116: Hellboy with Lin Codega

0:23 Welcome to Podcast Like It's the 2000s, the podcast where we're talking about the films of the aughts. Here from our perch in 2026, I'm one of your hosts, Felisco.

0:30 I'm your other host, Emily St. James. And a fun fact about me is when I stalk my ex on her date with a new man, everybody thinks it's charming. Everybody's like, that's fun. Good for you. That's the thing that I like. It's a cute scene, though. Yeah, I genuinely really love this movie and have watched it several times.

0:49 And this time through, I was like, hmm, that's kind of creepy. And I was like, why do I not feel that way? It's because Ron Perlman. I want to give him a hug.

0:56 And a little boy.

0:57 You want to give Ron Perlman a hug. It's also because the date in between those two characters....

1:07 Yes.

1:07 It's just like so, so charmingly sexless.

1:11 Yes, completely. Completely.

1:13 So platonic.

1:14 With us today to continue our miniseries on Guillermo del Toro's 2000s films is author Lynn Kudega. She's here to talk Hellboy. They're here to talk Hellboy with us. And we appreciate it deeply. Truly. Lynn, when Emily suggested you, I was like, great. Love this. And I had no idea that for, I don't know, 10 minutes or so before we started recording, we would talk about tabletop games. And, you know, it'd be great. And we're going to get there, too, somehow with this episode. I have no doubt.

1:52 We're going to talk bunnies and burrows, Phil.

1:55 Bunnies and burrows? What's bunnies and burrows? Is that a game?

1:59 It is basically what if Watership Down was a role-playing game.

2:02 It's really sad.

2:05 It's not as good as The Warrens. Which is like the update.

2:08 It's not as good as the Warren. The Warren's far better. It's just smoothed down. But Bunnies and Bros came out of the Forge in the early 2000s. Just before the Forge got really big. And it applies story game aesthetics to also... Imagine that you and your whole family are on the run. And then... Imagine if every single way is shut out. It's like you are prevented from leaving in every single way. Also imagine grief in this context.

2:45 Yeah.

2:47 Sounds great. So Hellboy. Lynn, did you see Hellboy in theaters? I did.

2:55 I was 14.

2:55 Was it.

3:03 Were you familiar with the source material before seeing it?

3:06 No, I was 14.

3:09 I don't know.

3:10 Maybe you read comics. No, I still don't read comics. That's fair. Emily, you had read the comics prior to seeing this movie or after?

3:19 I had not. I went through a phase in the late 2000s where I was illegally downloading a lot of comics. And then I would read them. my apologies to the.

3:33 Authorities actually whatever don't apologize.

3:35 Nobody in this administration cares they're like illegally download everything you want a hundred percent um but i was illegally downloading lots of comics and that's how i read a lot of hellboy stuff and came to i really love these comics i've probably haven't read them in like 15 years so i don't have like a strong memory of them but at the time i was like devouring them sure i really love them i love the ideas as we all know, weird Christian esoterica is my favorite thing in the world. And this is like, I was explaining to a person yesterday that the left behind books are kind of my star Wars, you know, like I was like enmeshed in that whole idea, that whole vision of the world, that eschatological reality. Sure. Like, Nobody's making more

4:28 left behind content for people.

4:30 Really not.

4:30 No.

4:31 So like Hellboy is kind of like in that niche. It's like loosely based on like medieval Christian bullshit, but mostly it's just its own thing.

4:40 I'm trying to see how many issues it ran for.

4:44 Oh, it's, it's, there's been so much Hellboy stuff. Cause they have like, things about abe sapien they have things.

4:51 About the well that makes sense yeah yeah like they.

4:53 You know the original like this sort of adapts the first hellboy.

4:58 Seed of destruction the first sort of yes it is interesting there's a lot of ephemera as you just mentioned emily there's just a lot of offshoots and because as this film shows there's lots of very colorful characters with which to spin off and do things with so that makes sense um I saw this film in 04, but I couldn't tell you if it was, I'm reasonably confident it was on DVD that I did not see this in theaters. I don't know if I've mentioned this in previous episodes, so forgive me if I haven't, but like I was, I was slow to come around to the Guillermo del Toro thing. Like I saw Blade II on DVD and I was like, that's really cool. But I can't say that like, He was enough of a draw to get my butt in the seats for this movie.

5:51 I saw Pan's Labyrinth in theaters, but I don't think I saw Hellboy 2 in theaters. Maybe I did.

5:58 Why did you not see Hellboy 2?

6:00 I might have. I might have. I remember seeing it and being like, this is fucking cuckoo bananas, but I love it.

6:08 It is pretty cuckoo bananas.

6:10 It is pretty cuckoo bananas.

6:12 Yeah no i saw i saw this i saw hellboy in theaters and tried to persuade libby to go with me and she was like i'm not seeing that and then i saw it and really loved it and tried to sell her on it by being like there's a scene where he fights a monster and he's holding a box of kittens it's true and it almost worked and then i think she realized that was not i think she realized that was not the entirety of the.

6:35 Film and was like you know what the film yeah i don't know.

6:38 I I mean, it is, but also there aren't enough kittens.

6:43 So, Lynn, 14-year-old you sees this in theaters. Yeah, 13. 13, 14. Had you seen Blade II at this point? No, right?

6:55 Had I seen Blade II by the time I was 13? I'm not sure, but I can guarantee you I did not know who the director was. Right.

7:05 So, I guess my point is.

7:06 Again, like 13 years old.

7:07 Was this... I just thought it was kind of like, excuse me, an entry point for you for hell boy. Did you, did you, were you like, now I'm a hell boy, Stan?

7:20 Uh, no, but I did love the film. It was one of those things where I, I still wasn't like totally sold on franchises. I had like got gotten onto like the Harry Potter fad. And then I was like, Oh, this isn't very fun anymore. Like, I don't think I read the like last couple of books, you know? Um, So I was never, I'm never really one to like totally dedicate myself to an IP, but like I watched it and I was like, I would watch that again.

7:45 I liked it. Yeah. Sure. Sure.

7:47 I thought it was great.

7:49 I'm going to give a little bit of context for our listeners who maybe have not seen Howboy or read Howboy. It's based on the Dark Horse Comics character created by Mike Mignola. Sure. Written and directed by Guillermo del Toro. The film focuses on the debut comic, Howboy City Destruction. The film, a charismatic demon turned investigator named Howboy played by Ron Perlman. works with the Secretive Bureau of Paranormal Research and Defense to suppress paranormal threats when a resurrected sorcerer seeks to make Howboy fulfill his destiny. That sorcerer, of course, is none other than Rasputin, fulfill his destiny by triggering the apocalypse. Howboy opened on April 2nd, 2004 against Walking Tall, Scooby-Doo Monsters Unleashed, Home on the Range,

8:29 The Passion of the Christ, and The Prince and Me. Ah.

8:33 Yeah, reading about how many theaters were like, well, we can't show The Passion of the Christ and Hellboy in the same multi-plex.

8:42 I love it so much.

8:43 That's incredible.

8:44 Just like, what if Hellboy kills Jesus? He can't purple Rose of Cairo out of this movie.

8:51 It's great.

8:52 If he could, I would have a husband. But.

8:55 It is funny, too, that Hellboy's title was changed in some international markets because you can't have Hell or Satan in your title.

9:02 Oh, right.

9:02 They called him Hello Boy.

9:05 No, they didn't. They called it like... like weird species or species unleashed or something like that.

9:11 There were some theaters or some countries where they called it Hello Boy. But yeah, I'm going to look up some international titles.

9:17 It's tremendous. Yeah, please. This movie would get a 72 score, a Metacritic from critics, a 7.0 from audiences and a 3.4 average on Letterboxd. Roger Ebert gave the film three and a half stars and said, Hellboy is one of those rare movies that not only based on a comic book, but also feels like a comic book is vibrating with energy and you can sense the zeal and joy in its making. Of course, it's constructed on nonstop special effects, bizarre makeup, and a preposterous storyline, but it carries that baggage lightly. Unlike some CGI movies that lumber from one set piece to another, this one skips lightheartedly through the action.

9:48 I think that's a fair assessment. I will say, though, and this was kind of the thing, and I don't want to hold this against the movie too much, but this was the thing that bumped me a little bit about this movie, was the script. It felt very kind of generically comic book-y to me in terms of just sort of like the moves. I think that it's all executed expertly, and I have a really fun time with it.

10:18 And it comes out in 04 before we were really obviously inundated with comic book bullshit like we are now. So I'm trying not to hold it too much against this movie because this movie was in the early days of this bullshit. So I guess like, you know what I'm saying? Like, but it's a little bit, there's a little bit of a lack of conflict or obstacles. Like everything's kind of resolved relatively easily, which... is a bit of a bummer to me, but again, like nitpicking. Cause I had a great time with it, but.

10:48 Most countries called this the hero, the hero from hell, which like, doesn't seem like it's avoiding.

10:55 It doesn't really fix it.

10:57 Uh, but, uh, in Malaysia, it was called, um, super sapiens. Uh, yeah, that's, that's a good title.

11:07 I like super sapiens.

11:09 Oh, it's a terrible title.

11:11 No, it's awful. It's awful.

11:12 It's a terrible title. Imagine trying to convince 13-year-old me to go see Super Sapiens. Absurd.

11:18 This is the thing. Hellboy's a great title.

11:20 I was the target audience for this film. A 13-year-old weirdo. That's who you want in butts in seas for Hellboy.

11:30 I mean, to be clear, that is Guillermo's bread and butter. You know, weirdos.

11:35 13-year-old weirdos for Hellboy, specifically.

11:39 I would argue 13 years old.

11:41 Russia just went all in and called it hellboy hero from hell which i think is already.

