Transcript

Cochrane (Halloween III)

Enjoy the horrorthon, doctor. And don't forget to watch the big giveaway afterwards.

Dr. Dan (Halloween III)

Why, Cochrane? Why?

Cochrane (Halloween III)

Do I need a reason? Mr. Kupfer was right, you know. I do love a good joke, and this is the best ever.

Cochrane (Halloween III)

A joke on the children.

Cochrane (Halloween III)

But there's a better reason. You don't really know much about Halloween. You thought no further than the strange custom of having your children wear masks and go out begging for candy.

Cochrane (Halloween III)

It was the start of the year in our old Celtic lands. And we'd be waiting in our houses of waters and clay. The barriers would be down, you see, between the real and the unreal. And the dead might be looking in to sit by our fires of turf.

Cochrane (Halloween III)

Halloween, the festival of Samhain, the last great one, took place 3,000 years ago. And the hills ran red with the blood of animals and children. Sacrifices. Part of our world, our craft. Witchcraft.

Cochrane (Halloween III)

To us, it was a way of controlling our environment. It's not so different now. It's time again.

Cochrane (Halloween III)

In the end, we don't decide these things, you know, the planets do.

Cochrane (Halloween III)

They're in alignment. And it's time again. The world's going to change tonight, Doctor. I'm glad you'll be able to watch it.

Cochrane (Halloween III)

And.

Cochrane (Halloween III)

Happy Halloween.

Steve

It's 2Dads1 movie. Shocktoberfest. A celebration of the spookiest movies of the 80s and 90s. Now, here are your hosts, Scary Steve Paulo and Nightmare Nic. Briana.

Steve

Hello, everybody. It's another episode of 2 Dads 1 Movie. I'm Steve.

Nic

And I'm Nic.

Steve

And today we are talking about the frightful kind of cult classic at this point, certainly not a classic in any other sense.

Steve

Halloween 3, Season of the Witch from 1982, the only Halloween movie to not feature Michael Myers. And that was like, a huge problem for it.

Nic

People get mad when you take out the main thing.

Steve

Yeah, yeah. It'd be like, oh, this is A Nightmare on Elm Street 5.

Steve

Where's Freddy? No, no, no, no, no, man. We're doing something different here. In all seriousness, Halloween 3 was an attempt by Carpenter and the kind of other filmmakers involved to turn the Halloween franchise into an anthology about Halloween, about the holiday Halloween. And so they were like, oh, well, we're going to have this other story that is honestly pretty batshit, pretty crazy, but about Halloween.

Steve

And we're going to call it Halloween 3. And really, if this movie had just come out called Season of the Witch, maybe it would have been received.

Nic

Right. I think it's definitely hurt by being associated with an expectation. People already.

Steve

Exactly. And we'll get into all of that. This episode. So I picked this one, and this is a first for me here in our 33rd episode, which would make this something like my 16th or 17th choice. Exactly how it works out, you know, But I'd never seen Halloween 3, and I selected it because I wanted to pick it for the last of our Shocktoberfest choices, which this is.

Steve

This is the last, you know, this movie. If you're listening to this on the day the episode came out, it is the last Wednesday in October. So this is the last of our Shocktoberfest films. And I just wanted to explain this one. I wanted to see it for the final.

Steve

I knew about it. I knew about its lore and the. The sort of, you know, anthology thing and people being mad about no Michael Myers. Like, I was aware of all that and I wanted to see it and talk to you about it, Nic. And so I think, you know, it's an interesting choice.

Steve

Normally I pick things that I'm picking because I love them, because I've seen them multiple times and they're great. This is more like, let's explore this. Let's see. Let's see what. This is what the hubbub is all about.

Nic

Right? No, I definitely get that. And so I haven't seen it either. And actually this is, this is a confession to make that will probably generate a lot of angry emails. There's certain movies that I've never seen that I know people would get fucking furious before.

Nic

This is the first of any of the Halloween movies I've ever seen.

Steve

Okay, that's a little unfortunate. Only because the rest of them are very different. So in a sense you've still never seen a Halloween.

Nic

So I mean, so that's good.

Nic

But I mean, I know, you know, obviously I know who Michael Myers is. Like, I love, you know, the Love Guru. I love Austin Powers. 3. Like, so I'm sure Mike Myers.

Steve

Nic. That's Mike Myers. Different.

Nic

Different guy. But yeah, so especially like not being a horror guy until very recently as we're like, doing it, which is really fun.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

But yeah, this is the first of the Halloween films I've seen.

Steve

Nice.

Nic

And that's kind of my perspective coming into it.

Steve

This is, I think, the third or maybe if it's more now movie we've seen on the podcast that involves John Carpenter.

Steve

He was. Did not direct this movie, but he was. He's a producer and he co wrote the score and you know, go back to watch the thing. Go back to watch they Live. Go back to watch the original Halloween.

Steve

Like, John Carpenter scores are tremendous. Like, he. He has a very unique style.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

He is as identifiable to me as Danny Elfman is.

Steve

When Danny Elfman does a score, you hear it, you go, that's a Danny Elfman score.

Nic

Yeah. Like, certain musicians, you can hear their. Their choices in all the music that they make.

Steve

I feel like I can kind of do that with, like, John Williams maybe, but that's more because I recognize the actual things he wrote.

Steve

I couldn't tell you off the top, is that a Howard Shore or an Alan Silvestri or, you know, a lot of other great composers that do a bunch of, like, great, great movies, but I can't pick them out. John Carpenter and Danny Elfman, I can pick them out for sure. You know.

Nic

Right. They.

Nic

They have a signature.

Steve

Absolutely.

Nic

Sure.

Steve

Yeah. So.

Steve

All right, so let's. Let's just go ahead and jump into the facts because we got a lot to get into with this psychotic movie. That's great. So Halloween 3 Season of the Witch was released on October 22, 19, 1982, just a little bit before Halloween, with an R rating. It has a running time of 98 minutes, was directed by Tommy Lee Wallace.

Steve

The movie was written by Tommy Lee Wallace, John Carpenter, and Nigel Neal. It stars Tom Atkins, Stacey Nelkin, and Dan o'. Herlihy. This is the second time we've seen Dan o'. Hurlihi.

Steve

I don't know if you noticed, if you recognized him from.

Nic

I found that out this morning, but I'm gonna let you do that one.

Steve

Nice scores. Okay. Rotten tomatoes, 49%, which is definitely rotten.

Steve

Not fresh. Right around that half mark on IMDb, a 5.2, which. That might be the lowest IMDb score we've had.

Nic

I'm not positive that's bad IMDb.

Steve

I'd have to look back at Pacific Heights.

Steve

I feel like that might have been around there. But very low IMDb score. And then Siskel and Ebert. So Roger Ebert gave a thumbs down to Halloween three season of. Which makes sense to me, Gene Siskel, who I'll remind listeners from last week, he gave the Silence of the Lambs a thumbs down for its depressing brutality.

Steve

He's a thumbs up on Halloween. I think Gene Siskel was just a contrarian for contrarian, contrarian sake kind of thing. Like, I think he just likes to go against the grain and against the tide because it makes no sense. This should have been a two thumbs down.

Nic

Six.

Nic

Six women get killed or every kid gets killed. What's.

Steve

What's too dark for you, Gene Awards. It didn't win any.

Nic

Damn it.

Steve

Okay. On a $2.5 million budget, which, again, pretty impressive when you think about the effects. Again, in 1982, 2.5 million went a lot further than it would in like, 92 or. But, you know, a couple years later, just a couple. Two years later, a Nightmare on Elm street comes out for 1.8 million.

Steve

And we were blown away by that. A lot of great effects in this one as well. 2.5 million did return. 14.4 million at the box office, 5.8 times its budget. So it's a commercial success.

Steve

There's no way not to see it. I will point out, however, more than half of the money made by this movie was made in the first weekend that it was released. And then it saw about a 50% drop one week and then an 80% drop off the second week to the third week before it was removed from theaters. So basically, word of mouth got around that Michael Myers is not in this one, and people stopped going. So you got that bump initially of like, there's a new Halloween, Halloween 3.

Steve

Da da da da. And like, you know, I'm sure the trailers. I didn't not actually look to see what the one. The original trailers looks like, but I kind of wish I had. Now.

Steve

It was probably pretty vague. It was probably very Carpenter score, Halloween is Back or whatever.

Nic

Jack o' Lantern logo, the whole deal.

Steve

And so it probably. Maybe even with the knife, who knows?

Steve

But, like, the point is people thought they were getting a Michael Myers movie.

Nic

Yep.

Steve

And they showed up and they got whatever the fuck this is. All right. That's the facts on Halloween 3, season of the Witch.

Nic

All right.

Steve

Oh, man. Okay, so. Yeah. What do we do here?

Nic

Well, one thing I do want to say is I think the intro is very cool. It's like very 1982 kind of computer graphics, very zoomed in. We kind of don't know exactly what's happening on the screen, but the different lines and the pulses and stuff and the music goes well together. And this is a time like we didn't have technology in our pocket everywhere we went. And we had a different.

Nic

And I'll maybe talk more about this later, but we had a different attitude towards a lot of the shit that is just very normal to us nowadays.

Steve

Yeah, for sure.

Nic

So, I mean, you could be ominous computer. Like that's a thing. Ominous computer stuff.

Steve

I mean, computers back then took up whole rooms, Right. So, yeah, I mean, it's like, you know.

Nic

But the John Carpenter Score, like, really, really stands out. One thing I do want to mention that your note here, the writer, Nigel Neal. One thing I read is that he kind of, like, disavowed this film and he bailed on it.

Nic

I mean, he'd already written it and certain parts got rewritten, but he basically bailed because the producer was demanding that it be bloodier than it was. He wanted, like, more gore and stuff in it. And this guy was a. He's a British writer, and he had done certain, like, British horror in the 60s was very well regarded, but I think it's not as, like, over the top with the gore and stuff. So he really didn't like that.

Nic

And he was just like, I'm out. Like, I want my name taken off the credits. So I think if you look at the credits in the movie, he's not on there.

Steve

Interesting. And I don't think that the.

Steve

The Writers Guild of America has an Alan Smithy. Do you know about the Alan Smithy thing?

Nic

Is that, like a fake? Like the name you use if someone doesn't want their name on it?

Steve

Yeah.

Steve

The Directors Guild specifically has this option for its union members where if you're a director on a film and based on, you know, not having final cut basically in the. The studio or whoever kind of takes over and, like, the movie is not what you intended it to be. And when all said and done, you're. You can't. The movie can have been directed by no one, but you can take your name off of it.

