Episode 26: "That's A Bad Dom"

*This week the queerwolves are traveling to a sleepy little suburban hamlet, the site of untold horrors for any outspoken gay. We’re talking 1975’s THE STEPFORD WIVES!   Nay discovers that 70’s liberalism MIGHT have a few flaws, Mark digs up some delicious Betty Friedan shade, and Michael lusts after that one cop in the movie.   Plus, in Tea Time we sip on AHS: FREAK SHOW, true crime podcasts, and the Last Blockbuster! [1]*

## **Trivia**

"We are comin' at ya tonight from the frozen food aisle of the world's most terrifying fucking grocery store…"

Topics brought up during the episode: *Ringu*, Sadako, *Sadako* movie, Hideo Nakata returning to direct *Ringu* 2019,

## **Tea Time**

**Nay:** Went back and watched *American Horror Story: Freak Show*

**Mark:** *Greta*; *Climax*

**Michael:** Over My Dead Body podcast season 1

**Brennan:** *The Cry* (2007)

## **Pride Float**

**Michael:** Does this movie get a Pride float?

**Nay:** Only if there's a sequel where Bobbie and Joanna fuck. Because I just think *it would be really good*. Also, when I watched this--

**Michael:** That's it!

**Nay:** That's it!

**Nay:** When I watched this earlier this week, there's this meme going around a lot about tall bottoms and short tops…

**Brennan:** My favorite

**Nay:** Oh my God, so funny

**Mark:** (as Frank Nelson) *Go on*…

**Nay:** Was it like a screenshot from *Bambi* or something?

**Michael:** Jesus

**Nay:** Because it's like the deer…

**Brennan:** When he's learning to walk?

**Nay:** Yeah, and is it like, Thumper who's like short and sniffing Bambi's ass, so it looks like Thumper's eating Bambi's ass, and so Thumper's short and standing up and Bambi's tall, so I was talking about short tops and tall bottoms…

**Mark:** Oh my God!

**Nay:** And I was like, "What if Joanna and Bobbie…? Joanna's the short top, *duh*. And Bobbie's the tall bottom, *duh*." And it just sounds so good

**Mark:** That's why we need a remake

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** There you go, folks

**Nay:** So yeah, I would give that…

**Michael:** You'd give that a Pride float?

**Nay:** A whole float and a party night, dedicated to short tops and tall bottoms

**Mark:** I agree. I don't think *The Stepford Wives* gets a Pride float. The only reason it would get a Pride float is to be like, "Aren't you glad you're gay?" Because straight people--

**Michael:** *So true!*

**Mark:** I look at this movie and I'm like, "Ahh, straight people are wild!"

**Michael:** "I'm gonna go sixty-nine with my boyfriend!"

**Mark:** I'm just like, "**Woof**, it's bleak. It is bleak."

**Nay:** Uh-huh. I feel that

**Mark:** So, on that level, *yeeees it gets a Pride float?* I dunno

**Michael:** Yeah. No Pride float for me, but I give it a recommend

**Mark:** All right

**Nay:** Yeah, definitely a recommend

## **Quotes**

**Michael:** We are solo tonight.

**Nay:** We are

**Michael:** Well, not really, but we're amongst ourselves

**Mark:** Stood up

**Nay:** Mmmm, true

**Michael:** Yes. Anyway

**Mark:** Somebody got Kara. I'm just saying, we're talking Stepford today, and Kara conveniently couldn't make it

**Michael:** Uh-oh!

**Nay:** True

**Mark:** Because of the "flu"

**Michael:** Mark, what did you do to her? That's her partner's name, Mark, so…

**Mark:** I was gonna say, "I don't know!"

**Brennan:** She shows up next week and she's like, "Why don't they have a Straight Pride parade?"

**Mark:** That's true. Oh my God!

**Michael:** *Oh my Gawd!*

**Mark:** Exactly

**Michael:** That would be a modern…

**Mark:** She goes from ally to like, I dunno, Tomi Lozenge or whatever the hell her name is

**Nay:** She makes my throat hurt, okay?

**Mark:** She's done now, right?

**Michael:** Yeah, I mean she tried to be junior Ann Coulter and it isn't working for her, and so now she's just posting pics and videos like she's a fuckin' realtor

**Mark:** She really was like the Muppet Babies Ann Coulter for a minute, *for a minute*

**Michael:** Angriest realtor in West Hollywood?

**Mark:** Oh God, that's right she lives in West Hollywood!

**Michael:** Isn't that the worst?

**Nay:** Yes, she does. What does she do?

**Michael:** It just bothers me, she lives in the one place she talks the most shit about, but she happily lives in its protections

**Mark:** So, I'm sure then that she just climbs out of her well and occasionally shows up at like…

**Michael:** She's the modern-day Samara? From *The Ring*?

**Mark:** The RNC's Samara, yes

**Mark:** Speaking of videotapes, did you guys read about the Last Blockbuster?

**Michael:** Yes, I did!

**Mark:** I was like, what does it say about me that, it's in Bend, Oregon, and they were like, "We have no plans to close!" And I was like, "You *go*, Blockbuster! That's right, you don't close!"

**Michael:** Did you slow-clap?

**Mark:** I totally did! It was like a *Rudy* moment for me. Reading about it, I was like, "I wanna do a pilgrimage," and then I was like, "What's wrong with me?" But I think I'm having a serious nostalgia kick or something

**Michael:** Well, yeah...

**Mark:** I mean, when you're nostalgic for Blockbuster, which like back then was…

**Michael:** You worked at one though, right?

**Mark:** I did. I even worked at one

**Michael:** That's part of it

**Mark:** So, I mean compared to like, the real Mom and Pop video stores that had like, some of the real gritty fun stuff…

**Michael:** *Oh yeah*, that was always great

**Mark:** You know, Blockbuster always kind of sucked, so, I dunno, I just wanna say that now I'm nostalgic for Blockbuster and that kind of bummed me out

**Michael:** Yeah… I saw someone post an article, I didn't read it, but the headline was something like, heh-heh, very modern of me to just read the headline, was something like, "People are nostalgic for a chain of stores that actually brought down every Mom and Pop shop in America"...

**Mark:** Exactly

**Michael:** So it's interesting, but it is the end of an era

**Mark:** Anyway, I was like, "I'm broken!"

**Michael:** You and me both

**Brennan:** We were a Hollywood Video family for a time

**Michael:** Same! That was the closest, that was like a block closer to us than Blockbuster

**Brennan:** Ours was further, but Blockbuster sucked so we decided to go the extra mile

**Michael:** Hollywood Video always had better deals…

**Brennan:** Yes

**Michael:** Like two-for-one, or third night free

**Brennan:** Absolutely! And they didn't charge you late fees for no reason.

**Nay:** We had a lot of Family Videos, is that a thing?

**Michael:** Yeah, that's *still* a video chain in Cleveland, there's like two still open in Cleveland. (whispers) They have a curtain room, it's great!

**Mark:** In Canada we had West Coast Video

**Michael, Nay and Brennan:** Oh!

**Mark:** Which at the time, in Oakville, Ontario, was impossibly glamorous sounding, like, (seductively) "West Coast Video. West Coast…"

**Michael:** Was there a commercial?

**Mark:** They had a jingle

**Michael:** Ahh, do you remember it?

**Mark:** No

**Michael:** Sing it. You love to sing!

**Nay:** It looked like you were…

**Michael:** (as Mark) "Don't make me sing!"

**Mark:** "Don't make me sing, don't make me sing!"

**Michael:** He so wants to sing!

**Mark:** It was like, (sings) "Get the best from the west, West Coast Video!" (normal voice) and it basically just like looped that for a half-hour while you were in the store munching on popcorn…

**Michael:** So great

**Nay:** Bomb

**Mark:** Staring at, you know, Shannon Tweed covers…

**Michael:** And like cardboard cutouts of her?

**Mark:** And I remember looking at Shannon Tweed and being like, "She's a sexy lady."

**Michael:** Sure is!

**Mark:** "People think she's a sexy lady. Why don't *I* think she's a sexy lady?"

**Michael:** "Oooh, Chris Sarandon!"

**Mark:** Exactly

**Brennan:** The phrase "West Coast" really was like a magical totem…

**Mark:** Yeah

**Brennan:** At least from my anthropological studies of the 1981 *My Bloody Valentine*

**Mark:** Mmm-hmm

**Michael:** Great movie

**Brennan:** The guy who comes back to his Canadian mining town, he was trying to make it on the west coast. It's never clear like, the coast of *where*, it's just capital "W", capital "C", so I totally feel that

**Mark:** Yeah, it really-- it had a magical chimes to it, that term

**Michael:** I miss video stores. We had a small-town one at my college, the horror section was so big they had to take the boxes and flatten them, and then put them in a filing cabinet because there were so many

**Brennan:** (groans orgasmically)

**Mark:** Wow

**Michael:** It was the best

**Nay:** My hometown college had a really cute store too, called That's Rentertainment, and their horror section was huge

**Brennan and Michael:** (gasp)

**Mark:** You get it? "Rentertainment", clever. Into it

**Michael:** I love puns. Sarah Jessica Parker's character would love the name of that video store. Anyway

**Mark:** (as SJP on *Sex and the City*) "And I had to wonder…"

**Michael:** (as SJP on *Sex and the City*) "Was I kind and rewound?"

**Mark:** (as SJP on *Sex and the City*) "Were we *all* about ninety-nine cents on Tuesdays?"

**Brennan:** (as SJP on *Sex and the City*) "It's time to return this relationship before I incur a late fee."

**Mark:** There you go

**Nay:** That is what she would have said

**Nay:** (*Freak Show*) is my favorite season (of *American Horror Story*) and it was amazing

**Michael:** Yeah?

**Nay:** Yes

**Michael:** I've never seen that season

**Nay:** Oh my God. Actually, you know what, there are parts of it I'm *so* uncomfortable during, and I don't feel that often when I watch anything. I was like, "Oh. I'm physically uncomfortable right now."

