The Flop House - Ep. #303 - The Happytime Murders

Episode Date: January 18, 2020

Didja really think we'd pass up The Happytime Murders? The movie that many proclaimed the worst of 2018? Don't be silly! We just held onto the episode in our vault of live shows until it was no longer relevant! Please enjoy this live recording from... last summer? We can't remember. Taped at our ol' stomping grounds, The Bell House, in fabulous and increasingly unaffordable Brooklyn, NY! Wikipedia synopsis for The Happytime Murders

On this episode we discuss the Happy Time Murder live Super Bowl Sunday at the Bellhouse in Brooklyn, New York! Hey everyone and welcome to the flop house, I'm Dan McCoy. That's right he's Dan McC, and I'm Stuart Wellington. Those guys are as advertised. Their names are accurate as they've just reported, and my name, well, they're in Liza Tale. Oh, I got. Oh, geez. You know, the name Elliott Kaelin needs a lot of different things, so a lot of different people. Yeah. He's been known as a lover, a hero, a rogue, a villain.

They say, in Elliot Kaylen either dies a hero or lives long enough to remain a hero. Oh. They call him destroyer of chickens. They call him maker of jokes. Interesting. They call him pro-longer of vits. Oh. And they call him Prolonger of Vits.

Oh. And they call him Wastro of Time. And that's what I'm doing today on the flop house. Good night, everybody. Okay. Well. By the way, if you noticed that I took a moment before doing the show, it was me remembering how the show began.

So after 276 episodes as of this taping, you're just about to get it. I'm just about to. You're almost hitting your groove. I think you'll have more episodes and you'll remember your own name and how the show starts. Ha ha ha. I have too much brain power dedicated

to remembering the Emperor's new groove to remember my own groove. That was more for Elliot than the audience, apparently. Apparently, I thought that was your mission going in. What's a joke, Elliot's gonna find funny, but nobody else has. So, Dan, what are we doing this podcast? This is a podcast where we watch a bad movie, and then we talk about it. And today, we watched the happy time murder.

Uh-huh. It's a recent razzi winner nominee, right? The most important award. We'll get into that. That's like the Pulitzer of made up awards that nobody cares about for movies. I mean the Pulitzer is a made up award though. They're all made up awards. They're no naturally occurring awards. It's not like if you leave a tree trunk in the middle of the forest for long enough, it turns into an Oscar. Guys, what do you think about most of the stuff we care about in life is made up? Oh.

Care to name some of it, Dan, to get you in trouble with some of this. Stop trying to mind-freak me, Dan. Here's something you guys need to know about, Dan. He's always trying to mind freak us. And it doesn't work most of the time. He's like, hey, hey, hey, that taco you're eating right now. How many different living things had to die to make that taco? I'm like, I don't know a bunch of corn, I don't care.

I don't really know what a mind freak is. Sometimes he'll just jump out of a corner and go freak. And then he'll go, out of a corner and go freak. And then he'll go, how's your mind feel? Like, okay. Say hello to your mind for me, because he just got free. You might want to dig a minute to calm your mind down, because he's pretty freak right now.

Anyway, Dan, so this movie, The Happy Time Murders. No, we're not talking about it. We're just going to dig around more. No, well, okay, it's a puppet movie. Brian Hansen, son of Jim Hansen, for some reason this was his... That's a collage. And John Hansen, as name you could tell is the son of a hen.

That's what his name tells us. That's the hidden language of names that can tell you a lot. If someone's last name is Carpenter, at some point, someone in their last name is Carpenter, at some point, someone of their family was probably Carpenter. And as I tweeted once, Alvin Tudick has two dicks. I mean, that's not how Dick is spelled, but maybe in Old English, this was, like maybe when Chaucer wrote his story about Alvin Tudick, this how he spelled it.

The Tudicks tale. Now, here's something I want to say about the happy-time artist, Rival the Mad. A couple of people that I know worked on this movie in the puppeteering area here's something I want to say about the happy-time murder is right about the rather bad. A couple people that I know worked on this movie in the puppeteering area, and I just want to say the puppeteering in this movie is phenomenal. So keep in mind, any criticism we have about this movie and we will does not apply to the technical quality of the puppeteering, which was top notch.

You did have a comment about some of the puppeteering, right? I was like, it's too good. Well, you were saying that, like they said. Well, this is something they can't do anything about it. Yeah, they do. When there's a lot of full body shots of puppets walking down the street. All right.

Here's the problem with a puppet. Ellie, I think you need to get up for this. I mean, the listeners will not understand. A visual bit that will not play. This is just playing. The listeners will just have to imagine this. But when you walk, your legs support the weight of your body. And so you walk like this. I'm walking like playing with the people listening at all. I'm not just playing with the people listening at all. The listeners won't just have to imagine this, but when you walk, your legs support the weight of your body. Yeah.

And so you walk like this. I'm walking like a normal person. I don't know. That was kind of awkward. But. Well, let me, oh, sorry. Let me walk like you normally do. Yeah.

Okay. You put a little support on it. I'm more of a keep on trucking Mr. Natural type walker. But here's the thing. Puppets legs do not support their bodies. They're supported by, I don't know, rods, puppeteers named Rod, any number of things. So when they walk, and there's a number of shots in walking,

they all walk kind of like this. Yeah, and it's like, you basically look like when Tilda Swinton is walking around as an old man in the new Susperia. So they're like, we're going to show these puppets are real live beings by showing them walking around. Instead they look like whenever they walk around you're like, okay, something seriously wrong is happening with that.

Yeah, they look like one of those weird little toys where if you push the button they just collapse. It's like somebody's pushing it halfway the whole time. Yeah, I mean, it kind of looks like they're being supported by their head is filled with helium. Yes. Yeah. And that's carrying them along and their feet are just like clockwork. Their feet are just kind of like streamers hanging below them, you know. Yeah. And not the play streamers. String and vitamin of Vietnam. I'm talking about like streamers. The party favor. Thank you for that clarification. I just I didn't want to be like very confused. I don't want people to be they

they had this look on their face like the play streamers That's what the mu- the puppets and I keep I'm gonna keep accidentally calling them up. It's these are not muppets It's a muppet. It's a it's a Hanson company production, but hey Street works up sued the production. I believe because they were using the tagline. I'll know sesame all street Or something like that. It's it open sesame. It's the street or something like that. It's open sesame, it's the street or something like that. They're like, hey, street. Yep, process me. Yeah, that's right.

But they have that mupity look, but they're not muppets. So if you were hoping, this is finally your chance to see the count, like having sex with Fuzzy, I'm sorry, not in this movie. Google it, it's probably out there. I like, I also like that you sound like a sort of a sleazy, big picture mogul. You're like, you got that muppety look, kid. Yeah, I mean, that's basically how the muppet movie ends,

right? That's true. Or some wells is like, you're going to make a lot of movies for me. Anyway, the happy time murders, let's talk about it. OK, this movie posits a world where puppets are an oppressed minority of movies. Yeah, the movie, the movie.

As you're mime and freak. The movie opens 10,000 years ago. The camera pans across a windsweb battlefield. An evil wizard is forging a ring or something. And an alliance has to be formed between puppets and humans. Carry on, formed between puppets and humans. This is not happening. Okay, I wish it did. That would be amazing.

No, the movie opens with puppets are living in LA, and they are a stand-in for... The story begins back in the old West, where a group of horny leprechauns have sex with what fairies what that's how dragons are made yes yeah The leprechauns and fairies that have sex on a man's rug Thus creating dragons the donut loving imps that we've all come to cherish You got them stick into the back of your car right now Such a cup solos to we can oh I thought you meant like a Cape Fear type scenario. They're like hanging underneath the car

so that you can't escape them. Sure. Moving on, though. Moving, yeah. Muppeting on. So anyway, puppets aren't a press minority. It's just like bright. It's just like alienation.

But this time, it's puppets. We're introduced to our hero, Phil Phillips. He's a puppet detective. And get this in this movie. These puppets, they curse. Like, I don't know if you guys want your minds to be freaked, but these puppets curse a lot. And also, they like doing it. Stuart, what are these your daddy's puppets? They are not your daddy's puppets. Okay, just saying. Unless your dad is Jim Hanson, in which case, they bear us in the restaurant. They are your daddy's puppets.

You raided the warehouse. But so I'm willing to bet no one in this room or listening is their dad is Jim Hanson. So technically these are not your daddy's puppets. Did your dad have any puppets, Dan? Mine did not. You know what? True story.

My uncle, who was a minister, as most of the males in my family tree are, had puppets that he used to minister the word of Christ to people. So wait, what kind of puppets were these? They were like puppets that you like. They were like, don't tell me the mechanics. I want to know the characters. I did not know the characters. They had, but they're the kind that had like, uh, what, uh, fuck, what's the call? They had arms, they had legs. They have a head, is it like a sock, is it a marionette? No, no, no, what, uh, it was it like a shadow. Is it those, those Japanese, broad puppets were the guys in all black

and he's on stage with the puppets. What is that stuff that you use that's like on like shoes when you don't have laces? Velcro? Velcro. Yes. That was a huge waste of our time. I wanted to say Ziploc for some reason.

