The Flop House - The Flop House: Episode #77 - Skyline

Episode Date: March 27, 2011

0:00 - 0:33 - Introduction and theme.0:34 - 30:55 - We discuss the Battle: Los Angeles prequel, Skyline.  What, it's not a prequel?30:56 - 34:20 - Final judgments.34:21 - 53:05 - Donations and Flop House Movie Mailbag53:06 - 56:27 - The sad bastards recommend. 56:28 - 57:26 - Plugs, goodbyes, theme, and outtakes.

In this episode we discuss skyline, so named because that's the only part of Los Angeles you get to see in the film. Hey everyone and welcome to the flop house, I'm Dan McCoy. Yeah I'm Stewart Wellington. And I'm Elliot Kaylen. We're all back together but first of all all, to address the casual gum chewing way. Stuart puts you. Yeah, I'm gonna try that out. What do you think? It's you're not chewing gum on my five days. I get the feeling that you're a cool guy who doesn't care what other people think. It's because I'm not wearing sunglasses. You're going to just gush. Everyone is listening. Just put it away. But if I just do this the whole time.

That would be bad, too. I shouldn't put it on my phone. Yeah. No, you shouldn't stick the gum on your phone. Well, guys, thanks for doing this before the podcast started. Settling up. We're really getting out of the gate with a bang tonight. All right. You've been away in France. That is true. Moan Sherry.

Spying, I assume. Moan Rare. Yes, I was spying, I was spying. I thought you were doing bad movie research for the podcast. I was. I was seeing what bad movies are making a splash in France and drive angry 3D advertised everywhere. Yeah.

There are ads all over the place in France. What's it called in France? Drive angry 3D. Oh, okay. That's the thing. They're not all the Americans. Drive a trist. Right?

That's, I don't know Chwa day. Yeah, I not a lot of a lot of American movies and friends. They did not they did not translate the titles For instance the King speech they do translate but true grit Just is called true grit. Well, yeah, I don't think there's no French equivalent for grit. I have to assume there is now there Over there a week. Well, there's a French word for true. Yeah, I assume. Great. What?

Foray. What's that? True. What's a true about? It's just true. Yeah, but I don't know what anyone would have guessed. Yeah, this is a lot of various. The classic flop house bit, we don't know French.

Hey, hey guys. Why are we so off our game? It's because we're doing this during the day. We're doing it not at night after a long day of work, but instead during the day. We're relaxed and we're not focused. I just woke up. And then you woke up to one of the more,

one of the dollar movies of like... Despite the monsters. despite the absence of a brain-eating monsters. Now, Elliot, we watched Skyline, which was not based on the chili of the same name. What was it actually? What was the story of this recommended by Elliot because Elliot was chomping at the bit to watch Skyline? No, not at all. I was- Do I not recall correctly? Did not suggest it and was dubious at best. I believe it was Daniel McCoy. Do you want to watch the Surveyor's Apprentice? I was more interested in watching Sorcerer's Apprentice.

Yeah. But I mostly I just didn't want to watch Cats and Dogs the Return of Kitty Galore. Right. Pussy Galore is not what- Every time I say the title, I have to stop for a second and stop myself from saying pussy galore Yeah, you have to stop and remember that kids don't know what pussy is nope But they know that kitty and pussy are the same words so the joke still works for them. Yep. Anyway

Skyline, huh? Well, it's like clover field but with aliens and they don't leave the house Basically, we're with a bunch of unlikable young people and also- Played by a couple of unlikable television stars. And also what's his name from Dexter, isn't it? Yeah, I like to play it angel. I just call him angel, because we don't know. And I was gonna call him Dexter, is that?

It's a different character. That's a different guy. But I was, because he's in Dexter, that doesn't, yeah, but Michael C Hall plays plays decks. Okay, we'll figure it out as the podcast. Who plays Skyline in this movie? But basically, a bunch of a bunch of people are in a high rise apartment building in LA when that's basically empty. That's basically empty. It's new. There's not a lot of people in the building. Aliens attack and these people proceed to

not leave the building very much. They kind of just hang out in their room. They try to leave once in a monster attacks them and they have to run back inside. Yeah. And it's like this, this could have been a very exciting movie is happening outside of their building while they sit around and wait for it to end. Until the end when they finally get out of the apartment and there's aliens and monsters and airplanes exploding and their brains are being sucked out of their heads and all that manages to still be super boring. Well, until like the craziest shit happens at the very end of the movie

but I think we should save that a little later. Okay, yeah, the ending is this is a movie that is like an hour and a half long and really it should be the first like 25 minutes of a different movie. And the movie starts getting interesting. Farts getting interesting. I was wondering if you guys heard that. The movie Farts getting interesting, like literally 40 seconds before the credits roll. Yeah.

It's really, and the whole time the movie is like, do you think that's setting it up for a sequel to the end to line two. I think maybe I mean every movie nowadays maybe a sequel. I mean the King's speech I assume was set up for a sequel like every movie I've just seen they're gonna do a sequel of it or a reboot. Well they gave that King a number at the end of his name already so you know that's just that's tipping your hand. Yeah. They can do prequels then. Yeah. So there are like babies in a castle? Yeah, king babies.

It's castle babies, actually, but that's okay. Really? I'm working on my stream, but it's a treatment right now. I'm going to give you the treatment. I was surprised. We're watching this movie and apparently we were not watching Battle Los Angeles in theaters now. No, we were watching Skyline, which is, I guess, the special effects demo reel for Battle Los Angeles. I guess we should. There was some sort of...

Brouhaha. Yeah, there was a civil suit. Sure, the makers of Battle Los Angeles sued the brother Strauss, which is the irritating name of the filmmakers of Skyline, who did special effects on Battle Los Angeles and sued them, thinking that they had stolen some of the Battle LA effects. Well, because they worked on Battle Los Angeles, right? Yeah. And then it was settled, out of court.

So. I think it was settled by, they must have shown the judge both movies and the judges like you really fucking arguing over this. Over these pieces of garbage. Yeah, so they settled it. So that was a piece of trivia that will be of interest to know. Well, but it's interesting because this does feel like a hastily made movie thrown together to take advantage of resources that they have. It feels like those Roger Cormin movies were like he had a gorilla suit for one movie. And a castle. And a castle.

