The Debrief - The Supernatural, Gore & Gothic Horror Galore

Episode Date: October 30, 2023

Happy Halloween!! In this extra spooky episode of The Debrief we are joined by the amazing Gothic Horror expert Elizabeth to discuss all your questions relating to horror! We also share supernatural stories that will get you in the spooky spirit!Don't forget to email us with any debriefs and dilemmas to: [e-mail] hope you have a great week!Kitty and Katie x Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

🎵 I've got a rebel soul. Yeah, I've got a rebel soul. I've got a really exciting episode. So let's just crack on. Let's crack on. Let's not have any fancy. Please mantra to me because I'm wanting to know. My mantra is. Yep. Every day is a lesson. Oh, every day is a lesson. Every day is a lesson. Every day is a lesson. Aren't you a bit of Sophocles over there? Well, I think potentially because there's a lot I don't know. There's a lot I don't know. And it takes a humble student to admit that. There's a lot I'm not sure on. Okay. Is this in response to your MA at the moment? Are you like, I'm ever learning? Well, yeah. I'm a sponge. I feel like...

I'm taking everything in. I just feel like, you know, people were talking at me today and I was like, none of this is sitting in my brain cells. Yeah, yeah. But every day is a lesson. Life lessons, intellectual lessons. Wow. Take every day is a lesson. Life lessons. Intellectual lessons.

Take every day as it comes and learn something. And what did you take from it? What did you take from it? Today I learned that if you flip something upside down, that doesn't mean you have to write backwards. Yeah. And I'll let that sit with you guys. Okay. Because I know some of you might be

confused as well and I just want to let you know that it's alright. It's okay. It happens to the best of of us it happens to the best of us okay but how have you been what's your mantra my mantra is i am strong enough to forgive and allow myself to forget when i say forget i'm not like nelly the elephant okay no i mean i'm moving on now line i drawing a line now the reason i need to forgive i've had a bit of um a situation where i found a bit of lies you know okay oh yeah yeah yeah so i'm taking these lies and i've forgiven them and i'm moving on hey oh don't get me wrong peach i i let my hair down and had a bit of a whip your hair back and forth you know i was living for a second yeah but bigger person that because every day is a lesson every day every day is a lesson we learn so i i overcome i'm forgiven yeah daily oh no i bet you are yeah

i bet you are i am 100 talking about whipping my hair back and forth is that your song it's not it's not but it's gonna make you want to whip that hair back and forth for Is that your song? It's not. It's not. But it's going to make you want to whip that hair back and forth. Are you ready? Yeah. Count me in. Do you want like a 5, 6, 7, 8? Yeah.

Okay. A 5, 6, 7, 8. Walk by every night in Takiswina looking fine. Yes. I've got an engine in the back of me

that's powering me forward. Always in suspense. Propelling me. Go on. What's your song? Tell me your song of the week my one is tell me um now i chew it is called chelsea dagger by the fratellis i tell you what we should guess the

names we should add that into our section because I tell you would you have known the name of mine um is it that big energy fantasy Mariah Carey I knew it

I knew it but did you did you though did you because you said it's a lesson I've learnt now yeah exactly

exactly and now I'm wiser for it I would have had no idea what yours was right guys we've got really really good wrecker wrecker recommendation okay you see these cute little T's no idea what yours was right guys we've got really really good record record recommendation

okay you see these cute little teas cute little teas i actually really really really like your one yeah you see these cute little teas katie show your cute little tea got my cute little tea i love this so these cute little teas are from in print we trust this is our recommendation this week guys yeah the first time we've had a recommendation that's a brand oh in print we trust it's unisex graphic tees clothing brand with print and magazine inspired graphics i love baby he's got kate moss and niama campbell iconic duo just like us my the name of my top is called What A Pair. I mean, isn't that fucking brilliant? Because it's a pair of shoes.

I think you'd be the pink one and I'd be the blue one. Oh, for sure. Being 100% honest. For sure. They've also got disco ball. They got the cowboy boot. They're really, really cute. They've got one that says future milf, which Katie, we will be. I need.

I know. I need that. Yeah. So guys, get out there. Get yourself on. Get onto Insta. We're going to tag them. Oh, we're going to tag them. Oh, we're going to tag them. You have to buy yourself a baby tee. Yeah. So guys, get out there. Get yourself on. Get onto Insta because they're on Insta. Oh, we're going to tag them.

Oh, we're going to tag them. You have to buy yourself a baby tee. Absolutely. Baby tees are the vibe because it just spices up an outfit. Of course it does. If you wear a baby tee and jeans, boom.

Boom. Boom. Fashion queen. Fashionistas. Fucking fashionistas. We are fucking fashionistas now. Okay, Katie. Oh, you got me nervous there. No, I did. I did. I got did i got a bit nervous see guys we've got a guest

today so honestly it's a bit exciting but let's debrief let's debrief let's debrief spooky debrief now it's spooky time it's a spooky debrief absolutely spooky time because it's october katie and that's spooky season so our special guest is very interesting and before we go into how we met and all of that I would like to introduce a specialist in gothic horror, our favourite woman of the evening, Elizabeth Parker. Hello, thank you so much for being here. Yes, thank you for having me. Oh my gosh we're so excited, we cannot wait to hear your spooky stories. So, how are you feeling? I'm good. I'm good. I'm very excited that it's October. This is my favourite time of year, bugger Christmas.

It's all about Halloween. So you prefer October over... I do. I do, yes. Ghosts, ghouls, scary stories, love it. I mean, it's great. She's even got a skeleton top on. Have you seen that? Yeah, I love that. I know, I was like, she is ready for the podcast. This is for you. Yeah, thank you. So, Elizabeth, we met in a skeleton top on. Have you seen that? Yeah, I love that. I know, I was like, she is ready for the podcast. This is for you. Yeah, thank you.

So, Elizabeth, we met in a really funny way. We did a great comedy course together called Crack Comedy. And, yeah, we hooted each other's socks off. And then I started to learn about what Elizabeth's speciality is. And it was very interesting. So, before we deep dive in go into all want to know pick your brain about every single thing what would you define as gothic horror what does it mean for everyone who's a bit clueless out there what does gothic horror mean okay so i promise i

won't do this but my background is in academia so i've got to try not to be like here's a really long explanation okay i was like I'm not gonna do that. A lot of academia, in my opinion, is people arguing over what words mean, again. Not really gonna do that. But very quickly, I will say, Gothic and horror are often used interchangeably. Some people use Gothic horror together

to describe it, as you did just there, as Gothic horror. There are arguably a little bit of differences between them. So in a nutshell i'd say horror is more immediate it's like designed to startle you to shock you i'm thinking jump scares in the theater that kind of thing okay gothic is a little bit more slow a little bit more full of dread foreboding is it exactly okay so my my research is on like gothic forests so i love horror films generally but anything set in the woods and so that would be more gothic in some ways because it's all atmosphere it's all sort of spooky vibes you think of castles convents but forests as well

like a full moon that kind of howling oh interesting I see. And this interest in gothic slash horror, or both put together, where did this come from? I mean, were you really young and at a sleepover and everyone wanted to watch Clueless and you were like, the exorcist, you know? Where did that come from? Have you always been interested in that?