I knew that was not correct. Dan, why do you throw away a million dollar idea? Say block shoes would keep feet fresher. I don't know. They had like velcro arms that would like go around his neck and like you would, you know, eat. Oh, I was like, dude, dude. Hello, Bible Step.

Hello, I'm here to tell you about Bible Step. I'm a puppet, so it goes down easier. But were the puppets like, was it a puppet of Jesus? Like what, or? No, no, they was it a puppet of Jesus? Like what? No, no. They were like a puppet of like a cool kid. And animals. Oh, animals.

Yeah, animals. Animaniacs. They were Animaniacs, okay. So that's why he was a puppet. Animaloobics. All right, move on. So anyway, Phil Phillips, he's a puppet PI. He was the first puppet cop in history,

but he was kicked off the force. We don't know why yet. And he gets a clonk. And he just recently stopped a ring of puppet poachers by kicking them in kicked off the force. We don't know why yet. And he gets a client, and he just recently stopped a ring of puppet poachers by kicking them in the balls a lot. Now, yeah. Now, he's our hero, and the actor is like the last person credited on the IMDb page, which is kind of weird.

And I kind of resent the movie by designing the lead to look a lot like character actor Dick Miller, who is unfortunately no longer with us, RIP. But yeah, so that's our hero. I mean, this is legacy. This is always going to live on in the form of a puppet. Now, as with any movie or TV show where the story of an oppressed minority is told with a stand in for a real ethnic or religious or what-have-you-group, there's a lot of deeper

implications to the metaphor that they don't really understand and kind of screw up. We will not be diving into those waters. Imagine it. Needless to say that. I mean, the shorthand is, would you like it my order to just be like,

hey, you guys are all puppets. Get it? I mean, the stereotype is everyone's like, puppets just love singing and dancing. That's all they love to do. And I'm like, Puppet's just loves singing and dancing. That's all they love to do. And I'm like, I am not comfortable with where this is going. So Phil Phillips, he has a client, Sandra White. She's a lady puppet, and she's being blackmailed

because she's so damn sexy that she's having sex with everybody all the time. She makes it very clear to him. Find the guy who's blackmailing me or woman, the equal opportunity, whatever. Find the person or puppet who's blackmailing me me and I'm going to have sex with you. Yeah, well she also like had one of the clumsiest jokes in the movie where she's like, say, because there's a ton of clumsiest jokes in this movie.

Like if you would have to say one of the least clumsiest jokes and be like, which one? What a handful of not clumsy jokes. So you're going to tell me about. No, but she says, I'm an Ima. Oh, right. And she's like, what does that mean? It's like, I'm a get next to it. I'm an Ima. Oh, right. And she's like, what does that mean? It's like, I'ma get next to it. I'ma fuck it.

And I wasn't sure. Why would you, who identifies them? Why not, praise. I was like, I've never heard of that before. So it's not a thing in this movie. Like, there's certain puppets that are just into doing it. And they're called Imas. It's never brought up again.

I guess she's just super cool, I don't know. Anyway, a clue that we don't need to get into, it's a letter on the ransom note that's taken on the cover of a porn magazine, called what, pussy party or something like that? Puppet pussy party. Puppet pussy party, the tagline on the tagline on the magazine says little kiddies, the big kids.

The book art is a letter. Anyway, that clue leads filled to a sex toy store where a live show is going on where an octopus is milking a cow and this is and it's like again the puppetry here is a stounding I mean it looks so good for something that looks terrible in concept it looks so good in execution And like and during the over the credits instead of showing us bloops

They show us a bunch of footage of the puppeteers doing their magic. And it's like seven people making this work. If this movie was, if they didn't release the movie, and they just released a behind the scenes making of the movie, I would say this is maybe the best movie ever made. Like, like those little moments during the end to credits when you see them actually doing the puppeteering,

I'm like, I could watch this forever. So much technical virtuosity. Went into the happy time. So much more than in the movie virtuosity. In which we learned that computer programs can turn into real people that murder other people. I don't remember how the movie ends, but I know Russell Crowe, you see his butt in it, I think, at one point?

I don't know. Anyway. He is a virtual man. That's all you need to know about that. Damn, check. But that's not the one where he's a senior. Damn, check Mr. Skin on your phone, Rool. OK.

OK. If you see a butt. He has it set up like serious. You think I'm not going to do it? I'm going to. OK. He is Russell. You don't have to narrate.

I mean, no. But. OK, so Phil, he's in this sex toy store, and he bumps into an embarrassed rabbit named Mr. Bumbley Pants, who was like, I'm not a porn addict, but I gotta get outta here. Phil Phills goes in the back to look up some information or whatever, and a hooded figure with a shotgun

comes in and kills everybody in the store, and they're all made of puppet fluff, so there's just fluff flying everywhere. So the interesting thing though, is that previously we had seen puppets squirting out all kinds of horrible stuff, but when you actually start blowing their heads off, it's just fluff.

So like, where does the fluid come from? Yeah, you're wondering where are the glands? Where are the puppet glands? So, I've got menadazineu.com. Russell Crowe, shirtless but seen in virtual Austin. Okay, thank you. You want to see it all over the room? No, I've seen it. I watched the movie. That's all I remembered from it. All right. Was his amazing butt.

Sure. Like throwing a phone at someone. It's like, say you, yeah, that's how amazing butt. Sure. Throwing a phone at someone. That's how amazing the butt is. You can pick up and throw a phone. Say what you will about his singing in Lame is. He's got a great butt. He's a man of many talents. Acting butt. He's a gutter's own rock band. Anyway, so I guess what we're saying is these puppets, yeah, where's the fluid coming out of? I don't understand.

Do puppets, I mean, it's never made really clear like our puppets made or do they give birth? Like, no, because there's a puppet family we say later. Look, don't ask those questions, it's puppets. Like, forget about it. It's just a move. It's like the movie Cars. If you start thinking about it, it's madness.

Well, yeah, well, you have to assume that all the people died and it's just the cars are left. Yeah. And the cars, they have no way of making new cars. And so that's. Yeah, it's like, like cars is basically like, that's a world where there was one turbo team. And then he had sex with a person.

And they had a child. And that child was a turbo team. And they had a bunch of turbo teams. And then the entire world became turbo teams. And then they all got stuck in transformation mode. So they're all transformed turbo teens. Yes, exactly. It's just like, I mean, the dystopian Milo and Otis universe where everyone was anamorphs and basically the same thing happens. Okay, so I think we're

about seven minutes into the movie. So Phil is kind of a witness, kind of not to this murder of Bumbly Pants and everyone else in there. He's old LAPD partner, detective Edwards, Melissa McCarthy, first name I don't remember from the movie. Let's just say Edwards. Let's say Anthony. Let's say her name is Anthony Edwards. She's investigating, they don't like each other. They used to be partners and now there's a lot of bad fluff between them. Not a joke they made in the movie, but they should have. Now, we've learned Bumbly Pants used to be on a show called The Happy Time Gang, and this was the first show that was

like, Puppet Forward, there was only one human on it. It was, it's better like, this was a, like, a groundbreaking show. It showed that puppets were entertaining, and it's like, what? I don't know, can I understand. Yeah, it's a bunch of puppets, and Elizabeth Banks. Yes, and the character's not named Elizabeth Banks, but, you know, it will be so meta. Yeah.

Now her name is Jenny. Last name I don't know. So Phil's brother was on the show as officer shenanigans a puppet who got a human style nose job and Phil really doesn't like that. Phil's really like. He also bleached his skin, Elliot. Yes, so it wouldn't be bulls.

Is a self-hating puppet? Yeah, yeah. He's a puppet who has assimilated in order to look more like a human. Again, they are swimming in waters that their feet cannot touch the ground in. A puppet is not supported by its feet anyway, so that's kind of okay. But there's a lot of, there's a lot of, let's, I was waiting throughout the whole movie for the like puppet power character with an afro who was like

a revolutionary. Thankfully that did not happen. But I was like, oh, okay, let's not take this metaphor any further. We learned that Phil got kicked off the force because he let a puppet perp get away. And everyone was like, oh, I get it, puppets don't shoot puppets. Putt now a puppet can never be a cop, which is a crazy thing. Because as we see later on in Flashback, he did take a shot at the guy.

So like, anyway, and he ended up killing another puppet while doing it, we'll get to that. Anyway, that night Phil's brother is in a hot tub He did take a shot at the guy, so like, anyway, and he ended up killing another puppet while doing it. We'll get to that. Anyway, that night, Phil's brother is in a hot tub with a human woman. I think it's supposed to be shocking, but it's like, yeah, I don't, whatever. Anyway, I've seen all this stuff.

I saw me eat the feables, like, again, doesn't bother me, like, like, the movie exists. So, and someone lets some dogs loosen the apartment, and they kill Phil's brother, ripping apart to pieces. I have to admit, I laughed pretty hard. Because they're just like fucking wild dogs get let loose and they're drawing and quartering this puppet in the background while this woman is draining the more tropical drink. And they were like transportable dogs.

