Toronto Mike'd: The Official Toronto Mike Podcast - School's Out!: Toronto Mike'd #873

Episode Date: June 25, 2021

Mike and Cam Gordon dive deep into School's Out, the 1992 Degrassi High TV movie finale.

We've done it. The Degrassi kids have graduated. Now, the real education begins. It's engagement week. Don't sacrifice your whole future for a guy. Here I come. Would you maybe like to go out sometime? No more living with my grandparents.

She's going away to university next year. He'll still be in high school, like me. This time, there's no turning back. Hey! School's out. The Degrassi Movie Special, Sunday. Welcome to episode 873 of Toronto Mic'd, a weekly podcast about anything and everything. Proudly brought to you by Great Lakes Brewery, a fiercely independent craft brewery who believes in supporting communities, good times, and brewing amazing beer.

Order online for free local home delivery in the GTA. StickerU.com. Create custom stickers, labels, tattoos, and decals for your home and your business. Palma Pasta. Thank you. And Mike Majewski, or as I call him, Mimico Mike. He's the real estate agent who's ripping up the Mimico real estate scene. Learn more at realestatelove.ca. I'm Mike. From torontomike.com and joining me to dive deep into 1992's Schools Out Degrassi High Finale is Cam Gordon. Hi, Mike.

This is awesome. We've been talking about, I feel like we first hatched this idea maybe back in March or possibly even last year about the idea of doing something with schools out around the last day of school. Am I imagining that? Yeah, but do you remember the original idea? So the original idea was we were going to have,

we were going to watch it and react in real time. Right, yeah, like a director's comic book. Right, exactly. So people were going to be able to go to live.torontomic.com and they'd see the film and hear it. And then they'd kind of have our real-time fun sort of like pop-up video or something like our real-time reactions to what was happening in the the 90-minute uh tv movie schools out yeah it was a it'll be a little uh pop-up video a little uh wizard of oz with dark

side of the moon um right sort of like would combine a few different, a little Beavis and Butthead as always. But yeah, I mean, that also seems sort of complex. And I feel like you might get like a DNC notice from playing with Time Productions. Which I would frame, if I got such a document from the lawyers behind that series, I think I would frame it

and I'd put it up on the wall somewhere prominent. There you go. Right beside the Ridley funeral home. Exactly. Exactly. The deckle there or whatever that is. But no, this is very exciting. It sort of dawned on me earlier today. It's sort of become a running gag that I don't really watch TV or movies. And I think it's pretty safe to say this might be my favorite movie of all time.

Do you consider this a movie? It is a movie. Yeah. It's a made for TV movie. Like you need to see it. Let me explain to you, Cam pre streaming. I have to explain to my teenagers,

you know, before we had Netflix and prime and, uh, you know, CBC jam and all these different streaming services, uh, movies were either for all these different streaming services. Movies were either for theatrical release or for TV. Yeah, you had some straight to video movies, of course, but you had TV movies.

This is definitely a movie and it's definitely made for television, not for theatrical release. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, and we'll get into it in a bit this it's not like this wasn't shown in theaters years later but um i'm curious did you watch this like during like the the time day was on the first airing cam i was that's a dumb question i was a massive fan of this series again i've told the story i've told it to Stacey Mystician. People are tired of hearing of it. But I got introduced to the kids of Degrassi Street

because my primary school would walk to Runnymede Library and we would go in a room and they'd roll out the big TV and VCR and we would watch episodes of the kids of Degrassi. So I get introduced to it there. And then when I,

I was there for day one for Degrassi Junior High. Like I'm watching CBC. I don't know what it was, Monday I get introduced to it there. And then when I, I was there for day one for Degrassi junior high, like I'm watching CBC, I don't know what it was Monday at eight, whatever it was. I'm there for day one and I never missed an episode. They were my age. So I felt like really connected to this, uh, this group and that schools out finale appointment viewing for me. I was absolutely all over it in real time. What about you? Same deal. Like I think Stu and I are a bit younger than us, but like when I, when I look at the date that this aired back in January of 1992, I mean, shout out to bare naked ladies, Stu and I were in grade nine.

So this is like kind of looking forward to like OAC years. It's like, holy shit. Like that's going to be fucked if all this stuff happens and it was sort of you know scary but i was also i think was also sort of self-aware enough to know this is just television or this is just a movie um but yeah like a same deal like i feel like i got into degrassi a bit later because i you know i remember like watching it. I was definitely on like eight thirties at some point on Mondays and going to bed right after maybe the second season two of junior high. But yeah, like same deal. I remember seeing these VHS cassettes in the library.

I don't know if we ever got to see it in school, but you know, there was posters and just such a big part of like, it's obviously like a huge pop culture thing for anyone who grew up in Canada. Right. And it continues this day. Like it's, this was like, what, almost 30 years ago, this came out. It's like two guys in their mid forties

sitting around fucking doing a podcast, but it's like, it's unbelievable just how much this still resonates. And we're doing it at the perfect time because school is literally out. It's, although I noticed my younger two kids actually have to go to school Monday and Tuesday. So they get, you know, but school's almost out.

Okay, it's really close. So, and for many kids, because many kids are probably, their parents are taking them to some cottage or something next week. So for most kids, school's out. So the timing is perfect. I heard you about, I don't know, five minutes ago,

you dropped an F-bomb. I love that you're working blue today. You're doing that in honor of this TV movie, Schools Out, which we all watched. I'm trying to get the listeners primed for some of the language. Viewer discretion or listener discretion, very much

advised on this episode. Oh my goodness. I can play... Well, let me make it official. Hold hold on here the following program contains adult themes nudity and coarse language viewer and parental discretion is advised it's official now boys the boys that's awesome yeah no um my daughter like she has two more days of school we got her like report card today so like she's you you know, as the NBA says, this is definitely garbage time in the school year

these last two days. Especially because it's Zoom. Like imagine getting your report card and being told you have to go to Zoom school Monday and Tuesday. Like my little two have no say in the matter. They're like five and seven.

But my teenager, she'd give me the finger and say, yeah, right, dad. I'm going to my Zoom school on Monday. Like F you old man. Like I'm going to the park so that's right she'll go anywhere else awesome okay so you're the boss cam uh i'm here almost like literally to react to the fun facts you're gonna bury us in i am so excited i don't remember

i think the last time i was as excited was when we decided we would dive deep into tears are not enough uh and that was a two and a half hour escapade. Yeah, well, I will say a small spoiler alert. I did have some research help with this. My friend, Rosie Gray Tio, gave me a hand in and has already made a few Wikipedia

updates based on some of the fun facts. You can check out Rosie Gray Tio's list in addition to his past updates about his or her, sorry, we don't know the gender, about Northern Lights, James B., and a lot of the other characters from the FOTM

universe, for sure. And let me just take a moment here before you rock and roll to tell the listenership that this is sort of the second in our series. So we did the deep dive into Tears Are Not Enough. Two and a half hours later, I felt it was too short. So that's what we did last time. This one promises to be much shorter, although I shouldn't make promises. My butt can't cash. But this one is a deep dive into Schools Out, the Degrassi TV movie from 1992. And if anyone has any like

suggestions or like requests for what the next cam and Mike deep dive should be. Please share that idea with me. I'm Mike at Toronto, Mike.com or my DMS on Twitter are open. I'm at Toronto, Mike, just let me know what you're thinking and then I'll run it by cam.

And if we're digging it, it might just happen. I feel like you could put these in with, um, I listened to a podcast you did recently with brother Bill and, uh, it was a captain Phil, captain Phil Evans. Yeah. Yeah. Sort of, you know, that deep dive about edge fest and, uh, you know, kind of going deep year by year, put this in the same spirit. Like this is for the hard course, but the people are going to be into it. Uh,

hopefully we'll love it. Cause this is, uh, we're, we're going to go deep. Like we're going to be cooking with gas today. I'm so excited. Okay, where do we begin, Cam Gordon? We heard a bit of it off the start. It sounded like you played the original CBC promo clip, but that music, who's that? This is going to be

a band. We're going to talk about the music of Schools Out. But why don't we actually just hear that song in its entirety? Why don't you fire that up and we'll just talk over it and let's get this underway Okay, so they must have had an instrumental version of this song too. I don't remember the lyrics. Do you know who this is? This is a band i feel like we talked about before remind me i i i just have memories of gowan being all

over this soundtrack absolutely we'll definitely get to him um and both both his uh professional names momentarily but this is harem scarum right uh the one of one of the real remnants of kind of the hair metal era in toronto uh harem scarum is all over degrassi schools out with eight different songs featured in schools out now cam i don't want to uh rain on your parade maybe you have some of these facts coming my way but when i listen to these in the headphones uh if you said what year is this i would never guess 1992 1992 to me is we're you know we're pearl jam and nirvana we're the heart of grunge here uh this song sounds very 1988 to me totally i think it's one of the really interesting things about schools out especially if you go back and look at it because in my opinion it neither seems nor like it was filmed in the 80s or is filmed in the 90s it doesn't seem like

it's from either decade it's very much that middle ground and you're right this music um it seems like if this movie was filmed a year later we might be hearing everybody from the sky diggers to lowest of load to maybe a little real statics less he spit trio all the naked ladies could be in there absolutely uh but no we're still getting you know harem scam kind of a more hair metal band it's almost like it's kirkland brand white snake yeah i'm sorry i i always get this band harem scare mixed up with a band called Svengali. Do you remember that band? Another Canadian? Sort of, yeah, like sort of.