So I love Clueless and the exorcist. Oh, you can have that, yeah. Yeah, great woman. Yes, so I think I was a bit of a weird kid. Okay. So I loved spooky things right from a really young age. I grew up near some deep, dark woods. I think that kind of influenced me.

Okay. My dad is very eclectic in his film choices. My sister loved horror, so I was exposed to a lot of horror films, probably from too young. Yeah. I love, so I've always had like scary dreams, which sounds bad but i actually

love them because i come out and i'm like oh my god how interesting i'm gonna write that everything you weren't like a nightmare you were like oh that was interesting so i'm both so i love horror and like my partner when i first got with him he was like oh okay so you're gonna be really brave in horror and i was like i'm the opposite i love it but i'm i'm absolutely scared of that as well but i love wow yeah so a bit of a contradiction. But yeah. So that. And then I saw the Blair Witch Project, I think, when I was about 13. I was one of the people who completely believed them.

So when they were like, found footage, you were like, yeah. And I never got over it. So I think my PhD was like therapy because I was scared. You've been scared for so long. Oh, bless you. Wow. That's so interesting. interesting i mean as you're speaking then something came to mind and i'm gonna pick your brain and we have not planned

this but i've just this is the beauty of a podcast because it just comes to you in the moment so i have a recurring dream every year every single year oh i think i've told you have i told you about this dream before potentially but involves the forest so you'll fucking love it yeah oh i'm ready every single year i have this dream and i never know when it's gonna come like but once a year and that's it and every time i have it like a teeny teeny tiny bit adds on but in the dream it feels like it's been ages like an hour you know how dreams do that yeah so i'm walking through a wood this is as much as I've got since I remember the first time was about I was seven and ever since I keep having this dream walking through a wood and I see I'm walking and walking and walking and I'm in an old-fashioned

clothing so I'm wearing a corset I'm wearing one of those old-fashioned hats you know um I say I don't know like the 1800s something like that walking along see the moon and interesting see the moon and then look forward here's something behind me a breath like that yeah and then feel a hand on my left shoulder look over that's as far as we've gone you're kidding in the middle of a woods trees either side pitch black oh yeah yeah every year every single year katie i'm telling you every year so i know what time of year it varies one day i got it on christmas day which i was like not christmas not christmas don't ruin my christmas i know but i've almost got in so engaged by it now, you know? Is it a human hand? Yes.

Do you know if it's male or female? Oh, actually, do you know what? I don't know. You don't know? I felt the touch. Do you see it or do you just feel it? No, I feel it. That's so interesting.

What does this mean, Elizabeth? Am I haunted? Yeah. Definitely, yeah. Oh, no! No, no, no! That's not the answer! Okay, movie's swiftly on before we panic.

Elizabeth, you have co-organised several conferences on space, place and the relationship between the gothic and non-human. Now, this word non-human was really interesting to Katie and I because the first thing that comes to mind for me is ghosts. You know, non-human, I attach with ghosts. What other things in horror, gothic, both put together are non-human? So non-human can attach with ghosts yes what other things in horror gothic both put together are non-human so non-human can mean a lot of different things people now say i don't know i feel like i'm doing like pc stuff here but people now say more than human or multi-special

if you want to be really up to date oh this is basically coming from the idea that we as humans are really really arrogant we think we're at the center of everything we're better than everything big long word for that is we're anthropocentric we put ourselves at the center of everything we background nature we background everything that's not us okay and so what this is about is kind of questioning that starting with like well what even is human because if you think about your own body it's not even entirely human like we're made up of so much fungus so much little bacteria oh my god so what is human in quote marks is actually very debatable all the cells in your body they recreate every few years so what is here now in 10 years none of the cells are here in front of me but you guys

will be here so there's lots of like i'm shitting it so it's a little bit like katie's a ghost so there's a lot of like uncanniness around what is human what is not human so the literal stuff there's nature so there's animals you might think of like animal horror all that kind of thing there's plants um these things that we think of as alive but not really alive in the same way as we are okay and so there's something with like plants where they're actually kind of creepy in some ways because they're growing you've seen those pictures on like buzzfeed and things where where cities are overtaken. Oh, I see.

So trees are included under the heading of plants. They massively outdate us. We're here for millennia before us. They'll be here for millennia after us. Wow. So there's kind of a sense where they're familiar to us, but they're also unfamiliar because if you start reading about how they kind of think,

that's a word that some people use, some people debate it, but they do communicate with each other. Plants do so much more than we think they do and there's something a little bit creepy in that yeah yeah that's part of the non-human and almost because we can't understand it you know we like to know what we know yeah and if they're like whispering shit to each other and we're like how are you doing that yeah that's scary and i think a lot of horror like eco horror which is like nature horror, basically, capitalises on that by thinking about,

well, if nature is thinking, what would it think of us? And if you think about how we treat the world, it's not going to be good. It's not going to wish us well. Yeah, vengeance. It's going to want to get rid of us. Vengeance. That's so interesting.

So there's that literal stuff. And then you've got the supernatural non-humans. So you start thinking about monsters monsters would be your big one. And I think something that's quite interesting about monsters is they tend to be a mixture of nature and human. So like maybe a human form, but with like talons of an animal or the head of an animal. So it's like, I think a lot of our fear comes from this very arrogant Western perception that like we're different from nature. We're above nature and monsters i think this is why i love horror because it it fucks with all of our kind of well we're better we're distinct it's like well hey no and so all

our monsters come forward to be like let's smash that all together defy boundaries and freak us out yeah yeah um and then i love that you said ghosts because i was thinking like are ghosts nature are they not nature because arguably they're totally supernatural. But then there's also a line of thought that all magic is magic until it's science. And then there's some people saying like, ghosts are absolutely real and they're going to get discovered by science. So could they actually be a part of nature?

Obviously that's not. Yeah. You know, that's very much up for debate, but I don't know. Completely. Yeah. So lots of non-human different things. Blimey, wow.

Do you believe in ghosts? I think there's something. I used to work at the Drury Lane, which the theatre, which is like one, I think it was voted like the most haunted theatre in the West End or something like it. It's been there for yonks. They're actually, tell Elizabeth,

they're doing a ghost tour. They do ghost tours where you can go, but so much of the original building is still so well preserved and they have loads of ghosts in there. And I've had dodgy experiences with weird things happening. In your opinion,

what are the three worst things supernaturally, non-human things that you could encounter that you wouldn't like to run into? If you had to rank them, like, girls, stay clear. These are the three fucking worst things.

Okay, okay. So the monster that scared me the most is, have you seen Pan's Labyrinth? No. Oh. Okay, that's a great film to watch. Okay. There is a monster in that

which is gonna mean nothing to you right now, but watch it. It's called The Pale Man. And for me, that is the scariest monster that has ever appeared in anything. Could you describe it for us? So, Pantshamperin is a film that really plays with different metaphors, and I love this kind of stuff, blah, blah, blah.

