really good bit for something. where, like, the school's putting on dangerous liaisal. So the teacher just doesn't understand why that's inappropriate. It's an incredibly soren joke to make. You're very keen on high school theater teacher being so dedicated to a specific play

that he puts blinders on to everything else around us. That I isolate as a very soren thing. Did we ever do that? sketch? No. Do you know what I'm talking about? I do. Oh, is it too racist? Is that why? I don't think it's too racist. I actually thought that was like a solid episode of a television show or movie. I don't know if you want to, if you want to spoil the thing that we've been talking around here. Yeah, I, I, I, we, it was while we went on a trip, I think we were like filming somewhere distant and Dan and I are staying in a hotel room and Dan was working on something.

maybe the pitch doc or something like that for cracked genuine work and I was like I don't write a sketch I didn't talk to me so maybe I was like yeah so like I sat down on the computer and I started writing the sketch about um uh when desegregation happened in schools it was like Alabama it was like the first desegregated school and the teachers are like talking about it and deciding whether or not to do it and there's this big teacher's meeting and uh and there's one teacher who's really advocating on behalf of it and it's the acting teacher. There's the theater teacher, the one who does all the plays and it becomes clear. It takes a while, but it becomes clear throughout that the teacher really is interested in desegregation because he's

been wanting to do a fellow for a very long time. And he needs a black actor. It still makes me laugh. I still like the idea. It's very funny. It's got a lot of potential. I think it's a good, it's a good vehicle. And he's quoting Shakespeare a lot in trying to get, because his intentions, what he's actually trying to get done is a good thing, but his, his reasons for it suck real bad. So like him, right, I think like his reasons. The natural, like, comedic extension of this is the guy, like, morally in his soul opposes integration, doesn't, doesn't want it like he he is a racist man who sees a great opportunity right to boost his credibility as a high school theater director it's a good platform for him for his next career move

in broadway or whatever yeah and like that was really it was fun it was fun to also create the other teachers who are like scared and they're creating slippery like straw man slippery slopes about it like wondering about when we're going to start letting bears into school and stuff like that. Just the worst people you can imagine and writing them all in a room together was very fun. But yeah, we never did that.

We never got to do. Sorry, I was busy with the pitch duck or whatever my job was. I'm sure I was going over budgets. So that's what I did I do. When my wife is not available for me to just like talk to

about the wasps I see and stuff like that, then I have to write. And I don't have any other choice, but they go right. in my garage. I guess, well, she's busy. So I guess I

I guess I'll write an episode of American Dan. Yeah. No, see, I'm never more productive on a piece of just my own writing

than when I am on assignment for work to write something and when my wife is gone. And it's like, well, I'm not, well, I can't bother

wife and I'm not going to work. I just write this little novel. Maybe I'll see what's going on here. What is this little thing ticking around in my brain? What are you doing there, little guy? Do you want to be out on the page? Right. And then wife comes home from bar class and she's like, what have you been doing? Like, ah, I've been writing all day and that is technically the truth and that's why I am sleepy and I don't have my computer out anymore. Oh,

what did you write? What did you write? I don't want to let the steam out of the bag. Nobody would be like, what's the topic of the show this week? I'd rather you just be surprised when you see me the show. Well, yeah. But if you ever did want to read an essay on how nobody got the real meaning of Robocop, I might have some stuff somewhere. I could go dig that out somewhere. I think dust that off.

Let you see it. Yeah, that's what when my, I was never more prolific than when my dad, when my dad was dying and I was supposed to be working on an episode of American Dad during that time I was like I will write anything else and so that's when Michael approached me

and he was like will you come host this podcast episode that's when I wrote a short story for Michael for his podcast and stuff like that where I was just like I'll write

I will write as long as the day is I don't do anything during the writer's strike I wrote Jack shit but give me a deadline and just watch those pages fly out.