They weren't like scary dogs. Yeah, they're a little tiny dogs. Ripping apart a puppet is like, ah, ah, ah, ah little tiny dogs. Ripping a part of the puppy that's like, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah, I don't know, imagine it. It's funny. Right, guys? Come on.

Be on my side. You're in the pitch meeting for this movie. So, yeah, Dan, now I imagine you in the pitch meeting, you're actually like, get this. And the dog is in the apartment. And he's like, ah! Dogs murder someone. Polaris, right?

Phillips and Edwards, there's nothing left to do. They've got a team up to solve the mystery of who's not. So this is a happy time gang. Well, this is followed by a scene where Melissa McCarthy comes to the scene of the crime. And Phillips shows up. He finds his dead brother.

And Edward says something that's kind of disrespectful. I guess is a racial slur in this situation. There's a lot of puppet racial slurs in this, which are, it's one of those things where it's like, they have so many puppet racial slurs. Like, people must hate puppets so bad. And I, it's like, I don't remember what they are. It's like, you know, job, you know, better, you know, like, what is happening? She should have called him like a panochio and he should have been like, what? So they end up getting in a fight and falling off. And they didn't do that. Again. I'm like punching up the movie.

Like nobody asked me to do this. They end up getting in a nervous or a normal thing, which is punching down to the movie. Yeah, high five. Oh. So they end up getting in a fight and falling in the hot tub. And what happens every time when I see somebody fall in a hot tub is I immediately think, oh no,

what happened to their phone? Like that would be such a pain in the ass. But other movies. That's the scene of her putting it in a rice. We're like going to a store and having to buy a new one. You gotta imagine it's a puppet cell phone. So it's like, call this person. I don't know.

I'm not feeling so good. And it squeaks when you hit the buttons. Oh, maybe that's just it. But no, the movie does not care for the cell phone. It's said she and them getting a fight, which she resolves by biting him in the dick, right? You have that, correct, sir. And I had to imagine Melissa McCarthy being like,

I'm sure this is not the year I got nominated for an Academy Award. The year I'm in a scene where I bite a puppet in the dick in a hot tub. But then lo and behold, that's what happened. Just not for this movie. Lops funny sometimes, Elliot. Oh, hey, it's one of Dan's old characters.

Let me tell you a story. Sometimes the year that you do the best work is the year you bite a puppet in the dick. Dan, do you have any other examples of someone who did a really bad movie the same year they were nominated for an Academy Award for a different movie? It's no, it's someone you already do an impression of. Michael Kane. Yes, okay.

Now, what was that like? Or do you already have to be impression, Dan? That's not problematic. No, no. Go ahead, I'll just go to the other side of the stage. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let me give you a lot of leeway for this. Any Murphy impression?

You gotta turn a courage back stage when it was just us. You see, Ali, when I was making Jorza revenge, I was not caring about whether it was a good movie or bad movie. I was caring about the polatial to state it would buy me. That's it. That's all it is, dude. Like... You know, Michael, I couldn't know,

but here and you're from backstage. You know, it's me sliced alone. I've never been nominated for an Oscar. No, wait, yes, I did. I won one for best screenplay. Thank you for reminding me. I really thought there was even as an actor you should have been nominated for Copland. I thought so too. I thought so too. Copland was Copland was kind of my big swing at the brass ring. But in terms of you don't swing at a brass ring, you grab at it.

So I just knocked the brass ring far away from the carousel and I couldn't even reach it. Now, I've never seen it. Call me Sly because I'm somewhat cunning like a fox. Like a Slylock fox, if you will. The greatest of all detectives. Yes, with his friend Max Mouse. I'm well aware of the adventures of slyloc fox. No, I always wondered. I always wondered, Michael. If I can call you Michael, I'll call you Mr. Kane. I'm very susceptible that way. I respect you. Michael, why didn't you ever play siloq fox in the movies? Well or TV

You know TV is where a lot of people make movies are going these days when I'm making it say it's the new normal I see he's doing as a Swood has left the stage Rather than joining us is all crazy character well Now would I made my my hit film without a clue? I like that's a wide definition of hit film, but what do I know? I was only in two of the top three grossy movies of 1985.

Would I make my hit film without... But those listening at home stood it has returned with a banana. And he's just going to eat it. Which is fine. More time for me. Slice the loan to talk to one of the true treasures of the acting field. Some Michael Cain. I should have been calling you some Michael all this time.

I don't know. Slice, you can call me whatever you want. Okay, so I'm here with my friend Derek. No, no. Derek and I are gonna talk about some of his great movies. Oh, I walked right into that one. And my accent is getting worse and worse. The longer I talk.

And yet, the longer I talk, the better minds gets. It's almost like I got a warm up my character. So anyway, we were talking about happy time murs. Now I've never worked with a puppet, but I did kill one once. But I suppose that's the story best left for another day. So we channel seven I witness news. I'm Sylvester Stallone. Hey guys, I'm back. Good night everyone. Guys, I'm back. What's going on?

Still ask me to run to the grocery store and get them a banana. So we have two dead puppets. Yeah, and they find out that the show, Happy Time Gang, it's about to go into syndication. These puppets were screwed out of the original profits by a frankly very puppet racist network exec or show development guy, the producer, I don't know. Yeah, like an agent. Yeah, Phil Phillips throws a billiard ball at him and knocks him out and he goes,

that's the first time I ever knocked someone out with their own balls or something like that. We never see him again, I assume he's dead. Okay. But the show's about to go into syndication and the deal is gonna be split up on the living members of the cast. No, like a taunting. Exactly like a taunting.

It's like some sort of marionette taunting except they're not marionettes again. They're like hand puppets. I thought they smelled bad on the outside. That's a common mistake, and they're spelled completely different. You go on, Ellie. Proceed. That's really funny that you confused them.

Because that one's a monster thing, and the other's like a pact. Like a kind of contract, yeah. He had to sign a taunt on. No one would ever make contracts. And a whole school of law would fall apart because they do smell bad on the outside. For Channel 7, I went to snooze. I'm Han Solo or whatever.

Anyway, so they figure one of the members of the happy time gang is bumping off the other members. They go to another former members gang HQ. He's a gang leader now, and Edwards has to prove she's not a flesh bot, and said that she's got a puppet liver by doing a puppet drug called like sparkle dust or something or glitter fang. Yeah, it's just a fucking bunch of purple glitter. And she does it and she gets high on that.

And this is the first time where it's like, oh, this is a character who's supposed to be on like rock bottom and has a drug problem, but we didn't know that until now. But it kind of pops in every now and then. Yeah, I like everybody. Everybody in this movie talks to Melissa McCarthy and treats her like she's, like in the words of the characters, like a man in a pantsuit or like, they keep in front of her appearance. And yet she looks very nice.

You look great. Nothing about her appearance indicates that she's anything other than a professional person. And again, this is the year that she was in a movie about someone who has hit rock bottom. And it has a serious drinking problem and also a serious everything problem and she's so good in it

and I wish that she could have sat down everyone involved in halftimeers and showed them that movie and be like, look, I can do this kind of character. Like, you've got to give me the material to do it. And it's, it's... You can't just film my refrigerator in the apartment with maple syrup and say I'm a sugar addict

and that's all you're gonna do. But the scenes where she's doing puppet drug sugar are the most, it seems she's having the most fun. Like she freaks out, tells jokes. Like she's a talented improv actor. She's a classic rac contour. This is like, talent tales of bright made. Yeah, she's great on the old dick cabbage show.

Yeah. But this also brings up a weird thing about puppets. She has a puppet liver. Now we've seen several puppets heads being blown off by this part, or ripped apart. Yeah. They have nothing but fluff inside them. Yeah.

And suddenly we are to believe that they have puppet organs explain Elliot. Well, it's a movie. Is it? Is it? It's a movie. They're puppets. It's it's a movie. Is it? Is it? Is it? It's a movie. They're puppets. It's kind of a joke.

OK. But here's the thing. A lot of people don't know this about puppets. But especially the Jim Henson puppets, they're like, we need these to feel like real characters. We can't put a brain in their head. That's where the hand goes. Spoiler alert.

There's a reason. The reason Kermits head moves around like that is because there's a man's hand inside of it. But the rest of the body to make it feel real, we're gonna put real organs in there. No one's ever gonna see them. This is just for us, the puppeteers, to know that they're in there so that like, if it calls for cookie monster to eat a cookie, I know that in theory there's a felt stomach, there's a felt intestine, a felt anus, for him to expel the waste of that cookie. It looks like he's just dropping the crumbs in front of him as a kind of misdirection. But no, it's all working parts.

I feel the temperature of the audience dropping. And it felt an anus. It reached this neighbor. I'm not saying they have to feel his anus. It's a different word. Okay, here's the thing. If you don't want to think about Cookie Monster's anus, maybe Habit Time Murders is not the movie for you. So she has a puppet liver. She beats up a whole room full of puppets for being misogynists.