And it's all like civil war and fairy tales. It's very weird, it's Spanish and interesting, whatever. But this monster is basically, he's meant to stand for the Holocaust. So you go into this very dark little thing and you have all these children's shoes piled up and it's all very creepy and there are these strange, vague, violent old paintings.

You're like, what's going on? And then he appears and he's basically like, if you imagine, okay, have you seen those really weird cats that don't have fur? Yes. Those little rat baby things. Yes.

That kind of skin. Oh, the wrinkled skin. A wrinkled, naked, flesh-colored skin. Oh my God. No genitals. Oh. Barbie doll. That's the bit that freaks me. And then he's got this really, really long fingernails.

Really long fingers. And his face is just a bit like Voldemort. No features except for a little nose and a scary, scary mouth. No eyes. But then he lifts up his hands and there's eyes in the hands. And it's just, that is hands down the worst thing I could ever encounter.

Okay, so that ranks number one, would you say? That ranks number one. No way. I think this is all betraying the fear of men, isn't it? But. Real. Have you heard of Slender Man? Yes, I have. ranks number one no way I think this is all betraying a fear of men isn't it but real have you heard of Slender Man yes

I have but you'd have to describe it I'm afraid do you know Slender it's very similar isn't it

like a faceless man like super slender but like gangly like in a suit I can't be dealing with thin tall men dressed like this we'll have to avoid

my dad at all costs. Thin tall man. And he's only seen in the woods or at the edge of woods. Yes. Why? Well, this is the thing. There's something called like creepypasta on the internet. And there's all this stuff like about like modern day myths.

And I think the reason why I love him or love the idea, I don't want him in my life, but love the idea of him, is that it's like this myth that's come out of very recent years. So there was all this stuff on the internet where people kept saying in the woods they would see this and it would be in different woods in different parts of the world. There's this really tall man, completely blank in the face, just wearing a suit. And you'd often see him just at the edge of trees. There's all these like pictures on the internet where people say they're real and whatever.

You can just kind of see a little bit of somebody. He's particularly interested in children. So he hangs out at like playgrounds. Oh, you're joking me. And apparently they're disappearing. somebody he's particularly interested in children so he hangs out like playgrounds and then something that happened in reality is two girls two teenage girls committed a murder and they both said that the Slender Man told them to do it sorry is this a true story? That's a true story yeah it's true that they say that I'm not saying it's true that the Slender Man did that

okay okay yeah and and they're young they're children they're like 14 15 something like that and they do it together And they're young. They're children. They're like 14, 15, something like that. Oh my God. And they do it together. And they do it together and they both say they were being whispered to by the Slender Man. And so that just,

that freaks me out. Do you know what part of the world this was in? I knew you were going to ask me that and I can't remember. You're a tricky bitch. I was sitting there going,

don't ask me that. Don't ask me, don't ask me, don't ask me that. And number three, I don't know if this counts as an answer, but I'm going to go with it. I always find the scariest horror for me is when you can't see the monster. So I think number three is just a little bit like your dream,

where you can just hear something. You've just got little, like, hovering, little hovering hints that there's something. So I think the idea of being followed is like, so there's like, we'll get into ghosts and stuff, but there's some, like, ghost mythology, particularly in, like, Asian countries, about ghosts that follow you and like will hold on to you and i listened to a podcast recently uncanny which is a ghosty podcast i was telling

you about it's so good elizabeth isn't it it's so good and there was an episode the other day that really freaked me out about people who went to an airbnb their kids saw a ghost there and this was in france they came back to london and the ghost came back with them and so that idea of being followed of being targeted again i mean in real life and not like you know whatever but yeah there's a film we saw that trailer didn't we that there's a film coming out about that where like it attaches itself to you oh my god what was it called this has just reminded me as well is that um one of my close family friends, really, really big on the afterlife, very big on ghosts,

but said that with spirits, good or bad, you have to ask them to leave. You know, he was saying how he had a bad spirit in his house and he had to ask them to leave. And they didn't until their daughter was an older woman but until she passed away which was years later, good 10 years later. But I thought, oh my gosh, I'm not being funny but asking to go to leave, I'd be shitting it.

And as well, imagine if it's like, no, piss off. But I was gonna say that. I was gonna say no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And that angers them even more. Then I'm like, ugh, yeah, okay. They've probably been there longer than you as well. Exactly, that's their kind of,

their domain, their home, their area. Yeah, not fun. So we've got these three. Take us away, Katie. If I were to say, snog, marry, avoid, those three things,

I think I'd have to avoid the pale man like no that wrinkly soggy thing i can't like you just know you just know it'd be soggy like oh that's disgusting i can't do that I think I would snog Slender Man. Okay. If he had good intentions. Yeah. I think I would have to marry, which actually, no, I would have to live with being the following feeling.

Okay, cool. Which would be awful, but I feel like I could come to terms with it. Okay. Do you know what I mean? I see what you mean. I'm going to jump on it quick. Oh, yeah. So I am actually going to avoid at all costs the following thing. Are you?

Yeah. I do. For me, I'd rather fucking see it head on and be like, you shit. Rather than being like, someone in my ear or like tapping. I'd be like, oh, just get me already. I couldn't cope with that at all. Not a chance, Katie. This is not the wrinkly man, though.

So I'm going to... But once. No! It's only once. And then marry the slender. Marry the slender. Elizabeth, it is now your turn, and we cannot change your answers, okay?

Okay. So I've got something in common with both of you. I'm going to marry the slender man. Oh, okay. Just because I think he's dressed for it already. He's in a suit. He's ready. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, in a suit. He's ready.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, he's ready. He's ready. Yeah, the club's there. The wrinkly man is wearing nothing. Yeah, why is he doing that? That's weird. Why is he doing that?

I'm avoiding him like you. And then God knows what this would look like, but I'll snog the imaginary creepy thing because then maybe it'll then go away. Maybe that's what it wants. That's true. That's true. It could just be horny at the end

of the day couldn't it yeah exactly yeah give the ghost what he wants yeah if it's just snogging no if it's just snogging that's fine yeah anything else on your way on your way yeah exactly how interesting but can you you know how people live with these experiences live with being haunted you know that freaks me out within what you've studied like gothic horror or horror um is there that foreboding lingering is that a big theme of what gothic horror is for for me i would say definitely horror and gothic whatever is much more effective if there's like anticipation and like slow building up and whatever like i hate it when you're like two seconds into a film and it's like here's a scary monster like I hate it when you're like two seconds into a film

and it's like here's a scary monster looking all weird and you're just like yeah I'm not scared yeah interesting okay yeah but I think it's really interesting you were saying about you'd avoid at all costs the like creepy feeling because like there's something called monster theory which is legitimately an area of academia oh wow one of the reasons they say that we like monsters is because they they by existing by being corporeal, by being physical and flesh and all that kind of thing, they tell us that they're defeatable. And so all of our fears go into a monster.