out for pages for something unrelated. Yep, yep, yep. Wait, wait, hold on. Before we move on, did you like Opus? I was hoping it wouldn't come to this because after I had solved the mystery, I gave myself an ice cream treat and fell asleep. I, a portion of the text that I think you left out,

which was I think I called Opus pretty good. Yeah. I've had time to marry. marinate on it and marry it on the movie and wonder about certain characters that just disappear and stuff like that and think now I'm like I don't actually agree with myself. I don't think it was a very good movie. I think it was super weird and I liked the I liked the agreement at the beginning of this is what you're going to get and I thought John Malkovich was very interesting. But ultimately I don't think it was a very good movie at all and there's a lot of good people in it. I could see it moving in a weird direction. I like everyone else in America, love Iowa debris so much. She is just the greatest and funniest person on the planet. And I clearly love John Malkovich and a lot of other people in that. And I could see what kind of movie it was trying to be and shaping up to be. Yeah. It was just not enjoyable enough moment to moment to keep me awake. And I'm sure I'll give it another shot at some point. But I, you know, two songs in. And you're

write the two songs that that I saw and heard were really great but I like we just hadn't gotten to enough like me yet that I was I was it's slow burn obviously it has to be because you have to put somebody it's like get out where you have to keep somebody in a situation where they should be leaving and they're just not but she's yeah she's good in it it made me really think of as I was watching it because you know you can't just watch a movie anymore it made me really think about how if you have a main character you've got to give your main character some sort of selfish moral failing or some sort of flaw some sort of flaw that you can that is relatable because when your character i watched a death of a unicorn too and i had the same

problem with that movie when your main character is just this is is a young woman who is perfect in every single way i'm i'm super bored i no longer care about what happens Um, she is, there's, make no young women shitty. It's two thousand twenty five for crying out loud. Give her limits. Give her some. Yeah, something gross like that. That's the same as shitty. Give her something that she's tempted by or something. Give them something. She's just, did you watch death of a unicorn? No. I've, I heard many bad things about it. Um, yeah, it's, it's tough. It's the, both these movies, I was like trying to identify it because I like the cast so much of both these movies. Yeah. And then in thinking about it, I was like, they're, they share a lot in common in that you have somebody who's like surrounded by, by wolves essentially. And they're like, they don't realize it. They don't realize it until it's too late.

And then you're like, well, but I, but this person, this person is not even realistic to begin with. I found that very troubling. Anyway, we don't have to get to why these movies are bad. No, I mean, I think there's a curious thing forming around Jenna Ortega, where I'm not entirely sure if her agents should be trusted anymore. I think her publicist deserves a million-dollar raise because I see nothing but articles about how great she is. and she is very charming in interviews and I don't think has turned in a bad performance but I don't

I don't know what direction her career is moving in and she has made many bad movie choices in the last like 15 months it seems she just pops up in a lot of things like she was in the the written and directed by the weekend movie that came and went that I think made like

$1,500 or something absurd like that and this depth of a unicorn movie that no one seems to like anywhere the Wednesday show is like very incredibly not my thing but that's a

but like it makes people very happy and I'm fine with it existing but beyond that it just seems like Jenna Ortega is this it girl who has made a bunch of bad movies and we just need to give her the right age agent or like put her on the right path. We don't need to.

Nothing matters. She's doing fine. But I agree with you that she has like this aura to her that I'm like, you belong in something better. You deserve better to what you're currently doing. What else is she doing Wednesday? Yeah. Did I say that I meant to say Wednesday earlier.

Did I not say Wednesday earlier? I don't think you did. Oh, that was the one that is like respectfully not my thing. that other people seem to enjoy. Yeah. Oh, okay. Whatever I, man, I can't imagine what I called it. Well, maybe you did.

I just wasn't listening. Only the viewers. I'll find out when I read the comments next week. Dan. What? I had a really startling experience the other day. Can I tell you about it? Yeah.

I was scrolling through Facebook, one of my favorite things to do in the whole world. just like flipping the channels and get to an after hours video and I was like I'll check in on old after hours I'll revisit this and I'm watching it and it's funny

and it's the points are good in it and I'm like I like this I like this this is a really good episode and I was like who wrote this one and I went back and looked I wrote it and I had no memory

of it whatsoever no memory of having written and I even like well of course you'd like your own fucking jokes but like I did not remember this one and I didn't I don't remember that because a lot of times those ideas would incubate for a while for me I took a rig a lot of pride in the ones that I would write because I was like I want this to feel really good and like all the arguments to be really compelling I wanted to have to fit within the universe of the show where everybody like there's fun stuff for everyone to be doing and I don't remember any of that for this one the trail the trail is gone in the snow yeah it's it's really wild i think i was i had that experience with agents of cracked and i was trying to think of that show and and especially

the first i think two seasons we didn't put uh written by by lines on episodes sort of by design and now that is completely gone from my brain who did what on that show and after hours I think I might have an easier time with the after hours just because I felt like I was diligent about topics. Like I wouldn't pick something that was going to be a huge lift for me to like, I wouldn't, I would never write the James Bond one because I haven't seen enough James Bond movies and I still have it. And I like to feel like I picked things where I felt like I had something in me. already that I could bring to it. But I don't know. You could tell me right now that I did write the James Bond one.

