Prepare yourself for superstitions, candy, light jazz soundtracks, evil hair, the return of a legend, and a Blackhall/Coffin crossover.
Find the full show notes at http://flashpulp.com
The Skinner Co. Network
FC40 - The Strange Love of Dr. Monstrous
[Music] Hello and welcome to Flashcast 40. Prepare yourself for Superstitions, Candy, Light Jazz Soundtracks, Evil Hair, the Return of a Legend, and a Black-Haul-Coffin-Crosser. [Music] Tonight we have myself, OpoponX, Vocal Trepies Artist, Jessica May, Hello, Audio Ringmaster, Vosho, and Jaredie. Hello. Clown. Oh. Clown. Did you guys know that in Germany, it was a long-held Superstition or belief, I guess, that if you tossed a silver coin with a satire square into a fire, it would extinguish it? What's this, Satour Square? It's a, it's like a palindrome. It's four, five, uh, yeah, five, sorry, Latin words that happen to be a palindrome together. Okay. And so it was a long-held to have magical powers. You know what? I've actually heard of those, not any kind of, like, name to it. I haven't seen any, like, Satour Square or anything put to it, but I've definitely seen things where it's like an incantation, but, like, a, sort of a block of, of words almost. Mm-hmm. It's interesting that people would believe that just writing something into something would change its nature enough that... Because words have power, right? Words have power over people. I love that old trope, that if you just find the right language, it'll have the ability to, to change things, like, maybe English or whatever, but if you can find the tongue of the old ones. Yeah, you know, do you remember the movie The Mummy, like, with Brendan Frazier in it? I do recall The Mummy you speak of. There was a part in that movie where the wiry little weasel guy was confronted with the mummy, and he started, like, praying to God, and he was like, no, not that one. Okay. And, like, he was holding a cross in his hand on his necklace, and then he pulled out, like, a zillion other little charms, and he was, like, praying to whoever until finally he got to, I guess, Hebrew, and the mummy was like, oh, oh, I understand that language. Maybe, maybe we can do something with this, you know? Yeah, yeah. And, I mean, he lost out in the end anyway, but I loved that. I was like, yeah, I guess if, you know, he got the right one at the right time. Yeah, it was... Might be helpful. Statistical analysis has applied to the longevity of various religious beliefs, and their believers would be interesting. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Anyway. Interesting thought. Thank you. Yeah. And now... [Music] So, just up front, although it's not exactly a news item, we did discover since the last Flashcast that, uh, although there may not be a lot of unifying topics for the mob, Candy is one of them. Yeah, we're real. Our Bob loves Candy. So, a huge props to everyone in the Facebook group who's been discussing their country's personal choice in Candy. Mm-hmm. Well, and with the same names, but entirely different substances. Mm-hmm. A great bit of research on Barry's part in discovering that, uh, there's a company in the New York area that owns the copyright to Smarties, which everywhere else in the world, uh, are made by Nestle. Except for there, apparently they look a lot like rockets, which I don't know. Yeah. I wish I could get a picture of rockets. I mean, I'm sure I can find one on the Internet. Wait. Wait a few days. It's almost Halloween. You will get them scurrying on the bottom of the kids' bags for sure. That's right. And they're delicious. I also wanted to throw down with a, uh, a return to a bit of a classic feature that we used to do more often. Revisiting a classic pulp character over the past. So, today, one that caught my eye, and I have to say, um, the public domain superhero wiki at pdsh.wickia.com has been fantastic for looking at these ridiculous old characters. Fantoma. Fantoma is a mysterious god-like being who protects the jungles of Africa. She has vast magical power to the point of being practically omnipotent and can transform herself into a frightening blue phantom skeleton creature as well as a floating skull with blonde hair. Wow. Now, I'm going to put some pictures in the show notes. I have a little transformation sequence. Uh, clipped out that is fantastic. But as the blonde hair mentioned may have tipped you, even though she's apparently an African god-like being, she's a white lady. She's a white lady. She's a white lady. Yep. Very unfortunately white lady. What year was this? 1940. Yeah. 1940 even. Mmm. Jungle Comics number two. Now, jungle comics. Does that not in itself invite a sort of dangerous... Mmm. Anyway. But the character... Okay, so she transforms into the skull thing, which really you need to see the picture of this. She looks a lot like Skeletor with a blonde wig on. Nice. In like the bathing suit. So like really pretty. Yeah. It's actually pretty fantastic. She takes on very man-like features. Yes. But she has very golden locks just spilling down her shoulders. What are her... Oh, I'm sure you're going to get to her powers. Fantoma often sentences her enemies to bizarre and brutal punishments. For instance, in Jungle Comics number seven, she transforms a band of greedy diamond miners who oppress the natives into one man. Now you think somehow that might be enough, but the thing that I found especially awesome about this character was how every one of her sentences turns into this. Then sends that man to an unfound world to be enslaved by hideous green-fanged monster. Geez. Okay, that's pretty rough. Then sent into a pit of cobras. Oh, geez, okay. And then absorbed into a wall by a giant hand. Yikes. Every comic involving Fantoma seems to almost involve the same situation where it just goes over the top in the brutality that these characters undertake. Like there's a guy who decides he hates nature after he's attacked by a snake. All of nature. Like a snake, a buzzard, a elephant, a rhino, a antelope. He's just entirely assaulted. Anyhow. Wow. Yeah, I would not want to suffer that fate. So I'll leave a link to the... Jungle Comics. The entire article over at the Public Domain Superhero Wiki. And you guys should really check out the picture. And what was her name again? Fantoma. Fantoma. Which sounds a little bit like a soda. Or a car name. I'm right along in the Fantoma. Sounds like a Mexican wrestler. So, let's move into the October 31. We got a lot watched this week. Yes, we did. You know what? Can I mention the one that scared me the most? No, I think that would be really inappropriate. Insidious. The movie that was sort of assigned to his homework for everyone. I hope a lot of them all got it there. Which one is that? I can't ever remember. Here's the thing. We watched it as we promised last Flashcast. We watched it almost immediately after we finished recording. Mm-hmm. And it was great. I really enjoyed that film. It kicked me out. I made him come sit on the couch with me. It was the ghostly visitation on the child who passes into a coma. Oh, yes. Which is almost giving away too much already. And I'm sorry. But that's as much of spoilers as we'll give them. The kids' dad. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. It was a quality film. It scared me. I must say this was a recommendation from Matt Cohen. Mm-hmm. And it was certainly appreciated. It was definitely a quality film. There's only one moment in the film that I was kind of taken out of it. And it felt very sort of PBS-y. And I'm just going to refer to it as the lantern sequence. Sort of between two houses with a lantern. And that's all I'm going to say. But I didn't necessarily buy that scene as well as I should have. I felt. They can't all be winners. Yeah. Speaking of not all being winners, we caught the Tingler. Classic William Castle. That sounds like something we need ointment for. We caught the Tingler. This weekend, we caught the Tingler while we were out at the public pool. Yeah. We dipped our toes on it. We got it. A case of the tingles. Yeah. William Castle. Vincent Price. Very early in sort of the reboot of horror after the '50s downturn when they didn't want to see it anymore. They just wanted aliens. Mm-hmm. It was great. Yeah. Yeah. Fun. I mean, one of those early exploitation films where they put a little joy buzzer under the seat in the theater. And there's a ridiculous, one of the hallmarks of William Castle's films that ridiculous sequence where all of a sudden it cuts to the crowd or like an actor has to leap out. And it makes the film almost unwatchable these days because he never expected it to be released on like home DVD. Yeah. But you don't have these actors in your house running around and living around and missing a scene. Or if you do, it's a little weird. Yeah. Yeah. Fair enough. Yeah, and I believe the others were for 3D. But a guy with a yo-yo just constantly. Oh, yeah. Yo-yo rising towards the screen. That was fun. It was back and forth, back and forth. Yeah. And it looked cool too. But all I kept thinking was, oh, another 3D moment. That was actually a house of wax. That was a quality film. That was a quality film. But there were extensive scenes where they would go. And 3D now. