Episode 70

### Title

EFAP #70 - Ralphthemoviemaker has a BAD TAKE on the Joker (2019) with Literature Devil

### Guests

Metal Commander
 Literature Devil
 Jay Exci

### Next Episode

Episode 71

**EFAP #70** is the seventieth episode of the Every Frame A Pause podcast.

## Important Events

* Debut of Literature Devil
* First time ralphthemoviemaker is covered
* Premiere of *Le Fromage*
* Debut of the Hot Doggler
* Unconfirmed debut of Alfred
* Penultimate battle of the Joker War

## Plot

The Joker War rages on, as ralphthemoviemaker unveils his BAD TAKE. So bad is his take that supporters and detractors alike theorize he made it bad on purpose as bait, and our plucky team of Little Clown Boys must get to the bottom of it once and for all

## Synopsis

MauLer, Rags, Metal, and Literature Devil (Armoured Skeptic was supposed to join, but he didn't) came together to take a look at ralphthemoviemaker's BAD TAKE on *Joker*, having just watched the films people claimed *Joker* ripped off in preparation. Many people had defended Ralph's video on the grounds that it was made bad on purpose as response bait, but that was seemingly contradicted by Ralph standing by it and disabling the ability to play it on sites like Watchtogether, which he normally allows. Shortly into the video's runtime, Jay was added to the roster, as his video had been shown in Ralph's as one of the examples of people who would be uncharitable to him in defense of the film. After a quick cold open where he insisted that a shot of a pane of glass cracking looked like CGI, Ralph began by bemoaning that "a bunch of children on the internet" disagreed with his take on *Joker*, implying anyone who was positive about it was being dishonest. When he explained that he did not want to make this video and would rather make others, the gang suggested that he just not, but it was too late, as Ralph felt he had to defend his opinion, as he has a right to his opinion.

Ralph chastized the ending where Arthur shoots Murray as obvious and cheap, whereas Rags recalled not predicting it and MauLer considered the execution of the scene more important than whether or not it surprised anyone. They were already skeptical of his claim that all of the characters were 1-dimensional and only in service of the "society message," with LitDev adding that even if it was, the movie is a character study on Arthur, not them. Ralph's title card introducing this topic, bizarrely enough, mocked the writing of the film on the grounds that the only two likable characters were "a woman of color and a dwarf." He figured that Todd Phillips' background as a comedy director led him to craft scenes that were as simplistic as those from a comedy, a claim MauLer and Co found baffling since both comedies and dramas can be both simple and complex. The scene he described as so simple it was comedic was the one of three drunk men harassing a woman on the subway, leading MauLer to have to explain to him how alcohol, public transit, and harassment work. MauLer also countered the common complaint that bad things just happen to Arthur in succession by arguing most of them lead into the next, with the example of Arthur losing his job because he had a gun on him that was given to him in response to him being mugged. As for the complaint that too many people acted like assholes, MauLer could only recall a video he saw of six teenagers literally just trying to flip over a random parked car.

Ralph contrasted *Joker* unfavorably against *The King of Comedy*, which he considered more subtle, Rags baffled that he would consider a movie where a man builds a TV show set in his apartment "subtle." He described *King of Comedy*'s Rupert Pupkin as unable to interact with others due to being raised by television, thus making it understandable why Rita likes him for that reason, the gang finding both of these claims shaky since Pupkin tends to get along well with strangers and as Literature Devil pointed out, the clip he used of them getting married was misleading since that occurs in his fantasies. Ralph put forth that Arthur's mother was only included in the film because there would be no fleshed out female characters otherwise, prompting Jay to recall he had previously said there were no fleshed out characters besides Arthur, meaning of the 0 fleshed out supporting characters in the film 0 of them would have been women, as well as Ralph's phrasing being a roundabout way of saying there was one fleshed out female character in the movie. Regardless, Ralph wrote her off as just a ripoff the mother from *You Were Never Really Here*, a character who only had about 2 minutes of screentime, leading MauLer to figure he was just trying to discredit any positive things about the movie. Jay was inclined to tentatively agree with Ralph that the 10 seconds of flashbacks when Arthur realizes he hallucinated his relationship were unnecessary, but MauLer felt that they showed what Arthur was realizing as he was realizing it, and they helped to remind you of what scenes she was in and thus recontextualize what she said in those scenes as being Arthur's own thoughts.