Steve

And the name that would be replaced officially in the credits is Alan Smithy. There's a very funny movie that I love, a mockumentary called Burn Hollywood Burn, an Alan Smithy film that is about a fictional man whose real name is Alan Smithy who gets screwed over by his studio and therefore can't. He wants to take his name off the film, but he can't because his name is Alan Smithee. And that movie, Burn Hollywood Burn is credited to Alan Smithee because the actual director had the same problem with the studio. So the film itself is now in Smithy film.

Steve

It's very, very funny. Honestly. One will do at some point on the pod, but let's move forward. But that is interesting. Also, you said the guy's.

Steve

The guy was British. I could have told you that. His name is Nigel. Yeah.

Nic

Not a lot of.

Nic

Not a lot of Nigel's being born in Omaha.

Steve

No, not a lot of Wisconsin, Nigel. That's true. Yeah. All right, so let's kick it off.

Steve

So Halloween 3, season of the witch. We do get this intro, which is just based the credits and all these little lines and the music. And it just. It ends up showing us this, like, you know, Jack O' lantern graphic. Right.

Steve

This computer graphic of a Jack O Lantern. It looks ominous in a sense, but it also kind of looks like a kid's thing. It looks playful.

Nic

If you had like a glow in the dark Etch A Sketch, that's like kind of what the Jack O Lantern would look like.

Steve

Yeah, exactly.

Steve

There you go. Exactly. And so. Yes. Or like a light bright.

Steve

Almost light bright. All right, so then we cut to. It's like nighttime. It just. The title card just says Northern California.

Steve

It's like dark out. And there's a man running down the street. And he's clutching this orange. You know, it looks like a mask, and it is a mask, but it's this orange, like cloth or whatever in his hand. And he's running.

Steve

There's clearly a car chasing after him. He, like, ducks into like a. Like a junkyard or something.

Nic

Yep.

Steve

Does a piss poor job of hiding.

Steve

Kind of like tries to get through a door. Doesn't really duck down at first.

Nic

He's surrounded by every good hiding space you could ever imagine.

Steve

Right.

Nic

And he does suck at it.

Steve

Very bad. Very bad at hiding. So he's kind of hiding from this car. The car goes past, he thinks maybe he's okay. It comes back, oh, no, they're coming to me.

Steve

So he tries to run, at which point he is stopped. You know, he's kind of back, and he is stopped by a man in a suit, wearing black, like, leather gloves, like very oj. And you know, he kind of attacks him and knocks him down. The man in the suit, and he starts, like, choking him, choking him out. Now the guy who's got the mask, whatever, he like, pulls on a chain that's on the ground.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

And it's got like a block that's holding a car in place, like under the tire. And I love this scene because it really gives us an indication that this dude in the suit is not okay. There's something weird about him because the car starts rolling towards them and the dude has literally zero reaction. He looks over, sees the car coming, no reaction.

Steve

And it literally crushes him.

Nic

Lets it hit him. Yeah. He just kind of gets squished sideways and our man is able to escape from there.

Steve

Right.

Nic

I mean, interesting. Like you're writing a movie like this. I think a big part of the spitballing process is what are some interesting ways that people can get killed. And, like, that's one I haven't really seen before, is dislodging the wedge from underneath the car tire and having it roll and, you know, kill the guy who's trying to kill you. So, yeah, he gets out of that, you know, and then he's able to kind of, you know, keep running away.

Steve

Right.

Nic

He runs and he's trying to get help.

Steve

Yeah. And he runs to a gas station, basically. Right?

Steve

And he runs to the gas station and there is a TV ad on the TV in the gas station. Yeah, Right. And it's. It's like, eight more days to Halloween, Halloween, Halloween. Eight more days to Halloween, Silver Shamrock.

Steve

And we're gonna hear that 50 more times. And then, of course, it counts down seven more days, five days, like, whatever. Right. Tomorrow, two more days of whatever it is. But that's.

Steve

This ad keeps playing, and it's basically like, hey, kids, like, come get one of these three masks. They're the best masks you can get. Now, I will say, in the grand scheme of early 80s Halloween masks, these were awesome.

Nic

Oh, yeah.

Steve

They're like latex.

Steve

They're like full head. They look really cool. Like, there's a skeleton, a witch and a pumpkin, like, jack o' lantern head. They all look amazing compared to, like, the plastic with the little strap that we used to have back then. So.

Steve

So the guy, like, goes and he's, like. Basically collapses at the gas station, I think.

Nic

Yeah. So he's trying to get help from the guy at the gas station, and he's basically saying, like, they're coming, coming.

Steve

They're gonna kill us all.

Nic

He has this mask in his hand and kind of collapses there. I think also, before it shows the Silver Shamrock commercial, it's kind of a news report talking about how there is a missing stone from Stonehenge.

Steve

Oh, that's right. Yes, that's right.

Nic

And they're trying to find that one.

Steve

Of the blue stones from Stonehenge that's.

Nic

Dropped in there as well.

Steve

How many? Five tons. What did it say?

Steve

I can't remember how much it said. It said it weighed a lot.

Nic

Yeah, crazy. Crazy weight, though. Shout out to Stonehenge.

Nic

We also saw you in the Spinal Tap film, so it's good to see another appearance by that actor. So, yeah, so we see that. And the man kind of is like, they're coming, they're coming. You know, very ominous. And that's it.

Steve

Right, right.

Nic

For that scene.

Steve

Right, exactly.

Nic

And cuts to a scene. We have a father who's coming home to his family.

Steve

Well, we have a man who's coming home to someone. He's got a couple of paper bags with him. He comes in and the. My initial reaction was that his wife. It's his wife and two kids.

Steve

Or a woman and his two kids are clear that they're, you know, they. Dad's home. Dad, dad, whatever. I was like, this woman is awful. She's just immediately like.

Steve

Like, oh, you're late. But I'm used to it. Like, all this stuff. Whatever. And then I realized, oh, this is his ex wife.

Steve

Like, this isn't like a current marriage.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

And so it's the bitch ex wife archetype. Exactly. Right.

Steve

Which. And he's the deadbeat dad archetype. He's awful. But, yeah. Like, this is our hero, by the way.

Steve

This is the character played by Tom Atkins.

Nic

What are we going to call him? Dr. Dan.

Steve

Yeah. Or just Dan.

Nic

Dan. I don't know Dan.

Steve

Is it Chilton?

Nic

Because that was Chilton. Because that's Silence of the Lambs.

Steve

But it's close. Chilson. Or chilling. I don't know. Whatever.

Steve

Doesn't matter. His name is Dan. I don't for a fucking second buy this guy as this heartthrob hero that he's basically played as throughout the movie. Like, there are so many points where I'm like, this guy makes no sense.

Nic

I don't understand.

Nic

So, okay, I'll bring this up now.

Steve

Okay.

Nic

I told you before the pod that a lot of times before we do a movie, I don't really like to consume. And just like. You don't.

Nic

I'm not trying to listen to another podcast about the movie that we do or stuff like that because you don't want to cross ideas. But this movie, I was just kind of like. Like, I need to be reassured that I actually saw what I saw. So I. I got into a couple of them. But the way that people talk about Tom Atkins, and maybe this is me not being like a horror guy.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

They're saying things about Tom Atkins that kind of remind me of those shitty Chuck Norris jokes from 15 years ago. Like, they talk about Tom Atkins like he is just the most unstoppable, you know, fuck machine badass in the world. And I, in this film, I mean, he's certainly. He.

Nic

He had a lot of great opportunities, but that guy.

Steve

I think the joke about that is that he so clearly isn't that. That because this character plays like he is. It's like, let's just lean into that.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

And that's sort of the meme that's the joke of like, you know, Tom Atkins is like, amazing because it's like, he's really. Just looks like he's got bad skin. He's not in particularly good shape. He's tall, but he's like, you know, probably 50 and soft in the middle. You know what I mean?

Steve

He's just like, got this look of somebody that just like the mustache sucks. Like, the whole thing is kind of like, why is not wide enough, right.

Nic

Silence of the Lambs with.

Steve

Or something. Or something.

Steve

Doc Holliday holiday kind of style twirl to it. I don't know. Something. But like, it doesn't work. And he.

Steve

It is hard to buy him as our hero. Basically, he's there and he's supposed to be like. He gives his kids these masks or. Right. And again, it's the kind of crappy ones.

Nic

Like, I was talking about the paper bags. And he's acting like it's this big surprise he has for.

Steve

I told you I'd get your masks. Dad came through. And they're like, well, mom already got us good Silver Shamrock masks.

Steve

These are pieces of dad. You. That's basically. That's not literally in the. But that's like it.

Steve

And so they show them. They. They've got like the witch and the. And the. The pumpkin or whatever.

Steve

And. And you know, he's. He's like, oh, okay, you already got masks. But that's when he gets beeped on this, like, you know, Jurassic era pager that he has absolutely. Old, old, old pager.

Steve

But he calls in because he's a doctor and he calls in the hospital needs him to come in because this guy was just brought in and he's going crazy and we don't know anything about him. So you got to come and take it. Take a look. The other doctor had to go home or some, right. So he's like, sorry, you gotta go.

Steve

And the ex wife is like, you promised you'd stay. Like, she, like, freaks out on him. And he's just like, oh, I gotta go.

Nic

So he did she learned anything about being married to a doctor? I mean, not.

Nic

I'm not defending his. His performance as a dad, but like, if you get paged and have to go to the hospital, that's different than being like, I got to go to the dog track.

Steve

Right? Yeah. And also the way he's being paged in and who he's seeing and where.

Steve

He's clearly an ER doc. That's got it. That's like the most stressful, time intensive. You Know what I mean? Like, that's like one of the hardest kinds of doctors to be as an emergency doctor.

Steve

And so that seems like what he is. He's not a fucking pediatrician. Like, he's working in an er. So, yeah, so there's all that. But basically he has to go and he goes to check out.

Steve

You know, he goes there and it's really like, just him and like, one nurse. Because it's like, really late at night. Yeah, maybe. And then the. The ambulance people, like, help bring in.

Steve

And the guy from the gas station. Actually, that's what it is. The guy from the gas station is, like, coming in with him. He's like, hey. Like, he just came in, he said, they're all going to get us or whatever, coming for me, blah, blah.

Steve

And he goes, can I leave now? Can I go back? And they're like, yeah, yeah, thanks so much for bringing him. You can go.

Nic

Good move by that guy.

Steve

Yeah, he got the. Out of there. Good call. So. So there's that.

Steve

And the dude is clinging to this mask still, and he's got the Silver Shamrock mask, and he's just holding on to it. And they basically, you know, they get him to calm down. They put him into a room, but the guy says, they're going to kill us all, they're going to kill us all, whatever. So they leave him. There's like, okay, he's here.

Steve

He's like, stable, like, whatever. And again, it's like just the one doctor and the one nurse. It seems like they go. And then we see this, another man in a suit walking and being weird with the gloves. Being weird.