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Sorry. I heard Vincent Price and... Yes. Because, yes, he was also in house of wax, which was another one that we watched. Now, it's a quality film. I think it stands up over time. But the one thing that I really took away from that, what a strange, pulpy career Charles Bronson has had. He was the young sort of Igor character in this one, just like... I remember you being like, is that Charles Bronson? I had to go and look it up. And he was actually credited as Charles Buchinsky. Really? Huh. Wow. He was in this film, and he was extremely young. He was pretty buff, and he... I think they tried to make him look kind of gaunt. You know what he really reminded me of? What? Do you remember the original Clash of the Titans? And the guy that plays the lizard-y dude? Ooh, only vaguely. He totally looked like that guy. Only after he was all like hideous and ugly. It was... Anyway, it was interesting. And it was very pre-death-wish. So, that was neat. Now, I found some interesting connections between House of Wax and another one we watched called A Bucket of Blood, which was a Roger Korman film from the '50s. Oh, man. It was extremely low budget, but it was short, which was on its side. The '80s? It was 70 minutes. Which meant it could run through the scenes very quickly and not bore you. My favorite thing in House of Wax is watching the mannequins burn or the wax burn. Yeah, there's the sequence where they burn down the first House of Wax. Some of them go like others where it just seems like there's this sort of really thin layer of skin or makeup and it just smears off and then it's just this white sort of face. Others, it looked like the eyeballs were bulging. And it was really neat to watch him go up. Yeah, it's interesting to watch the mannequins slide into the uncanny valley over time. They obviously invested some money in that scene. Yeah. They let the camera linger, which I really didn't mind. Well, that was the crux of Vincent's dismay because he loved them so much. Yeah, and I thought it was an interesting counterpoint because in a bucket of blood, which we actually watched before House of Wax, although I think I would have felt more like Corbin was ripping. Because I enjoyed a bucket of blood, but if I had realized how badly Corbin was ripping on House of Wax, I've seen House of Wax before, but it'd been a few years. Are we going to give away the finale of a bucket of blood? The House of Wax? Or the House of Wax? Well, because they both have the same sort of idea. Oh, yeah. The ending is the same in both films, I suppose. Well, let's stay away from it just in case people watch. Yeah. But I will say that one of the odd things about a bucket of blood was that the entire film revolves around hipsters as many of Corbin's films from that period I want to do. And the lead character is kind of amicable, and then he's a complete poser. And then he's just horrific. Yeah. But he's just simpleton. He just doesn't understand. I don't really think he understands. Which was interesting in that sense, because he was the one guy who sort of sold the role, I think. He was a wormy guy. He was really... Yeah, he went all the way, for sure. Yeah. It was actually the same fellow who was in Terminator, the gun shop in Terminator. Everybody who obsesses over that film. Now, the one thing that I found out of sorts with a bucket of blood, although I did enjoy the film, was the light jazz soundtrack. I think people were trying to get a handle on what Beatniks listened to, and it wasn't like, it wasn't Freeform Beatnik Jazz, it was really, like, 20s, 30s swing, like... Well, and even if they had, like, the appropriate atmosphere, or the appropriate feel for, like, the scene, but they didn't, it was just always a sort of upbeat, like, it was from another movie, or you're listening to some music while you're watching a movie, but it did not mesh at all. Frankly, I fully expected 60 Spider-Man cartoon Spider-Man to just swing in there and... Yeah. Anyway. It was distracting. But watchable, for sure. Back to William Castle, we also watched House on Haunted Hill, the castle version. Mm-hmm. Also Vincent Price film, we watched a lot of Vincent Price in this last week, oddly. He's wonderful. Yeah, true. I really find this, even though William Castle is a low budget fellow, I find this film stands really well. I really enjoy it every time I see it. It's something I can kind of watch with the kids without them being excessively terrified, but it does have some nice little jump moment. Yeah, it's quality. It's one of those movies we watch a couple of times a year at least. Mm-hmm. And the way it resolves itself is kind of funny. Here's the demon. What was that one again? Another classic. There's like a paper. There's this American researcher who comes over to Britain to debunk a occultist and ends up being cursed with a demon. The movie itself is quite moody in most of its shots, and I enjoy the way there's a good back and forth between the main character and the villain, who is very much your sort of snotty, classic British, Satanist, yeah. Pointy beard. Wasn't he American like a know-it-all? Yeah, he felt a little know-it-allie. Okay. But here's the thing. You make a very good observation there in that the Satanist had a very Satan-y beard. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. And it got me wondering, is there evil lady hair? There's very definitive haircuts. If you see a male character with, you know that he is a bad guy. But is there a female haircut? Yeah, there is, I think. I think like, it really depends on the role, but like you get like a widow's peak and like a tight bun that's like really strict and really- Wicked Witch of the West? Yeah. Like, crazy hair. Anybody with pointy bangs, you know, pointy in the middle. Yep, like B-shaped bangs. Goatee. Always very, very neat. Yeah, and a goatee. A goatee? Well, that's a yeah. Yeah. Satanists, they just, they can't stay away from it. Even the ladies represent God. I guess lady with a mustache might be a little evil, but it just reminds me of the grammar. Um, that was the film that our dear beloved Robert Osborne led into. And he was discussing how the studio was afraid that it wasn't literal enough or something, so they threw in like after shots of like this crazy looking fuzzy demon or whatever. Demon puppet. Yeah, it was ridiculous. It was like a rabbit dog. They had a pretty interesting way of showing the demon approaching. It was all kind of smoky and hazy. So, yeah, the implication. It was more like, yeah, in your, you could kind of form it in your mind. Yeah. You know, but then they show this funny little demon puppet after. So, the, the, you don't see them in shots with anybody else. It's just a shot of a giant head of the furry thing. Coming at you. Yeah. So, the shots before those shots are okay and kind of interesting. Yeah. They're used to shadow and stuff. Yeah, and I thought it was really interesting. There was a lot of darkness. Watch the Covenant. Which one was that? It was the one with the Twilight teens who were actually from the movie The Craft, but they were boys. Oh, it just broke me. Oh, it was this film, these, you know, 18, somewhere between 16 and 18 year old males. Okay. Running around with magical powers that they gained through it. They're ancestors or some junk. Yes. They're family members, both gone and here. I don't know how it works, but. Basically they. Right of passage. Yeah. They fight each other with Matrix powers. But they get the powers and either they accept them but can like restrain themselves or somebody can go crazy go nuts. Like, like somebody's father and they aged a whole bunch of years within a short period of time. Anyways, there's this whole lore about it. It's crazy. It seemed really like the story seemed kind of anime-y to me. Yeah, it was oddly anime-ish. It was very Twilight-ish. It was obviously ripped off from The Craft and it was really poorly made. Well, I think like the script too. Like, it just, everything was loose. Like, them flying around was kind of cool but other than that. Any excuse to put them in a very emo kind of suit jacket? Yeah, and then you can go, like, when they're fighting and then they need help from their family members or whatever, you can see the mouths of their family members wherever they are whispering like, "I really like my power." And then the teens get stronger and can beat each other up. That's so embarrassing. I hope people