So it's like, look, we've got these for another two days. Let's write another gorilla castle movie. And then the movie already sounds so much better than the one we just saw. And that's how we came up with gorilla castle freak. That's the sequel to King Gorilla. Gorilla Castle Creek. And Gorilla in the family. An invisible Gorilliac.

But it does, it feels like a quickly made movie to take it. Like it almost feels like an exploitation movie that has a super high special effects budget. I know understanding of what exploitation is. Of what's exciting about a movie. Yeah, they had a full weekend with a department building before people start moving Everybody let's come over I got all this liquor that we'll use as props throughout the movie We'll drink it party and shoot this fucking crazy moon and I'll just add in the monsters later

So just make up stuff and pretend it's beautiful. Imagine it's beautiful. Imagine the tentacle is attacking you. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, don't say alien at any point, because we haven't decided what the aliens would think will be like. This could still be a devil's movie. So that's the thing. Yeah, there could be a devil in the elevator. Spaceships come down from the sky.

It could be almost anything. Techno-organic monsters that are eating people and never does anyone say aliens or yeah, or even monsters they just say like those things they that thing one guy makes a Bible reference to the rapture yeah yeah because the first thing the spaceships do is they hover over LA and project a blue light which hypnotizes people into walking towards them and then they they make their face old, Vainian shit. Yeah, it makes their face Vainian,

their eyes go pupilous. And then the people are sucked up into the mall of the spaceship, pulled into the sky. All right, well, let's explore. All right, the Julienne more movie. What was it? The forgotten, something like that?

Yeah. Let's explore the ammo of these aliens because it makes not a bit of sense. The ammo of the aliens? Yes, the baboons. So the aliens come down. Sure. They shine this bright blue light.

Yes, it's almost like they're checking if people are drunk. Which draws people out of their houses, I guess. All the easier for them to use their giant sky vacuums to pull them into the sky. Yes, where they then take their brains out. Yeah, but also I don't know, but for some reason the bright blue light creates these black veiny things underneath the skin of the people and does things for their eyes. So there's some sort of genetic change that's going on there that comes into play basically not at all. Well, very briefly Eric Belfartore is stronger to Eric Belfore.

Our hero is a very loose definition. Horseface, horseface mustache. He can lift Angel up with one hand at one point, and it's kind of implied that because he looked into the blue light but wasn't taken by the aliens, then now he's like super strong, or there's something different about him and focus his like his inner alien powers. Yeah, he's like iron fist. Yeah, you wouldn't like him if he gets angry or something. And that kind of comes into play in the last 25 seconds, 40 seconds of the movie.

Right. But otherwise, you just every now and then he's got veins all over him and you don't know why. But why these aliens are here? Not, not ever made clear. They come down and what they do is these aliens take humans' brains and put them in the place of their own brains that already look like human brains. So I'm not really sure, like they already had brains. I don't know whether I don't know if they're eating the brains where they get like electrical energy from the brains or something, but you'll see you'll see a monster Will with a tentacle it'll shut it'll suck a brain out of someone's head and then put it into its own head

Yeah, and then just walk away, but it seems like that it seems like a lot of these aliens already have brains Like are we to believe that those are brains that came from people that were killed earlier in the movie? We just didn't see that. Maybe, or like they like have factory brains that have a limited warranty. They've got to replace them with better brains. Maybe this has all happened before in human history and these brain batteries have finally run out.

Maybe they're going back to their brains. One of them stargates. They might have picked up a load of bad brains, backs, and then they use the band's bad brains. Right. Abby normal. But yeah, it's the alien. Well, here's why the aliens are never explained.

Because we're seeing a street level view of an alien invasion. Oh, that's what they're doing. It's a real amazing gimmick. And this is something I was talking to you guys during the movie about, that this sounds like a really cool premise. Like, it's an an alien invasion, but we're just gonna see it from the point of view of like a couple scattered people like Yeah, like neither living dead Don't face on scrubs

What scrubs do it nowadays? Scrubsie was in this film and a guy from scrubs and and scrubsie scrubsie scrubsie Mc it? And scrubs he scrubs he scrubs he scrubs he scrubs and but like what the the Outcome of it is that the characters have no idea what's going on but not in an interesting like ship We don't know what's going on, but we got to get out of here more of a like what's going on outside? I don't know man Okay, and any you see all these fighter jets come and attack the main mothership, but You don't have no idea who's flying these planes. Like we don't really care.

Well, not only are these characters watching it from like the window of this building, they're watching it through a telescope that is hooked up to a video camera. Like it goes to the TV so they're watching the TV out the windows. It's another level of removal from the action. They're watching characters watch TV of the action. Yeah. Yeah. And it's and there's this one like there's a I will say maybe the filmmakers worked well. But there's one part where these fighter jets are all escorting a stealth bomber that's going towards this mothership and the stealth bomber is almost there it's almost making it and it's fighter jet is being blown up. Yeah it's a whole dogfight in the sky a hot dog fight even.

Yeah and you're like like a fight and you're like man I wish I knew who was inside that bomber because it looks like he's having an exciting movie experience right now. Yeah Randy Quaid's probably a man. He's a crop duster. They're not going to I mean he does get to use a fighter jet. variance right now. Yeah, Randy Kuwait is probably a man. So he's a crop duster. Uh-huh. They're not going to, I mean, he doesn't get to use a fighter jet. It's probably Bill Pullman. Okay. Bill Paxton? No. Pullman. It's probably Bill Paxton. Okay. He's probably a love Pullman bread. Sure. Bill Polton. Yeah.

Um, probably other names. Any other names? George Lipton. Yeah. If he's filming an episode of mouse curfee's theater. Charlie Lipton's iced tea. Anyway, point is skip jump jack. They blow up the mothership with a big nuke. They also they nuke this mothership which is in the heart of Los Angeles and not far from where our heroes are and the heroes just kind of shake it off like they all look away

from the blast and throw themselves on the ground and I guess the radiation passes over their heads. Like, they're fine. Like bullet time. Yeah, I think. And Angel goes like, and the, and the mother ship falls to the ground and it looks like it's dead and then it turns out it's not and it flies back up again. But for a minute, they're like, Angel's like, this is it.

