Hello, and welcome to FlashCast episode twenty-three – this episode is brought to you by Juju Klick, check out her fabulous photography at jujuklick.com.
The Skinner Co. Network
FC23 - The Legend Continues
(upbeat music) Hello and welcome to Flashcast 23. This episode is brought to you by JujuClick. Check out her fabulous photography at jujuclick.com with a K. Prepare yourself for a DC Ultimate editing, heist films, F-bombs, time management, and once in a balloon. (upbeat music) Tonight we have myself, O'Pokanax, president of art and narration, Jessica May. Hello. A CEO of Audio Production and Attitude Adjustments (laughing) and J.R.D. Hello. Consonant scrubber. Scrub away. So, I want to keep the front end a little bit short tonight. Agreed. The mailbag is frothy frothy, and we need to keep moving, but I do have a few things I wanted to quickly discuss. Okay, go. Heist films. Dan. Go on to the next one. (laughing) Hop back to the next guest. Yes. I realize that heist films in a weird way are about exercising creativity, and that sounds maybe a little obvious, but the large heist film is all about doing that one impossible thing, that one Rube Goldberg almost heist. Okay, would you argue that Inception was a heist movie? No. No. Inception was science fantasy, I guess. What's the difference? Well, that's more of a genre than a specific thing like heist. Whereas heist falls into crime, this is more so broad. Well, they were out to do something not exactly legal. Heist involves going and retrieving something worth a lot of money and going back with it. Which they were sort of doing, really. I mean, they were going in with the purpose of making up this guy's money for him. Which was going to, it was a business venture. I would say that Inception was almost more of a hacking film. I guess, I mean, like Johnny Mnemonic. I never saw that movie, was it good? Oh, it was so good. The writing, the dialogue, it was beautiful. Beautiful. Are you being sarcastic? Yes, Johnny Mnemonic was kind of a terrible movie. I love the original short story, it's based on by William Gibson. And I was, there's a lot to love in the fact that Dolph Lundgren is in a film with Henry Rollins and Can I Reuse, Can I Act? Yeah, I saw it in the theater. I was excited. Dolphans, man. Yes, I've been at a Dolphans. Really? Like Star Trek Dolphans? This is one of those topics where we can sort of go around the rim and every new aspect of the plot we would describe to you would make it sound fantastic in a way, but in the end, you would just come and do it. You'd disappoint him. Yeah. Yeah, in a weird way, I would say it's more of a hacking film in that there are, but then-- Like hackers? Every hacking film was bad. There was the net, which was kind of, like in its time, I think for me, I almost bought it until, you know, you see it a few years later and everything looks really cheesy. I would say Inception has more in common with sneakers, which could be called a hacking film than it does with, say, Ocean's 11. Okay, but it's the collection of people with their own specific talents in order to-- But that's anything, that's serenity, that's-- Yeah, I got another question for you then. The Falcon and the Snowman, is that a hacking movie or is that a spy movie? Isn't it more like a drug spy kind of thing? Well, they started off with information, right? Yeah. And Sean Penn got into drugs, but-- Yeah. It was the real big thing was the-- It's a thriller, I would go-- All of these things are thrillers, and I would say heist falls under thriller, but I don't think that these are heisty enough. So, okay, what makes a heist? You need a collection of people, you need a witty story, and you need a epic jackpot? There has to be, there's some sort of prize that they're going after. Something tangible? Some millionaire entrepreneur that starts up the whole jazz. No. I believe heist immediately means theft, like it has to be some sort of large-scale theft. Yes, there must be blueprints. With an intricate sort of-- There must be a small man who can make it into a teeny, tiny box. Do some kind of gymnastics. Dispiring cement, do I fall into that category? Sorry, we've got a little off track, but my original point was this. There's no reason in a heist film that you couldn't pull 10 smaller jobs and make the same amount of money, but in the end, it's usually the creative urge, there's that one, you know, the leader, whoever the ring leader is in that particular film, or story, yeah, well, I mean, lately, yes. Yes. You're Leonardo DiCaprio, if you will. Oh, he's been in so many good movies. Lately, I didn't have a lot of hope for him when he was younger 'cause I wasn't all in love with him, like every other lady in my age. Growing teens, come on. Titanic could've been a death kiss, really, to his-- Yeah, I think it was, for a bit. Yeah, it was, for a while, and everybody was like, "Oh, Lately DiCaprio, it would've, me, me, me, me." But he is really, yeah, he has really redeemed himself, acting wise, I think. Anyway. You know what I don't think he could do? What? Tarzan. No, I wouldn't, I probably wouldn't like a Leo Tarzan. It seems to me, though, we're getting to that point where it's-- It's too snappy. We're gonna have to... Tarzan reboot seems on the horizon. I haven't seen any specific news, but it's about that time. Yeah. I can see that. I was doing some poking around, I was just trying to figure out sort of what the cycle length is for Tarzan. You know. But the truth is they had movies basically right through from the '30s to the '60s. I wouldn't be surprised if we saw another Dracula soon, too. Oh, they make Dracula's constantly, though. Exactly, but I mean, the last really big Dracula of our generation would be-- (coughing) - [coughing) - Yeah. Well, yeah. I would