The Bechdel Cast - Scream with Joan Ford

Episode Date: October 25, 2018

This week, Jamie and Caitlin are screaming with excitement to be talking about Scream with special guest Joan Ford!(This episode contains spoilers)For Bechdel bonuses, sign up for our Patreon at patreon.com/bechdelcast.Follow @joanhaleyford on Twitter! While you're there, you should also follow @BechdelCast, @caitlindurante and @jamieloftusHELP 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. Kay hasn't heard from her sister in seven years. I have a proposal for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. What was that?

That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. Can Kay trust her sister or is history repeating itself? There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller

from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. In California,

during the summer of 1975, within the span of 17 days and less than 90 miles, two women did something no other woman had done before, try to assassinate the President of the United States. One was the protege of Charles Manson. 26-year-old Lynette Fromm, nickname Squeaky. The other, a middle-aged housewife working undercover for the FBI. Identified by police as Sarah Jean Moore. The story of one strange and violent summer,

this season on the new podcast, Rip Current. Hear episodes of Rip Current early and completely ad-free and receive exclusive bonus content by subscribing to iHeartTrue Crime Plus, only on Apple Podcasts. On the Bechdelcast, the questions asked if movies have women in them. Are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands or do they have individualism? The patriarchy's effin' vast. Start changing it with the Bechdelcast. Hello and welcome to the Bechdelcast. My name is Caitlin Durante.

And I'm Jamie Loftus. And we talk about the portrayal of women in movies in life but mostly on this podcast actually that's maybe maybe it's an even split at this point yeah we're always texting each other being like hey did you see this movie what you think about and usually i'm like i didn't see it and then you're like okay let's hang out yeah that's fun that's a nice little friendship yeah it's really really wonderful that's good um so we use the Bechdel test, a test invented by cartoonist Alison Bechdel. So we use the Bechdel test as a jumping off point to take a look at some of your favorite movies. Our definition of that is a scene in a piece of media must include two female identifying characters with names who talk about something other than a man for more than two lines of dialogue.

You think it would be easy. You would think. And yet. You know what would be interesting is to like crunch like one of those AFI lists or something and figure out how many of those movies actually have. Ooh. I bet it's like 20% less that seems reasonable yeah i also there was something someone tweeted us this morning well then we'll get into the the episode i promise but uh someone had just listened to our bend it like beckham episode and they tweeted this stray

thought that's really been haunting me which is like what a season to be feeling haunted. Yeah, I've got a segue in mind. Okay. But he tweeted at us that he could think off the top of his head more sports movies that starred animals than starred human women. Yeah. Oh, I think we talk about that in that episode. Maybe he's just quoting us. Maybe we're geniuses. But I was like, oh, my God, he's so smart.

Maybe we're so smart. Right. Remember because we talked about like Air Bud and then various airbud spin-offs my favorite mvp most valuable primate yes the hockey movie I love that one oh god you I mean you say that and then you're like but I do want to see a monkey play a goalie so I guess we just need more movies with women and more movies with animals and less movies with men. That's what I meant. True.

Yes. Anyways. And speaking of, you know, being horrified at the representation of women in film. Yeah. Yeah. Where do you go with this? Oh, let's go shopping is what I was going to suggest. Women be shopping.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, yes, let us talk about the movie we're here to talk about today. But first, why don't we introduce our guest? Yes. She is a writer on Thundercats Roar on Cartoon Network, also a writer on Yabba Dabba Dinosaurs on Boomerang,

and performs regularly at UCB LA, Joan Ford. Hi, guys. Thank you for having me. Hello. Hi, guys. Next year. All those shows will be out next year. Yeah, so be on the lookout.

Don't stop looking out. Never stop. Have your TV tuned to Cartoon Network 24-7. Keep your eyes peeled. Stay in your perch. Yes. Your little crow's nest, Titanic. Yes.

Keep your eyes on the horizon for new media. My mom always used to say to me when I was younger to be alert and aware, which I think both applies to, you know. Cartoon shows that I wrote on specifically. And in the year 2019. Yes, yes. Only then. But she was also like, you know. Cartoon shows that I wrote on specifically. And in the year 2019. Yes, yes. Only then. But she was also like, you know, stay safe.

Be aware of your surroundings and be alert, which applies to horror movies too. I agree, yes. You're like, you've got 19 different segues locked and loaded today. It's my segue of life. Yeah, you're like Paul Blart because you love segues. Oh, that got me good. They should come. You're like Paul Blart because you love segways. Oh, that got me good.

They should come up with a new Paul Blart where he gets into birds. Yeah. Oh, God. The Pratt Falls Paul Blart would do off a bird scooter. I tell you. Yeah. Not to encourage more movies starring Kevin James. Right.

Although. Maybe it's time for like a female Paul Blart. Maybe it's time to gender swap that franchise. Where is Paul Blart? Paul Blart. Paul Blart. Paul Blart. Although. Maybe it's time for like a female Paul Blart. Maybe it's time to gender swap that franchise. Where is Paul Blart? Paul Blart. Paul Blart. Yes. Kind of unbelievable.

We're the first person to think of that. I feel like a high school that's already was like a high schoolers YouTube video. Yeah. What if Paul Blart? And so wait, what's the movie today? Well, speaking of strong female protagonists, we're talking about Scream. The first one, directed by Wes Anderson from 1996.

No, wait. What did I say? Wes Anderson. Someone has made that YouTube video, Wes Anderson Scream. Wes Anderson Scream. Just a lot of very center of frame murders and phone calls. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm literally looking at the name Craven right in front of me and I still said Wes Anderson.

It's okay. To be fair, it's a silly last name. Yeah, but a horror master should be so Craven. There was already a fake trailer of Paula Blart released with Melissa McCarthy. You know, someone got there. We're behind the times. McCarthy was a pass, if you can believe.

Okay, so what we are talking about is Scream, directed by Wes Craven. Craven. Joan, what is your history, your relationship with this movie? Oh my gosh, well, I hate talking about this because I'm going to date myself, but I was

very much like the target audience for this movie when it came out. I was... This actually came out on, like, the weekend of my, like, 16th birthday. Oh, my God. Okay, so can I take us all back to, like, winter of 1996? So I don't know if, like, people realize this now, especially if they, like, kind of, like, came up, like, after the movie. But, like, it wasn't just that, like, Scream was, like, not expected to't just that like scream was like not expected to do well it was like expected to like bomb oh like they buried

that movie because that winter like it came out the same weekend that like all these big christmas movies came out like mars attacks and jerry mcguire and abuse and but i do america and like all those movies were just gonna like bury scream in fact i remember it didn't even come to like the main theater in my town it opened in the like $3 cheapie theater because they just expected a bomb. And I was like a big horror nerd and I was really excited to see it. But like just I remember that like it opening and no one really thinking of it. And then it kind of like slowly like picked up steam to the point that it got moved. Picked up screams.

