Perfect Blue with Giana and Chika of Shoujo Sundae

This week, special guests Chika and Giana, hosts of Shoujo Sundae podcast, join to discuss Perfect Blue (1997). Here's the Substack we reference in the episode -- https://animationobsessive.substack.com/p/the-real-history-of-perfect-blue* 

Follow Shoujo Sundae on social media at @shoujosundae and check out the podcast wherever you listen to podcasts!

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
On the Bechdel Cast, the questions asked if movies have.

Speaker 2 (00:04):
Women and them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands,
or do they have individualism? It's the patriarchy, zeph and
best start changing with the Bechdel Cast.

Speaker 3 (00:16):
Welcome to the Bechtel Cast. My name is Jamie Loftus,
my name is Caitlin Dorante. This is our show where
we examine movies through an intersectional feminist lens, using the
Bechdel Test as a jump of goof point. The Bechtel Test,
of course, being something invented by our best friend, Alison Bechdel.

Speaker 4 (00:34):
Yeah, and she'll tell you more about it at her
house later where we're going to hang out.

Speaker 3 (00:39):
Yeah, just kidding.

Speaker 4 (00:40):
I mean this is actually kind of interesting because we're
talking about, you know, super fans and parasocial distance.

Speaker 3 (00:48):
Today.

Speaker 4 (00:50):
We are not going to perfect blue, Alison Bechdel. That's
the Bechdel Cast.

Speaker 3 (00:56):
Promise. We promise.

Speaker 4 (00:57):
If you are not familiar with the Bechtel Test, we'll
tell you what it is. There's many versions of the test.
It was originally in Alison Bechdel's incredible comic collection Dice
to Watch out For. She has of course gone on
to have an incredible career in graphic memoir. But the
version of the test that we use require that two
characters of a marginalized gender speak to each other about

(01:19):
something other than a man for more than two lines
of dialogue, and that exchange should be meaningful, not a
high high. But what does count is women in conflict,
and that's what we're gonna get into today.

Speaker 3 (01:35):
Wow.

Speaker 4 (01:36):
Yeah, we didn't know how to start this. It's hard
when it's just like, what is a funny way to
start a conversation about perfect Blue? We'll figure it out.

Speaker 3 (01:45):
But I did. I panicked. I didn't.

Speaker 4 (01:47):
I was like, there, any joke would feel very insensitive.

Speaker 3 (01:51):
It's a heavy film.

Speaker 4 (01:53):
Although I think that we could be in that group.

Speaker 3 (01:56):
What do you think?

Speaker 4 (01:57):
I think we could do it.

Speaker 3 (01:58):
I think we could be in the in the group,
Oh in the problem you mean cham exclamation point Cham.

Speaker 4 (02:04):
Yeah, I'm a huge I'm part of the Chamfam.

Speaker 3 (02:07):
Oh my Chamfam.

Speaker 4 (02:08):
Yeah, casual not scary, Yeah of course.

Speaker 3 (02:12):
Yeah. Yeah, we're all pop girlies here. It's true. And
I'm the Sea and Cham.

Speaker 4 (02:18):
I'm the Ham. You're the Sea, I'm the Ham and
uh huh's kind of how our band works.

Speaker 3 (02:24):
Yeah, amazing.

Speaker 4 (02:25):
Maybe you've heard of us. I'm excited to talk about it.
And the star of the movie for me is explaining
how the internet works, which makes sense because it's nineteen
ninety seven. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it made me giggle. I
was like, look at this, it's called a computer. There's
something on the internet.

Speaker 3 (02:42):
Is it good?

Speaker 4 (02:43):
And then the movie posits no, yeah, I think it
take this age quite well.

Speaker 3 (02:49):
I mean truly, yes. Yeah, she explains what computers are,
she explains what the Internet is. The recipient of this
information does not understand, and kind of to this day,
I also do not understand.

Speaker 4 (03:01):
Yeah, it's a whole Well, we'll talk about internet culture.
I feel like this movie's really ahead of its time
in that regard. Yeah, but let's get our guests in here,
because this movie needs to be discussed, and now.

Speaker 3 (03:13):
It really does. The movie, of course, is perfect Blue.
The guests are the hosts of the podcast show Jo Sunday.
It's Jianna and Chica. Welcome.

