The Bechdel Cast - Q&A with Jamie and Caitlin

Episode Date: January 2, 2020

On this special Q&A episode of The Bechdel Cast, Jamie and Caitlin answer questions from listeners to ring in the New Year!For Bechdel bonuses, sign up for our Patreon at patreon.com/bechdelcast.Follow@BechdelCast, @caitlindurante and @jamieloftusHELP on Twitter Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th 2017 was assassinated. Crooks Everywhere unearthed the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. Listen to Crooks Everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty and I'm the host of On Purpose. This week, I had the opportunity to speak with Dr. Andrew Huberman. Dr. Huberman is a neuroscientist and professor at Stanford University School of Medicine,

known for his research on brain function, behavior, and neuroplasticity, the brain's ability to adapt and rewire itself. The expectation on us is not perfection, it's being able to toggle between these different states. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Trust me, you won't want to miss this one. that's guaranteed to light up your day. Check out our recent episode with dancer, actress, and host of Dancing with the Stars, Julianne Hough,

revealing the healing journey behind her new novel, Everything We Never Knew. I am showing up for my younger self, and it is becoming a ripple effect energetically in my life, and that's why I feel so safe now. Listen to The Bright Side from Hello Sunshine on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Hello, everybody. We just have a quick few announcements at the top of the show. First of all, Happy New Year. Happy New Year. We wanted to remind you that there's a bunch of stuff going on in the extended Bechdel universe coming up soon. Starting with our live tour that we are going to be doing this month. If you don't have your tickets, get your tickets. We're starting on January 22nd in San Francisco as a part of SF Sketch Fest.

And we are covering the social network. Yes. And then we were scooting on over to New York City. We will be there for the Brooklyn Podcast Festival on January 24th. We will be at the Bell House and we are covering Black Swan. And then finally we'll be doing a stop in Philadelphia at our favorite Goo Goo Comedy Theater doing The Sixth Sense on January 26th. So all tickets are live now. Go to Bechtelcast.com and click on live appearances. Click on live. Also on that page,

I'm going to be doing a separate tour of some stand-up and I'm doing boss whom is girl in San Francisco Philadelphia and New York the same exact cities imagine that holy cow those tickets will be there too so yes go to Bechtelcast.com and check out the see you at our shows and then Jamie you had another thing you wanted to plug I have one last plug um so if you have been following me online for the past year or so you will know that i have been in mensa brag i mean it's no screenwriting degree because it only costs 75 dollars uh but i i have been doing a project where i've been in mensa and then i accidentally got targeted by like an alt-right group and it has been a whole

adventure of about 18 months and I just yesterday released a four-part podcast series called My Year in Mensa that traces my wild experience but also traces the history of IQ societies which is not so great but it's it was very interesting to me and if you enjoy the Bechtel cast I think you will enjoy it too so uh check it out it's my year in Mensa on all the podcasting platforms except Stitcher for some reason sorry and yeah rate, review, subscribe all episodes are out now not making it anymore so please listen. Woo and now enjoy the episode. Hello and welcome to the Bechdel cast. My name is Caitlin. My name is Jamie. This is our podcast about the representation of women in movies. But today, oh, first of all, happy 2020. Happy 2020. Hopefully this isn't the worst year of our life.

I hope in advance, this is not the worst year of your life. Today, we are deviating from the format a little bit. And we're going to be doing a Q&A episode. But hey, if this is your first time listening, and you just want to know things about us in our show even though you've never listened we'll tell you what the podcast is sure yeah uh we talk about the representation of women in movies and we use the bechdel test sometimes called the bechdel wallace test wow we're so insane close um and that of course is a media metric developed by cartoonist allison bechdel that requires two female identifying characters who have names talk to each other in a movie about something other than a man yes so we're starting there don't pass it yes but you know progress that's very slow uh but we're not talking about a movie

today we're talking about ourselves yeah so we're gonna constantly be taking up passing the bechdel test unless alfred there's i think there's some questions about alfred and melina but i think a long time ago we decided that that does pass the back you're true when you're talking about alpha it still passes if you haven't listened to the show just don't listen to this episode uh so we we um we asked our our matreon patreon aka matreon subscribers to get us a sick lineup of questions yes for this episode by the way roundabout plug for 2020 if you can't get enough Bechtel cast we do two bonus episodes a month right on our patreon aka matron and if you want the privilege of being able to submit a question for a q a episode just that we never do well this is going to be the start of many

or something I don't know I hope that people would want that um but in any case, we're taking it from our loyal matrons. If you'd like to become a matron, it's patreon.com slash Bechtelcast. If you don't, we will never know. Hey, was it your New Year's resolution to become a matron of our matron? Well, it's not too late. What? Go to the website and sign up today. But it's five bucks a month if you're interested there's a

backlog of over 50 bonus episodes so anyways that's where the questions are coming from yes um should we just jump into it i say we do all right starting with this two first names yeah first names this comes from linea they ask how did you two meet we We met in Boston. We met in Boston doing comedy. Do you, I remember, maybe we've talked about this before. I don't, maybe just in the matriarch. I don't remember. But I think the year would have been 2014 or no, 2013. Maybe I had just started doing standup.