**Mark:** Was that before or after *Hotel*?

**Brennan:** Before

**Nay:** Before

**Michael:** I think it was the season before it

**Nay:** The one before

**Mark:** Okay, see, I-- like around *Hotel* was the one, and I missed *Freak Show*, I was like, "Hotel. Lady Gaga. Sure. Like vampires, okay." And then the first five minutes of *Hotel*…

**Michael:** Click!

**Mark:** There was a man who was fucked to death with a spike...

**Michael:** Oh yeah!

**Mark:** And I was like, "I'm good! I'm, ah, I'm good!"

**Brennan:** But *Freak Show* has Jessica Lange singing "Life on Mars"

**Nay:** Oh my God, right?

**Brennan:** In this beautiful glittery production number

**Nay:** It's beautiful

**Brennan:** That musical number was literally the only reason I watched the rest of the season, and then it happened again, so

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm

**Brennan:** Rewarding

**Mark:** Didn't she also sing "The Name Game" in the *Asylum* episode?

**Michael:** Oh my God, yeah

**Brennan:** She sure did

**Nay:** Yes

**Mark:** I remember randomly flipping to it, and she was like, "Banana fanna…" and I was like, "Am… was I dosed? Like, what?"

**Brennan:** No, Ryan Murphy lets Jessica Lange do what she wants, and that is *always* a good Instinct

**Nay:** Oh, I would do the same

**Mark:** She was a remarkably good Joan Crawford, I have to say

**Michael:** She's doing something else for him right now, right?

**Mark:** I'm sure

**Brennan:** I think so

**Michael:** Isn't he doing another series for FX that she's in?

**Brennan:** I'm sure he is

**Mark:** I think he's doing something for Netflix

**Michael:** Or for Netflix, yeah. Seven thousand things in the fire, always

**Brennan:** "This anthology's gonna be based on Twitter threads."

**Michael:** And like, a Twitter fight?

**Mark:** One thing I saw was *Greta*, which is just… not really sure how to describe *Greta* beyond the fact that it's terrible, but fantastic, at the same time?

**Brennan:** Oh, absolutely

**Mark:** If you like Isabelle Huppert, you will *love* *Greta*, because it is just a movie where people were like, "You know, just turn the camera on Isabelle. Just flip a table, freak out, spit on Chöe Moretz, whatever! Just, whatever." And it's a good time

**Mark:** For people who thought that the Guadagnino remake of *Suspiria* (2018) was too heady or too intellectual or altogether too pretentious for them, may I recommend, currently in theaters, A24 released Gaspar Noe's Climax. It is horrifying…

**Michael:** I've been hearing a lot about this

**Mark:** It is terrifying. It is-- long story short, it's about a group of dancers who are about to…

**Michael:** Oh, right!

**Mark:** And there's incredible dancing in this movie, it's so violent and alive. One reviewer described it as, "*Fame* (1980) directed by the Marquis de Sade" and that's super accurate

**Michael:** That's cool

**Mark:** And it's clearly in many ways, stylistically, lighting-wise, *very* inspired by the Argento *Suspiria* (1977). And according to the, you know, the press notes, "*Climax* is based on a true story." I have zero idea if that's actually true, but *Climax* is about a group of dancers who rehearsing a giant piece, they're about to, based in France, and they're about to fly to America, New York, the next day. And so they're having a party, partying in their theatre, their rehearsal space-slash-dorm, whatever. And they're dancing, they're smoking, they're blowing rails, and they're sharing margaritas…

**Michael:** (chuckling) Blowing rails

**Mark:** Sorry, not margaritas, they're drinking sangria, and slowly but surely they come to realize that the sangria was dosed

**Nay:** Oh no

**Mark:** With some *really*, *really* bad shit

**Michael:** LSD

**Mark:** Yeah. And so begins a descent-- what begins as this exuberant, sort of…

**Michael:** Holy shit!

**Mark:** These characters that you don't know *well*, but you know them. Just a total descent into madness. It's the type of movie where halfway through I was covering my face with my sweater and I was sitting sideways in the seat, because I was like, "Just make it fucking stop."

**Michael:** I wish I could see *that*!

**Nay:** Oh yeah

**Mark:** So, trigger warning-y, if you-- if *Irreversible* and *I Stand Alone* were not your cup of tea, it's the same director. This movie is not as *genuinely* upsetting as at least *Irreversible* was? *Irreversible* was, once is enough. But there's nothing like it in theaters right now, and if, like I said, *Suspiria* (2018) was kind of a letdown for *you*? Then get to the theater, 'cause this one is delivering on a visceral level that is pretty unmatched for anything in theaters right now

**Michael:** Yeah, I saw someone post an article about it, and it was funny, it was like, "How much of it to watch if this trigger warning triggers you," so it's like, "Stay 'till this seventeen-minute mark, 'cause something's gonna happen, so you should leave." And it was basically all the chances you have to walk out of *Climax*

**Mark:** Yeah

**Michael:** And it eventually it went, it spoiled it, but as I was reading it, I was laughing and I felt like there was so much going on in the movie that whatever supposedly was a spoiler, I wouldn't get unless I see it anyway

**Mark:** Mmm-hmm

**Michael:** But I just thought that was a really funny article

**Mark:** Yeah. It is-- that is accurate

**Michael:** Yeah

**Mark:** I toughed it out throughout, but there was like, I saw it in a semi-packed theater and there were people that kept leaving, and that's actually weirdly part of the fun

**Michael:** Seeing when they leave?

**Mark:** Yeah. Because there's certain things where you know it's timed to what's going on on-screen, where people are like, "Nope! Nope!"

**Michael:** "I'm out!"

**Mark:** And they just get up and they walk out

**Michael:** The first one in this article was thirty seconds in

**Mark:** It's-- look, and it's Gaspar Noe, so it's like, *Enter the Void*, did you guys see that?

**Michael:** Yeah, I've seen that

**Mark:** Okay, I mean, *that* is a movie that makes you feel like you've done drugs. Like it's the most…

**Michael:** It really does

**Mark:** Like your eyes turn into spirals…

**Michael:** It's trippy

**Mark:** *Two minutes* in, because the credits are *so* fuckin' crazy, and this is sort of like the same-- it *is* an experience and you *have* to see it on a big screen if you can, so just do it

**Michael:** I've been getting into a lot of true crime…

**Mark:** Oooh!

**Michael:** Because why not?

**Mark:** (Frank Nelson kind of voice) ***Murder?***

**Michael:** Yeah. So I actually went to-- based on a suggestion from my friend Mark, I… you

**Mark:** *Oh!*

**Michael:** I took a weekend trip alone…

**Nay:** Nice

**Michael:** To kind of do a reset…

**Mark:** Just go

**Michael:** Just do it. (fey voice) Just get out of here

**Mark:** Just get *out* of here

**Michael:** And my boyfriend was like, "I don't wan-- you can go." So I actually drove to Palm Springs over the weekend, and on the way home I took like a six-hour route, it was awesome. But I listened to an entire podcast called *Over My Dead Body*, and it's really great. I don't wanna say too much about it because the final episode just came out yesterday. But it's about a Jewish couple, and I only bring up the fact that they're Jewish 'coz their religion plays a *big* part of their A.) Identity and B.) Into the podcast and C.) Into the community that's involved in the podcast, but I'm not gonna say anything more than it's hilarious at times, it's about this young Jewish couple, they're both lawyers, they're both super-smart, but then after they get married, things devolve, they start hating each other, there's a divorce, there's a murder, it's really great

**Mark:** Sounds juicy

**Michael:** And I hate to say it's really great, because there's a living, well, not anymore, but like there's a person that was real and living and is dead is part of the plot, so you forget sometimes when you're listening to those true crime podcasts that they're *real*. But it's a really great listen, it's six episodes, they're forty minutes each, it's like (snaps fingers) goes over like that, and it was just optioned for a TV show, because what the fuck isn't anymore. But it would actually make a really great TV show and I just like, I dunno, for some reason Sarah Paulson looks nothing like the main woman, but I'm just like, "Just throw Sarah Paulson in it." Every podcast I cast her in, when I'm listening to a show, I cast Sarah Paulson in all of these. But it's super great, and just really quick recs in that vein: *Lorena*, I don't know if we brought that up here yet…

**Mark:** Did we?

**Nay:** I remember texting about it

**Michael:** Yeah. I remember texting saying we need to talk about it, and then we didn't. America owes (Lorena Bobbitt) an apology. And I watched a documentary on HBO and I don't feel like saying the title because it's so rough, *Leaving Neverland*

**Mark:** I saw the first part and (whistles) (explosion noise)

**Michael:** Mmm-hmm

**Mark:** Yeah, I dunno. All I have to say is, if you love Michael Jackson's music, and of course, who doesn't…

**Michael:** Do you need to love Michael Jackson's music that much?

**Mark:** Well, no, but I mean I think that it's unavoidable, there's no way-- I heard someone somewhere talk about how that music is, you can't cancel that music…

**Michael:** True, it's literally everywhere

**Mark:** It's literally what today's pop is composed of, so…

**Michael:** That's a really good point

**Mark:** This is not me, this is someone much smarter about music talking

**Michael:** Mark is so smart that he brought that up

**Mark:** It's *all* me. So it's like, okay, you can't unring a bell, you can't unhear it. But you have to… I find the idea that you could watch these men's testimonies and doubt their sincerity or…

**Michael:** Their truth?

**Mark:** Because you love "Thriller" just too much?

**Nay:** Right

**Michael:** I mean, I hate to laugh, but right

**Nay:** Right

**Mark:** Fuck you, you know?

**Michael:** It's a total fuck you

**Mark:** It's just, come on. Both things can be true: Michael Jackson can be a genius, and he can also be an abused child who in turn abused the shit out of a bunch of people himself

**Michael:** That is *exactly* what Wade Robson's sister says

**Mark:** Yeah

**Michael:** She's like, "You can appreciate someone's genius, and you can acknowledge it. But they can also be a disgusting horrible human being that hurt many many many many many people."

