Bryan! (00:03.346) You're listening to Bring Me the Axe. I'm Brian White, and I'm on half of this morbid equation, and I'm joined by my co-host and actual brother, Dave White. Hey, Dave, how you doing?

Dave! (00:13.834) Well, I appreciate you asking. You know, I'm gonna tell you what, I'm okay. I have been trying to get into this goddamn Christmas spirit. It is now the, what is it, the 10th of December. I decorated this apartment. I go for a walk to look at other people's decorations. I'm still not feeling it. I don't know what I gotta do.

Bryan! (00:34.861) Yeah. I mean, have you? you indulged in the Hallmark

Dave! (00:38.314) Well, I think that's a given, I do that at least three or four nights a week. I mean I just finished watching A Tale of Two Christmases, I think that's what it was called. So it's a nuanced tale of a young woman who has a dream about an alternate life that she could be living. And you know, believe it or not, in both of them she has a handsome gentleman to go home to. It's a real rollercoaster of emotions. But not even that is doing it. And I don't know what it's going to take. But um...

Joey (00:42.833) Thanks for watching!

Bryan! (00:44.046) It's...

Bryan! (00:47.52) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:04.202) Goddamn.

Dave! (01:06.87) I'm gonna keep at it because I'm gonna feel the fucking Christmas spirit if it kills me. And it might.

Bryan! (01:07.25) Well, you know what?

Yeah, you know, you know what's gonna do it? Silent night, deadly night. Hey, so you know what? We got a little somebody over here on the side. We got a guest tonight. Yep. So, our guest is an author. He's the he's the author of It Came From the Closet and I wanna welcome Joe Valesey to the show. Joe, thank you so much for joining us.

Dave! (01:16.234) Well, it's gonna do something.

Dave! (01:22.478) We do. We do!

Joey (01:34.549) Hey. Oh, God, thanks for having me. I was just saying, I feel so flattered to be here for such an auspicious film. It's a true honor.

Bryan! (01:37.747) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:43.222) Oh, God, this you know what this series has really helped me appreciate this movie for some reason, like I will, I whenever I think of it's like, all right, it's, you know, it's getting to the season, like I could watch, you know, seasonal slasher movies and watch seasonal horror movies, or I could watch, you know, Friday, the 13th, part two for like the 50th time. And I always fall back on Friday, the 13th for some reason, but like this time around, like watching this, I

I am really I'm really feeling it in a way that I haven't before. And it's probably just because I really spent the time to just examining it. So we practically grew up in neighborhood video stores and the steady diet of utter garbage that those shops provided us with continues unabated to this day. There's no one else I enjoy chopping it up with more about trashy movies than Dave. Just before we get into it, here's a little housekeeping. If you want to keep up with us between episodes, you can also find us on Instagram and bring me the ax pod Dave's over there that werewolf.

We also started up a Facebook page. So help me God. I know. Yeah, I did it just you know, let's cover all them bases. I

Dave! (02:40.088) What?

Dave! (02:44.506) like there's people out there over the age of 65 who might be interested in this.

Joey (02:49.713) Ha ha

Bryan! (02:49.912) Yeah, they're sharing pictures of their grandkids and they're listening to podcasts about terrible movies.

Dave! (02:54.83) Because I'll tell you what, our parents are over 65 and they said to me the other day, uh, you guys swear a lot.

Joey (03:02.201) Ha ha.

Dave! (03:02.966) And I said, well, yeah, I guess.

Bryan! (03:03.574) Uh well, yeah. Have you not heard us speak? Yeah, I know you think they would they would know us by now but uh yeah. Yeah, I know. Yeah. Uh we've also got a sweet website now at bring me the axe.com. You can listen to all our past shows there and read the transcripts. You can also contact us directly at bring me the axe pod at gmail.com with any questions, comments, or suggestions.

Dave! (03:06.806) I'm a very colorful person, goddammit.

Joey (03:13.233) I mean, who raised you, right? So not to push blame, but come on. Ha ha ha.

Dave! (03:15.13) Exactly.

No, it's fine.

Bryan! (03:31.21) Do let us know if there's a movie that you love and would like to hear us give it the business. Lastly, if you like what you hear, you can subscribe to us wherever you get your podcasts. And you'll be doing us a favor by leaving us a five-star review on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. So get with it. I will say, I keep seeing that number go up and it pleases me greatly. So to all of you people out there who are taking the time, thank you from the bottom of my heart. It's, I'll tell you friends, for the love of God, just what's holding you back?

Dave! (03:54.314) and also tell your friends. Don't be stingy.

Dave! (04:01.198) Christmas.

Bryan! (04:01.202) way, just want to get that all out of the way right at the top of the show. So tonight, as I said, it's Silent Night Deadly Night just as the podcast is labeled. So let's give you a little give you a little taste of what we're talking about.

Bryan! (05:45.841) Jesus.

Dave! (05:46.271) Now this is an audio medium and you probably couldn't tell, that was the sound of people being killed.

Joey (05:48.9) Uh-huh.

Bryan! (05:50.846) That trailer shows you basically, with a couple of exceptions, every murder in the movie.

Joey (05:54.113) Everything. Ha ha ha.

Dave! (05:57.302) I have to ask, Joe, you were given a list of movies and you specifically chose this movie. Why?

Joey (06:01.945) Ha ha

I mean, I really wanted to do a seasonal film. And I hadn't seen this in so long. And I have really, this is really interesting because I don't think I'd watched it for 30 years, literally 30 years. I had very specific memories in my mind of what creeped me out about this film. And I realized as I was watching it, I was like, oh man, what I'm really remembering is really just the beginning with, you know, well, I'll get to it, but that sort of opening sequence, that is what was sort of.

cemented in my brain and the rest of the movie, I was like, wow, I forgot all of this? And so that says a lot, I think, but I, yeah.

Bryan! (06:40.47) that that's a that's a solid point because I think when I think of this movie I also think of that like the beginning when like his parents get killed like for some reason that scene just sticks out so yeah

Joey (06:51.554) Yeah.

Joey (06:55.553) It's pretty upsetting. Yeah, yeah.

Dave! (06:56.526) because it's like super sleazy and awful, probably.

Bryan! (07:01.034) So as usual warning before we get rolling, we're going to talk about this movie from beginning to end spoilers to follow. You've had since 1984 to see this one. So this Yep. So here, let's do the facts. The year was 1984. So some other movies released that year as a banner year for pop culture in the United States. Yep. So we also got a nightmare on Elm Street came out that year.

Joey (07:08.837) hehehehe yes

Dave! (07:08.894) Also summary, Santa Claus kills people.

Dave! (07:20.942) Yeah, it is.

Joey (07:21.698) Yeah, it's a good year.

Dave! (07:27.918) came out that week.

Bryan! (07:29.406) the same day. The same exact day. Yep. Also in 1984, Chud. Yep. Razorback, which y'all seen Razorback? 90 minutes of 90 minutes of a movie you can smell. Yep. It is. It's it's

Joey (07:30.445) The same Oh, wow, I didn't realize that.

Dave! (07:38.006) Yikes.

Joey (07:44.15) I haven't

Joey (07:50.175) Let me jot that down. Hold on. Save for later.

Bryan! (07:52.894) Yeah, so that's a that's it's Australian. So it's Russell Mulcahy and he's a couple of years later, he does Highlander and he really nails it down. But like he's a guy who made a he before he made Razorback he made basically every music video from the 1980s that everybody remembers. And so Razorback and he did all of them except for Thriller. But yeah, yep. So also that year Children of the Corn Outlander

Dave! (08:10.76) That's a lot of music videos.

Bryan! (08:23.718) and rounding it out. The movie that Yep. you that all the solution to Yeah.

Dave! (08:26.734) Oh, I like that movie. Also, Night of the Comet came out that year, too.

Joey (08:27.858) Wow.

Dave! (08:37.754) Yeah, that movie is remarkable for a lot of reasons. It is directed by 900 people.

Bryan! (08:45.082) Yeah. They're all basically all of Charles Band's friends. So, uh yeah. Yeah. And I just I was gonna say I just watched Night Train to Terror the other night and he is in that as well and he plays yeah. Yeah. He plays two characters in two separate segments. Just two separate entire characters and in one of them,

Dave! (08:48.67) Yep. And stars Bull from Nightcore.

Joey (08:54.029) Wasn't Friday the 3rd? Sorry.

Dave! (08:56.205) No, we're good.

Dave! (09:03.606) He got around. He was also in house.

Bryan! (09:13.662) They must have shot it with like some distance between the scenes because he goes from one hairstyle to an entirely different one within the span of like a single edit. It's crazy. That whole movie is fucking nuts. I thought for a moment like, man, we should really do Night Train of Terror on this one, but I think that one might be a little too crazy even for us. And we just did fucking elves. So yeah. Yeah, it's something.

Dave! (09:36.51) you

Joey (09:37.073) too crazy for you, huh?

Dave! (09:40.106) And if you haven't heard our elves episode, it's basically just us laughing hysterically for an hour and 20 minutes.

Joey (09:44.658) Hehehe

Bryan! (09:46.616) Yeah, yeah. At one point we completely break down for about two minutes. Yeah. All right. So cast and crew. This was directed by a man named Charles Selye. And when the producers first started brainstorming potential directors, they thought of names like Sam Raimi and Purple Reign's Albert Mignoli.

But the studio butted in and said, you know, who'd make a hell of a slasher movie? Charles Selye, producer of the TV hit and creator of Grizzly Adams. Yeah, which makes this the second episode in a month to mention Grizzly Adams. He also directed Annihilators, which is an absolutely dogshit vigilante movie.

Dave! (10:15.218) and greatest heroes of the bud.

Dave! (10:26.882) He's also a man who hates horror movies and didn't want to direct any gore. So good choice.

Bryan! (10:31.71) Right, right. Which brings me to our second director. Yeah, our second director is a guy named Michael Spence. He, I believe he's credited as second unit, but yeah, Selye didn't want to do any of the violent scenes. And so Spence, who's actually the movie's editor was like, yeah, sure. I'll shoot that stuff.

Dave! (10:48.49) Also, what do you mean don't wanna do the violence? Grow up, you're a director for God's sake. Do your fucking job.

Bryan! (10:52.98) I know. I know. Cuz everybody else. I know. Like, like, this movie doesn't even run 90 minutes. Even in its uncut form.

Joey (10:55.281) It's also the bulk of the movie.

Dave! (10:57.57) Mm-hmm.

Dave! (11:03.382) Yeah, I just said Santa Claus kills people. That is the premise of this movie. Why would you be like, you know what? That's the movie for me. Count me in.

Bryan! (11:10.051) Wait a minute, wait a minute. What's all this stuff in the script about Santa Claus killing people?

Dave! (11:13.482) I didn't hear anything about an axe before we started this.

Joey (11:16.781) He just wanted to direct Mother Superior. That's all he cared about, right? You can tell that's the character. Right? She's a pro, undeniably.

Bryan! (11:20.626) Oh, yeah. Yeah. Basically. Yep. And so in yet another connection to elves, Spence was the editor on a movie called Zapped Again, which was written by the writers of elves. Yeah, all roads lead back to elves. Oh, god. So, cast. Uh we got Robert Brian Wilson as Billy.

Dave! (11:21.406) And she directs herself. She's a professional.

Joey (11:36.497) Zapped again. Wow.

Dave! (11:39.65) the sequel to the Scott Baio classic, Zap.

Joey (11:42.177) Yeah, the classic zapped.

Bryan! (11:49.85) and so he basically pulled down some bit parts, TV roles after this one, but then he bowed out of acting until just recently when he started turning up in Low Budget Fair all directed by Dave D'Acoto and all starring... it is not. It's like Hallmark Channel stuff.

Dave! (12:01.119) Wow, is it pornographic?

Because Dave Dacoto has a very fascinating career in which he continues to make gay pornography while also making horror movies. He has never stopped making porn. And you know what?

Bryan! (12:12.966) Yes. Yeah, somebody that he is a busy man. Gotta stay busy, man. You gotta you gotta hustle. Yeah, he yeah, somebody once described the sort of soft core like werewolf stuff that he does as boxer briefs horror. And I think that is just a perfect description for what he does.

Joey (12:18.957) In this economy, yeah, I mean, what are you gonna do? It's a gig economy. Ha ha ha.

Dave! (12:22.689) No. Everybody's got a second job these days.

Dave! (12:36.482) I think that's the greatest thing ever.

Bryan! (12:40.452) So, oh yeah, and all that stuff. It also stars Jack A. Harry.

Dave! (12:44.674) Fucking right, I am into this! Is gay werewolf porn starring Jack Hay Harry?

Bryan! (12:46.803) Yeah, that...

Joey (12:47.161) That's cool.

Bryan! (12:50.418) No, no, no

Dave! (12:55.234) but there's no gay werewolves. Yeah, I'm not, I mean, I like Jackie Harry a lot, but.

Joey (12:59.161) I'll pass then.

Joey (13:03.738) Yeah.

Dave! (13:07.662) Who, uh, you all might remember from Butcher. He is, but I recognize him most. So he was in Butcher Baker Nightmare Maker, the worst name ever. I remember him most from the episode of the Brady Bunch where Marsha tries to get Davy Jones to play at the dance, and Britt Leach is Davy Jones' manager. And it took me for fucking ever to remember why I recognized him so much.

Joey (13:09.433) The most recognizable face, yeah.

Bryan! (13:11.571) Yeah.

Bryan! (13:15.09) Yep, our second episode all the way back there.

Bryan! (13:28.388) Oh no shit.

Bryan! (13:32.95) because this is this is the reason that I recognize him. I think I say that in our butcher breaker episode, but yeah, he's a professional hillbilly. This is his second appearance in a

Joey (13:42.574) He's really, really great in an episode of Tales from the Crypt with Leah Thompson, only sin deep. He's the man who makes the mold of her face and basically curses her and steals her beauty. And that's what I recognize him from. I was looking at his face, I was like, what do I know you from? What specifically? And that's really recognizable, but that is when he's at his creepiest. That's a great episode, it's such a good episode.

Dave! (13:46.006) Uh huh.

Bryan! (13:56.744) Oh shit.

I know he's so recognizable.

Dave! (14:00.662) because he has a really recognizable face.

Bryan! (14:09.13) Oh man, I fucking love Tales from the Crypt, man. And rounding it out is Lillian Chauvin as Mother Superior. She's probably the movie's biggest get, which isn't really saying much. She's a prolific character actor, usually playing very severe characters, surprise, surprise. She died in 2007, acted pretty much all the way up to her death. And this is the movie everybody knows her from, but she stayed pretty busy, and you've definitely seen her in other movies.

Joey (14:12.173) Yeah, so good.

Joey (14:26.918) Yeah.

Bryan! (14:38.423) Lydia quickly is also in this but for about five minutes

Dave! (14:40.302) for about five minutes. I mean, she's great for those five minutes. It's pretty iconic death.

Joey (14:42.573) Oh.