11:46 Really doubling down yeah it's really uh it's really going for.

11:48 Yeah i i think were they worried we'd forget yeah.

11:53 I mean there's a line in this movie just to to underline your point um lynn if there's trouble all us freaks have is each other um It's really very much a let your freak flag fly movie of just like weirdos unite type sort of mantra, which to be fair is Guillermo's thing. Yeah. And God bless him for it.

12:22 I mean, I think that, and we've discussed this a little bit in previous episodes, Emily, but when it comes to the style over substance weirdo filmmakers, quote unquote, I think he's got more juice and more substance and has more to say, or is, or is able to sort of make them feel a little bit more substantial than, than a Tim Burton, for instance, who, you know, has flailed for quite some time now. Yeah.

12:52 It's like you read about Guillermo del Toro wanted to make a movie of these comics for just ages and ages. And like part of every career decision he made until he made this movie was how do I get to make hell boy? And you're like, oh, yeah, okay.

13:06 All right.

13:07 The second you see.

13:08 It makes so much sense.

13:10 The second you.

13:11 Just look at Hellboy, you're like, oh, okay.

13:13 Of course. All right. Of course. I guess I don't.

13:18 I find it very weird to, like, think of this as generically comic book-y. Not just in, like, the designs, obviously, are not, are very.

13:26 No, no, no. I don't mean it that way.

13:28 But, like, the storytelling of it is about, like, I guess you could argue that there's been like some Superman movies that lean into is he, can he bring the apocalypse, the long promised, but like, even that's pretty rare. You know, this, this is a, this is a movie about someone whose destiny is to end the world. Who's like, I don't think I'm going to do that, which I think is sort of unique, not in superhero storytelling. It's, it's all over comics and things like that, but we haven't had a lot of that in the movies. So I don't mean to, it is about rejecting a destiny, you know, Sure.

14:05 To be clear, I don't think you're wrong, Emily. I agree with you that this movie is pretty bonkers in terms of what it's doing, right? Like, Rasputin has come back and he wants to bring on the apocalypse and we have a curmudgeon hero who has a stone for a hand. Like, I'm not sitting here saying that on its face this movie is generic. I don't think it is at all. In fact, I think that's what Guillermo loves about it. I think that at its nuts and bolts when it comes to like in its guts of yada yada things and having a team of people that are supernaturally imbued and, and just sort of, especially in the third act, I found it just like very easy on itself in terms of getting to a conclusion. And that's sort of what I mean. It's, it's not, it's

14:55 not certainly not in its visuals, certainly not in its, in its vibes. I think it's more just in its moves.

15:04 Sure, I could see that.

15:05 That's all I mean.

15:06 It is definitely... This reminds me of this era of superhero cinema when comic book movies would hold your hand a lot.

15:16 That's what I mean.

15:19 We know this is weird. It was before they'd figured out that the way to ruin all of culture was to have Robert Downey Jr. be like, I'm Iron Man now.

15:28 Isn't that crazy?

15:28 And people would be like, yay. And again, I, I mean, I love the MCU for a long time.

15:34 And then, um, yeah, now I, well, Deadpool knows he's in a movie, Emily. Like that's, that's, I mean, you know.

15:40 By, by the time this comes out, the Avengers end game revisited will have been.

15:46 Out long enough that I can score.

15:48 I cannot believe that it ends the, that, that scene that of, of Steve Rogers and Peggy, what's her name?

15:55 Carter.

15:56 Dancing as old people now ends with loki coming in and saying you have to help me like the end of fucking back to the future it's crazy it's crazy i'm.

16:06 It's great that's that's the real ending.

16:08 That's the change that to be the ending now.

16:11 They've retconned what was a good ending why that resolves 10 years of cinema and now they're just like jk You must come back with me. It's your kids, Marty. Something's got to be done about your kids.

16:28 Damn, Chris Evans got wifed up. He's like, you know what?

16:32 He's like, I got bills to pay.

16:34 I do need that Marvel money for my third house.

16:39 Yeah, it's crazy. It's, I mean, I, yeah, I know what you're saying, Emily, that we've sort of, there was a time, and we will explore this time, on this mini series of like pre iron man and even iron man, if we're being honest, like the first iron man was very fun and, and game changing in so many ways. And, and we talked dark night. It's it, it does feel like in the two thousands, they were still figuring it out a little bit. And that was more fun.

17:13 They saw, they saw the Raimi Spider-Man.

17:16 Yeah.

17:17 And we're like, this can work. But, like, you have to... And I honestly am a little nostalgic for this period when it was like, we're going to be hyper-sincere and we're going to hold the audience's hand through that. And, like, sometimes, you know, now that I've been enmeshed in fucking superhero movies for the full fucking half my life or whatever, like, it feels... it feels very rudimentary. And I remember at the time being like, just, just don't worry about holding my hand so much. But I do think that like, to some extent the audience had to be like, it's, it's like we're going through a video game movies right now where the fans get mad. Cause it's not like direct adaptation, but I go and see resident evil and

18:04 I'm like, thank you. I've never played one of these games. I'm so happy to be told what's happening, you know?

18:09 Yep.

18:09 And it's just when you start adapting these massively nerdy things. Like when Lynn and I write our Stone Top movie.

18:17 Yeah, it's going to be great. I think that we haven't actually talked about Men Begins yet, Emily. We will at some point. That feels like, obviously, a fulcrum point where... um that movie's successful not like insane numbers but successful and shows that audiences are open to something more grounded and something a little bit more intellectual um it's there are you know we haven't talked watchman yet uh which we will at some point i'm sure um but it we haven't talked hulk like there are some movies where like the studios are are flailing a little bit of just being like i love hulk to be clear but like hulk is a movie you kind of watch and you're just like they really haven't cracked it yet they

19:04 really don't know what they're doing.

19:05 Yet what if we did a miniseries that was sofia coppola and zach snyder what if we just did that.

19:14 I'm listen i'm here for it what is is that like edgelord edgelord and girls it's it's i'm just it's.

19:23 The taste you've left in my mouth it's like i've just brushed my teeth and i've like bitten into an orange it's.

19:29 Like what if we tart what if we this famous thing that people say about our current era which is that everything is gender what if we just made that our podcast for a while.

19:39 I mean i'm here for it i mean we talked about doing an edgelord series i believe you you were you i mean that was.

19:46 I love edgelords as we know i'm married to hellboy.

19:49 Um you're married to hellboy i mean a zach snyder a zach snyder aronofsky miniseries yeah i.

19:56 Just think i think we need to pair him with either the other option is nancy myers although we've already covered the holiday so i.

20:04 Feel like that's a little yeah it's unfortunate a little bit i oh.

20:07 My gosh guys what women want you guys are No, I think that you guys are really missing out on like the Nora Ephron of this time.

20:16 She's it's just Julie and Julia. And what else does she have in the 2000s?

20:21 Because like Bewitched and I think Lucky Numbers is Lucky Numbers.

20:25 Jesus Christ. How could I forget about those? I like Bewitched. I ride for Bewitched. Sure. But Lucky Numbers, that's.

20:32 I think the thing about Nora Ephron.

20:34 We're here defending Hellboy and you draw the line at Lucky Numbers.

20:39 Damn. Sexist. I think the thing about Nora Ephron is I prefer her as a filmmaker to Nancy Meyers, but Nancy Meyers is definitely making movies that are about gender in a way that Nora Ephron is a little bit less interested in.

20:54 I agree with that.

20:55 But Sofia Coppola... I, like, prefer to both of them, and it's definitely making a movie about what if you were a doomed rich girl, like, every time.

21:04 We could just do a Coppola's. We could just do, uh... What was Frantzopoulos? Frantz was up to some interesting stuff. Twixt, for instance?

21:13 Right, we'll call it a fistful of Coppola's.

21:16 And then we'd also do Roman Coppola's CQ.

21:19 Yeah. And because we said fistful, we'd also do all the Eastwoods, and people would be like, what the fuck is happening?

21:24 What the fuck is going on? Yeah, the thing about this movie that I think really works is kind of the Men in Black, Ghostbuster-y lightness that, truth be told, the Hellboys are really the only time that Guillermo is this kind of goofy, funny, silly light. Do you have other options?

21:51 Pacific Rim is right there.

21:52 What are you talking about?

21:53 I guess Pacific Rim is right there. I guess Pacific Rim... yeah i've only seen pacific rim once i liked it i'm not i'm not trying i'm not i'm not coming for pacific rim just to be clear with i think i think pacific rim is a fun movie um it's probably i guess you're right i guess i can't really fight.

22:12 That i think i mean i think i think pacific rim is absolutely his most popcorn-y film by a long degree Yeah. But to me, it's always felt a little insubstantial. I think it's I mean, Mimic is bad, but I think Pacific Rim outside of Mimic is my least favorite of his, which I know is not a like interesting, extremely well held opinion. But it is like Hellboy and Hellboy to feel to me like they are. grappling with a thing that he is very emotionally attached to about like outsiders and monsters and weirdos and fighting monsters with kittens in your hand like things that he really cares about and pacific rim i think he he absolutely cares about it but in the manner of like I play with my daughter all the time. She has all these little, like,

23:05 action figures from different universes, and we have a bluey-themed dollhouse. And so it's just like, oh, Spider-Man has come to visit the healers. And now, like, that's what Pacific Rim feels like, is Guillermo del Toro playing just with a box of action figures.

23:20 Yeah, I mean, it's robots versus Godzillas. Like, it's, I mean, it's pretty, you look like you have thoughts on it.

23:26 I have so many thoughts. This is not the topic of the podcast. Okay.

23:30 I'm so excited.

23:31 Now I'm excited. Yeah. Let's hear it.