**Mark:** Yeah. Both things are true

**Michael:** Yeah

**Michael:** Is it corner time, Brennan? Lighten the mood with some…

**Brennan:** Yeah, sure!

**Mark:** (sings to the tune of "My Sharona") La Llorona! Dun-dun-dun…

**Michael:** (joins in) I, I, I, I, wooo!

**Nay:** *Wow*

**Michael and Mark:** La la la Llorona!

**Nay:** Y'all aren't gay

**Michael:** I just wanna know about that picture of that guy. That's all I wanna know

**Brennan:** Oh! That's actually-- spoiler for next week I'm gonna bring that one up.

**Michael:** (softly with longing) He's so sexy…

**Brennan:** Do I have his name? Yeah, I'll tell you about that later, I don't have notes on that one yet

**Michael:** Hottie McGee? Is that his stage name? Hottie McGee? Hot Dad?

**Brennan:** Yep. Because that's the exact same joke naming convention they have in Mexico, yep.

**Nay:** Oh. My God

**Mark:** I saw that picture and I was like, "I wouldn't-- he's not my first choice to play La Llorona. But I'll take it."

**Brennan:** Okay, for the record, just here's a clue for what I'm going to be talking about next time: There's an actor named Adrià Collado

**Michael:** Text me that

**Brennan:** And he's in a movie called *Kilometer 31*, and he is, he is a hot dad. He's a silver fox

**Nay:** DILF

**Michael:** He *is*. He's everything

**Brennan:** Anyway, real quick, this is like an amuse-bouche to the La Llorona Corner, I watched a movie called *The Cry* from 2007, which is an update of La Llorona into a New York setting, because that's gonna be great. It is relentlessly tedious…

**Mark:** So they gentrified La Llorona?

**Brennan:** Yeah, they sure did

**Nay:** Damn

**Michael:** (laughing) It's so true!

**Brennan:** Yeah, this is…

**Mark:** Just checking, I just...

**Brennan:** It's just as destructive and painful as real gentrification

**Michael:** It stars Lena Dunham, it's in Brooklyn…

**Mark:** Sorry. Oh, Brennan I'm sorry

**Brennan:** No, it's really boring except for a single scene where a mom kills her son for opening a new jar of chocolate sauce instead of using the one that's already open in the cupboard

**Nay:** Oh, shit, that is something my Mom did

**Michael:** Three-and-a-half stars for me

**Brennan:** I feel like my mom would *totally* relate to that

**Nay:** (laughing) Oh yeah!

**Michael:** My mom used to get *so mad* if someone would do something like that

**Mark:** Yeah, relatable

**Brennan:** The one I really want to talk about-- do you guys remember last time when I talked about that *Cabin in the Woods* slasher movie called *The Wailer*?

**Nay:** Yes

**Michael:** Yeah!

**Brennan:** Well, I watched *The Wailer 2*

**Michael:** Oh my God, everything has a sequel

**Brennan:** From 2006. This movie? Weirdly better than the original movie. I would say it is…

**Michael:** One of those rare sequels better than the original, huh?

**Brennan:** I know! No, it's got better atmosphere, the director actually knows how to like, shoot a scene. There's some canted angles so it's like, well that's the most basic trick in the book, but they *read the book* is the point. Anyway, it's gorier, the Llorona pulls off somebody's head at one point…

**Michael:** Oh, cool!

**Brennan:** 'Cause the first one had like no gore at all, and this-- the one thing I will say is as always there is a problematic element to La Llorona, especially in the more exploitative movies, directed by men, womp-womp.

**Mark:** Why, is she like, topless or something?

**Brennan:** No! In this one she's...

**Michael:** (laughing) I don't know why that one just killed me, but it did

**Nay:** That would be bomb

**Michael:** She only shows one tit

**Mark:** She's like, killing kids with her titties out

**Nay:** Bomb. That would be so bomb, oh my God

**Brennan:** That's an aesthetic

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** Her supernatural tits?

**Mark:** Or just one? Just one

**Brennan:** That's like ancient art right there

**Michael:** (as La Llorona) "This is the better looking one."

**Brennan:** No, but in this movie they do the really hackneyed, they somehow force her into the framework of like, succubus temptress who turns into an old hag after you try to make out with her…

**Mark:** (disappointed) Ah, well

**Nay:** (disappointed) Well

**Brennan:** So that's a rough thing. And also, spoiler alert for *The Wailer 1*, the final girl who survives that gets possessed by La Llorona and it palpably does not give a shit about the fate of the actual girl. Like, "We're gonna exorcise La Llorona out of her, but she only matters as a vessel for La Llorona," and the second she is safe she is shoved off-screen, so the men can finish their arc

**Nay:** Wow

**Brennan:** So that's really rough

**Mark:** Geez

**Brennan:** I would not recommend this movie, except the guy who plays the dad who's like, trying to find his daughter is *really* trying to do a Liam Neeson thing, it's not working. Also, sorry for bringing up Liam Neeson, that's a rough conversation right now. But he's always like, (as the dad from *The Wailer 2*)  "I'm in Mexico trying to find La Llorona, buh-buh-buh…"

**Michael:** And his daughter's Maggie Grace? She's in it

**Mark:** (wistfully) Maggie Grace

**Brennan:** No, I wish. But there's also like a really tender moment between the hot dude taxi driver who's like helping out the white guy, his uncle and his uncle's best friend out of nowhere have a scene about how they're best friends and they're really tender and they share a moment and like, I wasn't ready for this in this movie, but I'll take it. Anyway, she rips off a dude's head.

**Nay:** Bomb

**Brennan:** The end

**Nay:** With her tits out or no?

**Brennan:** No. So that was…

**Nay:** Oh! That would have been major

**Brennan:** Actually, you know what...

**Michael:** She actually pulls her top down first and *then* she rips his head off

**Mark:** Did she do it *with* her boobs?

**Nay:** (laughing) Yeah!

**Brennan:** I wish. I don't recall if she's topless at any point…

**Mark:** Can I write a La Llorona movie?

**Michael:** Yes!

**Brennan:** I bet you can write a better one than some of these mid-2000s ones

**Mark:** With her boobs

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** That's the subtitle?

**Mark:** Cut to me at Screen Gems going like, "Okay, in *this* scene…"

**Michael:** "Her boobs are the weapon."

**Mark:** Yeah

**Nay:** Fuck yeah

**Michael:** "Again."

**Mark:** It's like a full-on Chesty Morgan La Llorona..

**Michael:** (chuckling) Screen Gems…

**Mark:** That was a movie, Chesty Morgan was a porn star, a famous porn star and she was famous for a movie called *Chesty's Deadly Weapons*-- and she literally had the biggest…

**Michael:** Did she smother people?

**Mark:** Yes. And it was a movie about how men would be hypnotized by her, and then she would smother them to death with her rack

**Michael:** That's pretty great

**Nay:** Oh! That's amazing. Oh my God, goals

**Mark:** Oh, okay, have you seen *Serial Mom*?

**Michael:** Yes

**Mark:** That is the movie that uh, is it Chip? No, that's her son…

**Michael:** Is he watching that?

**Mark:** No, it's the movie that the guy is jerking off to

**Michael:** Oh yeah yeah yeah

**Mark:** *Chesty's Deadly Weapons*. I'm pretty sure that's the title

**Michael:** Is he jerking off to her tits or the dead men?

**Mark:** No, but a shot of her boobs coming into the camera, and so he…

**Michael:** With the POV?

**Mark:** Yeah

**Michael:** Boob POV like the shark from Jaws?

**Mark:** Kind of. It's really something. I think Something Weird put it out ages ago, so you can pick it up

**Michael:** Speaking of feminism

**Mark:** I know! While we're on a feminist kick

**Michael:** We are here to bring you a movie. Uh, who picked this?

**Mark:** I…

**Michael:** Oh! Our missing guest!

**Mark:** Our missing fembot

**Nay:** I was like...

**Mark:** Our missing guest Kara

**Michael:** Hi, Kara, we love you

**Brennan:** I have an intro for the trailer. You know how I kind of have to cut the shit out of the trailers to make them seem shorter and more interesting for everybody? ...The narrator seems to know we get easily bored, and he is rushing like *hell* to get through

**Michael:** He sounds cum-tastic

**Brennan:** What?

**Michael:** He sounds like he's in the middle of an orgasm the way he's speaking

**Mark:** Jesus!

**Michael:** I'm not kidding

**Mark:** All right, so dear listeners, picture that

**Brennnan:** Yeah!

**Michael:** Listen to him!

**Mark:** You be the judge

**Michael:** 'Coz he's talking about what they do to women

**[Brennan plays the trailer]**

**Narrator in the trailer:** In the town of Stepford, the men are getting exactly what they always dreamed of, perfect wives…

**Michael:** (moans and groans orgasmically)

**Narrator in the trailer:** And the dream is becoming a nightmare for the Stepford wives…

**Michael:** Am I wrong?

**Michael:** That trailer has every great line in the movie

**Nay:** True

**Michael:** (to Mark) Were you gonna say something?

**Mark:** I,no, go on

**Michael:** Oh no, go ahead

**Mark:** No, no! I, I…

**Brennan:** No, you hang up!

**Mark:** I have a *lot* of thoughts about *The Stepford Wives*...

**Michael:** Same

**Mark:** Especially in terms of how *The Stepford Wives* as an adaptation of an Ira Levin novel, and Ira Levin of *Rosemary's Baby* and *Sliver*

**Brennan:** And *Sliver*!

**Mark:** You know, *Sliver*. I mean, I guess we'll never know really what was truly intended by *Sliver*. Like, there's a book of *Sliver* out there, and I could read it, but I'm just like, "*Eh*."