You didn't. I wrote that one. Oh, thank goodness. I was, this one is the terrible lessons in coming of age stories. And at least that's what it's titled. It doesn't seem to be like that's what we focus on. We really focus on time a lot in it and like how to, how you address aging and die. But it's very compelling.

And, like, we start with us sitting around looking at Katie because it's her birthday and trying to guess how old Katie is. That's so, it's really fun. In addition to not knowing which episodes I wrote, it's crazy how little I remember of what happened in that show. I know, I know. Like, that sounds right. It sounds like we must have done an episode where it was Katie's birthday and we were doing business with that up top. But, no, it's God. You're going to tell me I put on clothes and had a game to play in that episode?

It's way more than that. The amount of work that goes into memorizing one of those episodes is staggering because it's like memorizing other places. Like, it's like you have to have other places as a play that's almost entirely a monologue. But it's like you have to memorize like huge, huge swaths of monologue that are written like an essay. And it has to sound very natural. Yeah. And I look back on that and I'm like, we, I spent so much time working on those episodes, granted, sometimes on the day, but like freaking out on the day at least and being like, get it in there, get it in my head, get it in my head. To now look back on it, be like,

down forever. Yeah, never even didn't, none of these lines even triggered a thing for me. One thing that I would port from my current job at last week tonight into our past job at Cracked is so my boss, John, does about a 30-minute monologue once a week. And it's a lot of information. And he's got a prompter. But I will say that by the time we actually tape, if the prompter skipped or broke down a little bit, I feel somewhat confident. that he could not do an entire episode from memory, but like he knows it pretty well by the time we tape that it's like, I would say 80% of the way memorized,

is my guess. Wow. When we're in rewrite a few hours before taping, we have gone through a table read for some chunk of the staff in the office, a second table read in the office with some graphics happening on a screen behind him. a rehearsal in full suit in front of the studio

and then we're in rewrite after that so he's seen the script a bunch of times he's done it a bunch of times it's been punched up and we're still going through the script line by line and he's looking at it at a big screen and like we're together making some change that are like oh this makes the joke punchier this makes

this is a word we don't need but he's also going through it and like making it easier for himself to say Not in like a dumbing down sort of way, we're just like, let's get this, let's like finally tune this and finesse this language so it is, it flows as well as it can possibly flow for me to like rapid fire deliver at this insane click. And like, man, I wish we'd been doing stuff like that. We worked out after hours and excessive pop culture disorder that like we would write those things. And I, you know, very often we're writing those up until the last minute. and repeating ourselves in these monologues because we're delirious as we're writing it.

It's just like, I just, I need to get, I need to make this point clear. And I'm figuring out what the point is while I'm writing it. And so I'm repeating myself and I'm over explaining and I'm not going to edit it because no one has those scripts except me and I'm not doing it. And then we get there on the day and it's just like, just kind of, just got to like cram this paragraph into my fucking head and as long as I can hold it in my stupid head for like four minutes I can say it and I'll look like a crazed person while I'm saying it because my eyes are dead while my mind and my mouth are steering the whole ship yeah it would have just been so much

easy on ourselves if we were like now before we tape this let's just like practice it a few times and see if we can change this language a little bit and make it cleaner and tighter. Not once in a way ever think about that. No, we didn't do it. I'll say the show doesn't suffer a ton from it either because you have to keep in mind like it has to feel very train of thought like in the episode.

It can't give too much at one moment because it's really hard for an audience to keep up because they're learning it at the same time. The same reason like teachers, when they talk from a class, talk so slow. It's because you need time to think about what you just digest what you just heard. And so we certainly give them that. There's a lot of like reiterating a point over and over again and kind of circling around it in a way.

Like the first Ninja Turtle script I wrote, I was like, I remember stopping in the middle and Justin me like, what is the actual point here? And I'm like, it's this. And he's like, well, yeah, can you just say it like that? And I was like, oh, yeah, I guess I could. Let me write it down. you're saying you want this idea just one time instead of three times all right you wanted the shorthand is that we're going to just give them the shorthand okay all right um yeah that but it was really startling to watch an entire episode of that show

that we spent so much time on and so much of our life and then to to now remember that I written it was my episode Speaking of the past, Sorin, let's get into the show. Oh, yeah. I recently watched Happy Gilmore 2. Like a lot of people around the world, I watched Happy Gilmore 2 recently.