This is supposed to be super tough, but again, they're puppets. She is a human being with muscles and bones. But it ends. The whole end is with another happy time member dead, shot from the window of a car in what's made to look like a drive by shooting except just It's just an alleyway. It's not really. It's just like a even a drive by shooting is an assassination of a type So yeah, it's like they didn't really cover up that crime so well. Okay Phil takes this opportunity. He's on the run kind of he's like oh no, he's on the run. They split up

Edwards is gonna go to the beach to look for another happy time winner. Phil's going to go to his office to check up on what business he's been missing out on during this time. Because even though his brother is dead, he's got to catch up on his voice mails, I guess. I haven't mentioned up to this point. She'll come in more importantly later, but we've seen her up till this time

that he has a secretary named Bubbles, played by Maya Rudolph, who seems to think she's in a movie that's like parodying a 40s detective type thing and not like a 70s detective type thing Well, I like it. She does great, but she's great I mean this script is written by James Elroy, right? Yeah, yeah, well, this is an adaptation of my dark places This story of how he how he investigated his own mother's brother. Thanks got very changed from page to screen The weird thing is that when James they brought James over and they're like we want to do my dark places

And he goes yeah, but I want to do it with puppets, man. And they're like, James, oh, you are fucked up. Let's do it. Let's freak some minds. Let's do this thing. Or they could have done LA Confidential too, like more confidential, I don't know. And this time it's set in the TMZ world.

Dan, how would that movie go? It's basically nightcrawler. I guess, yeah, okay, good fun. I don't know, but if you want to see another embarrassing video of me as people here at the Bellhouse, Google, me and TMZ because I was on that for some reason. Oh, that was really funny. Yeah, they stopped you at the airport

as you were trying to get on a plane. Yeah. And they were like, let me act it up for you. Okay, so. Okay. Dan's, this is, Dan is carrying an Emmy. It's the only time I've ever seen anyone on TV carrying an award they just won, and I'm like, oh, that. Okay. Dan's, this is Dan is carrying an Emmy. It's the only time I've ever seen anyone on TV carrying an award they just won,

and I'm like, oh, that poor guy. He's carrying an Emmy, and they're like, that looks dangerous. Do you think you should be able to put it on plans? And he's like, I don't know. Yeah. This aired on television. And if you, very slow day for TMZ,

but also if you want to see someone whose eyes constantly look like they're on the verge of popping out of their head, He's a very slow day for TMZ, but also if you want to see someone whose eyes constantly look like they're on the verge of popping out of their head, look at me on TMZ because I'm like, why is this happening to me? What's going on? Should I be talking to TMZ? You're on Mars and they cut the oxygen. Yeah, that's right.

And then they put the oxygen back in and my eyes just go back to normal for some reason. Yeah, that's how it works. Yeah, it's the ultimate healer. Yeah. I'm not Dr. Oxygen. So he goes back, he finds that Sandra White is being blackmailed still. And she's been sent a photo of her with her lover Jenny. It turns out, this is Elizabeth Banks from the happy time gang, Phil's ex lover.

Oh, no. This of course leads to Phil and Sandra having sex. The scene everyone knew they were going to see when they saw the movie, a puppet sex scene. Surprisingly tame, like there's a lot of screaming, but compared to like the team America, a puppet nudity, which I kind of was expecting. Which Dan mentioned angrily throughout the movie. It was, yeah, if you're like,

at least in How are the Duck, you see puppet duck tits. If, if, I don't wanna see these, I'm being ironic. If you go on IMDB, have a half a time, Murgers, and you're worried whether there's a one star review from someone who's on screen name is Love Wife's Butts. That says, no puppet nudity, give me my money back. That's Dan. Thanks, Ali.

So I didn't mean to out you in your IMDB profile guy. Yeah. I have nothing to say. Move on. OK. So and of course, the set. And of course, there's some police officers in the waiting room, including Joe McCale as an FBI agent who

has almost nothing to do in the movie. And they over here, the sex and a witness has filled jizzes silly string all over the room for what feels like 35 straight minutes. Yeah. I was not actually shocked by the idea that a puppet movie was showing someone jizzing. I was shocked by that sentence.

I wanna know how that sentence ends. I was shocked by the amount of gizz this puppet apparently has. A puppet as we've mentioned which seems to have no internal organs. This puppet covers the room in gizz. Every inch. And I'm a human man. I don't want to get too many details. But there's a limit of... Oh, no, Dan. Give us like a cubic gallon estimate. There. Your average man has a, I would say, a limited amount of semen. Incorrect.

I would say your average man has an ununlimited amount of semen. Okay. Oh, well. All right. No, no, no. All right. Over time, you are correct, sir. Over time, there is a very large amount of semen.

Eesian, you're saying that semen is a long game. Semen production is a long game. Let's call an Eesian to the visual serving size of semen. No, I don't like that at all. It's not a term I care for. Damn, you have something to say. I was just trying to explain that my testicles are connected to the elemental plane of semen And when I cast my spells as I call it

There's a lot of jizz is what we're trying to say there's a lot that's the joke the joke is there's a lot of jizz Joel McHale FBI FBI agent is there. Phil runs away before they can arrest him because he is in trouble. He goes to see Jenny, Elizabeth Anx, she's stripping for puppets these days. There was a very long joke

where she is stripping for some rabbit puppets and they're like, we're not in the cabbage patch now, boys. Yeah, every fucking rabbit joke. I haven't even won my carrot and they hand her a real carrot and she bites and they're like, ah, like it goes on forever. And it's like, okay guys, we got it. I feel like so much of this movie is me watching one

like, I got it, okay, move along please, I get it. She and Phil seem to still have feelings for each other and she says, okay, I'm gonna go get a motel room so I'm safe, I'll call you when I get there, get some her car, of course the car's gonna blow up. That's what happens in these movies. I like to say I called both the car blowing up and number two spoiler alert her not being dead Okay, great Sherlock Holmes Like you're the great

I want my happy time murder metal that you promised me. I'll give you your metal for outwitting the happy time murders. I'm smarter than you by the numbers puppet detective story. You got to get up pretty early in the morning to fool Dan McCoy, aka Mr. Puffet Detective. Well, well, well. Happy time, Murders. Seems you bit off more than you can chew and try to fool Dan McCoy. It's okay, many have made the same mistake, but you have lived to regret it. I need these small victories. Yeah.

It is a very small victory, I think. It's why you're watching network procedural dramas because they're designed so that the audience is supposed to figure them out right before the characters figure them out. Yeah. So that's why I'm like, I could be Nathan Phillion. Thanks.

What's stopping me? You're not gonna be good? Maybe I'm blind spot. Yeah. Okay, so, I mean, well Edwards goes to a sugar shack, which she does not go to the Montreal Sugar shack tradition, which is a great place. It's to go if you want to eat tons of food

and feel gross afterwards, but it's wonderful. She goes to a, it's basically a crack house, but for puppets. Anyway, she, there's another puppet named Goofer, who was a happy time member and is now a sugar addict, and here's the thing that a real-life story that I'm going to drop on you, which is when looking up this movie on Amazon, so I could rent it for Amazon Prime, seeing how many happy-time character t-shirts were produced and still on sale at Amazon, and I was like, they really thought people were gonna fall in love with these characters.

They thought someone was gonna walk around with a goof or shirt on. Yeah. Now, this character offers to suck in Los MacArthur's dick. And that was at this point in a moment. Very reasonable rates. I think of quarter.

Very reasonable rate. What was that featured on the t-shirt? Yeah. I mean, it might have been. I don't know. There's like a whole measure on the back listing his rates. But this is the point when I turned to steward at all assembled. And I was like, is there anyone on the happy time gang

who did not end up at rock bottom? Because this is very straight. Like everyone is like a frug addict. It feels brother's team to be doing the right. Yes, just him. Okay. But he was the producer, like one of these actors should have ended up on another show.

Dan, correct me if I'm wrong. I'm no psychologist, but I'm gonna diagnose you as having been mind-freeced. Explain. Well, you seem really perturbed about what happens. You seem to be really having trouble wrapping your mind around this issue. If that's not a freaking, I don't know what is.

One of these puppets who was on a popular television show should have found other work, rather than being in a crack house. Exhibit A, different strokes, case closed, moving on. OK. So. Through the book, Adam. And it's been made clear in the movie that none of them got the money from it.

This is a searing indictment of how few quality puppet roles there are in Hollywood. There are two kinds of people who can't make an Hollywood agreement of a certain age, which is over 20, I guess, and puppets. Now, if you're a puppet woman over 20, I'm sorry. It's gonna be very difficult, unless you're Dame Helen Muppet, who is the puppet version of Helen Marin. Now, Alain, I thought you were, you're dangerously close to falling

into the same trap as the happy time markers, equating repressed people with puppets, but Dame Helen Muppet, I have to give it to you. Okay, thank you. Brought it back for me. Well, I'm looking forward to my punny award that I win this year. It's like barely a pun, not even anything.