change their names. Speaking of embarrassing, we also cut Ogre. This was a film that actually reminded me a little bit of Troll Hunter and only that it involves woods and sort of a large eye-metal. Oh, yes. The one issue I had with it, and I, you know, it's probably not the appropriate time because we haven't even said what it was about, but it bugged the crap out of me. The giant Ogre would, like, creep up on people and he was huge and he made so much noise when he was, like, eating or moving or anything, but he snuck up on so many people. It was very agile. Yeah. Yeah. To the magic. As his inherent of most Ogre, he has. The film definitely fell into your mega crock versus gator-saurus, kind of, whatever. Ridic. Yeah, there was a lot of death, like, eating people. A lot of blood splatter out of blood packs. Yep. I mean, a lot of splatter out of blood packs and a lot of CG that maybe they should have held back a little bit more on. Like, they really... They really didn't feel bad about putting the Ogre on screen and, unfortunately... A lot. It was so funny. Yeah. It was so funny. No, it did. Okay. So, one item that I did notice in this, and one item that remains, even though CGI is becoming abundantly cheap for these people, there are some Achilles' heels to the low-budget film that remains, and this movie really highlighted one of them that you notice semi-regularly. Semi-regularly, which was bows and arrows. The villagers in this film are sort of rustic folk, and they run around with bows and arrows for a while, trying to defend themselves from the Ogre, but their bows look like the constructs of children out for a Saturday in the backyard. Like, they have large twined string for the whatever, and the arrows essentially look like below switches that have been pointed to... Nice. A newbie prop designer, or somebody doing it for free. Well, I think they found a certain number of Renaissance or recreationist folks to get all the costumes from, but apparently they just forgot to borrow weaponry. Anyway, it was a fun Goofah film, but it was not a good movie. Yeah. I would recommend Trollhunter if you're looking for Trollhunters. Oh, heck yes. And then to round off the final film that we watched, this was a really productive week. I didn't realize until we kind of ran down this list. Well, it was cold and babies were sex, so we didn't go anywhere. Yeah, and my brain just wasn't out working certain days. Anyway, Friday the 13th, Part 3, or also known as Friday the 13th 3D. Our second 3D film on the list, neither of which we actually watched in 3D, and the second film with just a number of ridiculous throwing things at the screen, shoving rods... Rods in your eye. Fun. Now, we actually had our run of the Friday the 13th films when we selected this one. Jessica Mays essentially said, "I want to watch an 80's slasher film." And when I'm looking for a no-brainer 80's slasher film, this is the Friday the 13th franchise, is generally where I turn. This movie has, I specifically picked this one because all of the characters are entirely generic. You do not care about a single person in this film. You do not want them to be on screen any longer than is absolutely necessary. Yeah. Yeah, they were all kind of individuals, but they're all pretty annoying. Like, they were all throw away. Entirely. And if you look at the other films, there's always somebody that you can care about, Part 3? No one. Yeah. Part 2 has Ginny, and I don't know if you're familiar with the character of Ginny, but she stands out as one of my favorite horror heroines of all time. Part 4 actually has Crispin Glover and Tommy Jarvis has played by one of the Corey's, but that's when they start introducing all the psychic stuff. And that's who you named your Siberian dwarf hamster after? Ginny, yeah. Very nice. That's the October 31 as it stands at the moment. I'm not sure what we're going to have as the sort of homework movie for the next cycle, but we'll be sure to announce it on the mob and via Twitter, so keep your eye out. Finally, I wanted to mention real quick some movie news in the greater world. Ben Affleck made direct a new version of The Stand. Ooh. That'd be interesting. We were just talking about The Stand. Well, because we had just watched that Stephen King documentary, right? Here's the thing. There's enough content in The Stand to make a decent miniseries or an extremely long film. So, have they decided like it's one movie? Yeah, I believe he's just handling it as a film, like probably a long film. Well, they can't all be the same and some people don't like miniseries. You don't want it to be the same. I love being a post-apocalyptic world, so I'm not going to complain. Yeah, come on, bring it on. What's better than one stand? Two. Yeah, two. The other stand. Exactly. Brian Singer, director of the X-Men franchise and the first few films at least, and the kind of broken Superman movie that came out a few years ago. Mm-hmm. Maybe helming a Battlestar Galactica flick. That's interesting. Yes, please. If I could remember what that show is about. Well, here's the thing. I'm not sure if they're in any way going to connect it to the show and bring on like Edward James Almos or whatever his name is and everyone else involved. Or if they're just going to start fresh and apply a huge budget. Now listen, the one thing I'm actually excited about with this is that if they give it a movie-sized budget, we can get some really decent space combat scenes going on. And I don't know if I've mentioned this before, I'm fairly sure I have. I love me some space combat scenes. So I'm hopeful. We'll see what happens. Space guns. Pew pew. Pew pew. Ben Stiller is slated to direct The Mountain, which is apparently a period horror movie about a girl who finds a weird object based on Edith Wharton's 1917 novel Summer. Define weird object. I don't recall. Now, I bring this up mostly because I've heard Edith Wharton's work recommended before, actually by Matt Cohen mentioned earlier, who also recommended insidious. And the idea of Ben Stiller trying his hand at a horror movie interests me. A period horror movie as well. Yeah, I don't know if you remember the cable guy. But there were some moments in that film that were genuinely off-putting. I think it was intentional. No, indeed, indeed. But it was still a comedy. And to see him try to go in as a straight horror film. I can see it. Petey James. You know Petey James? No. She's a mystery writer. She also wrote Children of Men. Ooh, I love that movie. The novel that the movie was based on. Yeah. She's going to try her hand at a Pride and Prejudice sequel. Oh, I just peed myself. And it's going to be a murder mystery in which Darcy and... Sorry you're going to have to fill in the name here. Elizabeth? Darcy and Elizabeth attempt to solve a crime. That's awesome! Oh, they'll do such a good job together. Like, they can have lunch together while they're in the job. That'll be so nice. I know. Indeed. I thought this was interesting though because Petey James is a well-established author. He's doing something that's essentially fan fiction. That sounds like a lot of fun. Although I guess recently that sort of business has gotten a lot more acceptable since the sort of Pride and Prejudice and Zombie situation. Which really kicked off that recycling craze that we're into at the moment. Oh, that's so much fun. I can't wait. I've been having a lot of fun actually with Mr. Eight listening to the NPR Star Wars. I'm going to get him to record a little piece on what he thinks about it. I have to say it's been a lot of fun. They do an excellent job. It's a little off-putting sometimes to hear somebody else doing Princess Leia's voice, for example. But when they do get the original actors and it does happen quite often, it's really fantastic. You really get immersed because they do great job with the sound effects. You said Mark Hamill did a really good job? Yeah. Yeah, I believe Mark Hamill played Luke in the first episode. I believe probably throughout and it was really quality. That's really cool. Anyway, so if you can get your hands on the NPR Star Wars thing I really recommend. Very entertaining. We'll have Mr. Eight pull a review out shortly. Very entertaining for like the car and stuff. Or like podcast before bed. We do that. Now just a quick mention of Flashbulb news specifically. Sticker Robot. Who's got some stickers? I ordered them back in like August. I mean now, oh people's stickers. Yeah, and we have a fairly sizable list so no one's been forgotten. I'm not sure everyone. You are on the list. I am just waiting. I think we, oh Ingrid like something like 47. Yeah. Yeah, she's going to have quite a thick envelope coming to her. But generally I don't like to complain about these sort of things. And I don't know if anyone has kind of perceived my communication policy. But generally