Werewolf Ambulance: A Horror Movie Comedy Podcast - Repost of Neon Maniacs

Episode Date: October 26, 2026

Hey, no new episode this week so here is a classic from the the first year of the podcast. Enjoy Neon Maniacs!

Hello, and welcome to another episode of Werewolf Ambulance. I'm Alan, and I'm here with my friends, Katie. Hi, Alan. And our friend Josh. Hello. Josh is calling in from Seattle. That's the West Coast. On the Internet.

On the Internet. Isn't that the home of the Internet? West Coast of the Internet. Yeah, I guess it is. Internet, Internet, Internet. The land of Internet and coffee. And I know how much you hate coffee, Josh. I hate it.

I also hate rain too, which is stupid that I'm here. Yeah, not a good, not a good geographic choice. You know who hates the rain as well, the neon maniacs? Whoa, great segue. You were born to do. I have that in my notes. It's weird. They live so close to the ocean, given that they hate the water.

It was an odd location for them to be. Everything about this goddamn movie was on. Like they live in a bridge over the water that will kill them. Is it not damp? I have a lot of questions about this movie. So yes, Josh has brought us neon maniacs. We're going to do spoilers. I think you can spoil this.

I'm not sure. It may already be spoiled. I don't know. But Josh brought us neon maniacs. Josh, do you want to do a quick plot summary? Yeah, I'll try to make it quick. This movie has been with me for probably 25 years. I first discovered it at a West Coast video as a kid.

Of course. And I have watched it so much. many times over the years and I'm completely obsessed with it. So yeah, let's jump in. It starts off with an excellent voiceover that says, when the world is ruled by violence and the soul of mankind fades, the children's path shall be darkened by the shadows of the neon maniacs. Remember everything I hated about Candyman? Yeah. I love it in this movie. It's so good. I'm happy to hear that because I was listening to the Candyman episode a little bit like, uh, is she going to totally hate this thing? Because it doesn't make any sense. Candyman is insanity thrust.

into a sane world where this is just insane the whole way through. There's no sense to it. But anyway, go out. This is like a mythical San Francisco. The introduction to the film has a fisherman at the Golden Gate Bridge and beautiful San Francisco. And he happens to find this iron door under the bridge. And there's a cow skull stuck in there with some awesome hand-painted trading cards. Why?

Of the weird zombie supervillain dudes. So weird. You have no idea. And I would be so stoked if I found these as well. I'm going to say you have no idea how stoked out would be to find this deck of cards. Like that's why you pick up the cattle skull. Yeah.

There was this one time that I was walking down the street and there was a Polaroid laying face down on the street and I was like, I gotta pick this up. This could be like the fucking key to everything. This Polaroid. It's gonna be fucking amazing. Who knows what this could be? It was a dude sticking his dick through the rungs of a chair.

It answered. It asked more questions that answered. It did not change things. It did not. Could you see his face? No, no. No, just a dick. No, just, yeah, just right there.

Sticking it right to the back of a chair. Were they tight rungs? No. And it wasn't that impressive of a dick either. Oh, man. Just, I guess that's why it was like. Yeah, that's why you do it. Oh, I need a better.

I need a better dick for this picture. Did I get the first dick pick? Wow. That's the sexted, dude. It was like nature sexted me. Oh, God. All right, so the guy finds the book with all the pictures in it. Why?

They never come back. Yeah, which is the first of many questions you're going to have about this movie that after watching it for 25 years you don't have answers for. The next one I have is why does it go to like a smooth jazz intro like you're at the dentist? The like opening sequence is so smooth jazz. Oh, it's the incidental music from moonlighting, I think. It was just so like, chill. I was going to say staying elsewhere, kind of Hill Street Blues kind of thing. Yeah, definitely.

I think they're all the same. Yeah. So the guy finds the book, smooth jazz happens. Yeah, the guy finds these cards and is checking them out and is stabbed. No, no, I'm sorry, he gets hit with an axe. Yeah, that's right. And that's the introduction, the maniacs. It's good.

Yeah. Some sweet, bright red blood hits the cards. Then we get cut to a really long credits sequence with the smooth jazz music. Then we are introduced to one of the protagonists. a fella named Stephen who is out jogging with his dog. He's kind of a low rent John Cusack in this movie. I like that guy though. Yeah, I thought he's good.

No, I like John Cusack. I just support a version. He's quick-witted. Yeah. Bologna man. Bologna. Pasta breath, which I would love to be most of it. So he has an encounter with popular kids.

Who are all driving around? In a conversion van, as you do as a popular kid. It's a cool van, though. It's a cool van. It's a super cool van. It's got the captain's chance. chairs that swivel. Yeah.

Sorry, go on. Josh. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm describing this movie. No, it's okay. Yeah, so they're driving around this conversion van. They yell some shit at some movie punks.

So, man. I have a theory that I'll come back to with movie punks, but go on. Okay. And they stop in front of the store. Stevens dog gets away, runs up to the van, and we meet the other protagonist, the film Natalie, who's kind of, she's the popular girl who is a little more reserved. She doesn't seem to be as jerky as the other kids. She's a virgin, which they make a point of pointing out, but amounts to nothing.