Ralph chalked up the whopping 10 seconds of flashbacks (which Literature Devil noted was similarly done in *Fight Club*) to the movie being made for teenaged fans of *Batman V Superman*, apparently believing it to be trying to be part of the DCEU, which therefore held it back from being "a real film, like an art film," in addition to the bad acting and dialogue as evidenced by a drunk man shouting "Is something funny asshole?" Ironically, ScreenCrush' video purporting that *Joker* actually was in the DCEU had been covered by Jay, and Jay's video on ScreenCrush' BAD TAKE appeared in Ralph's when he bemoaned the concept of people accusing others of having BAD TAKEs. Ralph contrasted *Joker*, a single movie, against *Mr Robot*, a multi-season TV show, which was able to show its therapist character's life outside of the main plot, unlike *Joker*'s who only regurgitated the theme. MauLer figured it made sense for the government worker who was losing her job due to budget cuts to try to relate to her patient who is losing his treatment due to those same budget cuts by being candid with him, but ended up agreeing that yes, The Guy You See Press the Lever on the Death Star could have been more of a dimensional character. Ralph's hypothetical counter to his criticism of the therapist at the beginning of the movie was, of all things, that the ending of the movie was a dream, but he considered this lacking because all movies have dream-like logic, aided by a clip of Arthur getting into a fridge for some reason. He considered characters like Thomas Wayne to be a cartoonish dickhead for punching a poor man whose only crime was talking to his son through a gate, leading the roster to wonder if he was outright lying or just grossly incorrect since Arthur had stuck his fingers in Bruce's mouth and strangled his butler, Thomas even warning him not to touch his son again immediately after punching him. He contrasted this against Jerry from *King of Comedy*, showing footage of him first meeting Rupert and trying to humor him rather than later on when he has him thrown out of a building by security. He also found the ending of the film too coincidental since a recently-famous murderer also managed to get booked on a talk show, questioning why the talk show did not search their guest for weapons and mocking the whole thing as an example of dream-like logic, despite having previously said all movies have dream-like logic. Ralph, of course, did not even want to make this video, and would rather be analyzing *Parasite*,

Ralph sneered at the movie's big budget, which he claimed could be gleamed through the lack of artistic integrity in the film, itself evidenced by the movie having some redundant scenes, unlike *Taxi Driver*. Ralph blamed the bloat on the movie's obligation to connect to DC, which MauLer found funny since he had asked his mother, who loved the movie and knows nothing about Batman, what she thought of Thomas Wayne as a character and she had understood him perfectly fine. He described Travis Bickle and Rupert Pupkin's downfall as being brought on by their own actions as opposed to Joker's which was just chalked up to being the fault of society, ignoring the various actions Arthur takes throughout the movie. He did concede the film had many redeeming qualities, and listed a whopping two, Joaquin Phoenix' acting and the "decent" cinematography. He summed it up as the final form of attempts to make an adult superhero movie, adding *Logan* to the list of movies he considered it a copy of. Ralph brought up how he had previously called *Joker* good on the Sardonicast, but explained that there is more to a movie than ones initial impressions, since anyone who finds *Citizen Kane* or *2001* boring is a moron for not researching how groundbreaking those films were. MauLer found it funny that it could be argued Joker was groundbreaking in some ways, therefore making Ralph a moron by his own metric. He went on to downplay his own praises on the podcast as him just liking the movie because it was sad, LitDev finding it ironic that he basically accused himself, someone whose job it is to analyze movies, of having been one of the people who just says a movie's good right after watching it he had described earlier. MauLer guessed from this that Ralph was bitter that he had changed his mind but had already published his old take and people noticed the disconnect. Ralph then played a clip of I Hate Everything saying he could not take the movie seriously because he kept thinking of the Penguin and Killer Croc, which Ralph added to with a story of his mother thinking the dwarf in the movie would become the Penguin, Rags finding it ironic that they were applying their own meta knowledge to a movie Ralph claimed should have been able to function without meta knowledge. Unfortunately, Ralph's analysis was unable to appreciate the reference to iconic Batman villain the Hotdoggler in the film

