Prepare yourself for dime novel romance, swearing, Muppets, various types of cowboys, and Coffin.
Read the full show notes at http://flashpulp.com
The Skinner Co. Network
FC50 - Measuring Up
(upbeat music) - Hello and welcome to Flashcast 50, brought to you by Juju Click and Twitter's own, I am Ryan Hill. Prepare yourself for Dime Now Will Romance, swearing, Muppets, various types of cowboys, and coffin. (upbeat music) Tonight we have myself, oh Bobanex, the talkative one. Jessica May, hello, the audio finagler, I know I'm already hearing the P's, how am I gonna finagle out of that? Are you saying I talk too much? - Yeah. - J-R-D. - Hello. - The plastic tapper. - Have you guys heard about Johnny Gulen or Julian, I don't know how it's pronounced, known as Corta Nalgas? - What? - Do you know what Corta Nalgas is with your Spanish? - No, I can't. - 'Cause I'm so terrible at pronouncing things. - Maybe if I saw a written, I don't know. - Butt cutter. - Butt cutter? - He's a fellow who was wanted in a series of buttock slashings in Fairfax, Virginia. - Buttock slashings? - He was captured in Peru just yesterday, actually. - Is it a fetish thing, or? - I don't, I suspect that it's a situation where he's chemically imbalanced and probably annoyed that ladies that will never talk to him have nice bumps. - I, so they're all ladies then? - Yes, okay, it always happened basically the same way. They would be in some sort of, they would be in some sort of ladies clothing store. - Okay. - A TJ Maxx, if you will. Well, here, let me read you one of the examples. In another case, police said a 21-year-old woman was shopping at a TJ Maxx store at Fairfax Town Center on June 8th when she felt a pinch on her buttocks. Similar to other reports, the victim turned around, saw a man picking up pieces of clothing, thought she may have been cut by one of the hangers, but once you got home, she discovered cuts and clothing. - So creepy. - And there was one lady who was cut an inch and a half deep, I believe. - Oh, whoa. - 13 young women in total, that he, who have at least come forward to the butt-cutting. - So they haven't really got word from this guy yet. - They caught him in Peru, and he's being shipped back to Fairfax to be dealt with. - I can't wait to see what he has to say for himself. - Wow. - Yeah. - The butt cutter. - You know, well, okay. When I heard about like butt-slashings, I honestly thought like, you know, giant butt-slashings. Not like, oh, did I just pinch myself on a hanger? Hmm. So that's not as bad as that. - Well, no, my suspicion is that you can't really tell how badly cut you are when somebody like slashes open your butt. - Yeah. - And that they probably didn't realize the extent of the damage until they got home. Like, you can't really see what's going on back there. - Yeah, I know that it's not like you slashes open butt or nothing, like. - An inch and a half deep, man, that is a deep butt cut. That is not just like playing around. We'll have more butt news later on the episode. I really enjoyed these real life crime cases, but having the nickname, how would you actually pronounce that? - Uh, I didn't, "Korta Naglas." I don't know, "Korta" means like to cut, but I'd never heard the term "Nalgas." - I guess you don't run in butt talking circles. - Well, no, not really. - Not anymore. I guess I would've known the word for ass, but not butt. You know? - Yeah, fair enough. (upbeat music) - So we've climbed that mountain people. We've reached that 50 episodes for Flashcast. - I feel like it's actually kind of half the mountain because 100 is where I start. That's the celebratory episode of me. - Yeah, that thing's every scene is pretty newbie. It seems like we're still learning. - Well, if we've done another-- - Well, I mean, we're always learning, but in leaps and bounds, like, wait, we don't really know what we're doing. - Yeah, well, if we've done it once a week, I know we've done it for more than a year now, but we've hit about once a week, so it's about a year's worth of Flashcast, right? Minus a couple of holidays. - It doesn't seem like that long. - Yeah, a whole year. - Yeah, it doesn't seem like very many episodes at all. - Yeah, I mean, the Flash pulp, we've got, like, 200-something episodes. And I was actually just ruminating with you the other day that combined with the Flashcast, we've done almost 300 episodes now, which is really cool. But the Flashcast doesn't really seem that old to me. - And, you know what, it does, when I think back to when we were discussing what Flashcast would be, it was very early on. It's just, we do these once weekly. It's not thrice, right? So it was a very long time ago, but because we don't do it very often, and it's one big chunk, it seems a little more green. - Yeah, well, I think it's also that we're a little less comfortable with the actual discussion portions. It's a little easier to just sit down with the scripting banging out. - Yeah, as you. - Yeah, I suppose I don't actually have to do any of the talking in those episodes. - Yeah, besides just having notes in front of us, we don't really have a lot of prep for the show. - Are you kidding? You have so much prep for the show that you have to go through. - Oh, well, I mean, like, in order to sit down and have this discussion. - Well, I make the show notes. I'm the one who does the-- - Let's just-- - I mean, in regards to sitting down in front of microphones and having to have a conversation. - Let's not talk about all the logistics of the show. - You have a lot of prep. Jared, do you have a huge man of prep? - I have no prep. I don't have to do anything to prepare this show. - And then I probably have the most work at the end. - Yes, definitely. This is your baby, the flash counts. - But, you know, there's so much work around it before and after, but then when you're sitting down, you're kind of thrust in the situation, that is unlike anything else, 'cause it's just off the top of your head. So that's a little scary, a little daunting. - It's interesting to see how far we've come. I just wanted to take a quick moment to say thanks to a few people who've really helped us get to 50. - Jack Gantor. - Absolutely. - Colorado Joe. - Yeah. - We were our first really big supporters. - Mr. Lynch. - Mm-hmm. Fish. - Fish, certainly. - Ingrid. - Berry. And, you know, there's some people-- - And Jim, of course. - Jim, yes, absolutely. And there's some people we don't really talk about that often. For example, the occasional donator, or Juju Click, who is so consistent in her support. And we really appreciate it. - If anybody else ever feels like throwing in a few bucks or setting up a subscription. - It really does go a long way. - Yeah, it does. - We'd use it for the show. - Yeah, we basically fold it back into the show. It's usually for either equipment or stickers or-- - Or advertising, which, you know, every opportunity that we do have, it really, really pans out. So it's a huge turnaround when we can put money into it. - Mm-hmm, absolutely. If you're interested in giving us a hand, you can find the donate button on the right-hand to the site, flashpup.com. - But if not, we still love you. - Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for being there. Speaking of friends of the mob, Ellie in Sauterstrom. Ellie, very nice, always cheerful on the Twitter. Always, she does a piece on her blog every Tuesday in which she essentially writes short stories about each of, well, very short stories about each of the people who leave a comment in the same post of the previous week. - Oh! - And it's a fun little thing. - It's a clever idea. - But she recently posted something a little more pulp-related, which I thought was worth mentioning. So she was trucking around her local pharmacy or convenience store or whatnot. And these are the last corners to me where you can still find the low, I don't wanna say low quality, but what is left of the pulp industry in the classic sense? The romance novel, the ridiculous action novel. These things are really the convenience store and pharmacy shelf territory. And I mean, they always have been, I suppose, but they aren't the industry they used to be. I think that stuff's moving into Kobo and Kindle and all of the e-readers. And I think with good reason, there's a little bit of a, no one wants to be seen on the bus reading a Harlequin romance. - Mm-hmm, yeah. - Or a Mac Bolin. But you can't tell what somebody's reading if they're reading their Kobo, it's just words. Unless you're reading over their shoulder. Are you guys over the shoulder readers? - No, I hate over their shoulder readers. When I have her eyes on the bus, I did. - Yeah. - Yeah, I did a lot of snooping. - Yeah, I wanted to know if people are reading. - Anyhow, so she was trucking around her local store and she picked up a number of the romance novels on display there and just posted them up. And we've discussed this topic a few times, the interesting approach that romance novels have reached 'cause really, you're retreading territory constantly, right? So she's essentially taking pictures of the things and then put little captions to them, but I wanted to mention his Valentine triplets and the cover is a picture of a cowboy in hat with three tiny babies. They all look very cuddly. (laughing) - Okay. - There was "Must Love Kill a Buffalo" with a Egyptian arm band, as Ellie points out. - That's interesting. - Borrowing a bachelor? - Oh boy. - Mm, the husband recipe? - Yeah, yeah, you'd want that on your e-reader. And then my favorite, she's got others, but my favorite, the baby battalion. - Oh boy. - And it appears to be a romance/spy novel with some sort of daddy brigade. And now I guess they're somehow getting the kids in on the action. - Grown in. - It's fascinating. - You gotta make the baby army, right? - Anyway, I'll link to this. - Day for reinvention? - Yeah, I'll link to this in the show notes, but I thought that was pretty funny and worth a mention. - We've got to give our romance/a novel pulp cousins some love. - For real. Shouldn't the romance novels be giving us the love? Them being the romance novels? - Yeah, fair enough. - So we've been watching a lot of "Law and Order" lately. We've been kind of going on a "Law and Order" marathon. - Starting from the very beginning, from the very beginning, yes, season one, episode one. 