say he's probably on a 20-year cycle. That might be weakened by the Twilight franchises, too, though, and just sort of the plethora of vampires that are as they're right now. Well, it just might make, you know, other sort of vampire lovers go for a gold and do something different. Like, "Bepers, you want vampires, here you are." Am I first? No? I think the last time they made a good Tarzan movie. Brendan Fraser. No, that was George of the Jungle. That wasn't even Tarzan. Sorry. (laughing) (laughing) (laughing) Graystoke, the legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes, which is awesomely-- Oh, no, I remember hearing about that. "Hazata" to them for naming it the longest possible title. Yeah, for you. I know we're kind of off the topic of Dracula already, but I saw a really cool picture today, and it was like a nativity scene, except it was featuring, like, the bride of Frankenstein as Mary, and Frankenstein as Joseph, and there was, like, the wolf man, the swamp thing, and Dracula as the Three Kings. It was really great. That is really great. It was fantastic. Where did you see that? I saw it in an art magazine. Blast for me. (laughing) Just you. Hey, Flashgaz, three-day fish here, and excited to bring a new update on fresh fish. (laughing) I'm outta here! Fresh fish, a new batch of cinematic pulp with the always-listening, three-day fish. First off, Jessica May. I love the intro. It's silly. Thank you much. You're awesome. (laughing) Thanks. And, of course, to Oak Open Act, a wonderful read. Again, I always seem to get nervous when I hear you read my stories. (laughing) She's so professional now. I have to say, I was very pleased. And thank you, J.R.D., for pushing that. I get a whole segment of my jig. So, yeah. But now, we're on to business. (laughing) Just watched Super 8, and it was super ha-ha. No, but seriously, it was an excellent movie. And I feel like I've been giving you guys a lot of sci-fi, but there's been a lot of sci-fi lately, and it's all been good. What I really liked about it was a lot of sci-fi tends to forget all the human take on what these science-fiction-y situations might provide. Like, if there's robots everywhere killing people, it's like, "Oh, no, we just have to stop the robots." It's not always, "Ah, I feel bad." Yes. My friends type, my robot, or anything like that. And this movie, Super 8, really brings in a good human factor, which I think also makes it nice for gentlemen and ladies who do this, maybe. I love that he said that. Which is kind of hard to find in sci-fi, I think. So, yeah. And since I have my own intro, I feel obligated to make my segment a little more segment-y. So, I will give the flashers a bit of a preview on what I will talk about for the next Flashcast. Wait, we're getting into the Flash. - Done, done, done, done. Green Lantern. - Ooh. - Ooh. - I'm not gonna lie, I'm a little worried about Green Lantern. - Me too. - This may sound minor, but I feel like Ryan Reynolds, the suit is a bit fruity, but... - I love that. - We'll see. - What's wrong with fruit? - Always listening. (laughing) - Yes, I must agree. Ryan Reynolds is the Green Lantern, I'm not sure. - I'm very interested to see what he's going to say, 'cause I have concerns. - Yeah, we'll see. Maybe it's good, maybe it's good. - I think he's absolutely right about sci-fi losing the humanity every now and then. - Yeah. - What was that movie that we saw? It wasn't robots, so it was aliens. District 9, that's right. - District 9. - Yeah, that's exactly what I was thinking too. - And it was so shocking and it's, you know, a depiction of... - You don't feel bad for humans. - Yeah, you feel bad for the aliens and how they treat the aliens. - Yeah, I think the reason that movie hit home so much, even though the ending is essentially like a giant robot stomp about, is because of the lovely humanity that they manage to infuse into, well, both the human characters and the alien characters, frankly. - Yeah, it's not just about, oh my God, you know, a monster or an alien, we gotta get away. We gotta stop it. - Yeah. - Well, I have a lot of, I still, I must confess, I still haven't seen Battle of Los Angeles. - But you wanna? - I would really like to because it looks so ridiculous and I wanna go and I don't expect much of it. I just want it to be cheesy and over the top and full of CGI that I'll have to leave. But at the same time, I'm gonna watch it once and I'm going to have forgotten it. It's not going to be a sci-fi classic. It's not going to be... - You're not watching it for the story, but... - I don't sit down and watch Independence Day, ever. - Yeah, yeah. Man, I really feel like I wanted Independence Day, no. (laughing) - I'm literally in the mood. - Speaking of cheesy movies, did we ever speak about over here, I can hardly hear you? - A Realm Beyond. - Oh yeah, we watched From Beyond just this last week. - It was great. - I love that film. - Yeah, we're big fans of HP Lovecraft and I gotta say, it literally gave me shivers to hear somebody say Miskatonic University out loud. - Yeah. - Like, I could not get over it. I'm getting excited just thinking about it. - Yeah, it was a lot of fun. It was a fun movie. I mean, it was of that sort of '80s cheese period. I would say it had a lot to in common with Evil Dead, in a way. - It didn't upset me at all, seeing like the two, like things eating each other and stuff like that and that didn't upset me at all. But seeing the girl break her leg, wow, that made me flinch. - Yeah, yeah, well, those bones stick in there with a special effect, sure. - Yeah, that was rough. - All right. - So thanks for the segment. - Yeah, and I'm so glad that you liked this song. I can hear your excitement, your pleasure in it. So I, that's sweet, that's cool. - Guess what we're