Nothing at all. Yeah. And then we realize that Stephen sort of has this thing for Natalie. It might be a little bit both ways. Yeah, there's a good exchange when the jock dude comes out with beer. He calls him baloney man because we find out Stephen works at his father's deli. Italian store? Italian store. They have Italian store delivery, though.

It's pretty rad. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, so that's the introduction of the first two. protagonists, and then we meet the other protagonist who is so awesome. Paula. Paula. I love Paula. I love her so much. I want to be Paula. You want to look simultaneously like a child and a middle-aged woman?

She has that Benjamin Button disease. She is adorable. Mostly infecting her hair. They made her look young by putting a fucking alien's Nestromo hat on her sideways. A whole movie is sideways. I'm a plucking kid. I got a fucking mortgage, but I'm a the lucky kid.

But she's the best. She's just wearing like fucking Dracula makeup and hanging out in her house. Yeah. Yeah. They pan around the room and we see that she's a huge movie nerd. She loves, there's like an American Werewolf in London poster up,

like a Dracula statue, a Gremlin's poster, Blade Runner poster. One's got a Blade Runner poster. So she's totally down. She's got masks around and we see that she has video editing equipment. She's just putting together some footage. Yeah. So that's the introduction of the big three protagonists of the film.

And then it cuts to a pretty classic 80s teen sex party. You got firecrackers. You got booze. You got motorcycles. Motorcycle guy. I love the guy who's just standing there lighting firecrackers and throwing them on the ground. Is that baloney man? I can't tell these fucking mulled white men apart.

There was the moose head t-shirt guy, which I really wanted to get a moose head t-shirt for that. And then I have the note, I have the note, I have the note that says different couple also wearing denim. So I don't know. There were a lot of them and I'm glad we didn't have to learn any of their names. No, I think they were all named Steve. Yeah, it's fine. They were all named Bologneman.

The Bologneman's. So yeah, they're hanging out. You know, we find out that Natalie is a virgin, you know, has no bearing on anything in the rest of the film. Although she's not a virgin by the end of the movie. What? You think so? Yeah, there's one scene. I think they're just necking. No, I think there's one scene where they They full consummate.

I miss, that was not in my cut. I have the note, did Natalie and Bologna man fuck after the Battle of the Bands? I was wondering that a little bit actually. You've seen them be 25 times. Yeah, you shouldn't be wondering at this point. Well, I was just trying to find a way to have that make sense

to me, and it just wasn't. So. Yeah, I think they're taking it to the next level. They're 80s dry hump fucking. They definitely dry hump, first of all. Yeah. But you think they would do that in the school while the monsters are running wild? As we know, when you're a teenager and death comes ripping.

Your hormones go through the fucking... Do you remember Friday the 13th, Part 7, when Jason's, like, at the door and the girl's, like, I got to fuck. I got to fuck right now. I got to fuck right now. Yeah. All right. Fair enough.

So we see Natalie lose a virginity later. Spoiler alert. We'll come back to that. I told you that of spoilers. So in this party in the park, shit goes down. Well, the dudes playing football. Yeah. And then just making out.

Everyone's just making out, except for Natalie. Yeah. She's just nursing a wine cooler in the van while everybody else is doing their thing. She's a little pensive, like, kind of peeling the foil off of it, you know, thinking about stuff. You're to understand the shoes deeper. Yeah, that Bartleson James will lead to vomiting. So you want to go a little slow on those.

That's a Bartles and James joke for the over 40 crowd. Ooh. So what happens next is that the neon maniac show up. And they're the best. They are pretty excellent. They're, what, you got the guy of the hydrocephalic samurai? Yes. Yes, they all have names, too, according to the credits.

I watched the trailer today for the first time, which makes no sense. because I'd already watched the movie. But I was stunned that they were, they, I don't know. What were you stunned by? Just that they had different backstories or different personas. I thought they were just like a band of roving. Like I was like, oh, that guy is a samurai, that guy's a caveman, whatever. You were saying.

Yeah, I have this theory that this is actually the third or fourth movie in a series. And had I seen the other ones, I would have the full backstory of what the fuck's going on. But I felt like I already loved these characters when they showed up. Like I'd seen the other things. It felt like a television show from the 80s. Like, what is juice? What is he doing? What is his thing?

His thing is that he later gets electrocuted, right? He was prior named that. No, he shoots electricity. He shoots electricity into the turnstile to make it work when the one guy can't figure it out. When they're all straight. He shocks the conductor on the subway. Okay, I'll accept this.

To me, that's one of the things I love about this movie is just there are so many questions. And it's kind of become one of my life goals. How do they know each other? What are they talking about in there? Are they only come out at night? Why? What are they doing during the day?

Like, why do they live by the ocean? Why do they never speak? I have so many questions. What's the bright light in the back of the bakery truck where the little Cyclops lizard is hanging out? What is it? I have all of these theories that I've cooked up over the years that are just completely just made up.