And then we think, even if we don't succeed, we think we could kill it. So we could get rid of our fears. Whereas something more kind of ambient and vague. It's so interesting, though, that it's so psychological. that it's like it's so psychological like that there must be so many theories linking psychology and horrors together in terms of like yeah like you said like putting your fears into monsters that you think you can kill and that's so interesting yeah oh what are your favorite monsters or your like what monsters do you

remember that have like scared you oh really good really really good question are you trying to jump on i distinctly remember so i have a crippling fear of sharks like crippling i i can't do it i just can't do it it's it's just too much for me but this sounds even worse now in the scooby-doo films you know the live action scooby-doo films i remember there was this like um there was like this submarine man that didn't have a face that would wade out the water and it had you know the big like helmet and he literally comes out and he doesn't again doesn't say anything he's and he's just and you're like like i had so many nightmares that that man was gonna come and grab me in my dreams i think for me personally my biggest fear like overall biggest fear when we talk of fears when you say sharks and i i am terrified of mice but that's not my biggest fear but my biggest biggest

fear is death like death is my biggest fear and i was talking to i was talking about it recently with archie my boyfriend and he's saying, why? Like, everyone goes through it. And I'm like, not me. Like, I'm not being funny. I'm going to gaslight everyone here to tell them I'm not going to die. And that's the only way I can live through life. So my biggest... You're going to be the ghost.

I'm going to be... Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're going to be the ghost. I'm going to ghost you all. I'm going to come back and breathe in your ear and put my hand on your shoulder and you'll be... You'll be breathing behind people in the woods, your hand out yes i will i will and but something that freaked me out when i was younger my parents are big horror film fans um introduced me to the

others and obviously the twist of the others i'm sorry everyone i'm gonna ruin it if you haven't seen it but it is a good film is they find out that they're the ones that are dead now I tell you that haunted me that but that is my fear probably someone saying actually you're dead I would I'd shit myself like for me death realizing Katie's dead or I'd be like what is going on right now you know know, for me. And what does that, is there a different kind of association with horror that something yours is animalistic, yours is kind of the sharp, aquatic Katie Ships herself, anything like ghostly for me? What is that?

Is there different terms for that? I don't know about different terms. I think it's more that you're going down the kind of ghostly, ethereal route, aren't you? And like what you said earlier, where you were like, oh, if the pale man's there, I'd just turn around and be like, you little shit. Do you know what I mean?

I'm just like, you're ready for monsters. You're a bit of a buffy. Do you know what I mean? Okay, brilliant. But you're like, the ghostly stuff, no. So I think you're kind of going, you know, you're kind of proving that point that like it stays scary if you don't put it into form,

even though it's still scary if it is like an Aquaman or a pale man or whatever else. Because you can't kill death, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So true. Oh, don't. That's so, yeah. I'm guessing you're not meaning like death Grim Reaper,

you're meaning like death. Death, yeah. Like actually, like, closing my eyes, last breath, what? What do you mean? No, that's a bit deep. No, no, no, I can't. Like I actually can't. Elizabeth, you published in the monograph called The Forest and the Eco-Gothic,

The Deep Dark Woods in the Popular Imagination. Now, in chapter four, you refer where the wild things are. Now, this took my interest because as we talk, the monsters, the non-human, you know, the aquatic underwater for gating. The little fishes. Yeah. The demonic fishes. talk the monsters the non-human you know the aquatic underwater fishies the demonic fishies where the wild things are you refer to the different types of monsters and in reference to these non-human aspects again all these things we've talked about do you believe in them and

slash do you think that they are real even if you're like oh i doubt but i think they are out there so monsters probably no that doesn't mean that i mean there's things in nature they're like i don't know if you've ever looked up hagfish i would define them as monsters they're these like full of teeth fish so you would hate them and they just make slime and that's kind of that's what they do wait are they real they're real they're real so there's things that i think that exist that are monstrous but in terms of supernatural monsters, no, I don't believe in vampires and well,

it's not that kind of thing. Okay, I see. Ghosts is more complicated. Okay. And I have a really weird on the fence answer about this, where I simultaneously really want to believe, and I really don't want to believe. Interesting.

And why I want to believe is a little bit deep. It little bit deep it's because of i lost somebody quite close to me okay so the idea of like ghosts existing is quite promising because i'm like okay so there's like something beyond so since losing that person every ghost story has a kind of promise to it in a way that it didn't before and so i'm sort of more like oh god yes i really want this to be true yeah but to it in a way that it didn't before and so I'm sort of more like oh god yes I really want this to be true yeah but if I'm alone and I'm scared I don't want it to be true or if there's any kind of like evil to it or badness I'm like oh god yeah no or the idea is of like because I'm quite big on energies and like so I guess there's like a variety and like quite spiritual as well in some ways yeah so I think like if I was to like believe that there was just like a black energy,

like a bad energy, I would hate that. Do you know what I mean? So I want to, I don't want to, honest answer, I don't know. And with the people you've met that have interest in horror as well, do they usually believe? Do you know what?

No, not necessarily. So it's not that it necessarily draws people. It doesn't correlate. No, so it might fascinate them. So I think there's like a corresponding, like everyone's fascinated with fear and like what drives us and our fears and all that kind of thing.

But some people definitely think it's real. Some people really don't. And it's a mix. Yeah, a real mix. And there's always this kind of, I completely understand when you refer to there's a comfort there you know in believing in spirit in the spirit and that someone's living on and i and i think that that is the case but i think there's such a fine line for me and i get scared of how

do you know whether it's a good or bad and what do you think about that do you think there is a way to know whether there's a good feeling or bad feeling or good spirit bad spirit is that even a thing like i said i'm really big on energy so even like going into a space i will have this feeling of like it's a good space it's a bad space it's got good vibes and like sometimes i don't know what i even mean by that but there are spaces I've gone to where I've just been like, I don't like it here. And I remember there was one place where, when I was living in Dublin,

I had a very difficult flatmate at one point. I had to escape that situation. I was looking and I found this very old, very creepy place. But it was cheap and it was immediately available. And I was kind of like, do you know what? It's probably going to be fine. But something in my gut was saying, maybe not. And then my dad, who is the least supernatural person in the world he's a

mathematician he pooh-poohs all of this stuff he's like what do you do like bisexual fairy goblins or something you know like he has no idea um and I talked to him and he said I've just got a bad feeling about it and he's never said that and then my partner gave me goosebumps yeah and my partner saw it and he was just like Elizabeth I don't want you to live here and did they describe what that feeling was my dad hadn't even saw it he'll now say he never said that yeah he legitimately did in fairness something in the literal world which probably added to that for Ian my partner was there was a man who lived downstairs and in the kitchen we looked down and there was a little hole in the floor and it like went through to his sitting room and I

remember being like oh what's that and he was like oh it's just like a draft thing for the air and Ian was like that's weird. So that's less supernatural so maybe there were many things wrong. That's so scary. I didn't live there, I didn't do it. Well done. Well done. And I'm fascinated with the fact that you said your dad is completely poo poo with it all. So what's your family's opinion on it all? Are they all? Nah.