Steve

Just like the guy who attacked him earlier walking through the hospital. And I'm like, is there no security at this hospital, like, at all? And maybe it was that normal in the early 80s. Like, I don't know. But now there were security guards and, like, all kinds of stuff.

Nic

Yeah, I guess. And if you're not in, like, a super concentrated, like, urban area, maybe you have just less staff. But, yeah, it is kind of weird. Although a white dude in a suit who's dressed nice and who looks like he knows where he's going is probably not going to get questioned too much.

Steve

I mean, they say a uniform and a clipboard will get you into lots of places.

Steve

You don't have to be if you just act like you belong there. Exactly. So maybe it's that kind of thing. But nobody sees him. You know, he goes in, and so the dude.

Steve

This guy. This guy in the suit goes into the room with the man who's got the mask, who's running away, and he does something. I still don't exactly know what was done here, but it looked like he took his thumb and index finger and put them into each eye socket. Yeah, right. Pressing past the dude's eyeballs.

Steve

And then, like, grabbed part of, like, the bridge of his nose from behind.

Nic

Yeah. And, like, yanked it out.

Steve

And, like, really gnarly. Like, I.

Steve

Would that even kill you? It's obviously massively painful, but I guess maybe that shoves part of the bone into the brain or something. I guess. I don't know. But it kills him.

Steve

It's very brutal. The sound effect of the break is real bad. But this is our first kill.

Nic

And then it was just, like, no straw, like, just business, you know? I walk up, and then this is the thing that I do.

Steve

All with one hand. He was holding his hand, one hand over the man's mouth so he wouldn't scream, and does this whole other thing with the thumb and index finger. With a single hand, it just pulls apart his skull.

Nic

So, I mean, crazy amount of strength shown there. That's not, like, a normal person thing.

Nic

The nurse sees him as he's leaving, Basically sees him walk out, sees that this man has been killed, and the killer could not care less. Just walks away casually. Doesn't speed up, doesn't anything. Just, yeah, I did the thing I'm supposed to do.

Steve

Right.

Steve

And so then Dr. Dan tries to run after him. Like, hey, you know, doing the whole thing. Like, where are you going? Blah, whatever. Dude gets into the car that he came in, pours gasoline all over himself, super casually.

Steve

Very no reaction whatsoever. No, no, no commentary, whatever. And it's. Lights himself on fire, at which point the car explodes. Like a bomb is in it.

Steve

Like, absolutely would not explode.

Nic

Like, it would take a while if it did.

Steve

It probably wouldn't all just burn. You know what I mean? Like, so, I mean, I guess unless eventually the fire got to the gas tank and we can see whatever, but, like, wouldn't explode like that.

Steve

Certainly not quickly, but it does. And it's. So now everybody's just watching this car burn. Nobody's gonna run up and, like, save this guy or whatever. But it's like, holy crap, this dude shows up at the hospital.

Steve

They don't know where he came from. They don't know why. Another dude shows up at the hospital, kills that guy, gets in a car, lights himself on fire. What the hell are we supposed to do with this? Like, how do you even start looking into this, right?

Steve

It's completely crazy. So, yeah, there's that.

Nic

And it's. And it's kind of so so far. It's like.

Nic

I don't know, is he just kind of one of these, like, like mind control assassin type things that we've seen in other films where they're made to, like, kill themselves as soon as they finish the job?

Steve

Naked Gun style? Yeah, exactly.

Nic

So, yeah, the doctor, then clearly I gotta stay at least for a little bit, right? You know, I'm not leaving now.

Steve

Right? Because the cops show up and, like, investigating, and then the daughter of the man who was killed in the hospital bed, not, obviously not the crazy person in the car, she shows up and her name's Ellie. And good name. Yeah, great name. My daughter's named Ellie.

Steve

I love that she is. Goes up and kind of confirms, yeah, that's my dad. They even try to tell, like, hey, you don't want to look at this right now. Because again, dudes had a part of his skull pulled apart basically in order to kill him. But she sees, confirms, yes, that's him.

Steve

Oh, my God, I can't believe this actually happened kind of thing. And she talks to Dr. Dan a little bit, who again, you know, has. Has skin like Edward James almost, and a mustache that just screams like, keep your kids away from him.

Nic

It's like, Dave wants that backup mustache.

Steve

Oh, God, it's so bad.

Steve

And so, you know, there's. There's somehow a tiny bit of chemistry between them initially or even is there. It's hard to even.

Nic

It seems like there's none. So, yeah, my takeaway here was basically, hey, this is my dad.

Nic

Like, I gotta get to the bottom of this. I'm in town for a couple days and he's just like, I also would like to get to the bottom of this. Should we get to the bottom of it together?

Steve

There is that. But I wanna point out a couple things happened.

Steve

So when we first started off, it says it's October 23rd, and it says like, eight days of Halloween. We get that commercial. It's like eight more days of Halloween, like a whole deal, right? And then it's like. Then it says, because it's late at night, I guess now it's the 24th, it's Sunday the 24th, it's seven days of Halloween.

Steve

That's when the daughter shows up and confirms it's the dad. Then we zip ahead and it's like three days later. So it's like four days to Halloween or something like that. Something around there. We're zipping through the week suddenly, and he is in a bar just watching TV and drinking a drink or whatever.

Steve

And she shows up and first of all, thanks him for going to the funeral. Right. So there was a funeral and it already been. It already happened. And he went.

Steve

And I could see why he would. I mean, given all the circumstances around the gu death, I could see the doctor, like going to the funeral potentially.

Nic

Right.

Steve

But she thanks him for that.

Nic

And the guy who died was the.

Nic

He was the owner of a toy store.

Steve

Right, Exactly. A toy store in town. And he had this mask. And so the two of them go to their dad's store to like, look around and they realize that he had on.

Steve

You know, she said, I've looked through his, like, appointments and you know, he made this one. He made this one. And then he went to go to the Silver Shamrock factory, which is up north of here in Santa Mira. And. And then he missed his next appointment.

Steve

Appointment. Like the next day he was supposed to go visit, you know, his aunt or his cousin or something. She did, she said he never showed up. So that's where it's like something happened when he went up to Santa Mira, like, we need to check it out. And basically the guy is like, sure, I'll do that.

Steve

Of course he promised his ex wife that he would go, that the kids could stay with him like overnight or whatever. And now has to be like, I'm sorry, I'm not doing that.

Nic

Right.

Steve

I got this 20 year old piece of tail I got to hang out with instead and whatever. So bye.

Steve

Like, it's basically the dude is the worst deadbeat dad.

Nic

Like, it's terrible because he also doesn't seem to have any regret about missed time with the kids. He's just. It's just kind of like, yeah, sorry I couldn't stop at Taco Bell for you on my way home. Like, he does not give a shit.

Steve

It seems like the only thing he cares about is he now has to hear his ex wife bitch at him.

Nic

Yes.

Steve

And that his only impetus is to avoid getting bitched at.

Nic

Yes.

Steve

It's not actually about like, oh, I love my children.

Steve

I want to spend time with them. Like, that's not part of it. This guy's a real work piece of work. So. So they go.

Steve

So a couple things. So they get in the car and they drive quote up north. They don't make it clear where we started. Right. The original title was just Northern California.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

They don't make it clear how far from there Santa Mira is now Santa Mira, I can tell you, is located. They were shot in a town called Lolita. Lol. Eta, California, up in Humboldt county, about half an hour outside of Eureka.

Steve

That's where they filmed it. Okay. That is way up north. That is way up north in California. Yeah.

Steve

One of the other people we see a little bit later, she comes to play, talks about having a toy store in San Francisco and Union Square. That would be like a five plus hour drive.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

From San Francisco to this place, if it's where that actually located. But of course none of this is like made clear.

Steve

So they go to this town. We don't know again, like how far they had to drive or whatever. And they go to the Rose. On the drive up, he says he looked up a bunch of information about the town and that basically it was like founded like 100 years prior, 1880, something, whatever, by Irish immigrants. They stayed there and it was a.

Steve

A dairy maybe or something. And then it was turned into a, into a mask and whatever, like novelties.

Nic

Novelty factory. Yeah.

Steve

And everybody in the town, like works there is what he was able to find out.

Steve

Right. And so, so they go. And they go to the Rose O' Shannon Inn, which is like a very Irish sounding name.

Nic

And as they're driving through the town before they do like, they're getting very weird looks.

Steve

Very Children of the Corn for sure.

Nic

And I do want to say, I think we need to mention this every time it shows up in the movie. $1.32 for gas.

Steve

Oh my gosh. Insane. That would be wonderful.

Steve

Of course, it was probably like four octane, so. But yeah, so they go to this Rose of Shannon Inn and they check in as if they're a married couple just to try to like not give away their names or something, I guess. But the guy's got an Irish accent. The innkeeper.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

And I'm thinking to myself, if this town's been here a hundred years. Yeah. Why would any of these people still have accents?

Nic

You got to keep the old tradition.

Steve

So very strange.

Steve

But this guy's still got an accent then. So they're there and basically he tells Ellie, Dan tells Ellie, hey, like, like go talk to this guy about getting into the room, help have him help you the bags. And he goes, I'll go register us like, you know, because this is. There's no computer. This is old school.

Steve

There's a book. And he's able to look and see. Oh yeah, her dad did stay here, you know, like a. Whatever week ago or whatever it was. Right.

Steve

You know, so He. That's good. He confirmed like, he stayed there. He definitely came to the town. He.

Steve

Which means he went to the factory because he had an appointment there.

Nic

So they're on the right trail, right.

Steve

Confirming that the information that they, they thought they had is accurate. And so he like registers them in the book under like, Smith or something. And.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

And so, and I think while they're talking to the innkeeper and stuff, this like, limo drives by and he makes a comment that like, oh, this is Mr. Cochran, Mr. Cochrane. He's. He's the most important man in town, you know, Such a genius. So, like, the reverence they have for this guy.

Nic

It is this weird kind of like at best, company town type feeling where they all, you know, worship the owner of all the shit.

Steve

Or even more culty than that.

Nic

Yeah, for sure. Absolutely.

Steve

Yeah.

Steve

So. So they get checked in and then a family shows up in a Winnebago and it's like this mom and dad and this like, kid who's a little brat and whatever. And the guy with the Winnebago, like, almost hits Dan or whatever coming out of the office, has to slam in the brakes. The kid's bike falls off the front of the Winnebago and he's all pissed about it and like, is it broken? Dog?

Steve

I'm going to go ride my bike. Like, but basically it's this horrible, very Willy Wonka sort of feeling, dude, like family.

Nic

Absolutely.

Steve

But like, so. So this is.

Steve

So they're there and there's another woman that also shows up and is sort of just bitching about like, her situation and all. Like, they couldn't take me today and I'm so mad I have to stay here tonight or whatever. Right?

Nic

Like, this whole.

