The Flop House - Ep. #314 - Gemini Man

Episode Date: June 6, 2020

Before we start -- today, Saturday, June 6, at 6 pm Pacific / 9 pm Eastern, is our video livestream on our YouTube page, with presentations, a discussion of Howard the Duck, and some audience interaction. We’ll be encouraging viewers to donate to charity for Black Lives Matter, bail funds, and hunger relief, and those who donate $20 or more will be entered to win some Flop House prizes!But you came here for a podcast! Our guest for this episode is the terrific Jordan Kauwling, Maximum Fun producer, the woman who has made our recent shows sound better than they ever have, and a sheer delightful delight. We talk about the Ang Lee-directed Will Smith would-be blockbuster, Gemini Man.

On this episode we discuss... Gemini Man! Not to be confused with Gemini Dan, my new podcast where Dan McCoy reads horoscopes for Gemini's! You know, I am a Gemini. Oh, I'm Stuart Wellington. Hi, I'm Elliot Kaelin, trying to pick up the cues a little faster than everybody else today. Dan, we've got a special guest with us today, don't we?

Yes, well, I mean, she's our editor on this show, Jordan Cowling. She also is an associate producer at Max Fun. She produces the wildly successful as you described it podcast. I'm obvious. And appears on it as well. That's true. Hello Jordan. What's up? Who's? Whoa. Whoa. That's that's no, but that's Jordan's catchphrase. This Jordan's classic catchphrase. It's like a poochie. A different poochie. Thank you. Yeah. And now that we've introduced Jordan, the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the story of the flop house will be doing our online version of one of our live stage shows. We're going to have presentations. We're going to talk about the movie Howard the Duck.

We're going to try to in some way simulate the idea of audience interaction. We're not quite sure what we're going to do with that. It probably will just involve Twitter or something. You will find it at youtube.com slash c slash the flop house podcast. And you can find all the information about it at the flop house podcast.com it will be for charity and there will be a list of our approved charities on that website the flop house podcast.com and if you donate and send us the receipt you'll be entered into raffles and stuff and we'll go into that in more detail later. Now it's back to Jordan Jordan.

Wait a second that's June June 6th at 6pm Pacific. That's right, 666 were officially devil worshipers now. June 6th, 6pm Pacific time, 9pm Eastern for people on the East Coast. It's 669, three more than the devil. Jordan, back to you. Okay. Well, this is a podcast. You probably know that.

What are we doing this podcast? We watch a bad movie and then we talk about it or you know Maybe we don't know ahead of time Sometimes turns out to be good sometimes it turns out to be bad Usually we've been a light to believe it's bad and on this episode As I said in the beginning in the introduction wait is this momentum? Are we last year at Marion Madden? All of a sudden hold on.

Jim and I man was what we watched. Starring William Smith. Huh? Directed by Flop House Fave Ang Lee. Yeah. I mean, I do like him a lot. Is he a flop house fave? I mean, he's a fave of mine.

Okay. But we've, I don't think we've ever done an Ang Lee movie. No, because he makes good movies Because this is a comedy podcast and I make jokes sometimes Logic checks out now Jordan you were interested in doing this movie and I believe there's a drink geographical reason Yes, I've spent the last 10 years in West Philadelphia not born and raised but the playground is where I spent most of my days And I wanted to do when you guys had given me like a selection of movies that I could pick from I saw this and I was like yeah,

we're definitely going to do a Will Smith movie. I regret that decision, but life is about choices. Okay, we'll see as we go along. Well, we'll see what the reason is for that regret. Now, I do have a question. Now, on the playground of those days, what were you doing there? Chillin, Max and Relaxin. Oh, cool. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Excellent. Shoot some meatball outside of my school. For some reason, that is I cannot remember so many things. And yet, the lyrics of that song are buried so deeply in my brain. I'm sure on my deathbed, I'll be croaking them. Yeah, through my dementia, my grandchildren and they'll be like he wasn't raised in West Philadelphia. Why is he saying these things? At the end of

his life dad thought he was raised in West Philadelphia. Yes, you imagine that later in life he lived with his auntie and uncle in Belay or though. Yeah, well, yeah, it's a good song. It's a good theme song. It's a solid theme song tells you the story, exactly what you're new now. Stuart, I believe you are the summary man today for Gemini, right, man? I am, yeah, exactly.

So the movie opens in Belgium. We're introduced to Henry Brogan, played by Will Smith. And he is a... That's right, Osmosis Jones himself will Smith. Wait, he was Osmosis Jones. No, he wasn't. He was not. You guys, you guys, you fell into my trap.

I feel like Osmosis Jones would have been a bigger hit because Will Smith's a huge name. No, Osmosis Jones was a, who was it? He was the devil in that one down call and found the was just a little right is that yeah and he was a genius and a lot of so he's for you know he's and now he plays a clone so he's portrayed a number of

uh... science fiction on the mystical characters okay so uh... we open up and i'll hit the wrong but we open in belgium and and rebrogan played played by Will Smith is an assassin and he uses a high powered sniper rifle to carefully shoot a bad guy who was riding on a high speed train. It's an almost impossible shot, but he is just that. He's kind of a dead shot, if you will. I've never heard of that. Is that a name or something? Did you just point that? I think that's a copyright 2020 Dan McCoy. Now, so can you literally, like this is a very fast movie train,

he literally makes the shot of this guy through a window of the train from hills, like it looks like a mile away or more. Now, why, he has a man on the train. Why doesn't that man just kill a guy? Well, actually, he has a man on the train. Why doesn't that man just kill a guy? Oh, actually, that's a good question, guys. I think it's probably a lot easier to get away from an assassination if you're on the train with the body than if you

are a mile away, to just walk away. Yeah, but I mean, like he could poison them, you know, it could be a subtle killing. It doesn't need to be like, Dan, Dan, that come on. You've been reading too many Agatha Christie books. That's not how that's not how anybody does it poison him. Dan, were you really hoping that they were that the movie is going to open with poisoning in the guy and then the whole thing some murder mystery on the trip? Why not? So he manages this impossible shot and then we cut to a little bit later and he's hanging out on his isolated home all by himself. It's in the country. It's nice. You know, he's wearing sweaters,

he looks great, but you know what, he's retiring. He's getting old. He's lost a step. He's the best killer in the world according to his handler, Dell, but he's, you know, he's worried that he might slip in and he might kill someone. You know what they told him when they assigned him that handler? You know he's worried that you know what they told him you know they might kill someone you know they told him when they assigned him that handler What's that they said dude you're getting Adele? Oh? I guess that makes sense because his his handler's name's Dell right misunderstood He was like Adele the singer is gonna be my handler and no no no Yeah, no, you're not getting Adele you're getting Adele Wait, but you just said yeah, Adele the singer rolling in the deep that one and they're like no no no no hold on

Let me write the sentence out for you and that's when he finally understood what they were saying Yep now when when Jordan came to us to be our editor Which I was very excited about because it was right when I was getting burned out that she appeared We were told that she enjoyed the show but watching her face as Elliott talks Well, that's she doesn't like that part. Her favorite part of the show is when we sign off at the end and she's like, ah, it's over. My favorite part is when the song goes,

Dundin, Dundin, Dundin, Dundin. Yeah, then your curse is lifted for another. No, I'm kidding. I absolutely love this show. And I'm so happy to be on the show and talk about this really, really silly movie. Yeah. Hahaha.

It's in some way silly, in some ways serious. We'll get to that later. Uh, but yeah, so, uh, so he's the best of the best. He's the best super killer, but he's getting tired of it. He can't look at himself in the mirror, right? And also, but he's also got a weakness, guys. He's got a conscience. He doesn't want to shoot little kids on that. But this is the he has developed this conscience. 72 kills into his life as

an assassin. And that was one of my biggest problems with the movie right off the bat is I wasn't quite sure why we were supposed to sympathize with this guy who was like, because he's Will Smith Dan. That's why we sympathize with this guy who is like because he's will Smith Dan that's why we sympathize with him. No, I know that that's what the movie makers count on, but I was like, oh, 72 kills in you've suddenly realized that maybe shooting people is bad. Now that now the clue to that might be also that this script apparently was floating around Hollywood trying to get made for about 20 years. And it was it was one of those blacklist scripts, right?

For the people who were tuning in, blacklist scripts are scripts that James Spader writes down in his little black book, and then Brittany Murphy's always trying to steal it. It only when he's got a hat on, right? Yes, of course, the guys that it has had. Stu is, of course, scoofing. Blacklist scripts are scripts that a guy puts on a list claiming that they're the best scripts that haven't been produced.

And then when they're made into movies, they're always a bad. Yeah, they're not there. I don't know that I've ever seen a blacklist movie that turned out to be a good movie. But I haven't seen them all, I don't know. But this feels like a late 90s, early 2000s premise where we love assassins and we love people who shoot people. To be honest though, people still like that. Like, why is Deadpool the hero of his movie? Because he's, because he feels bad about himself, like he kills lots of people. But this is a movie that a lot of different stars, they tried to make it with at one point

or another. And I think it only really works with Will Smith at all because he's got so much natural charisma And I totally buy him as someone who Is like the best at something and now wants to get out and they won't let him but also because hey guys Guess what he's now the Tommy Lee Jones of the men in black. That's right He's the he's no longer the new young guy who's joining the secret government group now He's the old guy who wants to leave and now it's like full circle Okay We all start as Will Smith and we end up as Tommy Lee Jones. That's life one thing that stood out to me in this movie is that there was

Almost a complete lack of charisma from Will Smith that I could that I could pick up on it Well, it was he's I'll give you that is the least charisma that I think will Smith has ever had in a movie. And there's what about that one with his son where they're trapped on that planet. Oh, you're right after earth. That was where he plays like Zana like like like cypher rage or whatever is the scarier isn't it? Well, he's just I don't think that's a different one.

Well, he's he's he's a shell of a man, but you have to admit, he's really good at fighting. So, Stuart, he just wants to be an opponent. Yeah, so we're introduced to our other lead of this movie. That's right, we're introduced to Danny, played by Mary Elizabeth Winstead. And she is a grad student who just started working at the local marina. Now, she and Henry have a she's just a grad student who just started working at the

local marina now she and Henry have a little bit of fun they do a little bit of flirting he's I actually think he's pretty good at flirting for a murderous loner you know for a guy who lives all by himself and just kills people you know he's he's got he's got some I mean this is I will say this is like mild flirting though like when we're watching I would even go as far as to call it small talk Yeah, like well Audrey was worried that she was gonna end up being his love interest and there is like a something like a 16-year difference between them or something But yeah, but she's isn't isn't she dating you and McGregor in real life? That's about the same there

Like I'm not gonna cast aspersionsregor in real life that's about the same there but I'm not gonna cast dispersions on anyone's real life dating life I'm just saying that it's a bad habit of movies to always have this happen with an older man and a younger woman but the movie's credit I mean I would I would date either of those guys they're great again I'm not saying that I'm just pointing out to the movie's credit. No, I just not sure. Horn in a romantic thing between them. Like there's actually a scene where. Where like he says something like, oh, if he was the younger version of himself, maybe like it. Like because there is spoiler alert, a younger version of himself in this movie. Yeah, it's on the poster. Yeah. So I think that's okay.