But it's my goal to one day write a prequel to this that explains it all. I would really like that. Let's try to rush through this because I want to get into the theory. portion of this. Oh yeah, the plot is almost. So these zombies are the fucking neon maniacs. They're not zombies. They're neon maniacs. I should show more respect. Are just murdering everyone who gets in their way and then seemingly latching on to Natalie and following her to murder her.

It's like they need the completion. Yeah. The completion. You got to finish the set. Because at one point she's like, why are they after me? Like, well, I don't know Natalie. Why are they after you? Like nobody knows. And when they get wet, they drip really thick high sea juice or something. I would kill for an ecto cooler right now. It is really hot. Oh my God. And so the rest of the film is the neon miniacs chasing Natalie through her suburban home and her suburban high school and her suburban battle of the bands. I hope we have at least 10 minutes to spend on the battle of the bands because that's the bulk of my nose.

And Natalie also doesn't really seem to give a shit that they're chasing her. She's sunbathing. She's swimming. She falls asleep in the pool. Oh yeah. That's dangerous, by the way. Dangerous even when you don't have... Even without neon maniacs after you.

Which I assume they are always after me. That was a cool scene though where she starts dreaming that it's raining blood. I was really into that. Before we get too far away from it, earlier we see Paula eating breakfast. She's eating a fucking bowl of C3POs. Lost my mind when I saw that. That is in my notes as well. I'm very excited about that.

So at some point Natalie goes to the police who are all from the 1940s and wearing like vests and suspenders. They're fit perfectly into our 80s angry cop. They're the Freight Knight cop who is very angry with any teenager. The main dude, Lieutenant Devin chomping his cigar and like his weird extreme, like he'll go from like laughing

to like just angry. Yeah. And he calls his he calls the detective in the middle of the night to tell him nothing. Like just wakes him up to be like, we've got to get this guy or whatever. Like it seemingly woke him up so we could see that detective naked. Yeah. Because he's just got a tiny bit

of a tiny bit of little cover covered up his ding-dongs. I figured out why they put the scene where Lieutenant Devin calls his dude in the movie. They set up that they need a tail on Natalie and that cop starts following him around so he can get killed by scavenger and Doc in the end.

Because I've always wondered that about that movie. I'm like, why did he make this phone call at 3.30 in the morning to tell him a thing he's clearly going to tell him in the morning. At work during work hours. And it's like, oh, yeah. So it was a pickup shot to make continuity. Why the fuck would they care about continuity.

No. In this universe. We know this got to get killed at the high school. So she's chased around and Paula also, and here's the tale of Natalie's friends being killed. So she kind of tracks down the neon maniacs herself and sees one of them. And they want nothing to do with her, Natalie and Stephen. They're like, this kid, so shitty.

Be cool to Paula. Sorry she's a middle-aged woman who's very small. Benjamin Button. She sees one of the neon maniacs slip and fall into a woman. He has a slip and fall. This is right after, though, she yells oink, oink at a cop. And then he goes into a football stance and then reaches for his gun. Why?

Why? Also, did you recognize that cop? I realized recently was from the film The Prince of Darkness. Yeah, he's the dude from Prince of Darkness. Yeah, he plays the dude that gets all sweaty and sings Amazing Grace and tries to kill people with an axe. And I got so stoked when I realized that. I'm like, fuck, that guy, yes.

I'm so stoked he recognized him too. So they also chase Natalie and Stephen through the subway, which is actually kind of a terrifying scene. Yeah. Except that the charge is led by caveman who is the worst of them, or eight man or whatever he is. He is clearly the worst knee on me. His name is, yeah.

A mohawks there. Yeah, he just kind of walks around really slowly and just sort of like gestures a lot. Yeah, like just with his bare hands too. Like I'm not. But I felt like that guy was like researching how cavemen might have walked. He really got it down. He really got a walk. He's like a method actor.

Yeah. He can't really do it. You may have noticed that Ape actually, his face changes two or three times throughout the movie. This film stopped production for three months and they lost a bunch of the actors and had to bring people on. So a few of the maniacs are played by different actors at a few points. Yeah, if you look at IMDB, it's just like a bunch of names for different characters. Oh, that's great. Yeah, I actually read an interview recently with one of the guys that worked on the film.

It's kind of a bummer because apparently the dude putting this whole thing together ripped off a bunch of people and like didn't pay people for it. Kind of sad. Whose ideas were these? That's what I would like to do. This movie was written by the Duda wrote Pumpkin Head. Which is, yes. Yeah. Which almost makes sense. Yeah, I love Pumpkinhead.

Yeah, that movie's fucking ridiculous. Excellent film. I mean, 80% of my love of it is that Lance Hendrickson's in it. Of course. So, like, 90% of this movie, I would say, is the Battle of the Band? Yeah, as it should be. I mean, they play full, they give them the entire song. We could have used another song by Jaded.

Let's be perfectly honest. If Jada just could have done more than play that chorus, over and over. I would have been really into it. They've had enough. Oh, it's so good. It was so catchy. I would jam this on my run the rig. How do the outlaw boys? I scared my cat thing along to it, actually.