Ralph bemoaned the violins in the movie telling you how sad you're supposed to be, oddly enough choosing a scene of Arthur celebrating as his example, then called a scene of Arthur banging his head against a window in resigned frustration "corny," not elaborating why. He concluded that superhero movies, which he apparently considers *Joker* to be, are dead, since all the big ones are owned by Disney which does the same thing to them as it does to their PIXAR films and live-action remakes, raising the question of what any of that has to do with *Joker*. After a cutaway to himself reading some fairly tame responses to him tweeting that Joker is bad, then a random 4chan post insulting him from two years prior, Ralph theorized that everything good about the movie was improvised by Joaquin Phoenix, citing him improvising getting inside the fridge, despite having earlier called that an example of the dream-like logic he mocked. He then played a clip of an older well-dressed British man looking after Bruce Wayne and famously asked, "Is this guy supposed to be Alfred?" then immediately moved on, praising the first 25 minutes of the movie for not making Gotham look like Gotham because it meant he wasn't reminded Harley Quinn and Killer Croc exist.

Ralph assured people that his negative comments did not mean he hated the film, but that he merely did not find it perfect, despite having previously called it artistically bankrupt. He actually did show the clip of Arthur strangling Alfred so he could mock how he sounds when being strangled, causing Jay to change his vote from incompetent to liar. Ralph then writhed around on his couch, which seemed to have cotton balls underneath it, and shouted about how small his penis is to his dog, who appeared unamused, then went on to read a portion of a comment he received in such a way that it sounded like they were insulting him merely for criticizing *Joker*, but the full comment was actually insulting him for backtracking his previous praises for it and for criticizing something that was better than what he himself could make. Ralph explained how he found the movie boring until the scene on the bus, but that was ruined for him, because they played violins, which he apparently has an aversion to. He did praise the scene of Arthur committing a murder on televison, despite having insulted it previously, but complained that the movie did not make it clear whether he should be rooting for or against Arthur, raising the question of if he would have liked the music to tell him what emotion to feel, then his own editing caused him to say that the film did not have a "vision that co-ck." LitDev summed up the bulk of his criticism as him just repeating things in the movie in a mocking voice, and Jay concluded that if this video was a parody, it wasn't even a good one. At this point the stream cut out, and what little remained of Ralph's video was covered in the immediately following EFAP 71

## Trivia

* Rags is eating a London broil throughout this episode
	+ Meanwhile, Jay is playing a video game