Bryan! (14:44.338) Yeah, yeah. Yep. Yeah, that's definitely the one that everybody knows that or it's either that or this the guy on the sled that gets everybody. So let's do some notes here. Original title was sleigh ride. And the producers are very always very often too quick to point out that it's just one word. I don't know why that's important. But they point that out.

Joey (14:47.191) Yes. She gets the death, I think. Arguably. Yeah.

Joey (14:56.185) No, that's good.

Joey (15:03.661) That's good.

Bryan! (15:10.606) in basically every piece of media like tangential media I've seen some taglines for this film, you heard it in the trailer. You survived Halloween. Now try and survive Christmas. Yeah. Another one. Santa's here. Yeah. And then he knows you've been he knows when you've been naughty.

Dave! (15:26.466) That's my favorite.

Joey (15:27.397) Hahaha

Dave! (15:34.734) Mmm.

Bryan! (15:35.838) Yeah, yeah. A bunch of the ones that I am, I left off that I am DB lists is basically stuff that appeared on like Mondo posters and shit. But the last one is my favorite shocking disturbing the movie they tried to ban

Dave! (15:50.802) And I feel like that is a good third of this story is the, they tried to ban part of the story.

Bryan! (15:59.57) Yeah, yeah. They actually did ban it in Alberta, in Alberta, Canada, in 1987, three years after it was released.

Dave! (16:02.71) They did, yeah. Canadians. Yeah, it's real interesting, like... Yeah, we didn't do it initially. It took us three years to realize just how tasteless this thing is.

Joey (16:06.446) Oh, three years later.

Bryan! (16:14.63) Yeah. But yeah, it's source of major controversy. Dave, you got notes on this? Because I have none. Because I thought that I sort of figured that you would have the moral panic stuff covered.

Dave! (16:20.442) I sure do. I have a lot of notes on this.

Dave! (16:26.214) I do. I'm a big fan of moral panics. Not in practice, historically speaking. It's a fascinating thing because it's, for context, what is happening at this time is the silent, the idea of the silent majority is picking up steam, a lot of steam by 1984.

Bryan! (16:28.826) Who isn't though?

Joey (16:32.385) Let me get my cocoa for this. Hold on.

Bryan! (16:52.198) Right. Yeah, this is really like 84 is really sort of the flashpoint for a lot of kind of cultural moral panics. And it's not just that, like, we're starting to see the very earliest parts of like, satanic panic. This has none of the whole other thing.

Dave! (17:04.418) Which is another, I mean, it's, so it's all, it's all coming out of the sort of liberation and civil rights movements of the 60s and 70s. The 80s is kind of this, this particular part of the 80s is a reaction to that. And so a lot of it is, a lot of the sort of save the children bullshit is specifically a reaction to gay rights. And, you know, the Anita Bryant's,

campaign, I guess, for lack of a better word, and that other fucking asshole who was also from Florida whose name I can't remember. It's sort of, this is built out of that. It's this idea that the world is out to destroy childhood or the world is out to sort of taint children or to make them grow up too fast. We still see it today. It's just kind of a slightly different package, but it's the same idea.

Bryan! (17:59.534) Oh yeah, it's the same the current it's the same sort of seed that kind of bears terrible fruit.

Dave! (18:06.058) Right, and not surprisingly, it actually has nothing to do with children, it has a lot to do with whiteness, it has a lot to do with sort of heteronormativity, etc. Yeah, and so, like this particular movie, it's not surprising that this was the reaction to it, because parents were outraged, they lost their mind. Well, a certain section.

Bryan! (18:15.934) Reactions to feminism. Yeah.

Bryan! (18:27.954) Which is crazy because the one of the reason that these guys felt so safe doing this is because there's black Christmas before this, which bears nothing in common with us. But also, there's an out there was there's the short in Tales from the Crypt with the killer Santa. There's Christmas evil, which had been out by this point.

Dave! (18:36.246) Which is not, I mean, it has nothing to do with Christmas. It just takes, you know, takes place then.

Joey (18:38.198) No Santa.

Dave! (18:47.914) Yeah, but Christmas Evil was a kind of a lower budget. This was a, this had a big campaign and that was the biggest, the movie itself.

Bryan! (18:55.03) I suppose that's true. This was TriStar's first big movie.

Dave! (18:58.154) Right, so the movie itself was not so much the issue as it was the ad campaign for it. Because the ad campaign, as you can imagine, it shows a guy dressed as Santa Claus killing people. Because Santa kills people.

Bryan! (19:10.502) Yep. Oh, and they booked ad time like on Saturday afternoons and shit like.

Dave! (19:14.614) Well, sort of, they sort of did that because the actual, so not surprisingly, again, the truth of this story and the kind of myth and fiction of it get blurred quite a lot. So there was like an entire episode of Donahue devoted to this, which I wanted to look up, but I didn't really have a lot of time, so I didn't. So here's some of the things that people would say about it. There was an article, I believe this is the guy from, this is the head of the...

Bryan! (19:31.185) Oh yeah.

Dave! (19:44.77) uh MPAA who says this says that oh so it's an invasion of children's dreams and fantasies and it is a form of child abuse uh and then he goes on to say santa claus was like motherhood and apple pie and that and that i couldn't approve anything that made him look like a villain and i'm gonna keep going because these are some choice cuts here uh this is from the mayor of norwalk connecticut uh it says i believe in free speech and free expression but christmas is

Bryan! (19:53.791) Oh God.

Dave! (20:13.614) To make one of these killer movies with Christmas and Santa Claus as the theme, that's going too far. Is it, Ro? So the thing about all of this, this is the waspiest, most 80s bullshit I can imagine, because this is sort of a conceptualization of American culture as sort of universally Christian and extremely white, because this comes from the position,

that cannot imagine a world in which people do not celebrate Christmas, and the specifically Christian version of Christmas, because to call it sacred is ridiculous. It's not sacred. It's a very commercial holiday that was kind of, the version we celebrate, created by companies. And What's-his-face, I think it's one of the producers. I can't, I have it in my notes. Let me see if I can find it. Later on, obviously they say, well, this is a reaction to this.

Joey (20:47.47) Right.

Bryan! (20:49.775) Oh yeah.

Dave! (21:11.306) Oh, it's Dennis Whitehead, so he was the producer of this. He suggested much later that TriStar pulled this film because TriStar was initially owned by Coca-Cola and who created Christmas as we know it, basically Coca-Cola or Santa Claus at least. And so there's this whole, this argument around this is like this movie is destroying Christmas, it's destroying children's youth and blah, same bullshit we hear all the time. It's drag queens, it's gay teachers, it's all, it's the same stuff.

Bryan! (21:22.814) Yeah.

Joey (21:24.013) Right.

Dave! (21:41.01) But the thing is, you know, they're arguing is that, well, you can't have this in advertisements. Well, the three major networks did not air advertisements as a practice, did not air advertisements for R-rated movies until after nine o'clock. And so the stories about like, well, this was on during a football game, because those were local stations. And local stations were a little bit more flexible with that shit. Like if they wanted to, they could.

Bryan! (22:03.902) Ah, oh, yeah, I remember about a year. So in 85 when Return of the Living Dead came out, all of the local UHF stations ran ads for it constantly. And that was like one of those sort of like formative moments for me, as I was beyond fascinated by this movie. But also, that imagery scared the fucking shit out of me.

Dave! (22:31.286) I think I saw that movie on television in like 1988 at like two o'clock in the afternoon.

Bryan! (22:37.535) Yeah.

Joey (22:37.833) Yeah, yeah.

Dave! (22:39.49) So this idea that they're running these ads for children, basically, like the way they talk about it is like, well, you're putting it on during, you know, Saturday morning cartoons. That's not true. It occasionally showed up, but most of the problem is it's like a lot of things. It's sort of like, I don't know if you know anything about like the cruising protests or the protests of that movie, Windows. These are a lot of, these were gay, specific gay community protests.

Joey (22:59.127) Yeah.

Dave! (23:06.878) a lot of those people, because I interviewed a bunch of people about cruising years and years ago, and I was like, so you went out and you participated in these protests, and I was like, so what did you think of the movie? And they were like, oh, I didn't see it. And I was like, so you went out to protest something that you didn't even see? And they were like, well, no, I heard about it. And I was like, all right, what did you hear about it? And it turned out what they had heard about it was a big exaggeration. Now, you could make an argument that cruising is a pretty homophobic movie. But the point is they're,

Bryan! (23:19.565) Oh no.

Joey (23:32.789) Yeah, of course.

Dave! (23:35.406) objecting to something they have not actually seen or experienced. So that is not that surprising because like all moral panics, the reaction to this is completely nonsensical. They're running ads at movies at night. Like the whole point of an R-rated movie is that it's not for children. So they're not going to pitch a movie to children who aren't going to go see it. So it's sort of like it's a kind of a thing that gets, you know, ginned up when it didn't need to be. And I get the feeling that the filmmakers and the cast, they...

Bryan! (23:38.367) Yeah.

Dave! (24:02.934) They seem pretty forgiving of that now, because they're like, look, we get it. It was Santa Claus with a bloody ax. I understand. The one that they really couldn't forgive though, is Siskel Ebert. And I get that, because it seems like Gene Siskel, like went out of his way to be an insufferable piece of shit. Like he just could not stop himself.

Joey (24:13.369) Hehe.

Bryan! (24:14.138) Yeah, I get that too.

Bryan! (24:21.662) this was uh it was uh pardon the pun it was gift wrapped for him basically cuz this was like his crusade did not begin with this but this is where it reached a real sort of critical frenzy but uh they had

Dave! (24:38.618) There's something so unprofessional about that though. Like, dude, you were one of the most well-respected critics in the country, if not the most well-respected critic in the country. And so to get up on a fucking soapbox every time because you think something's offensive, like fuck off. I don't care what you think, Jesus. But he goes out of his way, much like he did with Friday the 13th, to go on camera and like list off all of the names of the companies that own Tristar.

all the people at those companies. It's like, wow, you were fucking doxing people for making a goddamn movie.

Joey (25:09.262) Oh wow.

Bryan! (25:11.154) Yeah, yeah. Yep. Unbelievable. It's it's a fucking crazy story because what ends up happening is, I am sure that the people who were marketing this at TriStar were like, Oh, man, there's no such thing as bad press. But then this happened. And they pulled it after two weeks, which is crazy because this movie out grossed a nightmare on Elm Street in its in its first week. And then I guess there was a

Joey (25:12.213) Wow.

Joey (25:25.634) Right.

Dave! (25:37.11) Well, so that was the thing is TriStar pulls this movie after a couple of weeks saying it because of the poor box office. But it's like, it didn't do, it made its money back within the first week. So whatever's after that is all yours. So it's like, okay, that's not really why you're doing this. You're really doing this because you're caving into pressure from parents groups or whatever. And like it always is, these are just small segments of population. They're just very loud about it and they're protesting out front of a movie theater. Now,

Bryan! (25:47.038) Yeah.

Bryan! (26:04.486) Oh yeah, if you look it up, you can see.

Dave! (26:05.058) If it were me, I would happily wade through a sea of angry parents to see the killer Santa Claus movie. I guess other people didn't fail that way.

Bryan! (26:12.559) Yeah, if you look it up, you can you can see photos of the protests and for a really long time, I lived under the impression that this movie that part of the story was sort of exaggerated but it really this so this comes very late in 1984 but and you know and slashers were really struggling at the time anyways but this protest

Joey (26:25.189) Mm-hmm.

Bryan! (26:40.446) puts a chiller on horror until 1987, I think, when, you know, Nightmare on Elm Street 3 comes out and sort of reestablishes the genre as a money machine. But yeah, it's a fucking crazy story.

Dave! (26:56.398) I think it caught them off guard too because this movie is so goofy. Like just the very idea of a killer Santa Claus is pretty fucking silly. And so I'm sure when people were like, oh my God, you're ruining the hopes and dreams of children, they were like, hey, calm down everybody. It's a joke.

Bryan! (27:00.423) It is.

Joey (27:01.053) Right.

Bryan! (27:04.839) It's super crazy.

Bryan! (27:10.91) Yeah, yeah, yeah. One of the things I read was that one of the one of the organizing bodies around this was a fucking group called citizens against movie madness.

Joey (27:12.642) Right.

Dave! (27:24.014) I would join that today, just for the t-shirt.

Joey (27:24.301) I'm sorry.

Bryan! (27:28.408) Yeah, that's pretty great. Yeah. So there are four sequels to this movie. Yeah, so.

Dave! (27:32.95) and they get progressively worse each and every... Well, I would say to call the second one a sequel is pretty rough. It's basically just the first movie with like 20 more minutes and one of the most incredible movie moments ever.

Joey (27:35.914) Oh yeah.

Bryan! (27:39.079) Yeah.

Joey (27:42.692) Right.

Bryan! (27:45.734) Oh yeah, part two is infamous for Ricky's garbage day murder rampage. The rest of it is basically a clip show compilation of scenes from this one. I read about this and whatever company picked up the sequel rights to it. They handed it over to the people who made that movie and said, they just gave them silent night, deadly night part one and said, re edit this and we'll sell it as a new movie, which is crazy to me.

Dave! (27:49.5) good.

Bryan! (28:11.994) Like how anybody could expect to make an entire movie out of the previous movie. And yet, yeah, they, and they, they fucking did it. But, uh,

Dave! (28:17.269) And yet.

Joey (28:21.181) Well, and that was the original plan for the Exorcist part two. They wanted just to like use footage that was leftover and sort of assemble it and do a little bit. So this must have been like a practice that they were trying to, you know, get off the ground to sort of make, you know, cheap sequels, which I think, you know, some movies did this, but

Bryan! (28:30.856) Oh my god.

Bryan! (28:41.662) I would I bet you anything that this is way more common than we think. It's just like I don't I just don't think any of us have encountered it but.

Joey (28:48.067) Yeah.

Dave! (28:51.478) Well, it's not that surprising though, because this is on that edge of when like the big corporations start to take over the studios. And so you've got people, like this movie itself comes from two guys who were working at like William Morris agency. And so it's like, they're all working in the business kind of corporate section. This is like how Hollywood kind of killed itself in the late seventies and into the eighties. So it's not surprising that you'd have a bunch of fucking dudes, you know, who are accustomed to sort of be, you know, finance guys looking at stuff and like, well, how can we bring more money out of this?

Bryan! (29:04.691) Yeah, they were. Yeah.

Joey (29:05.231) right?

Joey (29:10.957) Right.

Dave! (29:20.946) and really like move it forward.

Bryan! (29:23.794) Yeah.

Joey (29:23.861) Right. And if they could think to do that with a property like The Exorcist, right? Like it shows you how despite the controversy in the box office, that cynicism that was that cynical lens through which they thought about the genre, right? Like it doesn't matter what movie it was, they would still try to do those shortcuts and make money in the most cynical way possible. Of course, we got the heretic instead, which is a different story. But...

Bryan! (29:46.538) Yeah.

Bryan! (29:50.287) Ugh.

Joey (29:52.418) Maybe it would have been better off cutting up some stuff. Yeah.