Picked up screams. Sorry, I just can't switch. Stop today. It got like moved over eventually got moved over to the big theater and that like holiday break moving into that like first couple weeks of january in school like it became this thing that everybody was talking about everybody was going to see and like all of a sudden it was cool to like be into horror and like that was it was this very fun like communal thing where like everybody

like I went to see it a couple times in theaters and like you would always run into people you kind of knew so yeah it was just like it was fun and it would it made me feel like oh something I like is cool now because like I said you know I was like a kid who grew up like reading Fangoria and like writing letters to like horror directors and uh so yeah it made me feel like it gave me a little bit of a community and like for the rest of my high school I had like horror directors and so yeah it made me feel like it gave me a little bit of a community and like for the rest of my high school I had like horror friends

because of that like I remember going to see Bride of Chucky with the cool kids after that yeah because the cool kids

were seeing Bride of Chucky yeah Scream made it okay to go see Bride of Chucky that's excellent I was also yeah like you were saying I was really surprised to see this movie

came out during like the Christmas season because you would think it would be for sure in October at least. Like that's so, you can't kill Scream. You can't. And I would say if I was looking at and knew nothing about this movie and I hadn't already heard so many amazing things about it, if I saw the villain, I'd be like, probably this movie sucks. If I saw like the mask, I be like this is this is a goof this is a goofy one but i've my history with this movie is of course i watched it this morning yes and

before that i just i knew i loved matthew lillard and i was like let's roll the dice as lillard's number one fan because the i'll watch any lillard joint and I will say spoilers for everyone listening I was telling Caitlin when I got in today that you know like for me it seemed so clear because Lillard did not die right away because he's such a doofus

that he was involved when it gets to be the 45 minute mark you're like Lillard's still alive what is he so anyways and and Lillard and Nev Campbell were dating on the set of Scream wait what I know I hate that I hate it too I mean Lillard what a lucky guy yeah yeah yeah what a what a reach but you know yeah he went for it and it worked out good for him I guess. Is this the set that Courtney Cox and David Arquette meet on?

I believe so, yeah. Oh, wow. This is a hot set. Yeah. Everyone's fucking. A lot of momentary helps. Yeah. Yeah.

So my history with this movie is I did not see any of the movies in the Scream franchise until I think 2011 before the fourth one came out. So my friend JT, friend of the cast, Twilight episode, is a big Scream head. And he was like, look, we're gonna go see Scream 4 and you have to prepare. So we like sat down and had a little Scream marathon. So I didn't watch any of them until then and i was like these are fun this is great uh and then i just re-watched all four again in preparation of this episode and i like

these movies even more now i'm like these are so freaking fun they're so fun they are fun yeah there's still stuff to talk about but my first horror franchise or slashy franchise that I really loved was Final Destination. But I'm pretty sure Final Destination came out on the success of movies like Scream, right? That's post Scream, I believe. I think that I want to say that was 99 or 2000. Yeah. So, yeah, there's that whole way like horror was horror was really kind of, like, dead as a genre before Scream. Like, there was this, like, after kind of, like, the early 90s, horror kind of went away after, like, the, like, Jason Freddie Chucky boom.

Yeah, like, everyone thought horror was dead. Even, like, Wes Craven was coming off of, like, a string of flops. That's why everyone's so surprised when Scream hit so big. People were ready. Yeah. They were ready for horror to be reinvented. Did you see all the, sorry, I'm going to just keep bringing up Matthew Lillard, this

whole thing. Did you see the Matthew Lillard cameos in Screams 2 and 4? I did see that on IMDb. Yes, I did. I don't know about this. Where do I look to see Matthew Lillard in Screams 2 and 4? Crowd scenes it seems like. Okay.

He's just available is the point. Scream 2, the only thing that Matthew Lillard did in the year 1997, he played Guy at Party Uncredited. Go forward a little bit to Scream 4, Guy at Stabathon Uncredited. Okay. So, you know, he's now Lillard as the only person, I think, in the world living solely on a Scooby-Doo based income. You know, I think he's just around at the time. He was good in the Twin Peaks revival. Oh, he was in the Twin Peaks revival.

Yeah. I was like, I'm feeling something for Matthew Lillard. I don't know if I like that. I'm empathizing with him. That's not good. Right. That is something like maybe it's'm empathizing with him. That's not good. Right. That is something. Like, maybe it's time to go on vacation.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe I'm a sociopath. That's what. Yeah. I remember when he was on The Good Wife. I lost my mind.

Anyways. That's right. He was on The Good Wife. He was great. Yeah. He is good. Okay. So now.

Oh. Sorry. One last thing I wanted to say is while it took me a while to see the Scream movies, I did see all of the Scary Movie movies. As they were coming out? Yeah. So the first Scary Movie is closely a parody of the first Scream movie. And I also rewatched like the first half of that also to prepare for this episode just because, you know, just in case something came up.

And it is the worst movie in the world. It's like the jokes that it relies on are just a series of the most problematic jokes in the world. It's just, it's trash. It's horrible. But I did see those and was familiar with that. So I sort of watched Scream before I actually saw Scream. Yeah, you got the narrative of Scream before you saw Scream.

Because it is like, that is from just this generation of parody movies where it's like, you don't build another story. You're just like, let's tell the other story this movie already did. Right. But with more homophobic jokes. Exactly. It's so, those movies are so bizarre. Yeah, because there's no attempt at commentary on anything. They're like, hey, look it.

Look it. Look it. Let's just beat up a woman in every scene. And that's funny. What if they did this in the movie you liked? What if Juno got eaten by Alvin and the Chipmunks? Oh, my God. Wait, wait. I forget which one.

In one of those movie movies. They're all a blur, but there's definitely one where Alvin and the Chipmunks turn into zombies, because it was probably also around Dawn of the Dead time, and they eat Juno. God. Yeah. That's very late-aughts upsetting. There is a great video of Ellen Page watching that scene and losing her fucking mind. It's very fun.

So shall I do the recap? Yes. Okay, so Scream we open on a teenager named Casey Becker played by Drew

Drew Barrymore middle part Drew who was originally gonna play Sydney oh interesting yeah but then uh

scheduling conflicts didn't allow it so she took the smaller role but I think that was actually better for her I agree I assumed when I saw that scene I was like

oh they could only get Drew for three days yeah i mean yes that's right she she like was an early champion in the script she wanted to do it so she's at home she's getting ready to watch a scary movie and then she gets a phone call from an unknown caller who is asking her about scary movies and the situation escalates he's like harassing her this masked figure shows up and ends up killing her and her boyfriend steve steve jock steve yeah he's a big guy but not big enough not big enough to not get murdered no um and then we meet sydney prescott that is nev campbell's character and she's a classmate of casey's and then we meet a couple of. That is Nev Campbell's character. And she's a classmate of Casey's. And then we meet a couple of Sydney's friends.

Among them are her boyfriend, Billy, played by Skeet Ulrich. Skeet rears his little head again. Skeet's back on the cast. What was the last thing he was in? He was in, well, we've done The Craft. So that was our last Skeet discussion. Every October, Skeet comes up. Skeet.

Yes. Skeet-toberfest. We meet her friend Tatum, played by Rose McGowan, Tatum's boyfriend Stu, which is Lord, and their other friend Randy. News of Casey's murder gets spread around, and learned that sydney's mom was murdered a year earlier also i know i mean whatever billy and lillard did it but in the first scene you're like lillard's not showing really any empathy towards anyone i'm like it's he's the two the obvious choice i was on to him from moment one where Where he was like, yeah, yeah, I hooked up with that woman who just died

brutally a couple times. I don't freaking care. And they're like, what's your alibi, dude? And he's like, I was fucking. So I was like, are you serious right now, Lillard? Such poor taste. Yeah. Something murdered. Yeah. Lillard. Okay. So then we meet a cop,

a sheriff's deputy named De dewey played by david arquette and he's also tatum's brother he's investigating and then there's a nosy reporter gail weathers um that's courtney cox's character she's trying to get the scoop on this story so many good outfits this has the best name characters and like yeah like horror franchise I think 90% of the reason I remember it's like I will remember the names Sidney Prescott Gail Weathers and like Cotton Weary to like the day I die they're just such great like horror movie names Cotton Weary is the most insane name and I just oh I love it also such an insane character yeah it's like you're supposed to care about this guy you never see once in the actual movie.