**Michael:** "*Eh.* I'm good."

**Mark:** I dunno. Was this anyone's first time watching *Stepford*?

**Michael:** No, no

**Nay:** No

**Mark:** So revisiting it, how did you feel?

**Michael:** It felt, I dunno. I *don't* remember how I felt when I initially saw it. I've seen it a handful of times now, too. It's just been a really long time, but I think it's a really great movie

**Nay:** I remember thinking it was creepy when I was younger, but *this* time when I watched it, I think that-- I guess I'm just always shocked by people who try to make their partners into something they're not…

**Mark:** Mmm-hmm

**Nay:** And I dunno, it made me think a lot about kink and how I think when I was younger, I thought a lot of sexual experiences or kinky sexual experiences as like, convincing someone that you're having sex with to participate in certain things, and it's like no, if you're really into something you find someone who wants that done to them..

**Mark:** The difference between consent and enthusiastic consent

**Nay:** Right. And I'm like, "You couldn't find women to just-- that *want* to clean the kitchen all day?"

**Mark:** Who *loved* waxing the floor?

**Nay:** Yeah. EZ-Off, okay?

**Michael:** I think there's something-- the kink for them is making someone do what they want them to do

**Nay:** Yeah, I know

**Michael:** Yuck

**Nay:** Gross

**Mark:** That's a, that's a bad dom

**Nay:** Oh, yeah

**Mark:** So it's weird. I *love* this movie, right? And I think it's aged well, because it's like the older it gets, the more of a time capsule it is, the more I love it. At the same time, having read the novel and then sort of revisiting it this week again, because it had been awhile, it's interesting because I ended up feeling like… So, everybody, Michael forwarded to us a New York Times article that was like, "Oh, *Stepford Wives* from 1975. *The Stepford Wives* was screened for a group of prominent feminists…"

**Michael:** Yep

**Mark:** "And feminist activists, and most notably the reaction initially from that group was predominantly negative."

**Michael:** Yeah. Mostly disgust

**Mark:** Yeah. And Betty Friedan herself was visibly upset, apparently…

**Nay:** That's wild

**Mark:** And stalked out and called the movie "a rip-off of the women's movement." And I remember first reading that and being like, I admit rolling my eyes and like, "Come on." And then I was like, "Wait a minute." And I went back and looked at the book a little bit and it's really interesting because like, "No wonder she felt that fucking way," because I have this pet theory now that *The Stepford Wives* movie is like a fembot facsimile of *The Stepford Wives* novel, in a way...

**Michael:** Okay

**Mark:** In that Joanna in the novel, or novella, because it's super-short, she calls herself a "semi-professional photographer", but she has an agency, she *has* photos that are repped. She has a revenue stream

**Michael:** So she has a career

**Mark:** She has a career!

**Nay:** She's not like begging like in the movie

**Mark:** No. In the movie, Joanna's like, (as Joanna) "I'm a semi-professional wannabe, I dunno, bluuuuuh."

**Michael:** She does everything but call herself a professional

**Mark:** Right. Yeah. And you know, in the movie, Walter's like, "Well this is why we moved out here, 'cause.you could build a darkroom, you could do this, you could do that," and she just sort of sits there and is like, (as Joanna) "I'm not happy!" (normal voice) And in the novel, she looks next door and Carol Van Zant is obsessed with waxing the floor and sort of like…

**Michael:** It's so fucked up

**Mark:** And so she, in reaction to that, she's like, "Fuck that, I'm not fucking doing that." And so she pours herself a cocktail-- she starts building her darkroom, and then she starts going through her contact sheets and she finds a photo that she's like, they describe it as, she describes herself in the novel as wanting to start a N.O.W. chapter and being a fierce feminist, and you know, she gets really excited about a photo that she took before she left New York, which is a picture of a Black man in a beautiful suit and attaché case, scowling at a taxicab that's empty that drove by him. So she's like this incredibly aware, interested…

**Michael:** The picture just says a lot…

**Mark:** Right

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** About who she is, what her art is…

**Mark:** And who she's interested in discussing in her art

**Michael:** What her POV is, yeah

**Mark:** And it's fascinating to me then as-- and also, another thing in the novel is that the women are not, who have been Stepford-ized are not described as being Xanax-y, kind of like, (relaxed) "No women actually speak this way." (normal voice) But the movie titled towards comedy in a sense, in a way, and so I was like, like Betty Friedan and all these women who watched it that night and were pissed the fuck off, I go, "Well, no wonder they were pissed off." It's like this movie made entirely by men suddenly was-- and I still love the movie, but I have another reason and I'm gonna shut up in two seconds, but I was like, "Oh…"

**Michael:** No, I'm glad you brought this up

**Mark:** "Isn't it interesting that that would be the initial reaction why it was seen as kind of like a giant eyeroll." Because it was essentially how I guess they felt that night, just totally ripping off and making fun of a movement

**Michael:** Well, it's interesting that you bring this up, I was going to bring this up later, but it's great to bring it up now 'coz it's about the *time* the movie was made. And in that article, one of the "opinion-makers" is what they called them when they did this-- was it Columbia that released the picture, they're the ones that put this together?

**Mark:** They distributed it

**Michael:** And they talk about what you just said, one of them said, "If I ever hear that bra-burning again, well, it's just something no woman would have put in there as a line." And then this really resonated with me because it's something that was said forty-four years ago and it's still being said today, about how the awareness session ended with the remaining women pretty much agreeing that the movie was "junk and should not be taken seriously. And that when they finally let women write and direct their own movies, if they're ever going to have any intelligent women's pictures..." because that was another thing Columbia was doing at the time was say this was a "women's picture" so they were finally catering to the other half of the audience, you know? It wasn't just two guys, it was two women that were at the forefront of the movie

**Nay:** Jesus

**Mark:** Right

**Michael:** But you know, I was reading this thing that Entertainment Weekly put out two years ago about the making of the movie, and they spoke to a bunch of the actors and actresses, most notably Katharine Ross, who stars as Joanna and Paula Prentiss who stars as Bobbie

**Mark:** Paula Prentiss is so fucking good

**Nay:** Oh my God

**Mark:** Bobbie Markowitz for life

**Michael:** *Yes*. What's-her-name from *Gilligan's Island*

**Mark:** Oh…

**Michael:** They speak with her. I'm blanking

**Mark:** Tina Louise?

**Michael:** Yes. Nanette Newman, who played Carol, who is *so great* in the movie, that's hard to play. But they were talking about the reaction people had at the time, and the thing I found interesting in this article… is that everyone blamed Ira (Levin). At the time, everyone was talking about how Ira, his thoughts on feminism are horrible. Not the filmmakers, the guy who wrote the novel. And they were talking about how they interpreted that this is what Ira, and this is a question I was gonna ask you guys, that this is what Ira *wants*, that his version of *The Stepford Wives* is what he wants reality to be? And that was a question I was gonna pose for the two of you, just find it, 'cause I worded it…

**Mark:** Nay, what are your thoughts?

**Michael:** Yeah, what are your thoughts on that? Would you say that-- what do you think he was trying to say, Ira Levin? I haven't read the novel, I don't know if you have either

**Nay:** I have not

**Michael:** But even watching the *film*, I didn't take that away from watching the film either

**Mark:** I mean, I can chime in, having read the novel I can chime in

**Nay:** Please

**Michael:** Yeah, please do

**Mark:** So, and I say this as someone who will watch the *shit* out of the 1975 *Stepford Wives*. Any time it's on, right? Because it's *just* as a movie, if you take it on its own merits, it's just a well-constructed pop thriller. But, in comparison to what Ira Levin was trying to put across, um, Ira Levin's novel is about not being able to trust, like Rosemary Woodhouse, Joanna Everhart is not able to trust her own instincts that something is terribly wrong, and it is about the paranoia and the kind of gaslighting that goes on for Joanna, and *not* about a big reveal. And what's fascinating about the novel is that it ends in a, I mean spoiler for like a fuckin' forty-year novel-- and it's a really short book…

**Nay:** Thank God

**Michael:** Yeah, I wanna read it

**Mark:** Because even if you know everything that's gonna happen, it's still *so* well-written, it's so incisive and so great. But it ends with two things-- which I *really* fuckin' love, and totally forgot about. Joanna's sort of story ends with her, not at the Men's Association, and the men recording her children's cries to attract her…

**Michael:** And like maze-like like a haunted house

**Mark:** And a robot with black eyes…

**Nay:** That drove me nuts

**Mark:** That shit is nuts. And does it make for a fun movie?

**Michael:** Visually, of course

**Mark:** However, again, it is about fembotting the real sort of question at the center of the book, which is, the horror of *The Stepford Wives* as Ira Levin intended, as far as I can tell, is horror is not about what men do, necessarily. It's rather the constant fear these women are experiencing because they never feel that they can trust that they are safe

**Michael:** And there's nothing more frightening than *knowing* the truth about something and *no one believing you*

**Nay:** Oh God, yeah

**Michael:** Rosemary has the exact same thing in *Rosemary's Baby*

**Mark:** Exactly

**Michael:** Joanna has it here. I mean she has her confidant in Bobbie, but as soon as Bobbie's changed, like, "Fuck. Joanna's fucked."