opening mail time with? - What? - Another email from 3D Fish. - Awesome. - He just had a quick addendum he wanted to mention from, 'cause he was listening, I believe, to FC21. I believe you mentioned you noticed a decline in R-rated movies, is something I've noticed and something else I've noticed recently are PG-13 movies are making, are matching their limits on what they can get away with. Some recent examples are X-Men First Class and Super 8, both drop the F-bomb. I think it's the beginning of a growing trend of Edinger PG-13 films. - Good, they're allowed one F-bomb per PG, right? Use it. - And they can't be related to the act. - Yeah, so they make sure they get their quota in, I guess. - Yeah, well, there's, the level of free reign applied to violence in films, especially in PG-13, is a little weird to me and always has been, you'll get this sort of language cop and naughty time cop. - Yeah, which is very different around here because we don't like seeing, even like pretending that the kids are violent, but we're okay with swearing. Mind you, well, there is one rule and that's, we don't really-- - We don't avoid it around people we don't know. - Well, and we don't like teeny tiny ones doing that. It sounds-- - We don't encourage it. - But, you know, if you're getting older and you're hanging out with your friends and you use a word and you're not calling somebody a name, I'm down with that, but-- - Words are words. - Yeah, use your F-bomb, go for it. That's my opinion, at least. Fucking right. - I'm seriously curious, says Barry. Where do you find the time? Your output is prodigious and even more impressive considering how much effort must go into writing of the flashpops. - No doubt. - The production of the podcast takes a lot of time and you can also, you also do a significant interaction on Twitter. You do promos and an occasional appearance on other vlogs and sites and you have kids. I vote hit my level. I do it all and still have a life. If I had passed before in the past, I ask again because you somehow ramp things up. - This is our life, our life is our-- - Well-- - We're magical. - Here's a bit of the reality of this situation. - There's actually two of each of us. We keep pixies in the closet. - We're on speed. (laughing) That's what I meant by the pixies. - With little babies, especially in the one to three year old range, you don't go out very often. - You don't go outside. - Well, you go in the backyard, that's about as far as you get. - Yeah, it's nice. - Which is cool because you love them and you don't really want to be apart from them anyways. - But it comes about eight o'clock and the children are in bed and you're still a little wound up 'cause you've been chasing people all day. And frankly, right now, everything on TV kind of sucks. So I don't find a lot of distractions in that sense. - Having a pretty specific goal is very helpful. - Yeah. - Yeah. - You have a very regimented day that you stick with and we each, there's an understanding that certain people have to focus on one aspect of our life so the other can do some pulpy related business and it's all juggling and keeping, you know, an eye on the prize. - Yeah, and for all you say, I mean, there's nothing better to do like this one on TV or whatever. - There's stuff right there. - Yeah, we are carried. - Yeah, yeah, yeah, fair enough. - It can be rest your brain in the late 10 hours, so. - But like, you know, the thing is, that's really cool is the older children are able to understand what it is that we're doing and understanding the progression of our fan base and where we're going and, you know, I'm even teaching the little ones about, you know, how we're putting the songs together and finding special effects or like for sound effects and making them feel a part of it. - Yeah. - It's something they wouldn't see otherwise. - Yeah, and knowing that, you know, your stuff is just as important as whatever you're giving out to the man and as long as you're doing that, you're winning. - And like, the shows that they listen to, the podcast that they subscribe to, that they hear when they're going to sleep and stuff, it's the same as what we're doing and. - Well, sorry. - I don't think Story Norio would run one of our. - Well, no, but I mean, they know it's the same kind of. - Yeah. - Efforts are going into it, you know. - True. - Yeah, so that's pretty much it, very. - Motivation. - Yeah, and Jaredie's raw talent. - Well, brain is vast. It's a little larger than normal, but. - I should say on the flip side of that though, that I've always found writing a very good release for my stresses in real life. And there are times when things get too bad and I just can't write like this house sale situation we just got out of was really. - And there's nothing he hates more than postponing episodes, but sometimes it just had to happen. - You know, if we were in the shining, if we were stuck in a situation like that, we'd be fine. - I think so too. - 'Cause he would just write. He would come out with a novel. You'd be great. We'd come out millionaires, screw the hotel. - Yeah. - We'll beat this yet. - Yeah. - Plus, you're a northerner. - Yeah. - You would never freeze to death among the maze. Amongst the labyrinth. So it's just us at the screwed. He'd end up the millionaire. - Letter from Jim. - Nice. - Jim of relic radio. - Yeah. - Very nice. - I feel kind of like we're. - Was it in relation to our forum, non-forum idea? - Mm-hmm. - The clubhouse. - I feel like we're sort of Jim's Charlie, Charlie's Angels. - Bosley. - Can we call him Bosley? - Jim? - Bosley. - Jim! - Jim! - Jim! - Yay. - Come on, do it. (laughing) - I'm the second season replacement because the other one left. I'm going to just sort of jump lightly through his email 'cause he was