But he plays a much more prominent role in Scream 2. Yes. I was told skip to see 3. Oh, I disagree. I think 2 is more fun than 3. Wow. And Scream 4 is also a romp. Just watch them all.

All right. It depends on where you stand on Jay and Silent Bob cameos. I mean, well, I was able to weather them in Degrassi, but they took over a season of Degrassi. I did not know that. Oh, it was a nightmare. It was a nightmare. Yeah, apparently

Kevin Smith wanted to direct some episodes, but they're like, you can't because you're not Canadian. He's like, well, okay, can I just star an entire arc? And they let him do that. Right, and there's because you're not Canadian. He's like, well, OK, can I just star an entire arc? And they let him do that. Right. And there's still all the teenage stuff. There's still girls struggling with their teen pregnancies. But also Jay and Silent Bob are there.

It's very weird. All right. Kevin. Kevin. Kevin. OK. So then Sydney gets a call from the killer. And he is threatening her.

Mr. Scream. Mr. Scream. Yes. gets a call from the killer and he is threatening her mr scream mr scream and a moment later her boyfriend billy shows up and a cell phone drops out of his pocket oh it's also worth noting that sydney is a virgin she is dealing with the grief and trauma of her mom dying she has an underpants role she has an underpants role uh billy's, come on, do some sex stuff with me. And she's like, no, you know about my rule. And he's like, okay. Rats. Dough.

So Billy shows up right after she gets this call and a cell phone drops out of his pocket. And it seems like maybe he's the killer. So she's like, oh no. And he gets arrested. Because this was a period of time when you having a cell phone's the killer so she's like oh no and he gets arrested because this was a period of time when you having a cell phone and the killer having a cell phone was enough evidence to like link them

like we don't know many people with cell phones he must be the killer she turns on him so fast she's like cell phone you're the murderer right and that that like kept me off Billy's trail for a while. I was like, she is loyal to no one.

Yeah, she's jumping to conclusions so fast. Imagine being a teenager and being like, no, arrest my boyfriend for having a cell phone. Except in this movie, they call them cellulars. It's just like, you hear the word cellular like 18 different times. Do you ever call it a cellie? No.

I remember that, yeah. Call me cellie. it a cellie? No. I remember that. Call me cellie. Call me cellie. But I only have 12 minutes, so make it quick. Right. God. Yeah, you'd just be cut off in the middle of a brilliant thought of your cellie. So Billy's in jail, but Sydney gets another call from the killer.

So it can't be Billy. Mr. Scream again. Mr. Scream calls and he's like, you got the wrong guy. And then we learn Sydney had testified against this guy Cotton Weary who was convicted of killing Sydney's mom. And then Gail's snooping around. She's trying to get her story.

Hair outfits, hair outfits. Yes. Beautiful. Lots of streaky blonde highlights. The local news look is on full display. And Sydney hates Gail for exploiting her mom's murder for a book deal. And Gail, she's trying to get closer to Dewey to get information. And they're giving some cutie eyes.

Also important to note, I think, is that like she doesn't think Cotton did it. She thinks he's been falsely identified. Uh-huh. Yeah. And Sidney sent an innocent man to jail. Right. Which we maybe have seen her do twice now. Right.

That's true. And maybe Gail's on to something. So then the principal of their school gets murdered and people are speculating who the killer might be. And Randy, their friend, is this like horror movie buff and he's like, you know, it's gotta be

this and this and this. Which we should say, by the way, King Jamie Kennedy. That's Jamie Kennedy? Yeah. What? Yes. How did I not know that?

If Lillard weren't already in this movie, that would be my central focus. Yeah. But it is Jamie Kennedy of The Experiment. Yes. And your arch nemesis. already in this movie that would be my central focus but uh it is it is jamie kennedy of of the experiment yes and your arch nemesis my arch nemesis i'm gonna marry into the kennedys and i'll be jamie i'll be the jamie kennedy so but yes jamie kennedy okay good to know stars are

out in this movie so then the police trace the calls that were made from the killer to sydney's dad's cellular and they can't find him so like oh no sydney's dad is the killer and then stew throws a party some people get killed including tatum in the garage door in a very brutal scene never go to lillard's house yeah also very strong garage door like I feel like if I like every garage I've ever seen like breaks at like the drop of a pin and it's just able to like lift a full person like mash her head into

also like my garage door is a week but also it has enough of a sensor that it wouldn't it would it would just be like it would start to slowly rise up. Oh, well. A little tidbit that I like is that apparently I think they did need a stunt devil because like Rose McGowan was actually thin enough that she could get through the doggy door.

God. So the rest of the story, they're at Stu's party. People are getting killed. Billy and Sydney finally have sex. And then afterwards, she's like, wait a minute. I think you still might be the killer. And he's like, what do I have to do to prove that I'm not? And then he gets stabbed by the killer.

And then the killer is going after Sydney and then more people. This is such a high level prank at this point. I'm like, you're getting stabbed over your own weird, what? Because moments later, we find out that it was just, you know, the blood that we see was just corn syrup. The same as using Carrie. Mm-hmm. And he is in on it. So the killers are revealed to be Stu and Billy.

Yeah. Lillard, I like, you know, he never has narrative consequence. Right? I know. I was like, probably a big day for him. All right. He never has narrative consequence. Right. I know. I was like, probably a big day for him. Yeah. All right. So they're like telling their whole plan and the whole, you know, backstory to Sidney. And they're the ones who killed her mom.

It wasn't Cotton Weary after all. Right. And, you know, they plan to kill her and frame her dad. But then she's like, like no not on my watch and she throws a tv onto stew's head and then gail comes in and shoots billy goodbye ski goodbye ski something that always bothered me about the ending is that like an important part of uh skeet and lillard's plan is that they they're gonna like stab each other to other to, like, make themselves look like victims. But they do that in the middle of the plan, and it's like, wait until, like, you've gotten everything else done, then stab each other.

Don't do it, like, that's not step, like, two. That's step, like, ten. Last. Yeah. Maybe they're not so bright. Yeah. If only they could do a second pass at that point. They should have, yeah, they should have workshopped it.

Yeah, they should have taken it to, they should have gone to a local jail, that point. They should have, yeah, they should have workshopped it. Yeah, they should have taken it to, they should have gone to a local jail, run it by an actual murderer, be like, so if you could do it over and get away with it, what would you do different? Yeah. Because, yeah, like most murders involve you stabbing yourself to look like a victim.

Do your homework. Yeah. And then there's, you know, a running theme throughout the movie because they're watching Halloween and the different things that are happening in slasher movies are sort of informing what's. Yeah. So the two bad guys die at the end. Sidney emerges triumphant.