That's spoiler. But I think one, Dan, the poll quote I think from this episode is that Dan things would not dane to date either Will Smith or you in the Gregg. They're too old for him. No fogies. The other thing. It's kind of weird though, because I think like between, if you compare the two of them, I feel like you and McGregor's like later career stuff has been a little more exciting than Will Smith's stuff.

Why don't you guys discuss? Yeah, but also I would say that I bet you there was an earlier version of this script that was where they did have a relationship. Just like there's a scene where later on where she has to strip to show that she's not wearing a wire and it's handled as Tastily as that can be done where she's off camera for most of it and I guarantee there's a version of this movie That could have been made 20 years ago where it's a woman who takes off all their lives on camera for that seat Like it feels like there are times when this movie is kind of trying to fight what the movie the shape that the movie is in and But I'm sure that original script

Henry lived in like a warehouse that just had a bunch of like curtains draped around and he would be practicing his karate and his like like underpants for a bunch of. He's also a huge fan of whatever bands they made a deal with to have on the soundtrack. So like garbage or something like that. Like he's huge with it or like, I don't know, chumble lumber or something or. Yeah. What's the band did the walking on the sun song? Smash Mouth, like he's a big Smash Mouth fan. Like, I had the same thought though, Elliot with that scene later on where she's asked

to strip to show she doesn't will wire because it was like, Ang Lee like shoots it like so, like he does not want the camera to be ogling her which was kind of it was like a nice much to dance no no it almost makes you wonder it almost makes you wonder why they left that part of it. Well that was gonna seriously just not bad. It was a nice way of handling it but I'm like you know you can just cut that scene right? Like you can just change the the script if you don't want to be exploitative, but anyway.

Oh, so anyway, I, but I think, and later on, I think it's implied. I mean, he, it's the young Will Smith, we, we are told as a version. And it's kind of implied that the older Will Smith is a virgin, which makes me think that the kind of light, small talk, flirting he does is actually supposed to be not that attractive, so that he can deflect women who are drawn into his natural charisma. It really comes off to me. This was the point in the movie, I, I nicknamed Henry sensitive. And so because he really came off a creepy guy to me, especially with that relationship with Danny, which was really weird. Because I, I wouldn't judge anyone, you know,

for an age difference in a relationship, know as long as people two people are concerning adults but that there wasn't age difference between the two fresh prints and fresh king characters yeah it was he was kind of weirdo yeah I think it's a weirdo but it's also I think that if you I would read it as that that flirting is him trying to flush out whether she is a spy, which is the thing that he, which is ultimately subjective. But I think you're right. Sensitive in-sale is a good way to describe it, especially because when you clone someone, it involves their cells and going in the cell.

Yeah, well, we're jumping all over the place. So let's get back to stew here. Yeah, we're jumping all over the place like a regular Gemini, man. Yeah. Uh-huh. So instead of jumping all over the place, we're going to jump onto a boat where Henry takes a boat out to see his friend Jack who has a matching tattoo with him. So they clearly have history. They are hanging out on Jack's yacht. Yacht's just one of those guys who wears a shirt button down to about the middle of his chest and he's old, but he's got a young girlfriend. You know, he's one of those guys. And he's like retired a little bit, but he's still, you know, he's one of those guys. And he's excellent. He's like retired a little bit, but he's still cool. But he's still got his finger in the game

because he just got information that Henry's last hit who he thought was a bad guy is not actually a bad guy that he'd been lied to by his contact at the DIA, which is a government organization that he seems to take hits from. Now this character was one of several where I'm like all these older white guys want to show that they're real cool with Will Smith and that he thinks they're really cool friends. Like there's just a string of them throughout where it's like his different bosses and

buddies that he works with who are all like hey man great to see you and he like gives them a big hug and I was like all these guys want to want to brag to their kids I guess that they're big friends with Will Smith but I don't think it came off as realistic. I think you may be misunderstanding something about the movie. He's not playing himself Will Smith. He is a man who is employed by them. I thought it was called Will Smith Gemini Man. I mean it probably would have done better in theaters under that title, although they it's not like people didn't know that Will Smith was in the film. To be honest, how different would the movie be if he was not a government assassin, but he was Will Smith, movie star?

And he was found out he was cloned. I mean, I feel like that's an interesting idea that they're like, this guy's made the studio so much money. They now need to replace him with the younger version. I mean in a way that's such an interesting meta commentary on the current state of digital effects and what That's what after if was supposed to be J. J. Oots his son's name Jaden Jalen that he was supposed to be the new Will Smith Except he can't act at all. So do you think it's possible that he's a clone that they just raised as his son and they were like, this is how I keep going. I think it's absolutely possible. In fact, it is. That's exactly what happened. As a former not exactly native of Philadelphia, but resident, that's your privy to that

sort of information. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's great. So while they're having this conversation, we cut to a secret chamber, somewhere in a government building where his, the leader or head of the DIA, a woman who goes by Lasseter and Clive Owen, everybody's favorite English guy playing the character being... I know, now it's during my favorite English guy. You is Sherlock Holmes. I know he's fictional. Okay. But I think your second favorite English guy is Michael Cain, right? No, he's just, he's just the English guy most associated with me. Oh, I see. And of course, my favorite English guy is the B feeder on the B feeder gin bottle, because I like his hat. And Jordan, who's your favorite English guy?

John Boyega. Oh, actually, it's good call. Okay, so Clive Owen is playing a character named Clay Varis, and they are, the two of them are surveilling Henry and Jack on their yacht using some kind of a drone, I'm assuming. And they listen into the conversation, they realize that Henry knows that there's something up and they decide he's too big of a risk and they need to get rid of him. He cannot retire.

They're gonna kill him or retire him permanently. But his former boss, the DIA wants to handle it internally though Clive Owen thinks he should use his own team, a thing called Shema. Now, I want to say something here. So if he was retiring anyway, did he really need to know this information? Because it seems like this is the information that triggers Clive Owen to want to kill him.

This is like the only loose end that really needs to be tied up with Will Smith. So it's not really nice of his friend to be like, hey, you shot this wrong dude. You're right, Dan. You're right. It was not nice of his friend to tell him that he had been suckered and led to killing an innocent person. He should have just let him just retire, blissfully, with that stain on his soul. And when he showed up in hell, and the devil devil was like you killed 71 bad people and one good person And that's why you're here and then Will Smith look up to heaven and his friend Jack would be like sorry pal I just didn't have the heart and just try to just cloud yacht into the gates of heaven Do you think that anything Will Smith does in the rest of this film like makes up for killing that guy?

I'm not really sure what you're I mean I was watching the directors cut wherever you're now Then it's it cuts to God going all along with and then at the end his heart is weighed by a new bus and a new bus is like Yeah, just made it all right Yeah, I think there's originally a sequence like in dead or alive to where the hitman There is killing a bunch of people and then sending the money to starving people. Yeah, yeah exactly and then he grows angel wings So Dan you say the real villain of this movie is not Clay Varus who without Henry's knowledge clones him and raises that boy into a murder machine man. And then creates spoiler alert, even more bad stuff.

But it's actually his friend Jack who ruined his retirement. That's right. I mean, he was going to go away, not shooting me one anymore. And now he's got to shoot a bunch of people to protect himself. So, uh, well, with that in mind, uh, uh, we have to see remind me to say at the end that the real gem when I was the friends we made along the way, because he does end up with a circle of friends. I think you did say it now actually. Well, we haven't met the friends yet, though.

So the audience, audience forget I said that. Oh, so speaking of friends, Henry and Danny are having a little bit of playful flirting as he ferrets out the cheese actually working for the DIA to monitor Henry. I think it was kind of a tip off when Danny Orgard Henry the beer he likes to drink before he arrived. Well, I think it was more of a tip off when he like hassles her very threateningly about whether she's going to be she's like spying on him and she denies it and denies it and denies it but then agrees to go to dinner with him. Like something that I think would only makes sense,

she was surveilin' her. Fair. That's why he's the sensitive in-sell, because if, I mean, yeah, she was spying on him, but just if I was a regular woman out on the street and a guy comes up to me and he's like, no, I gotta go to your house. Let me buy you a cup.

I would be like, I would pepper spray him, so I just don't understand why we treat this as normal in this movie. It's not normal. It is the spot. It is the spy equivalent of when a girl breaks up with a guy and the guy is like, give me your reasons. What's your reason for breaking up with me? Because if it's not a good enough reason, we're still going now.

In this case, it's like, she's like, I'm not a spy. Oh, yeah, take me to your house so I can search it for spy stuff. Why don't we just go on a date and stay? That was probably the wildest part. That's like the equivalent of me like lecturing a woman on the merits of a katana and then making her go on a date. To be fair, it was, I've seen him to make that impossible shot on the train. I was like, yeah, it's a movie, but then seeing this scene, I was like, this doesn't make

any sense. I want to say that Stuart did the right way. He made someone marry him and then lectured her on the benefits of the time. And that's why he's been recording from a storage space the best couple of weeks. Oh, yeah, I guess my family drama is all out in the open guys. So so they so she she admits that she is a spy, right? Yeah, but but they seem kind of cool with it like they make some jokes and shit, whatever. Um, however, the DIA is not cool with it and they make their own move to clean up this mess. They send a team and the kills Jack on his yacht

and they kill, uh, they kill Henry's buddy, Marino, while he's out on a surveillance mission. They send a team to kill Henry, but he just smokes him. And then he wakes up Danny, creepy style, and then she agrees to team up with him, and then they go kill some more goons and figure out who's trying to kill him. She agrees to team up with him because they're trying to kill her too. It's like, like, she kind of does it out of necessity to stay alive. It's not like she's like, you're a good point.

I mean, that was, but that was one of the points where I was like, well, why do they send anyone to kill her? Why don't you just reassign her? Yeah, I, and then the only thing I could think of is maybe because she was surveilling him. She also heard the stuff on the boat. I don't know, but otherwise it does not make sense that they're like, like, she's not a loose end at this point.

This was my second favorite part of the movie because he comes to her house. I guess he breaks in. She's sleeping in bed and he's just like, your burnt on bird, everybody's burned. Like, this is definitely in some nonsense. Yeah, the there's a fair amount of presumptiveness for coming off a Henry. But there was, I did like the scene when she is trying to get the keys to the boat in the little boat shack and she gets jumped by a dude. And the whole time I was assuming that Henry was going to save her, but nope, she whips

that dude's ass and finds out the information they need. So that was cool. think Mariel is with Winston. I mean, like, she, she also in British of prey, but I think she's like really good at these action rules. I mean, I like her a lot as an actress in general, but she just, I don't know, she, she had a solid competence radiating off of her in this part. Did he just rip his ass? She like broke all of his teeth and handed them to Will Smith. Like someone asked you for change for a dollar. It was pretty bad. And I wonder Will Smith would be like,

ooh, why did you hand me teeth? It was weirder that he just threw him back in his mouth like they were tick-tax. And just went, and it was just like cool. And I got extra teeth. And he's like, is this your change for the keys? What's, I gave you a 20. It was a better fight scene than in last blood

when Rambo just sticks his fingers into a man's sternum. And oh, no, it's starting to, it sticks his fingers and just rips out a man's collarbone. Uh huh. This, this was almost as nonsense. I don't think that counts as a fight scene. He was fighting the surface tension of the man's skin to get in there. Yeah, you're right.