It's awesome. I don't care what anyone says. I love it. My, I think that's sticking in my brain, other than it's awesome, is that the movie, almost to a distracting degree, reminds you of the 1996 Happy Gilmore

by including clips, like actual clips, sometimes like a flashback and sometimes it almost felt like a clip show. And like they were kind of cheaply trying to remind me

how much I liked the first one to sort of gloss over whatever flaws this one might have. Because I can't, because no one who is choosing to watch Happy Gilmore 2 needs to be reminded of anything from Happy Gilmore. It's, it's, we are, we know it.

No one is coming to Happy Gilmore, too, like completely fresh or blind. Or it's like, oh, yeah, it's been a while. I've thought about Happy Gilmore. It's like, no, no, no, no, no. It's fun to think about that kind of person, who would be it. Everyone's talking about this Happy Gilmore, too. Let's see. All right, I'll pull the trigger.

I'll go see it in theater. not only did they keep showing clips of the 1990s movie they also brought back a lot of characters from that movie and they would show clips they would be they would they would say remember do you remember blondie the caddy that happy Gilmore strangled in one scene briefly here's that scene we're going to show you that happening and now here is him in the present talking to that kid and saying, hey, Blondie, I hope you're not still mad that I strangled you.

And then later, Blondie strangles someone else. So they have to remind you who these characters are so minor that they have to remind you who they are. Remember this from the movie? Watch it for 15 seconds. Well, guess what? Here he is again, everybody. Right. And like for characters that died or for the actors who played them that died, all of those characters

have sons now. There's like the big guy who got the nail in his head, the giant that Happy used to work with. He died in real life, but he has a giant son who functionally is the same. And he's like, do you remember my dad?

He's dead. I'm here now. He has a chip stick in his head. Right. Happy's mentor. You're like, do you remember Chubs? He died in the movie and in real life. I am his son. and also I am missing a hand

and I have it replaced with a wooden hand and I work in a mini golf horse remember the guy who said jackass here are several clips of him saying jackass he died here's his son also saying jackass it's really bizarre moves again I think it's just like

as close to a clip show like five minutes of new material and 90 minutes of clip show and hey remember this material to remind you that you like the original movie. It's still all of it fucking worked for me. Here's what makes it slightly more interesting to me.

Okay. Is the latest Mission Impossible movie also came out this year. And they also, Mission Impossible Final Reckoning, they frequently and literally referenced the original Mission Impossible movie which also came out in 1996, the same year Happy Gilmore came out. And they, Mission Impossible, also cut to clips, like literal clips. They wouldn't just, like, Ethan, remember that time.

They would show, like, 1996 Tom Fruz and his team doing stuff and other movies, too, but mostly they were like, they really wanted you to remember how much you liked Brian to Palma's Mission Impossible movie. Yeah. And similar to Happy Gilmore, too. they brought back pretty minor characters they had William Donnelly in the first Mission of Possible he is an employee who has

a couple of lines maybe two or three lines but mainly his thing is he gets poisoned and he has to puke and shit and that allows Ethan to sneak into the fucking place to get the fucking thing

whatever the plots of these movies are it's when Ethan has to like drop from the ceiling and go hard Donnell. Donnelly is the employee who gets poisoned and shits himself and we never see him again. Until this movie, until 2025. They show you a clip of him. Remember this guy? He is back here now and we're going to give him some kind of closure and some more lines and more screen time. Also like Happy Gilmore. Yeah. They're like, hey, do you remember Ethan Hunt's mentor? uh jim phelps who was john void in the first movie well he died in that movie but now in this current mission impossible his son is a character functionally doing a lot of what jim phelps did in the first one and it's i don't have much to say about this except that had happened i'm bringing you two movies that came out this year that reference an original that came out in 1996

and they both specifically would show clips from that movie and bring minor characters from that movie back into this present movie and if they didn't bring a minor character back into the present movie they brought, they mentioned a character from the first movie and they introduced a new character in this movie that was their son fulfilling the same role. Man, I...