'Cause I'd never really watched "Law and Order" before until just now. And you know what was really interesting? - Sam Jackson, like Samuel L. Jackson, obviously. And Philip Seymour Hoffman were on the same episode in season one. - Yeah, I found that very interesting. Sam Jackson played a lawyer. - That's right. - And Philip Seymour Hoffman played a-- - College student. - College student/suspect. Yeah, that was very interesting. - Yeah, it was-- - Neither of them were known, I think, at that point. It was like '89. - Not even Samuel Jackson, really? - 1989, I think so. I forget how old that show is. I would've been like, what, five? - Yeah, he was, he wasn't made really till, well, he did true romance and that was fairly big, I guess. I don't know what his earlier filmography looks like though, frankly. - No. - I think Pulp Fiction's really where you started noticing him. - Yeah, when did that come out? - '95, I believe, '94, '95. - So this was like a long time before that. - Mm-hmm. - I don't know if necessarily they did it so much in the later episodes of "Law and Order", but I really noticed that the two partners, Mike and Max, they're always playing two sides of the issue, you know? Like, yeah. But, you know, they're pretty understanding and they might have one little blow up, but they always, like, apologize and, you know, they see each other's point of view. - Yeah, but it seems a little forced, and I don't know if it's like that later, but-- - It is funny because sometimes it becomes sort of inconsistent in how their character eyes, just because they're always having to split like an issue. Okay, which one is more likely to be pro-abortion? - Yeah. - Anyway. - But, they don't go too far, I guess. I think they just, they were really trying to appeal to every kind of audience. - When we first started this marathon, it was really worse. It was much worse. - Yes, yes. As time goes on, I'm hoping they have a little more finesse. - Or they just stop giving, I think later on, when you realize that you can just drop the political opinions and have the sort of lawyers and everyone else around, give the actual-- - Exactly, yeah. Like, they do have episodes about current events or whatever, but not so much opinion, I guess. And check out the hats and cigars. - Yeah, yeah, the first cop to be replaced has a fetish for fedoras and cigars. His weight flexes hugely from episode episode. They've obviously, we're watching them in the order of their release, but it's obvious that it wasn't the order of their production. - Yeah, you don't think so? - No, 'cause there's episodes where he's, like, varies thin. - Yeah. - And then, all of a sudden, next episode, he is having difficulty chasing suspects. - He is the nicest smile ever, I have to say. He doesn't do it right after, but when he does, I'm like, "Oh, Max," and he hasn't died yet, but he dies. - He dies? - Oh my God, you didn't know that. - Just a good mix. - Ah, so tough. Poor Max. - I thought we always talked about when Max died, and this was before we even watched the man. - No, I kind of danced around. - What is his partner gonna do? Does he die too? - Nope, don't say anything. - Oh no, look what I've done, spoiler. - Oh, Max. At least, at least it's not Ben Stone, okay? - I couldn't take it if it were Ben Stone. - Yeah, she really likes the Ben Stone. Me too though, great guy. - Yeah, that's so-- - Here reminds me of Mulligan, only older. He's not quite Sergeant Smith, but not quite Mulligan. He'd be like, if Mulligan were a lawyer. - Yeah, Mulligan went to Harvard. - Speaking of televised death, Game of Thrones is starting up again soon. - Ooh, hey, hey, and tomorrow is the Golden Globes, and Peter Dinklage is up for a supporting actor. - That's right. - So we must watch it, 'cause I really wanna see him once. - Totes. - Totes, we've had a new member enter the mob recently, daughter of Bug, and-- - Buglet. - Buglet, yeah, she probably doesn't want to be known by her mother's traits, though, you know what I mean? - Probably doesn't want to be called a Buglet either. - They may be very close, but at the same time, I wouldn't want to be known, like, by any sort of sub nickname to my parents. - Anyhow, she's, I'm sure she'll let us know, but she's very frenetic about her discussion, and it's kind of fun, because it feels like a bit of a milestone in that we've got our first hyperactive teenager running a macho around the mob. - From Germany, I love how she spelled that. It's so much fun. - And now Opope is picking up parts of her lingo, including totes. - Yeah, totes, like, totally totes. I love that. - We've been, yeah, we've been using it, and she's actually been saying, like, "I need a place to use it more." - I totes need to use this more. - Dote, totes. Okay. - Game of Thrones, I love it. - I'm excited. - Yeah. - So yeah, it's coming up soon in April. It's been announced. - April 1st, yep. - I know. - Which is a terrible day to, yeah. - Don't screw with me, HBO, please. - I know, oh, April Fool's, like, but I don't know. I'll punch somebody. - I will fly to wherever HBO's headquarters are. - Just for punches. - And punch it in the mouth. - I will punch HBO in the corporation in the mouth. - I will, totes. - AMC is starting up a good fellow series. - Yes. - How do you feel about that? - I'm really excited about it. Not since, I'm sure it's gonna be, like, messier than the sopranos. A little shinier, you know? - That's an interesting question how they're gonna approach it. Like, is AMC gonna go walking dead style? Here's the problem. AMC, my feeling at this point is that they have a very good system in place for introducing good ideas for making television shows that don't necessarily always pan out as well as I should. - Well, Carnival. - Wasn't that HBO or was that AMC? Yeah, Carnival. - Where everyone wanted it to succeed. - It had a lot of good, oh, all right. - So many good things, so many good pieces. - So I'm really reserving my judgment for this good fellow series. I love, you know, I love a good mob story. - Yeah, it would be really nice if it was almost in the style of Deadwood. Like, obviously not the same time, but the same sort of grit. - Yeah. - And some sort of realism. - Yeah. - That would be awesome. - I just hope they don't try too hard to just make the movie but with. - I'm sure they won't. Oh, shit, they do it, I'm sure. - It would definitely be fun, however, to have the original Goodfellows cast come in as, 'cause you're always getting these peripheral gangsters show up through the story. It'd be fun to have them come in as somebody. - Somebody from New Jersey. - Yeah. Anyway. - You know, Jimmy from New Jersey. - Although you get the feeling of. - I'm the Canadian doing the New Jersey. - Yeah. - That's dangerous. - You do get the feeling these days that maybe did Niro and. - Yeah, like cameos. - What, like, they've got a lot of time on their hands. - No, no, I was actually just thinking, trying to space themselves, trying to push away a little bit from the mobster stereotype. - That they maybe want to steer clear. I'm not sure that Mr. Focker or whatever wants to. Anyway, we'll see. - Yeah, well, if it gets big, lots of people just want to be attached to it. So I hope everyone, you know, reserves are sort of commentary until it's bigger. And then they'll totally want to do it. 'Cause people are like that. And that lady that played the wife. I can never remember her name, but I love that actress. The lady wife, oh man. - Oh, really, Otas. Shoot, what's her name now? - She was a medicine man. And so many helpful hints. - Yeah. - Like Dr. Quinn, medicine man. (laughing) Insert Sean Connery impression right here. - I do have some bad news. - Uh oh, I don't like that. - The devil inside, which I was quite excited to see. It's had a very clever marketing campaign up till this point. - Yes, the radio ads and such. - 6% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. - Oh. - Yikes. - But people are pretty hard on horror. - No, but listen, 6%. - 6%. - That means very bad. Like you, if you get like in the 60s, you're kind of, you know, hit or miss, but. - I almost hope for horror movies being bad because then I'm not as scared. - Oh yeah. - Like feast? - Yeah, I was just gonna say, we watched a quote unquote, horror movie the other night. And I was like, oh, I don't wanna watch a horror movie before bed, no problems there, no fear whatsoever. It was such a terrible movie that I could not be afraid. I kept rolling my eyes and looking back at JRD and being like, really, really, come on. - But to be fair, it felt like they intended to make that movie. - That way, for sure. - Yeah, well, the guy with a warm eyes, he was so funny. JRD's sister was here the other day and she actually informed me that there were more feast movies. - Yeah, there were at least three. - They actually go downhill. I didn't think that was possible, but they do. - The, if you present the name of your film as feast and you've obviously got cannibal, whatever they are, is roaming around the desert. - I don't feel comfortable necessarily in throwing in like gratuitous prosthetic rape. I'm not a big fan of that, it kinda acts in me. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, the hacked off penis and it was just, it was so much. - It was trying so hard and anyway, it was-- - Yeah, it just got, yeah. Then it was like above and beyond just way dumb. And apparently that gets worse. - Yeah, it kinda was fun in some ways, but in some scenes it was just ridiculous. - And it felt like somebody had seen Demon Knight. - I understand that, yeah. - Tails from the crew, and they were like, that's an awesome movie, I wanna remake that movie. - That plus Gremlins equals awesome. - I was really disappointed with the end too. I felt like the fact that some of them got away to go like possibly rescue the little girl. That's what you would expect and they had spent so much of the movie being like, this is what you expect. But no, we're gonna change it, you know, to something stupider but still. - That was the only thing that was what the movie was aiming for I think was to make it something more than just its brethren in the B-movie pack. They were attempting to directly address all of the cliches of this sort of horror movie. - But then they end it on this stupid cliche. - Yeah, yeah, it felt like the end of from Dustle Dawn, essentially, I don't know. This movie felt patched together from another of other movies. - It was fun in its way, I'm not saying it was a terrible film. - Yes, but there were things that even by taking them out would have made it better. - Now, it was obvious when we were going through the final credits when there was seven maloofs as executive producers that there was a little nepotism going on in "V" but it was an uneven movie at best. How was that? - But kind of hilarious and-- - And an eye rolling type of one. - Yeah, so if you're looking for one of those, that's good. - Mm-hmm. - I do still have some hope on the cinematic horizon, however, with the "Woman in Black," which opens on February 3rd. - Which I'd kind of forgotten about, but I'm instantly, incredibly excited about all over again. - I am a little concerned that they're bearing in the middle of the winter. That sort of thing does not usually bode well for box office or intention, but we'll see how it goes. - It may be the type of film though, because in the summer, they want blockbuster, crazy explosions. - Yeah. - Explosions. - It's true. - I noted a part of their marketing campaign, they have a Jump Scare website at whatdidtheyc.com. - What's that? - You go and there's this little girl and she says, "Do you want to see what I saw?" and then you do some clicky stuff. And there's sort of a clever trick to try to, well, you know what, I'm not even going to tell you. You may want to check it out. I'm just going to tell you that if you've ever seen a YouTube video that essentially it purports to show you a real ghost and then ends it with your ears being popped out by volume, you may want to prepare for this website in that same sense. - Yep, not exactly the same trickery, but along the same lines. - Very close. - Yeah. - Yep. - A little more clever than just volume though, I would say. - Meh, I wasn't that impressed. - Okay, fine. - Something I am hoping to be impressed by. Cumberbatch, everyone's aware I'm sure now that he is going to be in Star Trek II? - I was going to say that's what the centerpiece of a tuxedo, right? - Yeah, yeah. - Sherlock is going to be the main villain it sounds like for Star Trek II. - Mm-hmm. - It would be fun if perhaps they made him con. I realize they've been trying to swim away from the con thing for a while now, but. - If anyone could do con, it would become Cumberbatch. - Smarty, smarty, smart-ass con. - Man, I can't wait to see him doing something different than Sherlock. - Wasn't he supposed to be some like genetically altered superhuman guy? Didn't you say that? - Yeah. - So, could Sherlock really? - I know, he doesn't have the physique. - Just genetically altered superhuman, I mean. - Yeah, listen, I guess my concern is that he falls a little bit too much into this re-roll, know-it-all smug kind of Star Trek villain that's a little too next generation for my taste. Well, no, no, listen, I love next generation, but what they're trying to do with these films is make it less old school Star Trek, and. - He could be the new Q. - Yeah, that would be awesome, that would be. I'm sure he'll do a great job. - I somehow suspect they're not going to introduce a super powerful alien that can basically do anything in the second Star Trek movie just to. It is interesting, however, to see him crossing over into mainstream American films. - Mm-hmm. - I've been doing a little bit of thinking about sort of the idea of Universal Television. Do you remember when I was a kid, we would sneak over to a friend of mine's house, and his dad had satellite television that essentially spanned the globe. I have no idea where he got the package, I have no idea what provider he was on, but he could watch television in Tokyo, Spain, like anywhere, and it was fascinating, and I thought, when I saw that as a kid, I thought this is the future man, like, one day we're just going to be able to turn on TV, and if we don't want to watch something that the North American providers are putting up, then we can just watch something from Japan. - Mm-hmm. - I do think we're getting there slowly. I think Pulp has really led the way in a lot of senses. - Yeah. - Up. - No, no. - Thanks. - Ooh, little break there. Apparently, the little guys are up. We'll see how quiet they are. I'm just going to finish this thought, I think, and then we'll get to the next section. We'll listen to the spot of water, and punch them a few times. No, as I sang. - So, I think that Pulp has really, and has often been in the past, the in road that brings culture together, oddly. I think we tend to share Pulp before we share other items. It's universal to, well, let's see here, you know, what do we learn about Japan? We learn, like, Kung Fu Boomies, and, like, Samurai films. And now our kids are really familiar with anime and manga, like, they read Yu-Gi-Oh comics, not really realizing maybe where they're being produced from originally, and even though they are translated, it's the same production. Items like Totoro and Hello Kitty. - Miss Nine loves Totoro, and Totoro was put out, I think, the year I was born. - So you see items like Akira, where they're trying to bring it across and make it all white guys, and you have to start wondering why they don't just use Japanese, actually. - Yeah, what's wrong with Japanese? - I mean, it started, I think, with the British, right? We were very comfortable with bringing it across the office and just using, like, I suppose people couldn't understand British accents for a while. I suppose we've discussed this in the past. Yeah, but it seems every year we get another item like Troll Hunter, or let the right one in, or the big Japanese explosion of horror films that happened maybe a decade ago now, not even, I suppose. Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, everyone who's seen the new movie seems to be telling me that they've seen the old one as well, or that they're going to pick it up now. - Yeah, so it's sort of like they're a gateway to the proper movie. - And because, you know-- - Why can't we just watch the proper movies, right? - Well, shooting at guys and that sort of thing is a universal concept, so it's easier to go into-- - It's like fireside tales. - Yeah. - We've always been doing it. - Okay, well, let's just wrap it up. We do have a winner to announce, in a sense, of the Hunger Games. - When is the official start for the Hunger Games? - Today. - Today. - Today, begin reading immediately. - Oh my God. - Oh my God. - Two weeks from now, we will have the first check-in, so not the next Flashcast, we'll give you a little reminder next Flashcast, but after that, the book is broken into three sections. So we're going to approach it that every two weeks will have a little, you know, five minute check-in, and then we'll have the summary episode, like we did with those in the death sun. - Okay. - If there's going to be spoilers, we'll warn people ahead of time that they should jump forward two or three minutes. - Yeah. - And yeah, I would just like to be able to have a little more discussion along the way with this one. I think that was the lesson of the last time. - Very soon, we're going to have a contest to actually win a few copies of the Hunger Games. - Actually, we're going to have the contest right now. - Oh my God. - So anybody interested in winning a copy of the Hunger Games for your COBO, you have to accept it as a COBO formatted book. - But COBO is free to get right. - Yeah, if you have an iOS device, if you have an iPod, an iPhone, I think you can actually read them on just on the website too. So even if you just log into COBO.com or whatever, you should be able to read it. - That's handy. - And if for some reason you want to enter, but you don't necessarily want the book, you can always just let us know when we can gift it to somebody else. - Yeah. - We're going to give away two books, one book this week, one book next week, thanks to a very generous anonymous donor. This week's trivia question. What episode did a certain Jeff Lynch appear in? - His first, his first-- - Not in the sense of Flashcast, not as a bothersome spot. - But it's a call. - But as a character, as a character-- - Oh, it's a character in Flash bulb itself. Jeff has been introduced as a character in the past. And the first person to email comments@flashbulb.com with the episode that he was in will win a copy of Hunger Games. - Awesome. - That'll be awesome. - And we'll have some equally interesting trivia question next week for another copy. - And speaking of Jeff Lynch. (dramatic music) - Spotty Father. - Hi, mobsters. When I lived in Raleigh, North Carolina many years ago, I had a personal experience involving a very strange event. Early one spring night in the early 90s, the old wooden decrepit apartment building directly across from my house caught on fire and became fully engaged within minutes. In an attempt to escape an elderly woman living on the top floor of the building, opened her apartment door and was immediately engulfed in flames. Her corpse was found the next day as the fire department combed through the charred remains of the building. It was a particularly gruesome event, which I watched unfold from the comfort of my living room sofa. What this poor woman experienced was something called flashover. Now Wikipedia