They know what to do. They know how to stop them. It's like, yeah, just a new weapon. The only weapon in the world is a bunch of nukes. It's a real great plan. Like, I don't know how they didn't think of this one yet. This giant spaceship that was hoovering up human beings is now a giant or radiated wreckage in the middle of one of our bigger cities. Yeah. Awesome.

What's worse at this point? Say what you will about Independence Day. At least they made a big deal about the fact that like throwing a new cat it would be maybe not the greatest thing. Yeah. The, there's also a lot of arguing over, it seems like the characters at times seem to think how the aliens work and don't.

They're like, we gotta get to the marina and get a boat. The aliens aren't over the water. It's like, I mean, I just mean that it's not like the water is a safe place. Yeah, I think you're confusing correlation and causation. I mean, maybe just because there aren't a lot of people out in the water, they can suck up to their brain. They're not actually sucking up seals. But the seal brains are good for their machines. And it doesn't matter because the characters' membranes are way too powerful. The characters never get out

of the building anyway. They just get to the roof It's a most frustrating thing like they they're they there's a time when that like they're about to get out of the building I'm like all right. That's what the movie is gonna start getting cooking no and then like immediately half of the cast dies And they're chased back into the parking garage. It's about to get eaten by monster. Yeah, and Okay, they're not leaving this building. They're also the kind of The big climax of this movie consists of Eric Balfour and his girlfriend running back and forth from different corners of the top of this building and they've been in well well like huge battle goes on above them that we don't see that much of and they fight a monster where it's like this is a

monster that shrugged off bullets and then Eric Balfour starts hitting it with an axe and he was the any punches it to death. But he might have his super vain strength by that point. I think that might be it. I've got a human body. That's true. He does punch it a giant vagina-faced alien with tentacles to death. And that sounds black stuff all over. It sounds way cooler than it actually is. Well, see, I don't know if you caught this,

but that alien was threatening his unborn child. Yeah. And he's just the type of guy where family is the most important thing. It's true. He'll lay it all in the line for a bunch of alien to death for his family. Oh, that's right. And it turns out, we find out earlier in the movie that his girlfriend is pregnant. How do we find that one out, alien?

Well, she gets sick in the morning. Sure. So we know she's pregnant because a woman turns up in the morning. She doesn't know. She doesn't have any thing to drink. And but also she says to him, I'm late. And he goes, what? And she goes, I'm late. I took a test. To a test, I was called a calendar. And it's proof that I am in fact late. And it's called, are you bleeding from the vagina test?

And I, what are you, I forget to do a Stuart, I think my views, but pointed out that like, if you took a test, then you're pregnant. You don't say, you don't say late anymore. Yeah, it's crazy. Oh, man. And we're the, yeah, and it is a boring, and they don't mention the pregnancy that much,

but it occasionally comes up. Like one of the characters starts smoking a cigarette and she goes, I gotta go. The smoke. Let's play the first 20 minutes of the aggressively not defining our heroes. Yes. Then a bunch of lights. Well, we know what we know. Well, in half of our heroes die.

It opens with the lights of one. And they hang around. The lights come frown down from the sky and our heroes wake up and see these lights. Then it starts with a bang. It starts with your son. Yes, and then sky. 15 hours earlier. After the hundred different production companies that are made in this movie have their, it's like, you know, like a Strauss Brothers production brought to you by rogue pictures in

association with hydraulics and and relativity something. Yeah. In accordance with rat pictures. And it's like, you know, when is this movie going to start? So that is like, then we have this company. Yeah, it should be called Rat Tale. Not a lot of, not a lot of effort boobies. Rat Tale, Rat Fink Productions.

In accordance with boobies. Rat Fink of boobies studios. So it's a, they see this blue light one of their number who is an expendable nobody gets sucked up by the aliens that says skyline and big words. Then we jump back 15 hours earlier to when Eric Balfour and his girlfriend. Every TV show on television style. Eric Balfour and his girlfriend show up in LA to meet their friend Scrubs and his wife and Scrubs is a famous something like or rich guy. I did not get any key words and not with special effects or something or movies or

something and he wants. But he didn't work on special effects. He's got the penthouse. He's like a movie star. I don't know. I don't think he's believable as a movie star. No. But he's all jack Stewart. I mean he was's believable as a movie star. No, but he's all jacked Stuart. I mean, he was barely believable as a TV star and he was on a TV show for years. Um, and he's not that jacked. Yeah, one of the things he's more barrel-chested. Yeah. I think the thing that's most interesting is that they they show us this like, you know, this this hard opening, okay? And then it goes back in time, 15 hours, to get us back to the point of the opening of the movie But all that time doesn't give us any more information or make the characters any more likable

All it tells us is that she's pregnant and scrubs cheating on his wife which we could eat all it's all stuff that Could have been revealed during the alien attack. Yeah, and scrubs cheating on his wife That doesn't play into anything. Well, he and his mistress get killed in the car by an alien Oh, I guess we're supposed to feel good about it. But that's the thing. It was yeah, they get killed. And I was like, I guess that's the movie's morality. Well, it was also set up as a total bitch.

Yeah, it's not the movie. The aliens don't like people cheating up. Maybe that's it that the aliens are targeting adulterers to steal their cheating brains. Like Jason Voorhees. Well, that's brains. Like Jason Voorhees. Well, that's just the, yeah. Jason Voorhees is going to turn up for a prolific. Yeah. Why do you think he hides his identity?

Yeah, why do you think his face is almost up? It was learning. By acid after he cheated on his child bride. Child bride. Because he's a little kid. I don't know. I'll work on the story. Come back. That's made about 10 minutes. So it's not, it's a boring movie. It's a, it's a, it's a boring alien invasion movie. It's boring until... Until the very ends when a whole lot of

shit explodes above the roof and then our main character, should we say what happens? Yeah, please. Let's get into it. It's the only interesting thing in the movie. So the main couple, Eric Balfour and the girl and a murmur name and pregnant girl. They fought Naly and he beat up with his hands, but then uh oh, spaceship above them. They start getting sucked into the blue light. As they're floating in the air, they kiss and mid air, which romantic that was a hundred point move. Perfect example of human affection. They go up into this spaceship where there's just like it's kind of like the inside of the spaceship in fire in the sky. Everything in this movie seems to be stolen from another movie. It's like this kind of oily gross technique organic.