What do I do? Yeah, no, I'm looking at it. So the way sequels to movies used to work was you would like, you wouldn't, explicitly mentioned the first one, but you would follow, to a T, the exact same formula in the second film, to the point where an audience who doesn't even know anything about movies can anticipate what's coming. So like Home Alone is a great example. Like when Home Alone lost in New York, you have to have a moment where Catherine Harris says, Kevin, and then you've got to have, there's got to be some creepy person that Kevin doesn't trust and is scary, but then ends up being like the voice of reason by the end. You have to have, to the two Robert Lee you have to

follow the exact same beats and then you're like that's what a sequel is Major League did the same thing and like and when you have that

then you're like okay I get it I get it we were still hungry for the same movie but it functions essentially like an S&L sketch

that was very successful and now we're gonna do a second one is you know we're just gonna hit all the same stuff again because that's what you all

like the first time oh you still have an appetite for it let's do a third and so I get that but too. It feels like

the step that's just a little lazier than that is well, just watch the first one again. Come on, sit down with us. We'll show you some new stuff, but really just watch the first one of us again. You liked the first one, right? That was good. Doesn't that? Can't we rest on

those laurels a little bit more? It is shocking that they were both made in 1986. I started looking through 1996 movies thinking is it possible that other movies or like this is the last time we had good culture? It is depressing to go through 1996 movies because there were so many original ideas. I know.

You're like, oh shit, we really were making movies then. I know. Just it's especially, and I know like Wikipedia is going to front load the major releases, but the Wikipedia page for 1996. Major releases this year included Scream, Independence Day, Fargo, train spotting the Rock, the English patient, Twister, Space Jam, Mission, and, possible, Mars attacks, Jerry McGuire. Holy shit.

That's an incredible run of movies. And again, it's like, that doesn't represent the entire year because there's probably a lot of shit there too. And some people think the rock and Mars attacks are bad. But just the variety of movies, the different kinds of things that we were doing. And the types of movies, I go through this and I'm like, oh, well, we don't even make that type of music movie anymore. Yeah. Like a time to kill was in 1996. The Chamber, which was like this like wrought Gene Hackman movie. There's, uh, the English patient. I guess, you know, we're still like making obviously a preexisting, um, IP. But that's such a slow, slow story about two people falling in. Yeah. That you're like, oh, we don't. No, we don't do that anymore.

I guess we do technically make screams, twisters, independent stays in space. and missions impossible. You might do make those. That's true. Let's see. Multiplicity came out that year. God, I love that movie. Swingers, Ransom.

Like, we were doing it. We were making all kinds of different movies. And the same people were like, okay, I'll give that a shot. Like the same people are going to all these movies, which is like, also it doesn't happen anymore, except you. I'd love to talk more about Happy Gilmore,

but unfortunately I won't be saying it until 2020. yeah that makes a lot of sense there was I wanted to see if um airbud was a movie that came out in 1996 it unfortunately for our purposes came out in 1997 um but i bring it up because there was uh i'm on the airbud beat yeah i don't uh okay good um so when airbud returns was announced that that news comes to my desk 10,000 times in one day and they are are making this Air Bud Returns movie. And in the press release, they say the movie will engage nostalgic Airbud fans while introducing a new generation to the beloved basketball playing Golden Retriever. They're going to try it. They're going to build upon the legacy of the OG Airbud with all the fun, magic, heartwarming scenes and Buddy playing basketball. The plot is about a 12-year-old named Jacob who discovers an original VHS of Air Bud.

Holy fucking shit. In his father's belongings while visiting his childhood home after his death, Jacob then meets a straight golden retriever by the name of Buddy. that he names Buddy and they embark on a journey of healing United Team of Misfits and Chase the Championship. I don't I don't understand

You're going to spend half an hour watching a VHS in that movie The kid finds a VHS copy of Air Bud the movie and watches it and then finds a dog plays basketball

I don't understand the reality anymore This is a franchise I don't know if you kept up with the Air Bud films. By the end of it, it culminates in Air Buddies. This is where they're all puppies and they have superpowers and they fight crime and they talk to each other. My son watched some of these when he was young. Yeah. It is still, that is a more exciting and fresh evolution of the Air Bud idea than Air Bud returns where they just simply watch Airbud the movie and then may care about the movie.