defines the term flashover as the near simultaneous ignition of most of the directly exposed combustible material in an enclosed area. Flashover occurs when the majority of the exposed surfaces in a space are heated to their auto-ignition temperature and emit flammable gases. Well, this terrible old memory came to mind this week when I stumbled upon a very similar event that occurred recently in Chicago. Here's more from the Chicago Tribune. A woman who had moved to Chicago last month died this week after she unwittingly went up an elevator as a fire was blasting through the 12th floor of the high-rise apartment building where she lived. When the doors to the elevator opened, Chantel McCoy, who was returning to her apartment with a bag of food, was hit with 1,500 degree temperatures from gas and fire fumes and killed. Said fire department chief Joe Raskalva. The fire began in a unit on the 12th floor. A man and woman were awoken by their smoke detector and noticed that the fire was tearing through their living room. The man and woman along with a dog managed to escape the apartment, but the door to the unit did not close, which allowed fire to spread throughout the hallway. When the elevator door opened, McCoy was immediately blasted with fire and burned alive. McCoy, 32, had moved from Philadelphia to Chicago after she had been laid off from her job the previous year with an accounting firm. She was looking for a new place to start over, said her mother Joanne. As it turns out, older residential buildings in Chicago are not required to have sprinkler systems installed. Older buildings can either install sprinkler systems or they can be evaluated and other safety upgrades can be put in place according to a building department spokesman. The Chicago City Council recently passed an extension, which would put off until 2015 the deadline for when building owners need to have the work done, a vote that most certainly sealed the fate of one young woman hoping for a fresh start and a new life. Remember folks, no matter how safe we make them, elevators can still be little boxes of horror and death and not just in the movies. I'm Jeffrey Lynch and that's this week's spot of bother. - Nicely done, Jeff. - As usual? - Yes, we've gotten rid of the hecklers. Basically just put them back in bed and told them that if they get out again, they'll be flash fried. - Yes, yes, like the last ones. - Which would make for a good next spot of bother? - Or some delicious barbecue, no, that's not right. We got a lot of positive feedback about Jeff's butt drug segment last week. - Yes. - Yeah, we really did. - We'll get to some of that in the mail bag, but another excellent iteration in your series. - Mm-hmm, excellent story picking. Okay, well, to lighten the mood a little, here's fish with a retro review. Fresh fish, a new batch of cinematic pulp with the all-ways listening, three day fish. A flash guess, three day fish here. My theater decided to suck two weeks in a row because we have gotten no new movies. We just keep getting old movies. So I'm going to do another retro review. Hopefully we'll have something new next week. The movie that we are retro reviewing is the fifth element. And I do this for a very particular reason. Last flash cast, JRD mentioned Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, where the main character is being portrayed by one Gary Oldman. Well, if you want to see a completely different version of Gary Oldman, then you should watch the fifth element because he is a crazy wacky, possibly southern villain in this movie that has weird plastic headwear and probably the best pinstripe duster I've ever seen ever. But the fifth element is about a evil, I guess it's just an evil being. It kind of looks like a star or just giant ball of fire. It was apparently a whole intention is just to crash into the earth and destroy it. And Bruce Willis, the hero of this movie, has to team up with the fifth element who is this perfect being to stop it. As far as sci-fi movies go, it's a pretty fun watch. There's like, it's really cheesy, but a lot of sci-fi movies are really. And the effects are a bit outdated, sadly. It's really obviously computer, not even like well done, generated, just kind of like TV shows have better graphics than this movie does now. So all in all, I'm gonna have to say this is a yellow light. If you don't like sci-fi, if you don't like cheesy movies, don't say this movie. If you do like sci-fi, then I can recommend this movie. That is all, always listening. - So I have a kind of confession. This is one of my favorite movies. I love the fifth element so much. - I remember really enjoying it, but I don't know how it would hold up. I suspect fish is probably on the nose that the effects aren't as good as I remember them to be. - It holds up in my heart. And if I think about it, then they're fine. But I think it would probably be different if I were actually watching it. It's been a while. - Yeah, yeah. - Your rose color glasses, it's like me in labyrinth. - Yeah, that's such a great one too. - I do find labyrinth holds up though, frankly. - Yeah, but it was puppets, it wasn't CGI. - Well, there are moments. - There are scenes. The whole fire, the swamp or whatever. Sorry. - Oh, yes, we're taking their heads off. - They're trading by a box and stuff, yeah. - Yeah. - And there's creeped me out one of the things. - A David Bowie's bulge and hair. And his poor acting at moments. His cod base left. - You don't get that much package in children's viewing that doft in these days. If you guys enjoy Fisher's segments, and I know you do, you should swing by the Facebook page, his Facebook page through your Facebook page, where he's always posting movie news and miscellaneous stuff. - And he's full of magic. So if you want a little piece of it, you can rub the fish at three day fish at Facebook. - Don't rub the fish. What are you talking about? - Now it's time for... (bell ringing) - Mingle bag. - Speaking of fish, he did want to write in with a quick thanks. He said, "A big thanks to you guys and Joe for your kind words "concerned to my coffin fanfic. "I am especially pleased that Joe liked the ending. "I hope you are a wonderful editor who probably should try "and steal you if Flashbulb wasn't around." - Aw. - Very nice. - Well, I'm glad, 'cause we haven't had many experiences of you editing other people's work, so I'm glad that it's, it went well. - It went smoothly, no one's feelings were hurt. - Yeah, so that should be a word to the wise, to those of you who want to. - Yeah, I want to hear you. - And it's a very pleasant experience. And, but we only share every so often. Only with you special folks. - Now speaking of something we want to share with the special folks, James, a listener named James after listening to Flashcast 49, brought a particular commercial to our attention. It's a hometown sort of affair. - Mm-hmm, it's real. - Main street commercial. - It's not your average pharmacy commercial. ♪ There's a cry across the heartland ♪ ♪ A yearning for the days gone by ♪ ♪ And in the low court in Indiana ♪ ♪ They're happy and they'll tell you why ♪ ♪ They got butt drugs ♪ ♪ They love butt drugs ♪ ♪ But blah, blah, blah drugs ♪ ♪ But blah, blah, blah drugs ♪ - I recommend butt drugs for everybody. - I can always count on butt drugs. When I thank drugs, I thank butt drugs. For all my health needs, I turn to butt drugs. ♪ You want hometown service ♪ ♪ And cheap hot coffee and liquor ♪ ♪ Now that's the ticket ♪ ♪ You can tell Walmart, CVS and Walgreens ♪ ♪ Exactly where to stick it ♪ ♪ But blah, blah, blah drugs ♪ - We love butt drugs. ♪ But blah, blah, blah drugs ♪ - Butt drugs won't play two games. ♪ But blah, blah, blah drugs ♪ - Free parking in the rear. ♪ But blah, blah, blah drugs ♪ - I love butt drugs. - Very nice, very nice. - Mm-hmm. - I'm getting that song stuck in my head now. - I love the delivery of Alaska. I love butt drugs. His eyes wander for a moment. (laughing) - That'll definitely be in the show notes if anybody wants to watch the whole spectacle. - It was so good. - That's gonna bring up a town tomorrow. You get liquor too at the pharmacy. - And liquor. - $30 for a monthly supply. - Speaking of the show notes, I've actually gone a long way towards simplifying how I post them. Things are taking a lot longer than they should have and it was a bit of a bother. - Yeah. - I cut it down. - Mm-hmm, it would take you at least a day to get them all done. - I suspect it was pretty tough to get through them too 'cause there was a lot of info throwing up and not a lot of it was necessary, so. - And maybe if this was our only show and we had all the time in the world and maybe if it was, you know, the only thing that we did in a day we would have website postings but you gotta pick and choose, right? - Exactly. - I was very pleased to see that we had a follow-up email from our Velcro page who, if you recall, last episode, had a bit of a glut. - So she writes in saying, "Good afternoon. "I'm slowly working my way through the backlog. "Good stuff. "Flashcast 15. "I agree that adults need to maintain authority "while respecting the child. "Discipline is important "and there are too many spoiled kids these days. "Gee whiz, at any moment I may just say young whippersnows. "It's true though. "I'm happy to hear that y'all balance authority with love. "I know how you feel about emoticons, JRD. "As a writer/editor, I try to avoid them "because I'm always thinking, "I should be clever enough to express what I mean "without these cutesy little beasts. "I've come to a bit of a compromise. "I avoid them unless I'm in social media "where expression is limited like Twitter "and I'll use them with friends and family as an indulgence. "After all, with friends and family, "the point is to make sure folks know how you feel. "And that's important." - That's a very good point. - Because you do, JRD, use emoticons with us. It's sort of a private thing. I think I do them because I don't want to, I'm