Dave! (29:53.986) Yeah, I think I'll take the clip show over the heretic.

Bryan! (29:58.583) Yeah. So let's see. I've never seen any of the others pass part two. Not terribly interested in them. Oh, Silent Night, Deadly Night. Yeah. So he so the last two in the series are sequels in name only. And they likely had Silent Night, Deadly Night attached to the names long after the production had wrapped because apparently during the outrage over this one, he was one of the like

Dave! (30:05.9) of Silent Night at the Night, Mickey Rooney isn't one of them.

Joey (30:07.429) Part 3's pretty good.

Joey (30:15.088) Right.

Bryan! (30:24.218) He was one of the celebrity voices like speaking out against it. So people were like, what the fuck Mickey Rooney?

Dave! (30:26.114) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Not so high and mighty now, are you, Mickey Rooney, who used to play a Chinese man in cinema?

Bryan! (30:35.33) Yeah, yeah. And so there's also a very loose remake from 2012 called Silent Night. I've never seen it.

Joey (30:35.711) Oh god.

Joey (30:42.399) No, I'm not over here.

Bryan! (30:44.45) So Silent Night, Deadly Night was just one of many holiday slasher movies and made the obvious move to subvert a holiday known for peace on earth. Good tidings and time spent with families follows black crit follows

Dave! (30:53.65) is it though? This is my issue with this. I because what I think is really interesting is if you look at social media right now everyone's getting because the bulk of my social media is horror. It's like it's either like gay shit, dog videos, and horror movies. Like that's all it is. And so these this time of year it's just like oh what about this one and this one? I'm like I've never heard of half of these movies. Turns out it's because most of them are very new because prior to Krampus there really weren't a lot of there was like

this and like a few others that nobody had ever heard of except for like kind of diehard people. And so the idea that it's like, well, there's tons of them now. And it's like, well, there are, but they're all dog shit. And this one's not good either.

Bryan! (31:24.843) Yeah.

Joey (31:26.94) Hmm.

Bryan! (31:31.998) they were all made in they were all made in the last like ten years like when I was looking up like I was like what other holiday like holiday horror movies are there and I looked it up and I was like oh okay well there's enough to make like a top 40 list but then I looked at it was like all of them yeah Christmas Evil which uh but yeah but all of them were made from like between like I think Krampus was the first one and then in the last like three years there's been like seven

Joey (31:33.613) Ha ha ha.

Dave! (31:43.598) There's that awesome one with Fiona Apple's dad in it. Yep.

Joey (31:48.613) haha

Dave! (32:00.682) And they're all like real tongue-in-cheek. I'm kinda like, all right, I get it. Killer Santa. Ha ha ha.

Bryan! (32:07.706) Yeah, yeah, I don't know. I don't get it. But uh, yeah, don't fuck around. Let's go back to the source. But yep, so film was submitted. Okay, so the film that was submitted to the MPAA for rating really lean 85 minutes, and it was rejected four times and cut so severely that the final theatrical cut ran a mere 79 minutes, which barely qualifies as a feature film. I think you got to be 75 minutes and over.

Dave! (32:09.43) It's like, for me, it's garbage day or nothing. It's garbage day or bust.

Joey (32:16.389) Hehehe

Bryan! (32:36.434) When it landed on VHS for the... It's gotta be. Yeah, but when it landed on VHS for the first time, it was restored briefly to its uncut state before the theatrical cut was eventually released to video, or re-released to video. And then the uncut version circulated in bootleg tapes until the movie was released to DVD uncut in the early 2000s.

Dave! (32:37.358) Which I think now it's 88 minutes.

Dave! (32:57.686) And it's rough because like TriStar had lost all of the original film elements. So when Scream Factory went back to redo this, they basically had to take those VHS, but like a bootleg VHS shots and insert them. And I don't know what, I mean, I had this in early 2000s. I had the first version. I think they tried to do it then too. And I don't really remember what it looked like because it's been so long since I watched that, but watching it now in, I think it's a 2K.

Bryan! (33:06.undefined) It's ti-

Dave! (33:25.878) watching it now it's like you really you could see it's not just VHS it's like hard VHS like there's fucking tracking lines on

Bryan! (33:28.379) It sticks out like a sore thumb.

Joey (33:31.345) It's very noticeable when those... Yeah, yeah.

Bryan! (33:32.898) Yeah, super grainy. The colors are all are all off and wicked dark. Yeah.

Dave! (33:38.242) And because of that, I wonder, and I get why, I'm sure it's for the sake of completion that they probably went all these scenes, but so many of the parts that they cut, you could have left that shit out. It's completely unnecessary.

Bryan! (33:51.062) there's some there is some stuff in there that bears that grain that's like just somebody reacting to something that's like

Dave! (33:57.686) Yeah, like you don't need, and it's gotta be just for the sake of completion, but... Like, it looks real shitty, like I, if it were me, I'd be like, I don't know, I don't think we should do this.

Bryan! (34:01.296) That's gotta be it.

Bryan! (34:07.73) Yeah.

Joey (34:08.229) I appreciate the context, because while I was watching my Amazon rental, I was like, why did it suddenly dip? Is there something wrong with my internet? Like, why do I suddenly? And then it happens over and over. I'm like, okay, now I see. Now I see what's going on.

Dave! (34:17.97) Yeah, and it's one of the ones where they actually, there's a notice, like a note at the beginning of the movie that's like, hey everybody, sorry, it looks like shit every once in a while, here's why. Like, you know when they put that up there, it's like, we really wanted you to see this, but also we know it looks.

Joey (34:26.281) Hahaha

Bryan! (34:27.878) Yeah.

Bryan! (34:33.318) Yep, I used to I used to have a couple of fan edits of certain movies that kind of like take bits and pieces from like various versions and kind of mix them up into a sim into a similar movie. And it really reminded me of that. Like I used to have this bootleg of the Warriors that took the original theatrical cut and it mixed in all of the stuff that they shot for the TV version.

Joey (34:33.872) Yeah.

Joey (34:44.192) Mm-hmm.

Joey (34:54.862) Yeah.

Bryan! (34:55.398) into a single one and it does that like flashback back and forth between the between like high quality DVD presentation because that was all that was available at the time plus stuff that was very clearly taken off of like a video tape that recorded it when it was on TV and such a jarring experience but I do appreciate it because I do like to see like certain things that's like oh shit like I wonder why they cut that out or you know you can see it but you're still like I'm a completist in certain instances so it is nice to kind of it is kind of nice to see that

Dave! (35:23.798) Yeah, you're the reason we have the shitty VHS version of Silent Night, Deadly Night, just every once in a while.

Bryan! (35:29.266) Yep. Hey, you're welcome. So all of the music, including the carols for some reason, are the work of composer Perry Botkin. There is not one familiar Christmas song in this movie. Oh, no shit. Okay. Because that part. Yeah, so that which is not true. There is actually one song, but it's sung by the cast. The rest all

Dave! (35:31.458) Yeah, thank you.

Dave! (35:41.342) Not the carols. The carols are done by Morgan Amos.

for getting this.

Dave! (35:51.97) the fuck is this soundtrack to this so the soundtrack and the score are awesome i mean they wrote a full album of legit christmas songs that are bangers every one of them they get stuck in there and they're not leaving for days

Bryan! (35:56.97) They're great.

Joey (35:58.081) Yeah, they're a highlight.

Joey (36:03.469) Mm-hmm.

Bryan! (36:04.034) Christmas. I cannot get Christmas fever out of my head. It's very funny, but all of the lyrics have these like suitably ominous undertones through them about like Santa's watching and shit. Yep, I love it. Absolutely love it.

Joey (36:06.565) Yeah.

Dave! (36:18.622) Yeah, Santa's watching, Santa's creeping.

Yeah, well that's how you destroy the fantasies and dreams of children.

Bryan! (36:26.746) Yep, God bless him. So let's get into it, shall we? All right. So we open on a station wagon, driving through the scenic mountain region of Utah. And in the car are mom and dad names withheld since they'll both be dead in a few minutes. And little Billy reads the night before Christmas in the back seat and mom holds baby Ricky who is mostly useless to this movie but central to the next one.

Dave! (36:30.823) If we must.

Dave! (36:50.898) And she keeps looking at the father. They both have these kind of idiot looks on their face. It's like, are you both hitting the head or something? Why are you looking at each other like that? Like they have these big cheesy grins like, God, I love being middle-class white people. This is fantastic. And I think, shouldn't your baby be in a car seat? I'm not a parent, thank God, but if I was, I wouldn't be holding it on my lap.

Joey (36:59.431) Ha ha ha.

Bryan! (37:02.326) Yeah, yeah.

Bryan! (37:07.082) they live in the dream, man. No, not night. Not night 1084. Dude, dude, we rode in the front seat when we were six years old. And yeah, so like, you know, it is it. It is what it is. Nope. No. So the discussion of the car is all about being naughty and nice.

Dave! (37:17.219) That's true. It's back at my desk.

Joey (37:21.337) Different time, no seatbelt required.

Dave! (37:23.202) Terrible. Worse, or time?

Bryan! (37:30.77) And mom tells Billy that Santa Claus is gonna be bring him a big surprise tonight. Boy howdy. Yeah, so the thing that I love about this is that you if you're just you don't even have to be paying very close attention. But the build up to the big first act break is like just compounding trauma on top of trauma and

Joey (37:36.621) Sure does.

Dave! (37:51.678) Yeah, it's like, what if- what if Maniac, but at Christmas?

Joey (37:52.026) Yeah.

Bryan! (37:56.079) Yeah, and the best thing about it is, to me at least, is this movie is a much better document of PTSD than anything Ari Aster has made.

Dave! (38:04.558) What if we took all the worst scenes from Last House on the left, but set them at Christmas?

Joey (38:05.571) Yeah.

Bryan! (38:11.318) surrounded by like happy families and smiling and Christmas carols that you've never heard. So they reach their they reach their destination with a shot zooming in ominously on the sign which reads Utah mental facility. And they're the that's they just all they can afford it's so it's Utah. So they're there to see grandpa who we learned is catatonic staring off.

Dave! (38:16.854) but are awesome.

Dave! (38:27.67) Yep. Yeah. Well, that's all you need.

Joey (38:28.313) Just the one, that's all they have.

Dave! (38:36.773) who is basically the grandpa character from South...

Bryan! (38:41.006) Yes, yeah. So he says staring off into the middle distance responding to no one that is until the doctor takes the parents and Ricky aside to discuss his condition leaving Billy with Grandpa.

Dave! (38:51.838) I love this part because it's like, hey, it's cool if we leave the five-year-old here with the demented old man, right? He'll be fine, right?

Bryan! (38:58.502) Yep. But because grandpa comes to life as soon as everybody is on a earshot. He does he kind of like turns he like kind of turns to the side a little bit gives him a little bit of smile and then unloads the most demented crazy bullshit you've ever heard.

Dave! (39:04.222) In the most delightful way, too.

Dave! (39:13.89) Yeah, he's like a video of like a Shiba Inu giving you a side eye, and then he launches into his thing. It's really fantastic.

Bryan! (39:23.285) So he sets the table for the rest of the movie. So with Billy utterly petrified and his delivery is amazing. It's amazing. You could tell that this guy played crazy prospector in like every mid budget Western made from like 1949 to 1975.

Dave! (39:42.154) And he's really trying to squeeze the tears out too.

Joey (39:44.725) Oh my God, there were so many tears in his eyes. I was looking at this guy is going for it. He really is. It's so intense.

Dave! (39:47.894) And he's going for it, he's really trying. He's like, I gotta make the most of this, this is it, this is my five minutes on screen, I'm really gonna do the thing. And he does, he does do that.

Bryan! (39:56.558) Oh yeah and he does. He does because he tells he proceeds to tell him that Christmas Eve is the scariest god damn night of the year. According to him, presents go to kids who the presents go to kids who've been good all year but kids have been naughty end up punished which is actually true of some of the versions of Santa Claus around the world and he says if you see Santa Claus, you better run for your life.

Dave! (40:04.814) to which I say, according to who.

Well, he's not wrong.

Joey (40:10.822) Right. He gets it right.

Joey (40:26.289) Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

Dave! (40:26.881) So good.

Bryan! (40:31.179) I love it. I absolutely fucking love it. Yes.

Dave! (40:32.726) Because he's got this beard that's ridiculous. It looks like they glued it onto his face. It's fantastic.

Joey (40:32.769) It immediately snaps back.

Bryan! (40:40.027) from like yeah from like hair shavings or something like that so as soon as soon as his parents come back and grandpa resumes his catatonia which makes me wonder is he pretending is that the is it the joke here

Dave! (40:54.006) Well, if it's a joke, it's not funny. I don't really know. I think it's just sort of like, well, how else are we gonna get this shit started?

Bryan! (40:55.722) I'm sorry.

Bryan! (41:01.822) Yeah, I suppose you're right.

Joey (41:02.893) It's also the shortest visit ever. They don't do any creative transition stuff. So it's like they show up, stay here with grandpa. We're gonna go talk to the doctor. They come back, they're like, well, we better go. It's like, so you drove all the way there for these five minutes? You didn't spend any time with him. Couldn't you have called? Exactly. It's so ridiculous.

Bryan! (41:13.69) right and from all the right by all accounts he they seem to have traveled some distance to show up and just kind of look at him sadly for like a few minutes and then they get my god.

Dave! (41:13.73) It's like, why did you come here? Couldn't you do this on the phone?

Joey (41:29.057) Yeah, they don't spend any time with him. They leave Billy to do it. And they were and then they go just to talk to them.

Dave! (41:33.122) Well, I think you know why.

Because all he does is talk about how Santa Claus is dangerous.

Bryan! (41:39.474) Yep. So on the ride back, Billy lets everybody knows that he's scared of Santa Claus now and that grandpa told him these things. And his mom, his mom replies by calling grandpa a crazy old man, which sets

Dave! (41:48.182) And yeah.

Joey (41:48.973) A ridiculous concept. They let them.

Dave! (41:55.21) And this is my favorite moment in the entire movie, a five-year-old clutching his pearls, because he basically is just like, oh, how can you say that? The look on his face is priceless.

Bryan! (42:01.162) Hehehehe. Yup.

Bryan! (42:09.055) Yeah, it's yeah, it's like it's naughty to say mean things about old people which

Dave! (42:16.882) I say mean shit about old people all the time. I did it just today.

Bryan! (42:20.686) Well, you better fucking watch out on Christmas Eve, because Santa's watching Santa's waiting. Christmas Eve will soon be fading.

Dave! (42:25.014) Look, I don't have a chimney. And, you know, the dad's driving with a big, dopey grin on his face, just like before. So happy!

Bryan! (42:32.69) Yep, but this sets Billy off because she's being naughty and Santa Claus will punish her for it. So put a fucking pin in that one.