Do they all have that opinion? So it's really interesting with my parents because my mom, so she's the person I lost. She's not with us anymore. Oh, sorry. No, no, no. Don't worry. But she was massively religious. Like, really funny, really kooky, really unjudgmental.

But she would literally be like, oh, how fun, let's go and look at the Bible again. And I'd be like, okay. And my dad would be like, load of bollocks, absolutely load of bollocks. And they were completely opposite. So I was around both of that. My sister growing up definitely believed in all of that stuff. And then I have always been a bit sort of I'm not quite on the sure yeah I had a very strange experience when I was about this isn't

my ghost story but when I was about 13 or something I went to a friend's house and her mum used to have a psychic come over oh my god I'm so jealous I know that would have been fab I don't even know how much that would cost. I'm really curious. Yeah. And this was like 1990s Faversham, which by the way is a very, very haunted place in Kent apparently. Oh, wow.

Yes, but she had this weekly psychic come around and I remember arriving as this psychic was leaving and this psychic held a lot of interest in me. I always wanted to see her because I was like, wow, what does this psychic look like? Really normal. Female or male, sorry? Female. I don't know if she was a total con artist or not. I have no idea. But as I was like, wow, my husband's psychic looked like really normal. Female or male, sorry?

Female. I don't know if she was a total con artist or not, I have no idea. But as I was walking, she saw me and she was just like, oh my God. And I was like, what? And she was like, I just have to, I have to tell you two things. And I was like, okay. And one of them was really nice. One of them was, you're going to find love, so don't worry about that.

And I was like, okay, that's very nice. And then she was like the other thing is you're giving off a very strong energy and there are lots of paranormal things around you that want to connect with you but you have walls up but you would have a talent naturally for clairvoyance so if you ever want those walls taken down please contact me or someone like me and my response was, build more walls. Build them up. You're like, what the fuck? Fuck off. Yeah, yeah.

I'm building a treasure wall. I'll just take the love now. Yeah, I'll see you. Absolutely not. Wow. So, no, I don't want it. So any ghost listening, no. That's so interesting.

Oh my God. My dad, I think for sure, as I said to you, is really interested in it all. And he invites it. He absolutely invites it. Yes. For me, I'm thinking absolutely fucking not. Like, no, skinny my pants off I go.

Like, not a chance. For him, you know, and I've said to him multiple times, and he has had multiple accounts of spiritual things happen to him. And people say to him you've got people around you that want to connect with you that's happened to him as well and i have no idea how he continues living for me i'd be like terrifying nah nah nah nah nah but it's so interesting that there are some people that i think they draw to but i've always thought it's the ones that want them to draw near to like for my dad he's like oh i'm happy for anyone to come chat to me

whereas you're the absolute opposite absolute opposite yeah how interesting yeah that's so interesting that you like you say about energies that there are people who have a larger energetic kind of vibe and field where that woman picked up on your energy and your vibes and you can pick up on vibes quite. I wonder if they're linked in that sense with supernatural tendencies and experiences to people who have a really good intuition and really good energy about them. How old were you at the time? So I would have been year seven, year eight. Oh, you were little. Little.

Oh, my God. Did you tell your parents, your family? No. No, no, no. I just was like, okay, thank you. Yeah, oh, my God. Oh, my gosh. I mean, Katie and I have said,

and it's similar kind of, maybe not, there's this person near us who does what they call... Tarot. Oh, yes, I love Tarot, yeah. Oh, so you do it? I do it a little bit, yeah. Oh my gosh, so tell us, is it good? Is it a good thing to do?

I love doing it. So I did it as a kid, unsurprisingly, given what I just told you about my mum. She walked in and was like, oh my God, you're raising the devil, this is awful. And I was doing it with my friend, and she was like, I'd rather you were drinking, and I was like, no, you.

It's fun. But no, Tarot, I feel like they're misrepresented. Drugs, not the devil. Yeah, please. Put the cards away. I feel like they're a bit misrepresented in horror because they're sometimes presented as these horrible, scary things.

They are a million miles away from Ouija boards. Ouija boards, I would do public service announcements every day saying, do not touch them. But tarot cards, they're intuitive. They're really like even if you don't believe that they're doing anything they prompt thoughts in you so it's just like it's a little bit like horoscopes or something where even if you don't believe it's absolutely written for you you can probably read something into it will get you thinking about something yes so they have no influence in the future you think well i mean some people would disagree so okay I think the basic theory is whenever you do a reading the future is true at that time

according to your energy so like something really weird happened with me and my partner once where we were doing tarot for a while and there's one day we're like I'm not even sure what was going on but our energies were off and we tried to do the tarot and twice the jokers came up and I never have the jokers in there the third time I dropped the deck and we both said we're not meant to do a reading right now but of course we did a reading again and we had all the scariest cards come up in the future cards and I think it was like me being a little bit superstitious I was like I wasn't meant to read this right now because it was telling me that where I am exactly now in my energy I'm pointed in not the right way that I want to go

oh interesting so if you get a bad reading don't freak out because try it another day try it in another kind of fresher space and it's very likely that it will shift how do you allow yourself to not fixate on that because personally I would get really freaked out I think I was a bit freaked out at the time but I think given the fact that that was many years ago and lots of lovely things have happened since you know and all that kind of thing and although hmm actually you've just made me think that did happen actually a couple of months before something very bad happened so I'm like oh god which I've never put together before interesting but hmm okay so there was my comforting don't worry about it but maybe do and a lot of this the cards mean different things from what you

necessarily think they do so like death is death of a situation yes and it can actually be a very positive card because like they always carry their kind of opposite meanings as well so it's like rebirth as well so like sometimes you'll get the death card in something where like actually it's just you're going through a big change and like the picture cards which are the ones so you have different suits which are like cups swords whatever and then you have the major arcana which are like death justice the lovers whatever that might be yeah wow and they say that um if you pull all majors it means that you're at a really major turning point in your life and i was like it was like oh bollocks then i did one and i got all majors at a really major turning point in my life that's crazy because i always seem to so i my mum loves tarot and has like an oracle deck kind of thing yeah

i've got she got me one so i haven't yeah i've got it in my room we can do a few pull a few but um and it has the little book like guide and you it's so crazy though you shuffle them and you're like okay what do i need to know you literally speak to the car they jump out like they fly out they do but i always always get either wheel of fortune um or the star or the fool so all majors yeah and i'm like yeah yeah she's like that's not leaving me yeah but wheel of fortune i always see i'm like hey girl it has different paragraphs so for example like career personal goals and stuff like that so it can mean a variation because you can be quite specific being like i want to know x about like am i going

down the right path for this and it'll be like the style be like you're on the right path xyz or take some time think about this navigate but usually you can't like predict it won't say you're gonna do this and fail but they're actually not that negative it's more ambiguous than that i think and does your partner believe in tarot reading does he believe in the afterlife is that so he finds it all really interesting okay he's now saying he doesn't know he used to say not at all and then i think it's partly this podcast uncanny he's listened to so many of these stories he's talked to me about my stories but he was also one of those people who don't believe in ghosts but then people would talk about ghosts at like a party or whatever but oh yeah the strange experience where a woman who

wasn't there was at the foot of my bed and there was a cat that was dead that was there and i was like ian that's a ghost story, I just didn't stay there again. Wow. Oh my God. And for you, how was that being, I mean, it's hard because believer slash non-believer, not sure on the fence, but also your interest is so big.