And that is the end of the movie. So let's take a quick break and then we'll come right back. 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 mtv's official challenge podcast is back for another season that's right the challenge is about to embark on its monumental 40th season, y'all. And we are coming along for the ride. Woohoo. That would be me, Devin Simone. And then there's me, Davon Rogers. And we're here to take you behind the scenes of, drum roll please. The Challenge 40, Battle of the Eras. Yes. Each week, cast members will be joining us to spill all of the tea on the relentless

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episodes of the Challenge 40 Battle of the Eras. Listen to MTV's official Challenge podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, everyone. This is Jimmy O'Brien from John Boy Media. I want to quickly tell you about my podcast. It's called Jimmy's Three Things. Episodes come out every Tuesday, and for about 30 minutes, I dive into three topics in Major League Baseball that I am interested in breaking stories, trends, stats

weird stuff, sometimes I make up my own stats, sometimes I do a lot of research and it ends up I was wrong the whole time so that's something you can get in on use Jimmy's Three Things Podcast to stay up to date on Major League Baseball and to make you just a

smidge smarter than your friend who's a baseball fan. You listen to me and then you go tell him, hey, I know this and you don't. So I make you smarter than your friends. That's what Jimmy's Three Things is all about. Listen to Jimmy's Three Things on iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You could also find it on the Talkin' Baseball YouTube channel, and new episodes drop every Tuesday. All right, we're back. Matt, I was waiting. Sorry for the break took so long.

I was waiting for Matthew Lillard. He's my assistant now. Oh, yeah. Yeah, and I was waiting for him to bring me my soup, and I was on the phone. You heard me screaming, Lillard, where's my soup? This is a joke that's just for me and I enjoy it.

Anyways, Scream, welcome back. Here we are. Yeah, as we mentioned, this is like a super meta slasher movie that spends a lot of time like calling attention to the tropes of popular horror movies and like the characters of Scream keep alluding to the fact

that their situation is just like a horror movie. Right. And then like as the Scream sequels go, this happens more and more. They get even more meta. There's even more references. They're making movies about the events of the first movie. Yeah. Like everybody from the first movie is brought on as creative consultant. Yeah. It seems like in general, and I'm not like a horror buff. I've seen just the basics. It seems like it's a very self-referential genre in general where like this movie and we just recorded our Halloween episode yesterday. This movie clearly pulls from Halloween very heavily. But even in Halloween in the late 70s, they're watching horror movies from like the 40s and 50s.

Yeah. I don't know. I mean, I think it helps to acknowledge that you have horror movies taking place in a world where people know horror movie conventions. And I don't know. I think I especially liked it in Scream because it's all over the place.

Right. For example, one of the things that happens is that the movie calls attention to different kind of frustrating choices that characters will make in horror movies where in the beginning, I think Sydney is talking on the phone to the killer and she's like,

I don't watch scary movies. It's all the same thing. Some stupid killer is stalking a big-breasted girl who can't act, who is always running up the stairs when she should be running out the front door. And then moments later, circumstances... Going up those stairs.

She runs up the stairs. So it's clever, funny things like that that I enjoy. And then the Randy character, who is a horror buff, is always rattling off, like, these are the rules. Here are the tropes. Even at the beginning, I think Drew Barrymore has that line about you know it's always they're always casting

people who are way too old for these parts and the joke is that Drew Barrymore is like way too old for this part but she was only 21 at the time oh

they styled her to look older yeah I think they but like it's like god damn it like Matthew Broderick got to play Ferris Bueller

when he was 24 I don't think like yeah yeah I mean it's weird because there's, sometimes when movies are too referential, that rubs me the wrong way,

and then you get into, like, Shrek territory of, like, so reference-y that without the references there is no substance. But I don't know. I don't think this movie toes that line very well. Yeah, I find, like, a little distracting at the beginning when it's, like like everybody's talking in movie metaphors.

It's like the cool boyfriend is like, our relationship's a PG-13. I don't want to take it to like an R. And it's like. So cheesy. It's also, he says our relationship was an R and I want to take an NC-17. But it's like, what's not happening in an R-rated movie that you, that like, I'm pretty sure you can have sex in an R-rated movie. Right.

I'm like, I just want to do some freaky shit like is that what you're saying yeah some like Italian museum fucking movie I can't there is a movie Italian movie

where NC-17 where they fuck a museum I can't remember what it's called oh I would like to know the name of that movie yeah and then Woody's like

oh we can't now it's like edited for CBS on a Tuesday at 7 I was like, whoa, you're 17. And then at the end,

Neva Campbell is like, would you settle for a PG-13 rating? And he's like, what's that? And she flashes them. And it's like, you can't show breasts

in a PG-13 movie. They're all over the place on their ratings. Clearly you've never seen Titanic, which... That's like artful. Yeah. You can get away with it

if it's artful. If it's oil painting breasts. Yeah. It's get away with it if it's artful. If it's oil painting breasts. It's okay. Yeah. Right. So many rules. So in the movie, there's direct references to Halloween. For example, Drew Barrymore's character mentions that Halloween is her favorite scary movie.

Whenever the parents show up to that house and they're finding that something is amiss, her dad is like, go to the McKenzie's house and they're finding that you know something is amiss her dad is like go to the mckenzie's house and call the police that's the same family that laurie strode and halloween tells the kids to go to oh no that's even oh and then there's that scene where skeet and and nev campbell are making out that blue oyster cult song from halloween is playing too. Oh, yeah. Don't Fear the Reaper. And Billy's last name is Loomis, and Loomis is the last name of the psychiatrist in Halloween. I do love that.

Rosemary Tatum comments, this is just like a Wes Carpenter film, which is a fun mashup of Wes Craven and John Carpenter. What she meant was Wes Anderson. Yes, yes. Of course. Yeah, and then later in the movie, they are watching Halloween and kind of picking apart the different tropes. So I just kind of wanted to do a little compare and contrast of the two movies, especially because we just covered Halloween. A little exercise.

Yeah. So like in the Halloween episode, we kind of broke down, okay, here are the women who are being attacked and brutalized versus like not nearly as many men however in scream we see still a lot of women get attacked and killed but so do way more men i feel like yeah it's like more than parody and that yeah i would say it's about split down the middle because we see case Becker get chased, stabbed, and then gutted. But Steve. And then Steve, her boyfriend, also is gutted. We see Sydney get attacked multiple times. We see Tatum get killed by the garage door.

But we see Dewey, he gets stabbed in the back toward the end. Kenny, the camera guy, gets his throat slashed. Gail Weathers. I don't, does she even get attacked or is it just that she crashes the van? She crashes and then she, I don't know. I think she gets attacked towards the end when she, that first one where she has the safety on the gun and he's like, it works a lot better if you take the safety off. And they hit her and stuff.

Yeah. I don't know if she ever gets stabbed, but yeah, she yeah, she gets, you know, scuffed up a bit. She gets, yeah. Randy gets shot. And then Stu and Billy stab each other. But that's all part of the plan. That's still so crazy. But, so yeah, it's about 50-50.

And we can't leave out Principal Henry Winkler. Right, right, right. Yes. So maybe even it's more men getting What a treat. Yeah, it's a fun cameo. I know. He's in and out.

He was Fonz and now he's the principal. He's so clever. Then about 10 years later he pops up in holes and you're like, what a gift. Oh yeah, it's the dad.

He's great in holes. It's Stanley Yelmatt III or something. Yeah, he plays shia labeouf's dad so good anyways um but i would say even though there is more gender parody of people getting attacked and scream i would say as far as on-screen violence the attacks on women are more extended they are more brutal yeah well. Because even what you were just describing, like, yes, David Arquette gets a knife to the back, but that's not as bad as being squeezed,

you know, like garage door. I mean, and then the whole opening scene is Drew Barrymore's character for a good five minutes is being verbally harassed, chased, stabbed, dragged across the ground. And then all we see of the boyfriend is that he's tied up briefly and then it cuts to the aftermath of him being gutted. So it's way more brutal when it comes to violence against women.