Steve

This movie is very.

Steve

Is very. Like if with Willy Wonka, the Chocolate Factory, whatever was like far more, far darker than even it is, which it is. But if we go many steps further down the like, D and forbidding path, like, that's what this feels like in.

Nic

A lot of ways.

Steve

And yeah, so I love when that kid gets on the bike and like rides up.

Steve

His mom goes, don't you ride in the street? I probably flips her off. He flips the bird to his mom.

Nic

And this is 1982, where, like, you could challenge someone to a duel if they flipped you off. Like, people didn't throw like, fuck you, buddy around willy nilly like they do now.

Steve

Parents routinely beat their children with belts.

Nic

Like, oh, for sure.

Steve

This is not something you should be messing around with, kid.

Nic

So, yeah, so Dan and Ellie now are in the hotel room. And Dan's like, oh, man, there's only one.

Nic

Oh, I messed up. I only got us one hotel room. Oh, hey, dude, it's totally fine. I. I don't mind getting another room. And then.

Nic

So at this point I still thought like, as you should. You're like 30 years older than her, at least. And her dad was just murdered in a super gross way.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

Like, like, yeah, give her a little space.

Steve

Right.

Nic

And then it just immediately went to her being like, well, what do you want to do? And he's like, I know what I want to do.

Steve

He literally said, that's a dumb question. Yeah.

Nic

And then they're, then they're making out.

Steve

I don't buy this romance.

Nic

It's crazy at all. I mean, it seems like the movie was written by the guy who played Dan. Right.

Steve

Tom Atkins movies, right.

Nic

Yeah. I gotta see them nips.

Steve

It's. It's so bizarre.

Steve

She is a very pretty girl, very attractive actress, and he is not a good looking dude. And I just don't buy. There's the huge age gap. There's the fact that they've only known each other for something like 24 hours. Well, I guess.

Steve

No, a little longer. As he went to the funeral. So they've run into each other a few times over the course of like maybe four days.

Nic

Right.

Steve

Right.

Steve

This is a very fast, budding romance. I don't, I don't think it's honest. No. You know, I don't think it's earned.

Nic

Her dad was killed under his care.

Nic

That's their connection.

Steve

That's true.

Nic

My dead dad was being watched by you when he got killed.

Steve

Yes.

Nic

You can.

Nic

Literally your patient love. I don't.

Steve

And now I want to bang you.

Nic

Very. A very weird thing.

Nic

And this is, I mean, this movie, like you said, it's. There's reasons that people really like it.

Steve

Right.

Nic

There's certain stuff where you're like, that you should have done more of that.

Steve

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Steve

Great idea. Bad execution.

Nic

Creepy townspeople stuff. Then there's these bells and there's this voice that you know, everybody go inside your house. There's a 6pm curfew.

Nic

6pm curfew.

Steve

Crazy.

Nic

And I, and I did read after the fact that that voice is actually Jamie Lee Curtis.

Steve

Oh, is it?

Nic

So she's unbilled, but she's doing the voiceover work for the announcement town. Wow.

Nic

So, yeah, there's a curfew in this creepy town where like everyone works at the same place. Everyone kind of looks the same. They all seem to know each other. They're very suspicious of outsiders. So the doc's like, okay, well, I'm not going to honor this curfew.

Nic

I'm just going to go walk around and, and just be taking pulls off a bottle of wine throughout the town.

Steve

He went to a liquor store or something, right? Bought a bottle and then decided to walk down the narrowest, darkest alley that the town possibly has. It's not that big a town. This is not a major city where there's like, oh, this is like the faster way to get here.

Nic

It's like, it's not a 10 alley town. That was their one creepy alley.

Steve

There's probably one stoplight in that entire town. And you're walking down this crazy dark alley, you know, runs into this homeless guy who I, I made a note at this point, no accent. Because the only, I think the only townsperson we'd heard talk was, was the, the, the innkeeper.

Steve

Yeah. Right. And so, but this guy, no accent, like, sounds like an American whatever, but basically is saying like, he tells him, he's like the factory there, they brought in outsiders. They're not even hiring local townsfolk like me. That or whatever, like, it's crazy.

Steve

And he asks him for, for a sip of his drink, which I'm like.

Nic

I don't have any diseases, right?

Steve

I'll bet. Yeah. You got any proof, pal?

Nic

You know, in addition, like, we were talking in the, the last episode about how Clarice Starling should carry around like a little Ziploc bag that has latex gloves and stuff. If you're like a public drunk, you should carry around little Dixie cups just in case someone wants a pull. Be like, look, man, I'm happy to share with you, but your lip does not look like something I want to think about the next time I sip out of this.

Steve

You have a dirty mouth. You don't have a nice clean mouth.

Nic

So this guy's very upset, right? And he's kind of rambling. Oh, everyone's from out of town. He's like, I'll tell you what I'm going to do. Do.

Nic

Yeah, I'm going to burn. This is going to be the last Halloween for them. I'm going to burn the factory down.

Steve

I.

Nic

And I think he says, like, I have four Molotov cocktails.

Steve

40 or something. But yeah, it was a big number.

Nic

I thought it was a small number. Okay, that makes more sense then. But yeah, and the most efficient way to burn something down is to like, one by 1.

Nic

Throw 50 Molotov cocktails into a build. It sounds like a Grand Theft Auto mission where you have to keep going to different windows and chucking them in.

Steve

Or if you're not getting them through the windows, the building's probably made of concrete on the outside. I don't know how much damage you'll do quickly, you know, with that. But I guess, look, fire.

Steve

Is fire good enough?

Nic

I mean, for, for a, for a town drunk, not too bad.

Steve

So, so this guy gets stopped then by two more of our. Of our be suited weirdos, right? So now we've seen a few of these guys even in town.

Steve

And so these guys walk up to him in there and he's like talking to him. He's like, no, no, like, I was just kidding, you know, I was just kidding. Like, it's all good, whatever. And they rip his head off. Yeah, they literally rip his head off.

Steve

I love the distinction here though, because five years later, the predator will start ripping heads off of people in an Amazonian jungle, but will do so with the spine intact. Oh, and whereas this guy, like, his head just pops up.

Nic

Spineless head.

Steve

Exactly. And then there's a couple of blood spurts out of the, like, torso that I really appreciated before it falls over.

Nic

Yeah, it was pretty grody and, you know, sad ending for this guy because not only did he get his head pulled off a little bit before that, his last meal actually turned out to be him putting a bunch of Cheez Whiz on a hot dog bun and eating it.

Steve

Yeah, I think it's a piece of white bread that he folded up. It was real.

Nic

It looked pretty rough. You know what sucks about that is the social stigma of cheese in a can is that it's like, oh, that's what this bum would be.

Nic

But if you ever try to buy yourself a nice can of easy cheese at Safeway to keep in the car, and I both know the exact retail price of cheese in a can. That's why this is an audio only podcast, folks.

Steve

Fair, fair play. Fair play. Okay, all right, so, okay, so we got a head ripped off.

Steve

Okay, so now we go back to the hotel and this is the sort of obligatory. Every Halloween movie has to have nudity or near nudity in it. This is the way John Carpenter rolls. So this is now Ellie. She gets out of the shower.

Steve

It's not like full frontal or like real clear, but she's wrapping herself up in a towel and not doing a great job of it. And she, again, very attractive woman, but, you know, she just Kind of covers herself in the blanket and is shivering. And I'm thinking myself, lady, dry yourself off and put clothes on. You won't shiver so bad. Like, clearly it's cold in there.

Nic

And absorb. It's not a terry cloth blanket. That's a bad idea.

Steve

She wraps herself up and I think that's when Dan comes home after his adventure with the liquor and the bomb. And basically she just like drops the blanket and, you know, we're gonna do this now.

Steve

Yeah. And I still, I just don't get why she's so into him. It doesn't make any sense.

Nic

No, not at all. And, and, and you probably picked up on this as well.

Nic

Well, so when this scene starts and this is like the, you know, they've been intimate multiple times so far. And look, I'm not going to judge what anyone does in the bedroom. There's different orders to do things in. I would say that generally, if you're going to ask a question like, how old are you? Do that before having sex with her, like six times real early.

Steve

And then she even said something like, oh, I, I, it's okay, I look younger than I am or something like that, or I'm older than I look. Whenever.

Nic

That's something where it's like, that's not an answer. That's, that's very coy of you. I need a concrete number.

Steve

See some id.

Nic

Yeah, I need, I need a utility.

Steve

Bill, you know, something in your name.

Nic

I need some personal references. I need a high school yearbook.

Nic

You know, I think consent just wasn't.

Steve

What it was, what it is today, back in 1982. That's the problem.

Nic

Just really, really bad. But again, it just adds to like how off putting the sexual part.

Nic

Ellie, I mean, really just, just absolutely gorgeous. Like, she looks fantastic in this next to them. This, this woman who was there for the order with the store in San Francisco. Marge Gutman.

Steve

That's right.

Nic

So Marge Gutman is right next to them. Dude, for sure. She's, she's in the adjacent room. Right, right. And, and instead of overhearing their sexual exploits and conducting it like a, like a maestro, instead she's kind of messing with this mask that she found.

Nic

And I think that the, the logo had fallen off of it or something.

Steve

Yeah, she, so she had shown. I can't remember if she shown, showed Ellie or showed Dan. I think Ellie, like, oh, she was there partly because her own child's mask, like the, the, she said the copyright fell off it. It's like the little logo thing.

Steve

Yeah, you Know that shouldn't happen. You know, whatever.

Nic

Also, who gives a. I wish the logo would fall off everything I own. God damn it.

Steve

But what she noticed is.

Steve

Cuz it like f. She. It had fallen off of the table, whatever. And you. There's like a microchip kind of on the back of it. And she just starts looking at.

Steve

And again, I don't know what the hell you think you're doing, but she gets like tweezers or. Or something that starts playing, like poking at the. The microchip.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

At which point a laser like shoots out of it into her face.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

Blowing her face open again. Like, honestly, like the pregnant. Like, like crazy.

Nic

You know, in like Bugs Bunny cartoons where like Elmer has a shotgun and Bugs Bunny puts his finger in it and then it just kind of peels back the way it blows up.

Nic

That's what her whole mouth looks like.

Steve

Like a banana peel.

Nic

Gnarly, dude. It was.

Steve

Yeah.

Steve

And then a bug like a cockroach crawls out of her mouth hole. The face hole that's been created by this laser blast. Real scary. Ellie and Dan in the next room, they do seem to hear something, but like, kind of dismiss it or whatever and go back to banging.

Nic

And as he should.

Nic

I mean, I'd probably be like, look, it's not a family member next door. What she does in her motel room is her own business. But they are kind of disturbed because they see like, oh, there's a commotion outside. And it's not the cops or the paramedics. It's a van that has the Silver Shamrock logo on the side taken with a bunch of people who are taking her out of there.