23:33 I love Pacific Rim kind of in the same vein of like what we were talking about with like Warren, like, um, uh, rabbits and Warrens, um, or the Warren, right. It's this idea that like, imagine that like monsters have unionized and they're coming after you. Now imagine the only way to fight them is through the power of love and and now and then you know you these two people that are like deeply in love they're obviously brothers but have this like really strong bond and then one of them dies that he's like imagine grief in this context.

24:07 Yeah yeah yeah okay you're talking about it i think part of why i struggle with that movie is that i did manage to make get libby to see it and she thought it was some bullshit she really hated it and i realized it was because she I realized it was because she was picturing having to be in like a shared mental space with me.

24:26 Yeah. She didn't want to be in a robot with you.

24:32 I mean, it's really goofy, but I do love that film. I think it has a lot of really great moments and very funny and very light, but also dealing with the same themes that you can sort of track through. all of Guillermo del Toro's work, which is really interesting because even though in Pacific Rim, the monsters are very clearly like the bad guys, they're also very humanized. They're like, we are doing this for a specific purpose. We have a thought process here. This is not because we're like mindless monsters. It's because like our world is dying and we need to leave. So it's a really interesting way of like a rejection of symbiosis and a rejection. And that again is, falls into how these like two like

25:11 drift compatible people are like rejecting their own symbiosis and learning to, or embracing their symbiosis.

25:18 Anyway. Can I just say that I love how, how you just threw away the drift compatible as though that's just a totally normal.

25:27 Whatever people on this podcast right now, who, which two are most drift compatible. That's an important question.

25:34 That's a question. I've wanted to rewatch a Pacific rim. I keep waiting for it to pop up on a streaming service that I don't have to pay for it, essentially. Like, it's just a movie that I've thought about rewatching and will rewatch at some point. Another thing that I wanted to talk about with this movie, just very, very briefly, or maybe not, the steampunkiness of this movie. Yeah. Yeah.

25:59 It's like so techno magic. It is so Arcanist. I love it. so goofy and like inspired a lot of people for like 10 years to dress in top hats with touch gears to buttons and i'm just like you know what you know you deserve that one million percent on you the trench coats and like the the fake leather piping.

26:27 The the the the i don't know what you would the villain or that the henchman to russ putin who is wearing this sort of steel suit yeah a a antiquated steampunky gimp.

26:44 Suit yeah the steampunk gimp we all know.

26:48 Who you're talking about it's it's great it's great it's it's really and he has to like wind himself up basically he has to like wind his own heart kind of He has like blades for hands.

27:03 It's great.

27:04 Yeah.

27:05 That is BDSM.

27:08 Yeah.

27:11 That is someone's fetish. And I don't know who's. And I'm just like. Is this you buddy? I don't know.

27:19 I love that steampunk. As a whole. Like a subgenre. The thing that has happened. Is that the steampunk aesthetic. has has continued to exist but the sub-genre which is what if we invented modern technology in the british empire of the 1800s it's um um uh the bruce sterling william gibson novel the difference um engine okay uh which is a wonderful book it's from 1990 but it is very much like a book about like how technological change like changes society how it like often leaves the underclass behind all of these like very important themes that alternate history gets really well. And people were like, what if men wore hats again?

28:08 What if men wore top hats and monocles?

28:12 The drip is the most important part of history. Like we all know that.

28:16 I mean, we are also going to talk about another steampunk movie in the coming weeks. Emily is when we talk about the golden compass, which is also steampunk.

28:24 In its own way i feel like yes i guess i guess it is i it feels like that was an aesthetic that was applied to a text that was not necessary but we'll talk about it.

28:35 We'll talk about that but i i think it is i think i think that kind of gets to the steampunk thing though right like wild wild west didn't have steampunk elements in the television show either am i.

28:50 Right, right, right, right. I, yeah, no, I get it. I get it. I mean, we, we like, it is a thing that looks cool that when you actually try to tell a story that is about how a world like that would come to exist.

29:02 You know, extraordinary gentlemen, for instance.

29:04 Yeah. It's usually an alternate history, which is great, which is fine, which is fun. But yeah, it's, it's, um, it is a thing where like, if you try to adapt the difference engine as like, it would almost have to be an HBO miniseries. Like, A, I think that's a noble goal, but B, people would be like, the steampunk of it all would cut against the books.

29:26 Yes.

29:26 Because we're so used to it being a thing for men in their 40s. I love men in their 40s. Phil, I love you.

29:34 But i think that steampunk is it breaks people's brains when you try to actually explain it i think that i mean didn't the nevers also have steampunk involved in it i never wish the nevers well i'm just saying i'm again i'm not i'm not like saying Joss Whedon is great. I'm saying that The Nevers existed and it had steampunk in it, is all I'm saying.

30:02 It did, and I think you can no longer watch it. But if you told me Joss Whedon made a steampunk thing, I would not be surprised by that. Sounds right.

30:12 It's just this, I think, and Lynn, it seems like with your excitement about bringing up steampunk, that it has fervent fans. Like, there are people that love it. And yet no one's fully cracked it.

30:26 Yeah, there's a lot about that genre that I love. One of the things that I love about steampunk sort of relates to what you said about technology leaving behind disenfranchised in our contemporary real world. And steampunk sort of says you can seize the means of technology for yourself and you can just make it. It can be whatever you want.

30:48 You can find it.

30:49 You can build it. And a lot of steampunk stories kind of revolve around creation of or the discovery of a device of some sort that is powerful that allows people who have been absent of power to reclaim that power so there is something really interesting about steampunk that while it does ascribe to hierarchies it also uses technology as a method to destroy those hierarchies which is really which is like really relational to hellboy where it allows Hellboy, the use of technology and artifacts, something from another world that nobody quite understands, allows him to disrupt the hierarchies of control that have sort of been oppressing him his whole life.

31:39 Yep, totally.

31:41 The thing I think about when I'm like, because that is inherent to a lot of steampunk storytelling, I think a lot about this webcomic girl genius that I read for a while, but I don't think ultimately was very good but had like cool aesthetics and steampunky stuff and it was very much like i mean the premise was what if a girl was a genius but like it it was like uh it was about that if you had the right kind of technology you could like upend the world order and i do think that we are not in a place where we want to like hear that anymore just because yeah the the people who upended the world order because they got their hands on like life-changing technology have so far Have a pretty bad track record.

32:25 They haven't done a great job, but I do think I do think it.

32:27 Is built out of that era aesthetically because of like the robber barons who are the closest like analog to our current tech.

32:37 Overlords also it is hilarious to me to think of elon dressing like a steampunk bro in the early 2000s.

32:44 You fucking know he has you.

32:46 Know yeah as soon as as soon as you said that i'm like oh yeah he absolutely had like a trench coat with gears for buttons what no.

32:54 Question before he had his gender affirming surgeries uh i'm sure he definitely um definitely dressed.

33:03 That way i i don't know dress that way again he should just.

33:08 He's dating Grimes He has three children with Grimes He's basically going cyberpunk.

33:14 Listen I will never like that man But I would dislike him Slightly.

33:21 Less if he dressed steampunk All the time If he wore a top hat and a monocle and gears for buttons I'd be like alright.

33:28 If he committed to the bit Yes Can I tell you a story about the film The Greatest Showman No We're moving on. It's listen, listen, this is important.

33:39 Okay. This is important. Okay.

33:41 I have only seen that movie one time. I went and saw it at an award screening that 20th century Fox put on, on the lot. That was like a sing along. And so it was like all these people. And at the end of the movie, they play, I think this is me or something over the closing credits, or one of the songs from the film plays over the closing credits and And I turned around and a group of like women in their forties and fifties were doing a choreographed dance to it. And standing at the center was a young man wearing a top hat and a monocle and holding a cane, which he just kept thrusting up and down in the air to in time with the music as these women danced around him. And that's what I think somebody should do with steampunk. They

34:28 should just make a movie about that is just like, Yeah.

34:33 I'm here for it.

34:34 Make Hellboy 3 Guillermo and add that man to Hellboy 3.

34:38 I don't think a Hellboy 3 is in Guillermo's future.

34:42 It's not going to happen, but if it does, he should take that note. That's my note for him.

34:49 I do wonder if Guillermo has moved past these types of movies, unfortunately. Whether or not he's he's now like serious filmmaker guy as opposed to having like playful.

35:07 Fun frankenstein could have used a little bit more hellboy great just just a little i.

35:12 Think i could have used a lot more hellboy that's a good good thought.

35:15 Or ape sapien oh what if ape sapien was friends with frankenstein's monster what if that happened that would be great.

35:24 Can we also talk about how ape sapien walked so the fish man in shape of water could run oh yeah oh so he could fuck He swam so he could fuck.

35:34 Abe Sapien was pretty sexy, so I get it.

35:38 Do we think Abe Sapien fucks?

35:42 Oh, Abe Sapien absolutely fucks. I'm sorry, Philip. Were you just surprised that I said Abe Sapien was sexy?

35:51 I wouldn't say that I was surprised. I agree, to be clear. I was a little.

35:55 I think it's because.

36:00 It's a fish man voiced by David Hyde Pierce. So it. Okay.

36:07 What are you seeing that I'm not seeing?

36:10 This is queer erasure. This is like.

36:12 No, no, no. I don't mean to suggest that David Hyde Pierce isn't sexy.

36:17 It sounds like that's what you're suggesting.

36:20 It sounds like you think David Hyde Pierce would be less sexy if he was a fish man, and that is offensive to me.

36:26 Actually, you know what? I take that back. He is sexier as a fish man, for sure.

36:32 You know, Niles. Niles, hot boy.

36:36 No, let's come on the pod. Yeah, I.

36:40 But it's also like Doug Jones. It's like Doug Jones is hot. That is a conventionally attractive man.