Here's a few fun facts about Harem of Scare and the eight songs. We'll just go through these quickly. Definitely like one of the feature bands, the Dying Days of the Gasworks. I feel like you talked about the Gasworks with probably Johnny Dovercord and maybe some other past guests out on Yonge Street. It was like an army surplus store most recently, although I think it's been closed. Our 1236. Well, you know, Miles Goodwin was on the program recently, and I think they played quite a bit of the Gasworks as well.

April Wine. Absolutely. And also famous for being the home away from home for Sebastian Bach before. I think when like skid row was coming up that would be right and shout out to uh shout out to slick toxic if the guys from slick toxic are listening yes okay that's actually that's the band i got mixed up not sven galley was slick toxic except um like a lot of bands in the 90s harem scam said oh shit we gotta like rebrand almost like the rainbow butt monkeys became finger 11 a few other examples they actually changed their

name to rubber um this is something i feel like 1236 has talked about as well very interestingly they changed their name in the late 90s they put out an album just called rubber in 1999 that in canada the band's name was rubber but they were big in japan and they still went by harem scam in japan which is very interesting and that album was actually produced by arnold lanny oh from frozen ghost and sheriff uh when i'm With You. Eight songs, again, from this album. This is from their 1991 self-titled debut, just called Harem Scare Em, obviously. Now, there's a song in the film, one of the eight songs is when Wheels, Joey and Snake are driving to the cottage. Do you remember this? They're in like Wheels, you know, that car he was fixing up all summer? Yeah, that shit box absolutely absolutely right now that song was called hard to love by harem scam the co-writer of that song fotm christopher war whoa okay wow like i said mike we're cooking with gas here like we're just

getting warmed up the guy who co-wrote Black Velvet number one on the Billboard Hot 100 also co-wrote that jam. That's Harem Scaram. Harem Scaram, by the way, much better name for a band than Rubber. Just going to say. Yeah, Rubber is, although Rubber sounds like a 90s band. I could, there was

a band called Smoother. I could sort of see how that worked its way in. And one more fun fact before we leave H harem scam for now there was a song on that debut album not in degrassi schools out called how long that was actually written by someone we talked about last night on pandemic fridays dean mctaggart oh wow from the arrows now i want to make this the northern lights force fit however when i dug that up i dug a bit deeper i'm not actually sure even though it says on wikipedia that dean mctaggart was in northern lights i'm not sure he was because i went back i looked at some of the

because nothing better to do i went and looked at some of the album art for northern lights i didn't see his name in the mix with all the other artists so i don't know rosie rosie gray to might have some edits to do this weekend um but anyway that that's a bit about harem scam some other artists music if you if you watch schools out you're gonna be hearing of course gowan i think we're gonna talk about Gowan a bit later The Box, we're going to talk about The Box a bit later Amy Skye We're going to talk about her a bit later Here's both an FOTM and a Northern Lights force fit There is a song by Spoons

Wow In this See, 80s, it's 80s Totally It's a song called On the Beach But not the Neil Young song Right On the Beach But not the Neil Young song On the Beach And a few other bands have music in this

Images in Vogue, Helix, Blue Dog Pick And then a song called Wall of Glass I think it's called Wall of Glass by Malcolm Byrne That I feel like we kicked out on the past Pandemic Friday I don't know if this is in your fun facts But I know that Blue Dog Pick Featured cast members from

degrassi in the band really yeah absolutely i i do not have that uh well they played my ready for this they played my high school so they played michael power and i remember the twins attended the concert they weren't in the band but the twins attended the concert and this was a very big deal that the twins were coming to power and i they weren't like prominent cast members but as a fan of degrassi i knew them i'm trying to remember who they were at the time but at least a couple of those blue dog picked guys were uh regular degrassi high cast members okay very good hey yes and uh that's of course heather and erica right the twins now it was obviously a long time ago but you have a very good memory for this stuff,

where they, if you recall during Degrassi, they always wore black and white. Oh, I can't remember. I'm curious if they, even in their personal lives, were wearing black and white. I wish I had that recall and I would tell you right now. I'm afraid I don't. Okay, very good.

So that's a bit about the music of schools out let's get more into this the the bit of background before he gets a plot again this aired for the first time january 5th 1992 okay so right after the winter break this this would been like probably the monday after winter break it's the first day of school. They're right into this. What a fucking moment. 92 minutes long. Now that date, January 5th. Let's do a bit of a side. Famous birthdays.

Got some big names here. Okay. We got Robert Duvall. Big deal. Legend. I love the smell of napalm. I need to react to all your names. I love the smell of napalm in the morning. Absolutely. I'll one up to all your names. So I love the smell of napalm in the morning. Absolutely.

You know, I'll one up Robert Duvall here. Diane Keaton. Wow. Speaking of The Godfather, they're both in The Godfather. There you go. They probably watched Degrassi's Skulls High because they like film. Gentleman that's been in the news for all the wrong reasons the last couple weeks, Marilyn Manson. Oh, right.

Okay. Yeah. The beautiful people indeed. Yes. Yeah. And then a few more actors here. We got Bradley Cooper. That's a big deal.

Okay. That's a big one. We got, we talk about Mad Men, if you like a fair amount. January Jones. Oh. Betty Draper. Yeah. I always say wife number one

For Don Draper absolutely Yeah absolutely Here's a name that I feel like if you rebooked Northern Lights in 2021 Might make the cut Even though he's not a singer Deadmau5 Well I don't know if you listened to my

Melly Fresh episode of Toronto Mike So I had Melly Fresh and Melly Fresh Had quite the, uh, she, she claims that she discovered dead mouse and had a whole bunch of legal issues with him subsequently, but there was a lot of,

uh, dead mouse real talk in the Melly Fresh episode of Toronto Mike. Oh, okay. I, I'm going to have to listen to that. I I've heard, I'll just say I've heard stories about,

don't sleep on melody, melody, Mel or whichever moniker she's going by these days. It's good. I, I, I'm going to have to do like wise plot soon. Just start listening to these on like one and a half speed.

I need to dig all these up. And last but not least, a former VP of the United States, Walter Mondale. Wow. Wow. All born on January 5th, same day this aired.

Are you surprised at all that this, this school's out special aired on January 5th, same day this aired. Are you surprised at all that this school's out special aired on January 5th, considering that's like the furthest distance you'll ever be from school being out? I think it's a little weird. I mean, we'll actually get to when this was actually filmed. And I'll just say they turned this around very quickly. So, yeah, it is. I feel like because I think the ratings for this were actually filmed. And I'll just say they turned this around very quickly. So yeah, it is I feel like, because I think the ratings for this were actually very good because it was also

ostensibly the finale of Degrassi to put up big numbers. Yeah, but yeah, it is a little weird bearing it like literally in the dead of winter. But nevertheless, in one of our DM groups somebody let the cat out of the bag on this one.

I was going to quiz you on this, but it's already out there. Sponsored by Tampex. Right, right. Which is a good one. I guess like Stridex was not available, but Tampex is a good one. So School's Out was filmed between June 1991, and they wrapped up filming on October 19, 1991. Now, if you recall, October of that year, Blue Jays played the Minnesota Twins in the ALCS. I was hoping there was a Blue Jay Twins game that year.

Unfortunately, they were already in the World Series. However, that was also the day of game one of the 1991 World Series. Okay. That game was one. Is this the 11 inning complete game for Jack Morris? Or am I getting my game wrong? Right guy, wrong game. Okay.

So he did start that game. But some very interesting names from Blue Jay history. Jack Morris was the winning pitcher. The losing pitcher was also the losing pitcher of game six of the 92 World Series. Also pitched against the Jays in the 1985 ALCS. Do you know who I'm talking about here? This is a guy who gave up Dave Winfield's double in that 10th inning. Tom Glavin.

I can't remember. Good pick. Charlie Liebrand. Okay, gotcha. Charlie Liebrand was the losing. But pitching in relief that day for the Braves too. I forgot this guy did a cup of coffee with the Braves late in career and actually pitched in the World Series.

Jim Clancy. Diamond Jim Clancy. Oh, wow. Good for him. He was the losingest pitcher of the 1980s. He was. Well, he's an inning eater. But anyway, as they wrapped up Degrassi schools out. You have to be good. You got to be good to lose that many games, remember.