Speaker 1 (03:24):
Yes, hi, Hello, thank you so much for having us.
We're so excited to be here.

Speaker 3 (03:29):
Thank you for being here. Tell us more about your podcast. Well.

Speaker 1 (03:33):
Showjo Sunday is a delectable podcast we like to say,
covering show, show and jose media, anime films, sometimes manga,
dissecting it through our segments that are all ice cream
pun names. So we go through all of our feelings,
taking apart each and everything we have felt watching it

(03:55):
and looking into the symbolism and the story writing, and
just digging in if you will, to every bite we can.

Speaker 3 (04:05):
Yummy, tell us about your relationship with this movie, Perfect Blue, Chico.
Why don't you go first.

Speaker 5 (04:14):
Yeah, So, once upon a time, when I was a
young warthog, I was very much so into anime. I
didn't know what it was. I just thought it was cartoons.
I mean it is, but then it's Japanese animation, and
so I couldn't really tell the difference. So in the beginning,

(04:37):
or at least in the nineties, I was watching like
Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball Z and stuff like that,
and I would go to Blockbuster and I would just
be like, I'm going to find the type of shows
that I like. I can tell because it's drawn differently.
And so I picked up Perfect.

Speaker 3 (04:57):
Blue, Oh as a child.

Speaker 5 (05:02):
As a child, Oh, I really shouldn't have watched that movie.

Speaker 4 (05:10):
You couldn't have known you couldn't have known.

Speaker 5 (05:14):
No, I couldn't have because it's just like, because we've
seen Mima and like the cute outfit and everything, and
I was just like, oh, like this seems great. Uh
so my relationship with it, it's like it's nostalgic. But
then it's also like a little bit flabbergasting, just because

(05:38):
I really had no business watching it.

Speaker 4 (05:41):
I mean, I feel like we all have that piece
of media that really you're just like and that changed
the course of my life in a way I wasn't
prepared for because I shouldn't have been looking at it fascinating. Wow, Yeah,
what about eu Gianna?

Speaker 1 (05:56):
My history with this film is far less interesting. So honestly,
I kept hearing about it from Chica because you know,
we've talked to some people about our history with anime,
and she would always bring up how she watched Perfect
Blue Too Young, and I was like, what is this movie? Like,
what is it about this movie? I'm like, we're gonna

(06:18):
watch it eventually, so like, I guess I'll find out.
And we had previously covered Millennium actress on show Show Sunday,
and I wasn't a huge fan. I know it's a
hot take, but it was like a personal thing. So
I was like, oh man, I'm like, I don't know
how I'm gonna feel about Perfect Blue. And then we
watched it to talk about it with you guys, and

(06:39):
it definitely exceeded my expectations. For sure.

Speaker 3 (06:42):
Oh cool.

Speaker 1 (06:43):
I liked it much more than Millennium Actress. But it
certainly certainly left an imprint.

Speaker 3 (06:50):
It'll do that.

Speaker 4 (06:51):
Yes, yeah, Caitlin, had you seen this before?

Speaker 3 (06:55):
I had, because when we covered Black Swan on the podcast, Yeah,
this movie comes up in the research quite a bit,
and we'll get into it later. But I wanted to
watch it and just sort of like compare it to
Black Swan, because I mean, the short story here is

(07:18):
that Darren Aronofsky was like rumored to have acquired the
rights to do an American remake of Perfect Blue. But
then he's like, never mind, I didn't get those rights
and I didn't do that. And then years later Black
Swan comes out and a bunch of people are like,
hang on, this movie is very similar to Perfect Blue.

(07:39):
Are you sure you didn't And then he's like, no, no, no,
it's not even inspired by Perfect Blue, And I just
made up this identical story all by myself.

Speaker 4 (07:48):
There's a lot of deep lore about this that we
can get into.

Speaker 3 (07:52):
But I didn't realize.