**Mark:** And this is the thing. So the novel ends with everyone is treating Joanna like she's lost her shit, right? She's convinced, she's asking, "Do you bleed? Do you bleed?" And so…

**Michael:** *Oh!* Beautiful line

**Mark:** I know. And so they bring her over to Bobbie's house, Bobbie's been Stepford-ized by now, and she's like, (as Stepford-ized Bobbie) "Of course, Joanna." (normal voice) But it's not described as like, (tranquilized voice) "I'm on Valium and I sound like a cartoon."

**Michael:** I was gonna ask you that

**Mark:** No, and that's the thing. That's another reason why I would imagine that feminist activists at the time might have watched-- I mean, I'm filling in blanks that I have no, y'know, this is supposition, but I could see how Betty Friedan could watch the Seventy-five *Stepford Wives* and be like…

**Michael:** "What the fuck?"

**Mark:** "Fuck you, you're making fun of women. You're not making fun of men, you're making fun of women, because a woman who chooses to love housework doesn't need to seem like a fucking idiot. If she chooses to love housework, then she chooses to love housework." What's bizarre to Joanna is not that they're acting like cartoons, but rather women who had a variety of interests, and who had started a N.O.W. chapter a few months before she moved there, suddenly *all* they're interested in is simply doing housework, and so I found that incredibly illuminating in terms of what-- and then the irony is that the 2004 *Stepford Wives* is like a Stepford fembot of the Seventy-five version

**Michael:** It's like the *Scary Movie* version of-- it is, you know what I mean? I actually saw that in the movie theater

**Nay:** Me too

**Mark:** So did I!

**Michael:** I was so excited to be scared…

**Mark:** I was so excited!

**Michael:** I was like, "What the fuck is this?!"

**Nay: Yeah…**

**Michael:** I'm glad you brought that up, because I was gonna ask you both a question, and Brennan as well, if you wanna chime in…

**Michael:** What *is* this film's feminism? 'Cause to me, and please tell me if I'm wrong, I'm just some stupid gay white boy I don't know what I'm talking about half the time. It does strike a tone that "This is the only way to be a feminist, which is to be opposite of what the fembots are," right? And I always see true feminism, or feminism as, "There is no correct way to be a woman, per se."

**Nay:** Right

**Michael:** Whatever a woman likes to do and wants to do…

**Nay:** Right

**Michael:** And is making that choice to do that, and that includes being a housewife, it includes being a woman who loves to clean. That's feminism. And I feel like the film only gives us one POV of feminism. Sure, a lot of the women in the film had no choice in the matter of how they ended up, but we only see one POV from two, at times three characters, so all of them have the exact same POV on feminism. So, what are your thoughts on that?

**Nay:** I mean, yeah, it could've been-- I mean that's an interesting layer, to think about people choosing that and then people not choosing that and it being okay to choose that if it's your choice

**Michael:** Yeah, 'coz I think they missed an opportunity in the film to have a woman who didn't quote-unquote "need to be changed", you know what I mean?

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** Because there's so many different-- I dunno. Like the film says you're either a cleaner or you're like a bra-burner, there's like nothing in-between, there's no other visual representation either. Where's the women of color, where's the queer women? There's no one over the age of thirty-five...

**Mark:** Well, I mean, listen.

**Nay:** I mean...

**Mark:** Seventy-five in Connecticut, you weren't gonna get...

**Michael:** But there's no one over the age of thirty-five.

**Nay:** Right

**Michael:** Is everyone else considered "unworthy" or-- you know what I mean?

**Mark:** This is like some *Logan's Run* shit happening

**Michael:** Yeah

**Nay:** It's just another way of expressing what they want ideally in a town and a community is not having those people

**Michael:** Yeah

**Nay:** If they really think that they're liberal for having Chinese food…

**Michael**: I forgot about that, I like the fog when she says that

**Nay:** And there's a Black family moving in "in the future"

**Mark:** Amazing

**Nay:** Like, I can't believe you have to be liberal for a Black person to live in your city. (laughing) It's just like, crazy

**Mark:** And the novel is like *dry as a bone* in terms of how it like lampoons those aspects. The whole segment with Bobbie and Joanna at the end ends with the men are upstairs in Bobbie's house, and the men are blasting rock music…

**Michael:** Okay. I'm into this like, *dickfest*

**Mark:** And Joanna's like, "What's going on?" And she thinks they're playing music that loud "in case I scream"

**Michael:** Oh shit. That's chilling

**Nay:** Ooof. Yeah

**Mark:** And basically it just ends with her sitting with Joanna and essentially ignoring her instincts and saying, "There's no way I could be right. There's no way that something could be wrong. Bobbie wouldn't do something to me, would she? Would she?" And then it kind of just essentially fades to black

**Michael:** Oh, I kind of love that

**Mark:** And the coda of the novel is great, because it introduces Ruth-Ann, a young Black woman…

**Nay:** Oh my God

**Mark:** Who's moved with her husband to Stepford, entering the supermarket and she's like, "Okay, here we go, we're new here," and you know, Carol Van Sant or someone, or Charmaine, I forget, is like, (as a Stepford wife) "Hi! I don't have to ask how *you* are because you just look incredible." (normal voice) And so, you know, Ruth-Ann is like, "Oh, okay." And she's literally like, "I guess being Black in Stepford may be okay after all. Maybe it'll be okay, who knows." And she talks to Joanna, who is, you know, (as Stepford-ized Joanna) "I'm so much happier now that I'm not doing photography, I'm just focusing on my housework or whatever."

**Michael:** (as Stepford-ized Joanna) "I'm a pledge."

**Mark:** But what's interesting is that Ruth-Ann is a writer…

**Michael:** Oh, no kidding

**Mark:** And it ends with her at home, telling her husband, you know, it's like, "I'm finally having a breakthrough on the book. You mind taking the kids to a restaurant tonight, I don't feel like cooking because I feel like I need to do it."

**Nay:** Wow

**Mark:** And her husband's like, "Yeah, no problem." And that's how it ends

**Michael:** Oh, wow

**Nay:** That's trippy

**Mark:** So, as far as the movie's brand of feminism, I think you can't dismiss *The Stepford Wives* out of hand, because it was the only pop feminist movie of its kind

**Michael:** Yeah, for sure, it was one of the first

**Mark:** But at the same time, it pulled punches in the sense that-- so, reading all this stuff, and revisiting the novel, I got annoyed with it, 'cause I was like, "Oh, so you turned Joanna into this sort of wannabe who's a little directionless and a little clueless, because what, you thought an audience wouldn't identify with a forthrightly feminist, forthrightly self-actualized, forthrightly professional woman," you know? She was too strong and that would be…

**Michael:** Is that quote-unquote "palatable" to like...

**Mark:** Right. They're hedging their bets. And then I thought-- it's so, I get so turned around because I was like, if you look at where the Women's Movement was in 1974, I guess when they shot this, it *wasn't* that popular. It wasn't like a pop thing, where it was really looked down on in a lot of circles. Phyllis Schlafly, you know, was actively fighting the E.R.A. that had passed Congress but would ultimately fail. And so, I feel like you still have to tip your hat to *Stepford Wives* in that they're like, "Okay. The people behind this movie agree with the tenets of feminism, and they agree sort of, that you know that they need to not-- that choice is essential to the dignity of any human being to live their life how they want to, and certainly women," and  so that's the reason why anybody who made this movie made this movie, right? Clearly that's what they believe. And so I guess why they made a lot of the pop choices around it, like making it a little funny, and *not* making it quite such a descent into hell like *Rosemary's Baby* was, but rather try to make it pop, so that you can seduce an audience that might be on the fence about the Women's Movement, about women's libbers or about whatever, to be like, "Oh, I see," you know what I mean? Because you can catch a lot of flies with honey rather than vinegar. And so, I get why it would piss some viewers off at the time, and why it's, I mean it's a landmark genre movie at the same time

**Michael:** Well, I had moments watching it, and I think I mentioned this to you before the show, watching it in today's context, some of the stuff Joanne says, I'm like, she's a bad bitch

**Nay:** Oh yeah

**Mark:** Yeah

**Michael:** Like she says her deal, she-- from the beginning...

**Mark:** Even sort of watered down, she *still* stands out

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm

**Michael:** Yeah! Even in the moments when he's like, "Have you ever done it in front of a log fire?" And she replies, "Not with you."

**Mark:** "Not with you."

**Michael:** I'm like, "Fuck yeah! Backhand that motherfucker," you know? And it's…

**Mark:** Does he, does the movie…? I forget all of a sudden, does the movie have a masturbation scene?

**Nay:** No

**Michael:** No

**Mark:** So in the novel, the first night that Walter goes to the men's club…

**Michael:** Men's club?

**Mark:** Men's Association…

**Michael:** Good for her

**Mark:** You know, presumably-- good for her! He's been pres-- No, she doesn't masturbate

**Nay:** (disappointed) Awwww

**Michael:** (disappointed) Awwww

**Mark:** (Valley girl voice) "Oh, boo!"

**Nay:** Who masturbates, then?

**Mark:** (Valley girl voice) "This story's boring!" (normal voice) Presumably at the Men's Association he's presented with this plan of like, "Hey. You know how Joanna can nag you?"