## Quotes

* "Mr ralphthemoviemaker made a video on Joker, and apparently it's real" - MauLer
* "So that one's more of an incel movie than the Joker, or are they about the same?"
 "I guess *Taxi Driver* would be by default, cuz I don't even see how *Joker* is in any way"
 "It's quite clear how Joker is an incel movie, it's... about a *guy*"
 - Literature Devil and Rags
* "First off- Lit-er-a-ture De-vil- okay your name is six syllables, so we're gonna have to do something about that" - Rags
* "Parasite is a movie about Jay and EFAP" - Sirjohn23 in Chat
* "Anything else anyone wants to say before we get started?"
 "Cheers"
 "Alchie"
 - MauLer and Metal
* "This is the introduction"
 "Yeah, okay so, just in case anyone missed it it says introduction onscreen"
 - Rags and MauLer
* "Ralph's Commentary While Watching Joker" - Ralph's text onscreen
* "That was added in post, that looks like CGI, come on! That looks like CGI" - Ralph, in response to something that was likely practical
* "It was rated PG-13, which means it's rated pretty good by 13 people" - Rags
* "It's such a shame no one can give their honest opinion on this movie, without having a bunch of children on the internet gang up on you" - Ralph, paragon of honesty
* "It's an obvious cheap ending, he fuckin shoots fuck" - Ralph
* "Todd Phillips has always been a comedy director, and some of the character writing and scenarios in this film feel so simplistic, it's like out of a comedy"
 "I don't think he knows what comedy means"
 - Ralph and Jay
* "The only two likable people Arthur knows are a woman of color and a dwarf. Great writing." - Ralph
* "Humans take the subway, regularly, it's like a faster way of traveling. During the nighttime, it's very common for people who have been drinking to use public travel because they can't be relied to drive themselves. Joker is there late, after he's been fired he's down in the dumps, he's taking the subway home. We saw him take the subway home before, it's something he does partially regularly. And three dudes are there, they're drunk, and they're fucking with somebody, this is a common occurrence in many places, but this is one of the worst cities in the country as far as I can tell with what this movie's trying to portray, Gotham's a shithole. So does that all make sense? And I'm just like, 'makes sense to me'" - MauLer, explaining a scene from *Joker* to Ralph the way Ralph explained it to his audience
* "Listen, Arthur Fleck, he finds himself aboard an airship, a zeppelin if you will, headed for Tijuana. after the failed jewel heist he has to escape the country, while the heat dies down, and he meets Captain... Johannsen... the Third, famed dog trainer, and secret... Nazi. That's not a comedy, that's a very complicated setup" - Rags, describing a movie Ralph would find less comedic
* "Don't call it a Subway, it's a great Iron Worm" - Porfirio Diaz in Chat, applying Ralph's teachings
* "Joker is in the subway, and three guys are there, and they're bullying a lady, and then the guys bully him. They hit him with a sign, they beat him up. All these bad things happen to him, all at once" - Ralph, describing two different things that happen at different times
* “Like, what are you, cartoon characters?” - Ralph
* “That was so bad" - Ralph, several times
* "*The King of Comedy* is far more subtle in how it portrays a character like this"
 "The new. King. Of comedy"
 - Ralph and Rupert Pupkin
* "Ra- MauLer- I just called MauLer Rags, but I'm Rags" - Rags
* "Exactly!... Satan" - Rags, to Literature Devil
* "It's kinda like seeing that scene in Fight Club where you find out Tyler Durden is - spoiler alert - the same guy as Edward Norton"
 "Right but that's a film that you're not allowed to criticize, so people say it's okay in that"
 - Literature Devil and MauLer
* "This movie is made for the 14-year-olds who thought *Batman V Superman* was a groundb- and then, because this movie was made for the same demo as the people who liked *Batman V Superman*" - Ralph
* "The words of Rags do not reflect the opinions of Rags" - Jay
* "It feels like it's set in some grand kind of DCEU, but if you're trying to make a real film, like an art film, then throwing in these connections like Bruce Wayne's parents, and having these cartoonish characters who say dumb dialogue like-"
 "Is something funny asshole?"
 - Ralph, and an angry drunken man on a subway
* "And the new thing to do now, when someone gives an opinion you don't like, is to say, 'Oh well that's just a BAD TAKE. ralphthemoviemaker? He has a BAD TAKE. His take? It's just a BAD TAKE'" - Ralph
* "'You call *Joker* corny, meanwhile you'll watch *Mr Robot*, which is way cornier.' Y'know *Mr Robot* has like, dimensional characters in it?" - Ralph
* "There is only one most fleshed-out therapist" - Jay, EFAP 70
* "Society doesn't care about you, society doesn't care about me, a-bluh-bluh bluh-bluh bluh" - Ralph, impersonating a social worker who is losing her job due to budget cuts
* "Yeah I'm gonna physically assault a poor man, because he talked to my son through an iron gate" - Ralph, impersonating a man confronting a stranger who stuck his fingers in his son's mouth and assaulted his employee
	+ "Lying at this point is the charitable interpretation" - Jay