Speaker 4 (07:52):
Because I haven't seen Requiem for a Dream. But I
think that that movie has even more direct connection also
from Perfect Blue, where it's like Aronofsky is a serial
offender and like he had actually met Satoshi Khan before
and they had this Like I would love to watch

(08:14):
a dramatization of this lunch we had that Darren Aronofsky
seems to have thought went very well, and Satashi Khan
was like he's kind of a clown and had some
I think understandable resentments that Aronofsky was this big shot
director ripping off his work quite a bit, and Satoshi
Khan was struggling as a director. And also just like

(08:35):
the I don't know the poetic irony that he passed
away the week before Black Swan even came out, so
he didn't even get to see it. Like it's very
like it's not all about Eve, but it's not not
all about you.

Speaker 3 (08:51):
It's wild. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (08:52):
I haven't seen Requiem for a Dream though, and I
don't think I want to.

Speaker 3 (08:56):
I have seen it many times. I am intimately familiar
with that I'm not sure why, because it's not the
type of thing that I tend to gravitate toward. But
I've seen it a bunch, and the similarities between Perfect
Blue and Requiem for a Dream are far more esthetic. Yeah,
he's like pulling direct shots slash like animation, the way

(09:18):
that a shot is framed.

Speaker 4 (09:19):
It's just pulling for the storyboards directly, right, pretty much.

Speaker 3 (09:22):
Yeah, and so he's replicating those for different shots in
Requiem for a Dream. The similarities between Perfect Blue and
Black Swan are far more like narrative and thematic. So
he's just, like, you know, stealing different components of Perfect
Blue for various of his movies. I have thought.

Speaker 4 (09:41):
I don't because I'm not an Aronofsky defender by any means,
but I am kind of a Black Swan defender. Yeah,
that's okay, and I do feel like it was meaningfully
different enough for me. But I also it's clearly he's
pulling from it, and I just wish he had just
said that, like the I think the problem was he
didn't admit it.

Speaker 3 (09:59):
I know that's the annoying thing.

Speaker 4 (10:00):
Because if you admitted it, I think the stories are
different enough that, especially if you're a big shot director,
why not shout out right someone who you are clearly
very influenced by. It almost is it's like an Aronofsky
problem versus a black Swan problem.

Speaker 3 (10:14):
Does that make sense? Yeah? Yeah, no, it's again, it's
like this happens all the time, where like a later
movie will pay homage to an earlier movie or be
influenced by an earlier movie, and it's just a matter
of like the creative mind behind the later movie admitting, like, yep,
I drew influence from this earlier thing, and then the
fact that he refuses to do that Aeronovsky does just don't.

Speaker 4 (10:37):
Be a white Harvard guy about it, which Aeronofsky struggles with,
right right, Yeah.

Speaker 3 (10:43):
No.

Speaker 5 (10:43):
I saw a YouTube video somebody had translated Satoshi Khan
having like sort of mini lectures about Perfect Blue, and
he directly talks about Darren Aronofsky and talks about how
he pulled like the bath scene, like yes, yeah, it's
very specifically pulled the bath scene, the bird's eye view

(11:06):
underwater view from Perfect Blue. And he was just sort
of laughing at the homage because he said that he
asked him about it, and then Darren was like, oh,
it's an homage and he's like, oh, I guess I
should also do homages to other people like that in
my films too, Like.

Speaker 4 (11:26):
It's so trick. I Yeah, there's a great piece on
a substack called animation Obsessive that like broke down the exact.

Speaker 3 (11:34):
Like, I don't know.

Speaker 4 (11:35):
The beautiful part of the Internet is someone has always
done the work for you. And yeah, the conflicting quotes
about because it also seems like Satoshi Khan felt different
about it at different points in his life, and that
towards the end of his life in particular, he was like, nah,
fuck this ooh. Also, I mean as early as the
two thousands after he first met Ronowski, he said, I'm

(11:56):
feeling pathetic. It's a pitiful tale when the person being
paid homage too has less name recognition, less social credibility,
and less budget to spend. So it seems like Satoshi
Khan's issue was at its core, like why not give
me credit? Like if you're so influenced by my work,
why can't I get my projects funded? Yeah, and there's

(12:18):
culture vulture stuff to be examined there too, we'll.

Speaker 3 (12:22):
Get back to.

Speaker 4 (12:22):
Sorry, So we got into the Aeronoski stuff immediately were.