very extensive, which was very nice of him. But he's essentially outlined a series of possibilities for the Flasher Clubhouse. - Okay, so tell me about that. - I don't know if I like the idea of the Flasher Clubhouse. (laughing) - Well, we can name it something else. (laughing) - I don't know. Maybe Flasher's just not a good idea, guys. - No, I like it though. - I still think it's funny. - Okay, cheers. - So there's vanillaforms.org, which would be largely just a form system. I'm sure people on the intercoop are familiar with forms. - Vanilla Flasher forms. (laughing) - Now that does run the risk of kind of being a little nine-user, as he mentions in his email. - Okay, dig it. - But it's, you know, it's a fairly simple method. Now the other thing, though, is, as I've mentioned before, Jim runs a fantastic community over at relicradio.com. Right form, and everybody there is pretty hilarious, slash, very knowledgeable about old-time radio. And I do feel weird about putting up a form in a weird sense of competition. Like, I don't wanna, anyway. - Yeah, no, I understand that. - Now, he also suggests ning.com, which people may be familiar with, ning. - Ning. - There are some fees associated with ning, but as he says, it's essentially a private Facebook. So I'm assuming that we pay the fees and then people can just sign up and utilize our playground. - Would we wanna do something that people would have to sign up for, though? - Well, is it free for guests and we pay? - Well, that would be my assumption, but I'm gonna have to dig into it more. I didn't honestly get a peek at that one. I kind of skimmed it over. It looks very nice. And then there's buddy press, which is a lot like WordPress, but of the social network style. So I guess what I'm putting this out to the flashers for is to know what people would be interested in. Are you looking for a form kind of situation? - Are you all formed out? - Yeah. - Or are you for a form? - It basically comes down to, do you want another social network style site or do you want a form style site, which is essentially just a dude there to communicate? You know what I mean? - I dig it. - Anyway. - I dig it. - So thank you very much, Jim, for sending in all of that information. - Some ideas. I'm still picking my way through it. - I'm still picking my way through it. - You take the time. - So the thing I was concerned about came into pass. Almost immediately after we finished recording the last episode of Flashcast, we received a Viennese legend from the always wonderful Ingrid. So rather than let it go to waste, of course, here it is. - The Danube made many, many years ago, the river Danube was split into several arms. In this beautiful, wild landscape, the Viennese fishermen lived in their simple wooden huts. When the Danube was frozen and the fishermen couldn't do their work, they sat together close to a warming oven and told their stories. So it came on a cold evening that a young handsome fisherman listened to his old father, who was talking about the Danube maiden. He told his son about the glass palace at the bottom of the river, where the maiden lived together with her father, the prince of the Danube. And he also spoke about that desire to meet people. So he closed his door with the birds. On warm evenings, the beautiful maiden comes out of the depth and sings for the people. Her voice is so wonderful and clear that everyone is enchanted. But take care, my dear son. It often happens that young men are so attracted by her sweet voice that they are lost forever. The son saw his father's sorrowful face. Oh, father, it's just a tale. Don't worry about me. In that moment, a sudden illumination feels their room. In the doorway she stood, a petite body wearing a long shimmering white dress. Her black hair was adorned with white water lilies. Both father and son stared at the kind face of the beauty. "Don't be afraid of me," she said. "I won't do you any harm. "I'm just here to warn you. "A strong south early wind will melt the thick eyes "of the Danube very quickly. "And within a few days a big float "will carry away these hats here. "Free, as fast as you can." Then the wondrous figure disappeared and all was dark as before. Father and son want her neighbors, then they packed the essentials and hurry to a safe place. Everything happened as the Danube maiden had predicted. A few weeks later, the water went back and the fishermen were able to return to that former dwelling places. They built up their hearts again. They were happy and grateful that they had been saved from the certain death. Only the young fisherman couldn't rejoice. He was longing for the beautiful creature of the Danube. As often as he could, the dreamy and sad man sat on the banks of the river and looked into the flowing water. His father knew what that meant and so he tried hard to bring his son to other thoughts. But all was in vain. On a hot summer evening, the young fisherman climbed in his boat and rode with low strokes in the middle of the river. The next morning, the fisherman found the empty boat and closed beside, they saw a crown of water lilies drifting on the river. His father knew that his son would never return. Since that day, the Danube maiden was never seen again. - Thank you very much, Engrid. I felt like there was a hole in the last episode where your legend should have been, and not to say that you have to keep doing them forever, but I am going to be sad the day they stop. - But we'll always have these. - Now I should mention that Engrid has begun posting them to YouTube as well with imagery and that's a pretty fantastic system. You can find them all at dancingella.blogspot.com. I think that's probably the easiest way to get to everything she does. - Yes, thanks again, Engrid. It was lovely, as