He was like serviceable. He was serviceable. Better than serviceable. Okay, so let's go into the plot of Degrassi schools out. And this is just going to be like riffing. I'm just going to throw a fun fact there's no rhyme or reason to a lot of these I found this actually very

interesting but it kind of makes sense this was the first ever Degrassi episode to feature anything happening in like summer vacation which makes sense sure because they're always in school that's the whole point right yeah I mean there was a whole arc you know with Saved by the Bell

and I feel like with like Beverly Hills Nine-Nine too, you know, beach clubs and stuff like that. So it's kind of a similar thing. As we go through the fun facts, I'm going to throw out a few unanswerable questions, kind of like a Confucius type thing. Something that always bothered me about this in terms of plot is that all of a sudden um lucy and caitlin were best

friends oh okay now they they sort of suggested that caitlin had skipped a grade she was fast tracking which we all you know knew people back in high school were fast tracking but it kind of bothered me because in degrassi classic they they weren't really friends or even in the same social circles and all of a sudden they're besties in schools out how so why was that i don't know how convenient okay so let's get into you're gonna like this one summer jobs of all the characters okay okay i i hope you're are you comfortable there i am so comfortable man you're gonna start vibrating on a couple of days. It's so exciting. Okay.

I'm going to start off slow. So Tess and Spiked worked. You remember where they worked? They worked together. I don't remember. Shoppers Drug Mart? I can't remember. Who said Shoppers?

Good guess. No, they were at like a photo mart type thing. Okay. Right. Right. Yeah. Like one of those like weird little huts you'd see like in the corner of parking lots or like a strip plaza um there's one i think there's one

prominent i believe in uh the uh bob and doug mckenzie movie uh what's the movie the beer the beer one anyway strange strange yeah strange brew i feel like that there's a pivotal scene by the waterfront in Toronto with one of those photo booths featured in Strange Brew. They were kind of standalone. They're like little huts. It's really weird.

I feel like sometimes they had almost a Swiss motif for some reason. Am I imagining that? They had kind of an elf type motif. But I could be, I just want to throw it out there because of course, here we are riffing. I could always be

a confusing strange brew with Police Academy. Like sometimes the downtown Toronto scenes from those movies get conflated in my head. But I do think this is strange brew with the photo booth. But could be police academy i could see that same same general era i would assume like the first place academy lots of parking lots in downtown toronto it was parking lots as far as the eye could see yeah yeah like aerial shots of toronto and like it's it's a real

like to talk about a mind blow. Especially for younger generations. Because we were all driving those boats, so you needed a lot of space. Exactly. Now, I tweeted about this recently. This is a huge mind blow, but we've talked about this. Caitlin worked at Swish LA and one of the servers in an uncredited

role. I would guess maybe the most famous person to ever appear on degrassi classic sandra oh um emmy award-winning great canadian actress which is if i didn't know that already i would have like i would be like my mouth would be agape i would be shocked at that fact that is massive sandra oh huge has sandra has won an emmy i'm sure uh at this point in her career maybe multiple emmys as far as i i feel like multi like what what's the show killing killing eve is her latest show but she was also of course she was on gray's anatomy i don't know if she was recognized for

that but sandra oh big fucking deal and was on degrassi schools out as a waitress at the waitress at the fake at the uncredited Swiss Chalet. Wow. But it's funny, also like wearing kind of Swiss barmaid type outfit as they did back in the day. Right.

Sorry, an aside. Did you ever see the movie Last Night by Don McKellar? Yeah, I did with Sandra Oh. Absolutely. It's great. That's actually a good movie. One of the better Canadian movies of the 90s. Yeah, I did with Sandra Oh. Absolutely. It's great. That's actually a good movie. One of the better Canadian movies of the 90s. Anyway, complete aside.

But that is a great movie and shout out to Don McKellar for making that film. Yeah. It was, from what I recall, it was like kind of last day on earth, but not like,

it wasn't like everything blowing up. It was like, what would it actually be like if the world just ended? And back then, we had Don McKellar, we had Adam Agoyan and uh maybe was david cronenberg active possibly but there were very few great like films coming out of this country yeah i mean uh who's the bruce mcdonald oh yes yeah and uh highway 67 or whatever 69 i'm trying to think who did who did

whale music was that paul corrington i feel like or was he the author he was the author who wrote whale i gotta ask uh dave bedini hold on let me message him absolutely yeah let's look him up um okay joey worked at chopper's drug mart right that's it now there were multiple other scenes in Degrassi Classic that took place at Shopper's Drug Mart. I'm going to run through them. I have three here. Actually, I have four. Okay, one, Stephanie Kaye's mom worked at Shopper's Drug Mart.

Okay. Now, there were two different scenes of young men buying condoms at Shopper's Drug Mart. Kat did the deals like, I'm going to buy some chips and I'm going to buy some of this and some paper and hopefully I'll put the condoms, they won't see it. Both Joey and Wheels did that. I feel like it was with Wheels that there was like a price check.

And it got all embarrassed. He's blushing and like have an old lady give him a dirty look. It's like, how dare you try to have sex, young man? And how dare you wear protection? Do what we did. Just do raw dog. Sorry, that was rude. And then last but not least, we've mentioned,

and she's going to come up a few times, Erica of the Twins. She actually bought, what do you think she bought at Shoppers Drug Market? She must have bought tampons. Okay, very good guess. No, she brought a home pregnancy oh of course yes and i just was like the whole move of like i'm buying condoms i'm embarrassed i'm gonna bury it between regular things like that was the teen wolf move when teen wolf wanted to buy the keg of beer he was buying regular things and then he also just threw in the

pile of things i'm buying is also a keg of beer. I still do that. I'm like in my early 40s. I'm still embarrassed to buy these items. Okay, other summer jobs. Snake was a lifeguard. Yes. Yes, and he had to wear, his nose would get burned.

Yeah, and this was actually a question. Did you ever do that? Lifeguarding? No, put zinc on your nose. I should. actually a question did you ever do that lifeguarding zinc on your no put zinc on your nose i should i have because when i get when i do burn it's my nose and under my eyes i don't put zinc on my nose no have you ever done that okay but i do put no sunscreen on my nose i but but that was like really popular in the 80s i remember i went to summer camp in the late 80s where i was alongside such great as michael layden i don't know if I've ever showed that fun fact.

So his sister, I'm doing the, trying to get the right names here was engaged to be married to Jeff Merrick. I feel, I feel like they knew that maybe we've talked about that. Cause this is of course I'm in the humble and Fred family. So this has been publicly put on their podcast that I've heard. So, yeah.

So Jack Layden's daughter was, I want to say engaged, but definitely heavily dating Jeff Merrick of Sportsnet fame. Rosie Gray, T.O., is making a mental note on that one. But yeah, zinc on the nose, snakes wearing the little shorts, the little tank top, the little bucket hat. I think I've told you this before. My sister was a lifeguard at a place in Richmond Hill called the Wave Pool. Okay. Okay. Which is literally an indoor wave pool.

Had the exact same outfit. Am I allowed to disclose that we were going to have your sister join us on this episode via Zoom? Okay, I just did. And am I allowed to disclose that she was too nervous to do it? Yeah, she was nervous. I thought it'd be great because one, this might be her favorite movie as well of all time. And she's actually a teacher too. So I thought school's out, you know, let's have a teacher on but yeah is it because i'm i'm a little intimidating is it just that you know

it's i make her nervous because she knows this is uh i'm a big number in this town yeah she knows you're the brian linehan of uh podcasting in toronto and she thought you might delve into her past so maybe maybe if we try this again next year, Lindsay, Lindsay, here's her name. She'll join us. So Lindsay, don't be scared. Okay. I know I'm a big number in this town, but I'll be gentle. Absolutely. The biggest now. Okay. Snake lifeguard. You may recall he fell in the pool with all his clothes on, you know,

little girls were chasing him around, like saying he's cute and stuff. Big outdoor pool. Do you know where that were chasing him around like saying he's cute and stuff big outdoor pool do you know where that pool is mike i'm gonna guess it's the uh that enrichment hill i don't know i don't know no okay do you remember this okay we've been locked down for a long time right right you you may recall late february early march they kept eased eased rules for a bit and you joined myself and some friends in Greenwood Park for a uh impromptu St. Patrick's Day celebration right I remember this yes there's a pool there that's for fucking steak work Greenwood Park wow wow that's huge that's huge I think that and I think that's's walking distance from FOTM Bob Willett's place as well. Shout out to the EastEnders. There's a few places we're going to get to that Bob could just stroll over to.

He'd probably be there in about five minutes. It's funny because all these things are east. But I will just point out that Degrassi Junior High is a stone throw from where I'm sitting right now in southwest Toronto. Yeah, it is very interesting. And then Degrassi High is on Carlos Street here in the East End, which is now Centennial College. And then the actual Degrassi Street is down by where the Opera House is and down in Leslieville. Yes, it's all East End stuff, except the location of Degrassi Junior High, which is now Vincent Massey Daycare or something like that. Okay.