Dave! (42:40.062) Now here's my question about this. So if we operate on the assumption that horror movies are essentially sort of a reflection of cultural fears, what is the cultural fear here? Is it of strangers? Because what we're coming up to is this idea that you stop to do a good deed for someone and that person then kills you. And I think that...

that was a very real fear because there's a scene in Henry portrait of a serial killer that's very much like this. And that scene scared the shit out of me when I was a kid. And I think there really was that fear of like, we're realizing the world is a lot scarier now that communications are sort of expanding and we don't have such localized news. We're hearing a lot more tragedy from around the country. Like what is this movie operating on or is it operating on anything? I don't know that it is.

Bryan! (43:09.671) Oh yeah.

Joey (43:11.323) Right.

Bryan! (43:32.285) I, well, it probably isn't. It's probably just a setup for, you know, just to get this kid's parents dead, but this was like the This there was a lot of like stranger danger shit, but it was mostly around children being accosted.

Joey (43:39.106) Right.

Dave! (43:41.07) It's just a hilarious contrivance.

Dave! (43:48.374) Well yeah, you're going to destroy the innocence and hopes and dreams of an entire generation of white American children. That's what the parents said.

Bryan! (43:53.618) Yep.

Joey (43:55.721) Well, and part of the thing that makes this so confusing, because I'm with you, I had that note. I'm like, let me take this very serious note about a very unserious movie. Like, what is the message? Yeah, what is the message? What are they really trying to say in this? And the thing that makes it so difficult to sort of process or reconcile is that, there's an episode of The Golden Girls where Terry Kaiser from Weekends and Bernies, Weekend and Bernies plays a Santa Claus who holds them hostage.

Dave! (44:05.09) Yeah, every now and then I do that.

Joey (44:25.901) And he's, you know, it's just, it's like really dry, crazy performance. And that's who this Santa in the beginning kind of reminded me of. So I felt like a sitcom Santa Claus doing crimes and murders. And so the strange performance and the difficulty figuring out what the motivation even was of this killer Santa, that's part of what confuses

the message if there is one, like I don't really understand because of the way that Santa is, you know, that this sort of like sitcom killer Santa is portrayed. It's a weird confusion of like different styles of Santa Claus and killer, if that makes sense, you know?

Dave! (45:08.074) And there's a weird thing I think that goes along with that in that there's a sort of a, I kinda wanna say it's a trope, it's almost a trope. In the eighties of like, bad shit happening to parents at Christmas. Like think of like the story in Grandma's, that really weird story in Grandma's that she tells about her father. And like, what's that? Is it one magic Christmas where like her father gets shot on Christmas in the bank? There's like this fear of like parents dying or some tragedy happening at.

Joey (45:23.014) Yeah.

Bryan! (45:26.315) Oh, yeah.

Bryan! (45:30.704) Oh yeah!

Joey (45:33.877) Oh, God.

Dave! (45:37.422) Christmas. It feels very specific to the 80s. It's reflecting something about the 1980s in America that, again, not surprising, it's the era of sort of Reaganism and this major expansion of white middle class fear. I don't know. I think we're overthinking this movie, but it did, it struck me as like, what is this telling us about anything? And I don't think it's telling us anything at all, really, but because I think that when they made this movie, they are not taking any of it seriously.

Joey (45:41.477) Yeah.

Joey (45:57.056) Yes, yes, yes.

Joey (46:07.855) Right.

Dave! (46:08.046) That's my aside, go on.

Bryan! (46:10.646) Yeah, I mean, I personally I think there's value in chasing that down. I mean, at least just for a conversation, but whether or not they intended it, or it was just something that they stuck in as a plot device, like it definitely does reflect the era, you know, in a way that I don't think in many other movies definitely did. It's better. It's it's Yeah.

Joey (46:24.241) Mm-hmm.

Dave! (46:28.726) Yeah, this is very much a product of its time. And we'll get to that at the end, but yeah, this is super 80s.

Bryan! (46:34.962) Yeah. So we cut to a convenience store where Santa comes in and holds the place up and to that like sitcom Santa thing like this movie takes evil Santa Claus and cranks it to 11 like immediately like this guy.

Joey (46:48.191) Oh yeah.

Dave! (46:48.374) Yeah, he thinks we'll be cackling as he's waving the gun around.

Bryan! (46:51.666) Yeah, I don't know who this I can't remember this actor's name, but he's a guy he plays a lot. He plays bad guys. And he played a lot of like biker types and shit. So yeah, so he goes to the counter. He holds the place up. And the guy behind the counter tries to pull a gun on Santa but gets shot in the process. So Santa empties the register out. But while the dude shot or the guy you know, lying on the ground, tries to line up a shot on Santa gets another one on the chest for his trouble and then one between the eyes to finish the gig.

Joey (46:59.29) Yeah.

Dave! (47:20.887) Merry Christmas.

Bryan! (47:22.39) Yep. And so before driving away, Santa complains that he only got $31 for his trouble. So, oh yeah, oh yeah, should have been more. Right, how much is a life worth? So, $31, $31. So back in the station wagon, Billy's family rounds a corner, finds the murderous Santa in the street next to his car. Now Billy understandably freaks out after everything he's heard.

Dave! (47:28.526) That's how you know he's the bad guy. Well that and he shot that.

Joey (47:33.347) Right, right.

Dave! (47:35.662) $38.

Joey (47:37.841) 31.

Dave! (47:46.754) So again, my question is, is he having car trouble or did he stop just to kill them?

Bryan! (47:52.587) This is that Henry portrait of a serial killer thing where they faked it just to kill him.

Joey (47:52.715) Right.

Dave! (47:56.63) Because if anyone, just I'm gonna go on the record, there is one movie from childhood that terrified me and it is Henry Porter for Serial Killer. I still cannot watch that movie.

Bryan! (48:05.022) here's the thing that movie is upsetting to everybody. I have I've watched it a couple of times. I do not go out of my way to check it out. But yeah, that scene immediately comes to mind here.

Joey (48:09.722) Yeah, agreed.

Bryan! (48:20.354) So Santa immediately draws a gun on dad who throws it into reverse. As Santa puts two in the windshield, killing dad as the car spins out and dumps into a ditch, Billy does the sensible thing. He runs out of the car and hides in the bushes while Santa drags mom out of the car and tears her blouse open. What's he going to do? He's five years old.

Dave! (48:34.286) That's right, leave your family to die, Billy.

Well, he's gonna have to wait, I don't know, about 15 more years.

Bryan! (48:44.847) He tears her blouse open in the street before cutting her throat.

Dave! (48:47.562) Yeah, my note says this movie is utter trash.

Bryan! (48:51.133) Yeah, grandpa was right about everything.

Joey (48:55.245) And that's the image that stuck with me so much when I was a kid. There was something just so extra, you know, perverse and like, you know, sleazy is a good word for it about the ripping open of the mother's blouse before he slits her throat. You know, it's goofy, goofy to see now, but as a kid that really disturbed me. That with the cutting back and forth with baby Ricky and yeah.

Bryan! (49:08.053) Yeah.

Dave! (49:20.155) It's because it's gratuitous.

Joey (49:23.077) Gratuitous and even like the music behind it is a little like silly almost in the moment, right? Right. But I remember it as one, which is the funny thing when I was a kid.

Dave! (49:27.278) Because this is not a rape scene. It's just, right. It's just, it's a mix of sex and violence that, you know, we see it throughout the 80s, but it doesn't serve a purpose other than to be gratuitously slimy. And I think that's why it leaves such an impression, because you're like, I don't want to see nudity and violence mixed together.

Bryan! (49:27.835) Yeah.

Joey (49:44.67) Right.

Dave! (49:52.218) Even now, I'm like, I still am not. Like, I know it's a goofy scene, but it's like, I don't need to see this at the same time that I'm seeing this other.

Joey (49:57.773) Yeah. Right.

Bryan! (49:59.678) I think personally, I think that the intention of the scene was to be like over the top and gonzo and very silly, but it does not come off that way at all. It's very it's which is why I think what we're all basically saying the same thing is we're trying to reconcile two conflicting feelings, which is like genuine shock and horror because it's

Joey (50:08.458) No.

Bryan! (50:21.542) it's an upsetting scene. You know, it's definitely it's very intense and it's very ugly. But it comes with this like, with the script called for it to be very insincere and just you know, bananas and so they just we can't

Joey (50:23.051) Yeah, yeah.

Joey (50:36.746) Mm-hmm.

Dave! (50:39.606) Right, it's hard to process when the tone is goofy.

Bryan! (50:42.502) Right, we can't put the pieces together in a way that sort of makes sense. So it just kind of floats there in our consciousness as this was the one part of the movie that we all seem to remember more than the rest of them.

Joey (50:53.353) Right, and having Billy watch it, and also watch him watching it, that's the thing that gives it that extra ick that makes it feel, you know, not even subversive, just like, what are we doing here? You know, like, what? Like...

Bryan! (51:06.066) right? And they definitely they definitely do like, it's not necessarily POV stuff. But the way that the scene is shot is a lot of like ground level stuff. Because what we see is he goes and he runs off to the side of the road, he gets into the bushes, and he's very, you know, he's a little kid on the ground. And so when they show a lot of those scenes, they're shot very low as if to put us in his in his position, which just, you know, plants it right in your memory. Oh, god, we do.

Joey (51:11.601) Mm-hmm.

Joey (51:20.281) Right.

Joey (51:25.475) Yeah.

Joey (51:29.433) And we flash back to it so many times throughout the movie. So it's telling us that this is, you know, like this is that instigating trauma, but also the most upsetting image in the film, right?

Dave! (51:42.222) All right, it's pure exploitation with the worst possible tone.

Bryan! (51:46.346) Yeah, yeah. So we catch up with Billy three years later at Saint Mary's home for orphan children as. Oh my God, that kid must have come from Canada.

Joey (51:46.605) Right.

Dave! (51:53.866) and he has the best haircut ever.

Joey (51:59.729) Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

Bryan! (52:01.546) He's called to by a nun to present his drawing to the class, which horrifies the children. And then he sent to Mother Superior's office, and we see why. It is a drawing of Santa Claus to one side of a Christmas tree, bleeding out with knives stuck all over him, and a reindeer with its head chopped off.

sister. Oh my god. Yeah, it's almost criminal that she doesn't get killed at the end.

Dave! (52:19.23) Also, Mother Superior, big asshole.

Dave! (52:25.41) But that younger nun looks just like Linda Ronstadt. And I love that.

Bryan! (52:28.054) that's why he's so funny. So yeah, that's sister Margaret. She understands why he draw such a thing. It makes perfect sense. Mother Superior thinks that all of her, uh, all this liberal feelings shit just needs to be hammered out of him through punishment.

Joey (52:28.89) Ha ha ha!

Dave! (52:42.642) And that's because she's French. That's why she thinks that.

Joey (52:43.106) I mean

And she's kind of just, she's a fucking moron. I mean, that's the real thing. It's like, it's such a easy through line behind what's like, what's wrong with this kid and what ha, you know what I mean? Like, and her insistence that doesn't matter is just like, beat your head against the wall frustrating. Yeah.

Bryan! (52:59.634) Yeah, later on, like sister.

Dave! (52:59.886) But that also feels so 80s though, because it's like here you have these conflicting perspectives. This older woman who's just like, why can't you just be normal? I know you saw your mother kind of not really raped, but also murdered. Yeah, just be better. Be a better podcaster is what I'm saying to you. And then you get this young woman who's just like, no, that's a terrible thing. It's like this, we're still arguing about this today.

Joey (53:11.417) That's no excuse. Yeah, that's like...

Bryan! (53:16.182) Hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe

Joey (53:16.89) Hahaha

Bryan! (53:24.73) Yeah. But yeah, like later on, sister Margaret is like, you understand why he like he does this every year at Christmas and she's like after Christmas, he's going to be great. And she's like, most of prayer is like, no, it works because my methods work. Yeah.

Joey (53:40.993) My methods are so good, yeah.

Dave! (53:42.706) And I mean, her methods are really, really quite something because then she ties him to the bed. And what I like to call the old Joan Crawford approach to parenting.

Bryan! (53:48.583) Yup.

Joey (53:52.185) Hmm

Bryan! (53:53.644) Yeah. So, uh,

Dave! (53:54.67) It worked well for Joan Crawford too.

Joey (53:56.197) Tie the podcast back in. Go ahead. In case you forgot what we're listening to.

Bryan! (53:58.398) There we go. There we go. So, so yeah, so sister Margaret and her woke values are undeterred and she invites Billy out to help with the snowman. They're all building. Because kids be getting orphaned in Utah like constantly apparently. So they're all.

Dave! (54:08.502) Also, why are there so many children at this orphanage?

Dave! (54:15.218) You know, I believe it. Yeah, come at me, Utah. What are you going to do about it? I said it.

Bryan! (54:21.426) not drink coffee.

Dave! (54:24.098) But drink for some reason, tons and tons of, you know what, that's a diversion. Let's keep going. Yeah.

Joey (54:26.361) The, yeah, yeah. The Long Island Ice Teas episode is, mix it up.

Bryan! (54:31.113) I'm sorry.

Bryan! (54:34.626) So, so yeah, they build the snowman. But he on his way out, he's distracted by the sounds down the hall and he goes to investigate. We see through the keyhole is two of the older orphans doing it. Yes.

Dave! (54:45.638) Okay, is that who they are? I was very confused by this, because I'm like, is that the nun? Is that Linda Ronstadt? Ah!

Joey (54:50.741) Oh my god, she looked just like the nun. I was so confused. I was like, is sister Margaret having sex? I was, yeah. Thank you for saying that.

Bryan! (54:53.118) she does but no but cuz later on later on yeah later on we see sister Margaret with her habit off and she she's got like um she's got like short hair so it's a totally different girl. It's just it's just older orphans like just making the best of a terrible situation.

Dave! (54:57.226) That seems very un-none-ly.

Joey (55:00.385) Uncesterly.

Joey (55:07.161) Yeah.

Joey (55:13.005) They don't make it very clear because those older orphans look like full on naked adults. Yeah.

Bryan! (55:15.474) But yes, the very first time I was I was like, are those is that a nun? Like what's going on here? I yeah. Yep, he's one of the. Yep. So Mother Superior breaks up the scene whips all parties with a belt when she confronts Billy about it. Uh she uses a couple of really dangerous keywords when related to him, naughty and punishment. Yep. Uh Mother Superior is way

Dave! (55:16.11) They're 35.

Dave! (55:22.282) And if so, who's the guy? But now I get it, it's all clear to me now, right?

Dave! (55:39.767) Yeah!

Bryan! (55:45.562) and then she whips Billy with a belt. So that night, he has a nightmare about his parents being killed again. He tries to run from his room, but Mother Superior catches him, literally ties him to the bed. So the next day is Christmas morning, and Billy is freed to join the rest of the kids. And Mother Superior assures Sister Margaret that methods will work, and she'll see this in action when Billy is made to sit on Santa Claus's lap and not freak out.

Dave! (56:11.47) So the guy who wrote this movie, one of the things he says, I watched an interview with him, and one of the things he says, he keeps talking about how every time he felt like he was going too far, he was like, I'm just gonna keep going. And this is one of those moments where it's like, if this feels like too much, lean in.