**Michael:** Yeah, naggy wife?

**Mark:** "You know, has a period and only God can imagine what the fuck…"

**Michael:** "Thoughts. She has thoughts."

**Mark:** Yeah, "Thoughts." You know, he would be presented with, "We could change all that." So, he comes home, and she's asleep by then, and she wakes up in the middle of the night and he just got home and he's jerking off.

**Michael:** And she catches him?

**Mark:** And she catches him, and he's like, "Oh, sorry, I didn't want to wake you up or whatever," and she's like, "What's come over you?" And then they have the best sex they've had in years

**Michael:** Huh

**Nay:** Hmmmmmm

**Mark:** But. It's so fucking twisted that like--

**Michael:** Yeah, fembot coming up

**Mark:** He's aroused at the fantasy of-- and in the novel he's like, "I'm going to change the Men's Association from the inside, honey. There's no reason why it should be so sexist as to be a Men's Association." And she's like, "Well, why don't I come with you?" And he's like, "No no no, let's not ruffle it up." Because he presents as a feminist, Walter, and so I dunno

**Nay:** That's wild

**Mark:** The story is just so ahead of its time in so many ways

**Michael:** There is-- and I mean the movie has-- I liked how everything is so layered in the movie, too. Like you start seeing it from the very beginning, like they do a lot of character development really quickly, briefly and right up front. Sometimes non-verbally too, like (Joanna's) first shot is of a mannequin being carried by a guy…

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** Who has no respect for it, like limbs falling off, naked. She's got tape or some sort of binding over her eyes and ears. And watching it as a non-college student, because I think that was the last time I watched it, I was like, "Fuck! That's like a *lot* right there." And the first two minutes, it gives you a *ton*. It gives you the entire, it eventually gives you where the story's going from the very beginning

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm

**Mark:** And on top of it, Joanna is a photographer. I mean, she's a woman who sees

**Michael:** Her eyes are so important to her...

**Mark:** Right. She's a woman who sees

**Michael:** That's why that shot at the end-- are those eyes in the novel, the black eyes?

**Mark:** No

**Michael:** 'Coz that to me is a really powerful thing, *those* are the things she needs more than anything else in her life are her eyes

**Nay:** Yeah

**Mark:** And it's like, watching the movie, I'm like, "I get it. It's a *movie*, and it's a visual medium," so I get some of the choices. But again, the novel is not about a sci-fi big reveal "Surprise, men are bad!" It's like...

**Nay:** "We knew that."

**Mark:** Well, yeah. Ira Levin's taking, he's treating that as a probable par for the course, it's *really* just sticking to the idea that Joanna, there's no release for Joanna. Or the only release is that submission, and that's what makes this incredibly *slight* tiny little book just-- I mean it's like, "Bam!" it just hits you. That's what's amazing about it, is that you know it's coming but it's so well-written

**Michael:** Kind of like order that

**Nay:** I wish she'd had some release with Bobbie

**Michael:** *Right?*

**Nay:** 'Coz they would've looked real cute together

**Mark:** *Remake!*

**Michael:** I wanted to know your thoughts on a remake. I think it's ripe for a remake, I would love to see a woman's point of view via a remake

**Nay:** Yeah, that would be cool

**Mark:** I wish Sofia Coppola would like…

**Nay:** *Oh, wow*

**Michael:** Karyn Kusama?

**Mark:** Yeah

**Michael:** Someone who's really gonna lean into the paranoia aspect and really make a real chamber piece out of it.

**Nay:** Yeah

**Mark:** I think it would be interesting to try to-- I mean, it would be a bear, because dragging *Stepford Wives* out of comedy-- because that's where it's so interesting, because while the novel has a lot of laugh lines, you know Bobbie is a really funny character

**Michael:** Very funny. I love her

**Nay:** (chuckling) Paula Prentiss is so funny

**Michael:** So great in the movie

**Mark:** It's like a vice, the book

**Michael:** (sotto voce) I need to read that

**Nay:** (sotto voce) I know

**Mark:** I mean, I'd love to talk about the *remake* that does exist. I find it *fascinating*. I found it totally fascinating

**Michael:** It's so… bizarre. I haven't seen it in a really long time. Kara texted me when she said she couldn't make it today, she's like, "I even read the book again! I watched that shitty remake so I could talk about it on the show!" She's like, "I was so looking forward to making fun of the remake with you."

**Brennan:** Maybe that should be the episode when she comes back?

**Mark:** I mean, yeah, maybe

**Michael:** That's a good idea

**Nay:** Yeah

**Mark:** Then we could just fuckin' tear it apart

**Michael:** Just fuckin' tear that movie apart

**Nay:** I have not seen the remake since that time in the theater

**Mark:** I mean, there are certain things--

**Michael:** It was such a kick to the dick seeing that in the theater

**Mark:** Well, it's very, it just makes a-- right out of the gate it's making some hot choices that I'm like, "I don't even know *what* this is about." Nicole Kidman, who is, when you think about it, perfect to play a Joanna

**Michael:** Absolutely. The cast is great

**Mark:** Yeah, but they make her a television executive--

**Michael:** Reality TV?

**Mark:** Of frankly insane Paul Rudnick-y reality television

**Michael:** Well, it was 2004, we were kind of like the peak of reality TV, or like the initial peak of reality TV, when it was still dominated by the broadcast networks

**Mark:** Right.

**Michael:** But it was gettin' crazier and crazier. Like, what was that one with Darva Conger? *Who Wants to Marry a Millionaire?*

**Mark:** (softly) Oh my God

**Nay:** (softly) Yes

**Mark:** With *Joe Millionaire*?

**Michael:** Joe was great

**Mark:** Was it *Joe Millionaire*?

**Nay:** Fuck that shit

**Mark:** And he was like, (as Joe Millionaire) "Oh, I'm not a millionaire. Heh heh, my bad." (normal voice) All these women were so...

**Michael:** (as Joe Millionaire) "I do concrete." (normal voice) "Construction?" (as Joe Millionaire) "Concrete. Uh."

**Mark:** And they're basically like, daring this poor woman to marry a liar

**Michael:** Zora?

**Mark:** "Who Wants to Marry a Liar?" Basically is what--

**Mark:** And they gave him the last name "Marriott" so they would think he's part of the hotel chain

**Nay:** Yes

**Mark:** Evan Marriott, was that his name?

**Michael:** Yeah

**Mark:** *Wow*.

**Michael:** I had a friend in college who was not the brightest, and one time we were watching, he walked in and goes, "Why do they keep calling him 'Evan'? I thought his name was Joe." And I was like, "His name's not actually Joe Millionaire, dude."

**Mark:** That man is President of the United States

**Michael:** Jared Kushner

**Mark:** (Joanna's) a television executive in the remake, who makes insane, bad reality television and then she's fired and she has a nervous breakdown and *that's* why they move to Stepford. So it's already, right from the top she's sort of this broken doll in need of quote-unquote "fixing" because she quote-unquote "works too hard" and she has quote-unquote "ignored her marriage", and it's like, it's really bizarre-- and on top of it, Glenn Close is the one who's behind the whole Stepford robotiziation of…

**Michael:** I forgot about that, that's right!

**Mark:** And it's really weird how the remake goes about trying to make like, a woman or these women sort of responsible for the men reacting--

**Michael:** For being trash?

**Mark:** It's really-- I dunno. It's a movie that just couldn't pick a tone, and...

**Michael:** Well, it's a movie that says, "You're either a career woman or a housewife. Can't be both!"

**Mark:** Yeah, basically

**Nay:** Right

**9Mark:** But also it was like, "But also, gay men. And gay men are trying to masc each other up," and it's like…

**Michael:** And they're like, barfing up, farting rainbows

**Mark:** I know, but *Stepford Wives* is not like, (whispers) don't make it about men. (normal voice) Don't make it about men doing stuff to men, don't do it…

**Michael:** *Yeah*

**Mark:** It's not (indistinct)

**Michael:** It's like the *Desperate Housewives* version of gay men, too

**Mark:** Oh, man. It was really-- I mean, at one point one of the wives is like an ATM, it's really insane

**Michael:** Yeah. It's really bizarre

**Michael:** Let's talk about Carol. I just love that she brings over a casserole. I wish I had a neighbor that brought me a casserole

**Nay:** (as Carol) "I'll just *die* if I don't get this recipe…"

**Michael:** So Carol is like…

**Mark:** Poor Carol

**Michael:** Poor Carol. I gave her a backstory in my head that she's the original, like she's the first, she was the prototype…

**Brennan:** The beta

**Nay:** The beta, yeah

**Michael:** Yeah, that they got this now. There were some before her, but they all melted down or malfunctioned or something, and they're like, "She's the one we go with." And she's-- it's fucking creepy

**Nay:** Oh yeah

**Michael:** Really fucking creepy

**Nay:** She's the creepiest of them all

**Michael:** And Walter's *total* gaze on her when she's walking away after giving the casserole, and it's cool how the movie plays it, like he's kind of like, "What the fuck?" But he's actually like, "Oooh, this is my future."