if I'm going to complain about something I just don't tweet or I don't put it up on Facebook. If I'm in a crap mood I'll just back away from the internet entirely because I'd rather just keep it fun. Yeah, yeah. No one wants to hear about my bitching. But at the same time, come on Sticker Robot, what the hell? Anyway, you know I love you Sticker Robot, but why you gotta make me hit you? So, yeah. Also while I'm discussing my communication policy, ooh you can tell we have the window open. Yeah, right. Uh, well I'm discussing my communication policy. I've been chatted up quite a bit on Google+ and if anybody's interested in tracking me down there, look for me as JRD Space Skinner. Um, unfortunately Google's policy does not allow me to properly punctuate my JRD, but at the same time... I love that you had to address that. Yeah, I'm hanging around. I'm sure there's quite a few people, just absolutely worried. We're worried about that. Yeah, well, it is interesting, I don't know if you guys have heard about it, but Google+ doesn't allow anonymous users generally. They only want people with quote unquote real names. Oh, so you can't... You can't be like, Missy Sunshine or something. No, and I mean plenty of people do, but at the same time they live in the shadow of the risk of having to lose their account of somebody. I know Nutty's brother, who I think she said even was using his actual name, ended up getting the boot. Wow, that's a bad one. Yeah, so I don't know if Google's turned around on that policy, but it's a little frustrating because I know there's a lot of people out there who, for various reasons, just don't want to use their full real name. I mean, I screwed on the edge of that, I'm sure people can figure it out fairly easily if they wanted to poke around, but come on. Even if I've got the phone book, they allow me to just put my first initial in. Yeah, come on, Google. Speaking of things that stare at you while you sleep, I believe fish has a little something for us. Fresh fish, a new batch of cinematic pulp with the always listening, 3-day fish. Hello, flashcasters, 3-day fish here with the 3 quilt to paranormal activity. There were a few things they did better. I mean, if you've seen these movies, then you know what's going to happen. It's going to be some buildup and then, like, all hell will break loose. They did a few things different. For one thing, they kind of cut to the chase. All the weird stuff kind of happens right off the bat. I did feel like they tied things in kind of well. Oh, I believe JRD mentioned this in the last flashguys, but there's definitely a lot of nods to Poltergeist. It takes place in the 80s. There's a scene where the parents are smoking some marijuana. All that good stuff. The little girl can see the people. Oh, no. Well, actually, it's just a person in this. Or is it a person? It's actually a demon. Oh, and all. It's a yellow light. I mean, you got to say it. If you like the first two paranormal activities, you'll like this and perhaps this one day be like the trilogy, the horror movie trilogy that we see on like Halloween's TV. Nothing real new. There's a few cool gimmicks. Like there's one it was really early on, like an earthquake happens during the movie. They're like, no, the earthquake is just kind of a way to introduce the demon. And like some dust falls and then the demon like shakes the dust off. That was kind of cool to watch. It looked real natural. So yeah, that's all. Always listening. I have to admit, after seeing Insidious, I'm a little bit ruined for this sort of hunting film. I realize it's not a found footage piece. But we've just been a little bit spoiled, I think, this year with October 31 and between this and Troll Hunter and sort of its low budget quality, I can't necessarily buy paranormal activity three at this point. Nostalgia for the '80s or not. Yeah, and I think for the 31, too, we like to try some new stuff. But we really want to make sure that we're enjoying ourselves and enjoying some of the classics. Yeah. We will reserve this for another month when we're not trying to enjoy ourselves as much as possible. I don't know. But we're not trying to feel a quota. Yeah. I have to say, although, and sorry, this is just back to Insidious again, but it's been on my mind. I have to say that the film, although it doesn't always work in some scenes, it's the first film I've seen in quite a while that has the, uh, gumption to just try. Like, even if it doesn't necessarily work with the budget, there are a couple scenes that I think could have been a little sharper. As I mentioned, the lantern run was not great. But at the same time, they did not poke around like I feel paranormal activity two did, even paranormal activity one to a certain extent, although they sold it well enough, and there was enough vigor in the way they presented it that I bought it. But at the same time, Insidious just went all out, like where they fall flat, at least they tried. Yes. It wasn't for lack of showing something. Balls out. Yeah. So big ups to that. Anyway, great review fish. Thanks a lot. I'm definitely going to hold off on paranormal activity three till it's, uh, better until it ages well. So, um, I can find cheese until it comes to a screen near me for free. It rubs the lotion on its skin. It does this whenever it's told it rubs the lotion on its skin or else it gets the hose again. Oh, yes. We all remember that line from the now infamous film Silence of the Lambs, right? The whole idea of a deranged maniac holding an innocent person against their will in a dark, creepy basement for their own gain is simply unthinkable. Right? Well, think again, in Philadelphia this week, four innocent people were discovered enduring this very atrocity to make matters worse. They were all disabled, although there was no wild bill preparing their flesh for a personalized skin suit. They were in fact getting a skinning of a different sort. Here's Eric with the rest of the story from CNN. At first, a Philadelphia landlord said he thought one of his tenants was attempting to conceal a dog after finding a dog dish in the basement of his apartment building. But on a return trip to the basement Saturday, he found something much more sinister. Four mentally disabled people held captive, including one man chained to a radiator. It was terrible, he said, Sunday, adding the people were surrounded by human waste. I don't know how long they were there. Three people have been arrested and accused of holding the people captive and stealing their social security checks. Linda and Weston, 51, Thomas Gregory, 47, and Eddie Wright, 49, face charges, including criminal conspiracy, aggravated assault, kidnapping, criminal trespass, unlawful restraint, and false imprisonment. The alleged victims included 29-year-old woman and three men, 31, 35, and 41. All seven, the three suspects and four alleged victims, had been traveling together, he said, but did not know for how long. Weston is believed to have been in McLean, Texas with some or all of the alleged victims. They then traveled to Florida and Philadelphia. He said he was contacted Thursday by a block captain of a neighborhood group regarding suspicious activity. He checked out the basement that day and found a few things out of place, but no people. On Friday, he found the dog dish. On Saturday, after hearing a dog barking, he went to the building's sub-basement and found a door chain shut. He found the people after removing the chains. Other than the barking dog, there was no sound, he said. "What the hell are you doing here?" No answer, and I called 911. This was a total surprise. I never expected to find people, I just expected to find a dog. The people, he said, acted like children. The four were in a room roughly 10 by 15 feet and looked malnourished and disheveled. They had a metal bucket and a jug and what appeared to be orange juice, but no food. They also had pillows and blankets, but didn't know they were there and what they were there for. Authorities believe the four were trapped in the tiny room for up to a week. Police said they suffered from bed sores and injuries that are very, very hard to describe. The alleged evictums appeared to be malnourished and were taken to a hospital. They were listed in stable conditions Sunday police said. The FBI is also investigating. The Northeast Philadelphia building is a former movie theater converted to a seven unit apartment building. Police cars were still outside the building Sunday afternoon. The four people found in the basement were brought out on stretchers. The block captain who noticed goes valley. She said she was concerned about some of the things she had seen recently, including people being brought in and back from an SUV from out the state plates. I hope I did enough, he said. I called. Thanks Eric. That was truly disturbing. I'm Jeffrey