Okay, anyway even anything. Okay, anyway, so. And I realize, guys, I don't think it's right that women of a certain age have trouble finding roles. Come on, I'm a reflection of society. Okay, don't blame me, blame Dan. That's why I'm here. Okay, so that puppet turns up dead later too.

They're all getting dead. Okay, and we finally see Phil has a bad dream. We hear members of the shooting. We're a big puppet with threatening Melissa McCarthy and she's like, they're partners, they love each other. They're great partners. And she's like, take the shot, take the shot. And he chokes and he fires and misses.

And the bullet ricochets off a column and kills a random other puppet who's hanging out on the street with his daughter. And she's like, oh no! And she's a pretty dark backstory for happy-time murders. I mean, the movie has murders in the title. Yeah, it's cop kills in innocent civilian. I mean, it's not funny.

No, it's not. I'm just saying. I mean, not much of this movie is that funny. It's a fair point. OK, anyway, Edward's, meanwhile, also feels like an outcast because she has a puppet liver, and she's addicted to sugar now. She does, she exists in between worlds. She's not fully human, not fully puppet.

What is she, she says? Reminding us all of the much better song from the Muppets, which covered the same territory. There's, and they, at some point, addressed that this flashback happened 20 years ago, and if nobody said that, that long ago. Yeah, if nobody had said that, it would not have seemed any different than yesterday.

No. No one has aged at all except spoiler alert one very specific character. Oh yeah, that's right. It had to have been a certain number. So they feel like Phillips finally, as they're driving out to go to the last members of the halftime cast who are like in-bred religious barbecue owners, it's weird. Yes. Phillips apologizes for missing the shot and they kind of make up.

And I'm like, well, it was that easy. And like, how did they not do this years ago? I don't understand. Anyway. Sometime within the 20 years, I just mentioned. Yeah. Long story short, they go to that barbecue restaurant. The people they are dead already.

They're not suspects. We do see their in-b bread puppet children yelling at a mirror. And we're like, OK, weird. The killer is still there. And Phil starts chasing them, but ends up arrested by the FBI. It turns out Sandra White, the woman who was the puppet woman who was blackmailing him and had sex with him,

or saying she was blackmailed, has is married to Jenny, Elizabeth Banks, and has blamed Phil for the murders, and shows us her vagina-based instinct style. Dan, explain. There's nothing much to explain, except for her pubes are purple, which I mentioned not because I am pervastoid number one, but because it is the key clue to this film. Yeah, it's the key piece of evidence.

It makes you wonder why did she do that? Because she could have easily not let that clue slip by wearing underpants, not uncrossing your legs at that moment. It's one of the things where she's like, this would be such a great moment for me to parody basically instinct. I know it's going to undo my entire plan because it gives them the piece of information about me that they need, but I know it's gonna undo my entire plan because it gives them the piece of information about me that they need, but I just can't help

but be a parody. Well, that's the thing about being a criminal who also loves movies. Yeah, yeah. Is the obsession to show off how smart you are and also reference a movie. So show off, let them give them a clue just so you can give them bread crumbs.

It's a real Batman villain type thing which it's like, hmm follow my clues Batman. It's like why drop the clues. You're doing it with a lot of intention. So just don't drop the clues get away with it. Or like if you're two-faced, maybe do something that doesn't involve the number two. Yeah. Hey, they won't know it's you. Hey. Stop being the character you are. Hey, hey, Riddler. You don't have to leave a Riddler that leads people to the scene of the crime. You just not do that.

Are you guys auditioning for an Arkham Asylum therapist job? I guess so. Riddler. Like therapists that help criminals be better criminals, I guess? Calendar man, I know you love calendars. Maybe just commit crimes and collect calendars. Clock King.

What's with all the clocks? Is he a Batman villain? I don't even know. Yes, he is. I would join him and go clock King, same basic advice. I gave him a calendar man. Kite man, same basic advice. But with kites instead of calendars and clocks.

Joker. Really? Let's just do a blanket one here. I thought we were doing group therapy. Anyone with a theme? Maybe not. of calendars and clocks. Joker. Really? Let's just do a blanket one here. I thought we were doing group therapy. Anyone with a theme? Maybe not. Maybe, maybe just don't give into that theme.

And Killer Croc is like, what about me? I can't make that choice. You're right, Killer Clock. I got to under Killer Clock. Killer Clock is a different character. Killer Clock. Drop the clock theme. Killer Clock.

That's me having to check my privilege. You're right, it's easy for me to commit any crime I want. I'm not a crocodile man. But you are, and that's your burden to carry, and I apologize. I'm Killer Croc's like, well, I appreciate that you said that. Yeah, it's a good therapist. Yeah, well, I don't know about a good therapist, man.

Firebug, maybe just don't, light fires. Yeah, because a good therapist just tells people what to do. That's what I went out of my fucking therapist. That's what my therapist never would do. They just ask you questions. Yeah, I just wanted me to fucking talk. What good is that? I mean, yeah, you're like, listen to the podcast, dude. At least so many of you hired a therapist and you just sent him the link to the website

and you're like, listen to this, they tell me what I should do. Tell me why I'm fucking problem is. And he's like, I'm gonna have to bill you for over 300 hours of therapy. And you're like, ooh, ooh, ooh. Well, I'm gonna have to bill you

for 300 hours of free entertainment. So I guess we're even therapists, checkmate. Dan, I think you shouldn't hire therapists based on the P.P. play chess within the park. I guess what I'm saying is Batman Villains just kind of like give it a rest. I don't know. Anyway, so Ed, so Ed, Phil is arrested by the FBI. Edwards blows up at Joe McAill. Get and tries to fight him. She gets suspended.

Bubbles, Philip Secretary, Maya Rudolph, she's so enamored of him. She's going to help Edward's go to Sanders' apartment because Bubbles isn't following Sandra and find basically when they unlock the door a secret happy time murder evidence dungeon. It's all there. The whole thing is there. All the clues. It's all they need. But then they trip a trap and it all burns down, which is the weirdest mind freak of the whole thing that Sanders like, I gotta make them know I got away with it. So I'm gonna show them all the evidence

and then have it burn in front of them. So they sound like crazy people, I don't know. Yeah, she's gas lying them for their inheritance. I guess so, but we learn, this is why it's important she has purple hair down there, is because the daughter of the man that he accidentally killed years ago had purple hair up there. That's right guys, she's the grown daughter of the man Phil accidentally killed when he didn't kill that bad guy puppet.

Oh no! So here's the question in this way. Why do you have sex with her? Yes, that's the grossest part is that she like, there was no, and the movie goes on, you're like, why did she have sex with him again? Like there's no reason. I mean, maybe she was trying to...

It was to submit the idea that they were having an affair to frame him, I believe. I asked the same question. Oh, okay, because I was the answer I was given. Why did they have all that gizz, Dan? I believe. I have the same question. Oh, okay. Because I guess it was the answer I was given. Why do they have all that gizz, Dan? The gizz was extra. Like guacamole.

It was extra. I don't know why that upset people so much. To be honest, Dan, I don't know why either. I know what I'll be talking to my therapist about. Why was that the most upsetting moment of the night? Okay, so basically Edwards is like, we got to save Phillips. She goes in, she shoots Phillips,

and she's allowed to meet with Phillips in an interrogation room, the two of them. She's not how guests are usually allowed to talk to prisoners with no supervision, just in a room together, and she shoots him, so they can escape in an ambulance. Phillips confront Sandra as if she's about to get on a plane to fly to Papavania, I don't know,

somewhere where the puppets are free. We got to make, before this he is handcuffed from most of McCarthy to the steering wheel of the car because he wants to protect her. Moving on. Okay, fair, good, okay, great. Oh thank god, you told me that. Oh yeah.

And she says, hey, I like killing it turns out, so thank you. And now I have all this money. And she got all the happy times indication money. Why is that? Because Jenny is alive and she's still with her. So I guess they are married? Yeah, yeah. It wasn't all alive.

I guess. It's very weird that that's the one thing in it that's like true, but I don't know. Anyway, but she also, then Sandra Betray is Jenny, for reasons I don't remember, because at that point I was really losing interest in what was going on. Did she shoot her or just trip her?

She liked her when she had her own... Yeah, with some language. But it's okay, so why did she do that? When she's about to escape? Because all those other things is like soft on her old boyfriend, and so she's like, well, we don't have to shoot them. And she's got a taste for killing.

Yeah. Okay, fair point. It's an airtight movie, nevermind. Um, and Phil gets taken away by Sandra's goons, which exist, and were never introduced to the movie before. But she has a team of henchmen, I guess. And they're about to throw Phil into a jet turbine of a plane, effectively taking that plane out of commission.