Were you affected by people around you saying, not really believe that much, your parents or your friends or your colleagues, the people you work with did that make you believe less or were you always quite clear-minded as to how you felt about um I think studying it and writing about it made it feel more surreal so most of the time it made it made it feel more pretend kind of thing because you were looking into like academic theories and you know all that kind of thing um I had one weird experience where I was writing a section literally on the devil and I just started the introduction and I was like how many words have I done I used to like obsessively word count you know we were trying to hit a word count yeah did the word count how many words do you think I'd written

666 and I felt sick like that that was my moment where i was like oh that's really like that was very weird that wasn't nice and i used to get this because i was watching too much horror during this time because i had to yeah and one of the shots you get in horror again and again is like the pov of whoever's like watching usually a woman yeah um so you'll get lots of shots of like the back of a head of somebody is it usually a woman what's that about that's a whole new podcast anyway that's a whole new podcast but so i would get this thing where i'd be sitting in this little flat typing away and then i'd get this recurring image in my head of what i looked like from behind coming around the corner oh and that was that was the worst of it so i'd turn on all the lights and just be like no this is where i needed to watch my mermaid show which you know yes the mermaid show yeah yeah oh my gosh to

cancel it out yeah you would need to yeah seriously would need to 100 we asked the debrief the podcast we said we've got a specialist with gothic horror who's done a phd study an author and a television editor as well as a founding editor of the Gothic Nature Journal. I said, what would the one question be to these people? And the reoccurring question from numerous people was, have you ever experienced anything supernatural or non-human? Now, this is a question we are both dying to know, but I'm also shitting myself.

I'm a bit scared. So so yes is the answer okay um so i can't explain it so i'm not saying it definitely was a ghost but i i cannot explain it yeah so i was about 17 16 17 years old at this point and i used to babysit for a family in my little village and I'm going to give you some information here that's going to seem really random but it's really necessary to understand go for it so they had three children right three-year-old called Emily and two twin babies and I used to go and look after them but I used to look after them when the mum or dad was there so after school they'd be around they'd do some washing or whatever and I'd be like supervising just an extra pair of eyes yeah and I was quite young so I was like okay fine yeah did this a few times never felt anything weird it was always fine and then one day after a few months they said how would you feel about doing an evening if we went to like the cinema or something and I was like

guys that's fine I do this all the time yeah it's grand but they were a little bit like cautious are you sure okay and I was like, yeah. And they were like, okay, we won't be gone that long and we have our phones on us. And I was like, well, turn your phones off when you're in the movie. And they were like, I mean, we'll have our phones on us. And I was like, okay, weird. Just before they went off, they said, oh, the children are really light sensitive.

So like we've put them all to bed, but you can have the light on in the room that you're in. I was watching TV downstairs. All the other lights need to be off. If you make a a cup of tea you have to go and turn on the light but then turn it off straight away but do not turn on any of the other lights in the house because they'll really really wake up so i was like okay you just do as i thought it's a bit weird but okay fine yeah they said here's a baby monitor next to you there's a baby monitor in emily's room and a baby monitor in the twins room This is the last bit of strange information you need to know.

When you get to the top of the stairs to go to that upstairs floor, you have this little square bit of landing. And then you have three different sets of stairs going off. Oh, just a few like five that way, five that way, five that way. OK, cool. That becomes relevant. So I was watching TV really randomly. I remember the cable guy was on really weird Jim Carrey film. Not scary. And I was like doing my own thing, listening to the like occasional little like sounds. TV really randomly I remember the cable guy was on really weird Jim Carrey film not scary and I

was like doing my own thing listening to the like occasional little like sounds and I was like it's fine yeah and then suddenly there was a piercing cry from upstairs and I was like oh my god and it sounded absolutely like Emily so I was like the three-year-old so she was screaming and at the back of my head somewhere registered I didn't come through on the monitor like I heard it from upstairs I've got goosebumps but I didn't hear it on the monitor and I was like I always get a bit creeped out telling this story but I was like I just got goosebumps so I was like okay I'm gonna go upstairs so I went to run upstairs but all I was thinking at this point was oh my god this is the first time she's ever not had her mum or dad she's gonna be really freaked out

so I was like oh no so I went to go upstairs I've gone from a room with a light on to a passageway with no lights and the adjustment means it seems pitch black to me yeah so I was like oh god your eyes would be transitioning my eyes were transitioning so I'm going up the stairs and I'm trying to find the light switch I'm like dragging my hands across the walls oh god I can't remember where their bloody light switches are I can't find them and I get to the top of the stairs and I'm on this little like square bit and I know there's three different ways I could go okay I know it's not forward because that's the bathroom but I was like is Emily which oh god and I was like I think it's to the left so I started to go to the left at this point my eyes

started to adjust so I could see like the shapes of the banisters and the pictures on the wall and I turn around and my view if you can imagine is like a few steps down flat a few steps up right and in front of me I can see Emily who's got curly hair on the stairs she's got a head in her hands and she's just shaking and sobbing and I can see at this point I know where she is she's come out of her room so I was like Emily it's okay and I was like it's Elizabeth it's okay I'm here it's fine I start to walk towards her so I come down the stairs and I just get this dropping feeling in me of just blackness and she looks up and where her face should be there's just black of like the black landing like there's nothing and this voice inside meed across the landing into Emily's room the door slams the light in

her room goes on and I can see because it's these wooden slats like vertical slats and this light is coming through oh my god and to this day I am so proud that this is what happened what I did because I now I'd be like that's not not what I'd guess I'd do, but I ran after it because I was like, Emma's in that room. Oh my God. Oh my God. You brave girl.

Brave babysitter. Which is not what I think I would have, I should have been paid so much more. Oh my God, true. Yeah, yeah. Bloody salary raise. I know. So I like ran, and they had those like little iron latchy things,

and I was trying to open it, and it would not open, would not open. Sorry, on the door. I'm on the door, so I've run across the landing now to follow. Okay, the door's now locked. And the door is now locked. You're joking me.

And I'm trying to open it, trying to open it, trying to open it. It suddenly gives. I go into the room. Little bedside light's on. Emily's fast asleep in bed. And there's nothing else in the room. And she's breathing heavily.

And like three-year-olds just can't fake sleep like that I don't think and like the light to turn it on you have to like reach around like it wasn't and and I mean the door locked and it's finally gives and she's in bloody bed she couldn't get that so yeah what so that was my experience that I've never been able to explain did you did you did the parents ever you know how they were so cautious are explain. Did you, did you, did the parents ever, you know how they were so cautious? Are you sure? Are you sure? Did you ever?