Lynch and that's this week's spot of bother. Did you say it so cheerily Eric? It was great to hear Eric again. It's always nice to have him do a little cameo. Yes it is. Keep them coming. Thanks. Huge thanks Jeff. Huge thanks Eric. Nicely done. Nicely bothersome. I've always wondered because this isn't the first time I've heard about something to this effect happening. The law of averages says that at some point someone's going to be captured who has a fetish for that sort of thing and I've always wondered what happens at that point. Does it take some of the fun out of it for the captors if the person is super into it? I don't think that really applies in this situation. I think it depends on the captor. Yeah. I suppose this one was more about just financial gain. It usually is though, although at the same time it's financial and usually involves some sort of minor torture at the same time, like having a cigarette when it's tough. Yeah well, hanging around with your own crap, that's torture. Yeah I suppose that's torture enough. Anyway huge thanks Jeff. You can find his work over at bothersomethings.com or on the Twitter hat please lynch me. I'm Barry and this is your nocturnal underground dwelly New York minute. If you listen to conventional wisdom and shame on you, the sewers of New York are inhabited by alligators, and not just regular alligators, but a race of blind mutant albino alligators. Why not? So being a lover of all things dark and mysterious, I put on my Carl Colchak hat and set out to discover the truth. My first stop was the sewer. Sorry, I mean the internet, same thing. Stories of sewer caters go back to at least 1927, and no less the source than the venerable, meaning way past its prime, New York Times, published stories of killer reptiles roaming the sewer tunnels all throughout the years. The story goes that years ago, and you can't see it, but I'm putting that in air quotes, note to self, video blog. Years ago, a family returned from a vacation in Florida with a little more than they came with a baby alligator. Really, you can't get a better pet for your young child than an alligator, right? They only grow to like 12 feet. So time passed, as time often does in this dimension, and the alligator grew and grew, and at some point the family must have realized that a small New York apartment is no place for a large apex predator. Obviously, the story does not take place in the Bronx. Anyway, the poor little guy, meaning the alligator not the child, ended up flushed down the toilet no better than a dead goldfish or your car keys to the hands with two-year-old. Now before you start yelling animal cruelty, put yourself in the alligator's shoes, so to speak. Lots of water to lurk in, dark, plenty of food like rats, chuds, the occasional sewer worker, and did I say rats? Lots and lots of rats. I have to figure that if there was really a race of mutant alligators in the sewers, it would be a lot less rats. And that's the point. According to Snopes.com, it's totally false. No alligators live in the New York sewers. But that hasn't stopped several city-funded expeditions over the years. From time to time, city officials have sent teams of men into the sewers to capture or kill the non-existent reptiles. Think about it. There's loads of underpaid city workers wandering the sewers with high-powered rifles blundering around in the dark, hunting and visible prey. If that isn't a metaphor for New York City politics, I don't know what is. And speaking of sewers, Wikipedia, their motto, "We Am Accurate," says that the New York sewer system stretches over 6,600 miles. It also says that New York has anywhere from 8 to 32 million rats. Those alligators don't stand a chance. I'm Barry. This has been your New York Minute, and that's One to Grow On. Maybe they do need to get themselves some alligators for all those rats, yeah. Yeah. This was a nice one. This is a classic to touch on, so I was happy to hear this one. You know, alligators in the sewers is one of the iconic New York legends. Yeah. That and all the rats. And it's kind of fun that it's lasted so long. How many times have they told the story? Mm-hmm. Had it just proven and then believed it again? Mm-hmm. I think there's a lot of fictional fur-- I think there's some frittile fictional ground in the idea of this snipe hunt in the sewers with, you know, chasing a monster that isn't there. I'm hunting alligators in the sewers. Yeah, sensible workers down there. Maybe they need to send some blind albino cats down there. Anyway, thanks a lot, Barry. You can find everything from the Barry Jacobs Corporation, or not related to the Barry Jacobs Corporation at BMJ2K.com. Now I'm very pleased to be able to say that we have a return from an old friend and a fantastic segment for the show. They're all pleased. Mm-hmm. Yeah, they're all quite excited. The curious tales of Vienna. The ninth pin, or the skilled player of St. Stephen's. In ancient times, Vienna had a tower guard. He was located at the highest point of the town. This was the times St. Stephen's Cathedral. He lived in a small apartment in the tower of St. Stephen's and watched over the houses of the town. His duty was to alert the citizens when a fire broke out. But in quite times when nothing happened, it was quite a boring job. So it came that the Viennese built a Skittle LA for the amusement of the tower guard in a small room beside the guard's parlor. It was a small and low ceiling room, and so the Skittle LA was short. Therefore the player stood with their back to the LA, bought their head and had to roll the bowling bowl between their legs. But this didn't matter, the young fellows from the neighbourhood loved to play with the tower guard on this extraordinary bowling alley. Once there was a tower guard, cold fronts. He was a disolute fellow. He loved to drink, and his passion was the ninth pin bowling. He was a master of this game, no matter where or when he was playing, he always hit all nine pins with one's wringer throw. He won every time. But soon no one wanted to play with France anymore. So one evening in fall, France played the Skittles again, alone till midnight. Suddenly he heard a whole voice out of the dark. Little playing at such a time, a tall thin man with a grey cloak, the hood lowly pulled over his face, occurred in the light of the candles. Cold shivers ran over France and spec, but soon he was the fearless guy again and answered boldly, "Do you dare to play with me?" I win every time. The grey replied with a cheerful voice, "Me too, I never lose a game." France took the Skittleball, and with a full swing he held it between his legs. The Skittles were blasted out and cheerfully he shouted, "All nine! Watch that if you can." But when he realigned the pins, he hit one under his jacket and seemingly unnoticed his threw the pin out of the tower window. "Oh, not that way, my friends," the grey wrought in a sinister voice. Then the hooded man straightened up, he grew and grew and spread his cloak, shattering front so the bare bones. "I am the death," it ate through the little room, "and I always win. Even when there are only eight pins, I make all nine. I just have to hit eight, plus one." The skeletal hand reached for the ball and threw it into the pins, so that they fell with heavy glitter, and instead of the ninth pin, France fell to the ground. The next morning the tower guard was found, dead between the pins. Once then, the tower guard France appears as it goes, at the bowling alley every night. He whimpers and whines and still tries to find the ninth pin, because otherwise he can't find salvation. That is totally why I do not go bowling. That was great, it was fantastic not only to hear a return from Ingrid, but to also hear a return from St. Stephen's, which I feel like we really have this connection with now. Yeah, remember, in the event of Apocalypse, we all meet at St. Stephen's. Thank you very much Ingrid, I hope that you continue to submit. I understand that you're very busy these days, and that's the mob is behind you, and whatever you do, but we appreciate your submissions very much. The only thing that might have possibly, and probably not even better this story would have been, "Assumination" by Sam Elliott. Hey, man. Howdy, dude, dude. Oh, I wonder if I see you again. Wouldn't miss the same eyes. Oh, yeah? I think you've been going. Oh, you know. Drags and gutters, ups and downs. I'm sure I've got you. Yeah. Thanks, Gary. Well, take care, man, gotta get back. Sure. Take it easy, dude. Oh, yeah. I know that you will. Yeah, well, the dude abides. The dude abides. I don't know about you, but I take comfort in that. It's good knowing he's out there, the dude taking her easy for all of us sinners. There's never enough Sam Elliott in the world. And the mailbag is heavy this week. We got some feedback about the superstitions things