How do the outlaw boys even think they have a chance against Jaded? And also, why is Jaded, who is clearly in their 40s playing in this high school battle of the bands? They're called the Outlaw Boys on the flyer, but by the time of the show they were the outlaws. Yeah, they had grown. They had grown into men. But the first song by them wasn't terrible.

Those little tears for Fierzy, I didn't mind it so much. Yeah. The second song, the ballot was not good. I'm glad they cut it short when the neon maniac show up to mosh things. This is a band being fronted by Stephen, the lower end John Cusack. And Natalie's just in front of the stage like, oh, it's all about me. I love it.

And Paula's on the speakers, just the happiest jam out. Why is she sitting on jaded zampifiers? Do they know she's there? Are they okay with that? Yeah, because they interact with her at one point. The guitar players, like, leaning over and like, ah, hanging out with her. Maybe it's his daughter. Or his wife.

It could be anything. That's the thing about this movie. It could be anything. My wife has Benjamin Button's disease. Oh, that's so sad. Or maybe she has Jack disease. I don't know which way she's going. Katie has a problem reading her own notes sometimes.

I just, at some point, decided that jaded was just pro wrestlers past their prime. I have a lot of notes indicating that. Well, the bass player had obviously never touched a musical instrument in his life. No, and neither had Stephen. I don't know what guitar part he was supposed to be playing, but he was not playing. I did appreciate the singer of Jaded who played the bullwhip much more than he played that guitar that was hanging around his back. Sometimes he's got to play a bullwhip. Well, he's had enough.

The interesting thing about the Battle of the Bands is that this is a part of Paula and Stephen and Natalie's plan how to defeat the neon maniacs apparently. It's like, oh, there's going to be this big costume ball. So let's get squirt guns and give them to everybody. That will stop the neon maniacs, totally. It's such a bad idea. So good. They're responsible for the deaths of, like, so many people. They're just shitty high school kids.

18 teenagers and three policemen is the tally. And during that scene, the gym, like, panic scene where the neon maniac scene, the guy comes in and opens fire, gun guy. I don't know what his name is. Military man. Soldier. Soldier. Sure, gun guy. He comes in an open fire and everybody scatters, you know, as you do in like a crowd riot scene.

It's literally just people running back and forth across that gym for 15 minutes. Like, how big is it and where are the exits? Because they're just going and going and going. It's real. Maybe they should stop running around. and just like leave. I don't know. What did they call?

Oh, the dance is called the freak frolic. Was it? That's cool. That's cool. I mean, you need an excuse to have people in costumes. Yeah. So, yeah. Yeah, it was great.

I loved it. It reminded me of a, in Trick or Treat when there's the big band thing going on and then all hell breaks loose. Yes. Is that the one with Ozzy Osborne? Yeah. Oh, no.

Yeah, we should do that movie. Yeah, we should. Oh, please do that. So, yeah, the battle of the band. So their big idea is to have everyone in the audience have squirt guns. And do you think they prepped them like, okay, so these like mutant crazy... No, because when we show up, they're shooting each other with the squirt guns. Oh, it's true.

They did. They just did destroy all the... Yeah, you gave high school kids squirt guns. Steven, actually, I wrote down Stevens advice to everybody here. If you're wondering what the squirt guns are for, really plan on cooking tonight. And then they go into the song. That is very vague, Stephen. It's like, oh, cool, yeah, good planning, guy.

Well, he's got a band to propone. I realize there's a low-level neon maniac threat coming through, but he's got his band to promote. The outlaws formerly outlaw boys. You know, they've got to get a record deal. Yeah, they're trying to get signed first and foremost. They're trying to beat Jaded who has the catchiest chorus. Yeah.

Yeah. It's great. I can't. So the squir-gun plan goes about as well as you would expect. The neon maniac show up and just destroy teenagers left and right. I do appreciate that there's a drunk girl that tries to dance with a few of the neon maniacs. She's GTS.

Yeah. And then Paula has the bright idea to get a fire hose involved in this and starts taking care of people. Why did they not look for the fire hose at the beginning knowing that what, whatever. Why? Why? Why? I have a lot of questions. So then they put the fire hose going down the stairs. Right?

Yeah. They do actually manage to wipe out a few of Neimaniacs at this point. Yeah, they knock out juice by spraying the fire hose down the stairs. I think Mohawk gets it. Yeah. soldier gets it and then I think it just comes down to like hangman and eight kind of trying to track down Natalie. I love that you know them. Hang man seems so sad. Yeah. He has that one scene and it's like. I've thought about the guys

so much. When he's like trying to hang people and it doesn't work out, he just walks over and kicks a locker because he's mad. He gets so mad. Poor hang man. I'm sorry, I'm just looking at the list here. Decapitator. I don't know. I guess he's just the guy who cuts off that girl's head while she's given a beager at the beginning. Oh, fuck. How did we forget to talk about that? I don't know. Where's the guys? Weiner, because her head is cut off where below his weiner should have been when the head came off. That's a good question. That's a very good question.