36:49 His physical talents, right, of how he's able to move his body and how he's able to.

36:58 Yeah, body language.

36:59 Body language is phenomenal.

37:02 Body language.

37:03 We recorded these slightly out of order, so we did our Pan's Labyrinth episode last week, but his body language with the faun is tremendous as well. There's kind of no one that does what he does.

37:17 Another fuckable monster.

37:20 The phone listen.

37:23 I feel like you are really like showing.

37:25 The limits i do i want to also you could call me phil i should change my thing philip is so formal i appreciate the the formality but i i yes.

37:38 I think I said I would marry the faun.

37:40 No.

37:40 You said you.

37:41 Would marry the faun, but does that... I.

37:44 Mean, that implies some sexual activity.

37:47 You're not going to get an annulment to the faun. It feels like a bad call. You can even imagine serving the faun from Pan's Labyrinth with divorce papers.

37:57 But would you want to be held by the faun? The faun is made of wood, it seems. He's very prickly, and it doesn't seem cozy.

38:05 Listen, in a few months... wicker is going to be out you're right and then we will stop having these silly questions about whether or not the font is fuckable like obviously.

38:16 The like it is we are just in it's amazing to me how frequently it seems like every year we have to have a conversation that's like people who are attracted to men are attracted to this basket man people who are not attracted to men are like really and they're like so thrown by it, but it is.

38:36 Hold on. Hold on. I can, I, I understand the attraction to all of these characters to be clear. Like I'm, this is not me sitting here. I'm not yucking. Anyone's young. I look at the wicker man and I'm like, I see it. I get it. Not the wicker man, but the man in wicker. And I, I, I see it. I get it. I get the Abe Sapien.

39:01 I do.

39:02 The only reason I push back on the faun is because the faun is like diabolical. It's in ways that.

39:12 Okay.

39:13 All right. Maybe that makes it harder.

39:15 You don't fix him and also make him worse. Yeah. Don't worry about it.

39:22 That is just being attracted to men. You know, you just got to deal with someone who's a little bit diabolical and be like, you know what? I can, I can do this. I can make this happen.

39:33 That's fair. That's fair.

39:34 I can make it work.

39:35 Unless you want a strong, caring husband. And that's why you have Hellboy.

39:39 Abe Sapien is a different thing though. Cause Abe Sapien has this, like, he's very tender. He seems very sweet.

39:46 Yes.

39:47 He's an intellectual um he's got all these attributes that i understand.

39:53 What are you doing right now.

39:58 What is happening phil is like talking himself phil is like discovering like the one percent of himself that's bisexual and it's apesapien.

40:06 It's very funny i'm just like.

40:08 In real time what's going on We need to.

40:11 Put, like, a hear-me-out cake in front of, like, Just Phil and see, like, how it changes over every single episode because Ape Sapien's going on there.

40:19 You know Ape Sapien is lovely.

40:22 It's crazy. It's crazy to me because, like, you're putting Ape Sapien on a hear-me-out cake. I am putting, like, the very specific hole that Cronin in, like, tears his heart out of. Like, I'm like, that.

40:32 Correct.

40:35 I interviewed Doug Jones at the A.V.

40:36 Club.

40:38 I did a random rolls with him. which was so fun. I had like a half hour at Comic-Con and I was having a blast. And then he revealed he played Mac tonight in the old McDonald's commercials. And that, that like derailed me for like five minutes. Cause I was like, let's talk about when you had a giant moon head, please.

40:55 And I think very little of it survived the edit because it was just like me, like fanning out over Mac tonight.

41:03 Mac tonight is Mr. Melancholy from I saw the TV club. Like, that is just, it's terrifying.

41:11 Listen, except he likes hamburgers, and I don't think Mr. Melancholy's ever had a hamburger, so.

41:17 No, he just drinks that blue goo stuff, it seems. Yeah.

41:22 Yeah.

41:23 Anyway, I love Abe Sapien, and I'm okay with it. Yeah, I think that I also love John Hurt in this movie. John Hurt, who is never bad. might be in bad movies, but is always good. This is not a bad movie to be clear. The movie I'm ultimately thinking about is a movie that we're going to be covering, uh, early next year, Emily, um, Indiana Jones and the kingdom of the crystal skull, um, where, where John Hurt is just doing his best, doing his, doing his best. Um, but yeah, I, I do feel like he's perfect casting in this, like so, you know, fatherly and lovely. I mean, Guillermo, there's a quote about the film's central theme that Guillermo gave, said, the movie becomes a story of two fathers with a

42:13 single son. Hellboy has one father in Broome and another father in Rasputin. It's a very graphic way of representing Hellboy's conflict. Yeah, I mean, it is. You can see that. You can see these two fathers, the devil and the angel, if you will. But John Hurt brings so much like emotion and love. And it's, it's a really lovely performance. Yeah.

42:40 The thing I think I responded to in this movie that I think I, I lack in a lot of other superhero cinema is the ensemble aspect. This is very X-Men related.

42:53 Very much.

42:53 Yeah.

42:53 And I think like prior to this, probably when I'm like in my top five, let's see, this came out before Spider-Man two. So prior to this, my favorite, but a couple months before. So when I was, like, writing about it for my college newspaper, I think X2 at that time was my favorite superhero movie. And that is, like, I have always liked when a superhero story is actually an ensemble, like a WB ensemble TV show. Like, my ideal form of superhero storytelling is evidently Smallville, a show I never watched.

43:30 But.

43:33 But yeah, it is. It's yeah. It's, it's like I think that's what I respond to in this is that all of these characters are in this like kind of, I mean, it's a very RPG party thing where it's like, we have different strengths. Here's the guy who's the, just the normal guy, but his strength is he's got a lot of heart or whatever. It's yeah. I think it's, I think that's what I really love about this movie.

44:02 It's very reminiscent of just when you get together a heist film or a mob movie, right? You have a heavy, you have a fixer, you have an engineer, you have a driver. So there is something really comforting about having people fill these certain roles for the action that is going to happen in the film. Because if you have a driver in a heist film, you know there's going to be a car chase. If you have... If you have.

44:30 A pyromaniac or a pyrotechnic lady you know that like something is going to get set on fire that shouldn't like it's just it's really nice to have these sort of very very clear signposts for how the movie is going to fit together within the team that is created.

44:52 And it's also like it's a great metaphor for family and all that sort of stuff too right like you get to just play with the whole like found family stuff which is always great Yeah, I mean, Del Toro tried to make this movie for a really long time. So it was not a surprise that the second that he had even the smallest of blank checks off of Blade II, he jumped at the opportunity to make this.

45:13 There were various iterations of it, animated versions. There was a Harryhausen version of it. He invited Harryhausen to work with his animators. Harryhausen declined, said that he thought modern films were too violent. God bless him. Love that. You know, there was, del Toro researched the occult and Nazi philosophies and used them as reference for the opening sequence. There's an early version of the script where a gyroscope portal was described as being made out of rails that formed into pentagrams, hexagrams, and inverted stars to illustrate the film's magic and occult elements. Sure. You know, it's, I think that there's a lot of like, labyrinthian kind of components to this too which I wonder if I can only

46:01 assume that Pan's Labyrinth which is you know the next film that he does but he talks about labyrinths being a motif for the film to represent Hellboy's conflict of choosing the right path he feels that labyrinths represent the film's themes and a labyrinth it is said is a place not is not a place to be lost but a place to find yourself which is very much what Pan's Labyrinth obviously taps into.

46:26 That's really interesting because there's only one way out of a labyrinth, right? Like he's not actually making any choice, real choices. It's just, you know, he's trying to figure out how to get to where he's going. And I think that that's something really interesting is the fact that like there's no two ways out of a labyrinth.

46:46 There's one way.

46:47 So I think it's to have, to have labyrinth as a, as a theme for hell boys sort of, sort of like really confirms the hero's story of the whole thing where it's like, he was never really in danger of falling.

47:02 Right.

47:02 Uh, he was always going to do the right thing, end up at the right place, be the right hero for the time. And I think it's interesting that labyrinths, um, are places where you are afraid that you'll never get out of it.

47:19 Right.

47:19 You'll never find your way out. You'll never find your way to like the, the place where, you know, you're going to end up. So having that as sort of an extension of anxiety and personal turmoil, especially as he's got to deal with his friendships and his relationships is an interesting way to think of his struggle.

47:40 Right.

47:41 Because again, there's only one way out of a labyrinth.

47:45 Yeah, no, for sure. It, it, it is interesting that like, I mean, obviously, uh, Guillermo loves the visual metaphor of a labyrinth, right? Like, and that's, and, and, um, to your point though, there is only one way out of it. It's not, it's not a maze of, I mean, it's amazing for the character. I don't know. I appreciate the fact that he's making it literal. And yet at the same time, it just, it really works incredibly well for the characters. I do also feel like this movie, just wondering about its development process. Basically, he always wanted Ron Perlman as the lead of this movie. And as you can imagine, studios are like- I get it. I get it too, but also shooters are like, Ron Perlman? Like,

48:44 it is, they got a lot of pushback on that. It should be said that when Guillermo met the creator of the comic, Mike, and decided to reveal to each other their lead choice for the role, they both said Ron Perlman at the same time, which I think is hilarious.

49:01 That's so cute.

49:02 Universal wanted Vin Diesel. Okay. Also, the role was offered to Jeremy Renner.

49:11 Oh, yeah. In 2004?

49:14 Yeah. I know.

49:17 That's way earlier. That one's baffling.

49:19 Yeah.

49:19 I agree. Yeah.

49:20 That's like Ron Perlman was a bigger star than Jeremy.

49:23 I agree. I just wonder if they were just like hot hell boy, hotter hell boy. I don't know. I think Ron Perlman is hot, but I'm just Ron Perlman.