joking a lot and I don't want people to get the wrong idea to think of being a jerk or something. - But on the flip side, sometimes people say jerky things and put a smiley face on the end and be like, "Just be like a jerk or something." - Oh yeah, so your grammar has to be good, I suppose. - So she says, "Other than that, I try to avoid them "just to push myself to find better words." - Yeah, good for you. - That's very good. I'm very interested to hear that she's an editor, too. - Mm-hmm. - That's very interesting for me. And you know what, I read this email earlier and I'm going to make a conscious effort to use less emoticons now. It's very good. - So she's changing the world one person at a time? - That's right, episode 152. I noticed there was a long pause in the beginning. - Oh god, we've done something. - Somebody should have mentioned this. - That was K9, episode K9, which was a Karwick episode, if I recall correctly. - Mm-hmm, well that sucks. - Yeah, yeah, all right. Flashcast 17, "I love the idea of multiple New York's." "I love the idea of multiple New York's too, New York's too." - New York, New York. - Particularly the Stephen King New York's of the Dark Tower. "As for the whole mutable, immutable superhero question, "I have this to say. "Superman began as a fairly pure concept "in terms of his mythos. "He was all about truth, justice, and the American way. "I admit that as an American, "that last part makes me cringe. "As though any country or group of people "has a monopoly on those concepts. "But I think if you look at the first Superman movie, "Kristford Reed made, you'll see what I mean "by the purity of concept. "It's probably the best expression "of the general feeling about him. "Batman is old enough that he's classic. "The same is true of Superman. "And when anyone messes with a classic, "they tend to muddle the original flavor "and people get upset. "I will say I was disturbed when Frank Miller wrote "The Dark Knight series and put guns in Batman's hand." I agree, I think that's true. I felt that was just wrong. People try to justify that as part of the modern world, but gun-toting gangsters were a big part of his world when Batman debuted. Just look at the evil of the Joker when he first appeared. Yikes. - It's interesting because to me, the no-gun thing was always relatively essential, like he had not necessarily a fear of them, but just having his parents gunned down, he had taken to not using them. - Yeah, it was like a preference that he could work around it. - Exactly. - Looking in the shadows. - I suppose the concession has always been that the body armor is powerful enough that he can get away with it, right? - Mm-hmm, yeah. - Which is sort of weird 'cause the same idea happens in Dune in a weird way. You guys ever read Dune? - No. - They build these shields where you can't, nothing moving over a certain speed can get through, so bullets are basically useless. And so they end up in this weird technique of slow sword fighting. - Oh, crazy. - Yeah, but I think-- - That's neat. - Yeah, it's all just these attempts to bring us back to a point where, I think to loop back, it is about truth and justice and the purity of those original concepts and being able to get away without having to punch folks. There's a certain glory or a certain preference to those-- - It's like he would stop them from the bad stuff and throw them in the way of the police, you know? - So, simpler fisticuffs for a more civilized time. - Hmm, yeah, hmm. As far as the Hulk is concerned, let's face it, he suffered from a very limited concept. There is only so much you can do with him that makes sense. Look at all the junk they came out with just to scrape together a story. There just wasn't much of anywhere to go for. - Yeah, for him to go, yeah, for him to go. - I feel like the Hulk in the '70s, where he was sort of, he almost nailed that zeitgeist to me, that sort of miserable, wandering, not really sure what the whole point of it all is. And he's just going from incident to incident and trying to make something of his life. That, to me, touched something. I do think after the '70s, when it moved into the '80s, it's not really much you can do there. Turn him into a greedy mobster, I don't know. So, I agree, I think that's part of it though, is that everything exists in its time and sometimes you just gotta let it go. I love the Hulk, he's one of my favorite heroes but he exists of his time. - With Wolverine, they had to change his costume because his first costume, a problem with pretty much all of the X-Men, was horrible. It made him look like a bumblebee. The big difference between Wolverine and Hulk is that a lot of story seeds were some when Wolverine was introduced. His unknown past, his dog tag, his adamantium skeleton, which had to have been artificially added since he wasn't born with it. - The Hulk didn't have much mystery to him. I love Wolverine personally and I love the progression of his character throughout the ages. He's gotta be, I don't know, one of, if not my most favorite of all superheroes. - But having the ability, when Wolverine was dropped into the mythos, they had gotten to a point where so many characters have been created, they had learned a lot about creating character. - Yeah, he wasn't exactly the first guy at the party, you know? - And the truth is, one of the things I find pressing about comics is that, so many attempts are made to introduce somebody who is going to have some long lasting staying power, but so often the character makes it a year or two years and just falls off. - Fizzles out. - I wonder if Shatter Star, some people will recognize the name, I wonder if Shatter Star's doing anything these days. There was a time when I was a kid when he was huge, and he was like, guessing in every comic. And now I don't even know if they still write anything with him in it. - Hmm. So she says she enjoyed the Ragman. I googled Ragman and discovered that Ragman faded out in the early 60s. I'll be interested to see whether or not your story catches on and is taken for a folk tale. Yeah, I love that about the urban tales. And what I love most about it is that if you actually go back to the wiki, it says like, these aren't real little. But otherwise, you wouldn't know. I tried to convince JRD not to put that there, but he said it wouldn't be fair. - I'm not trying to fool them out. I'm just trying to fool everybody else now, I think. - Episode 159. I think the bleep didn't fully cover the word. That's just a technical note. I don't mind the language and I understand you want to maintain the rating. I'd like to also suggest that instead of saying the word and bleeping over it, just put it in a bleep. A softer beep, please. (laughing) If you must use beeps, please make them softer. - Yes, I know it does. It gets much softer. It takes many forms before you get to the final, but to the final beep, to the final beep. But I do not want to go back to every episode and change the beep. - See, this is where the pulp aspect kicks in. These are intended to be kicked out as quickly as possible. - Yeah. - Not every edge is perfect, unfortunately, and maybe someday we can go back when the archive is complete. - And rewrite it like just a scenario. - I don't know, yeah, would that bother people? If we went back and tripped off all the edges, suddenly-- - It's part of our chart. - You know what, you have. - Hayden Christensen is showing up. - JRD, I don't know if, I think we've discussed this at some point, but how we went back and changed episode two. - We have gone back to change things, but only for language. I've never gone back and changed a girl point, like a universe. - Well, I think that's the only thing that like, a long time after recording the episode, we went back and changed it. - Yeah, and I actually regret it. I wish I had kept the original custody in there. - I'm just trying to figure out how long we had that beep. I know that I turned it down before we changed beeps. So, I just feel for you. And then I feel for every single person who gets to this point. I don't know whether I like knowing this. I mean, I definitely do, but there's parts that just like make me blush. - You're giving her anxiety. - You've studied portions of nothingness. Oh my God. - Yeah, well, we've learned a lot in 235 episodes. - Yeah. So Flashcast 18, I think the reason Conan, the Destroyer is so bad, what? It's so awesome. - So bad. - We're not reading this one. - Is that it lacks the mythic gravitas of Conan the Barbarian. And that's totally true. When it came out, we all wondered, we're hit super tag on. Where's my super tag? - Yeah, I absolutely agree on that point. - Totally. There were too many bad jokes. - Agreed. - The thief was annoying. - Oh, so bad. - And it was such a waste of Max Fonz to sit down. - Side out. - Side out. Max Fonz to side out. - I don't remember Max Fonz to side out in that film. - No, I thought he was in the first one. And he was all like, "When the gold loses it's lust." - No, I don't know. Oh, the king guy? - Yeah. - Perhaps. - I don't know. Anyway, or if he was in Conan the Barbarian, he might have been the evil wizard that got stabbed or something. I don't know. - Daniel Jones? - No, that was the first one. I'm talking about the second one. - That was joking. - He was the evil green-eyed mirror monster. - Oh, man, that movie was terrible. - Yeah, that's really good. - But I loved it. - Yeah, I loved it. - You should see her nose crinkled. - But I was like the littlest kid when I saw that movie. - Yeah, see, that's the thing. - So it was like fantastic. It was like a kid's movie. - It is the original Star Wars mess-up where the first film was intended at a slightly older audience, intended for slightly older audience, I mean. And the follow-up is maybe trying to make it a broader appeal. - Yeah, you can always up the seriousness, but reducing it. - Yeah, you can't take it down. - Yes. - It's like Gremlins and Gremlins 2, right? Do you remember that? Switch