Was there a tinier samurai sword hooked up to the other samurai sword that took his wiener off? I just don't know. I just don't know. Oh, man. There is a mysterious neon maniac that I've always been really curious about. The one that looks like sort of a Grim Reaper with like Halbert arms. I don't know if you caught him. I don't think I did.

No. What is his name? I'm not sure I've never been able to figure out if he's Slasher or if the one at Paula kills at her house is Slasher. Could he be young lover one or two? I think he might be young lover number two actually. What about Stringbeam? I'll make note of that. And one of them is a biker also, right?

He just has a chain. Yeah, he like grabs the kid. Biker. Punker. Punk biker. He gets an adjective. So after the Hullabaloo at the high school where all the kids and police officers, die. We get the scene of the cops

being like, well, where are these things and how do we track them down? So they go to the bridge to track down the neon maniacs. You don't remember any of this? Nope. I remember the scene of the cops, but only because it was in the trailer. So they're, they go in behind the iron gates, the iron doors, whatever, and then they're walking around and don't find anything.

Okay. They're all equipped with squirt guns and seltzer bottle at this point. Probably police issued. Which is so great. In case that three stooges breaks out. But then the head cop, detective, what the fucks? Like, oh, hold on. Yeah, needs to go back in and take another look. Oh, I do sort of remember that, yeah.

Who gets him? One minor detail that I've obsessed over. The truck that he looks into, you'll notice on the side it says Dante's Bakery. Oh, holy shit. Don't know, huh? Oh, my God. I think there's also a picture of a cat eating some muffins on the side, so that doesn't really go, that's up itself in that theory. You are in deep on this.

You are really in deep. Very deep, yeah. So Lieutenant Dan, or whatever his name is, opens the back door to the bakery truck, and then we're eye to eye with a Cyclops Lizard Man. Oh, right. What is Cyclops Lizard Man's name? And a really bright light.

That's scavenger. That's scavenger, okay. I just want to be sure. I just want to know. It's scavengers, plural. Oh. Which leads me to believe that there's supposed to be multiple scavengers. Well, there were three people who played scavenger,

according to IMD. Oh, wow. So, yeah. So then there's a bright light and then we cut to the kids in the van. He gets a hump through the neck. Oh, that's right. And then it ends with them with the kids in the car. You described the last scene, Josh. Take this one, buddy.

They're in the car. Stephen turns to Paul and says, kid, you still have your squirt gun? She says, yeah. And he says, keep it. This rain won't last forever. And then they just drive off. And that's how the movie ends. It's setting it up for the sequel.

Someone was asleep at the wheel on this one. Like, I feel like I sneezed or something. And then I looked up and the credits went on. was like, what? It just doesn't end. They just, do they just not care about ending it? I don't know. I don't know.

No, they ended it. I mean, that's one of the things that has kept me obsessed with this movie for so many years. It's, it's so ineptly made that it sort of came full circle and became something just really, it's a joy to watch. You know, like I think everything they set out to do, they probably failed at, but still managed to succeed somewhere else entirely. I don't know if that's, That's true because I think the monster design is really great.

Yeah. They looked awesome and the makeup effects were really good. That's true. My beef with that, though, is I feel like it was shot. Maybe it was my TV or something, but it was shot so darkly that I felt like sometimes I couldn't tell the monsters apart. I think that's just, I mean, I'm sure the quality of this movie, whatever transfers they're getting stuff from is just because everyone watching it on Amazon, like every

10th frame had a cigarette burn on it. Oh, really? And it was just like, you know, like this is crazy. like what like 35 millimeter they get this from to get this transfer that had been around the world so many times I've got the anchor bay DVD that came out in 2008 yes I went out that weekend to purchase it camping outside you didn't pre-order last year code red actually put out a blue ray that I slept on and they only made a thousand copies and now it's sold out and sells for like $70 so I'm like uh I don't know if I could justify spending $70 on this I don't know 25 years of obsession seems like a

Just true. Someday, someday, someday. Let's spit some theories. Let's get some theories out there. Katie, do you have any theories? I'll develop one. Okay. You go first.

So here's my theory. This entire movie is about what happens when you curse at 80's movies punks when you drive by them. Oh, no. You think they unleashed it? I think the fisherman at some point had yelled at 80's movies punks. Probably told him to get off his lawn. And that's why he had to get it. We all know that 80s movies punks are the best.

They're just the best of the best. We talked about this a little bit the other. day and I've been thinking about it and when I rewatched it today I was thinking about it. Punk Biker, who has punk in his name, actually kills what seems to be a punk at the freak frolic. However, he kills him at this costume festival or this costume party costume festival. It's festival. No, I don't say it was festive. My theory that supports Allen's theory here is that that's a fake punk and punk biker is like,

yo dog, you're fronting. Like, you can't do this. It's not a costume. It's a way of life. Yeah, because if all of these... Because he's got that shitty normal kid Mohawk where he just puts up the top. He didn't commit and shave the sides. Josh used to be quite a spiky punk back in his youth. Yeah, yeah, I had some hair. But that's my theory.