Steve

And they're all dressed like orderlies. They've all got like the white coats and whatever, but it's like, whatever. And he comes out and he goes, hey, I'm a doctor. Like, can I. Let me in here.

Steve

Whatever. And they're just like. They basically push him aside or whatever.

Nic

But then he goes, I said, I'm a doctor. Which I do love the entitlement of that, you know, it's kind of like in the Fugitive, the way that Richard Kimball's friend was so arrogant with the cops.

Nic

There's just something about being a doctor that you're like, like, okay, well, I'm a little above. I'm not really a civilian. I'm a doctor.

Steve

To be fair, it's white male doctors, I think, more than anything else.

Steve

So, okay, so then we cut to the next day and we're going. We go to the Silver Shamrock Factory. They're going to go basically, like, take a look around or whatever. And they're talking to a woman about, you know, basically investigating did her dad come to the actual factory and, like, pick up an order and all this stuff. And so they're finding out, like, oh, do you remember, like, this name?

Steve

Like, we lost the order, so that's why we're here. And they're like, oh, well, that order was. Was picked up. And then even talking to another kind of work coworker, and it's like, do you remember loading this order up? He's like, oh, yeah, I loaded that up.

Steve

So they're kind of like, not really getting much info other than confirming her dad was there. Yeah, there's not like a whole lot else. So they go to leave, at which point the family from the Winnebago, from the hotel, they show up. And I can't remember the last name, but the dad and the boy are both named Buddy, which is just so insufferable. But, you know, before they leave, he kind of says hi to them, is like shaking hands real vigorously and all that.

Steve

And, oh, I'm like the one top salesman. That's why they invited me to.

Nic

He's like a how the hell are you?

Steve

Guy. Yes, exactly.

Steve

Right? Yeah. And slapping your back or shaking your hand kind of thing, you know. But at this point, they're about to leave. Dan and Ellie are about to leave, and Mr. Cochran, the owner, the head honcho, he comes into the room and they're kind of like, whoa.

Steve

And this is where we're going to mention it, but yeah. So Mr. Cochran is played by Dan O', Herlihy, who fans of the Pod here will remember as Grig, the co pilot from the Last Starfighter, although at the time he was made up.

Nic

Looks a little different.

Steve

A little bit of like an iguana. A brown iguana face makeup to be Grig with only, like three fingers or something.

Steve

But yes, but it's the same man. I recognize his voice before anything else. But yeah, so he's, like, going to give them all a factory tour. And it's like. And he even says something about like, oh, we're so sorry about the loss of your order.

Steve

It will be replaced on our charge. No charge at all, you know, kind of thing. And he's got this funny accent, Dan, look.

Nic

When. When.

Nic

When Cochran says that to him, that the order's free. Even though Dan, he's like, I'm playing a character. He acted so excited about the free order. I was like, you Gotta tone it down a little bit.

Steve

Good job.

Steve

Yeah. But yeah, his accent, Cochrane's accent is funny. At times it sounds Irish a bit, and at times it doesn't. It sounds British. And then even other times it kind of sounds, I don't know, Massachusetts, New.

Nic

England, where it's like that North Atlantic.

Steve

Yeah, the Atlantic accent. That's sort of whatever they do. And so he's got a very funny accent, Dana Hurley. He does, but there are times where it's clear he's trying to put a little Irish brogue on it, you know, to fit this character.

Steve

Oh, yeah, sorry.

Nic

I just want to jump into something because this will come in later. So before they get to the factory, Dan makes a call from the hotel room, I believe. And he's talking and he makes these calls a few times. He's talking to this woman.

Steve

That's right.

Nic

Who. It also seems like I'm. As soon as I get home. Like he just has this magic effect.

Nic

But a woman who seems to work at like the forensics lab or just at the corner. And she's doing her best. Best because they're trying to find out, like, this dude who lit himself on fire in the car. There wasn't a skeleton or anything. There's just more car parks, car parts.

Nic

I don't understand this. So they're trying to figure that out.

Steve

Yeah, exactly.

Nic

And I think he gets to the point that on the phone with her, that he wants her to take a look into Mr. Cochran. That's right.

Nic

At least just like Something's up. But Mr. Cochran, of course, this is his town. This is his factory. This is his motel. There's a listening device on the call, so he knows that Dan has called inquiring about it.

Steve

Right. So he's playing dumb, like, oh, you're just a guy, whatever. But he knows who they all are. So they go on this factory tour and. And like we kind of referenced before, it is like a fucked up Willy Wonka kind of situation.

Steve

There's like all these old toys. The buddy or whatever is talking to Dan about how Cochran made his fortune making, you know, knockoff crap or whatever, little crap toys or whatever, but then moved on to masks. And that's when he became a billionaire or whatever the hell. Yes, like all this stuff. And there's a bunch of like, like crappy little toys all over the place.

Steve

There's a kind of like, whatever as like, but like it's a museum almost like there's a couple of rooms walking through it.

Nic

Right.

Steve

Set up like that. And they get to where they're showing where the masks get made. And like the boy, the little Buddy, he wants to, he's like oh can I want this one?

Steve

I want this one. And he's like, like oh no, that one hasn't had final processing yet. You know, whatever, like what the hell's final processing? And sure enough there's even like a corridor and at the door at the end says final processing, no admittance. And you know, like the buddy, Mr. Cochran, what is final processing?

Steve

Like, oh, it's a bit of this and a bit of that and it's like that's all he says about it.

Nic

He's not let him go anymore.

Steve

Quality assurance, you know, I mean to.

Nic

Buddy's credit, he's kind of like, well I'm your best salesman. I came all this way.

Nic

You could show me and Cochrane again. Just no, like it's a trade secret. I'm not going to show you this. So they're about to leave and I think Dan kind of spots all those like weird guys with the black gloves on and everything. And he's just like, what's going on here?

Nic

There's an open garage on the property and Ellie spots a car that she could swear is her dad's car.

Steve

Car, green car, that's her dad's and she's absolutely positive. But before she can run up to like go prove it or whatever, more of these, you know, crazy suited guys that we've been seeing all over the place, like they stop her basically and, and you know, they can't do that. So then we cut back to the hotel at which point Dan delivers the best line he has in the movie when he says I think it's time for the Marines. Like as if he can just like call in the marines.

Nic

Like again Dr. Hubris I guess. Cuz he, I. We see this again at some point where it's like no, I'm a doctor. Like put me through to whoever. Yeah, so.

Nic

So they're back at the motel and they're kind of just like yeah, yeah, Dan's calling the cops.

Steve

Well yeah, cuz he has to go.

Nic

Well he has to go to somewhere to make.

Steve

There's no, it's like there's no phones in the room so he has to go to the office to try to make a call and that's. And but it's like, you know, it's like is this when it's like, oh like you know, your call cannot be completed.

Steve

Is that where they. Because it happens to them a bunch of times. It Happens several different times. So like the call cannot be completed. But.

Nic

And when they first got there, you know, because the plan wasn't to come out here and stay for a few days. They were coming out to check things out, whatever. They check into the motel and at first they're kind of like. Seems weird. The motel owner comments on.

Nic

Oh, you don't really have any bags. She just has like one, you know, little like toolbox thing.

Steve

Like a makeup case or something. Yeah.

Nic

So then Dan's like, I gotta call the cops.

Nic

You go pack. And it's like she's taken like an hour to pack this. It's like you didn't fucking have anything. I mean even if he just said like go scrape the underwear off the floor that we've been flinging around the whole time, we stay there. Get your bra off the fan and let's get out of here.

Steve

Yeah. So when he tries to make a phone call and can't, basically he then leaves to go back to the room. And of course the door to their room is open, open and Ellie's not there. So he freaks out. And he's basically just like running through town for a while as all these like Silver Shamrock.

Steve

These cars with the Silver Shamrock novelties logo on the side instead of a police logo basically are driving all over. He assumes, I think probably accurately they're looking for him. So he's just like hiding behind things and like tries to make a phone call from a payphone again. Gets the like your call could not be completed, whatever, all this stuff. And so he.

Steve

But he's like hiding, hiding. He makes his way to the factory. Factory, I think because he probably assumes that that's where Ellie has been taken and he is able to break in to the factory. And he's walking around and kind of like he's like trying to figure stuff out. Looking things, you can't hear anybody, nobody's there.

Steve

He opens a door and there is an old woman knitting in a rocking chair. It is the most bizarre thing ever until. And I don't remember exactly how this happens but like her head comes off. Like does he like like knock her over or something?

Nic

He's like, hey, like, you know, I need whatever.

Nic

And tries to shake her to get her attention.

Steve

Is that what it is? I just remember the head popping off.

Nic

Yeah. And then her head falls off and you know, she's this like old timey, like like steampunk looking robot.

Steve

It's all like gears and valves and different things inside of her like popping up where her like Spine should be basically very weird.

Nic

And then right after he discovers that.

Steve

He'S grabbed from behind, right.

Nic

And it's one of the suit guys, right. And Dan throws a couple of the weakest fucking punches of all time that do nothing.

Nic

But he ends up, you know, struggling with this robot. Finds some kind of vulnerable spot, right. Ricky owes his hands into him.

Steve

Seriously, it's insane.

Nic

His hands are like basically going to this guy's stomach and then he pulls it out in this like orange goo or green.

Steve

Yeah, it's orange. It's orange goo. It's almost like when copper like reaches into the guy in the thing and like falls into it or whatever. It's like ridiculous. Like just like falls through him and it's.

Steve

Yeah, it's like one. I think it's just one of his hands, but it's. Yeah. This really gross looking orange goo.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

Is all inside. And so what the key is these people are all robots, right? Wires, very weird valves and gauges and things. And then this orange goo and it's like all robots. So the other ones that are there have like captured him.

Steve

And he's looks. He looks drunk now. Like, he looks dazed. Like. I think he's.

Steve

It's supposed to be. I think what it's supposed to be. And I'll be honest, I don't think Tom Atkins pulls this off. He looks like he's in shock. Right.

Steve

I think is the idea.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

Is that it's like, oh, this is so shock. So he like very absent mindedly tries wiping the hand with the orange goo off with like a handkerchief. But he's like not resisting anymore and he's sort of almost wavering.

Steve

It looks. It's very strange. Like he's been drugged or something. Yeah. But basically Cochrane's there and he makes a comment about the old lady head.

Steve

He's like, oh, this model is from 1845, whatever. And I was like. I think what he was saying is the woman that that robot was modeled after was born in 1845. Okay.

Nic

I think that makes sense.

Steve

And then that's he was trying to recreate. Maybe it's like his mother or grandmother or something. Like, I'm not sure, but like it was very hard to like understand exactly what he meant by this model was that old or are we supposed to believe that on the, you know, we come find a little bit later. I'm not going to give anything away here, but like, you know, basically Cochrane is a warlock. He's like in a coven.