Yeah, like a matrix. Yeah, matrix. Where people are just kind of lying around in oil and an alien tentacle keeps picking up random people and pulling their heads off and taking their brains out. And the brains go through a tube that ends up being put into the heads of other things. Now, all the brains go glow blue except for the brain that comes out of Eric Balfour's head, which glows what red. Yeah, yep. And when that goes- Who knows why? Again, another thing in the movie, not explain. And the brains are being put into these kind of like hulking monster bodies, but when that brain goes into the monster body, suddenly it's still him. Yeah. Like Eric Balfour literally shakes it off. He is and takes. Yeah, he's shaking his head and shaking his head and he's sitting in the monster personality. Yeah, as evidence through the rest of the film. And when the and the aliens seem to be taking

pregnant women and putting them in a different section and then or the double harvesting. I guess. And the Eric Ball for monster fights away some kind of here's your scream. And see is that it's his girl, and fights off the spaceship tentacle, and then like sooths her, and then in still images, as the credits start rolling, not even, it's like Fumeti photo comics, it's not even, it doesn't move, you see him fight another monster and then pick her up and run away yeah yeah like the man thing you know it's and it's like wait what that should have been the climax of the movie is him and her like running out that should have been thirty five forty minutes in his brain gets put in an

alien body yeah they have to be on the run and she has to get used to the fact that her love is now an alien monster. Yeah, okay. That's some move. That movie's not called Skyline. It is called what? Alien fugitive. Instead though, this movie ends like with like the world in ruins. Our heroes have been sucked up. One of their heads gets ripped off. That brain gets put in a monster and we're done, basically. And that's it. A monster that has arguably more screen presence than Eric Balfour.

Yeah, once you get this thing, the monster body is more charismatic than the lead of the movie. I was saying I was hoping that there'd be an end of credits tag where the monster and his wife are now on like a Caribbean beach sipping pina coladas together. Yep, possibly with a little barbecue next to him and the barbecue is a burning alien roasting their meat. So he's got an apron that says, kiss me, I'm alien.

I'm the alien cook. I mean, he's still the alien cook. And she's cradling her baby in her in her arms and then there's a cut on the baby as the eyes glow Yeah, and then oh Did it Yep, David Lee were all scared Yeah, if only what a movie we just we just made a much stupider and better movie Through the fan cut. It's got a line. It's a but it's this feels like a family like this doesn't feel that different from those movies you see on YouTube where it's like two guys fighting with lightsabers yeah home made but the

special yeah looks like a proof of concept yeah yeah okay it looks like the time you get a job on a better movie yeah this is the type of movie that like you're walking around Comic Con and these guys have a shitty little booth. Yeah. Yeah. Like very actively trying to get this hot girl to sell this movie to somebody's girlfriend. Somebody's girlfriend is dressed up in cosplay costume just for that weekend. What kind of cosplay costume Stewart? I mean, in this case it would be, I don't know, a pregnant woman in Los Angeles. I thought you were gonna say sexy Naruto. I see. Sexy de ruto.

Yeah, I guess it would work for Skyline. Even the alien designs aren't original or good. I mean, the actual special effects are pretty well done. They are all the looks of aliens are derivative of, like, they took like four other things and threw them together. Yeah. And there's no real continuity. There's like a hundred different types of aliens.

A hundred different types of aliens. And you're kind of like, okay, I'm not really sure what differentiates this type of alien from this other type. Like, are they the same species? Or do they work together? Or are they pals? That'd be great.

Yeah, and you said neighboring planets. You said during the movie that it really would have benefited from some kind of a scientist character or like even like a little kid who's like a nerd who's like, oh, there's a tribe of alien who's clearly a worker. Yeah. Or even like that there's a part where they turn on the TV. Sure, a big bang theory kids were doing. There's a part where they that would be see there's an entertaining movie as a bunch of guys with

Asperger syndrome have to have to survive an alien attack and they hate each other but the awesome they they turn on the TV in the morning and it's just live shots of empty news desks Which doesn't make sense? It's like look the the news anchors got sucked up on We just show the desk we turn on the camera and then everyone got sucked up in the vacuum vacuum body machine and then we just the life he was still going on all channel. I would have liked it if the aliens were sitting at the desk. Haha. Third-day stop story.

Brains. Come outside. It's a beautiful day. Blue lights are healthy for you. Early reports of aliens are exaggerated. Incorrect. Coming up, what is inside your house that could be killing you? But the like it would have benefited from at least one appearance of a person on TV or the radio or something just to give us some context. Unless they're going to make the point of the movie that these characters are really

confused and that wasn't the point of the movie. The point of the movie was the characters can't be understood. The audience is really confused. Yeah, well the audience is hateful of the entire experience. Because like, you know, neither living dead is the best example of this where the characters don't really know what's going on and even the stuff the TV tells them may or may not be true, but you still get a sense of like, even if I don't know all the details, and I still feel like there's chaos outside, I still get what's happening.

When I said to, as we're watching it, like the reason staying in one location works for neither of them living dead is because zombies are zombies are such a I mean they're they're formidable enemy because there's so many of them but they're not like visually crazy or anything it's just a bunch of people outside your house whereas this movie is like oh there's a bunch of really exciting explosions going on outside that we're not getting to see let's keep the blinds down yeah most of the movie the the blinds are down and you can't see outside, which is. And but then they don't even play up that like that possibility where there is crazy shit going

out, saw going on outside or off camera and you have to rely on the character's reaction. Yeah. So like make it important or make it make it feel like the sense of like the tint mounting tension of being stuck in this apartment like the big dramatic thing was when the toilet stopped flushing. Like, oh, okay, I guess society's fallen apart now. The toilet stopped flushing. We gotta get out of this apartment. The thing, it really has turned off the water. We're getting their space books bill.