Bryan! (56:24.295) God bless them.

Bryan! (56:28.85) Yep. God bless us everyone. So yeah, so what happens Billy is sat on Santa's lap and he freaks out culminating in a left hook to Santa's jaw sending Santa reeling and Billy back to his room where he cowers in a corner. So now, yes, we do.

Dave! (56:43.402) And we get a, I think we get a freeze frame too, don't we? Like a real TV movie freeze frame.

Bryan! (56:49.822) Yep. So we now jump forward 10 years. Sister Margaret pleads with Mr. Sims, owner of a local toy store to give Billy a job.

Dave! (56:57.57) Alright question, is Mr. Sims gay coded?

Joey (57:01.481) I wrote that exact note, that moment was so gay coded, just Billy's... Yeah. He's like, oh yeah, I thought he was gonna be like a lech, I thought it was gonna be... There was gonna be a scene where he comes on to Billy and makes him snap, like I was waiting for it and of course it doesn't happen. No, he's just like, yeah, I want this cheap labor from this big hulking young dude, because the other guy's a twerp. Yes.

Dave! (57:04.918) Because he drinks him in, like, it is a long lingering... Mm-hmm.

Bryan! (57:07.824) Oh yeah.

Dave! (57:18.166) Surprisingly, no.

Dave! (57:24.694) Yes. Because Billy's got gay porno all over him.

Bryan! (57:29.374) Oh my god, dude. He looks like he looks like a cross between a Mormon and an extra from the outsiders. Like he is just denim top to bottom. He's the only thing he's missing is a pack of cigarettes rolled up into his sleeve.

Joey (57:36.334) Yeah. That's good.

Bryan! (57:45.274) So, so, once he sees Billy who is objectively handsome, he's a strapping young man, 18 years old.

Dave! (57:52.174) Serious moose knuckle though, I've just, I've gotta say that because... Because I was like, holy Jesus.

Joey (57:59.725) I noticed it as well. May I also just point out, as well-intentioned as Sister Margaret is, she's also a fucking moron. You think that he should work at a toy store at Christmas? You're so sensitive to him, but his job should be this one?

Bryan! (58:11.49) Oh. Well, so it starts out, it says like spring 1984, but she should have had a little should have had a little forethought in this. Yeah, like what the it's a fucking toy store.

Dave! (58:21.426) I mean, they had to see Christmas coming, right? Happens every year.

Joey (58:26.625) It's a toy store. I mean, it's gonna happen. Yeah.

Dave! (58:29.514) Now my question is, is it a toy store? Because this is the saddest fucking toy store I have ever seen. This is like a warehouse that they were like, well, put up some metal shelves and toss some toys on it, but.

Bryan! (58:33.367) Hahaha

Joey (58:38.345) I was surprised by how many real toys there were though. I was like, I see a Muppet, I see Mickey, I see real shit here. I was very impressed.

Bryan! (58:38.526) that is I know there's a there's a lot of licensed. Yep, a lot of Star Wars stuff.

Dave! (58:42.578) Oh yeah, you got that sweet crawl board game? Or the moment when they opened the G.I. Joe box of the toy and I was just like, that is a visceral memory where I was just like, I can feel that. Mm-hmm.

Joey (58:47.408) Yeah.

Hehehe

Bryan! (58:52.822) you can pop it all off the thick sprues. Uh huh. Yup. But uh to your point, see, yeah, to your point, was it a warehouse that they just slapped some shelves into? Actually, actually it was. It literally, it literally was. Apparently, that building still exists. So, uh yeah, if you're ever in wherever the ** that is in Utah, you can

Joey (58:59.185) There's a great montage after he starts working there too. We just have to...

Dave! (59:05.706) Yes, it was. Yep.

Joey (59:06.473) I believe so, yeah.

Joey (59:11.446) Oh.

Joey (59:15.076) if you need a tour. Yeah.

Dave! (59:16.382) I will, I promise you I will never be in Utah. I mean, okay, I can't promise you that I will never be in Utah, but I can promise you I will go out of my way.

Bryan! (59:18.798) I will never go to Utah.

Joey (59:22.685) I went once, it's quite beautiful, I have to say. It was like an alien planet, if you go to Moab, it looks like you're on the Predator planet or something, the scenery is pretty amazing.

Bryan! (59:30.634) Ha ha ha.

Dave! (59:31.262) It looks, I was watching like the, they do, cause it's weird, this movie, as fucking dumb as it is, it's very well made. And there's a lot of like, like little landscape shots that are like, these are, it is a gorgeous landscape. Unfortunately, it's also in Utah.

Bryan! (59:41.791) Yeah.

Joey (59:42.037) It does a lot of things well. Yeah, I agree.

Joey (59:47.246) Yeah.

Bryan! (59:49.782) Oh yeah, the the direct yeah, I mean the DP very obviously looked around and was like, oh yeah, we gotta get like as wide a shot on this ** as we can because like there are some legitimately like beautiful landscape shots on this and it is

Joey (01:00:00.973) And good transitions with music too. I mean, it does some things really well, which is also adds to the confusion. It's like, how is this almost an okay movie? Yeah, in many ways. Right, I know. But nothing is, yeah.

Dave! (01:00:08.726) Yeah, this is a real movie. This is clearly not elves.

Bryan! (01:00:12.79) Yeah. Nothing will ever be else. So yeah, we cut to a montage of Billy doing a great job at Iris Toys while a schmaltzy tune plays about the warm side of the door. I love that song. Love that song.

Dave! (01:00:16.366) Thank God.

Joey (01:00:26.779) That's a great song.

Dave! (01:00:28.706) Look, this soundtrack is available. Everybody should get it.

Bryan! (01:00:33.458) you've got it on the shelf literally right behind you. So uh so he has some

Dave! (01:00:35.09) It is on the shelf behind me, yes. That's my unpaid shout out to 1984 publishers. They are great. Buy their shit.

Joey (01:00:37.893) Good for you.

Joey (01:00:45.364) Heh.

Bryan! (01:00:46.01) So, uh, yeah, he has some coworkers. We meet a girl named Pamela who he has a crush on, and Andy, who's a real piece of shit. And there's also what I'd like to call Chekov's fire axe perched ominously next to the stockroom door.

Joey (01:00:53.856) Mm-hmm.

Dave! (01:00:59.286) I like that you say it like Chekov's Fireaxe is also a coworker. Like, oh, there's also their third coworker, the Fireaxe.

Bryan! (01:01:04.224) He's, you know what?

Joey (01:01:06.489) Sitting at a desk. Yeah.

Bryan! (01:01:07.662) Yeah. I mean, he is a very important tool in the job to come. So, so, yep, everything's coming up millhouse for Billy. It's all good. Nothing could possibly go wrong. Nope. But what's this? Yep. We're nearing Christmas and Mr. Sims is going to have a dude in a Santa suit there to meet the children. Surely, this will not cause a problem. So, Billy is starting to lose his grip.

Dave! (01:01:11.414) He works in HR.

Dave! (01:01:17.064) Yeah.

No. Except.

Bryan! (01:01:34.29) He fantasizes about Pam in a scene that's identical to what he saw through the keyhole at eight years old. And then...

Joey (01:01:38.807) Yeah.

Dave! (01:01:39.47) It's also, it feels very sleepaway camp to me. I don't know why, but it has a very kind of sleazy, lurid sleepaway campness. And then you get that like kind of a bottom, like, well, choice of words. You get sort of like from the, from his feet upwards. And it's like, you get this long lingering shot, like Billy's hairy ass. You just keep going. It's like, yeah.

Joey (01:01:42.953) Yep.

Joey (01:01:52.811) Hehehe

Joey (01:01:59.521) Well, there's a glow, there's a glow to the moment and there's nothing else like in the room. So it has that very sleepaway camp like you're kind of in like a black box. Yeah.

Bryan! (01:02:05.766) Oh God, yeah, like those scenes with the black backdrop. Yeah, so yeah, I put a black backdrop up, which was the style at the time.

Dave! (01:02:06.43) It feels like the... Yeah.

Dave! (01:02:15.262) It really, yeah. It's like, well, we need to stick some more stuff in here because this movie's not long enough. So, that's all.

Joey (01:02:15.429) Hehehehe

Joey (01:02:20.937) That's how you signal that it's lovemaking and not just sex. You have a black box.

Bryan! (01:02:23.894) Yeah. Yep. So then Santa murders him and he wakes up screaming. But as we learn back at the orphanage, if Billy can make it through Christmas, it's all good. He just has to get past the holiday. So the next day.

Dave! (01:02:37.834) Now, and again, the holiday comes every year, so we could have a plan for this, everybody.

Bryan! (01:02:43.142) he would think that he would learn coping skills, but not where he came from. No, but um we so yeah, if you can just get past the holiday, it's all good. So, the next day, we learn that the guy in the Santa suit at Iris Toys had an accident. He broke his ankle while ice skating and so with no options to fill the position this close to Christmas, Sims decides that the easy fix is to get one of his guys and put him in the suit. The obvious choice.

Joey (01:02:46.234) Mm-mm.

Dave! (01:03:06.742) Well first, what's her name? Mrs. Something or other? I can't, she's like one of the best characters in the movie. She's like, yeah, she's like, well can't you get a temporary Santa Claus? It's like, is a temporary Santa Claus, is there like, she's like, just call an agency. Like, there's an agency for temporary Santa Claus, is this? Santa Claw? What is it?

Bryan! (01:03:11.487) I love her. Mrs. Randolph or something.

Joey (01:03:11.638) Oh, she's great. She's great.

Bryan! (01:03:23.478) Oh, yeah. Yeah, that's what that's what Mr. Sims says to her and she's like, I did call the agency and all they've got is women.

Dave! (01:03:32.106) And all they've got is women. And as you know, women can't do anything.

Joey (01:03:36.552) And by the way, that actress, she is in the beginning of Halloween 4. She's the woman in the ambulance that gets the thumb to the head.

Bryan! (01:03:44.362) Oh no shit. Yeah, she's the fucking best.

Dave! (01:03:44.424) I love her.

Joey (01:03:45.897) Yeah, she's really good in that moment, when she's getting that thumb between the eyebrows. She's really good in this. She's really fun in this.

Dave! (01:03:51.35) good I mean she's equally good in this especially once she gets drunk because you know what she's made for getting drunk like that's your character that's who you are

Joey (01:03:58.607) Oh yeah.

Bryan! (01:03:59.47) Oh, yeah, it's I would say that like, there's a lot of stage craft that like you really have that people have a really hard time with one is stage fighting that it's very hard to do convincingly. The other thing that's very hard to do convincingly stage drunk. And she is a fucking master.

Dave! (01:04:15.966) I know, I heard, the one thing I heard about that once is pretend that you're a drunk person pretending to be sober. And that is how you act drunk. And I was like, that is really good advice. And much like Britt Leach is a sort of weird bowl-cutted, lecherous personality, she has the vibe of someone who is drunk in everything she's in. Like you're an extra in Steel Magnolias, but you're a drunk extra. It's that kind of...

Joey (01:04:24.037) Hahaha.

Bryan! (01:04:26.43) Ah, that's good advice, man.

Bryan! (01:04:39.018) Hahaha.

Joey (01:04:39.478) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:04:44.254) Yep. Yeah, so. Ha ha ha.

Joey (01:04:46.26) You're a stand-in in big business, but you're drunk. Yeah.

Dave! (01:04:48.683) Oh yeah, that's the one.

Bryan! (01:04:52.69) So when faced with misbehaving whiny children in the Santa suit, Billy does what he thinks Santa does. He tells her that if she can't get it together, then Santa will punish her severely.

Dave! (01:05:02.922) Now look, to be fair, I would do the same thing. And I was not traumatized by Santa Claus.

Bryan! (01:05:06.293) I'm sorry.

Bryan! (01:05:10.046) The parents unable to hear what Billy is telling them, just assume that he's great with kids.

Dave! (01:05:14.314) What's really great about this Santa Claus, this is a sort of set decoration thing, or I guess maybe costume, right? Is that the beard doesn't cover his face. And that is such a good choice because it's like, it all just, the costume hangs on him, the beard kind of hangs on him. It's like, you're not a Santa Claus. You look like a weird kind of cut rate Santa Claus. And that makes you weirdly more menacing, which is good because he already has this kind of Mormon good looks.

Joey (01:05:24.045) Right.

Bryan! (01:05:31.72) Yeah.

Dave! (01:05:43.182) Do you wanna make him look menacing? Make him look like kind of like a, like a uncanny valley Santa Claus. And the best way to do that is like, everything just sort of hangs a little bit too much.

Joey (01:05:49.538) Yeah.

Joey (01:05:53.633) And did you get the vibe that the moms were just totally lusting after him? And they're like, oh, he's just so good with the kids. It's like, cause he's hot and you can see his face and you know, he's a young strapping man, right? So they're like, Oh, great job threatening to kill this little girl.

Dave! (01:06:00.586) I think everybody is though.

Dave! (01:06:10.604) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:06:10.61) Oh yeah. Yeah. Well, you know what it was is they were entranced by the moose knuckle. Yeah. So, yeah. The uh so now the stock room receives a phone call from somebody checking up on Billy. Uh Andy, the asshole answers it, tells her that he's in the Santa suit now and it's revealed that the caller is sister Margaret who is appropriately horrified by this. So now, oh my god. It must be a wicked long drive because yeah.

Dave! (01:06:13.919) It's honestly, I-

Joey (01:06:14.389) Yeah, visible, visible through the red pants. Yeah.

Joey (01:06:33.45) Sure takes a while to get down there though, that's all I'm gonna say.

Dave! (01:06:35.138) Yeah, well.

Like, they only have one car at the one orphanage in all of Utah.

Bryan! (01:06:43.346) Yep. So now with the workday over, it's time to close the store. Commence with the Christmas party with Billy in the Santa suit. Everybody keeps calling him Santa, which does him no favors. So now Andy and Pam disappear back into the stockroom to fool around and this doesn't go unnoticed by Billy or Santa. Yeah, with the perm. So meanwhile, Mr. Sims extremely drunk tells Billy that he's got a long night ahead of him.

Joey (01:06:43.427) No.

Dave! (01:07:01.462) Wait, which one's Andy? He's the shitty one?

Bryan! (01:07:12.07) why he remembers what Santa Claus does on Christmas Eve doesn't he? Well, well, go get him Santa!

Dave! (01:07:19.67) First you get, you murder someone for $31. And you flag down an unsuspecting dumb struck family.

Joey (01:07:28.401) Hehehe

Bryan! (01:07:30.706) in the stockroom, Andy intends to give a very naive Pam a gift that she's just gonna love. But as it would turn out, he intends to give her the gift of sexual assault.

Dave! (01:07:40.118) Yeah, he's got a real men's rights vibe to him. I don't think I care for Andy.

Bryan! (01:07:42.832) Hahaha.

Bryan! (01:07:46.226) Yep. Good thing Billy's there to put a stop to it. Or is it? So Billy seeing this.