49:33 Gorgeous man. But yeah, that is the thing you run into is like, who are you going to cast? Who's going to be caked under that much makeup?

49:40 Yeah.

49:40 Who's going to like the person I think might have worked is Lawrence Fishburne. I think you could have made that work, but that's like trying to pick someone who in 2004 reasonably might've gotten this movie made. But yeah, like Vin Diesel, I think is just like, the thing you want is you never want the scene where he's magically appears without the makeup and, and Perlman's going to do that. I don't know that any bigger star than Perlman would have been like, well, you, I have to do a scene where I kiss Selma Blair without the makeup on and just, you know, whatever.

50:15 I also think, like, this was a movie that was going to cost a fair amount of money just on effects alone, right? Like, this is a movie that made $ 99. 8 million, so close to $ 100 million, almost broke $ 100 million.

50:28 I remember them keeping this in theaters to, like, try to do it. It just never happened.

50:34 And it just couldn't get there. It's a $ 66 million budget, which is not nothing, but like, it's not, you know, breaking the bank by any means. But I do think that it was clear that the production budget was going to be pretty high. So like none of these, you know, there, there aren't any names in this movie for, for not to be disparaging of this cast, but like, there aren't any names that are getting people into the theater. I also don't think that this was a comic that was particularly, you know, huge. So yeah, you kind of understand on some level them being like, we put Vin Diesel in this thing. Like, at least that's a guy that people know for what it's worth. I'm not saying they should have done it. I'm just saying, I'm putting my studio

51:16 hat on this thing. Like, I get why they were trying.

51:18 It's like, I understand why they cast Phil, David Harbour. I almost called him Phil Harbour. David Harbour in the, like, 2019 reboot that apparently, I've never seen this.

51:27 I've never seen it. Quite dire.

51:29 But, you know, I get it.

51:31 There's a reboot?

51:32 Yes.

51:33 Yes.

51:33 Did they make two of them, Emily? Why?

51:35 This movie's perfect. Yeah, they've made two additional Hellboy reboots, neither of which has been successful. The second of which was direct-to-video, at least in the United States.

51:44 Yeah, I'm looking to see.

51:46 It was Ketchup Entertainment, everybody's favorite company.

51:49 Yeah, Hellboy the Crooked Man?

51:53 Yeah, why not? Why not have a Crooked Man in Hellboy? It is like, I do think like the That this is an era when studios are not yet trusting the idea that the character is the star. And they very quickly would get past that. But the thing about Hellboy is nobody's kind of going to care unless it's Jim Carrey.

52:21 You know, what if it was Jim Carrey?

52:23 What if it was Jim Carrey?

52:25 I would watch that. Yeah, I think that it's interesting because this is sort of the early days of people of like Hollywood in particular, recognizing fandom as a legitimate method of getting butts in seats.

52:41 Right.

52:41 I think that this is one of the first one of the first eras in the early 90s. in the early 1990s, in the late 1990s, they had sort of begun to tap fandom for certain things. And then in the early 2000s, this sort of like really started exploding. And the big point where people realize that like, oh, fandom is like a marketable, so you can market to fandom itself, was when the Dark Knight ARG happened. do you remember that with the joke with joke with when it was like the joker film in particular um and they they thought this arg was going to take you know the fandom like again this sort of nebulous fandom that they didn't really understand um was going to take them for like four months to figure out and the

53:37 fandom figured it out in two days and it was yeah like very genuinely just like they were just like no we can totally do this they they organized on forums they showed up in person everyone was everyone like it was you had flip phones so they still had cameras and they were able to share all of that um and this this movie and sort of the ensuing superhero films they they quickly realized the power of fandom and fandom activation to get people invested and they really generated a like or not generated but they really uh created a foundation for fandom generated content to be used as marketing in this time which was a really really fascinating move to like putting power power maybe like too much power into the audience's hands mm-hmm.

54:31 Yeah i think we need i think we need to cut the audience down to size a little bit now i think we need to be like uh no uh that that is like that summer of 2008 is such a demarcation point because it's iron man and dark knight blow the fuck up and are both like just even the year before is snakes on a plane it may have been two years before snakes on a plane where everyone's like well this is an internet thing maybe it'll be a huge success and it was not And then it does feel like Iron Man and Dark Knight are finally this kind of the rise of this. You can market to the ain't it cool news audience because now they're everybody. I guess you could argue Lord of the Rings, but that felt like a prestige play in a way

55:12 that like Iron Man especially did not. So, you know, it's it's and also was based on a book that was like one of the best selling books in history. And the basis of culture.

55:23 Yeah.

55:24 Lord of the Rings at the time when it came out was like so enmeshed in culture right like at the time the Lord of the Rings had come out uh you know um what is it what's uh the Game of Thrones was already like on the had been on the best like five Game of Thrones books were already on the bestseller list by the time like uh Lord of the Rings was in theaters so it's just one of those things where it's just like that so prestigious and also like so enmeshed in culture and the way that people thought about storytelling. Kind of incomparable, in my opinion.

56:03 I totally agree, and I would say that Game of Thrones actually breaks television in the way that those movies broke movies, right? In the sense of, oh, okay, everyone likes The Dragon Show. It's not just for the nerds. It's actually for everybody. And it's... I mean, all the wrong lessons were taken from all of this stuff. And it does feel, unfortunately, especially with television, seeing sort of this trying to make TV into movies and vice versa has not benefited either formats particularly.

56:43 Yeah, I wrote a thing at Vox that was like, everything is TV now. And it feels like TV and movies have grown together in a way that I don't know has... necessarily benefited either medium it feel it feels like there's a there's a divorce happening now i agree um so we'll see what the most evident film but we'll see what happens going forward maybe it's hellboy three it's.

57:07 What i'm saying um david high pierce refused to take credit for uh the role he said it was out of respect for doug jones he felt it was his role and um yeah so i i I appreciate that. I think it's a sweet thing that he did that. It should also surprise no one that the... I don't even know how you say it. The Sam-Miao creatures in this.

57:35 Sam-Miao.

57:36 Sam-Miao. My apologies. Are inspired by H.P. Lovecraft. What? Guillermo del Toro? Inspired by H.P. Lovecraft?

57:45 I don't know how you say it.

57:52 It's a good thing you don't say it. The better for everyone you mispronounce it.

57:56 Great.

57:58 Cool. We should have the monstrosity on as a guest.

58:02 Okay.

58:03 What if we had Hulu on to discuss the country bears? I think that would be great.

58:11 I'd love to hear their thoughts. Guillermo opted to do this movie.

58:16 Lynn has doubts.

58:19 Just.

58:20 I don't think we should be fucking with that shit, man.

58:23 Guillermo did this film and in the process turned down doing Alien vs. Predator and Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.

58:34 I think he would have been fun for one of those two. I think I would have been interested in seeing his take on Potter. I just threw salt over my shoulder. so everyone knows to ward off ward off evil um but yeah yeah i would have.

58:54 Wanted to see him take on aliens versus predators i just.

58:58 Feel like he would have they would have they would.

59:00 Have fucked this is true that's the thing right We would have caught them mid-coitus, and I feel robbed.

59:11 I do feel like he would have gotten boxed in a little bit with two different franchises he had to satiate. And the thing we're forgetting about Azkaban is that it introduces the Dementors, which I know he would have had a blast with. So that's, I think, where my... It's the one Potter book I think holds up. I really like that.

59:30 I like Cuaron's direction of that film, but I agree with Emily that I would have liked to have seen what Guillermo did with it. Can we all agree that Baby Hellboy is really cute?

59:43 Yeah.

59:45 I would adopt Baby Hellboy.

59:46 Okay, good, good, good.

59:47 I think my kid needs a baby brother who's a demon.

59:50 Yeah. Yeah.

59:53 That would be so cute, though.

59:54 It'd be so cute.

59:57 I don't think I can adopt baby Hellboy, cute as he is. I have enough trouble with my dog, so, you know.

1:00:06 Are they still looking at you from the doorway?

1:00:08 No, my dog went outside, did some business, and now she is sitting in front of my office door, just in case.

1:00:19 Cool, cool. I think it's a little weird that the Hellboy comics exist in the world of the Hellboy movie. No, I love it.

1:00:29 I think it's so cheesy and so fun.

1:00:32 It's more just, it makes, whatever stuff like that happens, it makes my head hurt when I'm like, so what's reality?

1:00:41 I mean, it's like we have, you know, it's like how you have fan properties surrounding, say, Taylor Swift or Beyoncé or It's just like, it is a wink to that. Like if there were superheroic figures in our world, we would probably interpret them through superhero comics. It just, it becomes iterative. Like there's, for instance, there's so many children's books you can buy about like pop stars. Like I could walk out and buy like six Olivia Rodrigo little golden books right now. And they'd all like, some of them would be like mythologizing her rise to fame. Some would just be like about one of her songs. It is like, you know, I do think that perhaps it's just the comic book thing of it all. But I

1:01:32 love any time a story does that because it feels to me like how reality adapts to celebrity in a certain way.

1:01:41 I see.

1:01:41 That's fair. I would push it a little bit further away from this like direct hero worship and more like, you know, the Mothman statue in West Virginia.

1:01:50 Yeah.

1:01:50 It's like that, man. Like, we don't know if there's a Mothman. I mean, pretty sure there's not, but we don't know, man. The Monongahela National Forest is a radio dead zone. Nothing gets in or out of there. And like, if there's a Mothman, I'm.

1:02:03 Not, I don't know.

1:02:05 But like the, the idea that there's like, you know, now there's Mothman plushies and Mothman is a part of the culture. And there's Mothman comic books. Like imagine the real Mothman hold up in a nest with like Mothman memorabilia. You know?