Is that the same, like, is that Massey Hall? Is it the same guy? I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Put me on the spot there. We'll ask Johnny Dovercourt what's going on. Okay.

And last but not least, when the summer jobs wheels, as you may recall, worked as a mechanic or some kind of like grease monkey at a garage um that this is i wouldn't quite say this is a unknowable truth i i never remember wheels having interest in cars before so to go full grease monkey was a bit of a swerve but i mean you know you change a lot like you've developed quick interest back yeah they were only teenagers cam like so he picked it up and remember that we already alluded to it but i very much remember the shit box he was driving and it looks like a a grease monkeys project it's it's it's a piece of shit and uh i'll put an ellipse there because we'll definitely talk about that one now that garage was filmed at a

place called orchard park auto service that's at 76 kingston road again in the east end a bit further east towards scarborough though not quite now that garage where wheels worked actually showed up in another episode of degrassi um i'll see. I only vaguely remember this where I guess they'd taken snakes, parents' car and busted a taillight. I think they didn't have their driver's license and they had to go get it fixed. And it was actually the same garage where wheels later worked. Love it.

So that's fun. That's kind of fun. It's all fun. This is fantastic, buddy. Yeah. So actually my notes here are mixed up. This is where I've got all the music stuff.

So we already went over that. Why don't we hear the second clip that i sent you this is clip two i feel like we can bring this down. So we're going to get into the plot now. Now, this is, of course, the box out of Montreal. There's single Temptation that I feel like came out like 91. I don't think it was quite as big a hit as Closer Together or My Dreams of You.

All those great, or Just for Laughs, the single, not the comedy festival, although they did use it as the theme for the comedy festival for many years. I think this ties in very nicely with the aforementioned CFNY

Canada Day Festival slash Edgefest Deep Dive I did with Brother Bill and Captain Phil Evans, because I'm pretty sure these guys played the first one, so I think the box played the very first CFNY Candidate Day Festival in 1987. And am I wrong? I feel like they headlined one year with the hip right under them.

That might have been the year, maybe. Like, it's, I don't know, at some point in the late 80s anyways. Yeah, I will say for the box, like like they got a lot of airplay on cfdr and a lot of airplay on much music um and they had a number of hits i definitely remember the video for this song was kind of like a voodoo gimmick uh you know when they spent a lot of money on like music videos for canadian music and the box was uh it was right in the mix there is this the montreal act where sass jordan did background vocals on a single that yeah that's right it was um that closer together or yeah i think it was closer together because you can see her in the video with

like another backup singer and you can hear her and uh shout out to sass jordan because i i thought i think when i was giving her fun facts about her life, she was acting as if she was learning them for the first time. And I'm like, you live this life, Sass. This is your life. She seems like a real free spirit. That was a fun episode. She rocks. She rocks.

Yeah. Okay. So Temptation. So this was playing in the background when I think Joey was like, oh, should I go hang out with Tessa a bit? I'm dating Caitlin. We're talking about our future. Yada, yada, yada. We'll circle back to that in a second. Now, do you remember Tessa's boyfriend to start schools? A guy named Todd. a little bit so i should just let the listenership know that i actually haven't seen schools out in a little bit so it's all that's okay but but it's all tattooed in my brain uh copy of a copy of a copy so i kind of do remember that but you have of course for this uh for preparing for this episode you of course have watched this i'm hoping uh in the last week or so uh i i actually haven't but i i just most of the stuff was like all on like memory recall so i think

todd was only in really one scene um if you see behind me here so this is this is um maybe we'll like tweet out this graphic later so this is lucy's parents house where they had the raging party at the start right so todd's in the backyard smoking some joints with yik you yes and luke you remember luke luke was with shane when shane dropped lsd and jumped off the bluer viaduct okay right so luke's kind of a bad dude and clearly didn't he wasn't concerned about shane because i'm smoking joints with the todd and yik you uh so todd was i think really only in that scene was dating tessa at the time now the actor who played todd is someone named christian campbell okay do you know christian's sister is nev campbell nev campbell's sister was tessa's boyfriend wait okay wait so nev campbell is the sister of the guy who played tessa's boyfriend on degrassi schools out correct

christian and nev campbell it's like again how did i not know this that's amazing i was disgusted at myself amazing and related to that the very first time i ever saw nev campbell it was not party of five or even the uh ytv show what was it called catwalk i believe first time i ever saw nev campbell was uh in an in a skit on kids in the hall like that's right yeah so so there there you go nev fucking campbell amazing fun fact there uh unbelievable absolutely and i i took a peek at christian campbell's uh imdb never really did much else but did do a mate speaking made for tv movies i think this was a made for tv movie remake of Reefer Madness. Yes, of course.

Yes. Okay. Which is sort of ironic because you spoke in joints with Luke and Nick Yu. That film, which was on Showtime, you probably recall Showtime. Oh, my God, yes. Atlantis. It came out in 2005, featured his sister, Nev, and as well, Kristen Bell. Oh, my goodness.

It was quite a big deal. Yeah. Very big deal now. That's a fun fact. That's amazing. It's quite a big deal. Yeah. Very big deal now. That's a fun fact. That's amazing. By the way. Yeah, go ahead. I was just going to say,

this is an aside. Did you read, it must have been Simon Haupt or something, wrote a really good people's history of television or movies without borders in the Globe and Mail a couple of weeks ago. Did you read this? No, I missed it.

I'll have to catch up. What was it? I'll send it to you. But it was a good recap of just kind of like specialty channels in Canada in the late 90s and early 2000s because Cameron Bailey worked there and some other interesting people. I think you'd really dig it. Since you mentioned Yik, I'll just point out that the actor who plays Yik

is still very, very good friends with Pat Mastroianni, who played Joey Jeremiah. I know they're still tight and hang out. And as you I know you said something else that triggered another fun fact, but it'll come back to me, I'm sure. But so please continue. OK, OK. So we talked about the real life Todd. Now let's talk about the real life Tessa. Kristen Bourne is her name.

Guess who went to the same high school as her? This is the one fun fact somebody gave me. I didn't even research this. I didn't know this until like two days ago. And I was. I don't even know where to go with this guess. I'm just going to say, my girlfriend, MF.

MF went to... Oh my god. Wow. Are they like the same age? Approximately same age? Around the same vintage? No, Tessa's like quite a bit older. I think a lot of the characters... Oh, I forget. MF is a much, much younger woman. My apologies. A little bit. Most of the Degrassi characters of this generation older like i think i think a lot of i forget mf is a much much younger woman i always my apologies a little bit but yeah i mean most of the degrassi characters of this generation are kind of late 40s early 50s um so this would have been a few years older than mf but yeah it's a school called

the blessed sacrament that's near young and lawrence yeah i've heard that okay yeah it's in the catholic system of course because if you get a name like Blessed Sacrament, you're Catholic, damn it. Yeah, which, not a great week for the Catholic schools here in Canada, but nevertheless, some folks went there in the 80s and 90s. Usually kids don't have a say in it. Like, it's their parents' fault. I know that none of my kids have spent a minute in any Catholic schools,

but I was forced through the whole system. Yeah. I mean, let's move on. Like I won't say, but with a name like MF, you're going to be sent to the Catholic system. Yes.

I think you're a bang on there for sure. Now, do you remember Joey going to Tessa's house? They were fooling around like i remember like her top came off joey's like a boxer shorts is very salacious yeah hot stuff remember these scenes they're making dinner yeah very yeah like i was crossing my legs like pulled the whole thing um that house where they filmed those scenes yeah was actually the real life house of snake wow so stefan brojan is that how you say his last name uh brojan brojan uh i never know if it's a gen or a gen but uh wow

that's his like that's his family home that they filmed apparently yeah and again this is all stuff i found the internet so no but you know what at some point accurate. At some point Stefan is going to be on Toronto Mic'd and I can revisit all this and get to find it. So that means Rosie and GrayTO can go to the bank with it. Absolutely and I will give a shout out. There's like a wiki page

all about Degrassi. I don't know if you've ever stumbled upon this. A lot of these fun facts come from that. When I had Jake Goldsby on the program, I got some fun facts from this Degrassi wiki. Yeah. So absolutely shout out to the Degrassi wiki for a lot of this source material here.

So at that, you know, real life snake's house, but in the show is Tessa's house. You know, she's wearing kind of a sexy outfit. Joey comes over, I think wearing shorts, a sexy outfit joey comes over i think wearing shorts a tie and flowers which is a great look he didn't have the hat on even he was because anyway they had a food fight as part of that in snake's real life house and the soundtrack in the background was actually laurence gowan all the lovers in the world okay wow yeah wow um this this is not really a fun fact but both

Tessa and Caitlin had dates in the actual beaches with Joey you can see them both frolicking on the beach I don't know if you recall this um so let's get to the part of schools out where Caitlin famously loses her virginity okay we'll start with an unanswerable question. This bothered me at the time. Still bothers me to this day. Your call. Caitlin has like a condom in her clutch. And she kind of like hands it to Joey across the table.