Space books. This is 45 space bucks. Like, I was the, I refuse to keep paying this. The space box bill for these humans. We should say space dollars. But everyone just went with space bucks. But in theory, this should be like Cloerfield does this a little better, where it's a bunch of people

who happen to keep getting mixed up in what's going on, even though they're not, even though they're nobody's, and they're really irritating fucking people that you hate, but at least they leave the house. But this one, it feels like, it almost feels like the alien invasion is being presented for the people in the apartment.

Like, as if they're pretty irritating, but at least they went outside every once in a while. But they weren't sitting on their butts. But like this movie, it feels like, it almost feels like these are supposed to be nobody is just like everyday folks But the alien invasion only happens around where they are they don't Everything is kind of centered around the building there at even though there's no reason for it It wants the movie wants to have it both ways so it feels fake the whole time, you know Yeah wants to the movie wants to have it both ways so it feels fake the whole time, you know. Yeah. It tries, I think it tries too hard to throw in moments of action when if you're trying

to make it low budget, at least maybe focus more on people trying to figure out their situation and talk about things like, I think they're aliens or something. Yeah. Or give the character's personality traits which these don't have. Well, also, I like a more... Radiant is a personality. It is not a personality, also I like a more radiant is a personality. It is not a personality. Cheating on your wife is a personality traits.

Cheating on their wife is one guy. Pregnant is one girl. One girl is a betch who smokes. The other guy is good at drawing. And the other girl is the first guy's assistant. That those are their only personality traits. The guy, the first guy who gets killed or gets just taken by the aliens has the most personality of any of them and he's an asshole.

Like his personality is just that he's a jerk. But at least he has a person. And our two male leads for a while are named Jerry and Terry. It was like they could have changed it up a bit. At least come up with a name that has two letters difference Terry and Jari I'll say my last criticism for the final judgments, which I think we should get into should we do final judgments now Let's do it final judgment

This is a good bad movie. It's a bad bad movie. A bad bad movie, a movie you actually liked. I'm gonna start off. I say it's a bad bad movie. The movie had a lot of crazy shit in it, but the problem with it was, I mean, I don't mind a movie that has a bunch of like plot holes, if like they jack up that craziness and make it entertaining.

The problem with this movie is there's a bunch of stuff that didn't make any sense. And it was then butt-tr is there's a bunch of stuff that didn't make any sense and it was then butt-trished by a lot of scenes of people doing nothing in a room. Literally just sitting around and then at the end the craziest thing in the movie happened and then it was over. Because the good filmmaker always leaves you wanting more. Yeah, yes. I wanted it more earlier. It just even if the characters reacted to things in a larger way, like so often it was like, Oh, but even if like there was one character who was

like, shit, what's that? You know, or just in some way did a like reacted in a way where it was like, Oh, okay, we're supposed to have fun watching this. Like we're supposed to be, it took itself too seriously. Well, one example of, I mean, not taking it so very seriously. Yeah. One example of not taking it so seriously, but an example of like reacting in two small ways when Scrubsie kept trying to use a handgun to shoot these giant alien creatures. But even then, like, the movie could have had fun with that and have another care to point out, like, what are you doing?

That is not going to help you. Yeah. And at the end, like, he you doing? That is not going to help you. Yeah. And at the end, like he wasn't even able to shoot a door lock open. That's the he does waste like six bullets trying to open a door. That's that's the closest the movie got to being clever actually when they can't he get trying to shoot that door open and it was obviously a dumb idea. There's angel takes out a an alien by Ope setting start opening the gas on a stove and then lighting a fire and it's like doesn't work at first And then finally he lights it and he says what like biocondios or something

Son of a bitch or something and it's like if you're gonna make a big stupid movie about Aliens attacking a building like you should have more dumb stuff like that And it like have some fun with it. Instead of... Yeah, and then have the explosion happen and you see angels body smiling and crossing himself as he flies. I think that's a little too much. Well, you know, or even if you're gonna... Some of us just shoot for the stars, Elliot.

Yeah, that's true, but I like to keep my feet on the ground. Yeah. So that sounds like a bad, bad movie. But even a movie like like yes, even a movie like close encounters the third kind which is a movie that takes aliens very seriously has Jokes and funny moments and like fun things in it, you know, yeah, but I thought it was a bad bad movie also sewer Yeah, I mean there's no moments where you can I just I The it's not very exciting and any chance for us to try and care about these characters would be maybe through like the friendship

or the relationships and I hate a movie where you have two friends that don't seem to like have any reason to be friends at all. And don't seem to know each other. Or get like... yeah it's like Miami Vice, the movie that has no jokes. Like nobody smiles for any reason. So yeah, it's been, maybe not. Yeah, it's a, it's a kind of a software demo reel that takes itself very seriously. Yeah. Okay. Well, I got, I got some letters I want to read. But before I do that, I want to thank everyone who made donations this month.

Thank you. I want to say thanks to Timothy M. Cassinia, Y. Dimitri T. and Brian S. Thank you. And as always, if you are an eccentric millionaire or no, an eccentric millionaire, please donate or encourage said millionaire to donate to the flop house. Anyone who's eccentric should donate. Anyone who is still in the hatch maze, do you want to spend their money? So I'm going to go to a little contest and get them to donate.

Spend the night and there's spooky mansion. But if you want to donate, you can go to flop housepodcast.com and do so. Solve the curse of their antiquities collection. Yeah. And if you do appreciate the show, donate something because Dan has just sunk so much money he can't afford into this into this prison production. Or if you don't want to if you don't want to spend actual money. Can goods are also accepted.