The 80s movies punks will curse you if you curse at them. Well, that's better than anything I could come up with. I have a really complicated one, but I don't know if I should get into it. When else in your life are you going to get to? Nobody else wants to hear this. I want to hear it. Nobody, yeah. Okay.

So my theory, and I'm tapping into a little bit of a film called Raw Force. on this one, which I think, Alan, we saw this one together, right? It sounds familiar, but go ahead and remind me. These are all disgraced warriors who have been sent to hell, and for some reason they're coming back. I haven't figured that part out yet. Why do they live in the bridge? The scavengers are the hell demons,

and they need the dead bodies. So they're sending these powerful warriors back out into the world to kill for them and collect the souls of teenagers. Do you think the scavenger is kind of the boss that he, because he kills the cop at the end, he's kind of like the boss level. He's like the little midget dwarf dudes from Fantasm.

Yeah. Fantasm. Yeah. The scavenors at several points throughout this film, you see them stealing the bodies because that's the thing. When the neon maniacs kill people, there are no bodies left behind because the scavengers take them. Oh, shit. That's actually really good.

I watched this movie twice in one week. It didn't notice that shit. Why do they live in a bridge? At one moment, a scavenger does grab Archer for some reason when he gets down. He gets hit with some water and Scabbinter takes him. And he's like, yeah, what are you doing? Which doesn't make any sense. I don't think they live in the bridge.

I think that's where their bakery truck portal is. What? Yeah. They're coming in and out of that portal. Dante's Bakery Portal, home of fresh kitten cupcakes. What? That's my theory and I'm sticking with it. Sure, fine.

If you curse an 80s movie punk, the Dante's Bakery Truck will show up and the neon maniacs will come out and kill you. Why are they neon? The only neon in this movie is in the Outlaw Boys set behind them. The copy on VHS that I own for many years said neon because they only come out at night, which doesn't actually explain it. No. Well, it's something.

This was called Evil Dead Warriors, too. That was the other title. Yeah, when it was released in the Philippines, it was known as that, which is a better title. It's a more accurate title, I would say. Yeah. You know, that's the thing about this movie. Is it anything could be? It could be anything.

Yeah, yeah. That's the reason I've kept coming back to this movie for so many years because I watch it. I'm like, why? Why? And it just, it inspires me and like just really just stokes my creativity and imagination. And I just imagine all these different scenarios where this thing happens. And it's just, you know, it's so sketchily done that it don't have real answers. So you just keep questioning it.

And that's why I love it so much. It's stupid and fun and just the movie. It's everything to all people. Yeah. Except the people on Rotten Tomatoes, who I don't think like it that much. Yeah, those people are assholes, though. Yeah. Why are the policemen all dressed like it's the 1940s?

Because those are the props that they couldn't have access to, I would assume. This is not a cheaply made movie, though. It was like. Oh, no, it was on the budge. It was super budget. Was it? I thought it was like $2 million in 1986, which is like, Jurassic World Level now.

According to IMDB was made with $1.5 million. Jurassic World Level. A lot of money. A lot of inflation since then. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, they did have a high slime budget. Yeah. I mean, some of those sets couldn't have been cheap, too.

I think it was called. I don't know. Yeah, they had a different stage for both jaded and the outlaws. Yeah. I think that was at Hollywood High School, actually. I read that on IMDB. That's Neon Maniacs. Do we want to move on to the radius portion, or do we have...

Have you exhausted your theories? I don't know. I mean... I just feel like there's so much to unpack, but I don't know where to... I don't know where to go with it. I don't know. May I suggest spending 25 years watching it over there. I will definitely watch this movie.

again. I just, I was so disappointed by the end. Like, I just wanted some big epic ending and it, it just didn't, you know. Yeah. That's really the only disappointment I felt with this movie. That's not bad for a movie that could have been fucking abysmal. Yeah. It was really fun. Yeah. I also just have notes like, God, I hope I get to hear jaded and then thank God I got to hear jaded. I wish I had had the gumption of Paula when I was a kid. She also made me 30. Yeah. I'm going to look up how old Paula was when this movie was made. I couldn't find out any information about her. Oh, really? Yeah, she dropped off the face of the earth after this movie.

Oh, Donna Locke. She probably went into Dante's bakery truck. Perhaps. I really liked the movie that she was filming. What I referred to as daytime Dracula. Yeah, it looks pretty great. This reminded me of Super 8 where, like, I was like, I just kind of want to watch the movie those kids are making and not this movie anymore.

Can I watch that? There's 25 Donna Locks on LinkedIn, but I've dealt with him. Contact every one of them. We'll wait. Excuse me. Are you Paula? From what I read, I think, maybe like, the stuff that came with the DVD. That's not her real name. She used a different name for this movie.

She didn't want her kids to find out. She's not the software engineer at Oracle in the greater Denver area. I'm done. Done with Lincoln. Oh my God, you have so many notes. I really do. Parents went on a lot of long vacations without their kids in the 80s. No parents in this movie. Oh God, Paula's mom was such a bitch, too. She really was. well it was just like doing her thing and her mom wasn't into it or at the end of a write-up on the House of Self-Indulgence blog what so he ends his little synopsis of the film with

but either way you have to admire the director Joseph Mangine managed to create an off-kilter very ethnic the way you're saying in managed to create an off-kilter monster flick out of a loose assemblage of hallucinogenic afterthoughts and ideas pulled out of a goblin ass. That's pretty accurate.