I was 20. You were cool and doing, it was at that show in Jamaica, Jamaica, Plain, Boston comedy chicks. Yes. And you were doing it. I was doing it was at that show in jamaica jamaica plane boston comedy chicks yes and you were doing it i was doing it i was still very new to stand up you were like established in the boston scene and you literally because we were sitting at the same table i think there was like free pizza and i didn't i just like didn't talk to anybody i didn't know how to talk to anybody but you talked to me and you were talking about your master's degree you're like yeah I'm finishing grad school right now I was like wow oh my gosh and that sounds like me but that's classic actually that doesn't sound like me because I hate to bring up my master's degree you were really breaking form by really talking about your master's degree were

you mistaking me for someone else because I don't think I would ever mention my master's degree in screenwriting from Boston University that was maybe that's not the first time we met but that's the first time I remember us having a conversation yeah same yeah well and we both used to do you used to be in a sketch group at the theater that I worked at yes at Improv Boston yes yeah we got to know each other a little better that way and then I moved to LA I think a year before you did yes and then literally as soon as you moved here I was like do you want to do a podcast with me and the rest is history we became very very close doing the podcast you're listening to literally right now indeed here we are all right next question oh I love this one comes from Leon favorite Alfred Molina performance let me pull up his imdb i don't

want to miss anything sure i have one off the top of my head and it is his performance in the movie chocolate i knew you were gonna say he's really good in that he's really good and everything he's really good in everything but in this movie he he plays a villain. He's a great villain. He's a great hero. He can do anything. Yes. He is doing a French accent. Just the scene where you get... Okay, so if you haven't seen it, you got to see Chocolat.

Yeah, you got to see it. I mean, suspend your Johnny Depp hatred. We get it. Yes. But you should see it. There's a scene where... So he's like very anti-chocolate throughout the whole movie. Which sounds silly. It's a metaphor for pleasure. It's a scene where he so he's like very anti-chocolate throughout the whole movie which sounds where it's a metaphor for pleasure it's a metaphor for pleasure yes so there's a scene where he accidentally gets a little fleck of chocolate on his lips and he licks them and

then he's just like goes into this like horny does when he eats the krabby patty sure uh i have not seen did you see there's a spongebob movie coming out oh yeah i'm so excited okay i love spongebob anyway so um so alfred melina is you know just he's horny he's eating all the chocolate and it's truly one of the the best performances of any actor it's heaven of all time he's so good i think for me the seminal performance will always be spider-man 2 okay dr otto octavius i think the best the best villain performance i've ever seen sexual awakening and all uh but he's also i re i re-watch his scene and but i don't re-watch boogie nights very often but i re-watch his scene and boogie Nights a lot. Like that famous, oh, it's so, he's incredible in that scene.

He's so good. I also, he's been in so much. You saw Frozen 2. How was he in that? His character is not on screen for very long. And it's just his voice. Unbelievable. He was the only part of Vice that I liked.

I'll say that. I like the upcoming robot chicken sketch that he's in that I wrote that will maybe come out this week. I don't know. Oh, I did like him in Monsters University. Wait, he's in Monsters University? Yes. He's one of the professors.

He does a lot of like Disney animation work then because he's also in Wreck-It. No, not Wreck-It. Ralph Breaks the Internet. Yes. Yeah. I mean, I mean, he's he's first of all,aks the Internet. Yes. Yeah. I mean, he's, first of all, got to get those checks. And he's directing his first movie this year, too. He's just, I mean, we love Alfred Molina at the cast.

And also, this episode is going to come out on our one-year anniversary of meeting Alfred Molina. Really? Yeah. Because I remember it's January 2nd, 2019. I'll never, ever, ever forget that day.

Oh my goodness. And if you live in the LA area in February and March, he's going to be in a one man play in Pasadena. And I have tickets to opening night. And then I think we're going to go in March when you come back. When I come back, when I come back from new york among other places that i will be on the east coast oh yeah we're touring when i'm in yes we're touring so don't forget don't forget that we're come to our tour

but i when i'm in new york i'm seeing a play called paddington gets in a jam it is for ages three to eight how has alfred molina not been in a paddington movie yet i don't know he's it seems like a perfect because he's from paddington if only just for us yes he's from paddington yeah he's british yeah he's got the right vibe he would be he could be a villain or a hero yeah true that's the best thing about him i know i love him so much he's really good in frida he's we can stop talking about it he's good in everything yes he's good in literally everything he most certainly is i think no but you know what leon to answer your question our favorite alfred williams performance would have to be the aaron brockovich episode yes really career maker i think do you think he would have been in frozen too if he

hadn't done that of course not no thank you leon that's the answer uh next question comes from judy asks which film are you most surprised actually passed the test which episode do you think has the most outtakes due to tangents laughing fits etc okay so two different questions here tough uh well i mean movies i feel like most movies i'm surprised pass the test are ones that barely pass the test yeah right so like the i feel like we should have a shorthand for it now but like the almost like the barely pass of like hi to use your name hi judy look at this shoe awesome right and then the rest is men killing each other so those are always like it's frustrating i'm looking at our list of i always remember being surprised that the room uh oh yes that is the bechdel test uh-huh uh believe it or

not gang tommy wizzo's the room passes the bechdel test which is pretty amazing uh groundhog day barely passes i'm just looking through our our oh g that's one that passes the bechdel test that is shocking and inappropriate right past what else do we have here that you're just like um that can't be right manhattan passes yikes um yeah there's a lot of problematic movies that pass the bechdel test which is you know we're always reminding it's a flawed metric sure yeah no i think the room was a shocker well and then the second part of this question is uh which episode do you think has the most outtakes due to tangents laughing fits etc um i don't know if there was one there are some where we truly just like go to another dimension and at the end i'm like i don't know

what happened to that episode there oh i wish i remembered what it was because there was one that i had like a separate editing file open for that i had just i kept putting outtakes into that i was gonna like edit into like a super cut I mean to pull I don't I don't remember what it was a recent episode the Santa Claus is one of the most wild recording experiences I've ever I don't think we even cut that much from we didn't which is why it was two and a half hours long but like it was that I think was one of my favorite episodes to record because it was just like, where are we? Right. What is happening? But we didn't cut that much, so that doesn't really answer the question. I feel like when stuff gets wild, unless it's like wild in a, oh my God, what is this person saying kind of way, which has very rarely happened, we just kind of leave it in.