1:02:18 I love that for them.

1:02:21 But that's that's kind of the vibe, right, is that there is this like or even the way that like Slenderman or the back rooms have sort of like started out as the sort of like cultural phenomenon that has like gotten to whisper network and then become a part of a different part of culture and then like culture eating its tail like a giant Ouroboros of, you know, clowns in the woods trying to kill you.

1:02:43 I remember how many stories there were about Batboy. explicitly made up, but with the veneer of this is real. When Batboy initially appeared, I always like Hellboy has always felt to me like a riff on weekly world news type tabloid monsters that are not real, but are presented as being real. And then when one of them really hits the culture takes it in a whole bunch of different directions.

1:03:13 Sure.

1:03:14 I do. We think Hellboy has met Batboy.

1:03:17 Probably. Yeah. Probably.

1:03:19 Yeah.

1:03:20 Um, this is a, here's the thing though.

1:03:23 I think hell boy would hate bad boys guts. I think hell boy would meet bad boy and be like, man, I would bully you in school. Like that's the energy here.

1:03:32 Bad boys. That sounds right. That sounds right. Yeah. Um, a little thing, but it bummed me out that they couldn't either couldn't or chose not to buy the rights to Nick caves, red, right hand and had some shitty cover of it. Um, I think that's a wasted opportunity.

1:03:49 I kind of feel like Nick Cave read their proposal and was like, that's a little on the nose. I'm not going to do this.

1:03:56 I'm not going to do this. Yeah, I mean, so I want to talk Selma Blair for a second, not her political views, to be clear.

1:04:05 She's just the most normal person.

1:04:07 She's super normal. We have nothing to worry about.

1:04:11 In 2004, Selma Blair seemed like she was fine.

1:04:15 She seemed fine.

1:04:18 I have not kept up with the Selma Blair drama.

1:04:23 You're better off for it. Yeah, she's... Very pro-Israel.

1:04:28 Yeah, she's appearing in extremely overtly pro-Israel films made by the Israeli film industry now.

1:04:38 Correct.

1:04:40 Wow. So that's Selma Blair, her performance. uh, her choice, I guess.

1:04:47 Um, it is, it is her choice.

1:04:49 She's allowed to do that.

1:04:52 But in 2004, yeah, she's just, she's really, um, we don't, we don't need to go down this road, but I mean, here's what I will say. I, I, I, um, it's unfortunate that, that she, uh, struggles with multiple sclerosis. That is a thing. Um, and you know, uh, she has been helpful towards, I think organizations when it comes to that, uh, disease and uh with that i tip my hat everything else stays in the hat um.

1:05:21 And and she's quite good in hellboy she's good.

1:05:24 It's quite good and so we we talked a little bit about her emily when we did storytelling a movie that everybody has seen and everybody loves.

1:05:32 Uh yeah one of our most listened to.

1:05:34 Episodes two episodes um in the 2000s you know she's in the sweetest thing uh she's in a guy thing weirdly did two films that have thing in the title um the the sole effort of uh doug lyman as a director.

1:05:51 Um uh a doug lyman doug lyman did other guys.

1:05:56 He directed that though didn't he no he didn't do a guy thing he did what was the other what was the movie he did he did a movie with um god damn it this is.

1:06:06 I'm sorry guys i gotta maybe confusing him with someone else because.

1:06:10 I'm thinking of um uh the entourage uh showrunner creator what's his name why am i drawing a blank on his name come on emily doug ellen doug ellen is his name and doug ellen directed kissing a fool which i obviously got mistaken for a guy thing and we've come full circle i hope you all enjoyed that journey that we went on uh my apologies to everybody involved uh she's good at a great time yeah um She's never, like, been the lead of anything.

1:06:44 I remember, like, she would be in things as just, like, the normal girl compared to, like, some blonde lady.

1:06:52 Or the, like, edgy girl next to a blonde lady.

1:06:56 As a blonde lady.

1:07:01 Well, because, like, that's basically, Legally Blonde is that, right? Like, that's where she's doing that, where she plays Vivian Thelma Kensington. um but yeah she's really good in this movie and I'm a little surprised that Selma Blair didn't blow up a little bit more not even off of this movie but just kind of in general I feel like she's got this sort of Aubrey Plaza-ish energy that I think could have done more stuff with it and it just kind of it felt like she did that but in a bunch of.

1:07:35 Movies no one saw yeah looking over her her you know list of movies i'm like she should have fired her agent so fast like wow following allegedly following up hellboy with a again i'm on wikipedia this is very boring for a lot of people but following up hellboy with like a sex comedy pretty quickly a.

1:08:00 John waters movie so we should we should you know give john waters his due i'm sure that she wanted to be in a john waters movie it's just not a particularly good one and unfortunately his last film and then she's in in good company but it's a kind of a small role which is the paul wetz um i like.

1:08:17 Yeah i don't know you you do a sex comedy when you're trying to like break into a role not when you're trying to break out of a type.

1:08:24 I agree yeah it does feel like every time she would like try a thing, she would run back to kind of raunch calm. Cause she was like, I feel, I don't know. I feel safest there or whatever. Um, it is kind of wild that like within four years of this, she's doing the famous flop TV show, um, Kath and Kim, which like, right. Yeah. It's just like, yeah, she never, she never took off, but she always felt like she was about to for a long time there.

1:08:53 Um, yeah, she, she plays Chris Jenner in OJ, the American, uh, crime story. yeah she does stuff i don't know she yeah listen there the simple player is a is a complex uh she can she she contains multitudes um but she's good in this movie um she's got a she's got a great vibe she's got great chemistry with ron perlman She can.

1:09:17 Start on fire, which is a thing we all love.

1:09:21 She's pyrokinetic, which is pretty rad. I'll say that the one kind of significant miscasting in this movie, in my humble opinion, Rupert Evans as, what's his face, John Myers.

1:09:37 The everyman.

1:09:40 He's so vanilla. There's nothing there. It's just he's not doing anything for me.

1:09:43 I think that's the point, though.

1:09:45 Right? Sure. If you wanted wallpaper, you got it. And he, you know.

1:09:51 I mean, I think he might be a little harsh on this character. Okay. Because wallpaper, he might be. But he's also going up against, you know, fucking Hellboy. Ron Perlman as Hellboy. It's really hard to play across from Ron Perlman as Hellboy. And then Abe Sapien as... And then Selma Blair looking incredibly hot. And then also a guy with a clockwork heart.

1:10:18 He's wallpaper, but... I love that you're like, playing in scenes against Abe Sapien is really tough. He's like... Yeah. It is.

1:10:28 He takes up a lot of space. He looks cool. I think that's the thing, right? It's like, that character is. Like literally an accountant who got like sucked into this because of some sort of, I don't know.

1:10:42 Tax, whatever, whatever, whatever. If this actor, and I don't mean to be like clowning on Rupert Evans, but like, he's not a very nice boy. I'm sure he's lovely. He's not in the sequel and he's, he's not in anything ever again. Like it's, he's in stuff, but like no one's ever seen these things. This is short films.

1:11:00 It's like, he does feel like he's here because of a note, a studio note. It feels like this is the, like, the capitulation to, we are casting Ron Perlman. Like we're going to have a normal guy and we're going to cast like a guy who maybe could be a heartthrob. And then Guillermo del Toro is just like, look at this heartthrob. And it's, um, you do need a Xander in a story like this. You do need a guy who's just kind of there.

1:11:24 Yeah.

1:11:25 And like, I honestly, I, I love hell boy too, as well. I think it suffers a little bit for not having that guy. I think you just, I think you kind.

1:11:33 Of just need that guy.

1:11:34 Right. You need that guy.

1:11:37 I think the problem is this movie has three versions of that guy. It's Rupert Evans, it's John Hurt, and it's Jeffrey Tambor. And you kind of just need two or even just one. You could get by with it just being John Hurt except John Hurt dies.

1:11:52 I think it's also a little bit of... I really wanted the love triangle to really pop. And it doesn't because of him. And it's not to say that... another actor necessarily would have injected the necessary elements to make this love triangle really kind of come to life. But the thing that I kind of was thinking about a little bit watching this was the love triangle in X-Men between Wolverine, Jean Grey and Cyclops. And like Cyclops is just, he's just cuckold. Like he's just, there's, there's not a, And good.

1:12:34 For him, honestly. It's a valid pick.

1:12:37 He's where he wants to be. I don't know what's the problem here.

1:12:41 I feel a little bit like whenever you have an imbalanced love triangle where it's just so obvious that your audience is invested in one side of it, it's just a bummer. That's all.

1:12:53 I think part of the problem is we start the love triangle in Medias Res. Hellboy has been in love with Liz for a long time. She's unsure how she feels about him. Whereas if this movie is Liz joins the BPRD as does this normal boy and she sparks with normal boy, but hell boys kind of in love with her and she can tell she's kind of into him, but she's not sure what that says about her. Cause he's the literal harbinger of the apocalypse that gives you like room to grow across future movies in a way that, yeah.

1:13:27 Yeah.

1:13:27 Cause like, it does feel like Myers is obviously an audience surrogate. Right. Whereas if we're seeing and listen, I understand I'm not wanting to do an origin story of the team coming together. Like, I'm sure that's not fun.

1:13:41 And it's also like Liz is the character who can appear human in a way that Hellboy and Abe cannot. Like, you could take her out to a Cold Stone Creamery and then, you know, have a nice time. Now she would sell the ice cream on fire and that would be a problem.

1:13:59 But but only if you hit her, apparently, which is a weird thing. I don't love that she needed to be hit to come to have her powers.

1:14:06 Come to life. And why are you hitting her in a cold stone creamery? That's my question for you.