usual. - It's kind of a sad one. - Yeah, but there's a place for that. - Well frankly, they're all a little sad, usually. - Yeah, they're still enjoyable. - You know what doesn't make me sad? - What doesn't make you sad? - Call them Ray. - Hey guys, it's Ray. - Hey Ray. - Hey Ray. - I just wanted to say, first of all, with all the new additions, like all the noises with the water and like the splashing at the bus and the dock, it's been fantastic. It's really been feeling like more, like I've been sucked in even deeper into the stories. The stories are so rich, but this is just like a perfect compliment, like catch up on hot dogs. (laughing) That was really poor example to use. I'll find some hot dogs. - Uh-uh, I like catch up on hot dogs. - I promise. Anyway, the Pulpen Axe, thank you very much for that awesome reading. I was a little bit self-conscious about my story, but that made me feel better about myself. - I'm glad you like that. - You nailed the voices I had in my head perfectly. It was a little strange, but again, thank you very much. - I'm glad. - There is another little piece of information I had found and wanted to share with you guys. DC Comics in September. They're going to be starting all their comics at number one. Everything is getting relaunched. All the heroes are getting de-aged. Everything that happened up until now is not going to matter in this new world anymore. They're basically just taking all of the mythos, all of the chronology, everything, and just saying, yeah, we're done with you now. Now we're just going to start completely over. Rather than... - You really don't know about that. - With like new ideas or-- - I don't know about this movie. - The idea of like an aging superhero, I don't know. But that also includes action comics and some titles like that that have never been relaunched. Like with Marvel Wolverine gets relaunched like every second year. So it's not that big a deal with Superman and stuff like that. But want to comic like action comics is getting relaunched at one as well. It's just... I don't know... - That's a scary thing. - Yeah. - And the fact that they're just ignoring everything that happened until now. It'd be like trying to forget all the wars and atrocities that we've gone through. I'm taking my comics too seriously. Anyway, I wanted to share that. I don't have too much else to say other than keep up the great work and I'll be kicking around, listening, and enjoying. Talk to you later. Bye. - I'm glad you're enjoying the sounds. - Yes. - I'm really glad that everybody is taking it. And I don't know much about comics so you guys go nuts on that. - My feeling is this. Give it a year and they're going to be back to the original action numbering. - That series is so huge and it's so high numbered. Did they not? - There's going to be some pissing. - Sink about what they were doing. - Oh yeah, collectors, yeah. - Well... - What do you mean I have to start it? Let me win. (laughing) - I really feel like this is DC's take on doing the ultimate universe. Like Marvel kind of did this first when they did ultimate. They decided to change the characters just enough. - Maybe this one's ultimate. - Yeah. - Here's what I'm saying. - With something like Superman, people don't want to pick up a Superman and this is maybe why his sales have never been what they always hope they will be. No one wants to pick up a Superman and have him halfway through some really intense personal, whatever. They just want to pick up a Superman, have him fight some one dude. And then that's it. That's the last time they're going to read Superman for maybe years 'cause they know what Superman's out there. He's doing Superman stuff. Done. What they're doing right now by distilling the whole universe back down and trying to relaunch everything. - I don't think it's going to stick. I think you're like DC has the multiverse idea so deeply ingrained into it already that they're going to have no idea, or no problem, I mean flipping back to the original numbering, the original characters. - She's just like a ballsy move though, no? - It's just a gimmick. - It's a gimmick. Yeah, I buy this entirely as a gimmick and not as a serious. - Well, then that makes me mad too. - But here's the thing for those guys. - Plus it's DC and I don't really care. - Oh, rough. - That's what DC stands for. Really, I don't care. - But the flip side of that, and what I find very interesting about the situation is that I think this reimagining is actually an attempt to capture a larger audience through the movies that have been coming out and through the medium of digital comics. I think that the reason that they're launching day and date digital comics and in the stores at the same time as this relaunch is because people want to be able to get on board with Green Lantern, they want to get on board with Superman 'cause everyone knows Superman but they've never really been able to dip it in the comics and go-- - Yeah, it feels like something you can't really approach because they're already never like 10 zillion, bajillion-- - So many things happen. - Never would ever. - So my bet is that in a year, they're either going to peel this universe into its own side, shoot like ultimate, where people who have just come on board and really enjoy reading Superman essentially from the beginning-- - And the rest of the comic fans can just snub their nose at them. - Yes, and then action will flip back to its original numbering and it'll go back to being Superman, whatever, and maybe he'll fight alternate dimension, Superman, or maybe he'll just go, oh, that was weird. - That was a really strange dream I just had. - Yeah. - Wire inception. (laughing) - Thanks Ray, I really appreciate the call in. - Yeah, thanks so much. - For real