You're right. I'm wrong. You're right. Uh, okay. So, uh, they, you know, there's, you know, another feverish meeting between Clive Owen and the head of the DIA. And he's like, I think we need to send Gemini after him again. I have a special soldier to clean up this mess.

Whatever, you know, we know who that special soldier is gonna be in a second. So Henry then calls another old war buddy with another matching tattoo, a guy named Baron who's also retired, played by Benedict Wong, who is very charismatic and fun. You may know him as one of the other wizards from the Dr. Strange corner of the MCU. His character's name is Wong, Dan.

It's his real last name. Like, it's just, it's not that hard to remember. I didn't say it in a memory of his name. I was explaining who he was in a way that would appeal to the widest swath of our audience. Perhaps people who don't remember his character names i just say he plays long doctor strangers uh... uh... uh... i don't think there is anything wrong with the way he described who he was

with the way you just it it i think it raised more questions that answered because i was like how many wizards are there in the doctor's range corner of the marble universe this is character have a name that i know he doesn't i mean there was still the sweeten before Spoiler Alert, she gets killed. There were the other, like, monks at her, like, Dr. Strange retreat. So this is so, you're describing Gemini, man. Just bear in Mordor, who doesn't count anymore. Yeah. Well, if, if, if Dan was to mention Geminiini man, he'd be like, Will Smith stars as one of many special ops soldiers in Gemini man.

Like, well, no, he's one of the major characters. I mean, I don't know when the last time you saw Dr. Strange was, Ellie, but there are several notable masters of the Mystic Arts in that film. We like now see three PO is one of many droids in the Star Wars universe. This is a very needless, uh, now next, next, next, introduce, next, introduce to Darth Vader, one of many Imperial officers in the Imperial Navy.

That's the Empire's Armada that enforces the Emperor's laws throughout the galaxy. Okay. So Benedict Wong in this movie, character is that like you know that that that type of character that shows up in an action adventure movie he's the like retired friend who only wears Hawaiian shirts and like can fly a plane like at he's you know that's it's everybody's dream. He's totally burned notices. He's also the friend in every one of these movies who's like willing to drop everything and including his home to help the hero like he gets burned

too and can't go back and he's like well whatever literally gets burned to death eventually. Oh spoiler spoiler alert in case you want to stop the podcast now and write that out. Okay so Baron hides them out in his home in Cartagena, and Henry tracks down, he uses a phone to call and threaten his old handler, Dell, and Dell kind of spills a little bit of the history of Gemini, which is a private military contractor that is run by Clay Varus, played by Clive Owen, and they're involved in some way. I don't remember exactly which parts of the background is explained at this point, but it's one of multiple invoved dumps that are kind of spread out throughout the movie. There's also a brief moment of Baron just watching

Socker on TV with his dog that I really liked a lot. So of course a killer tracks them to Cartagena. Henry leads the killer away so that his friends can escape. He gets the drop on that killer, but guys, what makes this killer different? Uh, he's, he's mostly computer animation. Nope. Uh, well, maybe I don't know the actual technical details, but it looks like a younger version of Henry. It looks like a young Will Smith. And guys, I'm going to go out on a limb here. This action sequence is phenomenal.

This is a great action sequence. And like it goes on for a while and it's, you know, super well choreographed. Although there are like weird moments, like toward the end where younger Henry is like beating up older Henry using a motorcycle and older Henry seems only sort of mildly inconvenienced by this and I kept expecting there to be another shoe that was dropping saying that Will Smith was a super soldier of some kind because I get no idea how he's still alive after being slammed with a motorcycle wheel. That he should get that's he kind of shrugged off getting hit in the face with a motorcycle.

Yeah, yeah, having seen pets in the Terry too, I know that a motorcycle wheel is the ideal way to kill somebody. There's also the part where he, uh, where junior, the young clone, he swipes the motorcycle wheel under and Will Smith, you with all like, like a frogwood leaps it in the air just high enough to do it. And it's like, you can kind of see the wires pulling as close at that moment. So it's like, there were moments where it was this amazing action scene in the end, they kind of ran out of realistic things for him to do. And it briefly became commander. But that was okay.

You know, why not? It's a movie about clones. Why not? Yeah. I love that you also, this is an action scene that begins in one place and it turns into a chase and it uh you really get a sense of the geography of Cartagena. It looks like a really beautiful city. You really learned the schedule of most of the working people of Cartagena because early on in the fight there is nobody on the streets and then suddenly

there is tons of people. So it's like they're they're fighting past when everybody wakes up and showers and then it's time to go to work because they were running around the streets of Cartagena just firing guns each other for a while and I was like oh I guess nobody's up and about but when it turns into a chase sequence on motorcycles and you need cars to zoom around suddenly there people everywhere and I'm gonna tip my hand a little bit here and say like uh no damn there's a drink in it to spill everywhere uh no it we said this is a good action sequence uh a lot of the shots like this movie is shot beautifully like there are a lot of like things that could be just boring like exposition shots that they find some interesting way of of of framing or of uh you know like, doing the choreography of the scene.

And it really is like, okay, this like, the script that isn't much of anything got handed to a really, really good director. And you can see that. It is a movie where the whole time you're like, why did Ang Lee make this movie? I like how, and I like how, like, bright and colorful most of the movie is, particularly this actions. Yeah.

There's a part of the section scene where there's one shot with a lot of firing and then young Will Smith slides down a palm tree and throws a grenade in and Will Smith just slaps it out of the way. So that and then explodes down below and I had I watched that I think three times. I think three times. Yeah, I watched it as almost as many times I watched that footage of the protester full-volving a gas canister being lobbed at him that was floating around Twitter the other day. Okay, so not to let the real world bleed into this silly movie. Okay. We don't want to let the real world bleed into this movie about a black man whose body is used as property by a paternalistic older white man who who who who who pretends that he's a good friend of this young black man and a father figure while using him as a as a soldier in a tool and then later develops another young black man who can't feel pain. There's a lot of things going on underneath this movie that the movie is just kind of not

dealing. Oh shit. Gemini man is a documentary. Oh no. Uh, yeah. Why me will get to all this stuff over time. Oh shit, Jim and I man is a vacuum in every Yeah, why me will get to all this stuff over time. I'm sure the okay, so there's a the the the the chase and fight sequence ends it looks Henry seems to be holding back. He knows there's something up junior is before juniors able to kill him

And also I kind of like that like they specifically show juniors gun running out ammo, so that's why he's using his motorcycle to try and kill Henry. Okay, but then the cops show up, Junior runs, Henry is briefly arrested, and then immediately gets out of the jail. Yeah, this is an ant-waved way, like... Yeah, they're like that. I mean, also the fact that they're like, if we're going to go where we need to go, we're going to need a private airplane. Wait, where we need to go we're gonna need a private airplane wait I know a guy cut to them on a private airplane. That was the moment. I was like hold on a second I do like that they have a little bit of thought a throwaway dialogue to it It was they're leaving the police station where like Henry's like to Danny who had like got sprung him from jail

He's like oh wow, that was amazing That was great. So yeah, so they borrow a jet. We get a little bit of backstory in the two of them. They're on their way to Budapest where they're going to try and meet up with Yuri, the contact of his former friend, Jack, that had given him the information that the Henry's last hit had actually been a bad job. And you're a big fan of Henry and like makes specific reference to a lot of stuff that Henry did recently in a way that you know like Henry comments on I'm like okay this is

going to be some sort of plot thread and it does not develop anything like I guess he's just has like ESPN Henry that he watches at home and knows everything that he does. They're edging into John Wake, Mark and I remember. You know, those can't, yeah, John Wake stuff where it's like, oh, he's a famous assassin who has fans who follow his exploits. Like, and there's a certain point in the Marvel comics where Wolverine became famous and I was like, uh, this character doesn't work for me the same way if everyone wrecked that

The I mean, I think I think it I could be giving the movie too much credit, but I think it's implied that Later on we find out that Henry is being tracked because he has been shipped. Yeah, and I I suspect that Yuri is using some kind of spy satellite to watch this bad ass assassin battle dudes. But I could be wrong. Very possible. I mean, if I had access to that stuff, I'd watch all kinds of crazy battles. Battle dudes, battle toads, any sort of battles. Yeah. Battle bots. Okay. so meanwhile, we cut to junior, this young assassin that looks exactly like Henry, but a younger version.

And he is recuperating in this palatial manor house. And it's the house of Clay Varus. Oh no, he's like, they had this like weird father sun dynamic, which by wrote down, but is wrong, because they're actually father sun in this case adopted son obviously. But junior can tell that there's something different or wrong about this job. Clay treats him both as a son, but he's also like an emotionally abusive father in this case. He's made, he makes junior obviously, he's making his son kill people.

So that's it's like varsity blues If instead of James Vanderbake being forced to play high school football he's being forced to murder people all over the globe Yeah, that's what I was Reaching for you. You know also like I think it's because I watch too many movies like this is one of those things that if you're like a viewer of a movie Like you're like, oh, why don't people realize this thing already? But in real life, you wouldn't realize that you're a clone immediately. But at the same time, like Henry Jr. seems very, like it takes him a long time to be like,

hey, I look exactly like a young Will Smith. Well, the same. I've been watching a couple episodes of the new Twilight Zone. And I like it. But it feels like every single episode the character figures out what's going on like three or four scenes too slow for me and I'm like no dude this is happening come on come on you made a deal with the devil I mean I thought it was especially strange that it happened while he was channel surfing and Hancock

happened to be playing on FX and he he was like, Oh, I look like Hancock. And Clay Verris is like, no, no, Hancock's not a real person. I could almost excuse junior, not recognizing that he looks just like the older Henry, but I can't excuse Henry not recognizing his own younger face. Like if I saw someone who was you, that was me at the age of 20, I that's me. It's a quick obviously someone has cloned me because I remember what I look like. Yeah, but he's he's you know, he has that face blindness thing that all of his acts rights about. So he actually thinks juniors that have no seems like seems like a terrible

quality for an assessor. Yeah, yeah, that's why the 72 people that was two missions. So the weird thing is that we also learn so uh... we learn that juniors a clone but we also in that he's called junior because he was just stated inside the body of our old sports nigger movie crossover uh... man that isn't that way check the dates to check the dates they check out so this is where we we really get a a good look at the digital effects of the young Will Smith. And what do you guys think?

I actually, I thought they were pretty good. And like, I really like the motion that they are able to get out of like the young Will Smith face. You guys know me, I'm usually pretty tough on CGI humans that are supposed to look real. I thought in the scenes where he's not with Will Smith, it was really convincing to me, but for some reason every time he was with Will Smith, I would be like, oh wait a minute, it looks like

he's talking a cartoon character version of himself. I thought he looked weird in like the first scenes, then I think I just got used to it, but I will say like, I liked the movie's first hour because it was so sun-drenched, and then the second hour, things got really dark all the time. Like, they're always doing stuff at night, and I think it was because they had computers generated Will Smith talking to real Will Smith

all the time, and it was like, we gotta put this in the dark, or else people can be't make this looks weird. I think maybe I've been watching a lot of reruns of the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air recently, so I wasn't convinced. There are certain scenes where the young, where Junior looks convincing to me. There are other scenes specifically the last, the final scene, where it just looks like a cut scene.