we asked for in Flashcast 39. I saw that. And I thought they were great. Yeah. Certainly keep these rolling in, folks, but let's just go through a few quick ones here. Yeah, it's good story fodder. Mm-hmm. Treat. Treat. Treat. Uh, our bit stripper mentioned that the classic knock on wood. I'd like to mention how great it is that Treet sent in the one about wood. Knocking on wood, yes. I thought that was also quite nice. Thank you. Um, Matt, Matt McCurdy, if you will, Mr. McCurdy, uh, mentioned not seeing the bride before the wedding, which I always thought was an odd one. That's a good one. Yeah. I wonder what that's all about. People really invest a lot of this luck based on rules. Like they want to feel like they can control their fortune, I think, if they just put up a certain rule set and follow it closely enough. Mm-hmm. And that's a pretty, pretty worldwide one, too, right? I think so. I don't, I don't know, though. It may be just very Western. Uh, Nick, Miss, uh, Captain Pickhart, uh, he mentions, uh, that his lovely other half, Marilyn. Marilyn Bird. Which is a fantastic name. Yes. Yeah, I may steal that for a story, but... I want to draw a Marilyn Bird now. She will never leave a book open to page 13 or stop reading during chapter 13. Also he mentioned... And these are some great ones. I don't know if these are just British or even if he was just spitballing. What's going on? But, uh, the first person over the threshold is Ginger. It's Bad Luck. Not a Ginger. Uh, you're not supposed to trust a man in brown shoes, which is interesting. Yeah. That sounds like a salesman. Like a door-to-door salesman would be wearing branches. Uh, maybe, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, perhaps. Uh, Peacock Feathers in the House for Bad Luck because it's a sign of pride. Yep. And Hera, right? Yep. Uh, and never put shoes on a table. Sure. Unless it should only happen, he says, when a body is laid out in state. Which we don't really do here very much. No, we don't have, uh, many stately bodies here in Canada. Yeah. But, uh... Not on tables. I did hear some other people bringing up after Nick mentioned it, the putting shoes on table situation. I have heard of it, for sure. I think that's one that maybe just stems. It's one of those superstitions that stems out of basic cleanliness. Yeah. Like, mothers started telling people, "Oh, it's bad luck if you put your shoes up on the table and I'm trying to keep playing terrible luck, terrible things will happen." And stop smashing my mirrors, because that's also terrible luck. Yeah, right. Uh, Ingrid even mentioned some superstitions, she had a great list, actually. Shards bring good luck, but broken mirror means seven years bad luck. You know, I don't know if I had mentioned earlier, but I recently dropped my iPod and uh, smashed the front of it. So I have to get the touchscreen replaced. It still works, so I've still been using it. But um, our Indian neighbor across the street, the day she saw it, she just flipped out and was so upset that I was carrying around something that had just been broken and she swore to me up and down that it was such bad luck and I had to get rid of it right away. And then the next time she saw me with it, she's like, "Oh, I told you to get rid of it. What are you doing?" "It's bad luck for you and you can't get over it." Uh, Ingrid mentions that the same applies when a black hat crosses the road from left to right, or is it the other way around she asks. When you hear an owl screaming, someone dies, which is one that I've heard before. The one who finds a four leaf clover has good luck, I've heard that one before, certainly. That seems to be a pretty common one around the world. Even though, for some reason, I associate it heavily with Ireland, anyway. Yeah. Luck is with you when a chimney sweeper touches you, which I like that one a lot, but it makes me think of Dig Van Dyke. Yeah, I don't, I'm lucky if Dig Van Dyke touches me. I wonder what the basis of this one was. I don't really even know where that would come out of you, think that it would be the other way, it would be bad luck, because they'd be dirty. Maybe. Extremely cheap colonoscopy. No, no. Maybe it's because the work of a chimney sweep was like, in constant, right? So they had to be going around all over the place, because you wouldn't get your chimney swept out like every week, right? So they were always traveling. And so, they had a reputation for being, you know, like, kind of, no, not gypsies, but like promiscuous, and well-learned, so maybe it was good luck if a chimney sweeper touched you. I totally just made that up just now. Okay, I got you. Yeah. I think actually, I just heard Jessica May imply that chimney sweep was an early term for procteologist. I don't know that that's necessarily right either. It's a different, different sort of chimney sweep. Yeah. It's the discounted chimney sweep, a lot of geez. The horseshoe brings good luck too, but it has to be fixed on the wall with the open end up so the luck won't flow out. That's right, I've heard that. Yeah. Yeah, that's what I've heard too, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, so the luck won't flow out exactly. Although, I feel like, of course, once you'd avoid walking under your ladders. That seems like a no-brainer, really. Yeah, another one that comes out of common sense. It's a bad luck to walk under your ladder because you're going to get brained by somebody dropping something. First time you hear a cuckoo call in spring, and I love this one, you should have some coins in your pocket. Same goes that you don't have to worry about anything for the rest of the year. That's cool. I don't know what a cuckoo even sounds like, but cuckoos are kind of sinister little birds, aren't they? We need to import some, apparently, because I need some coin in my pocket. Do cuckoos really have a sinister rep-- like a sinister rep-- do cuckoos really have a sinister reputation? Because I don't-- Well, they do with me. I mean, the whole-- I've known a few bad cuckoos in my life, you know what I'm saying. The whole replacing their eggs and other-- Oh, I suppose, right? In other birds nests. I think it's-- yeah, it's kind of shady to me. Those shady cuckoos. Mm-hmm. Walking around with their eye patches and switch blades, eh? That's right. Can't trust a cuckoo, but we cut you. Speciesist. That's right. Anyway. Uh, with the words, hopefully everything goes well or similar, where it's people add, "Let's knock on wood." Yeah, knock on wood. There's another one. There's another one. Oh, another knock on wood. Another "treed," knock on "treed." No, don't knock on "treed." I'm sure he wouldn't appreciate that at all. Dude, personally-- He likes pokes. Yeah, he loves that. Yeah, everybody. And she also added a personal one that she had stopped on the 13th legend. Oh, wow. Yeah. That's a fun one. Mm-hmm. There have P mentioned on the Twitter that his grand was convinced she had heard a banshee when she was a slip-- as he says, a slip of a girl in Ireland. Are we a slip of a girl in Ireland? Yeah, that's fun. Yeah, that's fun. And someone did indeed die the next day. Ooh, creepy. So yeah, that wraps up the superstition calls for now. Thanks a lot to everyone who submitted something. Keep it coming. Hit us up on-- Oh, wait. There's more. Hey, guys. It's Jeff in North Carolina. So this is in response to your shout-out and request for superstitions. A few years ago, I stumbled across this gal. Her name is Glenis McCants, and she's a numerologist. She has a book called Glenis Has Your Number, which, if you're into that sort of thing, I would highly recommend. But anyway, she uses the old Pythagorean theories of numerology and whatnot. And she was telling everyone-- I think this was a radio interview I heard-- that if you take and write the number eight on a card or a piece of paper and put it wherever you work, for instance, if you make a living using your computer, put it by your computer, or if you're an outside salesperson, maybe carry it with you. Anyway, at the time, I thought, ah, this is kind of cool. But I really didn't act upon it. So I was-- at the time was participating in this little game. A lot of you guys may have heard of this called geocaching. You take a GPS, a handheld GPS receiver, and you go out into different various locations according to longitude and latitude, and you find these little hidden-- usually amoboxes or Tupperware boxes, and you sign a logbook, and you log it online, and you take something and you leave something. Well, as happenstance may have it, I found a card, a playing card, with the number eight and eight of diamonds in the geocache that I found right after listening to this interview. So anyway, I took the card, and I have it, and it's on my bulletin board, and I'm still waiting for the money to roll in. So anyway, I'm going to