Nic

So he might have had access to that type of technology.

Steve

But are we supposed to. Yeah. Just assume that since the mid 19th century, like, witches and warlocks have been able to create robots? Yeah, like, I guess that.

Steve

That could be, I suppose.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

There's lots of things in this movie that make no sense. Why not add that to the pile?

Nic

Yeah, so.

Nic

So Cochran, you know, takes Dan.

Steve

He.

Nic

He's in his underground lair and we see what's sitting right there. It's the Stonehenge stone.

Steve

The big piece of Stonehenge is there.

Steve

And they are. And here's the other thing, too, we should mention it is now, I think at this point, the movie, right away, it's either the night of October 30th, or it's very early in the morning on October 31st. So it's either like the day before Halloween or it is like, you know, 2:00am on Halloween day, Something like that. Right. Why the fuck are they still making more masks?

Steve

Who is going to get those masks into a store and purchased and worn by that night? Doesn't make any sense that they're still doing the manufacturing process and. And like, chipping pieces off of Stonehenge to continue to make the little, you know, silver shamrock badge that apparently, you know, that killed the woman in the hotel. They keep saying it was a misfire, you know, whatever. And.

Steve

And. But, like, what is the point to continue to make more, like. Doesn't make any sense to me.

Nic

Well, especially knowing, like, what their ultimate plan is, right? It's like, well, yeah, we're not.

Nic

We're not in business, you know, exactly.

Steve

Like, yeah, we're not looking for, like, next Halloween. Like, they kept. There've been tons of hints of, like, not taking orders for next year, like, whatever, all this stuff. And this will be the last Halloween we do this.

Steve

All this stuff. And now we get to see what the real plan is, because Cochrane tells Dan, like, you're now going to see a demonstration, you know, whatever. And so there's this room. The door on it says, like, test room or one or whatever. And they lead the family, Buddy and his wife and his kid, little Buddy, into this room and it's built.

Steve

It's modeled like a living room. Yeah, like a standard Middle American living room. Right? Couch, easy chair, tv. And they go in and Buddy, of course, little Buddy, has his mask, his.

Steve

His pumpkin head mask. And they go. And they sit down and big Buddy is like, oh, yeah. Cochrane just wants to ask me my advice, you know, or my opinion on, like, a new ad campaign, because I'm like, one of his best you know, custom. Our best salesmen or whatever, right?

Steve

And so he's got a little pad of paper and they're waiting there. And sure enough, Cochran gives the signal to one of his guys in the control room with the Stonehenge pieces and the TV turns on and it's that, you know, and more days of Halloween. But it's like, different now because it's like, yeah, yeah, it's Halloween something better. Like, yeah, today is Halloween something. Right, right.

Steve

But it's a whole thing. And it's like, okay, kids, it's time for the big giveaway. And it's like this whole thing.

Nic

Make sure you put your mask on.

Steve

Masks on, kids.

Steve

And so the boy puts his mask on. And I do love the way they did this because it was like, a little more inferred and a little less explicit at first than some of the other effects have been. But basically, this. That pumpkin graphic that we saw at the beginning of the movie comes on the TV and is flashing very like, if you. If, like, I swear to God, if you're epileptic, I wouldn't watch this movie because this flashing is real brutal.

Steve

And so, you know, there's this flashing, whatever. And the kid starts, like, clutching his face, like he's holding onto the mask and something's clearly happening. And he falls and is, like, shaking. At which point it's clear. We can kind of see.

Steve

I wouldn't say it's clear. We can kind of see through, like, the eye holes in the mask that, like, his face is screwed up now. Yeah, right. There's, like, damage inside and bugs, cockroaches mostly, start crawling out of, like, what would be his mouth. Then snakes, starting with, like, little garter snakes and little, like, like, you know, garden variety, kind of small.

Steve

The six. And then like a rattlesnake.

Nic

Rattlesnakes and like a mamba.

Steve

And like, there's definitely like a few different poisonous snakes. The mom passes out, seeing that her son's face is ejecting bugs.

Steve

The dad gets up to try to leave. Yeah, nice move, buddy. And the rattlesnake gets him. But it's like. So this is the plan, apparently, right?

Steve

This is Cochrane's plan, is that all of the children wearing masks and watching their commercial on. At 9pm on Halloween night will. Their faces will explode into bugs and snakes, which will hopefully kill the rest of their family. And, you know, however many kids watch it and wear the masks, that many people die. Like, many families die probably.

Steve

This is the whole plan. He even kind of explains it to Dan about how it was our time to take the world back. Like my coven is going to do this. We have our craft, we're evil. And none of it makes any fucking.

Nic

Sense because he's kind of like we got to go back to the old ways because they're not putting respect on Halloween's name like we used to when I was a kid. Like yeah, yeah.

Steve

Whatever. It's very, it's very, it's flimsy.

Nic

I don't expect a thousand year old warlock to be in touch. But yeah, so, so basically like we see how this thing works, right? And it's very horrifying.

Nic

And then we get, get really cool kind of montage of just. It's the beginning of Halloween night in all these different cities in the US and we see the kids going out trick or treating and so many of them have the, the Silver Sham, a ton of them.

Steve

They're obviously very popular. And then there's a, there's a little aside here where the woman that you mentioned, Dan was calling this woman at like the, the corner or somewhere else. She's starting to realize like everything that's in these pieces is metal.

Steve

Like there's nothing. Nothing.

Nic

Yes.

Steve

Human. And like what if, what does that mean?

Steve

And of course the, the Silver Shamrock people know that he, he. She was called by Dan. So one of their goons shows up, you know, she doesn't know he's there. He gets a power drill and ends up putting it through her ear. Just again, a brutal kill.

Steve

It doesn't show it, no, but it's, it's enough.

Nic

I wonder if this was. Yeah, I, I'm curious always about stuff like that. Like did they do it and it just didn't work to show or you didn't want to be that brutal to that character. I will say it was a kind of funny like juxtaposition effect technologies because she's there working at the lab sifting through stuff and she finds the Silver Shamrock chip which is basically like, you know, a mind control type chip or like it's something that can scramble your brain remotely.

Nic

And she quickly goes to her rotary phone to make the call. I really like seeing two of those on the same. On the same.

Steve

Speaking of technology, I was impressed. The power drill apparently was cordless.

Steve

Those weren't super common. That was a little more of a rare. Yeah.

Nic

So. And one of the things that Cochrane says is like the planets are in alignment to do something again. They're just throwing a lot of extra shit into this movie.

Steve

Yeah, it's like, they borrowed a ton of stuff from either kind of like Wicca or just sort of like pagan history, whatever. It was referring to Halloween as Samhain and all this stuff and just throwing stuff in about the alignment of the planets and the craft.

Steve

There's a lot of buzzwords, words basically, that don't necessarily make a ton of sense.

Nic

And he does the thing that you have to do, which is if you have an evil plan of enormous scope and there's one person trying to stop you, don't eliminate them. Keep them alive so that they can see your plan come to fruition. But also don't really guard them while.

Steve

You'Re keeping them alive.

Steve

Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. So it's so. Okay, so now with one question ahead at this point.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

As they're showing us, the kids, like, all over America, and they're showing city names and it's just like, it's all over the place.

Steve

Right. Was this thing happening at 9pm Pacific, 9pm in every time zone? Because at one point.

Nic

Because if you're doing it from California.

Steve

Right.

Nic

Then we're fucked already.

Steve

Right. But the kids. Are they expecting kids on the east coast to be up at midnight to see this? Because here's the thing, it already said something about it being 7:30pm you know, at the Silver Shamrock Rock Factory at one point, which is like.

Steve

Okay, well, that means in both the Eastern and Central time zones, it's already been nine.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

Or was this just for. No, because here's the other thing, too. There's a point where I'm maybe popping head just a second, but, like, Cochrane is on the phone, clearly, with, like, somebody from, like, the TV stations or, like some kind of news or whatever.

Steve

And he used the term 43 share, which would mean 43% of American households are tuning into this airing of the movie Halloween, which is the, like, precursor to the. Oh, the thing at 9 comes after the horror fest. But they make a point that it is. You can see it on, on the TV at one point that it's Jamie Lee Curtis coming out of the house. It's actually Halloween.

Steve

Yeah. Which is fun, obviously, a little Easter egg. But basically they have, after showing Dan the demonstration, and somewhere in here, the woman gets killed at the corner. They put him into a room and they strap him down to the chair and they put a mask on him and they put on the show. So the idea is, when 9pm hit, same thing happening, same thing's gonna happen.

Steve

He's dead. That's how they're gonna kill him. This is sort of the slowly descending into the shark pit kind of thing, where it's like, it's giving him a chance to get out because sure enough, he, first of all, smart, smart, smart. He destroys the tv. First.

Steve

He, like, kicks in the tv, so.

Nic

Now he won't see that.

Steve

That was great. That was a great call.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

Because if you can't do anything else, at least now the bugs and snakes don't pop out of your head. Great. But he is able to, I guess, get a piece of the glass from the broken tv, which, by the way, don't ever reach into a broken crt. The stuff inside there will shock you. Even if it's not plugged in.

Steve

It's really quite awful. It's very dangerous. And so. But he gets, like, a shard of glass from the. From the tv and he's able to cut the light.

Steve

They duct taped him, and they duct taped him with his hands in front of him. If they just put his hands behind him. None of this, I mean, yeah, real sloppy work. Terrible robots, Silver shamrock. Yeah.

Steve

But he's able to cut himself loose, take off the mask. And then the most Steph Curry shot of all time throws the mask up to the one camera in, like, the corner of the room, and it perfectly lands on the camera, covering it completely. So now he can move about and, you know, without being seen. It's like the most ridiculous shot.

Nic

Dude, it was so good.

Nic

So I wear a hat, like, all the time. And when I come home at night, I have, like, a hat rack on the back of my door. And I'll always take it off and try to, like, throw it and land it on the hat rack. And I do this every single day. And if I get it once a month, I'm psyched.

Nic

Like, I'm missing it constantly. And I'll go and get it and try it again. And my wife's like, what are you doing? Just hang out it on the thing. Like you don't understand.

Steve

Spoken like not a dude.

Nic

Yeah, but maybe this is why Tom Atkins gets laid so regularly.

Steve

Perhaps. I will say it looked to me like the way they did the effect because the way it, like, lands on the camera is so unnatural looking. Yeah.

Steve

I think what it was is that it was on the camera attached to, like, a fishing line that they then yanked to get it to pull off. And then they showed it to us in. In reverse. Right. Because that way you'd get it right the first time and it would land perfectly.

Steve

But it doesn't look right when it.

Nic

Does there's something about.