Definitely, as that last scene where they're like, the like wrap-up scene of the three of them, he looks terrible. Yeah, that's arguably the worst movie we've seen in the whole movie. So, yeah, let me see where we're at. Okay, we get a shot of a Gemini training facility where we see this like team of armored black ops dudes blowing stuff up in like a like a training course and juniors watching it the whole time and kind of analyzing it and Of course, we're gonna see that black ops team later. They're gonna show up. You don't introduce this is the last time on them This was when I started asking the question that you really shouldn't ask with this which is like what was the what's the economics of

Gemini because they seem to spend so much money. They have a whole fake town with actors playing townspeople so that they could train like six dudes. And they put all this money into cloning one, possibly two, Will Smith's, as well as how much are they charging the government for their emissions? Because they seem to spend a lot of it on facilities R&D and that you know Clay versus House looks pretty sweet. I'm sure he's raking in a pretty nice Well, the other thing about this too is like you started asking the question, you know I don't think it was a surprise anyone to learn that

Clive Owen does not make it out of this booby alive as the villain all villains must be killed even though his name has live in it. Yeah, but the villain. All villains must be killed even though his name has live in it. Yeah, but uh, you see live running dies. Yeah. And then like, uh, it's a, it's a, it can't he dies. And then like, uh, you know, basically all the loot is one of those things where like, Oh, we've killed the villain. All the loose ends are tied off because I guess like the idea is supposed to be that he was a loose cannon within the government. And they just like are like cutting, cutting ties the same way. And it's just like, they like, the government was clearly putting a lot of money into cloning someone. Like I don't think that just because they killed the one guy, this would

stop being a problem. I don't know. Well, well, the Gemini was putting money into cloning because Gemini is a private organization. And that's why I wonder if there was, I wanna see the scene where he's on the phone with his unicorn investors. And they're like, when is Gemini gonna start showing a profit and he's like, the future of assassination isn't about profit, man. It's about market dominance.

We're disrupting how people are killed. Yeah, there was a scene in the movie that was cut where Clay Verris went on the Joe Rogan show. Oh boy. He's like, it's a volume business. As soon as we have enough will Smith went on the Joe Rogan show. Oh, boy. He's like, it's a volume business. As soon as we have enough will smith on the street, we'll start making money. But we're looking at the numbers

and that doesn't really make sense. Hey, I just need another 500 million and maybe someday. Oh, okay. So yeah, what you guys are saying is that the government is an evil. This one rogue company is evil. I mean, certainly parts of the government are very evil too, but the rogue company can also be evil.

Okay. Okay. Okay. So wait, I lost my notes. Okay. So meanwhile, in Budapest, Danny goes to get a DNA test of some blood and some stuff from Will Smith. Including a hat. And so she goes to get a DNA test and guys, guess what? Turns out they're 100% each other. Get it? Okay, so yeah, it turns out like so. Danny reveals it not only to as their DNA similar It is exactly identical the juniors Henry's clone and Henry thinks about it and then he's like

Well, I also like that that once I have to assume once he was like they're like they cloned you He's like oh now the company name makes sense Gemini Because there's nothing particularly Gemini about like having a private soldier organization But if they're making twins then the name makes sense and he calls up Clive Owen and he's like is this why you chose the name Gemini? Because you were gonna clone someone at some point and Clive is like it's just a happy coincidence man My first wife was a Gemini. You can name the company after her. So I named after her star sign Yep, he's like this company has big Gemini energy.

He's really into crystals. I would love, you know how into astrology I am. You're such a tourist. That's a character thing I would have loved is if it turned out that Cliveones character was really into astrology And was always like doing junior star charts. And he's like, I don't know if it works the same as you because you weren't born, you were cloned and we grew you in a vat. But if you want that kind of if you want that kind of character work, you hire Nicholas fucking cage to do your movie. Oh yeah. Yeah. He would have done star charts for everybody on set. He'd be carrying crystals around. Sure. Yeah. Okay. So how how are we? How likely?

So he's supposed to play the Tiger King in that Tiger King TV show. How likely do you think it is that he buys a real tiger to keep in his house to prepare and where assuming he doesn't already own a tiger. That's a fair that's right. I should not have made that assumption. Because when you keep a tiger in a cage. Oh, okay. Yeah, Nicholas Cage. So Jordan, you're editing all this out, right? You're just editing it on the floor. No, is this the same scene where Danny has the line, Nelson Mandela couldn't kill a man on a moving train from two kilometers away?

Yeah, because he's like, why don't they clone Nelson Mandela? I was the Gikes movie's like, why don't they clone Nelson Mandela? I was the gags movie. Why? We've nothing to do with him. Well, why are you going to drag Nelson Mandela like that? And also, how do we know? He never had the chance.

Well, that's the thing. Like, the movie lost a step with me with by not having Will Smith say something like, like, we don't know know he could have been taught Oh, here's now here's something about uh now as well I this is getting a little ahead of us, but as we later learn a junior also has Henry's conscience which again as we know his conscience only kicked in after 72 kills and 30 years on the job But uh something I learned recently talking to a celebrity dog groomer was that when you clone an animal, they look exactly the same, but they do not have the same personality because they are raised differently. So here's my pitch for you guys about this movie.

What if it was the same movie, but the young Henry was totally, totally amoral, loved being an assassin, was so eager to get old Henry out of the way, because he doesn't want this old man clogging up his face. And he could just be, would that be a better movie or a worse movie? Well, discussion. I mean, like the movie keeps trying to claim, like, Clive Ones, like, we edited it out all of your, like, doubt and conscience. And I'm like, I don't think so.

Like, he seems to be basically the same, dude. If he could edit, that's the foul. How come they couldn't edit out junior being allergic to bees That's a very good point and it's something that is brought up multiple times for minimal plot development and you think that would be the first thing They're like they're like we got to send junior on a mission to Macedonia wait wait wait wait wait. It's not near those b-hives, right? It is okay forget it since somebody else lying down in a field I'm a first scene. I feel like once he actually does get poisoned like I wish that Will Smith would have said my one weakness bees Yeah, yeah, I mean, do you think do you think colony collapse all over the world and the and the demise of bees is just jam

And I trying to clear the way to make it so junior can operate anywhere on the globe Yeah, murder hornets are their latest latest weapon. Yeah, yeah, in the fight against bees. So, so Henry, Henry meets with Yuri, his friend's contact in a bathhouse, of course, because he's Russian. And he gives, he gives another info dump. I think it kind of explains all the basics that Gemini has this cloning facility. They're trying to make clones, soldiers.

Yada, yada, yada. And the Russian that he killed in the first scene on the train was actually the scientist who was working on the cloning project. Exactly. And that the virus took him out, I guess, so that they couldn't share that information. I don't quite remember. There's a lot of information, but it's all exactly what you'd expect. The only kind of surprise that Yuri reveals that he's a big fan of Henry's and that he has been watching some of his shootouts. How did this happen? Does it matter? It doesn't.

He has a guy, a delivery guy, show up with a phone, a bike messenger, thank you. And he has paid this bike messenger to deliver a phone to her and they call and have a phone conversation. Sorry, before that, the bike messenger reads a long message about like, hey, you know, like you tried to kill me, I'm going to kill you, I know where you live. I know where you go to get your coffee. And the bike messenger seems totally cool with delivering this message. And it's a game economy. He got paid $1,000.

Of course, he'll deliver what he probably thinks at some prank. He's like, where's Ashton in a van somewhere? Where are the impractical juries? So wait, is this guy in the rain this message? Just like wake up from a really, really long sleep. Dan, it's a 20 year old screenplay that was punked was still on the air back then. So this thing that's not in the movie because the screenplay's so old.

Exactly. Yes. Thank you. That's why everyone in the movie is talking about how great the matrix was. So, yeah, I did, I did the scene of disservice. It has some humor in it. But so, he basically bargains with his old boss for Danny's life. And he sets up an exchange where he will turn her over, but he'll only turn her over to the killer who had been sent to kill him, Jr. And they set up a meat in a castle in Budapest. What's the, they're like, they're like catacombs. It's like, they're like, grave catacombs. Yeah, it's just like, it's like a castle. It's like a tourist attraction. This is where Jr. makes to check Danny for bugs because he's nervous that, you know, he's just being cautious.

He makes your strip in a both exploitative but restrained scene. And he checks her for bugs and she the whole time is like trying to get to know him. She's asking a bunch of questions. She's talking quite a bit. She's explaining what's happening. She's trying to work on his emotions. He takes her to these catacombs and he sets up a whole bunch of traps, but Henry, of course, gets through these... He gets through all the traps that have been set up because the whole time Danny had been messaging Henry through a hidden bug. And we have a... Finally, we have Old Henry and Jr. The Younger version of him. They have a face off and they start, you know, they have they have junior dendorites and they lay out the situation to him, but he is not by that.

Okay, now technically it's not a face off because they both have the same face on. Oh, okay, so rewind the tape guys. So it's a face on. And it's a head on. I know. And a flight directly to the forehead situation. Oh, wow. I haven't thought about that a long time, those days. So Jordan, is this what you wanted to see from Will Smith movie? Is Will Smith a younger Will Smith hitting him and older himself in the face with a bone

that he grabbed out of a wall? I actually did want to see more of this in the movie. This was the only one of the only times where the movie was kind of not taking itself too seriously and it was just kind of silly and and I was having a good time. So yeah, I wanted more of this. I mean the again the junior doesn't look real to me in any way. It would be if Will Smith was fighting you know the younger Robert De Niro from the Irishman, it would have been you know. Or if like or if like like one of the digital characters from one of Disney's new live action remakes was battling the animated versions. Yeah, absolutely.

I mean, if they could get Will Smith and then his Aladdin character to fight. Oh, yeah. I will say, you know, like Henry gets the of a junior, like, in basically every situation. And I guess the movie plays it off, like, okay, it's because, like, he's cagey, most of the time, like, like, uh, living so long has- Well, he's more experienced. Made, given him more experience, but in, in, like, these fights, I think also you can, you see that they have made the younger version of Will Smith like smaller, like

he's not as jacked as 50-year-old Will Smith and I think that is to be like, to give it a way that 50-year-old Will Smith could possibly win a fight with a much younger version of himself. It's possible. I mean, I was watching the behind the scenes stuff and the person they had doing the motion capture fighting was actually 80 Deezin so it makes a lot of sense why we'll submit that no trouble defeating him. Yeah, it's not a fair match up because sometimes junior is like a little baby Terminator and then other times they're They're equally matched and other times, you know, Henry is able to get the the drop on himself. Yeah, yeah, and I feel like I mean the the drop on himself. Yeah. And I feel like, I mean, fast forward to the very end of the movie, there's a scene where the two of them are walking next to each other and it feels like juniors like a head taller. Yeah, spinal compression as the age. Yeah. Maybe he's wearing lifts. Who knows?