keep it around. That's my superstition story. See you later, guys. Ooh, that was a fun one. Thanks, Jeff. That was neat. I haven't heard the eight thing before, but man, love me some geocaching and that kind of synchronicity is fun when it happens. Okay, so I hope everyone keeps the superstitions rolling in. These were all great. I loved them. And you can hit us up at Twitter or, like I said, on the flash mob. You can email us at comments@flashpop.com. Keep them coming in, please. Eric the Mailman emailed. He just mentioned, well, he was actually asking some questions after our book club selection. Four weeks left on that, a reminder, everyone. That's right. Bimbos of the deaths. And we had some great news, some great research by the mob in the Facebook page. Thank you. Barry mentioned that it is available on Kobo, and then Jeff dug even deeper and discovered that you can get an audiobook version on audible.com. Sweet. Now nobody has an excuse. Mm-hmm. So we don't really get any, we don't get a cut of pushing you over to Audible or Kobo, but I highly recommend you getting over there. I think the Kobo book is four or five dollars tops. Yeah, they're usually pretty cheap there. Yeah, I can't go wrong there, frankly. Plus with stanza not working, oh my good gosh, ever since I updated my iPod, I can't use stanza, and I'm dying slowly. Every once in a while when it's very quiet, she'll whisper about stanza dago. Stanza. With the wind blows, I hear it say stanza. Nick also wanted to interject briefly about last week's spot of bother saying regarding. He was bothered by it. Drinking blood. Saying that, oh yeah, black pudding equals awesome. No. Admittedly the stuff with the hard fat lumps in it is less appealing, but you should really try some good pudding, like the Swedish black pudding, which is smooth, sweet, and delicious. We Brits are one step closer to surviving the zombie apocalypse, albeit as zombies. Yeah, exactly. I can't get behind eating a bowl of blood. Oh, you guys can't get behind eating many things. I would try it, frankly. I've eaten some odd French Canadian delicacies that certainly sound worse than blood pudding. I mean, if I'm willing to eat a large portion of a pig's ass, I think that I can probably deal with having a little bit of blood, but- Wait, wait, wait, which portion are you talking about here? I don't know. Sphincter. The rump portion, the meat portion. That's not so bad. That's not like it's blood. You're eating its flesh. How is that somehow better than eating its blood? I don't know. It really isn't. I'm sorry. It's not at all. This is a merchant of Venice haircut, hair splice here. You're right. Hair split. Okay, so I think we have one more fantastic item in the mailbag, but I think we're actually going to save it till- Mm-hmm. Oh, wait, no, hold on. No, I gotta research that, though. Okay. We have another fantastic item in the mailbag that we're actually going to save on for art of narration, so definitely stay tuned for a magic surprise we should have teased earlier in the show. Mm-hmm. But- A little submission from Anetty. But I am very happy to hear- He's a cup of Joe, four mobsters at home, it's Colorado Joe, four mobsters. Hello Flashcast crew and fellow mobsters, sorry for the radio silence last week. I can't keep up with the crazy schedule you kids have. Since I missed an episode, my comments crossed the last two. I want to throw a shout out to Barry for an amazing demonstration of impromptu exposition. If I didn't have detailed notes, I would sound like a gibbering protosimian. I'm the inept student learning from a grandmaster. I like Jeff's submission on those MIA on cruises. I totally twisted, but it brought back a memory about a conversation my son and I had on a cruise a few years ago. We were standing on a balcony at Sunset watching the water. We both found ourselves fighting a desire to jump in. Not because we had a death wish, but just because the drop looked so cool. Can totally see why some folks decide this would be a good way to check out. Jeff, you're a twisted bastag, and I'm glad to have made your acquaintance. Both Captain Pighart's contribution still laughing at his story. Hope to hear more. Regarding the US troll remake, nothing keeps him from setting it in Norway and using the same background myths, just with a bigger budget. Channeling John Hodgman, if US filmmakers take my advice, you're welcome. We watched three episodes of Terranova, which was two and a half episodes too many, dropped it from the DVR recording schedule. I'm more concerned with plot than CGI issues. I love the concept, but found the plots to be filled with stupid non-science. Bulletproof dinosaurs? A scientist who enters a quarantine area and casually removes his face mask and winds up becoming infected? Nah. Okay, time to get all gush and go on about how much I loved Free Alaska. This story had everything a libertarian sci-fi loving geek could want in a story. Great plot provided a very believable glimpse into a possible, not too distant, future. Great narration and sound effects as well. Would love for Jessica May to share some audacity trips, tips and tricks in audio-addacity of hope? Quick aside, I'm very grateful that when I go all anti-establishment, SON's missiles or lasers I want to point out, the worst I get from Linda is an eye roll. Now is a section where Joe gets pedantic about something science-related. Speaking how effective lasers will be, in warfare, I'm skeptical, assuming the power issues are solved and they will be, smoke and mirrors, literally, would be fairly effective defenses against laser weapons. Totally love in the Halloween vibe coming out of the mob, including the great pics from Canada's Wonderland. Looks like you had a great time. Want to throw out major props to Peter at Radio's Revenge for tweeting the link to John Delancey reading, "oppose the raven, excellent rendition of a great classic." To all mobsters, thanks for all the bits you're sharing as we approach the holiday. My submission regarding the call for superstitions comes from my grandfather, who was very superstitious. He bought into many of the standard ones, ladders, black cats, spilled salt, but he would totally freak out if anyone put a new pair of shoes on a table. Never understood that one, but he was very serious about it. So, lasers need power? I recommend solar. I know. #BrokenRecord. Take care. Thanks a lot, Joe, that's fantastic. And interesting, another return of the shoe conundrum. Odd, I hadn't heard that one until we launched this call for superstitions, so I'm glad that people are throwing them in. Yeah, I absolutely agree about lasers. There are pros and cons to the situation. At the same time, I think warfare is constantly a matter of... Who has the better toys? Yeah, it's a rock, paper, scissors game. It's ground combat, it's tanks, it's planes. Something is always going to trump something else. I do think that making a properly mirrored, because mirrors, although they will distribute the heat of a laser, I don't believe that I think that they still retain even some of that heat. And with a powerful enough laser, you're going to punch through that surface pretty easily, I think. Anyway, and you've also got to consider getting it up in the air. There's a lot going on there. There's a lot to think about. Yeah, we're scientists. Yeah, thanks a lot, Joe. I always appreciate your commentary. I agree absolutely about bringing pig heart back. Yes. I would love to hear another submission. Please. Aye. Please. I would also love to see Troll Hunter's remake set in Norway. I have a terrible feeling it's not going to happen, because the truth is I think most American filmmakers assume that if they don't set their movie in America, it's not going to sell. Americans will not want to see it. Yeah. And then I want pig heart to defeat him. That's what I want to see. I do believe, though, that if it's done right, Joe's idea could really work in that if they send an American documentary crew to chase down a Norwegian Troll Hunter, that would work. It would. Yeah, that's true. Now, I'm not too surprised to hear about Terranova kind of sucking. I'm kind of... Okay. Earth 2 was a previous Spielberg joint where he tried to do television sci-fi, and I recall some weird mysticism creeping into that one as well, and then if anyone recalls Sequest, which I also believe was another Spielberg development, Sequest Season 1, as I remember it, was quite good, and then with each subsequent season, they started working in psychics and spiritualism and a lot of religious talk. It just became very... Less Sequest, more me-quest. It became very new-agey, and I don't know if it was an attempt to connect with the hippie crowd who love oceans, and they were watching the show because they want to see a dolphin. Oh, things. Yeah, I don't understand what that was about, but