Yeah. Yeah. we just kind of leave it in yeah yeah i mean yeah so we haven't done back when we used to have more male guests on the show there would be more cutting sometimes to make our male guest not yet hate mail um and which is why we have since enforced a very sparing every once in a while honored male guest policy indeed but i think especially since we put the kibosh on male guests for the most part um we haven't had to do that many outtakes yes yeah next question comes from taylor asks when will you be gay um i'm bi which i did a soft come out this year in one tweet but i also don't feel the need to congratulate explain myself sure yeah um my sexuality if anyone was curious

um my birth control is making me asexual so that's something but it's coming yeah um but i'm gonna go off of it soon and you might be asking why can't you just like stop taking your pill or whatever uh it's because it's an implant in my arm yes and i have to get it surgically removed health care flex yeah um yeah i guess the answer to your question is i don't know i guess we're both like question marks all around yeah we don't know um uh we're somewhere on the spectrum as everyone is i know i've said i guess i have said at the show that i'm straight a number of times which has never been true but who cares i don't know it doesn't keep me up at night, nor should it you.

Sure. Yeah, I think here's an answer to your question, because I feel absolutely no sexual feelings and have not for the past several years since I've been on this birth control. I don't really know who I'm attracted to anymore. But I fun year. I think when I get new health insurance and can go to the doctor and get my thing taken out, I would definitely consider dating women. Yeah. So there's that. I'm currently in a relationship with a man.

Boo. No, I'm kidding. I know. Isaac is very nice. He's so great. Isaac rules. So I guess, Taylor, I hope that that answers your question in part. Our next question comes from Katie.

They ask, movies you're most looking forward to in 2020 i don't know i feel like i never know about a movie before two weeks before it comes out sure what are you excited for i'm i'm excited for mulan yes a lot of action they don't fuck that up i know they fucked up literally all of them so far they truly have so fingers crossed yeah it'd be great i'm excited for yeah what is even coming out let me look it up okay wait yeah 2020 movies in spite of the fact that uh scarlett johansson is canceled i am interested to see black widow okay sure um oh the new wonder woman comes out next year that'll be fun the harley quinn movie i guess kind of i'm getting a little burned

out on margot robbie tbh even though she's my in my favorite movie ever fast and furious 9 apparently sure dr doolittle i i'll see it i honestly we should cover the eddie murphy one oh sure um i oh god the return of tj thank you. Oh, you mean with Underwater? Underwater, yeah. Hard pass. Christian Stewart, how could you? Betrayal. Oh, you know what is a movie that I genuinely think will be funny to watch because it looks

really, really bad? What? Harrison Ford, Call of the Wild. Oh, my gosh. Why? Two movies I'll see ironically are Dr. Dolittle and Harrison Ford, Call of the Wild. So a bunch of CGI animals? The only CGI-

I want to see wealthy men and cgi animals in 2020 the only movie with a cgi animal that you should watch is paddington obviously it looks so bad oh minions three yes scoop gotta see scoop well i y'all i don't know if next year's gonna be i don't know if this is gonna be a good year for movies honestly i i will say 2019 i think was a pretty solid year for movies a lot of movies i really really liked came out yeah um yeah i guess oh in the heights will be cool i'm excited to see and i think west side story comes out next year too or maybe that's 2021 i don't know i know the new into the spider verse is coming out but I think it's 2022 oh my goodness I know we'll be dead

but that yeah that doesn't come out until 2022 Sonic I mean honestly that's a lot of bullshit coming out this year yeah I guess there's plenty of movies I'll see but there's nothing like I feel like going into 2019 there was a bunch that I'm like yeah

but not so much so far if we're missing if you have recommendations drop us a line please do yeah yeah next question comes from allison and they ask opinions slash ideas on how to effectively combat reboot culture which tends to perpetuate or trivialize regressive ideas regarding race gender sexuality etc combating it is difficult i mean it's just a very sinister cinematic i mean i think that if you if you are not about it don't go like that's a great way to combat it is not is is if you see it and you're unhappy with the way it's rebooting it make your thoughts known because like movie production places for better or worse are listening to fans now more than ever.

Social media is a useful tool. It literally ruined Star Wars. It's crazy. But but like for better or worse, people are listening. And if you're if you are unhappy with how a property is being rebooted, let yourself be known or don't see the movie you know i mean there's a lot of recent reboots that have flopped because no one wanted it yeah um money speaks very loudly in all industries this one included and if something doesn't do well but it

that sucks because like what you should do is put your money towards seeing movies. That you want to see. That you want to see. But it's like, I don't want to tell you to like, don't go to this like all female reboot of XYZ movie because what's going to, well, I don't know. What's going to happen I think is that executives are going to be like, well, no one went to see this. So that means that no one wants to see you know female driven stories and it's not that it's that we don't want to be get like the sloppy seconds of what men want and stuff like that yeah and i think that a similar thing was brought up