Steve

Exactly, exactly.

Nic

Or at least let's say you're filming it and you're gonna do it that way. And the actor magically throws it on the first time.

Nic

Film a couple where he doesn't hit it and then just splice those before it so you have a little tension building up to it.

Steve

Yeah, I think that would work. Yeah.

Nic

But luckily, you know, there's a, there's a perfectly man sized vent system that Dan is able to crawl into. And he's doing a little John McLean seemed to use.

Steve

Again, either the same or another piece of glass from the TV as a screwdriver to unscrew, which it's like, man, that your hand is not cut up. Really? That's amazing. Super doc over here. But basically he is.

Steve

Yeah, he goes, he goes through the, the ventilation system. And I think, you know, at one point he looks down, he can see the control room. So he knows where that is. But then he finds Ellie, right? He.

Steve

Because he was shown Ellie on a TV that she's like strapped down to a table there in the facility somewhere and, and he finds her and like frees her. And then now they're gonna run away. You know, they're gonna try to get, do something together. It's not even really clear. Are they gonna try to stop them?

Steve

Are they trying to get out? Like not 100%.

Nic

It's just like we can only think 15 seconds into the future, one thing when it's discovered that Dan has escaped. Cause we're looking at kind of the security footage of his cell that he's kept in. And we see, you know, the control room looking at the footage and the two security guys, One guy holds up the mask that he threw over the camera and one guy holds up the empty vent.

Steve

Like the COVID the vent grill or whatever. Yeah, exactly. And so it's like, oh, you must be here. He's in the heating system.

Nic

Yeah. And then, then the. Dan also has to get to a phone because he's like, dude, my kids are in these masks.

Steve

That's right.

Nic

I saw these kids in the mask.

Nic

So I got to call my ex wife.

Steve

Oh my God.

Nic

And, and tell her to get the kids out of those masks. They're going to die. I don't have time to argue about this.

Nic

And she's like, I'll show you how to get back at you. I'm not going to listen to you.

Steve

It's not just that there is, there is a, there is an exchange over the phone that I died when I saw this. And I heard it. It was.

Steve

It was. You know, you got it. You got it. You got to save. I'm telling you, they're going to die.

Steve

Like, it's going to be bad. You got to stop me. Got to stop this thing. You got to get rid of them. You got to get rid of them.

Steve

She's like, wait, get rid of what? And he goes, the masks. The mask. You got him. You got.

Steve

And she goes, are you kidding me? Are you serious? Like, she's so incensed that he is asking because in her mind, this is all Dan saying, you need to throw away those masks. So they have to use my crappy plastic tray masks that I gave them. Right.

Steve

And in her mind, that's all that matters. It does nothing. This is like the worst possible kind of divorced couple where it's like their kids mean nothing except a way to get at each other. And it's just so disgusting.

Nic

Yeah.

Nic

Like, if you're. If you're a couple who shares. Shares custody of a child, you need like, the equivalent of a safe word.

Steve

Right?

Nic

Where it's like, however much we hate each other, if I say this to you and then tell you a thing, don't question it.

Nic

This is our kid's life and death. Make sure you do it.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

Because, I mean, she was not taken. It didn't matter what he said.

Nic

He's the least credible person in the world to her.

Steve

Exactly. And then. But then he notices he can hear them coming for him, and so he has to, like, hang up the phone. He even at one point, he, like, hangs up with her or she hangs up on him.

Steve

So he hangs. Then he picks it back up to try to make another call, but doesn't because then he hears people coming. I'm not sure who. If he was going to try to call the TV station from there or the police or whatever. But, like, he doesn't.

Steve

He's. But he does make it. So he's got Ellie with him eventually. Because it's after that he finds her. He gets her.

Steve

They go to the control room. They are sneaking around in plain sight. I cannot believe that they're not spotted. At some point. They're not even really keeping to the shadows.

Steve

At one point, they're walking behind a rack of the masks that's, like, moving as if this is fucking Looney Tunes.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

Like, they are just. It's so ridiculous that they are, like, like, hiding and like, oh, what's that? You know, I could hear, like, Cochran's.

Steve

Be like, why is that group of masks Moving over there. Go look at it, you know. And it's like that, like walking across. So bad.

Nic

It was funny when we were watching that and my wife was, was we were commenting about the same thing.

Nic

Like they're not being careful at all. And then it shows, it shows Dr. Dan walking and she's like, he's wearing corduroys.

Steve

I hadn't even noticed that. The loudest pants in the world.

Nic

Walking all through the factory.

Nic

Dude. I mean what a great detail.

Steve

That's amazing.

Nic

Oh my God.

Steve

Not good.

Nic

Sneakin pants.

Steve

No. Bad for sneaking. Not at all. Tactical.

Steve

There's no such thing as a tactical corduroy. Corduroy. No such thing.

Steve

Oh my God. Okay, so all right, so they find a big box of the like chips basically. Right. They're the little like things and God, I can't remember exactly how this plays out, but basically they get it to play. He pushes a button, he somehow knows he sneaks up to the actual control board again without being spotted.

Nic

Computer circle. It's like they have a circle of all this computer stuff with a mainframe thing in the middle and all the scientists and robot guys, whatever. And plus Cochrane are just like mingling around there.

Steve

They're just hanging. They're not looking around, they're not being.

Nic

Nobody's guarding the main computer.

Steve

No awareness whatsoever. Going on, on. And so Dan is able to sneak up to some big control board and presses a bunch of buttons which starts the thing that's going to trigger all the lasers or whatever. How he possibly could have known what to push makes no sense at all.

Nic

I don't get that.

Steve

Whatever. He does it. And so. But some of the things starts playing and they are like up in the rafters now above it with the box of things and they dump them down.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

And so as they're falling, I'm not quite sure why this is happening, but they're sort of like, like sparking and the lasers are shooting and it's like killing all the robots.

Nic

I guess they're kind of doing a little of what they did back at the motel when March like tampered with it. I guess it's kind of like those anti theft ink tags. Like if you mess with it, it's going to blow your face inside of it.

Steve

So it kills all the robots but not Cochrane.

Nic

Yes.

Steve

So that's an interesting detail because he stands.

Nic

Right.

Steve

But then because the ad, that commercial, the thing with the pumpkin is playing in that room, which I think it was never intended to do.

Steve

It was never going to play in that room, the actual big Stonehenge bluestone reacts.

Nic

Yes.

Steve

And it's like building up this laser and then there's like this laser spinning around all the TVs with the pumpkins. And finally they kind of coalesce in Cochrane and destroy him.

Nic

Yes.

Steve

So all the robots are dead, Cochran's.

Nic

Dead, and he kind of gets like.

Steve

Turned to stone first and then like, very weird, but that. So now Ellie and Dan are able to leave. And so they get.

Steve

Get in a car. I can't remember if it was their car or some other car they found. I don't realize. I don't even know. Yeah, in a car.

Steve

They're driving away and my first question here was like, what do they do they think? Do they think this now means worse, that they're good? That, like, the ads not going to play? Because it seems to me like it would still play.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

But it's like in the moment, it's like, hard to tell, like, what are they doing next? Like, where are they going, rest of their plan? Because what I. You'd have to assume all this is still going down, the kids still have masks. And in fact, nothing that was at the factory had any effect on what was going to happen later that night.

Nic

True. Yeah.

Steve

Right. The masks already out there, the ads already given to the TV stations, like, everything's going to play. So it's like, whatever.

Steve

So they're driving and she attacks him in the car.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

And it's like, this was a good twist. I got to be honest. Did not see this coming.

Steve

She's a robot now. How the hell did they make one so fast? That's her. Yeah.

Nic

Like, this is a weird.

Nic

A weird thing, right? Like, was she a robot the whole time?

Steve

No way. No, they had sex. Like, come on, come on.

Nic

Maybe he's not paying too much attention.

Steve

The robots show no emotion at all. Like, I don't think they can orgasm.

Nic

Oh, wait a second, wait a second, though. There's a scene where Dan is in the elevator when they're doing the tour of the factory.

Nic

And he comments to Cochrane how, like, oh, these are all robots. They seem so real. And one of the robots, like, sneezes.

Steve

Yeah. Yeah.

Nic

Like there was something added to make it realistic. So, like, there's ways to make them maybe act more real. The other thing is that Ellie, like, other than her showing up and being like, this was my dad, like, there's not a whole lot of proof that she necessarily was. I'm not sure how I feel about whether she was or wasn't a robot the whole time. But I think it's definitely possible given what we've been shown in the.

Steve

I feel. I feel. I feel like I hate it more if she's been a robot the whole time. I hate it if they made her into a robot after basically capturing her and then somehow are able to do it within the course of an hour or whatever time passes. I hate that too.

Steve

But I feel like I hate it more if somehow this version of the robot is able to totally pretend to be someone else, seduce somebody. Maybe it does explain why she was so willing to jump in bed with him. But why would she shower? Robots need to shower. None of it makes sense sense with the robot and Ellie like at all.

Steve

It's just weird. But they fight and it's a great fight.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

They have to stop the car, get out.

Nic

Like he.

Steve

He like rips her arm off, but then the arm itself attacks him and is trying to like choke him out. It's a great set of little gag. It's a little gag fight.

Nic

And we love arms getting ripped off on the 2Dads1 movie podcast. It's one of our favorite things.

Steve

Fourth movie featuring removed or missing limbs. I believe I like at least the fourth out of 33. So that's pretty good.

Nic

Yeah. So.

Nic

And then, you know, as we think that he's finished with the fight and he like smashes her head.

Steve

Yeah.

Nic

And then this like loose arm just starts choking. Yeah, that's right out of nowhere, which is very good.

Steve

Here's actually my biggest problem with Ellie is the robot because I'm not done with this yet.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

Why wouldn't she have killed him before he could kill Cochrane and stop? And like, why wouldn't she have attacked him when he first rescued her? Why let him go through with all that?

Nic

She would have been really like advanced program, very strange.

Steve

And it still would make sense. Cochrane would never program be like, well, only attack him after I'm dead. Like that wouldn't you know what I mean? It's just so weird. Like none of that makes any sense that she's either been a robot the whole time.

Steve

That doesn't make sense to me. Even that they were able to make her into a robot in a brief amount of time doesn't make sense to me. And having given that she is a robot, why she let him go through with his plan to stop them to that point doesn't make any sense. Like none of it makes sense about Ellie and the robot. And I'm never getting over this.

Nic

I get it. But, dude, you know what? The first thing. When I get home, I'm gonna watch Halloween 4 and find out what happened.

Steve

Oh, I'm so sorry for you, man.

Steve

You're gonna be so disappointed.

Nic

So, Dan. I mean, the main problem of this film has not been solved yet, right? So Dan finally gets somewhere where he can get to a phone. The Shamrock ad is approaching.