1:14:10 Uh, I do want to say that Rupert Evans was in 26 episodes of the man in the high castle playing, uh, Frank Frick, which is a great name.

1:14:22 Oh yeah. He's good in that.

1:14:24 And that was the show I didn't really like. I, I would be curious to know who I, I do like the idea that like, uh, john myers and liz sherman coming coming into the team together whether that's like after a break or you know reuniting after a long time i think that would have solved the the some of the tension yes the romantic tension um but i also just like secretly like that liz is like in in her heart of hearts a monster fucker and she knows that like a regular a regular dude's never gonna do it for her but it's nice to pretend which i think is like that's the spin that i have on it whereas it's nice to think that you aren't attracted to.

1:15:08 Monsters sure i just i totally agree with you lynn and i i really do appreciate that at a certain point in gear most career he was like you know what i just i gotta make subtext text and i gotta have a mute lady fuck a fish man like it's just it needs it needs to just happen God bless.

1:15:27 And he won Best Picture. Everyone was like, we've been waiting for this.

1:15:34 Everyone.

1:15:35 Literally everyone. Another thing is I would be interested, who would you have liked to see as John Myers? Here's the thing that Emily and I have. 2004, every man. Hot, but not too hot. Edgy, but not too edgy.

1:15:55 Well, here's the thing that Emily and I discovered, have discovered pretty obviously in our 2000s journeys thus far, which is that there weren't a lot of great boys or young men in the ecosystem at this time.

1:16:11 The thing is, it would have been James Marston. And James Marston just always played that guy to the degree that he played that guy in X-Men. And like you're saying, He was good, though. Yeah, I think he was very good. I think in the comics, the Jean Grey Cyclops and Wolverine love triangle, while weighted toward Jean and Wolverine, is like more of a love triangle. Whereas in the film, you're like, yeah, but he's James Marston. And I fucking love James Marston. But yeah, he's always that guy, you know?

1:16:41 There is a version of this where it's like, and again, these are names that are probably too big for the roles, but like where it's an Orlando Bloom or a Josh Hartnett. You know, they're the right age. They're just probably two big names. But, like, again, those guys have, you know, charisma.

1:16:58 I have a pitch. 2004, Tom Hardy.

1:17:03 There you go.

1:17:05 Okay.

1:17:05 That'd be good. I would have been there.

1:17:07 He hasn't broken out into any major roles. He did, like, one indie thing. He's, like, been mostly on stage. This is, like, pure, like, slightly, like, he's not quite as buff. He's pure fuckboy Tom Hardy.

1:17:21 Yeah, he's like right off of modeling.

1:17:24 Yeah, right off of stage, right off of modeling, just about to get cast in his first big thing in 2005.

1:17:29 Sure.

1:17:31 2004, Tom Hardy.

1:17:33 Woodwatch. It ultimately comes down to.

1:17:37 I have a pitch. 2004, Kristen Bell. And it's explicitly a bisexual love triangle. This is Veronica Mars era Kristen Bell. Yeah, she reads a little young, but she's in her mid-twenties, you know?

1:17:52 It could work. I, she just, she seems to... Hmm. I think that there's something about Kristen Bell at that time that's, like, very, very grounded, right? And I think that I would want someone that's, like, a little bit more wide-eyed. A little bit more, like, has a, like, a knafe to them.

1:18:13 I know what you're saying.

1:18:14 Whether it's, like, a man or a woman.

1:18:15 Yeah.

1:18:15 Yeah.

1:18:16 But I think that's kind of part of the problem with the Myers character and the performance is he's too soft. And I know that like the arc is that he ultimately gets, it's quote unquote hardened by the end of the movie, but I just, he's just a little too boyish. He's just a little too, like, he feels like a boy.

1:18:37 He doesn't feel like a man. And, and how boys have Tom Hardy, despite his name, he is a man.

1:18:43 The Tom Hardy pitch. That's still what I'm going with.

1:18:47 What about Chris Evans? Do we think Chris Evans would work?

1:18:51 I don't think he had the chops then. Okay.

1:18:55 Alright. Does he have the chops now? That's a question too.

1:18:59 I think he does. There's been quite a few films where it's just like, okay, he's learned how to be an action hero.

1:19:06 Yeah. The movie around him. Not always the best, but yeah.

1:19:12 Not to turn this into a Chris Evans thing, but I just need to sort of just say this. A real disappointing turn of events for Chris Evans in the last couple of years in the sense of he extricates himself from Marvel. He decides, I need to be taken a little bit more seriously. I'm going to do some stuff.

1:19:33 And those things are just a really bad Ethan Coen movie. um he's miscast in the materialists despite a movie that i kind of like i just don't think he's particularly well cast in it and then he's in some movie that's coming out with it sacrifice which apparently is terrible like i just don't understand what's.

1:19:50 Happening the first and the first thing he does outside of marvel is knives out where he is just agreeably douchey and you're like he's got it he's he's figured it out totally agree.

1:19:59 Okay if we're if we're aiming a little bit older Yes. If we, if we like, obviously Tom Hardy, um, Chris, Kristen, um, they're all like, you know, in their early twenties, but Josh Brolin.

1:20:18 Oh, interesting. Okay. A little bit older, a little bit.

1:20:22 Like more grounded energy, but also just like, I've seen shit and I don't want to see it again.

1:20:26 That's interesting. I don't hate it.

1:20:30 You know, who's, you know, who's a little bit older. right in that right in that range yeah yeah jimmy simpson.

1:20:40 What are we doing now.

1:20:43 Jimmy simpson just kind of plays that guy all the time so.

1:20:47 Not all the time but yes a lot.

1:20:49 Of the time jimmy simpson.

1:20:52 Jimmy simpson uh zodiac it's always sunny west world.

1:20:58 Yeah Just kind of, when you see him, you're like, oh, there's Jimmy Simpson. And then when you're not thinking about him, you're kind of like.

1:21:04 Okay. But in 2004, he was in Debs.

1:21:08 There you go.

1:21:08 There you go. So he's ready. He's ripe. He's ready.

1:21:11 Yeah.

1:21:12 I mean, I do want to talk just for a quick second about the action set pieces in this movie, which are phenomenal. Oh, my God. Sorry.

1:21:19 The last one.

1:21:20 Bradley Cooper. Too sleazy. He has a vibe.

1:21:29 He didn't have that vibe then.

1:21:31 He's just been booted off of alias.

1:21:33 Yeah, he was the golden boy, nice guy. And I think he's better at being sleazy, but I think he was.

1:21:40 Wait, wait, one last pitch. Just because I've been re-watching the show. Noah Wiley.

1:21:48 Okay, okay. Now we're cooking.

1:21:50 2004, peak ER, Noah Wiley.

1:21:51 100%.

1:21:57 I'm there for it. We cracked the code. We solved it. He'd be perfect. He'd be perfect. Yeah, I feel like the action scenes, which obviously Guillermo is incredibly adept at and proved with Blade II and everything he had done since. But it is a movie that blends seamlessly the CG with the practical. There's a lot of practical creature effects, especially with the Sam males, whatever they're called. um the subway sequence is fantastic um all the sort of big uh cg sequences are done so lovingly and well done as opposed to what we now are inundated with which is just sort of volume it's like ai slop where our eyes glaze over and we just kind of see stuff um Yeah, it's great. The makeup just in general,

1:22:55 we talked obviously Abe Sapien, my future husband, is tremendous.

1:23:01 I'm glad that we have a Phil gets married to someone arc for once on this show.

1:23:08 So sweet!

1:23:09 The Cronin morgue sequence where we get to sort of see what he looks like, what his visage looks like underneath his steampunk gimp suit. is is amazing and you know that it's creepy because you don't get to see it much like it's he's under kind of this sheet or this kind of plastic film they they it's clear that like this would have got them an r rating if they didn't if they was this rated r i don't think so what's this r i think it was pg-13.

1:23:43 No i saw it in theaters there's.

1:23:45 No way i would have been able to see a rated r film So I just, that makeup, that whole sequence, all that stuff with Cronin is just, is fantastic. Even just the way that they kill Broom is quite visceral. And like, yes, it's out of, it's sort of like in the background out of focus, but this, you know that that knife is going through the back of his head.

1:24:12 It's really good. Love the sequence of Hellboy reanimating... Is it Ivan? Is that the Russian corpse? The snow coming down and him in the grave and the makeup of Ivan. All that shit's just gold to me. That's just Guillermo firing on all cylinders. Ivan in general firing on all cylinders. Ivan on his shoulder speaking in Russian nonsense is just great.

1:24:49 Was it subtitled for you?

1:24:50 It was not for me.

1:24:52 I watched it on Canopy, the library streaming service, and everything was subtitled. And I was like, I don't remember this. And now I know everything he says.

1:25:02 Does it say anything good?

1:25:05 It's all just very silly. It's like, go that way, monster boy, that kind of thing.

1:25:09 Yeah, I also appreciated what they did with the Manning character, with the Jeffrey Tambor character. which is that it would have been very easy to make him sort of the dumb suit who fucks up everything and makes his life bad and then dies or whatever like that. So I appreciate that. They like made them kind of friendly and like they worked as a team to, to take down, you know, I appreciated that.

1:25:32 Uh, Jeffrey Tambert, just, just an, also a piece of shit.

1:25:35 Yes.

1:25:36 To be clear. Yes. Not a, not a good guy, but.

1:25:39 Yeah, no, it's a, this movie, this movie, but it's got Ron Perlman. He's a sweetie.

1:25:43 So he's a sweetie. Um, liz's line red or white guys are all the same as.

1:25:47 Great great great quote i i used air quotes around that yeah.

1:25:57 I mean it was it was it's just i think that there's something funny about this notion that like you know hellboy's just another guy who can't doesn't understand his emotions i just think that there's.