with you're right where like when the charlie's angels reboot wasn't a smashing success it was like well this is a reflection on women where it's like no this is a reflection on reboots right but it is true that whenever a property is rebooted and it's like an all-female reboot or you know not every character is white this time or but it's if it's still sloppily written and i like and a lot of times the behind the camera diversity efforts aren't done right it comes out i mean yeah it's tricky combating it is really challenging and i think unfortunately kind of requires that you do a little homework on your own of like okay i don't want to see a reboot what do i want to see who is someone whose work that i really like who isn't getting the representation that they deserve who isn't

getting the work they deserve and you know let people know like it it is unfortunately it's like your money speaks very loudly and word of mouth online speaks very loudly so if there are people whose work you want to see more of scream it but yeah i don't know i feel like in some ways we are trapped in reboot culture for a while yeah uh disney has uh is has literally taken over the did you that for 2019 they had 80 of box office receipts it's an actual monopoly and we live in hell yeah but baby yoda right kidding didn't watch it um but he's cute baby yoda is very so monopolies are fine um yeah i don't know it's depressing allison i don't know try everyone keep supporting artists that you

like that are you know trying different things yes uh let's take a quick break and then we'll come right back to answer more questions. Let's do it. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere, a podcast that unhurts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks. Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. And she paid the ultimate price. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free,

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Most of the time. And we're back. Hope you enjoyed that commercial break. Yeah. Our next question comes, I love this one, Only for the Internet asks, what filmmaker should be legally barred from making any more movies?

Oh. Okay. Well, let's start with softballs like woody allen duh roman polanski duh now let's take it out of the criminal sphere michael bay that was gonna be my next one is a very obvious one yeah um basically any male director who has assaulted or disrespected women and continued to have a flourishing career shouldn't yeah they're done yeah they're done if we're if we're in charge which we aren't we never will be they're done bye-bye michael bay just made a netflix movie and i'm like yeah what was i don't know it was just a very i'm like ryan reynolds is that who's in there i know it's like ryan reynolds

could you relax you have enough money what are you doing um i would add is it the fairly brothers to that list you've made all those horribly problematic comedies in like the 90s and 2000s and then green book yeah i think any white director that has written a white savior story and won an oscar for it bye bye yeah done bye bye don't need that and and okay my pie in the sky which people always give me blowback for but it's a sinister cinematic trend that i fucking hate is men who directed broad often offensive comedies of the 90s and 2000s who are now experiencing a second renaissance directing more serious movies where they're mostly copying adam mckay adam mckay can continue working as far as i'm concerned everyone copying adam mckay let's say hangover guy let's say bombshell guy i'm sure they're

perfectly nice guy although todd phillips does seem like a fucking dick but uh i don't know about i don't know about mr bombshell but he directed all the austin powers movies and now he's like i get to make the me too movie no you don't right bye bye you don't get to make that movie i mean so if we're going all the way radical feminism yeah if you directed austin powers you don't get to make the me too movie yeah you can make another movie that no one gets to see right you make them like make awesome powers 500 fine so i mean it's just it's just frustrating and it's like less personal i guess but the the specificity of that trend is weird to me because the farrelly brothers also fall into that yes the specificity of that trend is weird and it is just like why do these white guys who have been bajillionaires for 20 years get this second renaissance when so many directors of color, so many female directors, so many queer directors are still waiting for their first opportunity at a mainstream movie?

Yeah. Grow up. I agree. Okay. Next question. Should we just pick one or two of these? Oh, Lindsay. Lindsay. Lindsay. Yeah, pick one or two of these? Oh, Lindsay. Lindsay!

Yeah, we'll answer two of these. First one being, are there any previous Spectral Cast episodes that you think you got wrong and would change your ratings? I can't think of anything specifically. I stand by all of my comments in the Matrix episode. But I think just in general,

Caitlin, I'm curious to your thoughts, too. But I mean, we started this podcast right after the election, which wasn't planned, but depressingly well-timed, which was over three years ago. And before, I don't know, like, I think that the discourse has kind of grown with our show, and we have learned a lot. And so I think especially in the first year of the podcast, especially maybe the first six months have learned a lot and so I think especially in the first year of the podcast especially maybe the first six months and a lot of like I don't know I mean I just know that discourse wise I I've grown a lot in the past three years I've learned a lot and same same especially from just like talking to our guests and just seeking out the information more so there's I'm sure and I don't go back and listen to them. I'm sure that like especially in the first six months of the show, there were some things that either we missed entirely that would be very obvious to us now.

Or we're just like, is that your take, Jamie? Is it? So, yeah, yeah. We've been growing up. Definitely. There's a few tropes, too, that I've learned about or noticed more since uh we started like even for when we did the um force awakens episode that was after we had already been doing the podcast for over a year yeah but i wasn't that tuned into like the mary sue trope at that point and i think we didn't

really discuss that on that episode about how while it is nice for a Star Wars movie to have a female protagonist, I didn't really acknowledge that she falls into like that Mary Sue trope thing. So, yeah, I think, yeah, it is mostly our earlier episodes. We've been learning along with everyone else. Yeah. And a lot of times just like it's been a slow process of just like making sure that we are finding the right perspectives for the right episodes and yeah like they think that there were early episodes where like if there was a queer storyline we wouldn't always seek out the queer perspective on it and just kind of free ball it and we know better now i don't know yeah we've definitely yeah i mean we always acknowledge when we have blind spots and i think our blind spots were i think we've narrowed them down a bit in in the

years of doing the podcast but i think they were quite they're bigger vast yeah at first so yeah um this has been has been an educational experience for us yeah um and we are always learning we're never the final word on anything so another question are there any movies that get requested all the time that you simply refuse to do caitlin you said you had an answer for this yes i do um i never ever ever ever want to do a movie directed by ari aster i know you say i feel like we're gonna end up having to do it though i'm sure we will but But after seeing. Well, that ties into another question.