Okay. So there's like no, it would be a stronger movie if it was like, oh, I can't beat myself at my physical peak. So I have to outthink him. But there's only a little bit a stronger movie if it was like, oh, I can't beat myself at my physical peak. So I have to outthink him. But there's only a little bit of that. It's usually like, I'm gonna outpunch him. Yeah. Like, and the two of them can take so many hits to the face, it's crazy.

And especially without wrecking those beautiful faces. I mean, I think they do a pretty good job of having the makeup reflect that they've taken some kind of damage. So a little bit some like this as much damage as I would get from like falling and smashing the face on the ground. Yeah, this guy got there. Yeah, it's fair. He just got a little road rash.

Okay, so, so as we said, they have a fight. Okay, so as we said they have a fight. The Danny manages to get a hold of the gun, but Henry's holding back, he doesn't want, he doesn't want Junior to get shot. They're battling, they end up in the water, which is as we've learned earlier, Henry's biggest weakness, he's framed of drowning. Danny comes down and shoots Junior in the shoulder

to rescue Henry and Junior escapes. They flee the catacombs, bear and picks up Henry and Danny and they take that private jet back to the US of A to shut down the cloning project. Meanwhile, Junior is also back in the US of A and he confronts his father Clay Varus about the whole situation. And I think this is where this Varus gives him another one of those like abusive dad talks right where he's like convincing him that he's doing the right thing, etc. I mean this is, I don't want to give it too much credit, but this is a slight stab at a more interesting villain because like he's a bad man. I mean we

can all agree is a bad man but he does I don't I don't know Dan name one thing that he does that's bad he does believe that he loves his son in his own way and he's trying to protect him throughout the movie even as he's trying to kill the man he cloned him from although the justification of like sending his son to kill his older clone to like battle his demons. No, it seems like that's a reach. Yeah, I think that's how it's like I just would describe it. Nutty. He's kind of like Thanos for me where he's explaining his motive behind, you know, his evil plot. And I'm kind of almost like,

oh, this guy's got some great ideas. Does that make me a bad person? Well, yeah, you're like, maybe we should, maybe we should workshop this a little bit. Let's get a little more diversity in your life than Thanos. Well, and later on, Clay is talking to these guys, the other other guy, heroes, and he's like, I was gonna have a whole army of just clones. No parents would ever lose their children again. No real people would die. And Junior is like standing right there, and it's like, uh, like, so, like, am I hold on

a second? No, no, no, no, you're one of the good ones. You're one of the good ones. No, no, no, Junior, you're like a person clone. You're totally cool, but these other clones. So he's a bad dude. So Henry Danian, Baron, you know, they touchdown, Baron gives his private jet a kiss. It has served them well this entire movie. They're running through a barn where they get ambushed by junior and junior tests Henry by shooting him in the neck with Bevenum just to prove that he is allergic to bees because that's the only way to prove that they are

Clones And also and by giving him the antidote he proves that he's he's not there to murder Henry, I guess Yeah, I guess neither of those tests really prove the thing that they intend to prove since it's not like Will Smith is uniquely allergic to bees among all the humans in the world Yeah, yeah, that's that was kind of a nappy panic when he goes at the naffron like dude, I know I'm allergic to bees I know I know I'm allergic to bees I travel around the world and I kill things. You would think I would have a couple of these on me at all times. I guess I was thinking like, wait, why does it older? We'll have one of these. Now I wish I had seen a scene where juniors like it's epinephrine. Let me use it and we'll say, I know how to do it. Just let me do it. And they're just arguing over which one of them is going to give the shot. No, let me do it. You need me to do this.

I can do it. I've done this before. I'm older than you. So this is where we find out how they've been tracked. Junior cuts out a tracker that's been embedded in Henry's arm. I guess it had been embedded in them during a previous surgery.

Then they are driving to go take out the clone facility. They catch up. they talk some stuff. But then they get ambushed by in a small town that looks surprisingly, I guess not that surprisingly. A lot like that model village we saw the Black Ops guys training in earlier. So they get ambushed and a tank shoots their car, killing Benedict Wong's character bear, and everybody's super sad. Everybody else gets out. And now when I watched this movie earlier in the week, a military style police response to a few people walking down the street seemed crazier than it does now. So I'm glad I watched it a week ago when I was like, well, this is nuts.

Anyway, move it on. Yeah, it wasn't quite the fun escape I was hoping for at that moment. So yeah, so we find out that Various is on site. He, you know, he diverts police away. He's having his own team try and take out these guys, clean up this mess. I keep using that term,

because that's what they say in action movies. Okay, and the perimeter and so forth. Yeah. At this point, Junior runs away from Henry and Danny. I can't quite, and he goes to confront his father. I can't quite tell, did he intend to lead them into that ambush? No, I don't think so.

Was he still working for his dad? No, no, and this, well, maybe he's worried. They think that I was on I was understanding it as clay has now ambushed all of them because he doesn't trust junior anymore to get the job done. Yeah. And here's the thing. Then because then clay is really ready to argue with junior when junior shows up, clay isn't like great job, buddy. Thanks. Thanks, Sunnyboy. You did it.

They're you let him into the ambush. He's like, what are you doing? And clay also tells Jr. to run like when they're in the car. He calls to you up and is like, Hey, get out of there. Like that's true. Yeah. And this is the scene when now he's he starts arguing with clay and they have a fight. And Jr. the super assassin who is so skilled that he had to be a clone of the greatest assassin in the world gets his ass handed to him handily by Clive Owen, a man who is older than Will Smith, I think. And this is the scene where I was like, why did they just clone Clive Owen? I kind of thought that was what was going to come later on, but it didn't happen.

Okay, so meanwhile, Henry and Danny get to go. And he goes, my name's Clive Owen, it's Clive 01 and then Clive 02 and Clive 03 and Clive 04 and army of Clive clones comes out. It's a real the sixth day and it's all and it's Clive on from all his movies. Croupie, children of men. What was that when he did with like Julia Roberts? Shoot him up. Shoot him up. Yeah. Did he do a movie to you? Robert will be hitting it up.

What are you talking about? No, not to him. That's Monica. That wasn't Julia. No, that's not the one he was talking about. Is that the movie where he plays? Oh, closer. Oh, closer.

That's what I was thinking. Yeah, it's him from closer. What was that, Jordan? You were wondering if shoot him up with the movie. He's a killer who chants on a carrot that time. That's the one where when every time he takes a bite at a carrot his eyesight instantly gets a little better. I love that movie so. In a smart well, the movie. Yeah. That's

the movie where he shoots the umbilical cord off a baby that he's just delivered. So, Henry and Danny start taking out this kill team quite efficiently. I don't know why they've been training so much because they just keep getting smoked. Junior fights Varus, Danny gets shot and they end up like holding up in like some kind of like a machine shop or something.

It's like it's like a hardware and things you would use to stop a sassom store. Yeah, so it's like they prepare to make a last stand. They only have one bullet left. A couple guys run in and Henry manages to kill both of them with the same bullet because he's just that good as we've already addressed. It looks like things are curtains for them, but of course, Junior shows up. He kills the remaining black ops guys. He rescues them. Hooray.

Well, this is after Will Smith has given Marla's once said in himself axes because they don't have guns anymore. And I was like, okay, I'm ready for the scene where there's but that didn't happen. They don't actually fight with axes. So cut to the rooftop. Clay Verus is realized that his his plan is in ruins and he has to initiate his his plan B when he he brings in a secret bulletproof ninja who like runs around the building. And where's a full face mask helmet? Yeah, he's like a real daft punk. It's like a or like snake eyes who's ninja.

No, no, but if daft punk was a ninja, that's what he would be like. Okay, cool. I guess instead of being... You get partial credit. Instead of being two older French guys. I wrote down Scoob and Ninja. That's what it looks like to me. But instead of taking a splash of the water, he splashes into our hero's blood as he kicks and punches them. And they keep shooting him, but the bullets just keep bouncing off. And this, and they keep shooting him, but the bullets just keep bouncing off. And this, you know, this one bulletproof assassin

is beating up all three of our heroes. It's crazy. Now here's, and he seems unstoppable. They're like, blasting with shotguns, they throw explosions at him. It's all kinds of stuff. And this is, we learn that he cannot feel pain, but he's being shot in the head.

Like, even if it's not hurting him, like, it's good. Like it's causing brain trauma. It is. That he keeps getting up. I don't know. It is unclear. The degree to which like, it's the armor that he's wearing versus like his painlessness. What there is no helmet, you can wear that is so strong that if you get shot multiple times in the head, it's not going to like make it harder for you to get up and keep keep keep keep this special clone helmet out yeah that's true the look at the helmet they cloned a regular helmet and they removed the parts of the helmet at break they cloned they cloned the best helmet in the world

all the every part of him is the bet they found the best pants in the world and they cloned them they found the best pants in the world and they cloned them. They found the best boots in the world and cloned those. It's a pentor all over again. You can't see, but he's wearing underneath the shirt. He's wearing the best pukashell necklace on a little piece of rope in the world. Yeah. After much battling and blasting, the bullet proof assassin collapses.

They have defeated him. They go up and remove his helmet. The bulletproof assassin collapses, they have defeated him. They go up and remove his helmet and it's another young Will Smith under there. And I gotta say, I mean, even though it wasn't that big of a surprise, it was kind of rough. Like I found this to be kind of affecting to have this feeling of endless, like, young black faces on like like, dead soldiers. Like, it was pretty rough right there. It was rough, but it was also one of those things I, like, I found, I also felt that way

at first, and then I was like, why did they sent him in the first place? Yeah. Why are there weeks in town with Junior? Like, he's better. And like, he can't, at this point, he can't even, like this, like, it's not address whether or not he can't, the super assassin is dying and can't talk, or if like, he, like the ability to talk had been cloned out of him. Like it's this horrible moment.

It's, it's a, and that's when Clay comes out and he's like, oh, we were gonna have an army of Henry clones and it was gonna be great for everybody. Not the clones, but come on, they're clones, right? Who cares, right, Junior? Oh, I mean, Junior, I didn't realize you were here. Oh, boy. And this is when Junior has a moral choice to make, guys.

And it's a moral choice that after Stewart explains it, I'm going to go into why I've started hating this part of the past few movies I've seen it in. Stewart, you know what I'm talking about? I mean, I don't know. So, Junior has his, his, his super shotgun placed at his father's face. And he's like, I'm gonna kill you. And Henry, Henry steps up and he's like, no, you won't be able to live with the guilt. That's a choice you, you shouldn't have to make killing your own father. You won't be able to come back from that.

You'll be irrevocably changed. So it takes the gun away and then he blasts him himself. And this is the thing I've seen in a bunch of movies, this made me think of Rise of Skywalker the most where the hero has blown away endless cannon fodder. People who oftentimes were just maybe ex in the world of Gemini man, they're ex-military who now work for this evil company where their, you know, police officers who got kicked off the force or something and now they work with this, this, this everything. And after killing swathes of those, they get to the one guy who is responsible for all of it and they're like, no, don't kill him. It would be wrong too.