Dave! (01:07:52.262) Also, when he's, so he is sexually assaulting her, but he's sort of not really, he's just kind of rubbing his face all over her in this really weird, not that I want to see anybody sexually assaulted, real or otherwise, but like, it's, it's real, like if the scene where the mother gets killed is a little bit too realistic, this is the opposite of that, where he's just like rubbing his fucking greasy men's rights face all over her body. It's like, I don't know what you're doing, but that is not-

Bryan! (01:08:00.008) Yeah, I noticed that.

Bryan! (01:08:12.298) This is not at all. Yeah.

Bryan! (01:08:18.139) Hahaha

Dave! (01:08:20.83) sexual assault or sex? I don't think. I mean, I-

Bryan! (01:08:22.726) It's you know what it's like a sex scene in a jallow like where it's just people smashing their bodies together awkwardly.

Dave! (01:08:28.022) Yeah, like two Barbie dolls again, just mashing them together.

Joey (01:08:31.277) Well, her reaction is doing all the work of saying it's assault, but his actions are sort of hovering over. It's just a...

Dave! (01:08:34.306) Best.

Yeah, you know, that's the story of women all over, you know?

Bryan! (01:08:41.062) Yeah, they were like, okay, he's like, okay, so like, you gotta you gotta direct me through this. What do I do? And they're just like, you know, like, go get her, like, go get her tiger.

Joey (01:08:48.237) He's like, just rub my curly hair up and down her breasts. Like, is that what you mean?

Dave! (01:08:48.266) And like she was-

Dave! (01:08:52.398) I don't want to kink shame, okay? You know, it's to each their own. But I'm sure when it came to directing her, she was like, no, I got this. I know how it goes. Don't worry. Hey, I didn't create the culture. I just live in it.

Bryan! (01:08:52.832) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:09:01.662) Uh, don't do that.

Bryan! (01:09:07.708) Uh, no.

Joey (01:09:08.237) I just don't know if it's to the film's credit that it fumbles like all of its sexual assaults, you know? Like, you know what I mean? Like, is it trying to be conservative in that way and not really depict, you know, the grim reality of sexual assault or is it just really incompetently directed and thus we get.

Dave! (01:09:14.21) Listen, there is nothing to the film's credit.

Bryan! (01:09:16.438) Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

Dave! (01:09:27.33) That's what I think is so weird about the contrast between this scene and the other one in which it's not really a sexual assault, but I think it's supposed to be, is that you make this one thing that's not what we're led to believe it is, and it is jarring and upsetting because of the context. It's a little bit silly and dumb. Now you have this other thing where we're supposed to understand it to be this one thing, but it looks so fucking dumb that I'm like, I...

Bryan! (01:09:45.234) Yeah.

Joey (01:09:46.672) Yeah.

Dave! (01:09:55.382) Why did you do this? You did it the other way and you weren't even trying before. Now you're doing it here.

Joey (01:09:55.774) Yeah.

Joey (01:09:59.917) Well, I think it's both are like evocative of what they're supposed to be, but they're not actually portrayals of them or not like, not realistic portrayals of them. And that might be like an example of the film wanting to have its cake and eat it too, like to give us these sort of disturbing moments. But because the film is so unserious that it can't sort of figure out like how to do it. So it winds up being kind of like a spoof almost, you know what I mean? Like it's a...

Dave! (01:10:16.854) Yeah, I guess.

Bryan! (01:10:23.658) Yeah.

Dave! (01:10:25.59) Yeah, it's only disturbing by accident.

Bryan! (01:10:26.887) Yeah.

Joey (01:10:29.525) Right. Well, and then, you know, the comeuppance comes quickly and shiny and bright.

Bryan! (01:10:30.182) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:10:36.37) Yep, so Billy seeing this is brought back to five years old and he snaps. He declares Andy naughty and he rushes in wrapping a string of Christmas lights around his neck and hanging him by one hand. He does. Yep. And when Pam rejects him and attacks him, he guts her with a box cutter.

Joey (01:10:47.565) He gets him real high in the air too. I mean.

Dave! (01:10:49.068) Yeah, it does.

Dave! (01:10:54.83) To which I say, look, did she deserve to die? Of course not. But bitch, he just saved you from having that man rub his fucking greasy, gross face all over you in what he thinks is sex. Be a little bit more grateful. Yeah, I mean, he killed him in front of you as well, but...

Bryan! (01:11:10.367) Yep.

Joey (01:11:10.561) It did make me wonder about her. But again, sort of the incompetence of the script in the moment, it's like her reaction to being saved is not what he expected, but also, I guess, just the sheer lunacy of what he does. It's just, I don't know. I don't know. Her reaction is so quickly like, you're crazy, you're crazy, you're crazy. It's like, maybe that's not what you say to somebody.

Bryan! (01:11:35.602) She immediately, it's like she throws a switch. Yeah, yeah, it's like a light switch went off, like immediately, like her, that was her reaction.

Dave! (01:11:36.814) Yeah, just take a breather.

Joey (01:11:41.013) Yeah, it's very, yeah.

Dave! (01:11:43.174) You can be upset, yeah, he did just murder someone in front of you, but at the same time, like, you know, he did sorta save you. Look, we're overthinking it again. God damn it.

Bryan! (01:11:50.556) Yep. Yeah. You know what I say? You know what I say? Just shut up. Watch the movie.

Joey (01:11:52.261) We are we are we're gonna go. Yeah. Yeah

Dave! (01:11:56.426) Yeah, I ask a lot of questions to which the answer is often, stop, stop doing that. Why are you doing that?

Joey (01:11:56.945) the

Bryan! (01:12:11.967) the

Dave! (01:12:17.814) which they actually use very effectively in the next...

Bryan! (01:12:21.33) Yes, yeah, he kills him with the claw end of a hammer. So with only...

Joey (01:12:22.225) Yes.

Dave! (01:12:25.59) And I will say, again, this goes to that, the point of this movie is surprisingly well-made because the violence and gore in this are very well executed. And I have no idea who did the effects and who did the makeup, but like the kill scenes, especially the Linnea Quigley death is like, these are pretty well done.

Bryan! (01:12:36.595) Mm-hmm.

Joey (01:12:37.489) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:12:45.138) Yeah. You know what it is? There's not there's not many scenes that involve a lot of like latex appliances. And so, yeah, and so all they really got to do is just like the sort of hidden blood bag and the knife and shit like that. So you know, but still, there's like a much greater volume of blood involved in it that I think kind of elevates it. It's Yeah, the yeah, the gore scenes in this are pretty good.

Dave! (01:12:52.03) Yeah. And there's not a lot of close-up shitties.

Dave! (01:13:07.054) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:13:10.938) So now with only Mrs. Randall left in the place, she also goes back to the stockroom and finds Mr. Sims dead with the hammer sticking out of his head. Now Billy gives chase, slowly stalking her through the store with an axe. Yep, reciting the twas the night before Christmas until he catches up to her with a bow and arrow, shoots her through with what has got to be one of the most common slasher movie kills of the era. But

Dave! (01:13:23.414) but jingling the whole way.

Joey (01:13:34.321) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:13:36.29) First she fakes him out with her hat before knocking him over and running off with the axe, which I think is

Joey (01:13:40.881) This was genuinely pretty fun, this scene. I thought this was the one that most closely resembled like a true tense slasher chasing and was, yeah.

Bryan! (01:13:51.85) Yeah, yeah, there's a bit of there's definitely like there's a setup to it where the other ones just kind of happen and yeah, it's good. Yep. So now we cut to a montage of the corpses as sister Margaret shows up a moment too late.

Joey (01:13:54.961) Yeah, right. This is a real set piece, this one.

Dave! (01:14:04.406) Also, wait a minute, why do they have a bow and arrow? Like a legit bow and arrow set at the toy store.

Bryan! (01:14:09.086) Good question. Very good question. Not something I would stock in a toy store. But then again, it's 1984. Who knows? I don't remember bow and arrows being in toy stores in 1984, though.

Joey (01:14:21.681) Utah does it differently, I guess.

Bryan! (01:14:21.934) but it's definitely it's Utah man. So she screams as she spots the body of Mrs. Randall, we cut to an awesome reaction shot of horrified nutcrackers.

Dave! (01:14:23.23) Yeah, that is true. It's in their constitution.

Joey (01:14:26.929) Hehehe

Bryan! (01:14:38.046) So now, elsewhere in town, a wild Linnea Quigley appears, doing what she does in horror movies, making out with a dude on a pool table, almost naked. It's all going great until the dude hears the carolers outside and puts on some bluesy, sexy Christmas music and resumes his business.

Dave! (01:14:43.918) Showing her breasts. Oh, sorry. Sorry.

Dave! (01:14:58.274) This whole fucking scene, this is the most 80s shit I've ever seen. It's a basement den with a pool table and a bar.

Bryan! (01:15:06.586) and a velvet painting of a tiger with

Dave! (01:15:08.046) I'm a tiger. Yeah, I even have a note about the tiger print, because it's great.

Bryan! (01:15:12.414) with wood paneling all the way. Yeah.

Joey (01:15:14.865) Mm-hmm.

Dave! (01:15:16.638) And here she is making out with this like real hot 80s guy.

Bryan! (01:15:20.498) Yeah. So, yeah. Mark up yet another awkward, cringy sex scene. The dude is basically devouring her face. Yeah. So, she hears the cat outside wanting to come inside and uh she goes upstairs to let it in and she goes up.

Dave! (01:15:26.583) Eh-heh.

Dave! (01:15:35.138) where you see more tiger prints on the walls upstairs. Big fans of tigers, this family. I get it.

Bryan! (01:15:38.542) Yeah, she goes upstairs to she goes upstairs to let it in dressed only in a pair of tiny cut off shorts.

Joey (01:15:44.625) Hahaha

Dave! (01:15:45.222) I feel like, look, on one hand, Linnea Quigley is obviously very comfortable showing her body, and I'm all for that. But at the same time, there's something about Linnea Quigley's comfortable, her level of comfort with showing her body on film that I'm like, I don't know, it makes me a little bit sad too. Because, you know, you're more than that. I don't know, I just like, I feel like I've watched a string of movies lately that have her in it. Because she's in everything.

Joey (01:15:51.473) Hmm.

Joey (01:16:12.049) All right.

Bryan! (01:16:13.038) It's like you watch it's like you watch you watch return the living dead and you watch this and you watch night of the demons and you're like, god damn, do you do?

Dave! (01:16:18.442) I'm like, I have seen Linnea Quigley nude more times than I have seen anybody nude. Maybe more than myself. I don't know. But I mean, I guess good on her. She's happy with it. She's doing great.

Bryan! (01:16:23.627) Yeah.

Joey (01:16:25.457) Hehehehe

Bryan! (01:16:32.492) money. So she goes upstairs to let the cat in. What she finds is the cat but also Billy who declares punish chops his way through the door. And so once inside he throws the axe at her and appears to actually throw the axe at her.

Joey (01:16:39.985) Hmm.

Dave! (01:16:49.442) Yes, FYI, that is a real axe going into the wall next to a real Linnea Quigley's head.

Joey (01:16:53.169) Wow.

Bryan! (01:16:55.57) Yeah, it's a ballsy start. It's pretty

Dave! (01:16:57.782) Look, if you wanna be in movies, this is what you gotta do. You gotta get naked, and you gotta have someone throw an axe at your head. That is universally true.

Joey (01:17:05.457) Imagine risking decapitation to be in this movie. Jesus Christ.

Bryan! (01:17:08.294) my god. I know but you know what? II don't know of too many horror movies because this is a fairly common thing is like subjecting actresses to like really fucking dangerous stunts just in the name of like cheap thrills but at the same time, I've never

Dave! (01:17:08.302) to be in this movie.

Joey (01:17:22.961) Yeah.

Dave! (01:17:25.654) Yeah, watch Crystal Lake Memories, you'll be like, wow, it really is misogynistic.

Bryan! (01:17:29.906) Yeah, but I will say I would never heard of like a one of these dangerous stunts going really going wrong. Unlike say like a major big budget studio movie like say the Twilight Zone.

Dave! (01:17:43.534) cough rust cough the crow. Well they did in the in what is it Friday 4 they almost what's the woman who goes swimming at night in the lake she almost died. And the stunt coordinator was like look if you do this shit again I'm leaving and that's like finally they toned it down but thanks William Lustig.

Bryan! (01:17:45.526) Yeah. So, like, yeah.

Bryan! (01:17:57.727) Oh yeah, she almost just like freezes to death, yeah.

Joey (01:17:59.889) Oh wow.

Bryan! (01:18:04.072) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:18:07.646) Yep. So back to the linea quickly. Billy picks her up and he lifts her and he pales her on the antlers of a mounted deer's head in

Dave! (01:18:15.99) Look, did either of you read, what was, Grady Hendricks, not his last book, the one before it, the Final Girl Survival Guide, is that what it's called?

Bryan! (01:18:24.394) is that.

uh... you uh... sir uh... support group i've not read that one by no of it

Dave! (01:18:30.09) Yeah, the final girl support. This is one of the characters he models after her, this character in this particular moment.

Joey (01:18:30.769) Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Bryan! (01:18:38.918) uh alright so uh Tommy who has somehow missed all of this commotion down there. Nope. It's down there playing pool in that arch 80s basement with another sweet 80s Christmas song playing and uh

Joey (01:18:39.665) Oh wow.

Joey (01:18:44.913) He didn't hear any of it, yeah.

Dave! (01:18:50.678) Yep. And then he goes upstairs and they're like, look, I get it's, there's so many tiger prints on the walls, it's hard to know what's real and what's not. But I feel like you would notice a lady impaled on a set of antlers on the wall a lot faster than he does. It takes him a minute to clock that.

Bryan! (01:19:11.023) the window. Yep. Cuz he he's like, wait a second. What her and is immediately attacked bit and then Billy picks him up off and throws him out the

Dave! (01:19:23.166) in a very sexy moment. I mean, before he throws out the window.

Joey (01:19:26.257) Well, but he overtakes Billy briefly and then really like has it like a stroll over to the phone to call the cops. Like he really takes a minute to give himself time. And it's like, the pacing is wild. It's like, let me just, you know, he's down for a second.

Bryan! (01:19:35.635) Yeah.

Dave! (01:19:38.102) But he may as well have just dusted his hands off like, whoo, all right.

Bryan! (01:19:43.183) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:19:46.45) Yep. So yeah, so now he's thrown out the window where he lies dead, nearly cut in half with broken glass.

Dave! (01:19:52.15) I will say though, the Lenina quickly antlers thing, that's pretty fucking brutal, that moment.

Joey (01:19:57.489) Oh yeah.

Bryan! (01:19:57.586) Yeah. Oh yeah. And that's also like that's one of those scenes that was caught like really heavily because when you

Dave! (01:20:02.922) Really, so this is the moment where I was like, all right, I can see why you would want to put this back in the uncut version.

Joey (01:20:04.433) Hmm.

Bryan! (01:20:09.83) Oh yeah, you see the antlers come through her, so yeah.