Now, here's a true story. A few days ago, I flew in from Los Angeles to New York. And the plane I was in was hit by a bolt of commission. Now here's a true story. A few days ago I flew in from Los Angeles to New York and the plane I was in was hit by a bolt of lightning. Now I can only imagine we were okay. I'm alive. It's okay. This is not the moment where I was doing it. I reveal him a ghost and Dan goes what a great trick and I go yeah but I can only do it once and then I fade away. It disappears. Yeah. So I can only imagine how, and they made us turn around and get a new plane, which was very frustrating, not as frustrating as being dead, but you know what I mean? I can only imagine how they'd have to get a new plane if a puppet got all clogged up in

there. They're asking for a miracle on the Hudson Dan, I guess is what I'm saying. But Edward shows up. She has used her superhuman, or I guess she's fighting puppets mostly, so regular human strength to rip the searing wheel off the car. So I think of her, she fights all the henchmen and saves Phil. And, but Sandra gets the drop on her and Phil has to make the shot that he failed to make years ago and shoot Sandra in the head killing her.

Our hero's lady, ladies and gentlemen. So, and I was, I watched that and I'm like, so am I supposed to be, wait a minute? So he accidentally murdered her father and that was the guilt. He hit her. Like, the circle is close. The blood, the blood line has been stopped.

I was like, am I supposed to be having fun right now? Cause it, uh, Phil asks bubbles out on a date. She's delighted. It's been clear she's been sweet on him the whole time because 40s detective secretaries are always sweet on the date after he looks. Candy looks like a blue dick miller. And who wouldn't want a data?

Blue soft short dick miller. Who walks like his legs are just gonna hang in from him. Then the lieutenant comes over and he's like, Phil, you're back on the force, which is the kind of thing you need to go through in a approval process to do. Joel McHale goes, I'm going back to the FBI and they call him an asshole and leaving me again with a question of like, why was he in the movie?

Like, let's, and then there's an inexplicable music video for I Want Candy, featuring the characters from the film and showing behind the scenes footage of the movie, which as we already covered, much more entertaining than the movie. And that's the tale of the Happy Time Murder. It's... It seems we've closed the case file of the Happy Time Murderers. Hey, gang, Jesse here, the founder of Maximum Fine, and with me is Stacey Molsky, who is among

other things the lady who responds to all of your tweets. Hi, everyone. I also send you newsletters. So anyway, something really awesome. You, Max Fun listeners, have given us the chance to do something really cool on behalf of our entire community, and we wanted to tell you about it. Last summer, following the Max Fun Drive, we put all of the enamel pins on sale to $10 up members with proceeds going to the National Casa GAL Association for Children.

Your generous support and enthusiasm raised over $100,000. Our bookkeeper's staff would be quick to tell me the exact total is $109,000 and $25 to be exact. Your money will go toward pairing kids who've experienced abuse or neglect with court-appointed advocates or guardian ad-litum volunteers. In other words, kids in tough spots will have somebody in their corner. Knowledgeable grown-ups who are on their team through court dates and life upheavals and confusing situations, whatever. The money we raised together is going to help a lot of kids. Whether you bought pins or not, you can help us build on that $109,000 foundation. Make a donation to support National Casa GAL and help some of our nation's most vulnerable children. At maximumfund.org-c-a-s-a.

That's maximumfund.org-casa. And seriously, thank you. Our community rules. Hi, I'm Joe Firestone. I'm Anolo Moreno. And we're the host of Dr. Game Show, which is a podcast where we play games submitted by listeners regardless of quality or content with in-studio guests and collars from all over

the world. And you can win a custom magnet. I've custom magnet. Subscribe now to make sure you get our next episode. What's an example of a game Manolo? Pokemon or medication. How do you play that? You have to guess if something's a poking on name for

medication. First time listener, if you want to listen to episode highlights and also know how to participate, follow Dr. Game Show on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. We love to hear from you. It's really fun. For the whole family, we'll be every other Wednesday starting March 13th and we're coming to Max Fun. Snorlax. Poggyman? Yes. Hey you, goobers. You guys had two great episodes of new movies in theaters, and now, after those treats for the beginning of the year, you get this trick of me, Dan McCoy doing another solo ad read.

I hope you think about what you've done. Hey, there's only one sponsor this fine day, and it's Squarespace. Squarespace, you all know what it is. You make websites with it. Everyone needs one these days. That's what they tell me. I'm old. Things you can do with Squarespace. You can create a beautiful website to turn your cool idea into a website that seems redundant, blog or publish content, sell products

and services of all kinds and more, whatever your heart desires. People using Squarespace include architects, creative consultants, wedding professionals, restaurants, spars, pubs, makeup artists, gym studios, there's, you know, what, why, why a list? Everyone uses a website these days. That's the point I started the ad with. Hey, Squarespace allows you to do this by giving you beautiful customizable templates created by world-class designers, everything optimized for mobile right out of the box, a new way

to buy domains and choose from over 200 extensions, free and secure hosting, and 24-7 support, hey there, head to squarespace.com slash flop for a free trial and when you're ready to launch use the offer code flop to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain and now I return you to the live show that we've kept in the flop house vault up until now until you were slavering with desire to hear it and or forgot we ever did this movie. Thanks guys. Okay so we should get to audience questions but real quick what we do now is we do final judgments on the movie whether this was a good bad bad movie, a bad bad movie, or a movie we kind of liked Elliot. What do you have to say about it?

On a technical level of puppeteering, this is an amazing movie. But on every other level, I'm going to have to go bad, bad, and apologize to the people who worked so hard, bring to life these stupid moments. Stupid moments, the precious moments, off-shoots. That's why it's like a little kid going like, will this fit in an electric socket? Just a ceramic of that. What I'll say about this movie, like technically,

this movie is great, as you said. I would say it on a... Technically great, Raeves Dan McCoy, put it on the box. On an acting level, everyone is doing their best. I guess it's talented cast doing their best. Everybody's having fun? Well, I would say that the lead puppeteer is a long timeer and he like he does a great job as the lead. Yeah That puppet has star potential. I would say for the first 45 minutes

I I don't want to disappoint you. I kind of like the movie Dan You disappointed me so many ways and you're like why stop now for the first 45? I kind of liked it as like the puppeteering is good As long as they're not doing the same fucking joke of like, oh, a puppet's doing a dirty thing. Like when they're not doing that joke, but other jokes, I was like, this is kind of funny. There's a few funny jokes in it. Yeah, but then it got boring.

Then it got boring. So I don't know, mixed, kind of like, bad, bad. I don't know where I'm at with this. Stewart. Yeah, for like a gritty LA neo-noir, it doesn't really succeed. Not up to time. It sounds so Stuart Wellington.

You have to admit, LA is a character in the film. Yeah, now it's, yeah, I mean it's basically Uframe Roger Rabbit, but dirtier and with puppets. And not very good. It's like, there's no weasel gang. with puppets, and not very good. It's like, there's no Weasel gang. No, it's still every movie. Stuart first judges it on whether there's a Weasel gang.

How many Weasels are in it? And it's got to be the full Weasel gang, even with the crazy guy with the razor blade. Yeah, he's scary. So yeah, I mean, this is a, I think this is a bad bad movie. There's parts of it that I genuinely laughed at. Like, I think there's, we've watched a lot of bad comedies for the show, and I laughed more during this than I did

for any of them. I think if I was watching this with other people, there might have been parts where I was, where I was felt light enough to laugh at, watching it by yourself, as with any comedy, it suffers a little bit. Hoping desperately that your child doesn't wake by yourself, as with any comedy, it suffers a little bit. Hoping desperately that your child doesn't wake up

and glimps any moment of it. Dad, dad, why do the puppets do dirty things? Yes. Dad, how much gizzo's a puppet have inside it? And I'm like, how do you know that word? You're like, well, scientists disagree. Let's so we're given what, happy time murders like a, thanks for trying? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You know, everybody, everybody works really hard. Yeah, you know, guys, everybody poops. I don't know. Move, face on, now what do we do, Dan? Now, let's take, let's talk to the audience for a little while. Sure, yeah, yeah, let's wrap. 15, 20 minutes, I don't yeah, let's wrap 15 20 minutes I don't know whatever 15 20 minutes

Hey, Dan's at that time of night. It's Lucy Goosey time who knows that much? Dan's like 15 20 30 hundred. I don't know So we we have a I was I was driving Jan you are and I started drinking again. So who knows what's gonna happen? Oh boy So we have a microphone here if you don't mind getting in line Microphones. I don't know if the microphones on the side of the stage work. I think the center one might be the only one Yeah, we're getting yeah center mic So that so you'll have to go to the yeah, that one's not turned on. Oh, that's just an audience background mic or something look

It's the center microphone. The center microphone. Apologies to anyone who's at the center microphone. So you have to send a center microphone. The side microphone are only to pick up your delightful apps. So anyway, there's something I like to say before we ask questions next. Oh, God. Let's have fun, everybody.