And I bet if we're clocking how long, yeah, like you're saying, like those scenes are way longer. And it might be worth noting that in that opening scene where we see the boyfriend tied up and kind of like used as sort of leverage or like usually it's a woman tied up in an action movie or a superhero movie but this time we got steve so but he's what's the line that drew barrymore said he's a football player and he's going to kick your ass. He's big and he's going to kick your ass. He's like, oh yeah? Yeah.

That first scene, I mean, there's so much to unpack in that first scene alone where it's one of those movies where, you know, because it does come down to the last girl still, essentially, and Sidney's, you know, the last girl in the movie, just triumphant, whatever, that trope which which kind of like our guest April Wolf was saying on the Halloween episode there's a lot of different ways to look at the last girl trope um but that is upheld in this movie uh but in in the first scene there were moments in this movie where it was hard for me to figure out I don't know like how the writing felt about some of its female characters

that weren't Sydney. Because a lot of them come off as a little dumb, a little flaky. Yeah. I do think there's some, I don't know if Williamson extends this to all his female characters, but I think there is some fun

or interesting setting up expectations that you would come to expect from having watched a lot of horror movies that he kind of undercuts like gail weathers is a hundred percent set up as like as a victim like she's like fucking with our main character uh she's just like she kind of played as this like snoopy like bitch who's just like getting in the way and like you kind of like a hundred percent expect her to get it. And I would say this is a movie where I might say this actually has two final girls because I think Gale kind of fits that at least with her character. I don't know if I'd say that's the same for like Tatum, but like for her, like they're

building up these expectations so they can kind of like undercut them. Subvert them. Yeah. Right. The Gale character is, I mean, Galedney are both extremely smart and and capable and i mean the movie doesn't do like you're saying that it doesn't the movie doesn't do that much to undercut their abilities even when they're wrong it's not being positioned that they're stupid it's just there's a lot going on and there's a stabby plan that no one could have guessed yes uh yeah yeah but there are

like casey and tatum are a little bit trickier in in that way which is you know i'm not even saying every woman that appears on screen in every movie has to be really smart that is unrealistic and at some point gets boring but that that first scene is so long and the the like phone over the phone coercion which like was making me squirm a little bit of like like don't tell him you're home alone. What are you? Yeah. And then telling a story, you're like, oh, I'm making popcorn.

I'm going to watch a movie. It's like, what are you doing? And there, what I could relate with in that scene is confusing Freddie, Jason and Michael Myers, because I would, that's, I would have died there too. Imagine just like failing a BuzzFeed quiz and then being murdered. Movie trivia is like the one thing that I am good at in my entire life. So I would have been like boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.

Don't take that bad. I would fail. Although we did great at Gilmore Girls trivia. We won. We won. Anyways, quick brag. I accept it. It Anyways, quick brag. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I said it. It's a worthy brag.

Another thing when you, if you're comparing Halloween and Scream, for example, in Halloween, there are a lot of women in the cast, but they weren't really driving the narrative. They were basically just kind of reacting to what the killer was doing. And their main goal was survival, essentially, and only one of them gets to achieve that goal, which is Laurie Strode. In Scream, however, there's a few elements that are introduced that allow female characters to be more active. One, the identity of the killer is a mystery. Unlike Halloween, where like we know right off the bat that it's Michael Myers and there's no like ambiguity there.

So in Scream, the women are trying to figure out who the killer is. Mostly Gail, because she's, you know, she's trying to like crack the, you know, get the scoop. But then also because Sydney keeps being attacked and called and harassed by the killer. And she's like, what? Who is this? I, you know, I want to know. And that Gail has alternative theories of like she's really thought about. She's positioned like you're saying, Jonah, as like kind of a flighty local reporter.

But she's done some investigation and is good at her job and seems to be getting closer than, I mean, unfortunately our girl Sydney keeps kind of fumbling it. Until, yeah, until after she has sex with, and then like the clues click after she's had sex. She's like, I fucked the killer. Yeah, she's like, I could tell. Damn it. Which is a really interesting subversion to the tropes of slasher movies.

Because as soon as she, rather than, you know, getting murdered, which is what usually happens as soon as a girl has sex in a horror movie. Yeah. Like, things fall into place for her. It's an interesting, I mean, that was a subversion where when that happened, I was like, huh. Like, yeah. Yeah. Sometimes it just feels like they're like subversions without actually thinking like what is the implication of this it's just like subverting it because

i'm clever and i can do that math of like well if this usually happens then this should happen but it's like what are we actually saying with this as opposed to like just doing it because i'm a clever screenwriter because i was like is the implication of that like okay so now to be able to solve crimes you better be fucking like there there's like there is the implication of that like, okay, so now to be able to solve crimes, you better be fucking. Like, there's a lot of different ways. I was like, I don't know. Like, it was an interesting subversion, and it sounds like at this point that is not something that would normally happen in a horror movie. But yeah, I was like, what exactly was Williamson trying to say with that one?

Right. And I'm like, on this theme, I'm sorry if I'm jumping to the end too soon. But I mean, I think. Okay. So like seeing this in theaters in like 96, the moment that just like I've rarely been in a theater where like an audience went this crazy was when she's kind of like turn the tables on when Sydney's turn the tables on the killer and she has that voice box and she's like terrorizing them. Yeah.

Like that is so like that is so satisfying and so gratifying like the audience erupted when she started started calling them and it's like at that point she's not just like the active protagonist she is like i don't know she's empowered yeah she's giving them a taste of their own medicine it's so good yeah because you so rarely see that because again if we're comparing it to halloween laurie strode just kind of gets away by sheer luck at best they're like defending themselves and like fighting for their lives they're not like actively going after the people who've like terrorized in the whole movie they're rarely like cunning yeah like at least until that point i think we've seen that a little more

but scream was kind of a little bit of a innovator of a innovator yeah it's cathartic yes and in halloween uh dr loomis has to come in and kind of save the day by shooting michael myers whereas in this movie in scream sydney kills one of the bad guys and then gail kills the other one so it's two women yeah triumphing two last girls another like audience going nuts moment when she was like, safety's off that time, asshole. Yeah. And like, my audience erupts. Woo! Yeah.

It's a good audience. It's a good audience movie. Yes. Like you got to see it with a crowd. I kind of want, I'm sure there's public screenings of it around this time of year. I kind of want to go. Want to see it? Yeah.

I want to see it as a group. That'd be so fun. There's one at the Arclight this Saturday. No way! Yeah. Oh. I might go. Okay.