If the listeners can't see this, I'm kind of like rubbing hands. Almost like I was saying, give me some skin. She kind of discreetly slips it to Joey at the table, saying we're going to fornicate tonight. We're going to do the horizontal bop between the sheets. So to speak, yes, the un-skinny bop. Shout out to Warrant. No, it's Poison, it's not Warrant.

That's Poison, not Warr's poison not oh oh god okay i'm still thinking about jenny jenny lane because we talked about it last night yeah i had to look up what took him uh because he died at 46 okay that's way too young and it was alcohol acute alcohol poisoning like he drank himself to death in a like a motel terrible yeah also thinking like how how the gap between warren's heyday and that happening like that's a lot of years to be sort of drowning your sorrows and self-medicating with alcohol so shout out to his family right well our condolences ridley funeral home absolutely but when when you i just want to shout out to poison because because Unskinny Bob,

which is a guilty pleasure of mine. Okay. You should not admit that you like Unskinny Bob. That's ridiculous. I like Unskinny Bob by Poison. Yeah. By the way, and shout out to your episode

with Art Bergman because I know Poison versus Poison came out and Art Bergman, not a fan of Poison i just said hey what about like guilty pleasure every every rose has its thorn art wasn't hearing it no not not interested anyway the thing that bothered me about that scene there it seemed like was an italian restaurant they're both drinking red wine so like what we knew about caitlin yeah, she was underage. B, she was kind of played by the rules.

I don't think she'd have a fake ID. What is this place serving them red wine like they're teenagers? Like, what the fuck? They're about to have sex. Like, she's handing them condoms. Okay, you're right. They're probably underage. But remember, in 1992, Ontario had OAC.

Okay, so we went to high school for five years, not the four they do now or the four they did in other provinces. What? Baby. So you... Caitlin also fast tracks. Right. Okay.

You got me. You got me. But I will say you're older than you think when you graduate high school in 1992. Okay. Well, I mean, nevertheless nevertheless they were drinking red wine and had sex for the first time at least caitlin did joey certainly that wasn't his first time we'll get to that shortly right um now in this episode you might recall as the plot progressed joey bought like a cheap engagement ring gave it to her at the start caitlin's like fuck that i'm going to university with lucy later reconsidered and did like look look this was at the cottage we'll get to the

fucking cottage soon that's where the action is holy god did the the move look what finger the rings on like doing it to like lucy and bronco and and snake and whatnot and they're like oh my god you're out of your mind, Caitlin. I got breaking news. Can I put a pin in you for a moment? Absolutely. Andy Pandy's watching this live on Facebook. And she says, Joey was 19,

but he does make a comment that he can't believe they didn't ID him for the wine. So this is acknowledged. Yeah. So I have to go back and study the scene, sort of do like a prunder thing. Maybe Caitlin did not have wine in that scene. We need to check this, like the Zapruder film, we need to break this down. I just want to let

Andy Pandy know that Andy Pandy, you can let us know anything. I'm reading the comments, so I will read your comments here live, Andy Pandy. Andy Pandy, please fact check us. Joey did this thing. You sort of stubble. I do recall.

She's 100% correct. Unlike us, I think Andy Pandy watches schools out weekly. I think this is a weekly ritual. She sits down and watches schools out from 1992. It's embedded in her brain. So that's good. Anyway, so anyway, Joey and Caitlin, in theory,

engaged in Schools Out. Not the first time they were engaged within the entire arc of Degrassi because they actually got engaged in the new class too. I don't think you watched it, but that did happen years later. No, but I remember I watched the episode.

It might've been the first one i might have been the pilot of the next generation because i remember they said the old gang was coming back so i wanted to see because wheels wheels was out of jail spoiler alert and joey and of course snake would be a cast member spike was a regular cast member caitlin was there i 100 watched that episode yeah Yeah, and they did reference a lot of plots, including some of the plot arcs from the film.

Anyway, they suddenly got engaged in an episode of the new class called Going Down the Road. Now, talk about a glimpse of a lot of parking lots in downtown Toronto. A lot in that film, Going Down the Road. And at the time Joey was used car sales

and Caitlin was kind of like an Avery Haynes type investigative reporter. White streak in front, yes. The gentleman who made Going Down the Road, of course his son is a big producer for

Drake, Noah. So his son has done very well for himself whoa i i definitely know who that is i did not know his dad made going down the road yeah his dad is uh is it don shabib am i getting shabib yeah and you had someone associated with this song peter gross had a phone call with Don, and we played the conversation on Toronto Mic of Don Shabib talking with Peter Gross about the follow-up to Going Down the Road that starred Peter Gross. Okay, very, very good.

Follow the money. The only reason I'm fucking, do you think I'm doing this for the money? I'm doing this because I'm building something here. I'm mapping something. All the I'm doing this for the money? I'm doing this because I'm building something here. I'm mapping something. And all the pieces matter. They all connect. And if I don't do this, who the fuck's going to, is Retro Ontario going to do this? Is Wiseblock going to do this? I'm going to need

their help, damn it. But I'm doing it. Absolutely. I mean, this is going to be the archive. Like, this is going to go in, like, kind of, you know, the annals of, like, history. Because no one else is archiving this stuff like you are. I'm a big number in this town. I'm a big number.

Okay, Mike. Now we're going to talk about a serious topic. And I'm 100% serious that this is we're going to talk about abortion. Okay. Now, Tessa in this, you know, there are some scenes her going to abortion clinic. Now, not the first Degrassi character to get an abortion. The first was Erica. Erica's coming up a lot of the twins.

She actually got an abortion when she got pregnant from someone named Jason at summer camp. It's not, sounds almost like a Friday the 13th type thing, but a different Jason. Now, if you recall those episodes, I feel like stuff with the Morgenthaler Clinic was a lot in the news. And I actually did a lot of reading

about Henry Morgenthaler in the clinic. And just like, what, like a real, again, 100% serious and genuine. What a legend and like a hero. Are we talking like bomb threats and this type of, yeah. Yes. Okay. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. And there were scenes when Erica went in to get an abortion of protesters, like holding up placards and like a fetus. This is your baby. This is your baby. I remember being like a fetus this is your baby this is your baby i remember being like like whoa this is like really heavy yeah um because i i probably didn't even know that much about you know where do babies come from and sex and all those topics when i first saw that so uh credit to the show for like you know giving people like you and me like a first look at some of these like heavy topics that's why I like the Degrassi approach.

Because we were also watching a lot of American television of kids the same age, be it like Saved by the Bell or 90210 or whatever. And sure, 90210 did go into some of these areas, but nobody did it with the gritty realness of Degrassi. I always liked that when you saw Wheels' parents or his grandparents, they looked like regular people. These weren't like models or whatever. This is what my friend's parents looked like or my friend's grandparents looked like. It all had this gritty realness. It was real talk. Yeah, well, I also liked that the homes they lived in were middle class

or very working class, too. Most of the houses even like tessa's you know house where snake live was not you know it was pretty modest too i mean these are you know i assume you know you me and the rest of us are kind of like middle class people growing up too so like you could see a lot of yourself and a lot of these scenes right and you couldn't see that in the the brandon and bre and Brenda Walsh home, which was like the whole- No, that's ridiculous.

Give me a break. Move from Minnesota. Give me a break. So anyway, I always thought, sort of the Erica arc with the abortion was very much inspired by the Morgenthaler Clinic and a lot of stuff, debates about abortion at the time and i did

like that degrassi would often inspired by true events or true things in the news cycle now when i was doing some research i actually have another pretty interesting thread that i'm gonna try to like tie the thread thread the needle i think that's what i was trying to say thread the needle between henry morgan taller and the degrassi universe this is kind of interesting okay just tie the thread, thread the needle. I think that's what I was trying to say. Thread the needle between Henry Morgenthaler and the Degrassi universe. This is kind of interesting. Okay. Just stay with me here.

There's a 1996 book called Morgenthaler, A Difficult Hero. Okay. So it's kind of the life and times of Henry Morgenthaler and all the work, good work that he did. This is written by a journalist from the Toronto Star named Catherine Dunphy.

Do you know this name? It seemed vaguely familiar to me very vaguely familiar to me yeah so she wrote four books in her career one was this morgan taller book there was another book that honestly i forgot i should have written it down the two other books she wrote were actually degrassi books do you remember the degrassi book series where there'd be these like books that were like just about one of the characters it'd be like joey wheels spike lucy i have no memory of this book series yeah like you can find you can still sometimes find them used i bet you andy pandy has the whole set oh totally like mint condition probably multiple sets.