over. Gremlins 2 is just this ridiculous slapstick farce. - Yeah. - But Gremlins 1 was actually kind of-- - I love Gremlins. - I remember we tried to watch it with the kids at some point. They were like, "We can't watch this." Do you remember trying to watch it with two? - Well, we've also discussed in the show previously that Gremlins was the film that forced the PG-13 rating. - PG-13 rating, yeah. - Anyway. - Oh, those Gremlins. I loved your comments about the Rapture. I must now look up the history of the Jehovah's Witnesses. Jesus and his invisible sky castles. Seriously? That sounds like an amusement park ride. No offense to Jehovah's Witnesses. No offense. - People in their latter day scenes. - No. - I don't mean to offend anybody. But doesn't Jesus and his invisible sky castle actually sound like a Japanese anime? - Yeah. - Okay, somebody-- - Jesus and his flying castle. - I'd watch it. - I think I have seen that. I think I've been told about it all my life. - Flashcast 19. I love Ingrid's stories. - More please. - No, don't. - I'll try to make my emails shorter in the future. - Oh, don't. We like them. - Keep up the good work. Thank you. - Vow. - Thank you. I'm very concerned about you hitting the border with the casting. - I know we're a little afraid for you. - Yeah, we'll see. - There's a moment of silence. She's already dead. We're gonna be able to do anything about that. - Shit, 'cause I can say that now. (laughing) - Oh, thank you very much, Vow, for sending that in. So, last episode we were discussing Captain America. And David Duckblue went, he of same time next year fame, was commenting it all felt like an intro episode and not an actual movie. Think of it as a pilot to the Avengers movie, maybe? - Yeah, that's a real thing. It's like one long commercial. - The first Avengers. - It's just setting everything up. It's like, you know, a pilot episode. They're just putting everything in place where you understand they don't wanna make it too complex for you. - It felt like a novella of a movie. Like, it felt like it had 45 minutes, maybe an hour of movie. And everything else was just kind of filler. - What it was, they did it, they did a fine job. - Or at least a mediocre job. - I think it really hinges on how well the Avengers does. If it's a good movie, then people will look back at it fondly as this sort of a step and not as, you know, necessarily the main course. - If not, this is just an empty shell of nothing. - Yeah. - And you know anybody who's seen like the Hulk or Iron Man or Captain America now, any of these movies or Thor, they're gonna wanna see the Avengers, you know? So if you loved any of those shows when you were younger or even if you, or I shouldn't say shows, comics, even if you had liked Spider-Man or Batman, you're probably going to go to another like comic-y movie, right? - Right. - And then because you saw those and they're gonna be in the Avengers movie, you're probably gonna see the rest. So they're really covering like all their bases here. They're just, one movie for each of the Avengers characters, you know? - Yeah, yeah. - I think that maybe they're getting back to what the original comic form, well, no, actually, I think what will be interesting is what happens next because after the introductions, that's when the tough story aspects start kicking in and you need to, if they're gonna keep the ball rolling with the shared universe situation, they're going to need to introduce some sort of ongoing, almost soap opera system, you know what I mean? Maybe they're gonna have to start having villains that cross over three different movies or... We were also lucky enough to get a call from the doctor. - We did indeed. - This is Doc Blue wishing JRD, Jessica May and a Poconx a wonderful Flashcast 50. It's been a fun ride and I'm looking forward to it many more. - I hope so too. I hope there's lots more after this. - Yeah, it's interesting. I had actually gotten used to hearing his voice. He had done an advent calendar with his kids, a Lego advent calendar. - For some reason, I just didn't think his voice was gonna be that deep. So when I played it, I'm like, "Who's this?" - Well, thanks a lot. Yeah, we're really pleased to hit 50. - Yeah, yeah, thanks for thinking. I hope the next 50 are like lots better and stuff. - I hear there are considerations of giving Time Traveler Rich his own, or I mean, sorry, Rich the Time Traveler goes fab me. His own theme song. - Yes, I've been talking about it for a while, but we wanted to see if he was gonna stick around. - True facts. Every time we're introducing his bit, I hear the doctor who theme in my head. - The original? - Yeah, which obviously we can't rip off 'cause that would be problematic. I don't wanna be shived by a Sonic screwdriver. - No, no. - I want to, I keep telling Jamie, I want her to come up with something like David Bowie ask like 70s Zeke Star Test. - Yeah. - So, well, I think we should ask Rich what kind of music he would like. And maybe or maybe not, I'll listen to you. - There aren't enough Time Traveler in country songs. - Yes, there are. - Ramblin' Man, throwin' his pooch in the back of his DeLorean and gettin' out there across the coronal range. - The coronal range, that's awesome. - Herding them, Time Buffalo. - Yeah, I see it now. - Hello, Flashpaul gang and now fellow mobsters. This is Time Traveler Rich coming at you real time. If that's not just real time, this call is coming at you from inside your house, inside your house. So there's some speculation about whether I traveled into the future or not, and whether I could comment on your future catalog. Well, doing so would be completely irresponsible. For instance, if I were to let slip how episode 200 was so amazing and that it won the newly created 2013 Golden Globe for internet broadcasting, that could irrevocably change the timeline and I just wouldn't do something like that. Also, I have to apologize if my voice is a bit off. I have a bit of an ear infection and get the antibiotics rocking now. So my voice has a little odd, that's what's going on. I had an awesome spot of bother, gravelly, deep voice going this morning, but it's clearing up a little bit. A recent story is coffin hidden. Thought there was a harm connection there. The old man in the corner's voice and men are speaking seem kind of similar to his. In fact, I thought when I was listening to it, someone even dropped the name Carter. Then I had to go back and look at the text of the story. Turns out, I just was hearing something, but I don't know if there was intentional, don't know if that was just me not differentiating a couple of different voices correctly, but definitely made me think. And speaking of harm, antidote in the recent one. Yeah, I think I'd be too paranoid to try any injections too if I'd had that same early encounter with the doctor he had. Interesting to see what happens with the bite. The gnashing of the teeth, the re-seeing, some ruby crossover, I don't know. Let me talk about some other time traveling I'm doing. Thanks to the miracle of DVRs, we tend to pile up a lot of series and get through them. I apologize if some of these are networking, you guys don't get them up there in the great North. Once upon a time, very tell series, breaks it premise. It's good, I'm a little Disney-esque, it shows through at times, but I really like it and digging it, trying to see where they go with the story and how they can maintain it in a few seasons. The art direction of this one is really amazing, especially when they look back into the fairy tale land, then back into the real world and lots of neat stuff going on there. Another fairy tale story, Grim. This one we're on the fence on. We've been watching it. The stories are kind of okay. Interesting kind of setup. He can see the fairy tale creatures, no one else can, his family usually hunts them, but there's some good ones. But I can't help shaking the feeling that it's a pale shadow of the Buffy Angel universe and we'll have to see if it can stand up on its own and separate from that. We also just finished up the first half of the season of Walking Dead, which is coming back in February. And that was, I have to say, an absolutely amazing season. It kind of got a little slow in the middle, but we were completely slocked jawed at the mid-season finale on that one. I think my wife and I were sitting on the couch there for a good five minutes. Just kind of, I just couldn't believe the palette ended. So, if you're not watching Walking Dead, go pick it up. The first season on Netflix streaming, amazing show. And the next thing we got, we got the American Horror Stories piled up on the DVR to watch soon. We haven't started those yet. And I believe this Sunday, at least here in the States on Fox, Alcatraz is premiering. And that's an interesting premise. If you haven't seen it, the trailers for it, the base of premise is Alcatraz was shut down, but it wasn't actually shut down. What happened was one day, all the prisoners just disappeared. And they shut down the prison to cover it up. And in the current day, a crime is committed and tracked back to a person who was supposedly incarcerated in Alcatraz, who is the same age they were in Alcatraz, basically haven't aged. And you find that all the prisoners have disappeared now are still reappearing. And there's a team setting to hunt them down. Could be interesting, don't know yet. We'll get the pilot to try and see how that goes. You guys are talking about kids' fiction. There's one that my daughter is reading. It's called "My Sister is a Vampire" by Sienna Mercer. It's a series, I think there's at least six in the series, I think she's read the first couple. It's a bit below her reading level. I think she's in fifth. I think it's probably about a second or third grade. Reading level on the fourth. And she definitely knows this, her guilty pleasure, kind of pulp story to read, but she enjoys them. And if you have kids that are into vampires, they're seeing to be pretty