Maybe we should all. Yeah. Okay, maybe we should not. Well, we gotta take another quick break, so let's take a break and figure out the plans for that, and then we'll come right back. 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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It's called Jimmy's Three Things. Episodes come out every Tuesday, and for about 30 minutes, I dive into three topics in Major League Baseball that I am interested in. Breaking stories, trends, stats, weird stuff. Sometimes I make up my own stats. Sometimes I do a lot of research and it ends up, I was wrong the whole time. So that's something you can get in on. Use Jimmy's Three Things podcast to stay up to date on Major League Baseball and to make you just a

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J.K. and his friends yeah he's kind of you know going through the rules and the tropes and he's saying he's like jamie lee was always the virgin in horror movies that's why she always outsmarted the killer and the big chase scene at the end there's certain rules that one must abide by to successfully survive a horror movie for instance number one you can never have sex sex equals death number two you can't drink or do drugs number three never say i'll be right back yeah he's like he's monologuing out and in this this is where there are a few parts of this movie where i'm like okay like we're we're we're laying it on a bit thick yeah kevin so he's calling attention to these tropes but i would argue that there's not a whole lot of active commentary

being made. Well, I mean, kind of like what we were just talking about. It's like the obligation that's like, no, women who have had sex before can escape alive and can have agency. I don't know. I mean, I guess I was just thinking about myself in high school. I'm like, well, where does that leave all the virgins? That used to be the only thing we had was that we could live. And now what we got to work with? We got nothing. Yeah, there's I mean, in terms of I think

this movie came out at a time where starting to acknowledge media tropes in text is becoming trendy but not necessarily doing much about it because this is like you know third wave feminism time this is squarely in the like girl power but as we see in this not very diverse movie in terms of race or, once again, women's body types, it's like, okay, there is some level of catharsis and liberation for women, but only a very specific type of woman. Young, conventionally attractive, white, straight women. Exactly. And that, I mean, I think that that shows up in almost every movie of this era of you also can

be a murderer if you look hot and play by the rules like there it's progressive for its time but certainly not yeah and it's a little I would maybe a little disappointing coming from Wes Craven because he had a string of movies before that that are a little more, like, progressive. The People Under the Stairs, I think, is one of, like, just, like... Oh, I've never seen that. I'm not familiar. It's, I mean, I'm going to say all this with a grain of salt because I haven't watched any of these movies in, like, years.

But, you know, People Under the Stairs is a horror movie about, like, gentrification that puts a young black kid at the center of the movie. And it's so good and so freaky. And like, and he actually, I think he did a little more interesting stuff with just the idea of like these metameratives a couple of years before with New Nightmare. But this was kind of all that stuff.

I feel like Scream was kind of like dealing with the same stuff as New Nightmare. I don't want to say dumbed down, but like, you know, for a mass audience. A broader audience. Yeah, for a broader audience. Right. And then the screenwriter, Kevin Williamson, I mean, kind of built his career on, and I love a lot of his work.

It means a lot to me. What else has he done? So he is the force behind Dawson's Creek. I've never heard of it. The Vampire Diaries. Screams 1, 2, and 4. I know you did last summer. The Faculty.

The Faculty. I think The Faculty might be the one movie from this wave of late 90s horror that I actually like more than Scream. Really?

Yeah, I love The Faculty. Whoa, I've never seen The Faculty. I don't think I was in it. It is Elijah Wood. Ooh, Josh Hartnett. Josh Hartnett, yes. Bebe Ne't think i was in it uh it is elijah wood oh josh hartnett josh hartnett yes um baby newworth is in it that's right oh john stewart is a teacher in it early yeah okay um but there is this through line even with like this specific relatively progressive writer's work where in a lot of these and i'm pulling mainly from dawson's creek and early vampire diaries where there's a lot of well-written female characters that are making active choices

they're complicated they have backstories but again like in scream it's almost across all the work we just mentioned a very specific type of woman for sure that this agency is available to um scream 2 comments on the lack of diversity in horror movies to some extent um and that movie seems to have have made like a more conscious effort in terms of casting to cast more people of color in the movie but all of those characters are in supporting roles none of them are really in the main cast and then that effort to be more inclusive in the sequels after that in scream three and four just doesn't happen again i mean as far as i remember scream two just kind of opens with like a like the opening murder is um who it's jada pickett smith yeah and her boyfriend i forget

who plays her boyfriend yeah so do i at I. At a screaming of Stab, which is the fake franchise that's in the Scream universe. You get it. But like, you know, so it does very much feel like it's like, okay, we've paid lip service to this idea. We're acknowledging it. Now let us get on it and make the real movie. Yeah, right. Yeah, it feels like certainly more could have been done to acknowledge the lack of diversity in horror movies, certainly in the first Scream, because that does not happen at all. And then even when Scream 2, when it, there is like such a kind of like going back as far as like Night of the Living Dead, a rich history of using horror as a template to talk about race that it almost feels negligent,

like willfully negligent on the side of the side of the people who are making this meta horror film, not to like bring that into the conversation. Yeah. Like even like going back as far as like the Twilight Zone, you know. Yeah. Like horror is a, horror has always been used as kind of a platform to talk about like more progressive things

because like people like Rod Serling always said, you could like tolerate talking about this stuff when you bring spooky stuff into the mix. Yeah. So I don't know. It's frustrating. Yeah, this, I mean this whole, a lot of like Clinton era movies for whatever reason, they are willing to acknowledge the problem, but then also take little to no action to solve it.

Where it's like, okay, thank you for bringing it to our attention that you're aware there's a lack of diversity and then straight up like show white people for three hours. It's just bizarre. Yeah, this falls squarely in that span of years where that's that's happening i think the first movie on this podcast that we really started to unpack the kind of like semi-empty girl power message of the 90s is spice world uh ironically you did that with amanda meadows right yeah hi amanda i bet you listen to this she She's our biggest fan. Yeah. The best. Right, because that had just so much kind of like empty, quote unquote, feminism, where it's like, you go girl, girl power.

But it was like corporate feminism. And they still, you know, subscribe to a lot of the tropes that are regressive toward women. And it became a buzz. It became like, yes regressive toward women. It became a buzz. It became like, yes, a marketing strategy. It's like girl power. Buy a pink Polaroid camera. Yeah. And I think to some extent that is happening now too.

And it's like I try to be really like mindful of that when I'm, you know, just it's a weekend I'm strolling through, let's say, the Glendale Galleria, my closest mall. Mine too. I love the Glendale Galleria. I love the Glendale Galleria. Me too. And it's just a quick, a couple steps, and then you're at the Americana. And you're just at another great mall.

Yeah. Park once, get two malls. I love the mall. I love shopping. I got- I may be shopping. I got these great French fries at the mall. I love shopping. I got- Women be shopping. I got these great French fries at the Americana the other day. Anyways, but walking through, because it is such a precarious, strange moment in time

where we care about women's issues again, but do we kind of thing, I think that's reflected in marketing so much. We're even walking through my favorite mall the other day, my favorite indoor mall across the street from my favorite outdoor mall. Yes. Perfect. Perfectly situated. We love it. There's Apple stores at both.

Anyways. I want to go to the mall. But there is a concentrated effort right now to play into that especially and where i find it especially sinister is with uh empty messages about like body acceptance there's this i'm thinking of a campaign that lush is doing right now to sell soap and it's like hey any body type can use our soap you're like yeah no yeah, no shit. It's so bright. Yeah. And then it's like me to the soap.

And you're like, fuck your meat. Like there. But then, but then it's like you go across the, then you just like go across the mall to like forever 21 where they're not selling. Like those are the stores that like won't sell clothes into like the extra

large sizes. Cause they don't want like bigger women. Right. Yeah. So it's like in their clothes. Yeah. And you know, that's something I deal with a lot. But there's a lot of times where this girl power messaging that's happening now feels

a little shallow. Right. Because you don't see it extended to like, you know, you don't see it extended everywhere. Yeah. It's pretty exclusionary still. Right. And just like capitalizing on a moment while doing nothing to actually support it. I guess I'm just

like yeah. But everyone should check out the Glendale Galleria. Great food court. Yeah. And then there's a little side food court

if you go up there. Guys take a weekend just one day at the Galleria one day at the Americana. You're it's a you're just have a full weekend.