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm

**Mark:** Mmmm

**Michael:** I just thought that was super-interesting. And *I* was a little confused and wanted to bring this up, who was the guy in the yard with her? Was that her husband that he saw grab her boob, that Joanne--

**Mark:** Yeah

**Nay:** Yeah, that like opens her shirt and--

**Michael:** Okay, I thought it was somebody else

**Nay:** No, that was her husband

**Michael:** So I was like, I couldn't remember, I hadn't seen it-- I was waiting for the film to go where the husbands share their bots with each other

**Mark:** Right

**Michael:** So I wanted to get clarification on that

**Nay:** Swap night!

**Michael:** Swap bot?

**Nay:** Yeah

**Mark:** Good lord. I can only imagine. Poor Carol. Who was hit in the parking lot of the--

**Michael and Nay:** Carol

**Mark:** Was it Carol? She's like, (as Carol) "This is so silly."

**Michael:** What did she say?

**Nay:** She just kept shorting out

**Michael:** (as Carol) "This is so silly."

**Nay:** Like, "Girl, do you…"

**Michael:** And she keeps kind of feeling for her head, but not touching it the whole time

**Nay:** *Oh my God*, yeah

**Michael:** And I'm like, "What's going on with your chip?"

**Nay:** Right

**Mark:** What do you think, I mean aside from just sort of the, "Let's make sure we do mass appeal," what's behind the choice of the filmmakers to make a Stepford woman a *literal* robot, as opposed to a sort of just…

**Michael:** Brainwashed?

**Mark:** Docile, narcotized kind of…

**Nay:** I think it's really scary, 'coz it's like--

**Michael:** Yeah, do they have to *kill* their wives?

**Nay:** Yeah, if you become, you're into the propaganda and I don't know, eventually you're like, swayed, maybe you could come back? I dunno. But if you're a robot, you're dead and there's just this--

**Michael:** Right. And there's no chance.

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** Like you're replaced, you're gone. I find it really interesting too, that (Carol) was not just saying, "It's so silly," she also kept saying, "It's just my head." Like, there's so much there. It's where your brain lives. It's also your head. It's like so interesting that like, the repeated sentences, "This is so silly. It's just my head." And I have dealt with scary tension headaches in the past where I thought I might have had something going on so bad that my friend who's a neurosurgeon, *literally* I was telling him, and he was like, "Could you *please* go get an MRI? *Right now?*" And thankfully nothing was wrong, but it flashed back to that, and maybe it's kind of a statement too, on how as humans we protect ourselves by denying things, and when those were going on for awhile, I was like, "Ehhh, it's just headaches." But it kind of bleeds into her next thing, where it's like malfunctioning of the recipe, which we have the clip of if we wanna hear it… this is the second instance where we get a big "What is going on?"

**Brennan:** Oh yeah. And speaking real quick to the robot thing, it's kind of like a *Get Out* situation of your body is disposable. Like, "It literally doesn't matter to me if your body is present here. It just needs to look like you, it needs to be the surface, but the inside doesn't matter. Your guts don't need to be there, your brain doesn't need to be there."

**Michael:** Jordan Peele has said many times to people that his biggest inspirations were (*The Stepford Wives*) and *Rosemary's Baby* (1968)

**Brennan:** Oh hell yeah

(Clips of Carol at the party malfunctioning and apologizing the next day are played)

**Nay:** Bobbie's like, "If I had to apologize every time I got drunk…" She's so funny. Oh my God

**Michael:** Right? That was my thought while watching. "Why the fuck is she apologizing to these two?" What do you think the motivation is there? For the men to tell (Carol) to go apologize to Bobbie and Joanna?

**Nay:** To put them at ease, I think

**Michael:** You think so?

**Nay:** Yeah. I mean she looked-- there's something so human about her apology because it's like when she's shorting out and walking around the party, it's like, that's *not at all* the weirdest thing someone's done while drunk

**Michael:** Right

**Nay:** I don't know that they really would have thought *that* much about it 'cause they already thought these folks were kind of weird

**Michael:** And they kind of didn't, 'cause didn't they, weren't they like, wasn't one of them like, "Why are you apologizing to us? You didn't do anything."

**Nay:** Yeah. But I think it like, the men *need* the women to take all responsibility for their behaviors

**Michael:** For everything

**Nay:** For *everything*. And it's also part of submission, I think, to have to apologize for things that you did that weren't wrong

**Mark:** Well, it's the oppressive ladylike mentality that the women, these robots have been programmed with

**Nay:** Yeah, all about respectability

**Michael:** Yeah, you know basically what you just said made me think, "I bet she had to do the apology tour that day…"

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm

**Michael:** "And we only got to see the apology to Bobbie and Joanna."

**Brennan:** Did she have a press conference?

**Michael:** She's just knocking on doors, apologizing, like trick-or-treating

**Mark:** It's on the nightly news like, (as a news anchor) "Local woman sorry."

**Brennan:** Like, "I'm sorry if you were offended by me asking for the recipe."

**Mark:** Exactly

**Nay:** (as Carol) "I'll just die!"

**Mark:** Oh, man. I mean, the audio of those parties, there's an aspect to *Stepford Wives* when I watch that just reminds me of the dinner parties my parents had

**Michael:** Oh really?

**Mark:** Yeah. It was kind of like, (as a woman attending one of the parties) "We're all friends in the community and because of work, and we're the wives…"

**Michael:** "We all have the same interests…"

**Mark:** "And we're going to talk around stuff, in a kind of non-committal way." (normal voice) It's a very specific tone

**Nay:** Uch, boring!

**Mark:** And I don't mean to be…

**Michael:** I know what you're saying

**Mark:** Rude or mean about any of it, like people's interests are their interests. But there's an exaggerated truth, you know, about what the movie captures in terms of the tenor of a dinner party in the, you know, at least in my case, the early mid-Eighties

**Michael:** Yeah

**Mark:** You know, "We're the adults and we're all gathered in our best. Come into our dining room with the new stain-proof carpeting, and the, you know…"

**Michael:** "The new China."

**Mark:** Yeah, it's very-- I think that's one of the reasons why I do love the movie, because it has one of those, it really conjures in many ways what I remember *homes* looking like, neighborhoods looking in a certain way, and I didn't grow up in Connecticut, I grew up in Canada, but there is a kind of aggressive niceness sometimes of…

**Michael:** Well, it also captures the Seventies in that sense, too, where more and more people were moving away from the city to the suburbs. And the thing that stuck with me while watching it too, is that I was like, "Oh my God, only three years later, *Halloween* came out where they finally put the scares *in* suburbia," and I guess the scares are in suburbia here, but they make such a point in this movie of saying, "You can leave your doors unlocked! It's so safe!" This that and the other thing. But then that hottie cop, later in the movie is like, "You can't walk around at night in the town like this. Everything's so nice, someone's gonna come and steal something from you." So it's like they are essentially gaslighting the women at all cost, and, "You're gonna feel safe here," and if you wander from that in a different way, then they'll use fear to manipulate you. It's really fucked up

**Nay:** Yeah. Also thinking about when they have their men's meeting in front of Joanna, and they're talking about all the charity action they're about to get involved in and it's just wild, because I often think about men in power and how they may do some good things, like have a charity drive for Christmas toys or whatever they were talking about…

**Michael:** When they mentioned a cake drive, I'm like, you cunts are gonna make the women bake those cakes

**Nay:** Right

**Mark:** (chuckling) Michael

**Nay:** And having them float by on these mediocre good deeds, when they're fuckin' evil

**Michael:** Right. It's like that pat on the back'll last a year for putting together one donation drive

**Mark:** And again, this is a way the *Stepford Wives* film somehow manages to make it about men--

**Michael:** It's true!

**Mark:** And not about the actual-- it's so wild, 'cause now that I feel like I read all this stuff and I'm like, "Oh! I'll never watch it the same way again, even though I love it!" I love it so much, but...

**Michael:** Even in that scene, we don't even get to see her, we get to see a man's *drawing* of her

**Mark:** Yeah

**Michael:** The camera's not even focused on her, it's on his notepad

**Mark:** Which, by the way, so creepy. It's like, "Hey honey, my friend is gonna come hang out and he's gonna sketch you."

**Michael:** Before I heard his name, Ike, I kept referring to him in my notes as "the drawing perv"

**Nay:** Right. Like, "This person's gonna draw you, this person's gonna record your voice. It's not weird."

**Michael:** *Yeah!*

**Nay:** "He works at Disneyland making mannequins, it's not weird"

**Michael:** Speaking of him, she's got a great line to Diz though, when he's like, "I used to work at Disneyland," and she just kind of looks at him like, "No you fuckin' didn't." And he's like, "You don't believe me?" He goes, "Why don't you believe me?" And she goes, "Because you don't look like someone who enjoys making other people happy."

**Nay:** *Yes!*

**Michael:** And it's true!

**Nay:** She went off with that line, yeah

**Michael:** I love that he kind of smirks, 'cause you know his smirk is like, to me, anyway, watching it again, the smirk is totally him like, "She's got me pegged. She's right. And I'm gonna get you."

**Nay:** "And also I'm gonna get that ass."

**Michael:** Yeah. Ahh, the drawing perv

**Mark:** That's a good one. We love you, *Stepford Wives*

**Nay:** I really, really do

**Michael:** How about when Patricia's calling Frank the king?

**Nay:** *Oh my God*. (as Patricia) "You're the master!" (normal voice) I think there are, this is a question, there *are* men that want that said to them?

**Michael:** Yeah!

**Nay:** I was like, "Is that real?"

**Michael:** They don't care if it's true

**Nay:** I guess if you can articulate it, I guess there's somebody that wants it, of course

**Mark:** Yeah

**Nay:** But I think it's supposed-- this is the comedy you're talking about, right? Like this is what it's supposed to be? It's supposed to be hilarious, right?