Can some of your time by going to iTunes and leaving a review. Hopefully a positive one because that does affect our listenership. Yeah, any work you can do to spread the word is much appreciated, because we rely on our fans. Well, that real grassroots organization, the flop house. Oh, yeah, very much so. That ugly business behind us. We can get onto letters, which I know is Ellie's favorite part I like that part. Yeah. This is letters. I was this could be an all letters podcast. I would enjoy that. This letter is titled hop house. Oh hop flowers actually. Sorry. Okay. I thought I first I would start over

I thought I said hop house. I thought it was someone trying to send it to a beer podcast but it's actually hop for an opium Dan. Yeah. And it says, uh, as someone who's a big fan of bad movies, flops, if you will, we will. I was. I know, thanks to the writer at this point, I think we can all agree that that's a word we would use to describe bad movies. The name of the podcast is flop. As you know, we will. He said, I was pleasantly surprised when I stumbled across your podcast. I give it 10 out of 10 flop houses That's that's fair. Yeah, I feel I may be too late to request this but would highly highly recommend an episode centered around the postmodern classic GI Joe the rise of cobra as Wikipedia says Critical reception was mostly negative and I couldn't agree more

That's sincerely exact last name with hell. I like that. I like that Wikipedia joke. Yeah, that was good. G.I. Joe, Ryza Cobra is a bad movie. Yeah, but we've all we all saw it on our off time. Is that a problem? Yeah, we all saw it for for fun. Yeah, this is what we do for ourselves. You know what, I would not argue for it to be a good movie, but if we're going to spend a little time on G.I. Joe, the rise of Cobra, I would say that I had much more fun watching that than most of the movie. Certainly we watch the Skylop. Sure. Well, Chanting Tatum has way more charisma than Erie Bell for. Which is, wow, that

is the backest-handed compliment of any kind to Channing or criticism because Channing Tatum is like a like a mannequin. But what a mannequin. But it's there's eGi Joe has enough things in it that are nuts to get you going and at least there's energy in it. It's a terrible movie and it doesn't make any sense and it's stupid. And especially for movie called The Rise of Cobra to end with Cobra being thrown in jail. Really doesn't make sense. But at least it has people running around and robot suits.

And it does. And it does. And it does. And it takes itself just the right amount of seriously. We're like the actors in it never wink at the camera except I think Brendan Frazier in his in his cameo. But the actors never wink at the camera except I think Brendan Frazier in his in his cameo but the actors never wink at the camera but the movie knows that it's this big dumb adventure movie there's never a part where like a character's like like in the climate characters like you don't die on me we're gonna get you out of here and like someone almost dies and then pulls through and they're like oh we almost lost you oh my god this job is so difficult like we were never meant to worry about these characters.

Yeah, they're all cartoons, you know, amazing. And that girl with the red hair is pretty. Yeah, Rachel Nichols. We're talking about her. She's starting P2. Oh, yeah, next level of here. Pudgement Day. Yeah. P2. All right. I'm that note. We won't be one. All right, on that note, we won't be willing. Yeah, I ruined it. This is from Sorry, Dan. Did you have anything you want to say about G.I. Joe Stewart? No, I was going to talk about Pudgement Day.

That would be... That's right. That's by chocolate, right? Yeah, he's living liquid chocolate. That can turn it to any any shape So this is primarily bunnies and like squares with balls. Yeah cream eggs Orange is no you can't do a cream egg. It's got a moving parts, right? Yeah, it's got It can't take any cream back through time with it. So it shows up just chocolate. I can't take no get with it

cream back through time with it. So it shows up just chocolate. I can't take no get with it. Well, that's how you know it's the robot chocolate egg is because there's no cream inside it. You crack it open it. Just chocolate. And then turns it to a knife. I mean, it's not very dangerous because it's the chocolate. You can just bite off the end of it. I mean, you want it because it's delicious. That would have been a great end of the climax where the killer, the killer chocolate cyborg is just eaten by the hero.

Why didn't I think of this before? I didn't realize I could just melt it down and put it on my Sunday. Yum. Okay, this is from Dash, last name with hell. It says, he has to get into what getting the character. It just isn't even it says. It is very dramatic. Dash says he has to get in a glass battle with mirror Hitler.

That quote is from Stewart in the third annual Oscar episode. I left so hard I almost ran off the road. So I just wanted to pass that on to his jurors. Dan the first time. He says, Dan, you never got back to what you thought of terror vision. I recently rewatched it and loved the experience. A supremely bizarre hilarious movie that I would recommend to the listeners of the show. What did you think about it? Well, okay, he's referring to an old recommendation of mine. I don't remember that one. I was talking about how I'd seen most of

television and Or I thought half of it at the time and I stopped it. Do you mean changing channels? Is that the movie you're thinking of? television I watched television Stay tuned. It was a week that I Mom and dad say the world it was a week that I had not Had enough time to watch movies, but I had seen most of television and I recommended it and you all made fun of me for recommending something that I hadn't seen all of. Did was I was this never saw I was on? Yeah I don't remember this. I remember this time. I promise

that I would get back with a report on television. So if you've been if you've been waiting all that time, you've been held in suspense the months since I mentioned terror issues. Well, they've had it out from Netflix for months. Yeah. This is when we finally finally finally found out who the X-Trader was after years and years of them laying the clues. It was the X-Trader. Turned out to be Torment San Diego. First it was wow. That was so surprising about it was he wasn't even an excellent character and i'm still waiting for it there are two times that they revealed someone who was supposed to be the extrader first colossus when he threw his through in with magneto

then turned out that was it and then professor x when he was revealed to be on slot which led briefly to the heroes rebelling so, Dash, I hope that answered your question. About terror, baby. Alright, Dan, say what you thought about terror, baby. Philosis, Peter Rasputin, painter, mutant. No. Well, Russia, so his last name is Rasputin.

So it turns out that I had one minute left in terror vision, because that movie is 68 minutes long. And so I thought there was more left. My DVR had recorded something after it, which is what I thought there was more. So I actually had seen basically all of terror vision. So that's the really anti-climatic finish. That's the exact opposite. And did you like it? I did like it.