anyhow, that totally ruined that show, and I'm not surprised to hear that things in Terranova are not entirely up to SNF plot-wise and otherwise. So, just for all the dolphins I've seen. Thanks, Joe. It was great to hear from you. Yes. We're sad when you're gone. Are you a dassy, oh-ho! So I wrote a song, everybody, and all the mobsters saw it, and listened to it and were very, very sweet to me. Mm-hmm. They were very kind. It's a very good song, though. My reason would be, although I must say, I understand that these releases are generally experimental and sort of done in the limited time that you have, so they're not necessarily meant to be entirely, you know, studio record quality, but having your dog wandering around the room was a little distracting. Okay, okay. I understand it wasn't perfect. It was a great song. Don't get me wrong, and I loved what you did with it. I only had so much time, it either would get on the internet or it wouldn't for however long it took. It either wouldn't get on the internet or it would have a dog in it. Yeah. That's all. So you got it with a dog. She was the accompaniment. And there was a train. What did you think of Joe's suggestion to do some audacity tips? Oh, I don't feel like I know audacity well enough or know how to explain detailed thing in my work or bajilli joggers, the way that I should be. Okay, well, maybe you should just keep it in mind while you're doing your editing because I rather suspect you'll have more tips than you believe at the moment. So keep it in mind while you're editing and see if you come up with anything. I do a dassy, oh, ho. So we actually got a submission from Nettie this week. She was listening to the Flashcast and we were talking about the idea of superhero romance. Well it was the episode in which we discussed the UFC Harlequin book that's coming up. Yeah, exactly. So she actually came up with this little sort of fiction she wrote that she sent in. So here's a little excerpt from A Superhero Romance. "It had been a month since Alexis had been held captive by Dr. Monstress. Yet her thoughts were still plagued by memories of her time and his secret lair. His lair wasn't anything like Scott's. Of course, Sergeant Spectacular would have the latest crime computers, space for his arsenal and costumes, as well as an engine bay for when repairs and modifications need to be made to this spectacular mobile. There wasn't an area to hang out, watch good TV or goof off. It wasn't even an area like that in his all too immaculate estate. Walking in the estate made Alexis feel like she was walking through a museum. Sleeping over was always awkward. She slept in his bedroom, but if she put anything out of place, there was that wrinkle in his forehead that would form." She was pretty sure he had OCD. And while that helped Scott fight crime, it wasn't the most comfortable for a girlfriend. Other than the bedroom, there was nowhere she could even sit. Now Dr. Monstress's lair had had a TV area, dungeons that were decked out with king-sized beds, lush sofas, and personal butler for all captives to keep them satisfied with tasty treats. Alexis was sure she'd gained fifteen pounds during her stay. Fifteen glorious pounds of the most succulent food you could ever imagine. Alexis allowed herself to indulge. After all, she didn't know whether she would live or die. Well, she knew she'd be safe, but she used that as an excuse. Scott always saved her when the villains tried to hurt her, though Dr. Monstress was the first to hold her captive for more than a day. He was a gracious host too, always checking in to make sure she was entertained and happy. Truth be told, while she was a prisoner, she was happier than she had been in years. She found herself looking forward to the visits of her cruel captor. Very quickly she was watching movies and playing games with him. Then she was dining with him. She wasn't sure how long it had been before she found herself dressed in a slinky dress and dancing with him in his armory, and all she wanted was for Dr. Monstress to kiss her and kiss her he did. From prisoner to lover, it was a quick trip. Alexis was swept up in the romance of it. She lived for his touch and woke each day in his arms. While she never knew his first name and cried out, "Oh Doctor!" when they made love, she felt more connected to him than any other man she had ever known. Now, back in the safety of Scott's lair, as he worked to track the whereabouts of his nemesis, she yearned for her villain and couldn't help but think of ways to be held captive again. She wondered what Scott would do, should he find out what really happened while she was held hostage. Would he care? Would he be more upset? His enemy slept with his girl, but that his girl was unfaithful. That small difference was the most vital for Alexis. She loved Scott, but she felt happier with a man who was evil and never even told her his real name or took off his mask, not even, to make love. That was naughty, Nutty. Thanks, thanks so much Nutty, that was a lot of fun. I'm really glad that somebody grabbed that idea and ran with it and needed a brilliant job. I had a fun time reading it. Nutty little subtext there, anyway. I think I probably turned several shades of red while reading it though. Backroom plots! So did a black hole coffin crossover? Yeah, it did. I really honestly, after having completed it, I realized that I probably should have turned it into a three-parter, but an oddly lopsided one, like black hole first episode, coffin last two? Yeah. Um, get a little more in depth with the ice spiders or something. Yeah, there were things that I could have done to stretch it across, but even then if you look at the word count, it is more than two episodes worth ever worth. Yeah, it felt like it was kind of cut into two parts. There was the part where they're introducing the character of Burt Stewart, and then there was the part where you're being reintroduced to Sarah Thistle. Yeah, I definitely think it could have been spliced in two, but at the same time, I hope that it feels like it stands up well enough, like I don't think it feels like there's a cut to commercial moment halfway through, like you will sometimes when you get a, uh, you know, you get one of those made for TV movies home, and there's always that moment where you feel like this is where the commercial would go. Or even some of the Mulligan three-parters, you know, we've seen, there's clear cuts, you know? Mm-hmm. It becomes obvious. Anyway, this one, uh, it was interesting because I felt like the first of the two, the black hall, was busier in what was happening in the story itself, but there was a lot of meat in this coffin that isn't necessarily immediately apparent. I mean, there's some flashpaulp history in there, there's a return of an old friend who we aren't necessarily expecting to see in coffin, uh, there's some items that I sort of inserted that I don't want to bring up specifically that somewhere down the line, hopefully someone will realize, like, oh, that was a little more important than I thought. Like the box, right? Uh, yeah, some items related to that, maybe some items related to the dabbler himself. Mm-hmm. I don't think we've seen the last of the aftershocks of this tale, for sure. Mm-hmm. So, I think that is a show. Da-da-da! Big thanks to Jim, as always. Thank you, Jim. Thank you, Jim. I know he was under the hood with the, uh, wiki just today, and we really appreciate his efforts. So, huge thanks to him for hosting Wikito flashpaulp.com and flashpaulp.com. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. A few people have comments, questions, suggestions, superstitions, anything you can find us at flashpaulp.com and call our voicemail line at 206-338-2792 or email us text or mp3us to comments@flashpaulp.com. Jessica May's Volca talents and musicals talents can be found at maytunes.com. Sometimes. Yes, but you do have new content, and I'm certainly worth checking out. The entire run of flashpaulp can be found at flashpaulp.com or via the search bar and iTunes. Flashcast is released under the Canadian Creative Commons attribution not official to my five minutes. ♪♪ Sunday to leave my hour, that's number left ♪♪ ♪ Here is the shadow that is with our number left ♪♪ ♪ Little light cloud will never awake a new morning ♪♪ ♪ Not well, the black rose of sorrow has taken you ♪♪ ♪ Angels have no thought of ever returning you ♪♪ ♪ But baby, I'll be fine without avoiding you ♪♪ ♪ Oh, this is the last time that I am ending you ♪♪ ♪ Ooh, there'll be candles and prayers at us at our door ♪♪ ♪ Why should they cry when they know that I'm glad to go ♪♪ ♪ It's the dead dream, then I'll dream I'm threatening you ♪♪ ♪ Come along, journey, I know I'll be blessed to you ♪♪ ♪ Oh, this is the last time that I am ending you ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