Anyway, Catherine Dunphy, who wrote the book about Henry Morgantall, also wrote two books from the series. The book's about Caitlin. Yes. And the book, I don't think this guy was in Schools Out. BLT.

Love BLT because he also appeared on a Kids in the Hall skit that I quite liked with Buddy Cole. He was a good dude. He just dated Michelle. Her parents are racist uh awful um and she also years later katherine dumpy wrote some screenplays for riverdale oh the the uh yeah the archie is a reboot yeah which like years later i mean so good for her my teens watched it and I understand Archie fucks okay

spoiler spoiler alert okay do they use those terms or I don't know that's the big update is yeah this is Riverdale the guys you know Moose and Jughead and they're all here Midge is here but now Archie

fucks okay good to know. I bet Archie did the whole I'm going to go buy condoms but pile a bunch of chips on top of it so I don't get ashamed. We're going to hear our third clip in a second. Before we do, just two more.

These didn't really map to anything. Heather and Erica, second to last time we mentioned them. This has nothing to do with anything But I knew someone who went to a restaurant And saw them As entertainment And they were doing some kind of mariachi dancing

Okay Wow I wish I knew who told me Maybe it was someone my sister saw But this was like years ago I know you're in the middle of something here But it always, when,

when I would watch Degrassi every week and then I would go to HMV to buy, I used to go in the basement cause that's where the, the hip hop was. And, uh, I, I kind of check in the basement and working at the cash was the actress who played Kathleen.

And I remember, I distinctly remember Liz and I, I distinctly remember thinking that was like the very, I think in my whole life that was, and I distinctly remember thinking, that was like the very, I think in my whole life, and I was a teenager. I wasn't like five years old or anything. But that was the moment where I realized, oh, you can't live on being a TV star on Degrassi.

Like you actually need to get a job. Yeah. And more broadly, I don't think you can live being a TV star in Canada. And sorry, it wasn't, the actress you're talking about kathleen was actually her name's rebecca okay in real life this is the blonde right i'm not confusing my yes okay yes she was yeah her mom was like a drunk and stuff right um

i actually know rebecca a little bit through work she's now she works for i think the university of alberta and does a lot of like health advocacy and stuff out there shout out to my wife Monica who graduated from the University of Alberta she'd be fast friends with Rebecca she's very nice I'm sure last but not least before we go the next clip didn't know where to fit this in but it's kind of fun Lucy's

dad in this show I think is only one scene gives Bronco and Lucy the keys to the car so they can go up to the cottage. Lucy's dad in the show was like a really well-known stuntman named Darren Marsman, who did stunt work in a bunch of movies, including Jumper, one of the Incredible Hulk movies, and the Robocop remake that I think they filmed in Toronto and had some like blog two articles about. Look what they're doing on Yonge Street. You just reminded me of

an episode I did outdoors only a few months ago with Cam Woolley who was retiring from CP24 and he came and he told me basically he starts in the whole media universe because he's working as an OPP sergeant or I don't know what his title was but he was

he saw like fake cop cars up in Orillia or something like that I'm sure you'll tell me in a moment where it was but he saw these junky fake cars and he went to check them out because that's not that's not legal and he found out they were going to be used for some tv movie called schools out and uh yeah so that that is I remember you you shared this before and like you gotta I it. I know you skipped this one, buddy. Don't sleep on cam.

I just thought it's out there in the ether. I didn't want to, I don't want, I I'm trying to do fresh material. Okay. Breaking news. Okay. Andy Pandy reveals that Kathleen's mom was played by Stefan's mom in real life.

With a drinking issue. Right. Kathleen's mom. Kathleen's mom in real life with a drinking issue right kathleen's mom kathleen's mom so that was played by uh stephan's real life mother played the fictional mother of kathleen on degress okay that i'm gonna tell my sister that she's gonna find that well tell her if she's maybe she had a drink of wine or something and she wants to join the zoom here it's not too late i would love to have her join i'll send her send her a text where's my phone um okay this is a moment i bet a lot of people are waiting for the whole fucking tessa campanelli i'm gonna try to take that down a few notches there's t-shirts that have fucking tessa campanelli the seo is off the charts a lot of people there's memes there's

everything not the first time they're swearing in this film, okay? Wait a minute. Slow your roll here. We got to get this right. So you're telling me that scene is not the first time on Schools Out that swear words were used. Yeah. There were several swear words

mind you just before that, but nevertheless Joey was not the first one to swear into grassy caitlin was not the first one it was actually snake okay mike if you would could you play clip three you got it jeremiah is the name and i've got it all excuse me make me sound like an object. Oh, please. The object of my desire. Hmm. Snake, by the way, this is a girl. I know you don't know much about them, so I thought I'd bring one over and show you.

No, seriously. You see, I know you don't have too much experience with them, so I thought... That's it! I've had enough. Oh, come on. He's just jealous. He doesn't have a girlfriend. You shut up, Joey. If you're not quiet, there's a thing or two I could say about you. Things that some people might find pretty interesting.

Hey, whoa, whoa, whoa. Snake. What's going on? Come on, let's go outside. What was the letter? The guy's deranged. That was stupid. He was just kidding. Let's go play. That was stupid. He was just kidding.

Let's go play some volleyball, dude. Oh, real funny. I'm sick and tired of that jerk bugging me. I've lived this summer from hell. Come on. The guy thinks he has everything. You really feel sorry for yourself, don't you? Oh, poor Snakey Wakey.

He can't get laid. But he's going to university. He's got two great parents who are alive and who love him. He lives in a great house. Yeah, well, maybe it looks easy from the outside, Wheels. Well, it's kind of hard for me to feel sorry for you, Snake. Mama's little boy. Grow up.

Oh, and you're so mature, Wheels. Guy spends his whole summer drinking beer and playing with his car. You watch what you say about my car. I don't know why you're so proud of it, Wheels. I'd put a bag over my head if I was driving that piece of shit. You know, you can be a real asshole sometimes. Yeah, you got a really big mouth.

I've got a big mouth. Yeah, what was that with Joey? That has nothing to do with you, wheels. If you guys want to fight, don't do it inside. Take it out there. Take it out there. Come on, let's go.

Fine by me. Come on. I'm sorry. I'm riveted by this dialogue. I can't believe how good it is. It's intense. I mean, I don't know. I do really like the moment like some somebody would be really interesting like just caitlin's reaction

where she's like what like what is it like she already has like i think trust issues right with joey and she's like what the fuck is this about uh me and my sister growing up i i like brought the character bronco too he was also another like voice of reason me and my sister growing up, I like the character Bronco too. He was also another voice of reason. Me and my sister growing up used to all the time, anytime things were going to be intense, we'd go, take it aside! We used to call him Bronco. Really? I love it.

I wish your sister had joined the Zoom. But that clip we hear, so they talk about can't get laid. And then we hear, I guess there's an S bomb and then the A word. So is that, that's the, now, I mean, we're going to get into this because I pulled a clip myself that includes the F bombs. So the S word that we hear from Snake, that's the first swear word in School's Out? I think so.

Now, it depends on your term because there is a scene early on when they're still at the party like five minutes in where Wheels, you know, kind of in full dirtbag mode is they're playing pool in the basement and Wheels does something to the effect of,

oh, welcome to the summer, gentlemen. Who will be the first to get laid? May the game begin. Shout out to the band James oh welcome to the summer gentlemen who will be the first to get laid may the game begin shout out to the band James by the way with the laid I don't think delayed is like a swear word no late is not a swear word it's a little crass it's a little crass but that's not a swear word

George Carlin told us the seven words you can't say on television I do think piece of snake I put my bag over that piece of shit. Yeah, that's it. Yeah, I do like wheels, the snaky wakey part. I always enjoyed that.

And I will say, in 1992, you weren't hearing asshole on that. That might have changed, but at that time, asshole was a word you didn't use on television. No, so like in quick succession, we got laid, shit, asshole, fucking once, fucking twice.

Do you want me to play? So can I play my clip now? Okay, so here we go. Mine is a little, it's a couple of minutes, but it's not just audio from schools out. It also includes a little conversation I had with Stacey Mystician. So it's all cut from that

episode, which is a pretty recent Toronto Mic'd episode with Stacey. And we, of course, also dove deep into this. But here we go. You're just so full of yourself. Joey Jeremiah, what a studly guy. Let's recap the Jeremiah summer, shall we? See what a swell and decent human being you've been. You're gonna listen to this. No you're gonna listen to me.

Joey Jeremiah spends his summer dating Caitlin. Shut up. And fucking Tessa. Oh what ethics. What a hero. Let's have a great big hand shall we? Big round of applause hey? Yes all right. Snake's got a fairly weird sense of humor. Tessa Campanelli? You were fucking Tessa Campanelli? No. Don't lie to me, Joey.