The same with how in Rise of Skywalker, how many people is re-killed in those movies by this point? And she gets to the emperor and he's like, hey, hey, if you kill me, everything will go even worse. And she's like, I can't do it. I can't give in to hate and kill the emperor, even though she's killed hundreds of people in cold blood. And the emperor empires, members, murdering thousands of people at the same time, like this idea that once you get to the person in power, it becomes a moral choice of whether to kill them or not.

And it's the high road to not kill them. That it's better to kill, it's better to kill an army of no buddies than to kill the one somebody who's responsible for it is not a thing that I pulled up. Elliott though. This is not an exact analog because the reason specifically here is that he's shooting his surrogate father. Now the part I find weird is the way where Henry's like, hey, if you kill your dad, you're not coming back and then he shoots the kid's dad right in front of him. Right, Farah. I mean, if I was Henry, I'd be like,

this will give you the closure that you need to get out of this relationship with this dude. Like, Yeah, this is the Angela Bassett blowing up the car. Yeah, exactly, yeah. Freud tells us that we want to kill our fathers and finally he has the chance to do it. I just I just it's the idea that it's more the idea that like Hey, you're never gonna be able to live with yourself if you kill this guy But I killed a lot of people. Yeah, yeah, but this guy is a movie star

So let me do it instead or maybe there was something in Will Smith's contract where it was like yeah Yeah, but the real me gets to kill the bad guy not the clone me and Ang Lee was like, but will you play both characters? Yeah, but the real me gets to kill him right not the clone, but will you're both of them. They're both will The same way there's an old story about um, I think Joey Bishop that there's there used on the Joey Bishop show There was a character who was like his cousin that he also played and he would get mad because the cousin had more funny lines Than he did and to be like Joey you're playing both characters. Like why do you matter if the jokes come from Joey Bishop or the Joey Bishop's cousin? That's what it feels like. I do think that the moral issue that comes to play here actually for me, Elliott, is sort of

the a different one, which is like in these movies, they should get to the bad guy and not kill him movies, they should get to the bad guy and not kill him because they're like, they've killed everyone else in self-defense. Now they have this man dead to rights. Like, apparently he's operating way off the reservation at this point, based on the way the movie wraps up. If the movie is like, oh, I'm so tired of killing, take the fucking guy in and have him arrested. Like, it's so weird. I think maybe seven years ago I might have felt the same way, but now I'm like, no, the world would be better without Clive Owen in it. I mean that about the actor, Clive Owen too. Wow.

Guys. Wow. Whoa. No, I'm just kidding. I love Clive Owen the actor. He's great. Shoot him up. I love it. But at this point, do you really believe that that guy is going to get taken in and go to jail? Look at Eric Prince. He's still out there and he's the same character. Okay. I just think that the whole point of the movie, like the moral point of it, if there is one, has been like, I'm tired of killing.

So I don't know, it just seems weird that they've got him captured. I guess I'm angry more that every action movie has to end with killing being the solution to all of the problems in the movie. Yeah, then I think maybe Gemini Man's not the movie for you. Yeah. Yeah. So, uh, so Clive Owens character is dead. We now cut to a college camp. I've, there's probably some other bullshit, but we cut to a college campus. Well, that Henry meets up with us old boss and his old boss is like, all the bad guys

are gone. It's nothing but good guys now. And Henry's like, Hey, even though you let everybody try to kill me, we're cool. And that's the end of that scene. So, uh, there Henry, Danny and Junior are walking around a college campus. Junior is the new cool freshman. He's got a great group of friends that he's, he's, and they, yeah, they walk around and tell them to read them. Jack, I just got me like, he must be so hot. A sweater under under a denim jacket and it's sunny out. Yeah, well, you know So I mean sometimes you make sacrifice for fashion. I like so I mean I don't know they walk around They like tell jokes and shit and then make a point they make a point of saying oh that was the only other clone

Oh, that was the only other clone. I thought it was weird. So everything's random tight. This, I mean, I'm assuming this scene was added late in production. Maybe the end question mark starts rolling on screen and Will Smith pushes it off and goes, nope, that's the end. No unanswered questions, no sequels, please. I mean, honestly, like, there were parts of this last scene that I thought were affecting in the sense of like, okay, well, now they have this surrogate family, like a thing that none of them

seemingly had had before, but it goes on at least three times longer than you think it's going to. It's a very long scene and at the end it's fading out as Will Smith is explaining to Jr. How he's still tougher than him even though he's older and it's just Will Smith talking. You don't hear any of the characters as it pulls back. And at some point I was like, is he talking to himself? Like, is he just a, was this all in his head and he's a crazy person wandering around this college campus, like talking to his imaginary clone? Feels like they're making all this effort to identify that like, yeah, we get at your clones. What you don't have to tell me again. See you at the fucking movie. I definitely think they added this scene in later.

It looks terrible. It feels really rushed and it feels like it comes out of a different movie. I mean, this is one where I was like, there's something refreshing about the fact that Junior is just going to try to live a normal life now. Although, he's going to college and they're like, here's your new identity, new passport, new social security card, and I'm like, how did he get into that? So that any of that stuff. Like did he enroll with ecologists, junior R-clone?

Like what? At first. Yeah, because this scene is supposed to take place six months after everything else happened. So what have they been doing the past six months? Yeah, I mean, probably teaching about all the pop culture that he never got to see, because Clive Owen wouldn't let him. So like they watched all the all the Marvel movies. Look, this is a movie called Bad Boys 2. Wow. Now there's some stuff in it that's not great. They do drive through a shanty town, but if you can ignore that. We're gonna watch all the best movies ever made.

Pursuit of happiness, concussion, focus. Yeah. Guys, let's wrap this up. Let's do final judgments. Is this a good, bad movie, a bad, bad movie, a movie you kind of like? I'm gonna be honest. I think I know where Jordan is. She seems to have a great distaste for this movie.

I gotta say, I kinda like it. You know, like the first hour, I thought was pretty solid. That action sequence was great. The middle part, I was pretty bored by when they were started like getting into the moral implications of everything. And I'm like, this movie's not well written enough to make me care about all these characters But then the end was exciting. Yeah, as long as this movie's an action movie. I think it's fun I think Mary Elizabeth Winstead in particular is good and Benedict Wong's good And I think that this movie probably would have played better When the script was written before like we'd already seen the born identity in Looper.

Yeah, but that's what I have to say. What do you guys say? I would, I also was coming down on kind of liked for basically the same reasons, like there's a couple really good action sequences in it. I think it is, it's a pretty dumb plot for a movie and it like almost touches on interesting things, but doesn't quite go all the way there.

But it might just be that my standards are at the usual level for the movies we watched that as soon as I start watching it, and I was like, oh, this isn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. Oh yeah, oh, this action sequence is really good. I was like, okay, this is a solid, like, I don't know, I would say like two and a half star movie, something like that, which would be, which to me is like, it's a Saturday, I'm sick, this comes on TNT. Okay, I'm gonna watch it. Yeah. I think it's a movie I kind of like actually. I, it's just whole time, Jordan, I thought you were gonna get really mad at us for saying

that I kind of like it. Let's do. But then I remember at the end of the movie in House Dilly and how much it made me laugh when I saw the final Fresh Prince. It doesn't, it takes itself to seriously in certain parts, but the action sequences are pretty solid. I think that this movie could have starred, you know, any number of people. I think that they wanted Mel Gibson at one point. I could see like a Bruce Willis or something like that. Like I'm fine with it. I kind of like it. Yeah, I like it. Whatever. Yeah, I mean, I think I'm with with all you guys. It's I think that when the action scenes are moving and it's

pretty fun. I I actually I had a actually thought Will Smith was pretty fun in this movie. I thought Mario Lisbon the Winstead was fun. I thought Clive Owen was like a good creepy skeleton. And yeah, I don't know. Maybe I was like it was both a scapist, but also it made me think about the world a little bit, it made me sad, so cool. No, I wonder if we, so I watched this on my computer. So I didn't see it in the like 120 frames per second that it was supposed to be projected in. And I, did you guys see it that way?

Or couldn't tell or no? I don't, I mean, is that something that's possible on like normal televisions? Like I, it looks like a normal movie to me. And honestly, Elliot, I would meant to say something about this, but I forgot. I wonder whether like the, you know, it's not a great movie, but the outsized critical rejection of this movie.

I wonder if it was because it was done in that high frameframe rate that everyone seems to hate. Oh yeah. Well actually I when I watch it last night but I watch it in Peter Jackson's screening room. It's wellington New Zealand so I'm allowed in. Oh sure of course and now so that's the screenroom where everything is 120 frames per second and also they just insert CGI hobbits into every movie. Uh huh, yep. So you thought for this whole time that he had a sidekick who is a hobbit? It's, well, it's weird because every movie comes every every movie watch there. It's actually twice as long as the original.

It's split into three even though there's no real reason to. So you watch the Gemini Man trilogy and you're like, is it's weird that Junior and Will Smith are doing this song about washing the dishes? Makes sense though, it was in the book, Gemini Man the book. By Gemar, our mankin. All right, and we made, I should have said Gem and I mankin.

Yeah, next time. I think if you, if nothing else, I think our listeners owed themselves to watch that Cart of Hania action sequence Yeah, yeah, I mean yeah wait till it's free somewhere, but yeah, yeah, I mean yeah I mean or that were I don't know do or don't I don't know it's but it this reminded me a little bit of our Do little experience where I went into it being like this is gonna be nuts and then I was like all right This is you know, it's just a movie. Yeah, and we made it through without Elliot ever singing send in the clones

So it's a win for all of us Now now now I now I the idea comes in. Why couldn't you done that earlier? Hi, I'm James hosted minority corner, which is a podcast that's all about intersectionality It's hosted by James with a guest host every week Discussing all sorts of wonderful issues nerdy and political pop culture black queer feminism race sexuality news You're gonna learn your history. They're self-empowerment and it's told by what feels like your best friend. Why should someone listen to Minority Corner? Why not? Oh my god, free stuff.

There's not free stuff. The listeners of Minority Corner will enjoy some necessary LOLs, but mainly a look at what's happening in our world through a colorful lens. People will get the perspective of marginalized communities. I feel heard, I feel seen. Like you said, you need to understand how to be more proactive in your community, and this is a great way

to get started. Join us every Friday on Max Fun or wherever you get your podcast. Man, we're the corner. Because together we're the majority. Hi, this is Rachel McLeary. Hello, this is Griffin McLeary. And this is wonderful. It's a podcast that we do as we are married and how's the ad going so far?

Because I think it's going very good. We talk about things we like every week on Lensays. One time Rachel talked about Pumper and Nickelbread. It was so tight, you cannot afford to miss Cher talking about this sweet brown bread. We also talk about music and poems and, you know, weather. There was one... Oh, weather.

One time Rachel talked about Baby Beluga, this song for like 14 minutes, and it just really blew my hair back. So check us out on MaximumFun.org. It's a cool podcast with chill vibes. Amber is the color of our energy. Is what all the items reviews say? They will now.