So I didn't tell them. Okay. So they came back, because I remember I went downstairs and I was like, I'm trying to release exactly what age I was. I was doing GCSEs and I was randomly doing textiles

and I remember just like shaking, but being like, look at how sewing machine works. That's not scary. Oh, bless you. I was like, it's a bobbin. Oh. It's a bobbin. Oh, oh bless you and I remember just being like waiting them to come home and they came home and I remember the wife just looked at me and went walk

her home and he did and I normally would have walked back on my own and I was just like thank you but we did not we did not talk about it they didn't clarify and I did go back once more and I made my friend from school come with me and this was for a shorter thing in the evening and I said oh god I've been invited again but I told her at school and she thought I was lying I think she thought I was doing that like content teenage thing and so she was like oh my god yeah I want to come with you it's gonna be amazing and I was like it's not it's actually like it was horrible and but she was I don't know and so she came with me we got there and she was really like hyped it was horrible. But she was like, no, no, no. And so she came with me.

We got there and she was really like hyped for something. Because again, I don't think she really thought it was real. Okay. So like there'd be a couple of strange noises in the wind. Like the doors would be going, the windows. And she'd be like, she'd be doing this very dramatic like, oh, you know, don't mess with us. And I was like, don't say that. And I was like, oh, I think that's all.

And anyway, we went to make a cup of tea in the kitchen. There's a big dining room table with six chairs around it. And we went back into the sitting room with our tea. And a few minutes later, we just heard this screech, like a scraping screech, which was really loud from the kitchen. And I remember my friend, she just went so pale and looked at me. And I remember just seeing in her face, she was like, oh my God, this might be real. I wasn't ready ready for this so we held hands and we went to the kitchen and no word of a lie

one of the chairs had moved like so far and the noise the noise it had made wasn't like someone had dragged a chair it was like someone had pushed down hard and scraped it across the floor like quite suddenly and i remember her just being like, she just burst into tears, like straight away. She was not ready for that, was she? She was not ready for that. She was like, I told you. For goodness sake.

Oh my God, that is a brilliant, well, brilliantly scary story. Yeah. But they moved after that, not that long after that. Wow, interesting. Really interesting. And I don't know who lives there now, but every time I go home, I go past it and I'll sometimes cross the road or I'll just be like, interesting. Really interesting. And I don't know who lives there now, but every time I go home,

I go past it and I'll sometimes cross the road or I'll just be like, no. Did you ever tell anyone about this, like family? I told friends. I told my parents a lot of years later. I don't know why. I think there's all that weird teenage feelings of like you don't talk about stuff, you know.

And I think I thought as well it would be dismissed or I was being crazy or, you know, I don't know. well it would be dismissed or i was being crazy yeah you know i don't know yeah okay um but yeah wow so our icks this week we are going to ask you katie take it away my friend you want to ask elizabeth your biggest ick with perceptions of gothic slash horror the genre itself where you're like oh you're being stupid that's just wrong, stereotypes

if someone does something and then you're like what are your ex, what would that be so I think the big one is people just really dismissing horror, so the amount of people that will just say oh no I don't like horror and then you start talking about films that they like and then they'll start to say like oh yeah Silence of the Lambs is really good and I'm like well you know you know that's a horror film right and

they're like oh no no no no no because that's art or that's actually quite good so it's that ick of like people being like well horror's shit horror is the like gorno man chasing a woman with a knife and it's really simplistic and it's really whatever absolutely it can be that but it's so much more as well so I think it's whenever people are like horror is stupid or horror is all the same story again and again and you're like if you look at the different things they're so different yeah so when people say like final girls are always feminist so have you heard of have you heard of the final girl no okay so this is a trope that comes up again and again in horror that there will be one girl standing at the end like drenched in blood she will have faced everyone's been picked off one

by one yeah and she's the last one standing yeah exactly which lends itself in some ways to feminism yeah but i think sometimes there can be like a kind of assumption that this is like a really really positive thing and i think they're not exploring like the cost of the trauma because the credits roll when she's soaked in blood everyone she her lover's been murdered her friend has been murdered everything else

and it's just like what a happy feminist ending and I'm like is that the happy ending we're giving to women like she's fucked up now yeah so that nice point

nice point actually and sometimes labelling it isn't always a great thing to do because you think well actually you know you're putting bad shit on that girl. Interesting, that's really interesting.

And I have heard our classic that she would be the last one standing, good old feminine. I have heard those kind of things before. Yeah, okay, great ex. So, Katie and I love a good horror film. Preferably, I am a good horror film preferably I am preferably like even though I don't like it

but I like to be scared like I like to jump I'm the same I like it so but we went to go see a film that was gory I don't think personally

it was scary it wasn't scary I don't know it wasn't scary at all what's your opinion so we went to see Saw X I haven't seen it

so very gory I've never seen any of the sores no neither of us so the last film that we saw was the insidious red door wasn't it so we were like we and we love the being scared i was like oh this is really exciting we fully screamed like we were in the cinema in the cinemas we were so scared yeah honestly but would you say because it is like horror in the sense but it's not jumpy horror like where does that fall in the category of horror so i think saw is quite body horror yeah it is actually that's really hard to say body horror heavy

and like some people love body horror they live for it it's not really my cup of tea so yeah yeah um because i think i'm much more like i want story i want yeah yes i want to build up you know um so for me i don't find that kind of thing scary i can find it gross and disturbing yes that was exactly obviously if it's like based on people in real life doing this that's horrific but in a different way from that kind of shutter down your neck way yes yeah it doesn't it doesn't scare me no and we found like i personally didn't enjoy it as much yeah because i just found it a bit gruesome i felt and it was as you said very body horror heavy yes you know yeah did it feel decapitated like in terms of gender like was it particularly like oh scantily clad women being

harmed or was it like a myth it was it was more women yeah yeah it was more women that's crazy yeah which happens again and again it was more women and the women weren't in a lot weren't wearing a lot yeah and i also feel like and most of the the things they the challenges decapitation and all these horrible things. Happened to the women. Happened to the women, yeah. Have you heard the term gorno? No. So that's like gory porno. Oh.

And it's like a criticism of a lot of horror like the Saw franchise for being like quite titillating and maybe like turning particularly men on but also being like really, really violent and mixing that kind of sex and horror into it. Bloody hell. And that's a thing, wow. Yeah.

Two things quick. Why are children so scary? And why are women so scary? You know, old woman in the corner, shit myself. Yeah. Two kids, shit myself. Like, The Shining.

Why is that so scary? Why are kids and women so scary in films? Okay, so my opinion. Yeah. So if we go back to like earlier when I was saying like we put ourselves at the center and we background nature and that makes it a bit uncanny when it comes back i think we have a history of backgrounding women and children we put men at the forefront so anything that we kind of push away and don't let speak up

don't let's take up space becomes a bit scary to us that makes so much it makes a lot of sense actually that's crazy that makes so much sense oh i just need to give you more room to speak and then you'll be less scary yeah question let's get on to questions i am serious and you're silly there we are right serious question this week could you name me your top horror films of recommendations, please? Yes, I can. So I've cheated slightly. I've got some special mentions. Oh, go on.