Steve

Importantly, not just somewhere. They had to drive to Santa Mira. Now, they've driven far enough back. Apparently, he ends up at the same gas station Ellie's dad went to at the beginning of the movie, because it's the same attendant. So what?

Steve

Where the hell even were they? And how long was he driving?

Nic

That's crazy.

Steve

Again, something that makes no sense, but he's back in, like, his town, basically.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

And that's where he is. And so. So he gets on the phone, and he's, like, telling. I guess he's talking to who, the fcc?

Nic

Yeah.

Nic

This is important because he's basically. He needs to call and say, don't air this on three channels, apparently, right?

Steve

Abc, NBC News.

Nic

All the channels back then.

Steve

Exactly.

Nic

And this. This thing is going to kill every kid in the country. But there was some centralized number that he could call. And they're like, what? No, there's nothing like that.

Nic

He's like, you don't understand. I'm a doctor. They're like, sir, let me connect you right, to the president of Tel Aviv.

Steve

Right. It's so bizarre.

Steve

But he's able to. So. So then these kids show up while he's on the phone. You've got to stop it. You got to take the commercial off.

Steve

You got to stop it. And it starts playing on the tv, and these kids walk in with the masks on, and you got to stop it. You got to stop it, stop it, stop it. And then it stops. It goes, we're having technical difficulties.

Steve

Whatever. So the kid goes up and flips that UHF dial to, like, the next channel or whatever, and. And it's back on. And he goes, no, it's the other one. You got to get the other channel, too.

Steve

Oh, we're having technical difficulties. Oh, he looks. Kid flips it again, and that one's still going. And he's like, no, it's still going. You don't understand.

Steve

You have to stop it. You have to stop it, stop it, stop it, Stop. And the movie basically ends. Yeah. And it's.

Steve

That part's awesome. The very ending. The very last, like, two minutes.

Nic

I think the most tense thing being the very last.

Steve

I honestly, it almost saves the movie for me, like, not to the point I'm gonna give it a good score or anything, but, like.

Steve

But, like, it really redeemed. Like, I. I finished the movie feeling better about it that it ended that way where we have to. To assume that the children representing a 43 share of American households are all now dead. Like, that's brutal, right? That's so dark and messed up that I kind of love it.

Steve

It actually made it. It improved my overall vibe of the movie to have it end like that.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

No happy ending.

Nic

No, I think that's definitely good.

Nic

Like, if there was like, a Hail Mary save at the end. Because also, like, this guy was shown to not really care about even his own kids. So he's gonna go save the children of the world. It didn't seem like. Like his fate here.

Nic

Oh, my God.

Steve

So that's Halloween 3, season of the Witch. Good Lord. Okay, I'm going to kick this off because it was my selection. Not that I regret it, but it was definitely an interesting choice.

Steve

So, look, overall, I enjoyed the experience of watching this movie. I will say that this is not a good movie by kind of any measure I can really think of outside of Carpenter's music is awesome. I love the way Carpenter's scores make me feel while I'm watching. Watching a movie. It's.

Steve

He's so manipulative in the right. In a good way about it. The acting is nothing to. To write home about. I don't like Tom Atkins as the hero.

Steve

I love Dan o'. Herlihy. I think he's a fantastic villain. His accent, his sort of muddled British Isles accent is actually perfect for this. Really a lot of fun.

Steve

It is an inventive and creative concept. I don't think it plays out as far as the plot goes, as much as the concept had promise.

Nic

Right.

Steve

You know, like, I kind of love the idea and the premise of this movie way more than the actual execution of it. There's a lot of.

Steve

Of real big holes. Like I said, the whole Ellie's a robot thing, that doesn't make much sense in several different ways. That's probably always gonna be an issue I have with it. There's other things that happen that just kind of didn't really make a lot of sense and aren't explained properly. There is a documentary about the making of this movie that came out maybe like seven or eight years ago that I'm going to be watching, watching.

Steve

Maybe not tonight, but at some point.

Nic

Yeah, that sounds good.

Steve

Just because I'm curious or Whatever. But, you know, this was a really interesting movie, and it was a really. And it is a really interesting story.

Steve

The whole concept of, hey, let's make Halloween an anthology. Let's do something without Michael Myers. Let's see how it goes. And to have it just absolutely explode in their faces so horrifically that they then made nine more Halloween movies, all with Michael Myers in them, is an interesting thing unto itself.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

As far as rating this movie goes, I'm gonna give it a two out of five. I can't go as low as, like, one or one and a half or anything like that because there are absolutely redeeming parts of the movie. Yeah, there are parts of it that are a lot of fun. I laughed out loud a few times. There's a couple of really great gruesome kills in the.

Steve

In the sort of Carpenter Halloween style. Again, the score is great. I do honestly think. I think honestly that that last maybe two minutes worth of the movie where he's in that. That service station trying to get the commercials shut off might have given it a half a point, like, just on its own.

Steve

Like, that really was a great way to end it. It. But there's so much wrong with this movie. And honestly, the lack of Michael Myers is the last thing I care about. The movie itself just has problems from beginning to end.

Steve

But, yeah, I'm a two out of five on Halloween three, Season of the Witch.

Nic

Okay, well, I think that's fair enough. And all your points are well taken. Yeah, I mean, it's like. It's hard to separate because sometimes it's like, was this movie good?

Nic

No. Did I have a hell of a lot of fun talking about it? Yes, I did. And then by the end of the episode, it's kind of hard to separate that because I'm like, it wasn't as good as I. I enjoyed chatting about it. But, yeah, a few things about this movie I thought were.

Nic

Were kind of interesting. One is, like, just the. The paranoia centered around Halloween and trick or treating that has existed kind of since about that time, maybe a little bit before. Yeah, I know this was around the time when they were doing the. Like the razor blades and the apples and the.

Nic

The poison Tylenol thing, which was a real thing during that period that they had found poison in different pill bottles. So, like, there was a lot of paranoia with that. Some of the things that Dan is paranoid about in this movie, like being listened to, being videoed and stuff, it's like we all just accept that that's just normal life now. Like, that's happening 100% of the time. So it's kind of interesting to see that.

Nic

But yeah, I mean, basically this was a film fundamentally about the dangers of Irish immigration.

Steve

Hey, now.

Nic

And no, it is. It's funny. I like my family's Irish as well.

Nic

I don't like the Irish as the bad guys. It's not as fun of an accent to do, I swear. We've decided as a society, it is the Italian accent that's the fun one to do. So that should be what the guys are. Because when I'm trying to quote the bad guy, it doesn't really work as well in this.

Nic

This was pretty influential also, I do want to say, like, with the theft of Stonehenge, it was kind of funny to see, like, a Carmen Sandiego element to this movie that. That I thought was pretty. Pretty interesting. But yeah, I. Same thing.

Nic

I think there was a lot of cool ideas. Kind of like in the Simpsons episode where Homer was allowed to design his own car.

Steve

Oh, yes.

Nic

He was like, I want a horn.

Steve

Here, here, here, here, and here.

Nic

It was like they made this movie. And then someone was like, well, what about aliens? Well, what about this? Or what about that? But if you're a person walking into this film.

Nic

1982. Halloween. Great Halloween. It's going to have Michael Myers. Doesn't have Michael Myers.

Nic

It's all right. Season of the Witch. It's going to have witches. Doesn't really have witches. The title, the packaging of this makes no sense.

Nic

Right. It's like if we packaged it as something else, it might have done better, but entertaining. If you're a horror movie person, you know that they don't have to be good to enjoy them. And I think this is one that is not good, but is enjoyable. I'm going to go ahead and give this one a two out of five.

Steve

Okay. All right. So we are four out of ten on Halloween. Three. Season of the Witch.

Steve

And before we find out what movie we're watching next week, I should mention. So this is the last episode in our Shocktoberfest series.

Nic

Great Shocktober.

Steve

Lot of fun. Lot of fun.

Steve

We have a whole new theme month coming up, though. The entire month of November is going to be cagevember. We are going to watch nothing but Nicolas Cage movies in the month of November. And I could not be more excited about this. So, Nic, given that parameter, tell us what is the first Nicholas Cage movie we are watching for Cage?

Steve

Remember?

Nic

Oh, man. Yeah. And this theme, when you suggested this theme, I really that it really put a hop in my.

Steve

I think this is the first one I came up with.

Steve

I think we did this one first and we added a few. We did Shocktoberfest after. But like the first one, I thought it was like we got to do Nicholas Cage and we got to do a lot of it.

Nic

I feel like you thought of Cage Vember before you. You even thought of this podcast.

Steve

Maybe it might be we built the.

Nic

Whole thing around it. But yeah, Nicholas Cage, I mean he's so great because he's actually good and then he's cheesy good in different ways. He gets, especially during this time period, was on like some pretty interesting projects, some really fun movies. So I want to take us to one of our favorite Nic Cage movies and I'll talk about the story about it next week.

Nic

But Nic Cage kind of in. In my mind, like in his prime. We're talking late 90s. I think we're in 97 for this next one here. And Nic Cage is a man with a good heart and soul, but who has somehow been convicted of a crime and he ends up having to be transported.

Nic

He's about to get out of jail and he's going to be transported via airplane with a whole lot of other convicts, which they call Con Air. I cannot wait to talk Con Air. It might be our first five hour episode. I. It's so fun.

Nic

And yeah, Steve, that's what I have for us for the. To kick off cagevember.

Steve

The thing about Con Air as a great choice for this first Cage member movie is not just how good Nicholas Cage Cage is in Con Air, which he is spectacular. This accent alone we'll talk about for. For 10 or 15 minutes probably.

Steve

But the rest of the cast, Malkovich and Cusack and Buscemi and Ving Rhames and like, oh, it's Colin Coleman. Yeah, yeah. Like there's just so many amazing Danny.

Nic

Trejo, Dave Chappelle, John Leguizamo. Like it's, it's really Buscemi.

Steve

Absolutely.

Nic

Like it's crazy.

Steve

Absolutely loaded cast. So that's going to be a ton of fun. So listener, join us.

Steve

Next week we will kick off cagevember with we're gonna watch Conair and it's gonna be fantastic and you're gonna love it. We're gonna love it and everybody's gonna have a great time. That about wraps it up. So if you like what you hear, and we hope that you do, please go on over to Apple or Spotify, either one. And leave us a five star review.

Steve

It really helps people find the show. And if you want to drop us a line, you can do so at the show@2dads1movie.com. That's the number two and the number one. You can also follow us on Instagram @2dads1movie. This has been Halloween 3, the season of the Witch, another episode of 2dads1movie.

Steve

I am Steve.

Nic

And I'm Nic.

Steve

And we will catch you next week with Conair and the start of Cage of Ember.

Nic

Yeah.

Steve

Thanks, everybody.

Nic

See you next time.