Our friend our friend calls it was Jared called friend calls it uh what does jared call it jared calls it like the paris of california yeah it's just the americana is hey can't afford to go to paris check out the americana there's a water fountain yes and it's already synced up to songs from the polar express christmas starts early at the americana oh there you go way out of their way yeah i saw i when i was at the Americana. Oh, there you go. Way out of their way. Yeah. I saw, when I was at the Americana, sorry, one more thing

about the Americana. I was getting my computer fixed on a Monday, so I was like, oh, it's a quiet time at the Americana. There was an old couple watching the water fountain display

and like crying. They thought, it was like 11 in the morning. I was like, guys, what are we doing here? But they were so moved by the Americana water display that they were both crying

and holding hands. That's beautiful. I know. Well, not to derail this Glendale Galleria conversation, but tying it back to what we had been talking about in terms of the exclusionary soap is for every body type

and it's like, duh. There moment where courtney cox fat shames her camera guy yes other than that i would say there's not as much actively problematic stuff that happens in this movie it's a lot of omission it's omission yeah and then compare this to the Scream parody of Scary Movie that, like I said, relies entirely on problematic jokes. So also this movie was supposed to be called Scary Movie. Yes. Crazy. Also, we would be remiss not to say, you know, it is a Weinstein joint. Yes, it certainly is. And should we, I don't know how much it's worth talking about to bring up Rose McGowan, who plays Tatum.

Right. But, you know, she's been very outspoken about the Me Too movement. But she also, you know, says some problematic things that are fairly turfy at times. I think it's important to remember there is no perfect advocate for a movement and if you're putting all your chips behind one specific advocate, probably not a smart thing to do. Put your chips behind the movement, not a specific person.

But it is unfortunate. I mean, and if I'm recalling correctly, I did a little bit of a light goog on the subject and it appears that the issues with Weinstein and McGowan happened after Scream. Oh, okay.

In 97. Interesting. Just a thing. I might be wrong, but I don't think I think that just was those wave of like Dimension and Miramax films that they weren't actively involved with. It's just like their names were on everything. Although I do know it was them who decided to change the name from Scary Movie to Scream.

That's the only active participation I know they had in the movie. Got it. Harve. I mean, they still got money for it, so I'm not happy. Also, a weird Hollywood reporter story came out as the Me Too movement was starting this time last year. And Skeet Ulrich, for some reason, took it upon himself to be like, yeah, I also knew Harvey Weinstein was bad. And like, Skeet, can you sit down for like a second?

Don't they need you on set over at Riverdale? Don't you need to play some fedora asshole? Don't you need to be brooding in a jail cell somewhere? A fake jail cell, not a real jail cell. I'm not advocating sending Skeet Eldridge to real jail. Well, I am. Not yet. Show us the receipts and we'll send Skeet to jail.

Oh, Skeet. Does anyone have any final thoughts about Scream? I just really enjoyed it. Yeah. There's blind spots, mostly by omission, but I really liked it. Yeah. There's blind spots, mostly by omission, but I really liked it. Yeah. Yeah, I love this movie. When it came out, it was a lot of fun to revisit it.

The one moment I've always loved in the movie is when everyone at the party finds out the principal's been murdered, and they're like, fuck yeah. And then they, like, take off. I'm like, what is wrong with these kids? These kids' reaction to finding out people close to them. Like, they're so stoked. It's so, they're heartless. I really want to see the moment where they get to the football field to see Principal Henry Winkler strung up. And the gravity of what they're actually doing hits them.

And they're like, oh my god, a person is dead. I thought this was just fun, but a person, a principal her principal is dead i mean i didn't get along with him but but he doesn't deserve to die yeah jamie you mentioned this a bit on the halloween episode where in that movie and in this movie as well it's clear that the people who are displaying toxic masculinity and you know other negative qualities it's clear that they are the bad guys because often we find in movies where you know the the hero is also ripe with toxic masculinity but we're still in a jobipped a 15-year-old. At best. Yeah, at best. But because in different moments of this movie, we see, like, Billy emotionally manipulating his girlfriend

by being like, you're still upset about your dead mom, you fucking loser. Why don't you just have sex with me already? God. And it's like, oh, okay, so you're, you know, abusive and gaslighting and uh and then he ends up being the bad guy so also that was one one last thing i wanted to say about sydney is that like kick-starting stuff with the brutal murder of a woman and i think

they say rape as well there's issues oh of sydney's mom that's in the report yes in the report yes that i mean both seems like a reference to halloween and just like oh boy we're killing a woman to start the story but you do see sydney dealing with that trauma in a way that at least seems for this universe to be relatively honest and it's not the sort of story where it's like oh yeah we're just throwing this in there to get the story started and it's not this sort of story where it's like oh yeah we're just throwing this in there to get the story started and it has no actual

narrative impact on our main character so I was happy to see that. And I'd also I mean in regards to actually both of what you're saying especially like

the display of understanding and display of toxic masculinity I think a lot of that might have to do with the fact that Williamson is a queer writer so he's not

writing from the inside. He's kind of writing from the outside a little bit when he's dealing with character. And I think maybe he can see them with a little less hero worship than, say, someone who might see themselves in Billy Loomis would. Right.

And I would say overall, in terms of the character development of the main female characters we get to know, which is mostly sydney and gail weathers we don't know a whole ton about them outside of how they relate to this specific story it's not like you know we're like oh and sydney loves chemistry and you know stuff like that but you know there's only so much you can accomplish. She's in the debate club.

Right. But it didn't super bother me in this movie because this movie has an agenda. And also it's not like we know that much more about the male characters either. There's not a massive imbalance. It's just the story doesn't tell you much about the teenagers outside of their sex lives

across genders. And they all love horror movies. They all love horror movies. Insanely specific knowledge. Yes. Yeah, I like this movie. Yeah, it's a fun. God damn it.

I want you to see the other three. Let's watch them together. Okay. Okay. Wow. Hey, does this movie pass the Bechdel test? It does. Big time.

It does. Yeah, quite a few times between quite a few different combinations of characters. It passes between Sid and Tatum early on. Men get mentioned in this conversation, but there are two line exchanges that pass. Whenever Sid's like, hey, what's going on at our school? And she's like, oh, some teens were killed that we know there is a scene between sydney and gail where the whole thing passes as far as i could tell oh and i think tatum is there too where like she's like get away from her don't ask questions this is none of your damn business blah blah yeah so there's there's quite a few scenes where the

movie passes the bechdel test it It was good, impressively so. Yeah. Yeah. And we've talked about this before of the, you know, few horror movies we've covered that so far it seems like all of them pass and it's because horror movies have to be populated by many women so that they can get murdered. But before they get murdered, they talk to each other.

What a catch-22. And they usually have to talk because of what's happening in the movie. They probably have to talk about something besides a man. They have to talk about... Hey, did you hear about our friend Sally getting murdered? She got snuffed. My guess is all the Saw movies pass the Bechdel test.

Which is just another proof. It's a flawed metric. What are we going to do about these traps? There's so many traps here. A lot of are we going to do about these traps? Yeah. There's so many traps there. A lot of knives in this room, Christy. Christy. Agree.