That's the exact opposite of what happens whenever an element of crime is on TV. What's his name escaping me now? That's the exact opposite of what happens whenever an element of crime is on TV the What's wise his name escaping me now say really no Who did it was Who did dogville and 20 his early movies and every time it's on TV Tivo thinks it is a half hour long, but it is two hours long So I've never seen the whole movie because every time I start to watch you and I record it it ends at a half hour long, but it is two hours long. So I've never seen the whole movie. Because every time I start to watch it and I record it,

it ends at a half hour in. Or, you know, so anyway. Tito's just not a fan, a Von Trier fan. Does not want me to watch that. Okay, well, okay, so I hope that actually answers. So this is from Jason, the last name withheld. It says, I discovered the flop house through Dan's appearance on Read It in Weep,

which is like a podcast. That's a good podcast. I's a good podcast. You did a good job. Thank you. Thank you very much. Seek it out people or don't. So I'll really up to you. I'm not going to come to your house and force you. He will. But he says I enjoyed that. I'm discovering the back catalog. The show is rapidly becoming my favorite show featuring a racist Elliott and a humble foe. Wait, how am I a racist? At a drunk steward. Yeah. Drunk is easily the best of those three.

Oh, by far that's the best of them. Also, I noticed that the, every time the three of you are together, Elliott makes an a, the original Peaches Joe, which nobody else on the show ever reacts to. My contrast, I crack, crack up every time. Gunpla, I didn't say that. I don't crack up is that, as you say, he makes it every time the three of us are together. So it loses its appeal, is that what you're saying?

But are you arguing that we are not the original peaches? Come on. I'm not Lori Petty, that's, I mean, I'd be Lori Petty. You'd be Lori Petty? You'd be Gina Davis. Okay, you're probably right. And Dan would be Rosio Donald. No'd be Lori Petty. You'd be Gina Davis. Okay, you're probably and Dan would be Rosie O'Donnell. No At least give me a way. I like where you go. At least let me be my good. But you're the player who's really good, but is unattractive How about I'm the one who gets married?

No nonsense. You could be the one whose husband dies in the war. Oh Betty spaghetti. Okay. I'll take it Anyway, and I'm Lori Petty. Okay, I'll take it. Anyway, and I'm Lord Betty. Okay. So he says, my question is this, I appear on a podcast about games, pulpgamer.com's out of character. There's your plug. There's your plug out of character. Where I'm the RPG guy. Feels like dirty. Similar to how Dan is, quote, the sad guy on your show. Very similar. I know you're all nerdy enough to have an opinion on this of the movies you've watched Which one would be best when adapted to a role-playing game that you would need eight-sided dice to play?

Oh, Stuart is the specialist in this world. Oh Stream question. This is super fucking easy. It's Brett's Gonna say it has to be Brett's Because they got your so cast your breath sports Brett your paladin breath your chaotic evil mage Brett I don't know so many chaotic evil and the Brett well you will talk about that later that's true the Brad's are all catac. So many good like non-player characters.

You have that deaf DJ. Yeah, that's right. I totally forgot about him. Yeah. The the deaf musician. Yeah. John Boy. John Boy principal. Yeah.

And the rich girl. There's a rich girl. Well, she's the villain. Yeah. Oh, and the elephant has to be a playable character that she rides into her party. Sure. And there's a rich Brad's universe, that's part of her trappings.

We got the Carrie Nation, uh, high school. Yeah. Oh, yeah, that would be the first supplement. It would be the Carrie Nation, uh, guidebook. That's not the, that's not the, you know, it's the first, I would feel like that's the starting set. Well, no, like the, the,, like the main rule book would have, like all the rules for being a brat. Yeah.

And evil villains and stuff like that, and some NPC ideas, and all the rules for creating your own adventures. What are PC ideas, explain. Well, like ideas on how to get started and form a brat, like what makes a brat different than a regular human, like a normie is where we could put a sapient. I assume that that quality is gratitude. Yeah. And your gratitude levels

will go up. Yeah, you got to really roll to see what your base gratitude level is. Well, that would be in chapter four, Bratitude. And then you would have the expansion pack. So you're saying that first one will be the school. Yeah, you all, it would be like like a world book almost where it explains like all the geography, maybe some important characters, some adventure ideas for the for the game master or the bright master depending on what other there'd have to be a capsule that's all about that they're starting their music career. Sure, because that's how the movie ends. Well, that could be that could be a that could either be a supplement or maybe a you know, a adventure pack where

you can... And like helping the one's mom with her catering business? Sure, absolutely. Those are all adventure seeds, I lay it. A recall for the events of Brett's, the movie is amazing. I could believe you remembered the name of the high school. Oh, God. All right.

Well, I think that covers that question. I think that's a good idea. You're welcome And so if the makers of breads are out there if the owners of the rights of breads are just didn't roleplay in game Yeah, get in touch and we won't get back to you so this is a guys What what a penny meta dinosaurs been sweeping the nation? Yeah, Rebecca black has nothing on what if Penny met a dinosaur. So these last two or about messages.

The first one says written by Dan two days. This first one is from Brendan last name with hell and he says so I googled what if Penny met a dinosaur and the guy who made the comment on YouTube had just made the comment, would you touch April's boobs? You, you, the letter you, on a video of April O'Neill from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I thought you should be updated. So, they're carrying on the tradition,

the investigative tradition that I started. I didn't want to point out that the person who wrote the letter's name was Brendan, or Brynn Dan. Oh. See, you got to find the clues, put the pieces of the puzzle together. So intricate. Worlds and worlds. It's like the Westing game.

Okay, well this is a similar. We'll touch April's books. Which you ridiculous comment. Well, that's why you put on the internet for the entire world. Unless it's like he was saying he was watching this clip from the Ninja Turtles and he's been, would you just touch April's boobs already? Come on, Raphael. I don't even know why it's coming here.

Because I mean, come on, other reporter that works at the station. Obviously, April. Craig as an anime of character. V-bop. Come on. You leave him money on the table here. You can see she wants it. Rocks that he'd be so upset. Come on, you leave him money on the table here. You can see she wants it Continue no, I'm just as an animated character, you know like obviously you can't so like in that context

It doesn't work, but he's saying is if if she was really cool world or something It will lose and if if you were in cool world, then why wouldn't you yeah, you know that's you would He's not so he's not wondering why Baxter Stockman is not growing April I don't know maybe that was directed at us through the medium of YouTube comments maybe he knew that we would that we brought to our attention by friend and last name with help that's good stuff so this is this last I came in I want to know I want to meet that guy so we're not meeting but I want to know who he is so well this is another piece of the

puzzle this last thing comes in from at unsupervised on Twitter he sent a message a direct message to us or he sent an ad message at the flop house pod is that our Twitter presence yeah that's our Twitter presence and unsupervised says this goes even deeper than just Penny. And he sent a Google search he had done, with the words metadinosaur and this gentleman's username. And so this gentleman also wants to know what would happen if these various characters metadinosaur.