Joey (01:20:10.961) Right.

Dave! (01:20:12.842) Yeah, like it's like you went through, you put all of this other unnecessary VHS bullshit in just to justify putting this back in.

Bryan! (01:20:22.046) uh yeah, I mean, there's a bit more. There's a bit more of like the explicit violence that I'm not going to lie. I'm glad it's in there because also if this if I yeah because also they cut the they cut the decapitation scene pretty heavily as well, but what happens next is bar is barring none my absolute favorite scene in the entire movie.

Dave! (01:20:31.478) What else do you have in this movie if not that?

Joey (01:20:35.089) Right, if you can't deliver on that, then there's nothing to this movie.

Joey (01:20:45.585) Ha ha ha

Bryan! (01:20:46.906) So with his job done, the little girl in the house comes out excited to see Santa who asks her if she's been good, like really good. And then Santa. Yeah, yeah. She's almost insulted that he's like, you sure you haven't been naughty?

Joey (01:20:56.241) She is insistent.

Joey (01:21:02.321) She's like, yeah.

Dave! (01:21:02.55) Well, it says a lot that the two best moments in this are this girl who's just like, well, how dare you? And then the other one where the boy is just like, oh!

Joey (01:21:05.745) hehe

Bryan! (01:21:08.393) Ha ha

Joey (01:21:10.993) Ha ha ha

Bryan! (01:21:12.506) There's a real economy of child actors in this movie, and they are delivering. So yeah, satisfied that she's been good. He gives her a gift. The bloody box cutter that he used to kill Pam.

Joey (01:21:13.905) very indignant children.

Dave! (01:21:15.358) Yeah.

Dave! (01:21:21.858) Look, this feels like a real white elephant gift if you ask me.

Joey (01:21:27.537) Her face when she's looking at it, she's like, the fuck? Like, what is this?

Bryan! (01:21:27.539) She's gonna read.

Dave! (01:21:30.67) Like, yeah. Like this? Really? I finally see you and this is what I get?

Bryan! (01:21:30.69) Yeah, I know.

Joey (01:21:35.409) She doesn't scream or anything. She's just like, what is this blood? Like it's just.

Dave! (01:21:38.306) Like, well also your babysitter's impaled on the wall, is that cool? I mean... She doesn't notice it either. Says a lot about women in America.

Joey (01:21:41.489) She doesn't really seem to notice either. Maybe the layout, maybe it's about the layout of the house. Maybe you just, depending where you come from, you just can't see the rest.

Bryan! (01:21:44.734) Yeah, she doesn't notice it until.

Bryan! (01:21:50.974) Well, yeah, after Billy leaves, you hear her call the babysitter's name like she finds her. I god damn I just I love the scene. The the tone of it is so fucking strange. It's it's really great. It's very funny. So now the police are now on the scene and they're out to get every dude in a Santa suit and find one climbing into a house and it turns out that it's just a dad in a Santa costume.

Dave! (01:22:16.034) And this also feels sort of quintessentially 80s to me. Not like it's shit that like people would do, but it's the kind of shit you would hear about where it's like, oh, so and so's dad does this. It's like, all right, I bet they do. But it feels like the kind of thing where it's like, isn't this so cute and wholesome? And this is a way of sort of subverting that cute and wholesome to be like, maybe it's menacing. Now it's, you know, it feels like a little bit of like an urban legend-y type of stuff, but it just feels so 80s to me.

Joey (01:22:20.593) Yeah.

Joey (01:22:37.361) Yeah.

Joey (01:22:45.297) Well, but that kid was asleep. What was he gonna do, wake her up? Like that was the plan, you know? Like, yeah, this is not advisable. I will not do this to my kid. I promise not to, I promise not to crawl in his window. I'm afraid of heights, so I don't think I can go up that big ladder anyway.

Bryan! (01:22:50.024) Yeah, let's scare the shit out of her

Dave! (01:22:50.251) out.

Bryan! (01:22:54.838) It's... no, it's... ..

Dave! (01:22:57.318) I actually I would like for you to do. Don't say that now. It's too early.

Bryan! (01:23:06.322) this is just people repeating a pattern of Santa Claus related drama. So, yeah, elsewhere, we catch up with a couple of dudes out in the woods who tend to go sledding. I'll speed it up in editing so it works.

Dave! (01:23:14.734) That's how you get January 6th. It would have been a better joke if I did it faster. I'm sorry.

Dave! (01:23:22.382) Thank you. Look, they can't all be gems, alright? It's late.

Joey (01:23:22.865) Hehehehe

Hehehe

Bryan! (01:23:28.372) So two dudes in the woods intend to go sledding but they're waylaid by a

Dave! (01:23:31.35) And these guys are way too old to be doing this shit. And I get it, like you can't kill younger people. Like that would have been a no-go with the MPAA. But like they're too fucking old to be doing this shit.

Bryan! (01:23:39.558) Oh, right, because these bullies.

They're two grown ass men. And I...

Dave! (01:23:45.75) But even the boys that are going sledding are like 17. And I think I said multiple times, are they gonna kiss and they don't. But it feels like they should.

Bryan! (01:23:50.119) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:23:57.366) Now, you know what it is? It's Mormon Utah. Nothing else. Yeah, nothing else to do than ** with a couple of teenagers on Christmas Eve. Everybody is just, it's just sexual tension all the way just from

Dave! (01:24:00.046) That's true.

Dave! (01:24:06.786) What do you do? You can't kiss each other. You put on your fancy underwear, and you go sledding. Come at me, Utah. Come on. Tell me I'm wrong.

Joey (01:24:13.073) It's also so dark out in that scene. I was like, this is just like, I would be so scared to be out in this thicket over here in the dark. Like, I mean, it's just, yeah. The outer darkness, as they say.

Dave! (01:24:22.07) Well, your fears are about to be proven real. I mean...

Bryan! (01:24:27.73) Yeah. Yeah, because unfortunately for these

Dave! (01:24:30.698) I feel like you're already making good choices. You're not climbing on your child's window. You're not going sledding in the middle of the night of Utah.

Joey (01:24:34.033) No, and I'm not going into the woods in the dark. Yep. Comes with age.

Bryan! (01:24:37.47) You know, the good thing about that is your child, your child will never murder anybody in a Santa Claus costume. So you got that you got that going for you. I feel

Joey (01:24:41.873) I'm sorry.

Dave! (01:24:41.966) Well, I mean, you can't say that. You don't know that. You don't know that to be true.

Joey (01:24:45.329) Listener you should also know that both brothers are wearing red right now tonight. Just FYI. I'm not sure if it was coincidence or thematic, but

Dave! (01:24:48.309) That's true.

Bryan! (01:24:49.329) Hahaha

Bryan! (01:24:54.491) I'd say I planned it. No. So, yeah. So Billy is there to witness their shitty behavior and he punishes one by chop.

Dave! (01:24:56.018) I didn't, I don't care that much.

Dave! (01:25:03.21) Yeah, cause it's a real karate kid moment. Like these two dudes, these two dudes really suck.

Joey (01:25:06.481) Haha

Bryan! (01:25:09.866) Yeah chops his chops his head off while he sleds down the hill and then the body. Oh, I love it. I love it the body

Joey (01:25:10.353) They do suck.

That's an excellent scene. That's so good.

Dave! (01:25:15.978) It is, but also the sledding is really lame. Like, they're just like... Cause again, they're like 32 years old, and they're like, weeeeee, going down this hill real fucking slow. You're like, I... I feel like this is worse than watching him get his head cut off. Now I'm just embarrassed for everybody.

Bryan! (01:25:22.57) But they...

Bryan! (01:25:33.222) Yeah, so the body sleds down the hill headlessly while the head rolls after it. It's an all time great. So sister Margaret meanwhile visits the police in a sort of Loomis and Sheriff bracket moment, they come to the conclusion. They come to a conclusion as to where he'll strike next. There's a lot of weird continuity in this movie where all of a sudden, it's like daytime, and then it's nighttime, and then it's daytime and then it's nighttime. This is one of those scenes.

Dave! (01:25:44.951) I love this part.

Joey (01:25:45.073) Hmm.

Joey (01:25:57.105) Yeah, I am.

Dave! (01:25:59.807) Well, she's like, is there any news? And he goes, it's all bad, sister. And I was like, that's the best line of the movie.

Bryan! (01:26:04.381) Hahaha

Joey (01:26:04.465) Well, she's a she's asleep, right? She's asleep on the bench and wakes up. So she's been to station all night, I guess.

Bryan! (01:26:08.35) That's a that's a Troy McClure line if I've ever heard one. So yeah, cut to Sister Mary's home for orphan children, where the kids all happily open their presents as the old mother superior now confined to a wheelchair still runs the place runs the place with an iron fist. So yeah, now the sheriff dispatches all the deputies out to the home.

Joey (01:26:12.753) Yeah.

Dave! (01:26:21.698) Still being an asshole.

Dave! (01:26:29.974) And listen, the number of orphans in this place, it has doubled since-

Joey (01:26:35.505) It's pretty crowded.

Bryan! (01:26:36.391) the kids. There's an epidemic murderers just killing parents. Oh, yeah, dude. Where else you

Dave! (01:26:41.774) Do we still have orphanages? Is that a thing?

When I lived in Portsmouth, there was the orphanage that was right behind the place that I lived last time. Last place I lived.

Bryan! (01:26:55.102) trying to picture where that was. Oh, I didn't know you really you lived over that way. All right.

Dave! (01:26:56.77) for J-Hope.

Dave! (01:27:01.981) And they were always out causing trouble in the yard. Orphans. Oh man. Troublemakers one and all.

Bryan! (01:27:08.828) early children.

So, yeah, they all watch happily as a man in a Santa suit approaches the cops. The cops get there just in time to shoot him dead in front of the happy children.

Dave! (01:27:20.261) This has such a stop he's already dead vibe.

Joey (01:27:21.105) This is the...

Bryan! (01:27:24.05) Hahaha!

Joey (01:27:24.529) This is the best slash worst moment in the whole movie.

Bryan! (01:27:27.026) Yeah, because what they do is there's there the Santa Claus is between the cops and the children and the cops just open fire.

Joey (01:27:34.193) That part was pretty realistic.

Bryan! (01:27:37.594) Yeah, gotta say.

Dave! (01:27:39.134) This is how you stop a bad Santa with a gun. Yep.

Bryan! (01:27:42.038) with a good Santa. So it's yeah, we find out that it's not Billy. It's a deaf priest who always comes to visit the kids. So.

Dave! (01:27:49.494) which I think you didn't really like, come on guys.

Joey (01:27:49.649) The delivery of that line. Oh, he's deaf. Of course he wouldn't have heard them. It's like the delivery is so campy.

Bryan! (01:27:52.466) Hahaha!

Dave! (01:27:59.01) That alone, though, is like, you're gonna protest this? That is the fucking line. You're gonna protest this movie?

Bryan! (01:28:05.486) Yep. So inside the orphanage, the cop facing no consequences for pulling a Ben Tramer, warns the mother superior that the killer could still be on his way. And then she assures him with grim prescience that no one will get in who doesn't belong there.

Dave! (01:28:13.174) Yeah

Dave! (01:28:22.51) Well, she is wrong. She's wrong about that. Because she is an... Yeah, she's an elderly woman in a wheelchair.

Joey (01:28:25.393) talks a big talk from that wheelchair over there. She's just like, what is she gonna do? What is she gonna fucking do? It's.

Bryan! (01:28:33.054) So the cop now stalking the ground looking for Billy finds his way down into an old furnace shed and finds nothing in a scene that is just pure time killing. But upon emerging from it.

Dave! (01:28:43.506) I think the reason they do it is, and I watched the documentary on the Blu-ray, I think they, when they found this orphanage in the middle of nowhere, they found the thing out back and they were like, well, we're obviously using this. Yeah.

Bryan! (01:28:53.534) They found the shed and were like...

Joey (01:28:56.657) We have to use it, that's what I thought. There's a great POV shot from there too. They really take advantage of the camera falling down.

Bryan! (01:28:58.018) Yeah. So, upon, it's a, it is, it is a great horror movie location. And I, and I'll give it to him. It definitely does build a little bit of tension. But upon emerging from it, he finds Billy putting an axe right in the old stomach. And the, that, that cop looks familiar to me for some reason, and I don't know why. For a while, I was like,

Joey (01:29:07.345) Yeah.

Dave! (01:29:23.306) I'm gonna guess some television show in the 80s, just like every other person in this movie.

Bryan! (01:29:27.954) Jesus Christ, it's gotta be. He was probably on the fucking A-Team or something. But yeah, so now Billy makes his way to the orphanage as the children joylessly sing Christmas songs.

Joey (01:29:31.185) Hehehe

Dave! (01:29:37.682) And also out of sync. That whatever they're singing is not what's playing.

Bryan! (01:29:41.594) Yeah, yeah. So, seeing Santa at the door, they helpfully let him in and he now

Dave! (01:29:45.494) Yeah, contrary to what that lady in the wheelchair just said, these kids are actually going to just invite him right in. To which I say, that's how you get murdered, children.

Bryan! (01:29:51.328) Oh, just a-

Yeah, they're hosts to mayhem. So now he faces the

Joey (01:29:57.041) But they recognized Billy, right? They knew who he was, right? That's why they let him in.

Dave! (01:30:00.678) Even if you don't, I think they recognize Santa Claus, but it's like, even if you recognize Santa Claus, he is one gnarly, fucked up Santa Claus. Like, it would be like, hey, I'm gonna go let this dog in that's foaming at the mouth and its fur is all matted and gross. Like, you need to be able to recognize something's wrong here. And if you can't, that's how you get killed by Santa Claus. That's how you learn, children. That's how you learn.

Bryan! (01:30:00.854) AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Joey (01:30:09.969) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:30:15.072) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:30:18.707) Yeah.

Joey (01:30:18.769) Sure.

Bryan! (01:30:22.35) Right and Ricky his brother Ricky is in this scene and does not seem to recognize him so Oh, yeah, Ricky vanishes

Joey (01:30:29.361) And we forget all about Ricky too, that's the thing. He's barely, yeah. No, we'll just need him in two more minutes. Yeah, yeah.

Dave! (01:30:33.462) You won't need him until later. He comes in handy later.

Bryan! (01:30:39.348) Yeah. So yeah, he now faces the mother superior who declares to the children that he's not Santa Claus and that there is no Santa Claus, which drives Billy to declare her naughty.

Dave! (01:30:47.95) Wow. Well. You know, maybe she should have said that 15 fucking years ago, and we could have solved this problem before it happened.

Bryan! (01:30:54.927) Yeah.

Joey (01:30:58.161) I mean, she softened in her old age. That was part of that. That was a subtext to there too.

Bryan! (01:31:00.236) Hahaha.

Dave! (01:31:01.866) Well, she didn't though, because she's like, why aren't they grateful for their presence? And I was like, god damn, woman, have you learned nothing? You just shot a deaf priest outside. It's kind of your fault.