It's not even that I hate him as a filmmaker. It's just that his movies punish his audience. And I hate movies that I feel punished by for just watching them. I don't mind movies that are punishing you on purpose. Sometimes I don't like his movies very much. Which is a question that we got. We got, why didn't either of you like Midsommar? I couldn't stop thinking about it for weeks.

Well, I didn't like Midsommar, but I did see it three times. So what does that say about me? It means I really thought about, do I like Midsommar? I really thought about it. I was also under the influence of Will Poulter, who I had a real moment for him over the summer. Ari Aster is doing

the 2019 thing that I don't like where he's like, women are front and center in my movies, but I never have a female co-writer and all my female characters are written weird. Great. Why didn't you like Midsommar? Horror movies just aren't really my genre. And his are so unsettling that I just feel awful after I've seen them and I don't like movies that make me feel awful I like romps I like movies that make me feel good so I like horror movies and I like feeling awful so that's not quite but I I didn't like well I yeah I think that that movie more than any other i saw this year hit that trope on the head of like touting this female protagonist but so many tropes are present where she is strictly defined by her trauma there's just it's just a lot of tropes that i feel like didn't

really that everyone got a pass on because they're like it's a breakup movie and i'm like but but but but i just yeah i i didn't i don't know i i love how his movies look they look good and he gets really good performances i think he also tends to uh demonize mental illness quite a bit definitely demonizes mental illness a lot i mean hereditary is where that is and the horror genre has done well in some instances but and others have really sold people with mental illnesses just completely sold them out yeah so i i just think that he has a lot of blind spots that he has maybe not been forthcoming with and it's just like it's okay to have blind spots but you know it's a process and seek out it is frustrating to me that he has not had any

female co-writers but only writes movies with female protagonists like that is a glaring blind spot and i think it comes up in his both of his movies very clearly and it sucks because i think he's a good director yeah and i would encourage him to maybe get over himself a little bit also if you've listened to an interview with him, oh boy. I have not. I don't care enough. Your eyes are, you're like, is this a freshman film seminar? Shut up.

So that's two answers in one. Yeah. Great. Next question comes from Amber, asks, can there be more people of color guests? Answer? Yes. Yes. We should do that.

Yes. We're always making an effort to make the show as inclusive as humanly possible. But obviously, yeah, they're like we always always room for more. And there will be. And if there's a specific person, comedian, writer of color who you would love to see their perspective on the show, let us know. And also tweet at them in case they don't know we exist and think that we're a fake podcast which sometimes will happen sure but yeah point taken there's always more work and more perspectives and yes we'll

keep on getting them yes indeed thank you for the question yes next one uh henry asks if you could redo any of the movies you've already done which would you do except titanic and doubt mean um i would read i mean i think it's really just like some of our first episodes i would redo i think we should redo kill bill possibly with zach sherwin again oh interesting um because i just know first of all we didn't even give ratings for that episode apparently yes we did it on we didn't have the nipple scale yet and i just remember giving that movie so much credit that i would no longer give it now right um with the perspective of time i think that i would redo kill bill i would redo mad max fury road because that has become truly one of my favorite movies of all time and i watched this really good uh video

essay series about it that brings up a lot of points that i don't think we discussed and yeah it was another early episode another early episode yeah i i would probably redo that one too and give it more credit even though i still don't enjoy the genre yeah that was uh right the steam punks i mean and i still don't like steampunk aesthetics but i would give i would give the characters more credit this time i actually might uh have us redo that one for a matreon episode for my birthday month this year yeah that'd be fun yeah yeah i don't know i mean for the most part it's i mean you can definitely track our growth throughout the episodes but i wouldn't redo the matrix but that's for sure oh well because i've seen that movie

we'll see what happens when my birthday month comes around don't don't i that's my i veto oh you i'm not gonna do it all right i'm gonna do one by myself then no you can't do one by yourself that's cheating oh my god okay we can do we can okay here's compromise okay i'll do a sequel no those are so bad but i won't watch the original okay okay wait next question uh our next questions come from douglas the first question is are there any all-female reboots you'd actually want to see um i don't know that it would have to be really really good i mean i i always err on the side of just let there be new stories in general, but new stories about women and people of color and queer people. The work of updating a story that at very least has internalized misogyny

to not have internalized misogyny, I feel like we've seen it a lot of times. It is rarely worked in a really really really effective way for me at least i would much prefer to see new stories right and we might have touched on this even earlier in this episode already but for me the all-female reboot it's like the industries they have this notion that oh no one's gonna want to see a movie with a female protagonist unless it's already like a tried and true yeah recognizable property which is not true i don't know why they think that and and there's so many like proven box office things that are like yeah that's not true but just there's not enough female executives.