	+ "Ralph is a poorly-written character, I don't believe that any real person would be this stupid" - Jay
* "Listen Jay, I'm gonna tell you about being a man..." - Rags
* "What a coincidence, I guess it's some of that dream-like logic, right?" - Ralph, who previously claimed all movies have dream-like logic
* "Yep, the movie had a huge budget you can tell, cuz any artistic integrity or originality is completely removed from this film" - Ralph
* "It's not your fault your life sucks, it's the fault of society! Everyone around you is just a jerk, and beats you up, so the solution is to shoot DeNiro in the head" - Ralph
* "Joker Has Many Redeeming Qualities / Joaquin Phoenix is a great actor and he saves the film. The cinematography is decent."
 "I don't think he knows what the word 'many' means"
 - Ralph's text onscreen, and Literature Devil
* "I guess the Joker didn't tape enough bananas to walls!" - Literature Devil
* "It's rated R"
 "What does the R stand for?"
 "rrrape"
 - Metal & Jay
* "It's different in a way" - Ralph, on *Deadpool*
* "You think Joker wanted to be like this film much?" - Ralph's text onscreen, on Logan
* "So I went on a podcast, on that podcast I said Joker was a good movie- I think I said Joker's a good movie before, yeh- so I'm gonna explain why I'm an idiot"
 "Oh it's okay we already know"
 - Ralph and Jay
* "There's a more to a film than your initial impression of a film than when you see it" - Ralph
* "When you watch *Citizen Kane* for the first time, if you're a moron, you go, 'That's boring. That's a boring movie,' without actually reading about *Citizen Kane*, and why it's a groundbreaking film and it's impact on cinema, and the same thing with *2001*, the same thing with any other film that you can list, that people say are boring, meanwhile they think *Joker*'s a great movie, because they sit down in the theater and they watch it once, and they go, 'wow that was a good movie'" - Ralph
	+ "Ralph is literally being the strawman version of objectivity that people like to pretend exist" - Jay
* "The funny thing about Ralph calling people morons for thinking *Citizen Kane* boring is YMS in an argument even admitted that it was boring and repetitive(though technically well made) so he just called his co-host a moron." - comment by verucasaltpile3510
* "Lets do a test. In chat, 1 for *2001* being boring, 2 for it being exciting. I'm making a false dichotomy, deal with it" - MauLer
* "This video is hoes mad" - Rags
* "You can already tell I'm more hopeful in this episode than I am now"
 "Of course you're more hopeful, you're like a wet sock in this video"
 - Ralph and MauLer
* "And the first half of this film is really said, and dour, and I liked that about it"
 "See I just liked it cuz it was sad"
 - Past Ralph and Future Ralph
* "I'm okay with taking this seriously as like a character study, but then when you do delve more into the- well basically the dumb shit, when the dumb shit starts then it's like well, this tonally isn't really working for me, cuz now I'm thinking about Killer Croc and the Penguin" - I Hate Everything, in a Sardonicast clip in Ralph's *Joker* video
* "So this isn't really like some masterful art film, it's a studio piece of crap"
 "That's an ad hominem. That's an ad hominem argument about a film"
 - Ralph and Jay
* "Like a transformer - *Oscarbait in disguise*" - Ralph
* "If a black person can say the N-word, then I can cay the F-word"
 "And I can say retard"
 - Rags and Jay
* "Is this guy supposed to be Alfred?" - Ralph
* "Just because I have negative things to say about the film does not mean I hate the film, does not mean I think it's a worthless film, I just don't think it's perfect" - Ralph
* "Let go! LA DADA DOO!" - Ralph, mocking a man being strangled
* "Look how small my peepee is!" - Ralph, to his dog
* "You have the gall to criticize a movie like Joker - Fuck you" - Ralph reading a comment he received
	+ "You have the gall to criticize a movie like Joker after giving it praise previously...only to back your own portfolio with cheaply made schlock like this? I think you should refocus your directorial style, acting and cinematography before criticizing a movie that's pretty well made. Your series fucking sucks and your spineless opinion should not be influenced by a pretentious brat like Adam and his bf Alex. Fuck you" - the actual full comment by Danny Roqs
* "The gross overreaction to this film is hysterical"
 "I know, look at your video, it's kinda crazy"
 - Ralph and MauLer
* "*This* is exceptional" - Ralph, on an out of context clip from the *Monos* trailer
* "He's still funnier than Jimmy Kimmel" - Ralph, about a fictional comedian he called unrealistically unfunny
* "We cut to a shot behind him that's rotating around him - did James Wan direct this?" - Ralph
* "Doesn't Ralph like this Joker better, because he is about as subtle as *The King of Comedy*, he has the word 'damaged' right on his forehead" - Literatuve Devil
* "The moment where Arthur commits a murder on television was pretty good. Everything after that didn't make clear if I was supposed to be against or rooting for Arthur"
 "What he wants the film to tell him how to feel does he?"
 - Ralph and Jay
* "It doesn't really have a vision that, that *cock*" - Ralph