Yeah, I agree with you. I'm wondering if like, because we're coming up on basically the 30 year anniversary of all of these, I wonder if there's internally within studios, there is a tacit agreement that 30 years you can reboot something from the beginning. So it's a property that you've watched. And like, this has got to be the plan all along, right? Was that you, you do a movie. It's a success.

So you do a second one. You do a third. And then at some point, you're like, and now what we should do is just start. again at the beginning. And 30 years is like the amount of time that you're allowed to do that in. And like, okay, let's just start airboat over. It's really, it's, it's so wild the, because until a few months ago, I couldn't, I couldn't tell you when the first Mission Impossible came out.

I know I saw it in theaters, but it could have been 98, it could have been 95. Like I just, it's not a thing that I think about. But if you haven't seen the most recent Mission Impossible, they make a huge deal. Like, in the movie, the date May 22nd, 1996, is, like, thematically relevant. It's the date that a certain mission took place, and it's the date that Hannah Waddeham's character and the Angela Bassett, the president, like, when they met or did some kind of thing. like the the the movie truly wants you to think may 22nd 1996 is uh meaningful and important uh a date that has no meaning other than like it's the real life release date of fucking mission impossible

and i it's it's such a strange move like they're like i guess it's not so wild in modern times because, like, May 4th became Star Wars Day, because May the 4th. And then at some point, we just decided that there was, like, a Marvel day where all the Marvel news comes out. And it's, uh, it's, it sucks. But there's like the day where they announced the new slate of Marvels. Like, we've all got really hyped for, um, press releases in modern times. And I think Mission Impossible is just really trying to also force their own.

May 22nd is Mission Impossible Day, and it's going to be Mission Impossible Day forever. And I don't, and again, it's not like, it's not like May the 4th. It's not like something that you could potentially divide to something. Like, like, why is May 22nd, 1996 important to Ethan Hunt just because that's the date the movie Mission Impossible came out? It is fun to imagine. It's fun to imagine, like, what they were, because they were, I'm sure that they, backed into it. They were like, well, let's come up with a day. It would be really nice for us to have, like, a day that we own. Yeah. Same way we did. I cracked. We were like, we should have like a, there should be like something that we're known for. The same way the Simpsons are known for Halloween. Like, let's come up with a day. Let's come up with a holiday that we can hijack. I'm sure that Mission Impossible was like, let's find out of Mission Impossible Day. What's the day that's not occupied? And everyone's like, oh, no, every day is occupied. And then you have to sit in that room with a calendar as people like, okay, April 15th. And like, no, it's National Donut Day. And they're like, okay, we're not doing that one. Yeah.

And then like, they're like, finally they land on May 11th and like, I'm in May 22nd. They're like, May 22nd. And everyone's like, you know what? That's actually really good. There's nothing going on that day. Man, I've got one. I've got terrible news for you if April 15th, your main preoccupation is donut day. It's a bigger tax day.

Yeah, yeah, buddy. You got to be, you got to make sure you get that done first. But I love that they're like, okay, well, then it's May 22nd. So let's figure out how to like, let's do the pun. Let's figure out how it fits with the movie. 22nd. The M-I-I? Right.

No. No. It would have been, I'm sure they're really mad now that they didn't release it on May 1st because M-1 is so much more helpful than M-22. Yeah, absolutely. Maybe they're trying to get to 22. Yeah. Well, Tom Cruise can do it.

But if anybody can, it's our old pal Tom. Yeah, I, I don't know. I think that we, I'm a little sad with this conversation because I'm looking at these movies and thinking, not all hits, but you were, everybody was trying. Not all hits so hard. All swings, though. That's what's huge. Yeah. Yeah, everybody's working their hardest and they're making stuff and think of all the people that worked on that.

Think all the people that worked on Ed. Think of all the jobs. All the jobs of every, like, from the multiple script drafts that I went through to, like, the crew of Ed. And everybody along the way probably was like, we're making some got some dog shit. This is great. We're making dog shit, but we're working. And how nice that must have been. Just the quiet assurance that everyone working on those movies was like, well, it'll be in a theater.

And that's always been a lifelong dream. It'll be nice to see my name and credits in it. theater like it's going to get a release they're not going to just show this movie for tax purposes that'd be crazy there's people in it yeah

it's sad well this has been a fun podcast I think that's going to do it for us thank you everybody for listening Mirax obviously YouTube obviously Patreon

all the hits Goodbye. Two best friends and comedy writers If there's an answer, they're gonna find it I think you'll have a great time here I think you'll have a great time here