Caitlin, it's not what you think. Then what is it? Okay, so tell us now that we've heard that one minute of schools out uh why is stefan uh upset well upset is a strong word but he likes to point out he likes to make sure he gets credit for being the first person and and rightfully so rightfully so i think it gets overshadowed that he is actually the first person to swear on primetime TV. It's just people remember the Caitlyn moment more because that was like when shit hit the fan. You know, he has a right to be, I'll use your terminology. I want to say he's upset because it's more fun to think about the fact he's still carrying this. I like to r he's upset because it's more fun to think about the fact he's still carrying this. I like to razz him a bit. So not to bury the lead there, but that clip we just heard, that is the very first time the word fuck was heard on Canadian broadcast television.

That's mind-blowing in its own self. But you're right. The first time the F word is dropped is not you with that infamous line about fucking Tessa Campanella. It is, you're right. Snake says it just a few seconds before he says the F word first. He gets credit in the Guinness Book of World Records or whatever when they talk about the first F bomb. But I always joke, for years I've been joking, that's the F. And I always forgot about it. I'll be honest.

I forgot about the Snake F bomb. So that's why he's F-bomb. And I always forgot about it. I'll be honest. I forgot about the snake F-bomb. So that's why he's pissed, I think. But I always remember. And I swear twice. And it's just, again, I feel like snake swearing doesn't seem out of character. And you swearing, for some reason, it feels like you just heard a nun swear or something. It just seems really shocking or something. But I always call that the F-bomb heard across the country like

that's kind of a again i'm a guy in my mid-40s here so if in my world that was a big fucking moment when you dropped your f-bomb on cbc and and then i say bastard as well yeah that's where really like embraced it so there we go there you go so confirmed uh caitlin uh so it was snake and not caitlin who said i i still i find that a little hard to believe that's the first time there was ever swearing on canadian broadcast do you believe this well it's definitely it's not i think she means to put a qualifier in there, like in prime time, because of course I was watching, I was watching movies late at night on CBC, City TV as well, for sure,

where there was F-bombs and lots of, you know, sex and nudity and stuff. But it would all happen like after, I don't know, 11 p.m. or something like that. I think she means that's the first f-bomb on in prime time on canadian network and i feel like more precisely it would be in a like a scripted canadian made tv show because i mean there's also you know just like random like news clips where like you know some jerk like comes up behind a reporter stuff you might have heard it like a Leaf game with Mike, you know, Pat Burns.

Like Jim Schoenfeld have another donut. I think John Brophy and who was the St. Louis Blues coach at the time? I'm thinking in 86. Was it Jack Demers? Yes.

I think there were some F-bombs going back and forth that might have been caught by a hot mic. Only F-bombs. I think with those two. Shout out to Jack Demers. I love that guy. And he apparently was illiterate, I believe. This was his secret shame that he couldn't read. Yeah.

There's a whole story about Jack Demers. And anyway, Jack Demers, of course, the last coach of the Montreal Canadiens the last time they were in the Stanley. Are you excited about the Habs being in the final? No, not at all.

Not at all. Not at all. I was rooting for Vegas last night and I feel like it's my job as a Leafs fan for life that

I would always root against the Habs. Okay. You do realize Luke Richardson is their assistant coach. He was in the Gilmore trade. Gilmore was a Hab, don't forget. That didn't matter. It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter. You root against the... As Jerry Seinfeld says, you root against laundry. Actually, I'm going to correct myself. I think Luke Richardson was actually in the Grant Fuhrer trade, not the Gilmore trade. Yeah, Luke was in the Grant Fuhrer trade, not the Gilmore trade. Yeah, Luke was in the Grant Fuhrer trade with Glenn Anderson.

Fact check myself. Anyway, fucking Tessa Campanella. Good line. It's not the first time they support. In that clip, I listened to myself say Campanella, and it's Campanelli. So I'm thinking of maybe Roy Campanella or something. Roy Campanella, right. Hall of Famer

down in Cooperstown. Okay, so now we're goinger down in Cooperstown. Right. Okay, so now we're going to start wrapping things up here. Final scene is, of course, the wedding of Simon and Alexa. Another East End location, Mike. We got the St. Brigid Catholic Church near Woodbine in Danforth. Wow. I know we're very close to Bingo Bob and some other folks out here on the East End. Yeah, and Troy from Great Lakes is in thatforth. Wow. I know from very close to Bingo Bob and some other folks out

here on the East End. Yeah, and Troy from Great Lakes is in that hood and Robbie J. A lot of greats. A lot of greats live in that hood. I wish I knew what all these people look like because I probably have like crossed them on the street. Well, if you look at the photo I take in front of the tree,

you can see what they look like. I was there last night. This is sort of a stray thing from the wedding that I never really understood. They mentioned that this would be the last mention of Erica, the twin, who's barely in and schools out. But at the wedding they mentioned Erica's teaching in Dominican

Republic. And I was wondering who the fuck cares? It's not relevant to anything. She doesn't have to be in the scene why like why waste time on that um okay we're gonna start wrapping up and we'll play the final clip very soon but before we do mike this is very interesting because i mean obviously a lot of people in the u.s knew about degrassi perhaps most famously kevin smith amongst other people because it would air in like boston and new york and New York and probably Pittsburgh and some other places.

There was actually a lot of scenes from schools out that was edited out of the U.S. airing of this version and even on some of the U.S. VHS releases of this. Okay. This includes Snake falling into the pool, the lifeguard down at Greenwood Park. Snake being followed around the pools by little girls telling him how cute he is in his little shorts. This is not surprising. They added out the whole fucking Tessa Campanelli line. But I think they probably filmed it with two versions, right?

They filmed it with the F-bomb and then they filmed it with something less offensive. two versions right they filmed it with the f-bomb and then they filmed it with something less offensive so in the u.s version they said you're seeing tessa campanelli seeing tessa camp doesn't quite have the same impact doesn't pack the same punch yeah and then i don't know if you recall after that scene there was also a scene where a couple of girls i forgot what their names were they were actually drowning and snake like dove in to get them. And it was like Snake's big moment, but he's also you know, he referenced the summer from hell. Just all came flooding back. He's about to

I think Carlton. He just received these girls. He can't get laid. Big summer for Snake. For some reason that scene was edited out of the US broadcasting. Maybe for time. More ads in the States. And for what it's worth, apparently the abortion

episode with Erica, a lot of that stuff was edited out of the US, which is kind of shitty, if you ask me. Yeah, you know, you hear about those stories in the Bible Belt or whatever, and that certain episodes can't air South USA

for offending certain religions or thoughts or whatever but usually those will air in like you know new york and pennsylvania you know northern and california eastern yeah it's actually too bad because i feel like anything that qualified this is a very special episode of degrassi junior high those are the ones that would get edited those are the ones that actually have the important information for young people nevertheless one final comment about VHS and like because this

did come out on D I actually have the DVD here at home which is very exciting there was a VHS release of this now interestingly all the people it's got like a bunch of like the characters and sort of like a group shot there's like eight or nine of them everyone in that group shot is in schools out except for one person uh duane the bully oh yeah for some reason he's in the cover

of the vhs release of this not in the movie interesting yeah you you probably recall he got hiv and and joey and him kind of patched up right at the end of high school and dwayne but dwayne was not in the movie what a scene that was what a scene yeah um so they were like i mentioned off the top there were some theatrical showings of this just a few years ago joey and caitlin some of their characters actually took this on a bit of a tour where they did a thing in Vancouver with Edmonton. Here in Toronto, they've showed a couple of times at the Royal Theatre in college, as well as at the Bloor Cinema. Have you been to the Bloor Cinema much over the years?

For sure. For sure. Yeah. Sorry. No, it sounds like we might have a comment. You can always tell when I look to my right. Andy Pandy says there was an abortion episode in the Next Generation series that also was not aired in the USA. Oh, yeah. I only watched maybe the first or second season of the new generation, but definitely got some heavy stuff.

I think there was a creepy coach putting the moves on kids in the hotel room and right abortion like a lot of stuff about gender identity obviously in topics of the day um one other like on the road screening they did with schools that actually coincide in in 2018 was sask expo which is event it's kind of like the comic con of saskatoon okay right so this was one of the marquee showings it was you could go watch schools out in theater with joey and caitlin did a little q a other people who appeared that year the headliners at sas esco were ron perlman okay okay and john ratzenberger oh from, from Cheers. Yeah. Now, the headliners were supposed to be Sean

Austin. Okay. Sure, from Goonies. Rudy and Lord of the Rings. I think he was in Goonies. Yeah. I always forgot about Lord of the Rings. Yeah, Goonies. Exactly. As well as Billy D. Williams. Okay. Yeah. That's a big deal for Rocky. Both cancelled. They didn't show up. Didn't show up.