Z's. - Hello, Flashcast crew, Joe from Colorado. - Hi, Joe. - My comments today straight from Flashpulp and refer to JRD's Urban Legend blog, focusing on the latest Midnight Tales with Cassandra. I've enjoyed the entire series, but this one was over the top awesome. Love the foreshadowing with the host's name and tagline. - Yes. - This was a great read. - Thank you. - So my questions, have you ever considered adding these to Flashpulp, or is the fit with the Flashpulp universe too unwieldy? And if one or more of these stories should take on a life of its own and make it into the wild, how would you feel about being the Orson Welles of the 21st century? (laughing) - I like it. - Switching to a discussion of creating a Foley last week. That was interesting because I had intended to mention how much I love the sound effects, but I forgot. I'm old and the two brain cells I still have don't always talk to each other. - Aw, that's not nice. - I was looking together at any fire. - I was looking for Jessica May to discuss what tools and processes she uses to mix and produce the show. Along the same lines, we'd love to hear from Apopanax on how she creates her artwork, which is equally cool. - Also sticks. (laughing) - Well, that's it for this week. Renovations on the palatial Mctea state are still under way and Linda has a long list of items we need to tackle. (laughing) Take care. (laughing) - Good luck. - Thanks for the call. - Yeah. - I've been watching his progress on Twitter. - Yeah. - You haven't told me this. - Oh, I should mention actually to loop way back and hopefully not leave Joe in the nest at all. One of the reasons that I appear so omnipresent on Twitter and such is because of my space phone, which is a term I steal freely for more analysis. Especially since I have a Bluetooth keyboard, my iPhone essentially turns into a laptop wherever I am and I can do a lot of communication via just knowing via email that I've been updated on this or that or the other thing. - Yeah. - But yes, and I also use lists on Twitter, which is an amazing tool because I have an unwieldy number of people on my contact list and there's really... Honestly, if you think about the people you want to track on Twitter, there's maybe a dozen or two and then the rest you just want to taste every now and then. Anyway, but yes, I've been following his progress on Twitter because he is on one of the inner rings of the onion layer of my lists and he's had his whole family helping out, which is very nice. - Yeah, sweet. - And yeah, I hope I hope him well in completion and just being able to sit down for a little bit. - So what's he doing? - Oh, I believe he was doing a lot of painting the last time I looked, but he's doing flooring in some rooms. The details escaped me at the moment. - I've been doing painting, but I don't do anything like flooring. - Your painting's nice though. - Thank you. Oh, and he had a question about your drawing. - Well, no, not about my drawing. He was saying, well, not important about my drawing. Let's talk this in my nose. - Why? He asked a specific question about your drawing. - Okay, wait, can we go? - Yeah, but I want to talk about something else. - Cool. Yeah. What do you want to talk about? - Well, you know how you're saying that you should bring some of those urban legends over into flash pulp? I was saying, I really like having them on the blog because it's so similar to flash pulp that I feel like the people that are really into flash pulp can really get into your blog too. Because it's not always about some crazy radio show that's mysterious and spooky, but sometimes it's about nocturnal owls. - Yeah. - You never know, it's really crazy and cool. And I think that's a way to get the people from the flash pulp to the blog too, which I feel sort of exist in their own parallel lines. - I've always had a deep love of urban legends. And I've also had a deep love of telling people stories that hopefully freak them out a little bit, essentially my little brother and sister or my cousins or whoever would sit around long enough to listen. There's all these little nooks and crannies of society where you get to this edge and things get weird and you can insert something into a radio show where people are kind of familiar but they don't really know public pools. Everyone feels weird at public pools, I think. At least a couple minutes of going to a public pool, you're kind of like, "Hmm, I don't know these people." - Or hospitals, there's places that are relevant to people in the ways very in which they're relevant, but they're relevant to all people in a certain way, you know? - So now I don't, it's interesting. In my mind, the urban legends, I'm sure. I mean, maybe they all exist in the Flashbulb universe. They don't really, I don't think negate anything I've done in Flashbulb, so there's no reason that they wouldn't actually Cassandra very conveniently, that whole myth very easily slips into sort of the mythology of Flashbulb, so it would be very easy to take that one as Canon for reasons that I cannot explain right now without giving things away. That does remind me, I have a minor announcement to make. - Episode 200 is gonna be epic. - Oh, I don't know anything about it, just that it will be epic and it's keeping me up at night. - It's gonna blow your mind, but here's the thing, it's gonna be for actual flashers. It's one of the few episodes where I'm going to just, if you're not up to date, I'm sorry, you may not get everything, this one's for the flashers. - I'm pretty excited, and by that he doesn't mean people who expose themselves. - Are we going to addend? - Every time we say flashes, by that we mean. - No junks. Yeah, I think that we should approach Jessica May's editing tools and how she goes about editing an episode