I'll answer this question by saying that because this franchise is very problematic, but also like near and dear to me. I would like to see a female reboot of Indiana Jones. And I want to play Indiana Jones. Done. I'd see it. Thank you. I can't think of a property off the top of my head that I would want to see an all-female reboot of there's like some extended universes i would like to see female stories inside of oh sure maybe but not a beat for beat yeah just give me new stories give writers and directors a chance yes uh another question from douglas quote also as movies hopefully become more

inclusive should we assume that any conversation about a trans man passes the test and that a passing conversation can be between any combination of female, trans male and non-binary characters? Unquote. Interesting. Yes, that's a very interesting question. I would imagine that the test should be on the gender you identify as. I also think that there is space in the test to be inclusive i've seen versions of the bechdel test that it's like not just female identifying characters it's also like it's open to like femmes and like non-binary characters which i am totally for um so if it's like two

non-binary people talking about another non-binary person, I would say that passes the Bechdel test. I'd be really interested to hear Alison Bechdel's thoughts on that, too, just because she's still a working writer, still an activist. I mean, I would imagine that she would have the test be as inclusive as humanly possible. Yeah, I mean, we don't make the rules in terms of the test. We just choose the way we interpret it and unfortunately because there's not a lot of trans representation on screen this is not really a question we've ever come up against right in the movies that we've covered yeah no but i agree with you i mean the test should and i think was designed to be as inclusive as possible right and it will

and it wasn't even designed for to actually be applied the way that we're applying it. It's a comic strip. It's from a comic. Thanks to Watch Out For, an amazing collection. Yep. And the context of the scene that it appears in is two lesbian characters talking about this test. And they're saying, oh, I pay attention to see if women talk to each other in a movie. Because if they're talking to each other but not about men then i can sort of ship them together and pretend that

they are queer women because there's especially at the time that this was written and then also still today there's barely any there were so little queer representation yeah i think that that for now is kind of like a person to person. How do you interpret the test? For our purposes, we want to make it as inclusive as possible. And as you interpret it, I guess my thing is just like, as long as you're comfortable with the way that the test is treating gender in regards to you and your identity, you know, we're not going to tell you you're wrong. Yeah.

So yeah, the test is open interpretation i think supposed to be inclusive as possible indeed thank you douglas yes thank you uh grace asks is robert evans ever going to be a guest yes at some point yes the thing is robert doesn't live here anymore yes so it's hard uh we don't get to see him very often but when the stars align you know he's going to be on we've had email chains about it right and it's like are we going to see him very often. But when the stars align, you know he's going to be on it. We've had email chains about it. Right. And it's like, are we going to ask him to talk about what he wants to talk about, which is guns?

Or are we going to have him talk about... Also, if you don't know who Robert Evans is, he's the host of Behind the Bastards. Yes. A part of the I Heart Radio family of podcasts. A dear friend. If you haven't listened to his show it's wonderful also worse year ever with cody johnson and katie stole yeah yeah i mean we love robert we want to have him on the show i was pushing for him to do the hannah montana movie right yes i still if you

want that episode tweet it robert remind him and then the next time we're in the same city we'll make it happen yes yeah but we haven't been avoiding it. Right. It's going to happen. Yeah. He just doesn't live in L.A. anymore. He just doesn't. And honestly, smart. Grace also asks, what are the most popular episodes slash what are our favorite episodes? Popular episodes, I don't really know.

Just a little peek behind the curtain. We really don't know much about our numbers. We don't. For a very long time, theilight episode was our most popular i feel like twilight and spider-man 2 were up there with the most popular episodes for some time i have to imagine that that has changed i would imagine that aaron brockovich is probably up there yes at this point um my best guess is the more popular the movie the more popular the episode because we've done movies that are a little more, you know, off the beaten path.

And those numbers were far lower, believe it or not. But, yeah, I remember for the longest time. It was Twilight for a long time. I mean, honestly, I kind of still hope it's Twilight. But, yeah, I would be curious to know you know beats us yeah it's us to answer your question favorite episodes love actually is still going to be an all-time favorite for me sure i think one of my favorite a recent favorite would be the santa claus oh yeah i think of like conversations that i really i really loved our lion king episode with naomi oh that was great

i think that was a really good conversation i love the also black panther episode with Naomi. Oh, that was great. That was a really good conversation. I love the also Black Panther episode with Naomi. A classic. I always am going to love the Snow White episode with Jack. We were singing so much. That was really fun. One of the funniest ones that we've done recently, I think was Good Will Hunting with Ayo. Yes, that was so funny. One of my favorite live episodes we've done is Waiting to Exhale with Erin Haines-Wack. That was so much fun. Lacey episodes are always favorites. What Women Want and

10 Things I Hate About You. The best. Are always going to be, I just, yeah, we have great guests and we always have fun. I don't know. Bring It On with Maggie is really fun i just i love everyone i love all of our guests yeah i couldn't pick an all-time favorite but those are the ones that jumped to mind of like yeah yeah same yeah let's take another quick break but guess what gang we've got more questions when we come back. We've got a few more questions.

Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017 was murdered. There are crooks everywhere you look now. The situation is desperate. My name is Manuel Delia. I am one of the hosts of Crooks Everywhere a podcast that unhurts the plot to murder a one-woman Wikileaks Daphne exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state

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or wherever you get your podcasts. it is much more than just a sport and much more than just entertainment. Lucha Libre is a type of storytelling. It's a dance. It's tradition. It's culture. This is Lucha Libre Behind the Mask, a 12-episode podcast in both English and Spanish about the history and cultural richness of Lucha Libre. And I'm your host, Santos Escobar, the emperor of Lucha Libre and a WWE superstar. Santos!