That is good. Yeah, it's nailed it. That could be on the DVD box. Oh, can we talk about how scary the doctor was? Yeah, the surgeon. Terrifying. Yeah. Terrifying.

I mean, there were some legitimately scary moments in this movie. The doctor was really scary. Again, I think the subway scene was just terrifying. Like, to be on a moving subway and be trapped, like, the bus I had an issue with because why didn't the driver notice? He did. He said, you kids can't smoke on here. That's right.

All right. enough. 80s movies are just all about how authority figures don't get you. If you can consider a bus driver an authority figure. I think so. I think so too. They tell you what to do. Exactly. I don't know. I just have a note that says, what is the deal with a maniacs? What is the deal? Like, what do they do during the day, do you think? They sleep. Or they go back to whatever, they're probably going through the portal and going to different worlds and doing the same thing to other people. So they never sleep? Oh shit. Probably not. Like sliders? That's incredible. Do you think they talk to each other? Or do you think they're all mute? Psychic links.

they make some noises throughout the movie they do exchange glances too and several furtive glances yeah like they want to make out in the high school when ape and hangman look at each other

and sort of like nod a little bit like yo let's do this I like that the one that is able to communicate nonverbally is the ape I like when she's in the swimming pool early on and he just kind of comes out of the trees

for a second and there's like I'm not fucking with that pool and it goes back in Oh, that didn't even occur to me. It was so good. He was like, I'll be back later.

I just love that they live next to the ocean. Or you're telling me they don't live in the bridge. I'm sorry, but Wikipedia says they live in the bridge. Do not take my theories as canon. I'm sorry, but that's what it says.

Wikipedia says they live in the bridge. Well, because when I first read this summation of this movie, I was like, what the fuck? This is going to be terrible. And I am so pleasantly surprised. It's really great.

It's unlike anything, I think I've ever seen, you know, it's just bizarre. And it has, it definitely has like a nightmarish quality to it, you know, like, it makes me think of like a Luccio-Falci film or something like that where like, totally details aren't as important. It's more about just sort of getting across this kind of this feeling. And it's, this is just like, it's a really goofy version of that. But, you know, it's just, nothing makes sense in it at any point.

You're like, why, what, why, you know? It sort of felt like it could have fun. all and off at any moment, but by like, despite sheer luck, they made a enjoyable film. Like, it shouldn't be enjoyable. If someone sat down and explained this movie to you, be like, nope, that's not a movie. You didn't tell me a movie. You're just talking nonsense. Like I said, like, I feel like they did pretty much everything wrong, but it still worked somehow, you know? It's like that thing when people are so ugly, they become attractive. This is the plot summary from

IMDB. And to be fair, this was submitted by a username to Anonymous. A group of teenagers in San Francisco discover a nest of homicidal monsters living in a tower of the Golden Gate Bridge, but when they try to tell the authorities, no one believes them. That's the entire summation. What if that was the whole movie? We don't believe you. That's basically it, though. That was basically the end credits.

God, what a movie. All right, I'm calling it. We're moving on to the ratings phase. Josh, do you want to go first? I'll go first. This is hard for me to rate. Beyond category. I've been thinking, since you first approached me, I've been thinking, like, how do I come up with a rating for this?

I would say I would give the movie that they tried to make a five, but the movie that they actually made a 10. Oh, nice. That's totally reasonable. I would go there. I mean, I just, I deeply love this movie. It's such a weird personal thing for me. So a five and a 10.

I think that's fair. I enjoyed this movie. I don't know if it's just because my expectations were so low, but I loved it. Like, I loved every minute of it. It was so silly. Like, I know I always come down on things that don't make any sense. But my problem is putting things that don't make sense in a world that makes sense,

but this is just all fucking. nonsense. I'll give an eight and a half. Whoa. That's awesome. I am stoked to hear that. Yeah, I'll definitely watch it again. And if anybody asks me if they should watch it, the answer is absolutely. I'm going to give this movie a nine. I'm going to split the difference. Wow. I'm currently looking at my phone. Nine is not the difference between eight and a half and

ten. I'm just saying, like, you, you, you didn't give it as much as you could have. You could have, you could have gone more. Nine and a quarter? Yeah, why not? It could be anything. Just like this movie, it can be anything. Remember when we rated God Monster of Indian Flats is nothing? And turkey.

And turkey. And turkey. Well, this was better than that. Yeah. For sure. I'm trying to find the text that I sent to Josh, watching the On Meanings for the first time, not for the podcast,

just to check it out. And I have a new favorite movie. Oh, nice. Oh, shit. This is great. Nice. Yeah, and then he goes on to Lambast himself for not having shared it to me earlier.