Cermet, Bob from Sesame Street, Zach Weezy from Dragon Tales, I don't know what that is. Ernie and Bert, Arthur the Art Vark, Grover, Super Grover. It's Grover and Super Grover and I hate to bring it. The news to everybody. What? Grover and Super Grover and the same Grover. It's just the same, it's the same monster. Big Bird, Telly, Abby Kadabby, Buddy the dinosaur, that sort of is already a dinosaur. I don't know. I assume he met a dinosaur when he was born. Or he met himself, Elmo, and then lastly, Roy G. Biv, the mnemonic to remember the

huge of the visible spectrum. So. So, every, so I guess the internet is above us over what would happen if these characters met dinosaurs? It's a weird thing for this for the to become the secondary reason for this podcast to exist bad movies and investigating the sky Yeah, who loves to find out if so also if you're if you're Confused by this whole conversation go back and listen to the Oscar episode the the flop You probably skipped because we weren't talking about a movie. But Dan told a...

But it's a grimmitting tale. It's a canonical episode, so we're now going to be referring back to it. Oh yeah. It'll be in the flop house essentials album. Dan's, I think your story will be enthologized probably at some point. Yeah, it's probably a story core is going to put that. We've got to record this for future generations. So now's the point in the podcast where we make our movie

recommendations, probably quickly, because we spent a lot of time on letters. Right, so. A movie that we actually saw and enjoyed to watch perhaps instead of Skyline. Stuart, do you have something to make? Or you could always just watch Grass. What's that? Or, you know, like a movie.

Like, is that a movie? There is a movie called Grass, or you could watch the sky itself. Anything is more interesting. Like an actual Skyline is probably more interesting. Oh, yeah. The movie's going. I have a lovely one here in New York. Yeah, I want to recommend a movie that is available on demand, on cable right now called black death starring Sean Bean. It's made by the same guy who made a British filmmaker made the movie Severance and Creep. Both good movies I think I've recommended at least one of them before. And it's

kind of a thrill like a it's a historical thriller set during, a set in England during the Bubonic Plague. And it's about a... Bubonic Plague. Yeah, the Bubonic Plague. It's not not boobs. The boobs. No, the Bubonic Plague.

However, it's a crazy movie. Oh, it's playing a little bit. However, it's a Pulitzer, not Pulitzer. So yeah, I don't remember. Oh yeah, it's about like a monk and a couple of mercenaries who were investigating a Y1 village is completely untouched by the plague. And it turns out penicillin. It manages to be both, you know, I know. It manages to be dark and an interesting portrayal of both faith and the time period, and it's good. I recommend it. And it's kind of gross. Okay. I'd like to recommend a movie I watched just this morning called

Winnebago Man. No, Winnebago Man. Which is a documentary. I don't know those RV with Robin Williams, right? Oh, yeah. On vacation, no one can hear you scream. Not that movie, I'm recommending Winnebago Man, a documentary about a man who's the star of a famous viral video, or actually predated viral videos, it was passed around as VHS tape for a while before YouTube was a thing. Like the ring? Yeah. Exactly. Exactly.

Exactly. And just a man wicking out and getting very angry and swearing during the making of a Winnebago video. A video selling Winnebago's. Yeah, but it was like also, it was kind of like an industrial. It wasn't like a commercial. Yeah. I mean, when you say Winnebago old video, that's not a common thing.

Fair enough. You're asking more questions than your answering. And the filmmaker tracked this guy down to see, I love this video, but what's this guy's deal? And he lucked into a much more interesting story than you might imagine would be the case just being like, okay, who's the guy behind this viral video? But just on that level, it addresses some questions about, you know, what it's like to live in this world where one aspect of a man's life can be widely seen and be like

the only thing that people know him for, but also beyond that, just a character study of the man who was discovered and how he's much more complex than that one moment in his life would suggest. So it was a good movie. I recommend it. I'd like to see that one. And like that, I'd like to see. I will recommend quickly a movie called Ballad of a Soldier.

It's a Russian movie from the 50s that's set during World War II, where it's available on Netflix, wants to watch it st II, where it's available on Netflix, wants to watch it instantly, so it's not hard to find. The soldier manages to knock out two tanks in a battle, and so as a reward for basically winning the battle, they give him two days leave so he can go home and see his mother. And it's kind of about his attempts to get back home and the people that he meets along the way and the things that happen to him. And it's just a very well done touching movie.

It's a nice movie to see that's a Soviet film, but it is not, any kind of propaganda elements are very, very, very minor and subtle. And really in a lot of ways could as easily have been set anywhere. But it was very good. I liked it a lot. Right. Well guys, we've done it. We've done it again. Another episode.

The original peaches. There it is. Oh man, I thought you were safe, but no. Oh man, so what's up? It's probably sign off. I don't want to waste any more of these people's time. Sure we do sure I have for the flop house though. I've been Dan McCoy. I'm Stuart Wellington. Check under your bed. It's Ellie Kaelin Good night everyone You know throw one in there for the fans There's a lot of tension in the ears guys, because of skyline.

Just watch all of you good friends of mine. Sure. So, nobody's a good player. I don't want to watch that again. So, it wasn't scheduled. So, we're not going to lose this flop cast right? Yeah, we're not going to. We're not going to lose this flop cast right?

Yeah, we're not going to lose this flop cast right? Yeah, we're not going to lose this flop cast right? Yeah, we're not going to lose this flop cast right? Yeah, we're not going to lose this flop cast right? Yeah, we're not going to lose this flop cast right? Yeah, we're not going to lose this flop cast right? Yeah, we're not going to lose this flop cast right? Yeah, we're not going to lose this flop cast right?

Yeah, we're not going to lose this flop cast right? Yeah, we're not going to lose this flop cast right? We just let it go. That wouldn't have happened. We didn't watch that one at the end. No, we did not.