So, that's enough about schools out on the road. Now, really gonna wrap up mike while we play this last track i have a few more fun facts a few more unanswerable questions and then we'll we'll we'll stick a pin in this and i'll let people have dinner Sometimes at night I get so scared Cause tomorrow we might not be together I want to hold on to me today I wish that we could stay this way forever I know

we'll never feel so close again for each beginning something must end we can't look back okay so mike this is um this is amy sky and before we go into a bit about amy sky i'm just gonna backtrack a little bit that part where like right after that you're fucking tessa campanelli the music playing in the background is actually

images in vogue um well you talk again like 80s band but like we're in we're in 92 here yeah it's bizarre it's bizarre yeah maybe it was cheap anyway um so do you know anything about amy sky i know that she's married to singer-songwriter mark jordan oh okay i want to quiz you okay i had a phone call with well i knew that anyway i guess but i had a phone call of mark jordan uh over this pandemic yeah i will say i googled mark jordan and uh in google images one of the first photos that comes up is him i think on the humble and fred show yeah he's been on a few times yeah that does make sense yeah um so i this song which is called we can't look back by amy sky a good sentiment this played over the

final scene where they're at simon and alex's wedding so simon and alex are dancing snake with his new girlfriend that he met at carlton her name is pam we never learned anything about pam other than she's a lot shorter than snake like most people are but But Joey and Kate. Well, Snake's like your height, so what are you going to do? Yeah, so that's no slight on Pam. But then Caitlin and Joey actually share a dance, and they're sort of like reminiscing over like, oh, the summer. Oh, my God. I always thought it was weird because it was like five weeks. Like this is over like Thanksgiving weekend.

It's like, is that still not like a fresh wound? Like Joey was like cheating on you, Caitlin? Right. But I don't know. I mean, you know, we can't look back any of this. Nope. Okay. So as Amy Sky takes us out a few more unknowable truths.

Yes. And I actually pulled these off a Reddit forum. That was partially like a fan fiction thing about things that people either thought could have been a fit in schools out or again a final unknowable truth okay okay so we'll do three of these now one person thought there should have been a scene like why did wheels like he killed a kid when he's drunk driving his parents died of drunk driving it's like you know should he have known better but i mean wheels was like a messed up dude, like both,

you know, life imitating art too. Like it was kind of freaky how that like overlapped and kind of the tragic end of Neil hope, but somebody kind of fantasy booked a line in schools out where wheels would visit his, his parents' gravestone and say something along the lines of you were right.

And they break down in tears, apologizing before he went to jail. I don't know how that would work because he was in prison. So I don't know. Yeah. I don't think there was a lot of, there was no time between accident and jail for him to have this little visit to the grave. That's a nice idea,

but it's not practical. I think it would have been a powerful scene. I'm not sure it would have fit in schools out. I realized cam that were like literally an hour and 20 minutes into this sucker. And we never did discuss this one point, which I, I was wondering,

uh, is this an episode for people who have seen schools out? Or is this an episode also that would also work for people who have never seen schools out? Like, do we need to explain what this ending like what you just kind of throw off the cuff here that oh yeah wheels killed a kid drinking and driving yeah this is kind of a this is this is well for me anyway i think i speak for others as well this scene where as i recall wheels is drinking he's just down in

bottles of beer and he's got his shit box we talked about and him and lucy are going to buy chips or something where are they going into town to buy chips they're going out to and and mike to clarify it's not a shit box it's a piece of shit i think that's a neil young song a piece of shit yeah no piece of crap piece of crap piece of crap that's right sorry it's a piece of crap which i kind of dug that jam but it's just dedicated to wheels so lucy's car and there's a lesson here uh i think this lesson is something i'm going to actually share with my teenage daughter tonight which is reminder i think i've said it a million times but reminder never get in the car with somebody who's been drinking like wheels is not just drunk he's he's been down he's got a bottle

of beer with him in the car like he gets in the car to drive lucy to town to buy the chips and he's got the open bottle he's downing as he drives no no nobody needs chips that badly and also i it's too bad because lucy was such a responsible like she was the student council president she was a real responsible character but to her credit she was trying a responsible like she was the student council president. She was a real responsible character but to her credit she was trying to cool like lifelong friends wheels and snake were about to like fucking murder each other. Like Bronco

said take it outside. There was gonna be like blood all over the cottage. That's important context. That's important context. She was trying to diffuse the situation by saying hey let's go to town and get some chips. But yeah nobody needs chips that badly don't do it no chips are bad for you anyway yeah exactly like have some like oh my god like snakes mom like load up with like fresh vegetables like have some of those have some like celery absolutely uh so of course the tragic and you're

right there this parallels some of the tragic ending of the actor, Neil Hope, but Wheels himself, does end up getting in a car accident, and not only does he kill somebody, but Lucy also is hospitalized. Is she blind? Remind me what happens. She went blind, although, like Caitlin later said,

I think it was at the wedding, her sight was coming back. And I feel like Lucy was in the new class and had a cane though. So maybe Andy would know this. Yeah. And of course, Lucy was in the video for Kish's.

She's a flirt. Let's do it. She was in the video for Anna Gronowski. I butchered her first name and I think Stacey made fun of me. Anais. Anais? Anais Gronowski. I butchered her first name and I think Stacey made fun of me. Anais. Anais? Anais Gronowski.

And a fascinating story about her if you want to go find the Toronto Life article. I was going to say, we also learned she's polyamorous into non-traditional relationships. There you go. So yeah, she's clearly turned her life around after the car accident.

Okay, let's wrap it up. Two more. One fantasy booking someone had the idea what if tessa showed up on the new class with joey's baby because there there's a lot of chatter online how we never fully confirmed that tessa had an abortion she was at the abortion clinic yes she had an appointment but we because Tessa never showed up again after that. Do we specifically have knowledge that she had an abortion? So someone on the, a bunch of people on the internet sort of said that would, that would have been very interesting.

She showed up on the newscast. Joey, you know, it's sort of like the heart. All I want to do is make love to you. He had his Joey's eyes. Like maybe it's like a 17 year old wearing a fedora. It's like, Joey, this kid, like that's yours. Like that would have been powerful. I think they need a new spinoff series based around this child that Joey

fathered as a teenager. Yeah. And this is last but not least. Now in the new class, there's a kid named Craig that I don't recall was Joey's blood child or like, I feel like Joey's wife died in Crete. I forget what it was,

but that was basically Joey's kid. And, and so there was this thing on Reddit, someone's cat doing like a butterfly effect, sliding doors thing. Like what happened if Joey didn't cheat on Caitlin? What would have happened to Craig in the new class? He would cease to exist.

Sort of look back to the, it's a bit of back to the future. Yes. I would cease to exist or look back to the it's a bit of back that's back to the future yes i was gonna say back to the future that's back to the future of course if things yes of course of course and by the way yes we confirmed with andy pandy that craig was joey's stepson stepson okay well yeah so who knows so so so the fact is i don't know if craig would have gone to that school or whatever, but Craig would have existed regardless. Yeah. So, I mean, yeah, it's not quite back to it. It's Kirkland back to the future.

Right. That's all I got. Like, you know, Amy Skye said we can't look back, but clearly we can. This is almost 30 years old and we just spent like an hour and a half talking about this in these early days of summer in the late stages, hopefully, of a pandemic. So two things here to close with. One, Cam, do you think Stu Stone will listen to this episode? No.

Okay, okay. I don't think he will. And two, this is for all the students who are listening to this episode. Of course, I'm very popular in that demo. I'm a kind of a big ticket, not big ticket. What am I?

I'm a big number in this town. Big number, big number, big number showbiz. So just two words to close this out. Two words, schools out. I thought it was going to be and that's.

Oh, four words. Okay. Four words. Okay. Schools out. Oh! Four words. Okay, four words. School's out! And that brings us to the end

of our 873rd show. You can follow me on Twitter. I'm at TorontoMike. Cam, you did a great job, buddy. You really kicked ass tonight. This was amazing. This was...

30 years in the making, Mike. This was a lot of fun as always i hope you bring the same energy and effort uh to my backyard on tuesday when we're we're doing another episode of pandemic i already already have most of my picks just just need to send them over i'll probably do that tomorrow i love how you and i do our picks right away and i it's like the 11th hour i'm waiting for stew's picks to drop from the sky. So typical. So typical.

So Cam is at Cam underscore Gordon. Our friends at Great Lakes Brewery, they're at Great Lakes Beer. Palma Pasta is at Palma Pasta. Sticker U is at Sticker U. Ridley Funeral Home, they're at Ridley FH. And Mimico Mike,

he's not on Twitter, but he's on Instagram as at MajeskiGroupHomes. See you all next week. And I don't know what the future can hold or do for me and you But I'm a much better man for having known you This podcast has been produced by TMDS and accelerated by Rome Phone. Rome Phone brings you the most reliable virtual phone service to run your business and protect your home number from unwanted calls.

Visit RomePhone.ca to get started.