safe. Haven't you read them myself? I've had her tell me about them in their kind of tame. So probably a good start for kids that might be interested in kind of a pulpy empire story. You also asked about the zubilee zoo. And if we'd heard about that in the States, and no. (laughs) All right, and a little more thing. You mentioned last time about Jim and the spammers on the wiki, and from your description, all I can now picture is a new video game called "Castle Wickenstein" where you go through and you blow away spammers from a first person perspective. So I think she gets people working on that game and get it out there. It's definitely a good tie-in for Flash Bowl. Anyway, that's it for now. Tell Kara Grieses, this is Rich. - Oh, it was awesome to get a call from you, Rich. Love those calls, they're great. - Except for, I don't like that there. You haven't seen the zubilee zoo. That's some good stuff. (laughs) - If you're free. - Apparently I am. - Or you were in your youth at least, I don't know. I like that he differentiates between the mob and the rest of the Flash Bowl gang, as if there's some sort of grading system, like some sort of ranking. - And there is. (laughs) Who loves us more? Come on, at with it. - Sorry to hear about your ear infection, that's rough. - Yeah, and that, well, at least you got a little time pretending to be Jeff and Lynch. I wish I could be. (laughs) - Maybe I wish I could be Jeff or Lynch. - Yeah, but alas, we're not. - Well, then we have to watch the ladies burn to death and that's not so bad. - All the time, 'cause that's what he sees all of the time. 'Cause he sees dead people, oh my God. And I also heard that he is gonna come to Fan Expo 2012 in August. - If the man will let him. - No, he has. - Oh, the man. - No, no, no. - We're waiting on the State Department now. - Well, that's the other man. - Yes. - How many of the men do we have to do? - Well, there's his man, which should be first. - Right. - Yeah. - Well, I wasn't talking about that man. - Oh, you do. - The State Department. - I was just gonna say, I knew we had permission from that man. - Well. - As if it's like us that's like, yay! - Yeah, as a man. But as we all know, he was on the Terrorist Watchlist, so we have to make sure that he can come in the country. But if you can, he is coming. - Big brothers watching. - We'll see how many contributors to the show that we can have out. - I know I'm starting to count on all my little fingers. - Ooh, how many people can we get? - I know, and so early, so by August. I'm really excited. - Thanks, Beau. - I wanna go on August. - I wanna go on August. - And we're telling you early, guys. So save up your pennies. - Yeah. - We're telling you early. - We're telling you like 17 million children, and we're gonna do it. - I wanna get to my toes on this list. - Yeah, we're getting to all of our toes. - Yeah. - So if you're coming, call it in. - August. - August. - It's my birthday in August, so you guys can all make-- - Bring her presents. - Bring her presents. (laughing) - Or you could bring presents for me, then be good too. - She likes diamonds. - You like diamonds. - So give her diamonds and she'll give them to me. - Okay, just 'cause she loves them. - Or just come visit us either way. - That's diamonds enough for a pope. Not for me, I need diamonds. (laughing) - I enjoyed Richard's pulp listing of television shows. I'll have a little bit of a pulp element there. - Yeah, we'd have seen the Ever After on commercial. - Once upon a time. - Once upon a time. - Yeah, we haven't actually watched any of it. - I believe there are competing fairy tales. - Oh, yeah. - There's Grim too. - Grim, yes, I've actually heard the unfortunate reviews of Grim. - That's very grim. - Big Grim reviews. (laughing) - Cool check. - Good night, soccer. - Good night, soccer. - Oh, yes. - I just, I wonder, there's sort of a thread of fantasy television that's run. - Cold check. (laughing) - I think it's cheap CGI. Well, we've discussed this before. It's cheap CGI becomes easier and easier to implement in your television shows without looking too goofy. - Mm-hmm. - I think we're gonna see more of this. Although I'd be interested to hear people's classic 70s, like, psychic cop shows. What's the history of, you know, what's such a medium, or? - Yeah, yeah. - There's a medium. - There's also like your ghost whisperer. I feel like those things get back good. - Yeah. - Oh, it was it? Cancel? - Mm-hmm. - Good, yeah. - That was terrible. - It was, I believe, almost gonna go to another network, but it failed. Like all of Jennifer Love Hewitt's relationships. Zinger. - Ooh. Alcatrazin, interesting. - Yeah. - Definitely wanna check that out. - Mm-hmm. My sister's vampire sounds right up Miss Nines Alley. - Mm-hmm. - Oh, it's so funny. There's a book that sounds very similar on the scholastic book order forms. I don't know if you get those, but we get order forms for lots of different books and you order them through school. Anyway, she came home and she circled this one and she keeps telling me she's like, "It's just because it's really long "and I need it for the written challenge." And she's blaming it on this reading challenge, but it's this vampire book. And I don't know why she's weird about vampire books, but she's like, "It's 'cause it's really long. "It's 'cause it's really long." - And she like tells me every time. - She really likes the vampire book. - Yeah, and there's nothing wrong with her like in vampires. She knows why it's-- - You know why? It's literally love the vampire. - It's probably because she knows I don't like the vampire. - She shouldn't feel judged. She should like what she likes. - Yeah. - Little girl, don't feel judged. That's right. Mommy will allow you to love the vampires. - In the three-letter score board that is Castle Dickinson, the high score is always held by G.I.M. - Mm-hmm, that's right. Thank you, G.I.M. - Thanks a lot for the call, Rich. - Mm-hmm. - Always fantastic to hear from you from whatever timeline you're wondering around it. - Yeah, and now you're a mobster. - Yeah, that's great. We've been really lucky in the last week or two. - Yeah, we do. - Mommy and me showing up. - 'Cause it's always been a busy place, but he posted so many fun things. - Don't feel like you've always got to be at hand. Other folks out there, but it'll be really nice to hear from you. - Yeah. - It's odd. Sometimes people will show up and drop me a comment on Twitter or something, but they seem to feel very comfortable with me, which is great. I guess they feel there's a certain chatty report to the show, which is fine, but they don't ever say anything beforehand, but they just show up and they're like, "Hey, how--" - I've been listening for since you started, and we're like, "Whoa!" I find some people on the Flash Belt page they'll say something, and they're like, "I've been listening a while," and I'm like, "Hey, how about you come to the mob?" - Yeah. - So, yeah, it was a big day when Rich finally got there. - Don't feel like you even have to jump both feet into the mob. Just say a little hello. - Say a little hello. - A little hello, yeah. Because we're all very nice. Tree screams a little bit, but that's okay. - I think he just likes the caps locks button. - No, I think he's a screamer. - Yeah. - Maybe not in real life, in RL, but I think on the internet, he's like, "Hey!" 'Cause it's not just the caps, it's the exclamation points. - Yeah. - He's clearly yelling, which is fine, because it'll scare away those you need to be scared. - Ghost? - I don't know. (laughing) But he's almost front lines. - Yeah. - Yeah. - Another mobster that's been around for a long time and who I highly appreciate. I think it's time we hear a little something from Colorado Joe. ♪ Here's a cup of Joe ♪ ♪ For mobsters at home ♪ ♪ It's Colorado Joe ♪ ♪ Colorado Joe ♪ - Hello, Flashcast crew and fellow mobsters. First, it's real easy to compliment Jarity's work and say good things about him as a person. But I'm gonna go on record as saying I still disagree with his opinion of Neil Stevenson's work. I'm waiting for Jeff to finish Remdi and have him weigh in on the debate. Any others like to join? The whole family went to see them up but would be over the holidays. I just totally loved it and I'm thinking of starting a campaign to bring back the weekly series. We need a little more laughter right now. Along the same lines, I remember watching Zubili Zoo with my kids in the 80s. So it made it to Colorado. I haven't seen it in years. I may try and find a couple of episodes for the granddaughter. I'm not trying to take anything away from the commercial dedicated Lovecraft podcast but I wanna point out that every August, Drabblecast posts a Lovecraft story along with some original stories influenced by the master. At the risk of blasphemy, personally, I often find I enjoy the mythos and world building of Lovecraft more than his actual stories. As for cowboys, given the Calgary stampede, in my book, Rodeo equals cowboys so I'm on record as saying they do exist north of the border. What may be missing is the gunslinger. I have no knowledge of this aspect of the culture. As an aside, my hometown, Rock Springs, Wyoming, was a location where Butch Cassidy worked as a butcher and earned his gnome to gar. Another great story from Ingrid. One thing that bummed me out though is the wife who was responsible for the good fortune in the first place ends up being punished for her husband's greed. I know Linda would totally kick my ass if I screwed up like that. Great cough and three-parter. I have to admit, I was originally thinking the baby's affliction was some kind of moonshowsen by proxy issue. Obviously I was going in the wrong direction and I'm really glad you didn't kill the dog. I won't mention any murder plague spoilers given that it was just recently published, but... Holy crap! If I were to vote, I'd say drop the F-bombs with abandon, but totally understand your concerns. I've been trying so far unsuccessfully to