Don't put your hand in that needle pile, Christy. Oops, my B. Passes. So let's rate the movie on our nipple scale. All right. Where we rate it zero to five nipples based on its portrayal and representation of women. I'm going to give this one, I say a three i suppose i can go for three yeah because we see the female characters being a bit more active and more motivated than they are in typical slasher movies. We don't see like the gratuitous nudity that we often see.

We don't, while it does still align with some of the tropes, it also kind of redefines some of the tropes and it subverts some of them. So, you know, the whole final girl has to be innocent virgin type is kind of thrown out the window with this. They save themselves at the end. There is parity between the number of men versus women who get attacked. So I think it handles things better than, you know, the 70s and 80s slasher flicks that audiences had gotten accustomed to up until, you know,

the release of Scream. But as we also pointed out, there is no diversity in terms of race, in terms of identity and sexuality and body type and all of that stuff. So it's still the story of young, hot, white women, which a character like Gail Weathers continues to help sensationalize. Right, yeah. Yeah, so it doesn't handle everything the best that it could, but it's a step certainly in a better direction for slasher movies. So yeah, three nipples, and I'm going to give one to Sydney. I'm going to give one to Gale, and I'm going to throw one to our pal Lillard. Lillard! Oh boy, I'm going to go for three as well. We already discussed kind of, it's mostly progress on a surface level in that it's a

hetero white movie. Inside of the world, women have more agency than most popular horror movies up till this point. And I'm sure seeing this movie in theaters was cathartic for a lot of people. And it's just interesting to see in a horror movie two characters, Gail and Sydney, who don't just survive. They survive and they thrive. And they come together. I don't know if there's a lot going I don't know if like there's a lot going on like theme wise there's a lot

going on in Scream but one of the light themes I took out of it is oh it is about how kind of media and society like work to like keep women at odds with each other. Because like the whole movie they're at odds with each other and at the end when she's like how about this story a reporter like killed two asshole teenagers, murderers

and Sydney's like I like that story yeah it's like we always say people try to keep women fighting so because if we talk to each other then the scam is exposed right uh so so yeah i mean there's most of this movie is like terrific and it's definitely paved the way for even more progressive work to be made and a bunch bunch of weird, not great work. Such as Scary Movie and that whole franchise. The cost of success. Anyways, giving it three nippies. Of course, again, I toss this one to Lillard.

Give him a full set. I'm going to kick one over to Casey because Drew Barrymore just belts it. And I'm going to give my last one to Gail. Great. I might just for like nostalgia and being there factor, like I might bump it up to four. Oh, sure. Because I totally agree with everything you guys are saying.

But I don't know. There was just being there for that movie at the time it was released, like in a giant crowded audience was like, it did feel like something special and it did feel like we were seeing something like you know progressive and cool and new and like I'll never like forget that experience of seeing of like you know feeling that catharsis the first time I saw it in a theater and you know this is just me I feel like looking back on it with like remembering like kind of what horror was before that and kind of what Scream took it to.

But I can't help it. Like, you know, it is a very special movie to me for that. And I'm going to give it I'm going to give it one extra nipple for for for that reason. Yeah. And who would you like to give your nipples to? Oh, I'm going to give obviously Gail, obviously Sydney. I'm going to like also throw one

to Tatum just for that kick-ass move where she like slams the freezer door in Ghost Face's face. My last nipple goes to, can I give it to

Sydney, Gail, team up at the end? Yes. Because I fucking love that. A mutual nip. Yeah. You should get one extra half nip. Well, better that. A mutual nip. Yeah. You get one extra

half nip. Well better like next time Jamie Kennedy. No nips for you this time. And he's only in so many movies. He's in Scream 2 so

we gotta watch it. Next year. Or maybe when you get to Son of Mask. Oh. There's that's like 20 years from now when we're really

scraping for movies like all right here's it here's the son of a mask episode. Oh, yikes. So just wait 20 years, Jamie. Yeah. And then. And hopefully, you know, you'll be alive and thriving. Yeah.

Doing even more experiments. Well, by that point, the two of us will be married and it'll be the Jamie Kennedy, Jamie Kennedy experiment experiment. Amazing. Our awesome experiment. Amazing. Our awesome show. Anyways. Well, Joan, thank you so much for being here. Thank you for having me.

This was a lot of fun. So class. Yeah. I love going back to 96. Yay. And living my high school years. Awesome. Where can people find you online?

What would you like to plug? You can find me on Twitter or Instagram as Joan Haley Ford. Other than that, I'm at UCB pretty frequently. And watch out for Yabba Dabba Dinosaurs and Thundercats Roar. And don't forget to be on the lookout also. Be alert and aware for Paula Blart. Paula Blart. Kayla and I are going to hit, we're going to go to a Starbucks right now and start taking story notes.

Yes. Yeah. Maybe you could set it at the Americana. Oh, duh, duh. The twist is it's an outdoor mall.

Yeah, world's colliding. Oh, there's so much, there's so many more threads that's outside, it could rain. Yeah,

oh my God, yeah, what's Paula Blart going to do in a snowstorm? Oh God, we're going to need a high budget, we're going to have

to make that snow real. It could be a, oh, yeah, maybe it's a geostorm crossover where some terrorist is causing a snowstorm in Southern California. Oh, I love this. Amazing. We're well on our way. So good. Craft one complete.

Hey, for great ideas like that, check us out on Twitter and Instagram and facebook at bechtel cast uh you can rate and review us on itunes you can go to our merch store tpublic.com slash the bechtel cast we've got all kinds of goodies and you've you've got a few more days to get our halloween beetle juice get our yeah it's only on sale this month our feminist icon beetle juice uh fun ironic tea reference to last year's episode and you know are you on team wet scabs are you on team dry scabs a likely failing t-shirt design will only be on sale for a few more days also quick plug about our east coast tour that we're going to be doing in early november starting on november 3rd we're going to be in philadelphia pennsylvania november 4th we're going to be in

washington dc and november 5th we're going to be in new york city as a part of the new york comedy festival for more details about the movies we're covering our guests the venues we'll be at and how to get tickets go to bechtelcast.com go to our live appearances tab and all the information will be there you can also check our twitter and facebook we'll be posting the links there so if you live in or near any of those cities we hope to see you there for our live shows and finally we've got a patreon aka matreon that gets you two bonus episodes every single month, and it's only $5 a month. So subscribe to that by going to patreon.com

slash Bechtelcast. And otherwise, you scream, I scream, we all scream for Scream. Scream franchise. Yeah. Okay, bye. Bye. Daphne Caruana Galizia was a Maltese investigative journalist who on October 16th, 2017, was assassinated.

Crooks Everywhere unnerves 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. Kay hasn't heard from her sister in seven years. I have a proposal

for you. Come up here and document my project. All you need to do is record everything like you always do. What was that? That was live audio of a woman's nightmare. Can Kay trust her sister or is history repeating itself? There's nothing dangerous about what you're doing. They're just dreams. Dream Sequence is a new horror thriller from Blumhouse Television, iHeartRadio, and Realm. Listen to Dream Sequence on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. There's so much beauty in Mexican

culture, like mariachis, delicious cuisine, and even lucha libre. Join us for the new podcast, 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, emperor of Lucha Libre and a WWE superstar. Santos! Listen to Lucha Libre Behind the Mask on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you stream podcasts.