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This is Lucha Libre Behind the Mask. Listen to Lucha Libre Behind the Mask as part of My Cultura Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you stream podcasts. And we're back. All right, next question comes from Stacy. This one is rather long. It says, how do you feel the evolution of feminism, specifically second and third wave, affected the portrayal of women in movies over the years, both positively and negatively, through both the advancement of women and inevitable backlash. For example, there does not seem to be a linear improvement in the portrayal

of women or minorities in film and often seem to be steps taken backwards. How much of that is a type of protest by those in power trying to stop any change in the status quo or recapture the good old days oh this is an excellent complicated question yes so i do agree that the portrayal of women in movies has progressed as time goes on especially through various waves of feminism that have taken place and i also agree that the majority of this progress has applied to the way that white women are white hetero women are portrayed in movies and that as we've discussed in the show many times that they tend to be the first stop of who is afforded progress and that women of color and queer women and trans women and just just everyone else kind of gets left behind and the

progress is much slower yeah and again like that is it's very frustrating because you know hollywood is this huge bureaucracy still majority patriarchy still majority white so you have to scream at the top of your lungs you have to vote with your money. You have like all this frustrating stuff just to get the bare minimum accomplished. Yeah. And I think interestingly, we've kind of covered a bunch of movies that I think would fall into second wave feminism recently, where it was like white women should be allowed to work in an office. That was part of what was accomplished.

Nine to five. Nine to five. First Wives Club. part of what was like nine to five nine to five first wives club and as the show has continued we've tried to contextualize these a little better instead of i think maybe three years ago we would have been like oh this is so this movie from 1970 is horrible to women right and we've gotten criticism for that and like fairly taken yeah uh we've been trying to contextualize okay it doesn't read as a 2020 narrative right but oftentimes those movies do the smallest bit of progress that allow more progress to take place later obviously we would prefer radical change yeah but there are i think we have covered movies

that represent incremental change that doesn't read well today, but does represent progress for that time. Yes, yes, I agree. Yeah. And as far as like kind of the backlash that more progressive movies have been exposed to, I'm thinking like all the backlash that the all femalefemale reboot of ghostbusters got uh every incel boy on the internet was like this is ruining my childhood it's very revealing yeah like if there are executives out there studios and networks who are listening to these shitty regressive people and their bad opinions. And they're like, well,

you know, the incels didn't like this movie. So we better not make any more movies like it. Then. I mean, I hope that doesn't happen, but I think it's very frustrating. Who executives choose to take seriously and who they don't yeah it's weird

because i feel like now with social media in some ways we have more of a voice than ever in having a say but then so do shitty guys right like little baby boys have more of a voice than ever and you can see that reddit threads some cinema trends yes and it's so it's you know as with all things internet it is a blessing and a curse yeah it's about context i think of how a movie reads now and there's always i mean anytime there's any sort of progress made or social change and cultural evolution there's definitely going to be backlash and we you just have to power through it you just have to keep fighting the good fight and not succumb to the regressive tendencies and the status quo because they are harmful and i wanted to i guess this is

a good opportunity to shout out um our older listeners of the show too it's like i always especially like i mean our main chance to interact is online but also at live shows of it it is nice to see listeners who maybe were growing up during second or we were growing up during third wave feminism of like girl power right um but to see women who grew up during various waves of feminism just sharing their experience and talking about how like okay i was a part of the second wave like i've had conversations with listeners who grew up during various waves of feminism just sharing their experience and talking about how like okay i was a part of the second wave like i've had conversations with listeners who were like i was a part of the second wave feminist movement but now i see that you know if you get

stuck in a certain movement then you're just denying yourself progress and that's how we get turfs yeah um which is just like yeah so yeah we uh want to thank our older listeners who are keeping their minds open and we promise to do the same yes thanks stacy yes let's close up with a couple let's close out with a couple of fun ones yeah yeah unfortunately we won't have time to get to every question we've had to skip some um but we read them all we read them all and we appreciate it there's only so much time i wanted to take this quick question from jack would you ever consider writing a bechtel cast book yes someone should contact us yeah but but here's the tea jack

no one's asked um oh here's a question from michelle when will you release an episode about santa university uh when someone asks me to make it oh right because you have to we have to it has to exist first must be produced and then we will do the episode and then we have to have a five and a half hour a few people asked yes a few people have asked who's our dream guest uh even if it's not realistic or maybe it is who knows we got alfred we got alfred we can do anything we want to have alison bechdel of course yes alison bechdel would be a dream guest absolutely people always ask us also if we if she knows about the show we don't know we don't know

she if you know her you should ask i would hope i hope by now i would think by now she does um so if anyone has any contacts out there and wants to hook it up to have her come on yes we'd love to have her um also liz wallace who uh is the other half of the bechdel wallace test indeed love that would be great um i would love rashida jones i'd love to have i would love to have gloria calderon kellett oh i'm not sure if i know who that is she is one of the only um female latinx showrunners working today she's very online she's very cool and we follow each other on twitter and i'm always afraid to tweet at her she's really cool and she she's the showrunner for one day at a time on netflix oh cool um and so i'd love to have her on for me uh another one would be uh laverne cox i think would be

yeah i would love to have jessica williams oh yes i would love to have jenny nicholson she's a youtuber that who i admire also kat black is one of my favorite youtubers who else i mean just everyone reese witherspoon meryl streep meryl streep is that nicole brown oh yeah is that nicole brown would be an amazing guest she's so funny she's so funny and she seems cool i'm just picking people that i want to hang out with um yeah i don't know there's so there's so many people tweet at them and say hey have you heard of this you should be on it yes especially if you know that they live in our area we have a whole thing where we have to convince people we exist a lot um and so if you can be a assist oh anyone who was in a christmas prince wow i was not expecting you to say that but i i would agree well welcome them

especially the two different actors who play her dad rudy new york uh bernie sanders can come on the podcast oh sure okay let's do uh two more this one's from sarah i'd love to know if you get any weird or funny reactions from people about the show. You can't be a male comment. You can't. No, actually, we have. I take that back. We have a lot of wonderful male identifying listeners who have open hearts and minds.