Hey guys, here's a quick word from Squarespace, one of our beloved sponsors. With Squarespace, you of our beloved sponsors. With Squarespace, you can create a beautiful website to blog or publish content, sell products and services of all kinds, and much, much more. Squarespace does this by giving you a 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 and free and secure hosting. So go 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. Hey Dan, I had an idea for a website and I was wondering if Squarespace could help me with that. What do you think? Go on. Sure, let's hear it. Okay, here's the problem. You live in the United States.

Your clone is in a laboratory in Hungary. How are you going to send it to you? Well, sendintheclones.com. Sends clones to you from anywhere, to anywhere. That's right. Sending the clones is the sends clones to you from anywhere to anywhere. That's right. Send in the clones is the top clone delivery service getting your clone from whatever back to tank. It was bred in to your home. And you'll remember the name send in the clones.com because of the jingle. Send in the clones send in those clones send me my clones.com. But the URL is not send

me my clones.com. It's actually send in the clones.com. But the URL is not send me my clones.com. It's actually send in the clones.com. Please disregard the first part of the jingle. It's send in the clones.com. Now, are you whether or I think there's some edits I could suggest to you. I mean, I paid Alan Mankin to write it. So I feel like i can't really afford to get a new one right now okay well our second uh... sponsor for today show is express vpn now you know that uh... express vpn can protect your privacy and security online but did you also know you can use it to unlock movies and shows that are only available in other countries say you uh... want to watch your rick and more the but that are only available in other countries. Say you want to watch your Rick and Morty, but it's only available in Netflix, France, or say you're a big Will Smith

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smart TVs, and more. So you can watch what you want on a personal device or on the big screen wherever you are. So visit our special link right now at expressvpn.com slash flop and get an extra three months of express VPN for free. Support the show, watch what you want, and protect yourself with express VPN at expressvpn.com slash flop. It's crazy that, or amazing, I guess, we're crying, whichever air Smith title you want to use, that our screens have gotten so small that the TV is now the big screen.

It used to be the little screen and movies were the big screen. Now TV is the big screen and phones are so small. Is this another Andy Rooney bit? Is that what's going on? Speaking of people whose names sound kind of like Andy Rooney, Randy Newman just came in with another jingle. For sending the clones.com.

Randy, you want to hit it? Sometimes you got clones and you got a cinema round. Send in the clones.com. Because you got a friend in me. Every single one of your impressions is merging. Hey guys, I think you got some jumbo trons you want to read? Yeah we do. Stu you want to go first or should I go first? I can go for what you go first. I gotta find it. Okay, this message is

for Cody Mason and it's from Gail Kelly and it says, we had to postpone our wedding due to COVID. You're quarantining with your future in-laws and you still manage to make me laugh each day. I love you and I can't wait to get married as soon as we get the chance. I hope this message makes you smile and maybe you'll even get a special Elliott song out of it. Here's to more years of love and good bad movies. That's a very sweet sentiment. I don't appreciate being drag-ooned into singing a song, but I'm gonna do it anyway. Wow, the first time he's ever been at a loss for words. Oh wow. There's not a, they didn't give me a lot of hopes. Anyway, oh, oh. So,

you're in a house with your in-laws and you can't get married right now. I guess there's only one thing to do and that's to go to sendinaclones.com. That's right. Sendinaclones.com. So is that work as a jingle or? Yeah. Yeah, I mean for today's purposes, yeah.

Okay, how about this? I'll do it in the in the persona of Gail who sent the message. Mm hmm. Hey, Cody, thanks for all the stuff that you're doing right now. We'll get married someday. I promise at sendin the clones.com. Oh, did I forget to mention you can get married at the site also. Okay. Oh, wow.

All of the clones are ordained. Yeah. What what what what what what what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, what, you Japan. Join hosts Ian McAfee and Mark Heath for a highly casual and hilarious look at the politics, philosophy and production of anime. Just search for anomagnorant like ignorant and anime smushed together in iTunes, slash In iTunes slash wherever and subscribe. That's a N I M E G N O R A N T Jew it. Hey guys, I got another another song for Gail Cody. Uh-huh. Yep. So go for it. Okay Sometimes things seem sad Sometimes you're gonna get mad. Cause COVID canceled your wedding. And I'm betting COVID took the deposit and put it into its bank account.

But hey, keep looking for a brighter day because love is stronger than viruses. That's right. Love is stronger than viruses. The math works out, put a virus in love in a jar and shake it up so they fight and the love Of course sometimes love can give you a virus, but hey, that's okay Because love is stronger than viruses and the greatest medicine is love love from below or above It's love stronger than viruses and in the clones.com. No, that's not medically accurate. Okay, Elliot, we teased our live show earlier.

Would you like to give more full information about the live show that is happening if you are listening to this on the day it's released, it is happening tonight. That's right. This episode comes out Saturday June 6th. Correct. Well, today is Saturday June 6th. If you're listening on the day of release, end tonight Saturday June 6th at 6pm Pacific 9pm Eastern. That's right. 9pm Eastern 6pm Pacific. The flop house will be coming to you live over the internet. It's just like if you went to go see the flop house because they went to your city, but now nobody has to go anywhere. Will we broadcast in from our houses direct to your house? What are we going to be talking about? Well, a little movie called Howard T. Duck. That's right. Actually, the movie is called Howard, The Duck. I shortened it a little

bit, but it didn't save a lot of time because then I had to explain it. That's right. George Lucas' classic story based on the Steve Gerber, Gene Colin Comics, about a duck from another dimension where ducks have boobs, who gets dropped into Lea Thompson's lap and has to fight alongside Tim Robbins against Jeffrey Jones. That's right, it's Howard the Duck. I haven't seen it since I was a kid and yet clearly I remember more of it than I should, I'm excited to watch it again. How do I watch this?

And why are we doing it? Well, we're doing it to interview you, the listeners and viewers. But also, we're doing it for charity. We're going to have a list of charities that you can donate to during the show. It's gonna be on our website. I'll give you the information for that in a second. And if you donate, you'll be entered into Raffles. That's right, Raffles.

We'll explain that in a minute or rather Dan will. For more information, go to theflophousepodcast.com. That'll tell you how to go see it or I'll tell you right now. Go to our YouTube channel, youtube.com slash c. Slash the Flophouse podcast. Go to theflophousepod youtube.com slash c slash the flop house podcast, go to the flop house podcast.com, it's all there, go to the flop house Facebook page, all the information is there as well. Dan, tell us

about some of these raffles, huh, is that raffles the famous literary, uh, like, the gentleman cat, Berkler, well, yet again, you took the joke right out of my mouth. So I won't talk about that, but I will say, I want, I want to backtrack a little bit. I will say that, yes, as this is for charity in the sense that we'll be asking for donations, but it is entirely free to watch. We're just trying to, you know, use the power of a free to watch live stream to get some money out there, to some worthy causes. And yes, if you donate to any of the charities that are suggested on the website or, you know, any charity basically send us your receipt. If

it's over $20, this is just, this is just mostly actually to keep the work down on my end. So I'm not delused by the receipts. But also to encourage generosity, $20 or more. Hey, that's what you pay for a ticket anyway. Get entered into the raffle and you will get, if you win, we're going to pick out three people to get price packs of some flop house merch that was to be our touring merch. We don't know when we're going to tour because of the pandemic, but you can have it early if you win. And this is new merch.

This is merch that has not been served on Flophouse Tours before. It's never been beautiful merch. Never been sold to anyone before. So that's today. Clearly collecting dust in my basement. Oh, yeah, it's going to be real good and dusty. So that's Saturday, June 6th at 6 p.m. Pacific 9 p.m. Eastern. You want to hear us talk about how are the duck?

Yes, you do. Are we going to have presentations beforehand like at a live show? You bet show we're going to with slides and everything. That's going to be at youtube.com slash c slash the flop house podcast or if you don't remember all that from information, just go to theflophousepodcast.com or our Facebook page to find out the information and we'll be explaining more about the charity stuff during the show itself. Just remember, if you go to the YouTube page and you don't see it, refresh the page and the video should come up. That's a little tip from a pro.

That's right. Professional YouTube watcher. I do want to say, you called it George Lucas's Howard the Duck. I want to make it clear that Lucas produced Howard the Duck. It was, of course, directed by Willard Hieck, who wrote American graffiti and more American graffiti, Temple of Doom, radio land murders. He also wrote and directed Best Defense, the movie where Eddie Murphy was added after bad test screenings to a was added after bad test screenings to a deadly more comedy about a defense contractor. And Howard the Duck looks to have ended his directing career, that is his last directing

credit. So. No, but you're right, Dan George Lucas notoriously hands off when he produces things. I'm sure he just slapped his name on it. No, I don't. I look, I just want Willard Huck to get the credit he deserves. Yeah, the end of the line out. So that's our show then. What do we do next on this, Dan?

Next we answer letters from listeners or just read them. Hey, hey, send us a letter. Maybe with a clone in it. Send in the clones.com. Great. This first letter is. I can see I can see Jordan marking time codes in her head. Cutting all of us. Yeah, should I just be should I be clapping? Should be clapping. She's wielding her power with an iron fist. So Gus last name with held.

Right. Gus Mansant. Hey, peaches. Oh, wow. Long time listener, first time writer. I'm in my early 20s, and I frequently lost when it comes to the references used on your show. Years of listening and re-listing to the podcast have made it. Wait, hold on.

This early 20s guy's n' hip to raffles the gentleman cat for the... Well, I don't think that's of our time either, Elliot. If you're a- Yeah, true. A vision out of a- Victor- Victoriana, maybe you'll- Anyway, I'm in my early 20s and I'm frequently lost when it comes to the references used on the show.

Years of listening and re-listing to the podcast have made it feel like I have watched some of the frequently-respiranced films just through Osmosis, but I've actually sought out some movies because of how often they come up on the show. I'm wondering what you all would include in a Flop House Essentials list, a list of movies, television, or other media that are frequently referenced, or just a good starting point for understanding your humor. Some examples that come to mind are Robocop, Nightcourt, and the Road Warrior. Keep flopping in the free world Gus. Well, you know, ducktails comes to mind. Of course, the classic ducktails, the cartoon part of the new wave of Disney television cartoons. The Disney afternoon. Yeah, based on the works of Karl

Barx. Do I recommend you seek out? What else? I don't know. Are there any movies that are essential to understanding the things I like? Don't talk about any movie individually that often. Yeah, I don't know. This is a tough one. No, it's Castle Freak. I would recommend watching Castle Freak watch the special edition that has all the scenes, not this one that most people have watched. Castle Freak directed by Stuart Gordon, RIP, a king, a Colombo maybe. What do you got out of it? I think if you can go watch old episodes of 60 minutes to see Andy Rooney in them, and I guess watch Tang on cash First of estres alone, and I guess watch I don't know

Tang on cash is a good one. That's basically sums up everything we Yes, yeah, exactly. I think so. I don't know. I think it's's, here's what I would say, much as when I was a lad and I was watching Mystery Science Theater and I didn't understand some of their references, I just looked up, I did some research and back then I used books, not the internet to find out what that thing was and I watched it. So just kind of like, don't look for a quick solution.