remove the word from my vocabulary and insert frack. Didn't someone say that profanity is the crutch of the feeble-minded or something like that? I'd argue, but I've got frack and nothing. And speaking of death by acts, I refer the mob to Jim Steinman's "Love, Death and an American Guitar" later released on a meatloaf album as "Wasted Youth." I'll send a link to be added to the show notes. Take care. I absolutely agree with Muppet Show. Yeah. Staple of my youth. Love that show. Yeah. And the Muppet Babies? I was just going to say in the Muppet Babies? I think the thing with the Muppet Show, and again, the thing with the Muppet movie, is that it was one of those things that an adult and a kid can watch together and neither of them will be bored. That rare family entertainment concept, which isn't really just children. I remember when we had Mr. 9, and we had decided all the things from our youth that we wanted to watch, wanted him to see. I remember the first Transformers episode. I remember all that. But the Muppets, we really didn't, like, we didn't show him, indoctrinate him with, and told him it was much older. I did show him some Muppet episodes when he was young, but he was too young to really get it. It wasn't great, yeah. So I remember when he did sit down, it was like the Christmas Carol or something, and he's like, what do you mean, like puppets? I don't understand this puppets thing, but he understood the humor. So. Yeah. Let of love for the Travel Cast folks. Mm-hmm. Yes. They've been hugely helpful to us. They do a great job with their Lovecraft releases. I have heard good things about the for-pay dramas that we were told about, though. I think I'm going to have a go at that. I believe Barry was telling me at the mountains of madness, it was a good choice. Mm-hmm. I'm really excited about hearing that, too. That's like the epitome of Cthulhu tale. Mm-hmm. Calgary. Yeah. Yeah. Same for J.M.A. There you go. Yeah. I'm not going to argue. I know. I'm doing the Ida Charity, like, you can't say anything. Whenever I think of Calgary cowboys, like the Alberta Midwestern... Yeah. Canada cowboys. I always picture them riding dinosaurs because of all the... Raptor cavalry? Yeah. Raptor cavalry. That's where they're originally. That's where they go to train, actually. We have a camp out in Calgary. Somebody's got a ride herd on those raptors. That's right. Well, just because there's so many, like, fossils and dinosaur bones found in the area in the plains, you know? So I always picture all our cowboys riding dinosaurs. Are they, like, live dinosaurs? Or are they just, like, bone-down animals? Oh, no, they're live. They're live dinosaurs. Come on, come on. We want to be realistic here with our raptor cowboys. Thanks for the kind words with a coffin hidden. Mm-hmm. Very nice. Without ruining anything, there's sort of continuing the tale a little bit with 235, which I'm not sure how many people have already heard, but we've just kicked it up the door, really. Mm-hmm. With Don. Mm-hmm. Thanks for your words on profanity. It's interesting that it keeps coming up. We'll see. I feel it's not something I -- It's something that we've talked about. Yeah. In depth before we did it every time, there was a swear at the beginning we discussed it. Fans of the Big Lebowski will know that that film, if you look at the script, every "uh" and "er" is in there. And these things are necessary for a natural rhythm to the dialogue. Mm-hmm. And you can't -- to me, you can't have a bunny without having her cussing. Like, those are her -- That's her character. Yeah. Those are her filler words. Those are her punctuation. Mm-hmm. She wouldn't be wanted to say frack or some other sort of replacement word. She isn't really interested in trying not to offend you. Yes. Exactly. And I just don't know if Valkyrie Page's idea of not even adding the word, but just making a beep. Just making a beep. I don't know if that would really cover it. Yeah. In the beginning, I especially was not covering words. I just took out the -- like the book. Yeah. That was a little bit of a -- we had a little bit of a discussion about that. Yeah. And, yeah. So, you definitely get some -- but there's -- a lot of the word is covered in between. But, yeah. I remember once we left a swear when we weren't intending to leave swears. Right. And, thankfully, Gigantor had listened or read it, like, just shortly after we put it up. And he's like, "Hey." And we immediately -- wherever we were, like, just reigned to the computer and fixed it. Well, I don't know if you remember. We actually lost a viewer over Kessing. Yeah. Somebody actually wrote into us and said that we used too much Kessing in our show. It was a while ago, but we've only ever got the one complaint. Yeah. And it's unfortunate, but -- yeah. Well, you're always going to offend someone, right? Mm-hmm. So, you have to do what you think is best. Yeah. And what we think is best is to have you here swear words every once in a while. Thanks, Joe. And thanks, everybody, who wrote in or sent something in. Mm-hmm. You guys can throw your comments, questions, or suggestions at us at comments@flushbulb.com. Or you can call us at 206-338-2792. And please do. Please do. All of you shy flash pulp listeners. The flash gang. Yeah. Elevate yourself. Get an education and become flash mobsters for me. Are you a dassy? Oh, ho! So, last flash cast. We had all three mics and we're sitting around a round table. We found that quite comfortable, right? Mm-hmm. Which is good. And we wanted some pop filters and stands, which we don't have. Negatoric good, buddy. Mine is in a measuring cup. Jaredie's is resting on his fancy case for his mic. And a pop has the little table stand. Mm-hmm. So, definitely by the next flash cast, I promise that I will have the equipment. I want, she stamped it. I've stamped it. I've made it so. Don't forget that donate button on the website. Yeah, you can help us with that. It's working out, despite it's really exciting to see all the chords and buttons and stuff. It's so much fun for me to get set up for everything. It's getting a lot of positive feedback about the sound. Yeah, and especially from Jeff, who is always sound so crystal clear. So, props to us. We sound great. Ha, ha, ha. We are all never raised. So, I don't know if we're going to be putting it up with this. Um, episode. But, I actually came up with a new car work design. Mm-hmm. I'm quite excited. Yeah, well, I mean, we were talking about, um, you know. Monkeys. I don't think we were actually talking about monkeys. No, no, we were. No, no chichos. Was it T-shirts? Uh, it was while you were updating the car work wiki, I believe. And you felt like you're in the newest representation of him didn't necessarily fit as much as it should. Mm-hmm. Well, you had emailed me a picture of a spider a little while ago. Oh, I'd also, yes. Yeah. I was discussing how I liked the look of its eyes. Uh-huh. So, I got this, this new idea for a car work image. And we were thinking it would be pretty cool on T-shirts, actually. Mm-hmm. So, um, I was thinking I'd, uh, I'd put that design out there. And, uh, you mobsters could take a look. Um. Nutty has inspired us to put some things on Zazzle. I don't know how well it'll go, but. I was thinking I'd make a pretty awesome one. Well, certainly let you know what happens. I was helping to make a really crappy one, actually. Yeah, well. There are some other art pieces that you've got, uh, coming together that I'm pretty pleased, but maybe we'll just save those for the future. A little Ruby action, I remember that art piece. Well, it's funny, actually, 'cause I do have a coffin picture that's ready. It's gotta be scanned and put on the laptop now. Inked and business? Yeah, exactly. And, uh, the Ruby, I, we may have even taken a picture and put that out on the mob at some point, 'cause that one's pretty old. It would be nice to see it Inked and have something done with it, though. Yeah, well, now that I've got a little bit more free access to your laptop, while my laptop's out of commission, I'm hoping to get a little bit more stuff kicked out. So, we're gonna need to see a new Skinner Co. on Monday? I'm hoping to get a lot more stuff kicked out. We should have seen how our eyes were just starting around the room. Backroom plots. So, I've kind of got two balls in the air at the moment that I'm interested in maintaining, and next week isn't going to really move either of them forward much, but I believe both the murder plague and coffin are rolling into major... Well, let's just say the first act in each story is coming to a close. I don't want to give away too much about what happened in the last murder plague, but things is changing. Yes, the very last word of the very last line. It's like, "Ooh-eee!" And it's interesting how much discussion about coffin hidden. There's a lot in there that... Well, hidden is kind of my smart-assness taking over. There's a lot more in there than is readily apparent, so... Anyway, I don't want to give away too much this time around, but perhaps next week when we've gone through... ...visiting with some special friends. Some people we haven't seen in a while. Some threads we haven't seen in a while. Alright, well, this is probably a good time to roll out. Big thanks to Jim for hosting wiki.flashpop.com and flashpop.com. Thanks for all your efforts, Jumbo. For defending Castle with this guy. That's right, I present. We'll need to get him a bigger pitchfork. If you have comments, questions, or suggestions, find us at flashpop.com, call our voicemail line at 206-338-2792, or email us, text our MP3s, to your comments at flashpop.com. Jessica May's vocal talent and musical stylings can be found at maytunes.com. The entire run of flashpop can be found at flashpop.com, or via the search bar and iTunes. Flashcast is released under the Canadian Creative Commons attribution non-commercial 2.5 license. Good luck, Peter Dinklage. [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]