and your artistic process as well, hope. - I don't have a process, let's go with the tools of the audio. - I used Audacity, and all the tools that lie within, and then I used public domain sound effects from the internet, unless I'm stealing ambient noises from my house with my microphone. - I like the idea of you stealing them from the air somehow. - Yeah, audio theft. Just a moment, I think this would actually be a good time to go into... - The audio of Audacity, of hope. - Okay, continue. - Well, that's basically what I do. - I got some Audacity, I got a bunch of tracks. I trial and error, and then some sounds. I got basically an idea that I have in my head. Recently I've been using PDsounds.org, which is public domain, and freesound.org, which is Creative Commons. And when I use them though, I'll specifically mention. So, because that's what you do, I guess. - Yeah, Creative Commons licensing usually just requires you to cite who used it. - Yeah, but I'm a newbie with this junk. I just, I got some stuff and, well, I got a pretty clear idea of what I have in my mind. It's pretty musical usually, I guess, just 'cause that's how I roll. - Well, here's the truth. I think that a lot of our production quality relies on your sense of timing. - Yeah, I never realized that from show one, I'm always counting in my mind of when things are coming in and when they're going out and, you know, delaying some phrasing here and there from a Pope, like just for effect. But yeah, it is very musical. I thank all the years of piano that both frightened me and taught me for this experience. - Fantastic, okay, well, let's go into. - The art of narration. Maybe we can talk a bit about editing. I know that you had a brief discussion online with Ray earlier about the kind of things you watch out for. I know that I have some certain ticks that you certainly keep track of, like, too many bins, beans. - Yeah, I think I was saying just recently that I had gone back to an old episode and I just been like, "Oh my gosh, you know, how did I miss that repeat?" - Yeah. - And I think, you know, we noticed it a lot when we read books now to of other authors even. We'll notice things that, you know, a certain word, it'll repeat itself. - Right. - Yeah, like, "Hey, that word was two sentences ago." - Yeah. Or like, "Hey, that word was at the end of the last paragraph and now it's mid paragraph here." Well, that's the word too many times. Like, I was even, I used an example with Ray. She longed for a long nap. Like, it's not the same meaning, but it's the same word, it sounds the same. So, what you would do is you would look for, like, I would highlight that and point it out to you and you would look for a synonym or if you couldn't find one, then you would maybe slightly change the sentence so that it kept the same idea. And if that didn't work out, then you might change the idea altogether or you might decide to just keep it. But, you know, I would highlight that and you would make the decision. - I also use despite too often or at least I'm allotted. - No, I use despite that much. You use being a lot and just. - Just shows up a lot. Well, no, I suppose I should say I'm allowed one despite an episode. - Yeah, that's another thing. Like, if it's an uncommon word, it doesn't matter if you set it like five paragraphs ago. If it's gonna stand out, like the word flibberty jibbit or something like that, you can't say flibberty jibbit twice in the same. - Yeah, no, I shouldn't say that these are things that you enforce on me. These are all rules I've called down on my own head. The only time that you've maybe straight out censored me, do you recall? Do you know what it is? - I can't remember. - Other than stories that you've both voted down. - Was it gumshoe? - Gumshoe. - Yeah, I hate that term. - I'm not allowed to use it, which is kind of annoying. - I also noticed that Ray used that term. - Yeah, I think Ray used it specifically as a joke in the end. - Gumshoe. - Yeah. - Yeah. - But yeah, I guess I can't blame you, but it does become tough because a lot of times Mulligan is in a dialogue situation and you don't wanna keep going. Mulligan said, replied Mulligan, Mulligan said, replied Mulligan. - Smith, Mulligan, Smith, Mulligan. - So you throw out the detective and then where you go? - Yeah. - The Seamus. - No, you can't do it. - The Seamus. - Yeah. - You are racist there, no. We have a whole color code going on. It works out fantastically. - Like what? - Well, like yellow for repeats and-- - What's brown? - Brown is when it's a repeat, but it's intentional. - And what's blue? - That's when blue is like the hardest one generally 'cause it's when I have a problem when I don't understand something or when I'll be like, you know, you say this, but I feel this way because of this, you know, whereas green, it's just like grammatical error, you know? So blue is the tricky one. Blue is where I get to, where I cross the line sometimes. - My emotional response is not where you intense or-- - Mulligan would not say that. - Which I think I've told you before. - Back through watch. - So a couple of quick things for background plots. - Okay, lay it on me. - 174, not exactly what was planned. - No, it's not, it was supposed to be Mulligan. - Yeah, it was supposed to be the second half of the family legend. - But you were influenced by teen werewolf. - Teen wolf, which it's pretty-- - He was a werewolf. - It's pretty funny that you keep going. You keep calling it like teenage werewolf. (laughing) - Michael J. Fox's werewolf. - Post-adolescence. - But I bet it was a lycanthrop and-- - Yeah. (laughing) - But yeah, I mean, oddly, teen wolf doesn't even turn into a wolf because of a bite. - I know, it's genetic. - It's very, very scary. - Daddy's soaked. - I know, he's