Pick up when a reference is particularly intriguing to you be like, I need to find out what that means. Sometimes it might just be a, it just, I mean, sometimes it's an ad jingle from when we were kids and it won't be worth looking at. Save some time, it don't. You know, this exercise has made me feel almost older than anything else, but now that Dan, that says more about your physical being than any kind of exercise like this made you feel so old.

Jordan, I'm glad to believe that you have listened to the show before. Is there any reference you find that we make a lot that is baffling? I'm not baffled by any of the references. I've been listening to the show for much longer than I've been on as an associate producer. So I think, yeah, your advice to Google is your friend. If it sounds like a something cool I would definitely look it up and maybe dig into Randy Newman's back catalog. I don't know Is there was there ever a time was there ever Tim?

You remember listening to the show and you were like what are they talking about? You used to talk about theater a lot more of course now, you know No one can really go out and see a show in Broadway But I definitely remember in the before times, Elliot, talking about different stage plays that I had never heard of before. That's also a consequence of my having children and never getting to go to the theater anymore.

I used to see so many shows, so many amazing shows. And what was the last play I saw? I don't even remember. Maybe I never saw a play. Maybe I dreamed it all. A beautiful theater dream. Mm-hmm. Okay. Uh, show. Oh, no, wait. It was Matilda. Okay. I saw that. Yeah. The musical. All right. Uh, and it's, and you're talking about the stage play, not not the book, right? No, no. I saw the book sitting on a stage.

That doesn't answer. That's not a stage play that all i'm sorry that last when i saw is probably then twelfth night the book sitting on a stage yeah maybe was hamilton by ronchern out was sitting on a stage and he's just keeping books i got a look back to find when there's one that was actual person people Oh, it was probably the Adam's family book of Charles Adams cartoons Okay, no, you know what I think you know, I think it was wicked the book Sure, these were all books on home. Yeah, it's not their book. Okay. Yeah, it is

Hey, this is a fun game for listeners if you can think of a play that isn't a book I don't know go tell to the Marines, you know, I think you know the last one I like was like the monster squad right in a note to the Marines The I think it was probably to see the screen play of to see was sitting on the stage real stretch now Okay, um, this next scene, this next scene. You know what, oh, it was, it was Blue Man Group. Oh, wow. This is going.

The book. Okay, um, this next letter is from Adam Lasting with Held, who writes. Adam Driver. Dear Flawpouse, I started a podcast about the TV show Home Improvement called Home in Podcast, but now everyone keeps asking me to hang their shelves, slash refinish their hardwood floor, and assuming I'm a conservative. What should I do?

Question mark, ex-combations, boys? I can't say the voice. I tried to do the grunt. I'll try to do it. Do the caveman gr brunch or whatever it is. It's pretty good. Not bad. I got one more power. Okay, what about this one? This. I'm the baby. Gotta love me. Oh yeah, you did that. Hey, do you guys remember when the youngest son got like super into new

metal? That was really. Yeah, and you're the end of the run. He turned really got so. So the problem that the that the writer is having is that their home improvement podcast, people think that he is an actual home improvement guy. Or you think he's Tim Allen? Because who else would want to do a podcast about home improvement? Or. Oh, yeah, I mean, it's like that's a brand of this podcast. Yeah, I like this is obviously a podcast driven in large part by nostalgia and the problem he seems to be running into is that Tim Allen has turned out to be

not a great human. Yeah. Wait, the Tim Allen who went to jail for cooking sales. Yeah, the television star, the Tim Allen, they're read it out all of his friends. Oh, okay. Well, yeah, that's the one that Dan liked, right? What? That Tim Allen? Yeah, I think so. Yeah. Yeah. No, the only one I like when you just embodying voice that does bustle out your. Yeah, here's when Galaxy Quest came out, Dan was like, oh, just do some commercials

about how great Michigan is. That's what I want to hear from you. Yeah, when Galaxy Quest came out, Dan's like, what's up with all these lame actors that aren't Tim Allen that are in this movie? Some sort of Rick Man, what is this all about? Cloned them in some sort of Jim and I man situation. They could all be played by Tim Allen.

And the future all restaurants are Tim Allen. Anyway. That's a reference. That's a demolition man reference that you've rolled into a Jim and I man reference like a turduckin of references. But it's a reference to Tim Allen being in Galaxy Quest in the future of Demolition Man.

But he's also a restaurant anyway. With some Gemini Man sprinkled on it. Interesting. Yeah. Last letters from Jen Last Day with Hell, this is very short. This is regarding Canadians having sex. I believe we asked whether they did it. When was that? What possible context will we have that?

I have no idea. Jen, last name with hell. Caravan Mouti, maybe. And Jen says, absolutely not. So there you have it. Canadians do not have sex. Okay. Somebody update that Wikipedia article.

Drake is a Canadian and I'm pretty sure Drake flux. Okay. Well, I don't know. critical. Drake is the Canadian and I'm pretty sure Drake Fox so. Okay, well, I don't know this person knows everybody can. I don't know. Drake seems pretty busy cheering at women's basketball games. I don't think he has time for that sort of thing. I mean Rick Moranis has kids, so I guess yeah. Jordan, your eye roll when I brought up Drake's WNBA fandom was fantastic. Well, that's letters. That's our segment called letters. I guess I guess we need to ask a question.

We need to ask does Leslie Nielsen have any kids? That's the limit we'll find out for sure if Canadians have sex or not. Yeah. Hey, let's recommend movies. Movies that you can watch if you like instead of Jim and I man or in addition to, we don't control you. What, why don't I go and recommend I I watched, uh, I'll tell you Dan, you're gonna recommend Galaxy Quest, but they're all Tim Allen. It's a pretty good movie Galaxy Quest. Uh, yeah, of course it is. Um, no, yeah, no objections there. Uh, let's see. Oh,

I remember. So I watched, um, so Raising Kane is a Brian DePaul movie that was greeted with great division When it came out and I remember it's also it's also the inspiration for a fast food chain that sells chicken fingers. Oh I watched as I think it's I think it's localized in like Kentucky maybe I'm I watch I watched this movie also as a young man, and I thought it was bonkers and kind of fun, but I could see definitely why it was disliked. And then recently, there was a fan edit, I believe it was, that re-sequence the movie, per Brian DePalma's original script and original intention for the movie.

The movie had been re-sequenced by the studio. And he liked it so much that it became the official director's cut. And I watched that and the movie is still a very strange overheated movie but maybe a good version of that. Like my favorite like he's a very divisive director and I don't I understand if you don't like him and there's some stuff that is gross in his filmography, but I like him the best when he's taking absolutely absurd thriller plots and raising them raising the absurdity through like pure cinema and this movie has a crazy climax that plays on

three planes of height simultaneously. Like you see what's going on on three levels. And just as like an exercise in filmmaking, it's quite something to see. So that's my recommendation. See the recut version, if you can, of Raising Cain. Okay.

That movie was on, that movie was on like, well, when I first moved to a new house when I was a kid, it was like the first time I remember moving to a new house, my parents got a satellite dish. So we had never had cable or anything, and then all of a sudden we had a satellite dish which had like everything. We would have like movie channels that would play

the same movie over and over and over and over all day long. And Raising Kane was one of the first movies that I watched on one of those things. So I remember seeing it a lot, but since it was constantly cycling, I like never knew where it began or ended. It was just always raising. Well, also also the movie jumps around in chronology and does weird dream sequences. So it would be very baffling. You're talking about that way. It made watching Third Rock from the Sun very strange for me because I was so used to raising cane

as John Lithgow's main credit. I'm going to recommend a movie called Extra Ordinary. It's a spooky comedy starring Maeve Higgins and featuring a bunch of other people in Ireland. It's about some ghost hunters and evil wizards and it's funny and will for taste funny and it manages to be like sweet but not overly saccharine. It's funny and weird and though it does have a fair amount of special effects, I don't feel like sometimes a special effects driven comedy can be, I don't know, like it'll be less funny for me, but this one worked. I liked it. I'd recommend it extra ordinary. Extraordinary. Okay, Jordan, what have you got? So I wanted to recommend a black film because this week has been really trying for the African-American community in America and I wanted to recommend

1991's daughters of the dust from director Julie Dash. It's a beautifully shot beautifully directed. I really like it. I think that you'll if you haven't't, watched it before. It's a great film to kind of has a quality to it. One thing that I really like about it is it's just black people in a time period that we don't really look at from that angle and you know American entertainment. Just black people minding their black-ass business. I love it. Put it on the poster. I'm going to recommend a Japanese movie. That's right guys. We're continuing my strain lately of rediscovering Japanese cinema. I saw recently movie called Funeral Parade of Roses.

It's from 1969. It's directed by Toshio Matsumoto and stars the performer known as Peter, who you may know as the fool character from Ron. Kirikasa was King Lear Story, but funeral parade of roses, it's kind of like part retelling of edipus wrecks, part retelling of alabadi, part documentary about the 1960s, what they called in Japan, the gay boy subculture,

which was kind of the very early stirrings in Japan of transsexualism and homosexual identity over there and part kind of Jean-Luc Codard style new wave collage of styles and it's in some ways about the way that left wing art and this kind of new for Japan kind of like exploration of sexual polarity was merging together but it's also kind of a suspense movie where you have to puzzle out the backstory, and it's just really interestingly put together, and the photography is great. Like the images are super sharp and exciting, and there's also it's a formal tricks with editing and things like that that are real neat, and it's just a real real it's just a really unique movie. So funeral parade of roses a movie that is a real experience. I'll tell you that. Wonderful. Four movies. Four movies. Four action blockbuster. All on one DVD your local video store. Racing Kane, extra ordinary,

daughters of the dust and funeral parade of roses now available in one set. Fred, chill factor. Guaranteed, intertarget. They would have those DVDs would be like, it would be like chill factor, hard target, the fugitive. And I'd be like, had would be like chill factor, hard target, the fugitive. And I'd be like, had the future to get thrown onto this thing.

Like, yeah, that's what you call a lost leader, Elliott. Yeah, I guess so. Be like back to the future, losing screw balls. Yeah. Like, why did they, why did they throw these movies in such a classic? Excelliate. I guess so. I'm gonna throw these movies on camera. See in class, Excel.

I guess so. Well, that's our show. Hey guys, great to be here. Great to see you. Jordan, thanks for being here. Isn't it great to be here, Dan? Jordan, thanks so much for being here. I wanna apologize in person and on the podcast

for the way we consistently forget to credit you at the end of the podcast. But we hope you enjoyed your time as a member of the Peach's on-camera microphone as opposed to what you're usually just backstage. This has been so much fun. Thanks, guys. Hey, one last appeal to watch us on the live stream tonight, and even if you don't, you know, donate to a charity. Now's the time. But thank you for listening. We'll be back soon.

For the Flapp House, I've been Dan McCoy. I'm Stuart Wellington. I'm Emily Kaelin, and I'm Jordan Cowley. Bye. Bye. So, Jordan, how many of those send in the clone to think you're gonna cut? All of them. Thank you. All right.

It's good to have somebody on our team. Maximumfund.org. Comedy and culture. Artists owned. Audience supported.