**Mark:** Yeah, it's-- I think what you're saying makes sense, especially in light of the fact that only the most insecure people alive would turn their spouses, or *kill* them and replace them with fuckdolls, living fuckdolls

**Nay:** Yes!

**Michael:** Bots that say, "You're the best sex I've ever had"?

**Nay:** (as Patricia) "You're the master!"

**Mark:** Yeah. That's a level of tiny dicked…

**Michael:** (laughing) It is!

**Mark:** Tiny dicked insecurity

**Michael:** Little dick energy

**Mark:** Like *small* *dick energy*

**Michael:** S-D-E?

**Mark:** S-D-E

**Nay:** We're not bodyshamin', y'all

**Michael:** No

**Mark:** Stepford dick energy

**Nay:** Stepford, *yes!*

**Michael:** There we go! That's better

**Nay:** Yes!

**Michael:** No shaming, Stepford dick energy

**Nay:** Stepford dick energy can come in any size, but you have no act right

**Michael:** Yes!

**Mark:** Exactly, and it means that your entire vision of yourself-- I mean, these men, these men are erasing the personhood of their wives…

**Nay:** Yeah

**Mark:** Essentially because it's not even actually about *them*, it's about *themselves*. It's the biggest ego trip, and they need to see themselves reflected in someone else's eyes as being masters of their domain--

**Michael:** Perfect

**Mark:** And perfect, and fuck masters…

**Michael:** It's true!

**Mark:** I mean, to a one all those guys are not, y'know, fuckable

**Michael:** I getcha

**Mark:** I mean, am I forgetting any of them? Or are any of them hot?

**Nay:** Right, they need a robot. Yeah, you right

**Michael:** The cop is hot.

**Mark:** I love that that station wagon drives into town, like a station wagon with that family and he's like, "Who are they?" And I remember being like, "Wow, *Stepford Wives* is different."

**Nay:** Right

**Michael:** The amount of station wagons in the movie

**Mark:** That takes me back, too

**Michael:** And they're so, they need to be looked at as perfect, but they're such fucking cowards in every way too. They can't even *kill* their wives, they make these robots do it for them...

**Mark:** Yeah

**Michael:** And it's just gross

**Mark:** (chuckling) It's unreal

**Nay:** You know, when Joanna first goes over to Bobbie's, Bobbie has changed, I couldn't tell at first Bobbie has changed. 'Cause she had on a white dress so I was like, "Oh, she's changed," but at first the way she's talking seems pretty normal. And then, there's something so subtle that happens where she, where you're like, oh I'm absolutely positive that when (Joanna) stabs her, she's not gonna bleed

(Brennan plays the clip of Joanna confronting Bobbie and stabbing her)

**Joanna:** Bobbie, stop it! Look at me!

**Michael:** It's terrifying

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** 'Cause you know what's gonna happen

**Mark:** (as Bobbie) "Now why would you go and do a thing like that?"

**Joanna:** ...your face is different. What you talk about is different. All of this is different!

**Michael:** Just dropping mugs

**Bobbie:** Yes, yes, this. It's wonderful. Why don't you change your mind and have a cup?

**Joanna:** What does "archaic" mean?

**Michael:** Love that

**Bobbie:** "Archaic"?

**Joanna:** Yes

**Bobbie:** I don't know

**Joanna:** Think! You used to know. We went to Marie Axell's and she was ironing and you used that word

**Michael:** (sotto voce) That was the word

**Nay:** (sotto voce) Mmm-hmm

**Bobbie:** Did I? Well, I forgot! How do you want it?

**Nay:** That's not you, Bobbie

**Joanna:** It wasn't on the word list, was it?

**Michael:** It's like ten-o'clock, stop with the coffee

**Bobbie:** You take cream?

**Joanna:** Look, I bleed!

**Bobbie:** Oh, that's right. You take it black

**Joanna:** When I cut myself I bleed!

**Bobbie:** Why look at your hand!

**Joanna:** No, you look!

**Bobbie:** How could you do a thing like that?

**Michael:** Mark plays Joanna in the remake

**Bobbie:** I was just going to get you some coffee. Well, I was just going to get you some coffee…

**Mark:** Well, that would be inadvisable casting

**Nay:** Ugh, I *love* that part!

**Michael:** It's so great

**Mark:** Did you ever see the TV sequel?

**Michael:** *No,* I wanted to!

**Brennan:** There's more than one, Mark

**Michael:** Yeah, there's three of them, too

**Mark:** *Revenge of the Stepford Wives*…

**Michael:** Which is about…

**Mark:** *The Stepford Husbands*, and *The Stepford Children*. Because Julie Kavner, the voice of Marge Simpson is one of the wives who gets turned--

**Nay:** Okay, I'm insane

**Michael:** *No*

**Mark:** And so, if you've ever wanted to hear Marge Simpson as a Stepford Wife, now you can, just go to my Instagram…

**Michael:** That's amazing

**Brennan:** It's like our own personal Treehouse of Horror

**Mark:** Exactly

**Michael:** So amazing. The first sequel is like a reporter going to solve *The Stepford Wives*, right?

**Mark:** Exactly

**Michael:** Which is kind of like how the remake ends on that, with a little nod to the…

**Mark:** Precisely

**Mark:** *Stepford Wives* we love you. You may have some blemishes as a result of, you know, the road you had to take to make it to the big screen…

**Nay:** Right

**Mark:** I just think, I just think the movie ages awfully well

**Michael:** I think so too…

**Nay:** Oh yeah

**Michael:** And it's one of the first films about feminism

**Mark:** I mean, certainly pop films, you know

**Michael:** Yeah, in that way

**Mark:** Trailblazer

**Brennan:** If the *Real Housewives* can play to gay audiences, why not *The Stepford Wives*?

**Nay:** Right

**Mark:** Which is a way to think of how *Stepford Wives* have insinuated themselves in the culture already

**Brennan:** Exactly. "In this essay, I will…"

**Nay:** Oh my God. Imagine a *Real Housewives* crossover with *The Stepford Wives*. NeNe Leakes gets turned into a… okay, I'm dying already

**Brennan:** *Oh my God*

**Michael:** Well, watching the movie--

**Mark:** Greg, is it Greg her husband?

**Nay:** (laughing) Yes!

**Michael:** I kept thinking of--

**Mark:** Like Nene as Joanna is an amazing idea

**Michael:** Jesus Christ!

**Nay:** I die, I die

**Mark:** And then Taraji's the best friend. Taraji's Bobbie

**Nay:** Yeah

**Michael:** I had one last question I wanna ask

**Nay:** What

**Mark:** And then Tyler Perry runs…

**Nay:** Is nothing. Okay.

**Mark:** (laughs) I was gonna say he runs the Men's Association

**Nay:** You know what, that is, that makes sense, that's perfect

**Michael:** He's one of the station wagons

**Michael:** So, people have posed-- while I was doing research, this needs to be part of it because I think it's an interesting question. So people online *pose* that Joanna at the end of the movie is actually not changed, that she's actually still Joanna

**Brennan:** Is that why we have this whole murder board full of printed out articles you have over here?

**Michael:** Yes!

**Mark:** There's actually a red yarn wall of…

**Michael:** So I actually read-- like Ted Bundy's picture for no reason

**Mark:** Michael *came prepared*.

**Michael:** Okay, so in the EW article, someone-- I actually read the comments, for the first time in my life I read a comment that's actually useful

**Mark:** Oh!

**Nay:** Mmm-hmm

**Michael:** The writer of the Entertainment Weekly article is a woman by the name of Devon Cogan, and this comment says, "Interesting that Devon Cogan wrote about the ending being that there can be no doubt about what happened." This person doesn't disagree, but they found that when they've recommended the film to people, many people have expressed the belief that Joanna somehow escaped her fate and is somehow only pretending to be a Stepford wife. "I find it intriguing that this interpretation has come up as often as it has in my experience and I sometimes find myself agreeing with it. I think it's the way Katharine Ross plays the final scene in the supermarket. While the other wives glide serenely through the scene, she seems ever so slightly guarded and anxious, which a Stepford wife would never be. Then in the final shot before the closing credits as Joanna walks toward the camera, she goes out of focus and when she comes back into focus, her eyes fill the screen in close-up. On one hand, this serves as evidence that the Joanna robot was completed with the black voids having been filled in, but it could also be a sign that the *real* Joanna, a photographer and observer whose eyes were crucial to her identity lives on." So. Thoughts? I actually rewound that like ten times before, like today, after reading that today, and I see it. I see this slight hesitation and her like, *thinking*

**Nay:** I love that. I hope that's true

**Michael:** Yeah

**Mark:** I mean, I think it's intriguing. I'd be curious for listeners to get at us and tell us what you think

**Nay:** Yeah, definitely

**Michael:** Yeah. Good post

**Mark:** It sounds like a little bit of wishful thinking to me

**Nay:** Right

**Michael:** Yeah, a little bit

**Mark:** I'm not sure I *buy* that, I get the reason why we want that to be

**Michael:** Yeah, I guess it's a happy ending then?

**Mark:** I think if you come away from the movie desperately wanting that to be the case, then the movie's done its job

**Michael:** Good point

**Mark:** But I'm not sure I buy that

**Michael:** I think that's a good way to end

(Twitter poll?)

**Brennan:**...And for all of your Llorona updates, news, interviews and information…

**Michael:** And hot dads?

**Brennan:** You can follow me @mariamenounos. No, you can follow me on Twitter @itsrainingbrens. What if *she* interviewed La Llorona though? I would watch the hell out of that

**Nay:** Oh, iconic

**Brennan:** In her little overalls? She's wearing overalls now. Been in the movies lately? She's got 'em, it's great