First question. All right. Hi. Hi, my name's Beth. Hello. Hi. Hi. So, my name's Beth. Hello. Hey Beth, what's up? So since the happy time murderers didn't bother to explain the actual origins of why their world is the way

it is, if you could come up with the backstory for why humans and puppets live together in this world, what would it be? I guess what, Jepetto had sexual the puppet? There has to be some kind of an evil force, and they have to make some kind of a binding pact at some point. And there has to be mountains and a lot of swords, right? I think it should happen Meg's style,

and Rainwell's should fund a project that goes to the bottom of the ocean and breaks the thermal barrier and then a bunch of puppets come out. A lot of it's like, if it's like 10 years ago, the spaceship landed, puppets came out. Now, they're just a part of our world, and we got to deal with it. And then it's like, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, and like a sweeping shot of like the puppet neighborhood, and there's like a human cop who's like, oh, puppets do all these puppets here's your partner it's I guess that's the movie you know that's forget it thank you very much yeah so take your

pick any of those things any of them hello Jeremy hello so first off let me just say that currently the Facebook group loves your belt buckle oh thank you very much well real time update. Yes, let me get next to his cross to the scribe. It's a it's a the statue of Liberty. It's 1886. 1986. It's from the Centennial of the Statue of Liberty and it's my way of saying one I love big bellboggles. Two I love I love artifacts that are not of the original thing but of the commemoration of the thing and also Hey, this country's built on immigrants dude like let him in okay anyway, so Yeah, okay Jeremy so let me get off my soapbox, but I'd like to say on it cuz I'm very short

And as a man who is shorter than you yeah keep talking Oh, that's funny for everybody in the audience, but not for the listener. Right, so you had said that you felt like this movie was a poor remake of a better noir movie. I wonder what other, especially for you, Elliot, who are a fan of earlier movies? Oh, kind of just films.

Let's just call them oldies. Yeah, let's call them old black and white movies and nobody that you, yeah, nobody else watches. We're cares about, yeah. Nobody else watches. What would you like to see remade as a puppet movie? I mean, the implication of this question is that I would like to see any movie remade

as a moment of... Uh... What if it was King Kong, but it's a real gorilla and it's puppet people? I love it. Hey, hey, seven hundred thousand dollars. Would that freak some minds? My mind is freaking it. I don't know.

King Kong, let's say, great movie. Very problematic. Let's make a new one that's not quite so. Hi, I'm Mary Beth. Hello. So I wanted to ask a question about this movie in particular, because I'm kind of a big fan of Avenue Q. And I'm kind of wondering if you think that there's a line

between good and bad use of mixing something that's considered a childish medium, like puppets or animation and then adult content. Like you mentioned Hootham Roger Rabbit as well. So I was wondering what's the line between something like the happy time murders and then something like Hootham Roger Rabbit or Avenue Q. Well I mentioned intelligence to switch.

Sorry, go on, Stuart. No, I was just doing a call back to it. No, no, Dan stepped on it. No, no, no, Dan stepped on it. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, like, it's okay, I lost it, it's okay. No, I lost the audience. I'll answer this one then, okay, so I think the difference is, if the movie is about something other than, we're seeing childish things, doing non-childish things,

like, who frame Roger Rabbit is very much steeped in LA history in a way that other movies are not. Avenue Q is more about living in New York as a young person who has no money. Like, this movie is just about puppets having sex with each other, so I'm like cursing a lot. So, it doesn't really say anything about anything else. I have no answer, but I'm gonna pull on an Elliott

and do a little name drop. For the Daily Show, we had Stephanie DeBrujo come in who was the original Kate monster for Avenue Q and does stuff for Sesame Street is Prairie Dawn right now to do a bit Delightful super delightful her husband listens to the flop house brought me a Muppet book Wonderful, that's really nice super great So, if you wanted conflicts from that story, nothing will be pro-conflicts. Just happiness.

Nope. The absence of drama. Did you have anything to say, Stuart? Other than the thing that I stepped on? No, I'll get the next one. Thank you for the question. Thank you for being here. Next question.

Hi guys, I'm Matthew. Hey, oh, so the lead Puppet Muppet whatever is properly called this Phil Phillips detective Phil Phillips Yeah, in Philip Phillips. We have to say right miss mr. P not master P that is a rapper In the Muppets take Manhattan Kermick gets hit by a car. He loses his memory He ends up at an advertising agency. They ask him what his name is. He looks at an advert and he says his name is Philip Phil.

Just the inverse of this. I forgot this is a brilliant movie, never mind. Yeah. My question is, why are you freaking our mind? My question is, there are only three possibilities I thought of as why it's just simply the inverse for the need. Is it simply Brian Henson's like wink back to his father's movie? It's just Brian Henson is so lazy that he couldn't think of any other thing except fill, fill, fill, fill, fill, no comment or esoterically. Is he saying that this movie is actually a creation of the darkest, most

perverted parts of Kermit the Frog psyche? Oh, so it's like saying elsewhere, kind of. Well, in terms of Kermit the Frog and how he's identified, one of the things that he's most identified is that he's constantly in an interspecies relationship. He's defined in a way sexually. All right. All right, let's go. Here's my theory.

My theory is that he forgot the joke from the Muppet Stakeman hem. That's my theory. Because to him, my guess is that I mean, he's kind of shepherding his dad's legacy for a long time. But when you are close to the creation of a thing, it doesn't have the sacred quality that it has to other people. So I would doubt that he knows Muppet Chapteran verse quite the same way.

It's the same way that old mystery science theater, I would ask Joel Hodgson on the drive a little bit. I'd ask him about stuff on that show and he'd be like, I don't know man, I don't remember. And I'd be like, you can't remember this thing, but if people ask me if the new version, which I just worked on, I'd be like, I don't know, I don't remember that. Like it's like the way that people think about Star Wars and they're like, this is probably the modern religion. And when George Lucas thinks about Star Wars,

he's like, that story I made up about a robot and a boy, like, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know what. But let's just take this opportunity to remember how funny it is when comments like, how about Ocean breeze soap? It makes you clean.

Yeah, yeah. It's a good movie. Let's go home and watch it instead of this movie. Do you remember there's that scene when comments like, it's not a carousel. It's a time machine. You know, Fuzzy, the Greeks have a word, nostalgia. It means the pain of an old wound.

Thank you very much, thanks. Oh, I wanna do that all night. My wife's gonna be so mad that that's what in my head now. Hello, Marissa. I'm gonna do this with everyone I know. Dan, just, we know you know people. Hi, this is really tall, okay. So my question is, do you feel there's an

appropriate satirical way to address race and movies? Blazing saddles exist. But I'm more, yeah, but I'm more curious as to why we haven't been able to develop that in the 21st century. And like what, and in this scenario, I posit that get out is a horror movie. So I'm just curious as to like, do you feel there's a way to address this? Because we've talked about it in the Habitime murders. You talked about it at Bright and it's been done so very poorly. I mean, I think sorry about it. Oh, you're very sensitive white man. Why don't you answer that?

I am very sensitive. I'm almost constantly on the verge of tears. But I'm sorry to bother you, handles it well. And I think that here's the big issue. And I'm going to be stepping in a minefield here, folks. Some say a mine freak. But I wouldn't say that. I'm asking like three white dudes. Well, here's the thing.

I think for the longest time, Q.B. Lee Jollsong, that these satires about race have been in the hands of people who did not experience that racism, but people who were observing it. And so you had like Mel Brooks as much as I love him, and he's hilarious, and he had Richard Pryor working on the script for Blazing Saddles, like he is not a black man, and so it inevitably is going to be his impression of what black people must go through. And so like to really have satire that stings, I think it helps to feel that sting

and not to just observe that sting. But also, it's super tough. And satire, I've come to believe, is pointless and has no impact on anything. And has no effect at all. Former head writer for the Daily Show. I've become a real apostate in thinking that satire mainly serves to make people go like,

yeah, that is right, I do believe in that. And I don't know that anyone ever watched blazing saddles and was like, I should stop being a racist. Like, this is crazy. But honestly, I think that's part of it, is that for so long, the means of making those things have been the hands of people who were commenting on something they were not themselves experiencing.

And so there's always that distance there. You're saying the workers should seize the means of production? Uh, I mean, basically, I mean, they shouldn't seize the means of production. They already have control of the means of production. They merely have to exercise that control. So. Is that point two in your power point?

My 14 points of power, yeah. I think that's a reference to something that happened before the show started recording. But yeah, so, but yeah, but that's my answer. Guys, what do you think? I don't think I can say it anymore eloquently than that, so I'm gonna push. But I think, but I think a lot of people are like, why wasn't a movie like Get Out Made Before? And it's like, well, because someone who felt that was not making movies yet, you know, through the mainstream studio system. So what are you gonna do? I guess what you're gonna do is I'm gonna say.

Elliot speaks my mind on this. Yeah, and I'll explain also. Unless he said something dumb, in which case I distance myself. Like a true coward. So things to remember, workers, he's control of the means of production. Yes, racism, no thank you.

More people doing more stuff and, you know, Popeyes forever. Hi, Jeff, last name with out, I'm very excited to be here, and I would say that for the first time being in an audience here, I speak for the audience in that, wow. This is the third of the 14 points of power. If the workers are not seasoned, control the means of production. You do it. Isn't that what I'm most excited about is the Dan Solo Adred for this episode? Yeah.