Bryan! (01:31:08.71) Yeah. So as he's about to hacker. Yeah, he's about to hack her up and end her reign of terror. The sheriff shows up and shoots him again in front of all these kids. One missed shot. We're looking at a different kind of Christmas tragedy.

Joey (01:31:14.417) Correct.

Joey (01:31:24.241) Trauma begets more trauma. Now they all are billies.

Bryan! (01:31:26.91) break the cycle cops so as he lays down so he lays dying at sister Margaret's feet he declares Santa's gone so

Dave! (01:31:31.734) Turns out the whole movie is a metaphor for the 1980s.

Dave! (01:31:41.706) And to which I say, you're gonna kill a queen like a mayquigley and not kill this terrible nun who you have spent the entire movie making me hate.

Bryan! (01:31:51.478) Jesus Christ. I know it's it's such a fucking disappointment. but uh yeah, the axe now lays at his brother's Ricky uh Ricky's feet who glares at mother superior and says naughty. That's the thing is I think that's that's the implication but like why not just go the extra mile? Have him pick the ** axe up.

Joey (01:32:02.801) Why couldn't we have Ricky just pick the axe up when he says it? Just end it there.

Dave! (01:32:13.65) And the intention was always for this to be like a series. This was supposed to be TriStar's flagship horror series.

Bryan! (01:32:18.49) Yeah. Well, this was this was way into the yeah. Yeah, this was way into the sort of golden age of slashers and so like you just kind of assumed you were going to kind of forge a sequel like a series of sequels out of it. So, yeah.

Joey (01:32:19.409) Yeah.

Really? Huh.

Dave! (01:32:23.975) I can't imagine why it didn't work out.

Dave! (01:32:39.534) It turned out everyone was real fucking tired of these movies by 1984.

Bryan! (01:32:45.33) Yeah, yeah. So, right. Fade to night. Deadly night.

Dave! (01:32:46.922) All right, so. So Joe, we watch these movies. One of the reasons we watch these movies now and talk about them is because we watched them so long ago and now we're wondering, what are they like today? My question for you is how does this hold up to?

Joey (01:32:48.017) Hmm

Joey (01:32:59.729) Yeah.

Joey (01:33:04.593) It holds up like a guy with Christmas lights around his neck being dangled in the air. That's to say, that's to say spectacularly. It's funny because in some ways it was like different and maybe even better than I remembered and in other ways it was so much worse. It's technically a movie, right? I think.

Dave! (01:33:11.246) OK. So great.

Joey (01:33:33.457) But I don't, it's, the runtime suggests it's a movie. I don't know, I mean, it's, it's, it feels, it's a, it's so goofy and so hokey and so tonally bouncy that I can only think that the people making the movie thought they were making a better movie than what was actually the end result. It doesn't feel like they're in on the joke. It feels like they just didn't know what.

Dave! (01:33:34.343) I mean, the runtime suggests yes.

Joey (01:34:03.121) the movie, I mean, maybe you know more than I do, because I haven't seen the documentary, but the sense that I got was that they thought they were making a serious movie and the result instead was this.

Dave! (01:34:12.898) Which is weird because the opposite is true. They are very much in on the joke. They knew what they were making. Yeah, they were pretty into it, yeah. Big Red, what about you? What do you got?

Joey (01:34:15.729) Okay, so they thought they were making a schlocky interesting. Interesting.

Bryan! (01:34:16.51) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:34:23.306) Yeah. This uh I gotta tell you, I gotta, I just watching it these last couple of days, I definitely have a sort of renewed appreciation for it for a really long time and I think it's just thematically Christmas doesn't really do much for me as you know, in a horror context, I love to see it. I love to see him.

Joey (01:34:43.281) Ahem.

Dave! (01:34:43.854) What are you talking about? The hopes and dreams of children? You're gonna dash them too? You have them and you're just gonna smash those hopes and dreams.

Bryan! (01:34:50.778) I love seeing a smashed against the rocks. Don't get me wrong. But yeah, something

Dave! (01:34:54.25) Wait, the children of the homes and dreams. Both are biblical, so it's fine.

Bryan! (01:34:57.726) I'll leave it up to you guys. The the something about just Christmas as a as a horror movie device does not do anything for me. It's by the fact that I do like this movie a lot and I also I also I love. Fuck Christmas Evil is the one I was trying to think of. I love Christmas Evil. That's an entirely different kind of deranged. I think he's great but yeah, no, no. This this

Joey (01:35:17.553) Hmm.

Dave! (01:35:21.078) That's because you like Fiona Apples down.

Bryan! (01:35:26.834) This one definitely grew on me. And it's like you said earlier, Joe, like it's not one that I seek out, you know? Like I would not go out of my way to watch this movie, but I think going forward, I could probably see this as like a Christmas movie staple for me. Like just to get the mood.

Joey (01:35:33.233) Yeah.

Joey (01:35:42.929) Yeah, it's got rewatchability because it's, there's something about it that I think you could revisit it and just have it on and sort of giggle at it. But yeah.

Bryan! (01:35:52.442) Yeah, it's very it's very silly. It. I think with the exception of the beginning, it does not take itself terribly seriously. I appreciate the hell out of that. Yeah, it's just it's a it's stupid and it's fun. It's it's a very, very goofy movie that's just totally fucked up in a way that I like.

Joey (01:36:14.321) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:36:17.038) You know, and that's not the sort of thing that it's not the sort of thing that you can sort of like Manufacture that is the product of just like conflicting ideas that end up working out in just a really kind of fucked up way at the end So yeah, Silent Night Deadly Night gets the gets my seal of approval

Dave! (01:36:31.19) Yeah, I'm like on the other end. I think it's a, you could skip it. I mean, it's not, it is a cultural artifact. It's kind of interesting. I think the hysteria around it is more, is more of a, that's the more interesting story. If you want to see it for that reason, but again, I'm like, I'm with you. I don't think, I'm not particularly sentimental about Christmas. I don't, I think as a kind of a...

Joey (01:36:31.441) Do you? Yeah.

Dave! (01:36:57.458) a horror trope I find that a little schlocky and kind of dumb. Like the whole seasonal thing, I'm way, way over all of that. Like, I'm just kind of like, I don't, you don't need, if you're building your whole movie around that, you don't really have a movie. You have a marketing campaign and that's a little bit dumb.

Bryan! (01:37:11.342) No, no, that's very, that's very clearly, very clearly a product of the time. And even by even by 1984, these guys were kind of running late on that on that way. Like, the age of

Joey (01:37:11.505) Yeah.

Dave! (01:37:21.118) Yeah. Oh, and they admit that. They basically say like, we... they were all gone. We didn't have anything left to choose from. It's like, then you could have just made another movie. You didn't have to make a movie about it. Yeah. And that's... that's actually the argument that a lot of the critics made was like, you didn't have to make this about Christmas. You could have just made this about anything. That Christmas is kind of incidental, to which I say, is it? Because the whole point of his rampage is punish because of...

Joey (01:37:21.649) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:37:30.193) Yeah.

Joey (01:37:30.929) It could have been set in winter. It didn't have to be a Christmas movie necessarily. Do they, yeah.

Dave! (01:37:49.102) trauma because of Santa Claus because of $31. But I think it's like, it's an interesting artifact. It is so much a product of its time, right down to the sort of moral panic and kind of outrage, that kind of silent majority outrage. But like, as a movie, you can skip it. There's not much there.

Bryan! (01:37:51.999) Mm-hmm.

Joey (01:38:07.857) Do the filmmakers account for that strangeness in tone, the sort of like sleaziness of the opening, which is that sleazy slash, the juxtaposition of the sleazy with like the serious trauma and then the rest of the movie being so goofy. Like, what is that? What is that? Like, how does that happen?

Dave! (01:38:24.782) I, they don't, and I imagine that some of this has to do with changing directors back and forth. Is that you've got one guy making most of the movie and then when it comes to these violent scenes, you have another guy coming in. Who gets what's going on? Like I think to be able to come in, step in and do that adeptly, it takes a lot of skill and you don't feel like it's, you don't feel any kind of tension throughout the movie.

Joey (01:38:33.553) Yeah, okay.

Joey (01:38:47.857) Yeah.

Dave! (01:38:51.862) but it is very noticeable in tone because it's like you have a kind of tongue in cheek tone throughout this whole movie, except every once in a while when it's like, oh God. And that, there really is no accounting for that other than to say like, this is someone else stepping in to do this part. It's kind of like when you watch there's, Stephen King's, that movie, there are parts of that movie.

Joey (01:39:01.137) Yeah.

Dave! (01:39:14.798) where you're like, wow, how come some of this movie is really good and the rest of it is complete garbage? And it's like, oh, because other people stepped in to shoot certain parts of the movie. And you can feel that here. And that's probably what it is. I think also that it's made by, well, for a movie that is made by, I'm going to assume straight men, it's missing a lot of tropes that you would expect to find in movies like this.

Joey (01:39:19.185) hahaha

Joey (01:39:24.337) Yeah.

Joey (01:39:41.873) Mm-hmm.

Dave! (01:39:42.038) but there are some things where I think they do sort of fall into those traps. And a lot of that is around sexual violence. So it's not that surprising, but it's like, I don't really know if there's much of an explanation. It's a real halfhearted attempt at a movie where it's like, hey, we have kind of an idea. And they even openly admit that they're like, because the story came from a senior at Harvard who sent it to a guy, the guy who ended up writing the movie or one of the producers.

Joey (01:39:47.729) Yeah.

Joey (01:40:03.985) Right, right, right.

Dave! (01:40:09.25) the other guy who wrote the movie. So they were like, well, it has sort of a core concept that we liked. It's like, all right, so you kind of took a dumb idea and ran with it and you just kind of kept it dumb. Except for every now and then where you couldn't help but lean in to the, you know, the worst parts of it. But yeah, I don't know. There's not much here. It's fun to watch. I think if you showed this to younger people now, they'd be like, I don't get it. What is this?

Joey (01:40:19.089) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:40:23.441) Yeah.

Dave! (01:40:34.038) Which is probably why you see this new slew of movies where they're like, well, it's crepus. And it's all this, you know, what's that one I just watched? It's a wonderful knife where like everyone's like, it's so good. I got halfway through that movie and was like, no, it's not, I'm done. But I think you showed this to younger people. They'd be like, I don't get it. What's funny about this? Like, well, the whole fucking thing is funny because it's dumb and sleazy and really goofy. But I don't know that works now because a lot of the goofiness comes from the sleaziness.

Joey (01:40:40.337) Right.

Bryan! (01:40:46.615) I'm sorry.

Joey (01:40:48.433) Hehehe

Dave! (01:41:04.146) And sleazy just doesn't work as a thing anymore.

Joey (01:41:06.737) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:41:08.55) Yeah, you definitely can't get away with that anymore. You know, these

Dave! (01:41:10.698) Yeah, I think, you know, go with Black Christmas, because you can't go wrong.

Bryan! (01:41:16.306) Yep. Speaking of black Christmas, what's our next movie?

Dave! (01:41:18.238) Oh yes! Oh man! In two weeks we will be back and because the time has come for my all-time favorite movie, we're watching Black Christmas.

Joey (01:41:29.585) The greatest slasher ever made, I am in agreement. It's so great.

Dave! (01:41:31.286) The greatest film ever made. It is my favorite movie ever.

Bryan! (01:41:34.494) Yeah. Yeah, I'm really looking forward to this one. I have a feeling that this is going to be another like big love letter. No. So Joe, thank you so much for joining us. Yeah.

Dave! (01:41:41.802) Yeah, guess what everybody, I know a lot about this movie. More than anyone should.

Joey (01:41:45.457) I look forward to listening to it.

Joey (01:41:50.961) Thanks for having me. This was so much fun. I was so happy to revisit this artifact as you so lovingly refer to it. By the way, by the way, the one thing, one of the things that I remember is for some reason at the video store, the VHS box was enormous for this movie. Do you remember it? It was so big. They only did that for some movies and this was one of them. It was huge. I didn't know why. It was so strange. The big box.

Bryan! (01:41:56.728) Hehehehe

Dave! (01:41:58.186) Oh, I thought you were gonna say classic.

Dave! (01:42:08.406) Yes, it was!

Bryan! (01:42:09.705) Yep.

Bryan! (01:42:14.046) Yeah. Oh yeah. The the big the big box trend was a Charles Band invention and the and the whole reason the whole reason for it was they stood off the shelf.

Joey (01:42:20.369) Interesting. Tell me more.

Dave! (01:42:25.11) Yeah, because you would slide it out of the tray. We had an inner tray that it laid in, and the tray itself was bigger.

Joey (01:42:25.649) Yeah.

Joey (01:42:30.353) Okay. See, I wouldn't have known that because back then you couldn't, you could touch the box, but you didn't take it home. You know, you got in the, okay, that's interesting because it really stood out. The hat and the axe, and it was so big and just, that did something for it. Yeah.

Dave! (01:42:34.858) Yeah, you couldn't take him out. Yeah.

Bryan! (01:42:37.301) Yeah.

Bryan! (01:42:45.406) Yep. Oh, yeah, we did not even really mention the poster. The poster is fucking iconic. It is. Yeah, but yeah, where can everybody find you?

Joey (01:42:50.001) It is very good. Yeah. Yeah.

Joey (01:42:55.441) Well, you can find the book, it came from the closet, Queer Reflections on Horror, published by Feminist Press. It's 25 queer and trans writers writing personal essays about one particular horror film that shaped them and shook them and connects to queer identity. We published a year ago through Feminist Press. It was republished in the UK through Sarah Band Books in UK and Ireland this past June. We're very excited about that. And you can find me on Instagram.

at it came from the closet, one underscore under each word because that's somebody else had the other full name. Hey, when that happens. And you can also find me on Twitter slash X. I said that with an I roll at homo horror, H-O-M-O-H-O-R-R-O-R. But Instagram's the happier place to be right now. But yes, but do check out it came from the closet. You can get it at feministpress.org

Bryan! (01:43:39.742) Yeah.

Dave! (01:43:45.89) That sounds like leftist propaganda.

Bryan! (01:43:49.084) Yeah.

Joey (01:43:55.441) place where you buy books, it's everywhere. It'll make a great Christmas gift for the horror lover or the queer in your life. Or both.

Dave! (01:44:03.678) I'm gonna give it a huge endorsement. I am currently reading it not as fast as I would normally, but it's Christmas, so shut up. It is a fantastic collection, and I definitely think everybody should check it out.

Joey (01:44:13.841) Thank you. Well, that's the beauty of a collection like that. You can bounce around, you can take as long as you need to read it, because the essays can be quite heavy. So yeah, thank you guys for having me. This was a real treat. I really appreciate it. Your podcast is great. It's been a real joy to discover it and to listen to it and see it expand. Yeah, thank you.

Dave! (01:44:19.746) Thank you.

Bryan! (01:44:30.158) I'm so glad to hear that. Thank you so much. Alright, so be back here in two weeks for Black Christmas.

Joey (01:44:36.721) Can't wait.