We're not talking about them. We're talking about the other ones. We've, as I think early on, it's kind of tapered off. I think we've kind of found our audience and people who... It's pretty clear what the show is about. And if you hate us and what we're talking about and are listening, why are you torturing yourself? Like, no need to do that. But we used to get some male comments.

Oh, sure. Oh, like on iTunes? was that like one star objectifies oh boy so that is a a nice reminder to go on whatever podcast platform you use oh yes and rate us give us nice things say say nice things give us high ratings caitlin doesn't read our itunes reviews but i do because i hate myself i don't know um but it's reading our one star ratings can be fun but please don't write one here's our most recent oh no no no it's a nice one okay it's five stars the subject line is pee erasure. Oh, from Home Alone? I guess so. I don't remember saying that. But someone said I literally spit out my coffee when someone said pee erasure during the Home Alone episode. I guess that did I say that? Yeah. Yikes. Well, a fun fact about me, I forget everything I say

immediately after I say it. A reaction that i still get quite a bit from people and this this is sometimes people who like know about the show but people will be talking about a movie and they only want to know if it passed the bechdel test or not and i'm like oh my god that's so funny we spend two minutes maybe of every episode discussing the bechdel test and then the rest of it is everything else there is to talk about but people still only seem to be concerned about whether or not the movie passes at the Bechdel test and I'm like I barely care anymore I truly almost don't care sometimes forget to do it yeah I often forget to pay attention because it's just I think with like the three years that we've

been doing the show three plus years we've had so many more interesting conversations and there's so many more important things to talk about it's a jumping off point we've been saying it from the beginning but we mean it now more than ever it is funny yeah like when you especially because it makes me so uncomfortable to like i don't know like when you meet someone and they're like what do you do and then they're like but what's it about i'm like i don't want to do this i please just let me sit here um but like when you you're like but what's it about i'm like i don't want to do this i please just let me sit here um but like when you you're like oh it's about the vectal test and then someone's like uh-huh and then they're like so you just figure out if it passes i'm like i'm not gonna

have sex with you like please please stop um yeah i don't know yeah but i mail comments and then people being like should it take two hours to figure that out i think we're stupid i don't know um people are wild yeah uh but you everyone listening right now is great it's great unless you're not unless you're in the middle of running a one star all right well uh one uh one last question very important. I have a very strong answer. This comes from Chris. Can we start a team moist scabs for all these centrists out there? No.

No, we can't. No. So centrism. Who are you, Joe Biden? I don't like centrism. But on the other hand. But you love team moist scab. No. centrism but on the other hand no what i'm saying is that what if the scab thing is a spectrum and

we're being too binary about it no okay no well jamie says no i say yes scabs i say yes to i say no more scabs it's team dry scabs is the answer if you like moist scabs you're joe biden sorry centrism i gotta go i think i'm okay so i've always been team wet scabs yes you have but maybe now because no because i'm uh very cool and smart um i i like this team moist scabs is the... This is one of those things where you create something and then it becomes out of your control and it's very uncomfortable. I think that's what I'm experiencing right now. I understand.

I am very hesitant about moist scabs. I'll try to keep an open mind, but I don't like thinking about it. Dry scabs, sound of shuffling cards all the way. All right, folks. We actually, we have to go because we have to go back to recording Matreon episodes.

Yes. So we hope you enjoyed this Q&A episode. Thank you for listening. Happy 2020. We will be back on your main feed next week with a normal episode with a guest in a movie and all that shit, you know, and love from us. In the meantime uh yeah give us one of those five star reviews and join our matri and join the matri patreon.com slash vectile cast fun fact we were about to whatever it's january so we're

doing um what are we genetflixuary genetflix Janette Flixuary. Janette Flix. It's Janette Flix month. We should have waited until November and done Netflix November. We couldn't wait. We couldn't wait. We simply couldn't. So this month on the Matreon, in addition to all of our 50 episodes we've already published, we're doing Someone Great on Netflix.

And then we're about to do The Kissing Booth on Netflix. So if that's appealing to you head on over yeah check it out you can check us out on all the social media places at bechtelcast you can uh shop some t-shirts if you want at tpublic.com slash the bechtelcast we have upcoming live shows in san francisco in philadelphia in new york go to Bechtelcast.com. Yeah, we'll be back next week. Thank you so much. Bye-bye.

Bye. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was assassinated. Crooks everywhere unearthed the plot to murder a one-woman WikiLeaks. She exposed the culture of crime and corruption that were turning her beloved country into a mafia state. Listen to Crooks everywhere on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. To listen to new episodes one week early and 100% ad-free, subscribe to the iHeart True Crime Plus channel, available exclusively on Apple Podcasts. Hey, I'm Jay Shetty and I'm the host of On Purpose.

This week, I had the opportunity to speak with Dr. Andrew Huberman. Dr. Huberman is a neuroscientist and professor at Stanford University School of Medicine, known for his research on brain function, behavior, and neuroplasticity, the brain's ability to adapt and rewire itself. The expectation on us is not perfection, being able to toggle between these different states. Listen to On Purpose with Jay Shetty on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Trust me, you won't want to miss this one. I'm Kerry Champion, and this is season four of Naked Sports. Up first, I explore the making of a rivalry, Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese. Every great player needs a foil. I

know I'll go down in history. People are talking about women's basketball just because of one single game. Clark and Reese have changed the way we consume women's sports. Listen to the making of a rivalry, Kaitlyn Clark versus Angel Reese on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Presented by Capital One, founding partner of iHeart Women's Sports.