Speaker 3 (12:26):
So all this to say, I did watch this movie.
I think we covered Black Swan back in like twenty nineteen,
so that's when I first saw Perfect Blue, and we
you know, talk about it a bit on that episode
as well, for any listeners who want to go back and.

Speaker 4 (12:42):
Live at the Bellhouse if I'm remembering right.

Speaker 3 (12:44):
Yes, indeed, yeah, so yeah, but that was my first
and kind of only exposure to Perfect Blue, and then
rewatched it a couple times to prep for this episode Jamie,
what about you? What's your relationship?

Speaker 4 (12:57):
I hadn't seen it before. Yeah, I think that's the
whole story. I have seen Satoshi Khan's last movie, Paprika,
because it recently. It must be having like some kind
of anniversary or something like that, because it like re
released at AMC's recently. I didn't see it there, but
it's I don't know, I've just been seeing it around
a lot, and so I didn't do a particularly like

(13:20):
intense careful view of it.

Speaker 3 (13:22):
But I saw his last.

Speaker 4 (13:24):
Movie and I had conflicted feelings about it, and then
this is his I believe, his first feature.

Speaker 3 (13:31):
That I like a lot.

Speaker 4 (13:33):
I mean, especially from just like an animation perspective. It's
so engrossing in a way that, like, I don't know
how many movies I've seen at all like that, especially
ones that are so short, and the way that he
animates the crisis that Memama is having. It, I just

(13:54):
have like, never seen anything quite like it. It's amazing
story wise. I got some questions that I'm excited to
talk to you about.

Speaker 3 (14:02):
Yes, let's take a quick break and then we'll jump
back into the recap and we're back. Oh, we're back.

Speaker 4 (14:21):
Let's talk about the events of Perfect Blue. Shall wait,
It's not complicated at all, Caitlan, I'm sure this was
a breeze to put together.

Speaker 3 (14:28):
I'm gonna have a very easy time.

Speaker 4 (14:30):
Although very short movie. I will say it's like eighty
less than I think if you take the credits out,
less than eighty minutes long. We're talking space jambling.

Speaker 3 (14:39):
Yeah, it's awesome. I love it. I'm delighted. Yeah that
it's socior More movies should be seventy seven minutes long. Yes,
content warning at the very top for things like sexual violence, rape, stalking, coercion.
The story takes place in Tokyo. I believe we open

(15:00):
on a performance by a pop girl group called Cham
exclamation Point, which has three members, one of whom Mina
seems to be the star of the group. She's idolized
by the fans. Also at this concert is a security
guard man who is leering very creepily at Mima, as

(15:26):
well as a group of young troublemaker men, and there's
an altercation between them and the creepy security guard.

Speaker 4 (15:38):
I am curious what you think about, like what level
of famous are they because it seems like they're kind
of famous, but I can't tell. They're performing at the mall,
Like I'm not like, are they maltor famous, which does
feel like a very nineties, ye two thousands convention of
like they're maltor famous, they're gonna go big time or not?

Speaker 1 (15:59):
Yeah, because I did Britney Spears do a mall tour before.
Oh yeah yeah, so like they could be on the
way up, because later we're hearing about them charting in
the top one hundred. But it's like in the eighties,
so I think they're like working their way up the
pop ranks.

Speaker 4 (16:15):
They're paying their damn dues. Yeah, yes, have any of
you ever been to a maltar?

Speaker 3 (16:21):
I mean they don't really happen anymore as far as
I know. But like I didn't know that was a thing.

Speaker 4 (16:26):
So no, I mean neither. Yeah, I feel like I
missed out on something. I caught the tail end of it.
And in middle school I got to go to a
degrassy malteur. Whoa wow, and that was so amazing, and
Drake was supposed to be there, but then he did
not show up.

Speaker 3 (16:43):
Oh my goodness.

Speaker 4 (16:44):
So it was just like one of the objectively kind
of flop cast members of De Grassy. But my cousin
and I were really excited.

Speaker 1 (16:53):
I would have been thrilled.

Speaker 3 (16:54):
That's amazing. Oh it's great, Jamie. You and I should
do a Bechdel cast mal tour.