And then I sent him a picture of Paula. with your little dumb hat on Sunway. Where you suggest that she's your spirit animal. She is. She's awesome. I mean, she is great. I think as like a 12 year old watching this movie,

I totally connected with her. I'm like, oh, that's kind of me. Like, I'm a weird kid that loved horror movies. And like, she comes up with like horror movie tropes to fight the neon maniacs.

Yeah, she's welcome. She's like the female version of the kid from Monster Squad. Yeah. The Stephen King Rules kid. Totally. Yeah. Yeah.

I really identified with her. at 41. Yeah, I should also clarify, I haven't stopped identifying with her. Oh, yeah, that makes sense. I'm so grateful to you, Josh, for bringing this movie into our lives. Thank you for showing this to us.

This is not a movie I would have ever watched my own. I'm happy to share it with you guys. Do you want to plug your podcast or? I used to do a podcast called The Ungodly Warlocks, but I think it's actually gone now. It's not on the iTunes anymore? I think it's gone because I changed debit cards and forgot to update with Lipson, so I think the whole thing is gone. So I might try to get that back online.

It's defunct. Stop doing it when I moved up to Seattle. It was with my friend Isaac Williams, who was a filmmaker as well in Philadelphia. I might try to get that going again at some point. Oh, you should. I also would like to plug. I'm starting a D&D blog. Oh, nice.

I'm a big D&D nerd. I run a game for Allen online, actually. Don't out. Don't out me on here, Josh. I think they need a lot of D&D references. Oh, that's right. I think they know. They also know that you and I play in a game together.

I mean like, what else is there? I'm going to be launching this blog. I'm on my spring break from school, so I'm probably going to launch it next week. It's called, lend me your steel bearing hand. It's sort of D&D filtered through my love of heavy metal and horror movies

and all the feelings that I have for everything. Nice. So that should be going live, probably, actually, the week that this has dropped. So yeah, just check that out. at steel bearing hand at blogspot.com. Nice. All right.

Well, yeah, definitely I'm excited to read that. Yeah, me too. Josh is a great writer, so this should be really good. Oh, thank you. Yeah, of course. I'm still trying to figure out how to work neon maniacs into a role-playing game. Oh, my God. You could probably, we can talk about this offline, but you can probably do like a pretty

sweet Cthulhu adventure with them. Yeah. Where you are one of the maniacs. Like, oh, you're Archer. Whoa, you're playing the maniacs? Yeah. You're not fighting them? Holy shit.

Why would you want to not be a maniac? Are you kidding me? Sorry if that's hubris, I don't want to be a maniac. I think it's perfect. I'm so excited you want to be one of the maniacs. So you can find us on Facebook, where we're Werewolf Ambulance, and on Twitter where we're Werebulance

and Instagram, we're We're Werewolf Ambulance. And thank you so much to everyone who's been talking to us on there and getting excited about neon maniacs. I'm surprised by how many people are excited by you. neon maniacs. It should be. I just never had heard of it and it's so, so excellent. I'm so glad that you're to post neon maniac's world now. This is a new life for me.

I'm opening a new chapter. I posted a picture of Justin Gray drew neon maniac's VHS box. When did he do that? I think a couple years ago. Oh, it's incredible. And it's gorgeous. Yeah, that was a few years before I moved. Oh, wow. So, yeah. Yeah, that's really cool. If you haven't seen that, go to our Instagram and look at it. It's crazy.

Justin is the, he did our logo as well. Yeah. Prolific Justin Gray. Yeah, he's an amazing artist and a great dude. And I watched this movie with him in high school as well. Oh, that's awesome. Oh, that's right. You guys went to high school together.

Yeah, we did. It's all coming together. Yeah. What are we doing next week? It looks like. Well, let's see. Let's consult the calendar. We're doing wax work.

Yes. This is the first movie that Katie suggested that we do. Have you seen wax work, Josh? I watched it a lot back in, like, high school and loved it, but I haven't actually revisited it in many years. So I'm going to try to seek it out before. It's on Amazon. I watch it, yeah.

You can get it for like three bucks. Okay. When Alan asked me if I wanted to do this podcast with him, I said as long as we can do wax work. So hopefully you guys like it. And hopefully it's not our last episode since we've completed Katie's. I'm out. It's not how we recorded zombievers already. All right.

Well, yeah, thank you so much for being on here today, Josh. Thanks, Josh. This is awesome. Thanks so much for having me. I love the podcast so much. It's an honor to be on here. Yeah. Thank you so much for listening to another episode of Werewolf Ambulance.

Bye. Bye. Say bye, Josh. Goodbye, Josh. Which made me wonder if this movie is a part of the Elsewhereverse, which I don't know if you guys are familiar with that, and maybe I shouldn't even get into it. I don't know what that is.

The ending of the long-running television show, St. Elsewhere, ended with an autistic boy looking at the hospital in a snow globe, and it turns out the whole thing was in his imagination. That's really messed up. But the thing is that seen elsewhere had a bunch of crossovers with other television shows. So there's this theory that's huge on the internet, surprise, surprise, that all of these shows are actually just the kids' imagination. I think it reaches out to like the Simpsons and everything you can think of. So I like to think that Neomaniac is a part of his nightmare.