1:26:09 There is something hellboy is the male loneliness epidemic let's talk about this for 20 minutes.

1:26:13 Let's talk about that sure How boy turning into a real demon when like the portal is opened and his horns grow.

1:26:19 Good.

1:26:20 So good. Good.

1:26:22 Like the, the fire coming out and like the, the undeniable marks of destiny and then him tearing them off. It's good. It's good stuff. I think it's really like the idea of, I think Guillermo very often asks us like, what choice do we have? It's very much a thrust of a lot of his work. And I think that this is another really interesting place where it's like choices have been made for you, but also you will always have your choice. Totally. And the idea of destiny as a series of choices other people have made for you versus the choice you make for yourself. Very good stuff.

1:27:06 It's great because, and truth be told, it's, I would argue, the climax of the movie for me. I think that the death of Rasputin and his hench person is a little too easy. They just get crushed by a tentacle. It didn't feel particularly cathartic to me. And despite the fact that Hellboy reviving Liz and kissing her is obviously emotionally satisfying, I don't understand how he revives her exactly.

1:27:37 It does feel like the end of movie two. It feels like we've stumbled into the end of the second movie. That moment specifically.

1:27:44 Yeah. But him in hell becoming sort of the demon destiny that was always sort of whatever and controlling his own destiny, that to me feels like the climax of the movie. That feels like also just iconically and just visually is just phenomenal.

1:28:03 I've been a very good girl. And Lynn's been a very good guest, but I have not brought up the game apocalypse keys but i'm going to.

1:28:12 Now please do please do this is the it is.

1:28:15 A tabletop role-playing game that is like very clearly based on hellboy with it's not actually for legal but like you work in like a group of people who are like trying to like stop the apocalypse but the stuff that you can do like you you eventually you have like a little thing that you're marking on and eventually you yourself might trigger the apocalypse which is like always the hellboy thing sure and it's it it is great fun i've only played it like once or twice but i need i need to i need to get it going again so.

1:28:47 Yes so it's it's designed by ray najati um and one of the really interesting things that apocalypse keys does that is uh pushing the system upon which it is built further is that it does this thing called, uh, I spoke, I forget like what it's specifically called in this game, but basically if you succeed too well, it has consequences very often in role playing games. It's like, uh, like on a, on a scale, typically one to 20, 20 is the best. You get everything you want. It's perfect.

1:29:22 Don't worry about it. You're you're in and out of there. But in this game, it's like if you roll a 20, it's just like, oh, you have flown too close to the sun, right? Like you get everything you want, but it blows back on you. You do exactly what you want to do, but someone else suffers. Like it's being too good, being too much of who you are. It's being too perfect, right? And that is a really interesting twist on the way that we see games as like a very strict, like progression fantasy where it's like, okay, if you're at level two, you can do up to this.

1:30:00 If you're at level three, you can do up to this. And in this game, which is very, again, similar to hell boy in the way that like other genre media happens, right? Like we can point to supernatural, which was like going to be released in a couple of years. We can look at X, uh, X files. We can look at, um, Anything that has these sorts of, like, supernatural elements to it.

1:30:27 Buffy the Vampire Slayer. If you do something too well, there's always going to be these, like, consequences, right? It's the monkey's paw. And it is really interesting how that is translated not only in Apocalypse Keys, but, like, throughout genre where it's, like, you have to understand that your limitations are put there for a reason.

1:30:45 Mm-hmm.

1:30:46 And if you move beyond them and if you push too far, people will get hurt. Not because you've done something badly, but because like you are so powerful. Chill the fuck out.

1:31:01 Um, I love that.

1:31:02 I also just want to... It's going to happen.

1:31:06 It's funny you would say that. There's a documentary that our past and future guest Simon Ennis directed called The Hobby. I don't know if either of you have seen this documentary. It's a great documentary about tabletop games. And it is currently... You can stream it on Amazon right now. You can stream it on any number. It's free on Tubi. It's free on YouTube. It's free on all sorts of sites. Um, it's a great documentary, highly recommend it. Um, and it speaks to a lot of the things that you're talking about, Lynn, of just sort of the, um, the, the sense of community that, that is around this, um, and the creativity that comes into, like, it's, it's all just really, um, it's fascinating to me. So. Yeah.

1:31:52 The hobby is about trading card games. No.

1:31:56 No.

1:31:56 What am I looking at? Director Morgan Fox.

1:31:59 No okay what am i simon.

1:32:01 Ennis okay i think it's i think his is more broadly about board games but i don't remember i.

1:32:07 Was gonna watch simons is about is is about tabletop board games.

1:32:12 Wow hilarious that two documentaries titled the hobby both came out when was the other one that came out i'm just curious 2024 that's very strange.

1:32:22 Okay well simon should sue word the hobby he should.

1:32:27 But yes, it's a great documentary. Highly recommend our listeners check it out. And obviously, you guys should check it out too. You want to rate this movie, Emily?

1:32:36 Let's do it. I was thinking about this as we were talking and realizing that as I've seen this movie several times, I really enjoy this movie. I could not have told you the story of it, even though I watched it yesterday. The story of it is immaterial to why I enjoy it. And the thing that I love is when there's a movie that you watch and it feels like you're in another world. And I kind of don't care what the story is in that regard. The Green Knight's a movie I point to all the time.

1:33:04 The story there's kind of immaterial. You're stepping into another time and place. And Hellboy makes me feel that way. I love X-Files shit. I love Christian esoterica. I love all these things. I think this movie's a lot of fun. I recognize the problems within it, so I'm going to give it an 80. I was probably like an 85 back in the day, but it's wonderful.

1:33:24 So, Lynn, what we do on this podcast, we try to rate it back when we saw it first and then rate it what we think of it now, 0 to 99. Sure. Do you have thoughts on how you felt about this movie in 2004 and how it feels for you now?

1:33:39 Again, I was 13 when I saw this film. I thought it whipped. I thought it was the coolest shit that I've ever seen in my life. First Guillermo del Toro film. First, probably my first superhero film. I don't know if I was allowed to watch Batman kind of thing.

1:33:55 Like, I don't know.

1:33:56 I was 13. I don't think that like I had a, I don't pay a taste. But yeah, I loved it. So whatever, I know that like you guys are doing a number rating, but I don't know if that's, Totally what I was doing when I was 13, but like whatever really, really cool for a 13 year old is. That's my rating.

1:34:17 Where are you now? Zero to 99.

1:34:20 Man, I still, I still really enjoy it. I don't know if it's because of the nostalgia or because again, like what Emily said, it just sort of immerses you in this like high fantasy world. theological esoterica cult world that's like really fun and exciting of course like one of my favorite films is like hellboy one of my favorite television shows that comes out in like 2009 is kings so like this is.

1:34:43 Don't don't don't no no no i kings crazy well i mean we should should we do.

1:34:48 A So here's the thing I don't want to do episode by episode stuff Because it gives me PTSD flashbacks But we should just do a Kings episode Let's do it Lynn you.

1:35:02 Can come on for our Kings episode Yay oh my.

1:35:06 God please I've watched that show I have the DVD It's like the only show that I have the DVD of Anyway I think now I would probably still rate it I think Emily is exactly right Like an 85 80 to 90 feels good To me I would re-watch this. I would recommend it. I would still have a good time.

1:35:29 Okay, cool. Bill?

1:35:32 Yeah, you got it.

1:35:34 In 04, I probably would have given it a 65. I liked it fine. It didn't knock my socks off. I think now I'm at a 78, 79. I think it's a really fun movie. I very much enjoy it.

1:35:49 And yeah, I mean, I think To me, it's a movie that really reminds you of a lot of elements of film craft that we've lost. Which is the way I feel about the Pirates of the Caribbean sequels. Movies I don't really love, but I watch them and I'm like, oh, they made this thing. This is like, oh, look at all this stuff they made.

1:36:10 Totally.

1:36:11 We used to have cinema.

1:36:14 Lynn, can you tell people where they can read you? Or perhaps see you? Listen to you?

1:36:20 Yeah, so I am an author and a journalist. My books, Posh to the Storm and Moth Theater, are available anywhere books are sold. A lot of my journalism can either be found on Rascal News, which is dedicated to tabletop role-playing games, which is a site I co-founded a couple years ago with a couple other journalists, or on Fansplaining, where I talk about fandom. And yeah, but I'm Lynn Kodega, L-A-N-C-O-D-E-G-A, on every social media platform.

1:36:50 And um pasha the storm is one of my uh just a blast i recommend it to everyone who enjoys just kind of like rip-roaring fantasy adventure stuff and pirates and lesbians so.

1:37:04 What's not to love about all of those things sounds amazing um next week on this podcast we're talking pants labyrinth um we're we're we're gonna meet the fawn emily's future husband hi um And we're going to talk about all sorts of things with Sonia Saraya. And do you have any thoughts on Pan's Labyrinth, Lynn? You fan?

1:37:29 Yeah, huge fan. Big fan. Good movie, right?

1:37:31 Good movie.

1:37:32 Good movie. Sonia will have many more interesting things to say. But yeah, fantastic.

1:37:39 It's a fantastic movie. And then we're talking Hellboy 2. We're going to go back and hang out with the gang. Although, Myers, not in it. weird what a what.

1:37:49 A great october this has been it is just having a great time yeah this is it's a good it's a good spooky season to spend it's it's a.

1:37:58 Perfect season yeah and then we're gonna spend the fall with uh ya it's gonna be great yeah um all right um thank you so much lynn this was a blast we can't wait to have you back to talk about kings or something else it's gonna be great or country bears country bears i don't even know what that is It's better. You're better off for it. All right.

1:38:19 Thank you. Talk to you later.

1:38:20 Bye guys.

1:38:21 Bye.