Because I knew you were going to ask me this, and then my favorite ones. Tell me, tell me. And I know that afterwards I'm going to think of loads of things. Oh, I didn't say that. So special mentions to The Shining. Yes, great film. To the Scream franchise. That was very much part of my growing up.

I loved all of that. Okay, I'm excited. And I the Scream franchise. That was very much part of my growing up. I loved all of that. Okay, I'm excited. And I think Scream is clever, you know? I think it's doing more than you maybe give it credit for. Get Out, Jordan Peele. Seen that. I need to see that. That's the thing with the fluff in the ears, isn't it?

Don't give it away if Katie's not doing it. Sorry, Katie. Hold your horse. So, Katie, no fluff in no ear. I'll tell you. No fluff. It's really good. It filmed that. It's really good

Brilliant And a really good twist Oh gorgeous Don't read anything about it Actually we should watch it together We should watch that Yeah In that same vein

If anyone in the world Doesn't know what happens At the end of The Sixth Sense Yeah Brilliant Yeah But I don't know If anyone's alive

Who doesn't know I know I know I was one of the lucky few Who got to watch it Having no idea Me too Me too

It follows If you're scared Of things behind you if you doesn't know I know I was one of the lucky few who got to watch it having no idea me too me too scared the shit out of me it follows if you're scared of things behind you things attaching to you the idea of being always followed that is a film for you

or maybe it's not a film for you depending on but that's doing a lot of really interesting things as well whether it's like metaphors about

like casual sex and the modern dating and all that kind of thing but it manages like it manages to make a person walking in broad daylight terrifying like you can come out of the cinema at three o'clock and shit yourself just at the vision of the street around you like it's so clever and what it does so it follows okay um barbarian which is on netflix i don't like the ending but the beginning have either of you seen it no so it's based on says

a book that someone's collected like you know when you get a gut feeling of like a red flag about someone about a situation you're like maybe i'm not safe but it would be rude to exit maybe this feels impolite and basically this film is based on so many little situations where you think maybe it's wrong but maybe it's all right and they've made the tensest start about it and it like wow basically begins with like a woman goes to an airbnb at night and she gets there and she goes to put the key to go to the lockbox the lockboxes has already got the key missing and a light goes on inside and it's being double booked and someone else is there and it kind of starts there where a guy is there

there's nowhere else for her to stay and it's like where do you go from there and there's so many other little like just very believable little scenarios okay um but very very good okay um and that guy is played by the guy who plays pennywise and it which adds an extra like a little extra little yeah i don't trust you yeah yeah on the edge um the witch by david eggers which is a great, weird film. It manages to make a goat terrifying, which is fun. Cheeky goat. And I had The Other on there. Did you? Yes.

That is a good film. It is a really clever film. And the line with the little girl where she's like, are you mad? I am your daughter. Scared the shit out of me. No, no, no. It's the bloody wardrobe as well.

When they open the wardrobe. Yes. Yes. Absolutely. So my actual favourites are, number one, The Blair Witch Project. Okay. The Village by M. Night Shyamalan. So many different twists.

Very, very good. It's a quite, a clever one. It's a very clever one. And it's one I personally think you need to watch it twice because anyone I know who hasn't liked it, when I've explained what the twists are and they've watched it again, has gone, oh my God, I love it. Oh. Oh.

Interesting. So it's one of those where if you miss it and you can miss it it's so easy to you just go well I don't really know what that was about oh but it's still quite jumpy and interesting I'm with you and then the cabin in the woods oh I think I've seen that do they play a game uh sort of the cabin in the woods is very meta which means it's like a horror film about horror films and it plays with the idea of coming back to women and all that kind of thing. Like why do we like horror?

And it really shifts the focus onto us and it's basically saying you're fucked up if you like horror. So they do all these things where they play with different murder scenes and men being like, oh, are we gonna see some titties? Are we gonna see this, are we gonna see that? But then it like, I don't want to completely ruin it,

but the twist at the end of why horror films exist, it does something very amazing. Interesting. Oh my God, well, we've got a full October, don't we? Honestly, it's brilliant. Fabulous. And that's it. Perfect. Right, crack on.

My silly question. Yes. You are starring in a horror film. Oh, great. And you have control of the plot. If you die, like how you die die what you would want to be killed by i have to die do i you don't have to but what you'd want what you'd want the twist to be me i'm not answering this question what you'd want the twist to be as well if you want like a good

twist and you'd be like oh because i think the whole we were dead the whole time thing can get a bit lost okay i think it's a bit of a cop out in some senses like when we were watching from i was like i hope they don't pull that they're all dead yeah we're invested now yeah yeah so i have to so i probably have to die probably probably have to die okay in which case i want to die really early and be able to have an omniscient awareness of everything else that's going on. Nice. And then maybe help the other people.

So whatever has killed me, I'll die first, but then I'll help the others and get... Good ghost. Good energy. I'm going to say him. It's probably going to be a him. Yes. Yes.

Yes. Get him back. Brilliant. If I got killed by a shark, that would probably be the true horror. I've got any equivalent. Killed by a shark, that would probably be the true horror. That any equine killed by a shark, you laugh, it happens. Well, it does, doesn't it?

That actually does happen. That does happen. Not often, but yeah. That would be my luck. Did you see Jaws when you were little or something? No, I remember I watched, I actually like the film Jaws. I actually think it's quite good.

Granted, I was literally like, I couldn good granted I was literally watching it in between I think it was Finding Nemo in all honesty I think it was Finding Nemo and I think it was the I remember my grandma at the time bought me an encyclopedia for Christmas and the under S

it was like this big picture one and it there was a whole page of sharks and it was just this great white with its mouth. And I remember just like flicking across it and being like, no! And then I look and then what is it? Finding Nemo. And then you're like, what?

Then the little mermaid, the very beginning with the cartoon shark. What's that about? What is that about? Speaking of shark mouths, have you heard of the term vagina dentata? No. What's this?

That's Latin, and I'm sure you know the first word, vagina. Yes, yeah. And dentata is teeth. So it just means toothed vagina, and apparently this is an image that appears in horror again and again and again. And some people might argue

that a shark's mouth looks a little bit like a toothed vagina. Oh my God. There's a film all about the vagina dentata that I can't remember what it's called, but it's terrible. It's a woman who chops off men dentata that I can't remember what it's called but it's terrible. It's a woman who like chops off men's appendages. Maybe that's what

happened to the pale man. Oh my god. Me and the pale man was born. That was it. I'll tell you who comes up with this shit? I do.

Who thinks of a vagina with teeth? I mean honestly. Guys we've got you in such a spooky season ready for Halloween honestly. Okay debriefers thank you so much for listening. Thank you very much. I hope we've all got you in such a spooky season ready for halloween honestly okay debriefers thank you

so much for listening i hope we've all got you in the mood for a bit of scariness spooky season whether you stay and watch one of these scary films that elizabeth told you about maybe the vagina tooth maybe maybe you never know you never know but love you lots have Have a great Monday. Have a great Monday. Bye. Thank you. Bye.