like a teddy bear. That's when the kids knew everything was gonna be okay. - Yeah. - But, yeah, it was sort of odd. I've watched how many werewolf movies and this idea has never hit me before, but I just sort of lightning in a bottle and I had sort of personal things going on earlier in the weekend and my brain just wasn't into the Mulligan story, which in truth required threading some things together a little more delicately than my condition would allow, but I really feel like it came out, like a once in a blue moon came out very tidy. Nice little one shot. - Yeah, I liked it. - But 175, that's really big. That's so exciting. - Yeah, that's gonna help. - So that's gonna be the second partner? - Yep, that's gonna be the second partner family legend. - Awesome. The sweets. - You may also, yeah, I believe we'll actually be seeing more of the sweets even after this series is done. You recall last episode? I was discussing making a regular feature of having us peg characters to film actors or actresses. - Do they have to be famous as actors? - Rob on the Facebook page. - Oh, okay. - I don't want to give his last name away in case he's uncomfortable with that, but. He was discussing Black All and he said, "I don't know why, but I always think of Denver Pile when I picture Black All in my head." - What's that? - Okay, not Denver from Duke's A Hazard. He was Uncle Jesse. - Okay. - But when he had the mule in Grizzly Adams, I think he the mule was called Seven of Nine or something. - That is adorable. - Seven or nine, I should say. - Oh, I thought you said Seven of Nine. - Are you familiar with Grizzly Adams at all? - No, no, I'm sorry, I'm not. - He does have that Bushman look in that sort of beard situation going on. Now the thing is, in my mind, Thomas Black All's facial hair is entirely dependent on how long he's been in the woods. - Yeah, I picture him clean shaven most of the time. - But that's, when he's in town, he's pretty clean shaven. He's pretty proper. - He tries to be anyway. - When he gets out in the woods, especially like Red Mountain's legacy, he would have been pretty bearded at that point, or pretty scruffy at least. Yeah, I think that's an excellent selection. - And he also mentioned 80s era Christians later to play Mulligan, who was who I wanted to discuss tonight. - 80s era Christians later. - Yeah. - I was gonna say Jesse Slater, 'cause I was thinking of Jesse's fan-o and AC Slater. Okay, continue, sorry. - I don't know if he can just drop Mulligan on me like that with so little notice, I don't know. It's something I've thought about for a long time and I still haven't found the answer. - I dare say, although I did like the suggestion of Christians later, especially in that era, have you guys seen True Romance? - True Romance? - Classic film written by Tarantino, but not directed by him. Score by Hans Zimmer, very nice. And Slater does that sort of character, like the hey-ee-ee. - I can't help but think of Christians later in the name of the rose. - Yeah, I mean, it's not going to sell on every level, but I must say, if there was one person I could make B Mulligan for a feature film? - You shouldn't reveal it first, because we should say ours first. - Oh, okay, I know you'd say it too, but I just, I don't know. - Okay, who would you say Jessica made? - There is a little known actor, and the film that he was in latest was Sniper 3. (laughs) - My brother Cody? - Yeah, 'cause he looks just like Cody, and man, have you seen him in his movie? His acting chops? I mean, it's just his eyes, but my God. And that's honestly-- - I actually first got to see that finally. - Yeah. - It was great. - So, true fact, my brother lived in Thailand for a while, and apparently they're very short on white people in their standings for feature films. - And commercials? - They were, yeah, and he also got some commercial work always there. - He completely, like, it was not really interested in finding him life in it, but I'm sure if he wanted to, he could have. - It was so funny, he's very much not of that attention-seeking nature. - No. - He's got the right face for it. - Mm-hmm. - But, you wanna hear my pick? - Shoot. - Joseph Gordon Levitt. I think he would be perfect for Mulligan. - Yes, yes, he is like casual, kind of. - He's got that snappiness and kind of kidding. He's got the usefulness, the shorts. Like, I would-- - The shorts. - Oh, he's short. He's got the shorts. - Yeah, he can. - He's got a bad case of the shorts. - Yep, it's like the stinks. - Okay, well, we'll have to record the stinks as a condition in the wiki, which is gratefully, we gratefully, which we are very grateful to Jim for hosting, as well as the main flashpop.com site. - Thank you, Jim. - You can get to the wiki at wiki.flashpop.com and you really should go over there and do some fussing and check out the urban legends that I posted. We'd also like to give a big thank you to-- - Juju Click. - In Colorado. - Who completely stopped our dinner with our whole family for a moment. - Yeah, we had to sit and discuss. - She subscribed to our show. - Thank you very much. - Juju Click from-- - Colorado. - Denver. - From Denver. Yes, Denver's Juju Click. Thank you so much. If you have any comments, questions, or suggestions, you can find us at flashpop.com. Call our voicemail line at 206-338-2792 or email us text our MP3s to skinner@skinner.fm. Jessica May's vocal talents and musical stylings can be found at maytunes.com. - Yeah. - But Poponax's artistic work and general updates can be located at a Poponax feathers.com. The entire run of flashpop can be found at skinner.fm or flashpop.com or via the search bar and iTunes. Flashcast is released under the Canadian Creative Commons attribution on commercial 2.5lets. (gentle music) (gentle music) (gentle music)