Okay. Yeah. Asset has been described as Saint-in-Demadness. Yes. Also, I've heard you dance say that the live episodes are less popular. And I think that might be because of a lack of Elliot singing. Oh.

I love that. I mean, like, he usually does. He picked to it tonight, but he usually does, actually. Not well, but my singing in front of the live audiences is not quite the same, because I can feel the power of a whole roomful of people not enjoying it. And I like the feeling of you guys, you two not enjoying it. But there's like, I haven't gotten there yet

as a comedy performer where I love to waste a whole roomful of people's time. Like, Norm McDonnell is at this place where he can waste hundreds of people's time and derive real pleasure from it. And I'm like, I don't, I guess I have too much human emotion in me, I don't know. Well, I do have a very specific request, which is horsemeats dog.

Thank you. Out now, stores everywhere. Horsemeats dog by me and Tim Miller, buy it at your local independent bookseller. I'm very excited to share it with my daughter. And. Oh, thank you. Yes. And I was wondering if you could share with us

a teaser of the opening number of the Broadway musical Horsemates Dog. Oh, OK. Oh. Well, there you go. I'll take my answer off, Laura. OK, thank you. As you know, if you've read the book, what you should have,

it opens with a dog seeing a horse. So. As all classic off line. OK, thank you. As you know, if you've read the book, what you should have, it opens with a dog seeing a horse. So. As all classic plots do. OK, you'd think you would open with an Amo dog song. No, you've got to come on. You've got to start with when the action has already started. That's writing 101. You start as late as possible.

So it would be like, hey, what's that over there? Hey, what's that guy over there? He's so big, bigger than any dog I've ever seen. What kind of dog could be so big? What kind of dog could fill the skies? What kind of dog could reach above my dreams? I gotta talk to that dog. I gotta find out what makes dogs so big sometimes.

I gotta talk to that dog and see, maybe if I can climb the highest heights. And so they go like that, yeah. So that's the only way. Oh, thank you. Oh. Okay. I think that we can actually make it through the entire line,

but we've got to speed up a little bit, so. Okay, so lightning rounds. Yeah. Hey, guys. We're the O'Brien's last name withheld. And we came from Texas to ask you. So appropriately, woo. Oh.

All right. We've been working our through the puppet master series. Sure. Very different puppet movies. We got very well. And more fun. And in the second puppet master movie, the puppet master, Andre Toulon,

we realize sounds exactly like Thomas Hardy doing Bane and Dark Knight Rises. Yeah. And we... Candy! Yeah, it's crazy, but we went on Google and looked it up and we're like, no one has recognized this before. So we're asking, have you done that where you're like so sure that something had to be what happened?

Thomas Hardy in an interview while holding some beautiful rescue dog. Yeah. Explains that he got the inspiration for the character voice of Bay Batman movie was Puppet Master 2. Who's? I don't have a good one. The closest I have is in Galaxy Quest. Sam Rockwell's character, like a plane to the entire movie, he was in one episode, he got

killed. And then at the end of this show, he's on the new show when they bring it back next generation style, but he's got a red outfit. And so I'm like, oh, they're making a joke about red shirts. Like he's going to die again in the new show. And I remember, like, back in the day, Roger, you've heard had a questions for the movie answer man, column.

And I like send in, I'm like, hey, do you think that this is a joke about red shirts? He did not publish that letter. A waste. But he did send me an email back saying, maybe you're right. What? What? What?

What? What? What? So that's the best idea I've got. Anyone else? It's almost like he's telling you that you should do a career as a movie critic. Yeah.

All right. You look like you might have something. You know, you're saying you're head. I've never had to reach out to a bot. No. Sorry, I'm distracted thinking about you slaving over a keyboard. So excited as you send off this letter, printing it off.

I was like 13 or something, too. I was amazed. I've never had this story for a while. Yeah, it did. I mean, you can't be. You couldn't have been 13, because Galaxy Quest came out wet. I don't fucking know, I was young.

Wait, they didn't even know. Okay, no, it makes sense. It makes sense. See what 13 years old, uh, just one more thing. What was the Galaxy Quest released when I was older than 13 and I'm younger than you, so, uh, you know, so maybe, uh,

maybe it wasn't that age. Maybe, you know what? You know, for the first time in Colombo history, you got me detective. Take me away. Makes sense, makes sense, you did it. Just one more question. What do I do now at this point?

We got 20 more minutes in the episode. You were supposed to engage in a sort of mental cat and mouse game with me. Maybe, Galaxy Quest just made you feel like you were 13. And it was moving on. Thank you for that question. Hi, I'm Aaron. Hello. Yes, hi. So, happy time murders reminded me a lot of another puppet, neon war,

So, happy time murders reminded me a lot of another puppet, neo-noir, Fraggel Rock. So, I was wondering if there was any, if you could put any actor who might normally, or actress who might normally be in that kind of gritty crime story, into Fraggel Rock, who would it be? Michael Shannon. A similar Richard Widmark, the Michael Shannon. A similar Richard Widmark, the Michael Shannon of the 1940s.

Carla Gugino? All right, fair point. I'll give you that one. All right, let's move on. Are you saying that the doosers built the highways in L.A.? The doosers built the highway to take over the water rights. I am Paul Les, named withheld. Oh, they call. They call, are you? I have a question for each of you.

Like individual questions? Whether you may each individual answer. Oh, thank you. Oh, thank you for the permission. My question is in eight parts. No. Which muppet do you wish you were or strive to be? And then which muppet, if different, are you actually?

Oh. I'll take my answer off of you. Oh. Am I a Jason or a cheedy? Oh. You're not cheedy. You're Jason. But just because I'm questioning this,

doesn't that kind of make me a GD? I'll start. I'll start. I'll start. This should be a three-part answer. It's going to be a three-part answer. Okay. Interesting. I strive to be a rulf.

Okay, fair. I am a curment. What I fear is I was complaining about how much I hate Walter in Muppets, because he's such a bullshit, blind character that was invented for the movie that took the fucking spotlight off the Muppets. We all know and love. I was complaining about this.

And Mr. John Hodgman said, Dan, you're such a Walter. And he's Dr. Bunsen honeydew, so he's an authority. But if there's anyone who knows, well, cut me to the bone most, it's John Hodgman. Guys? I think I strive to be a curmit. Okay.

In my heart, I would like to believe that I'm actually fuzzy, but I know that I am statler or Waldorf. One of a group of friends who sit there watching things they hate when at any moment they could stop watching it and just leave. We all know who you are, right? I mean, I like to think I'm an animal. Yeah. Yep, yep. But I'm probably deep down.

I'm a scooter. Oh, no. No, don't say that. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no He's just irritating. Yeah. Oh, oh, I didn't know there's much of fucking scooter heads in the audience tonight. I will say when I was a kid, I wanted to be Gonzo. Yeah. But then I got older and I realized, Gonzo's don't fit in well to human society so well.

They're too weird. All right, final question of the evening. Oh, oh, it's the race. Hey guys, my name is Matt. Hey Matt. What's your direct question to either one of you, but I'd love to pick your brains about any of your observations you've had tonight. Yeah.

Are any of you going to have a beer after the show anywhere tonight? Oh, Jesus Christ. So, thank you for asking Matthew. You're sneaking away. I smell a plant. How do you always manage to get in the right place like? So after the show we're gonna be out We have some merch and we're gonna be signing stuff and saying hi and if you have any complaints about the show direct them to Dan and

Then afterwards I and I think I'm gonna drag Dan. We're gonna go over to the bar. I own called Hinterlands And I think I'm gonna drag Dan. We're gonna go over to the bar. I own called Hinter Lands. Woo! If you wanna come out, I know it's Sunday, but we'll be at Hinter Lands. Ellie will not because he has his family in town. I've got a whole lot of stuff to do.

I got, I guess, I would call it promise just to keep in miles to go before I sleep. Okay. But these two, I'll be there. Yeah. Even though I have to work tomorrow. Yeah. You know what, Stu, you're. Even though I have to work tomorrow. You know what's doing here?

I know I'm here, though. Yeah, fuck off. I got to get up at a normal time to go to a 9-5 job. Anyway, cool. So thank you. I guess that's all the questions. Thanks. And on a high note, as usual.

Guys, thank you so much. We're so glad that Ellie could be back so we could do another show and It's been great. I've been Dan McCoy I've been Helen And I've been Stuart Wellington Dan pointed at me out of order. I went the wrong direction Good night everyone Thank you so much for being here. Thanks everyone at the Bell House.

We appreciate it. A lot of people don't realize Dan is auditioning for SNL tomorrow, so he's gonna try out a couple characters tonight. No, so, four of you. Give us one of your famous characters. Give us one of your famous characters. I'm an old prospector. Hello. Okay, what I like about him is that his body barely moves.

And I also like that you said who you are right up top. Classic SLL, but... That's a Saturday night live special. That's how they do it. Artist-owned. Audience supported.