Speaker 4 (16:59):
I honestly, it still does. I feel it's more like
outdoor malls, Like sometimes you'll catch like younger musician performing
at an outdoor mall. Indoor mall tours are washed though
it's a convention of the past.

Speaker 3 (17:11):
Sure fine, anyway, they're doing a mall tour and intercut
with this concert at the mall are I think these
are flashback scenes of Mema with her like talent manager
team discussing Mima's career. So there's a woman named Rumy

(17:32):
who wants Mima to stay in the pop group CHAM,
while mister Tatacoro wants Mima to pivot to acting and
is trying to land her a part in a TV
drama series. So back to the concert, Mima announces that
this is her last show with CHAM. The audience is like, no,

(17:55):
we love you, don't go, and then someone in the
crowd hands her an envelope. It's like fan mail kind
of thing. So Mima goes home to her small apartment,
she feeds her fish, and she opens the envelope and
inside is a letter saying I'm always looking at Mima's room.

(18:16):
Here's a link to it. But she doesn't know what
that means, and she doesn't know what the internet is,
so she just kind of brushes it off.

Speaker 4 (18:23):
Incredible imagine, I wish, I wish Yeah.

Speaker 3 (18:29):
And then she receives a fax remember fax machines, she
has one, and the facts is just like this print
out of sort of like ransom note style lettering. It
seems that just has the word trader written over and
over again. So clearly someone is upset that she left
the pop group and they're being very creepy about it.

(18:54):
Then we cut to the set of Double Bind, which
is the drama sere that Mima has landed a very
small role in.

Speaker 4 (19:04):
Which reminded me of Twin Peaks a little bit. There's
like a similar thing that happens in Twin Peaks. There's
a I had to look it up, but there's a
show within a show called Invitation to Love in Twin Peaks.

Speaker 3 (19:17):
I forgot about that.

Speaker 4 (19:20):
I don't know why it clicked for me, but it did.
And Twin Peaks was big in Japan.

Speaker 3 (19:24):
I don't know.

Speaker 4 (19:25):
There's a lot of cultural exchange going on.

Speaker 3 (19:27):
Sure, sure, for sure. Yeah. So Mima is playing the
younger sister of a woman who was murdered in the show,
so that's her character. She's nervous about her performance. She
sees that creepy security guard on the set of the show,
and then Mima's manager, Guy Tadakoro, opens an envelope that

(19:53):
turns out to contain a small explosive and he's injured,
and it seems like the envelope was intended for Mima.
So things are ramping up and he's kind of like.

Speaker 4 (20:04):
Ha ha, don't worry about it, right, if that happened
in my head, I would not be like, hah, don't
worry about it.

Speaker 1 (20:10):
Yeah, how is it just a prank? That's a straight
up threat.

Speaker 3 (20:14):
He's bleeding.

Speaker 2 (20:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (20:16):
I was like, wow, he really is dedicated to the game.
He's like, don't worry about it. It's just a scratch.

Speaker 3 (20:21):
I'm good tis but a scratch.

Speaker 5 (20:23):
So much blood on the floor and everything. It's just like, oh,
no worries, Yeah, okay.

Speaker 3 (20:30):
Everyone downplays it.

Speaker 4 (20:31):
Guess him self esteem man, when you text ha ha.
No worries. But there's lots of worries. There's only worries.
I mean, I guess.

Speaker 5 (20:39):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (20:40):
That's a lot of this movie.

Speaker 3 (20:41):
It's just like, yeah right. Roomy also is like, no,
don't even worry about it. We definitely shouldn't have called
the police. And yeah, Mima's the only one being like,
unlikely thing for Ruby to do. Interesting anyway. So a
few days later, Rumy comes over to Mima's apartment and
sets up a computer with the Internet ever heard of it?

Speaker 4 (21:04):
For mema fully branded, fully branded, like, here's a Macintosh computer.
I think they're using an actual browser that once existed too.
I was like, did mac pay to be the scary
computer for perfect.

Speaker 3 (21:17):
Blue maybe maybe interest Anyway, So Mima goes to that
link that she saw in the letter for that thing
called Mima's Room, and it turns out to be this
like blog slash diary thing where someone is writing about

(21:38):
Mima's life as if they are her and describing intimate
details about her life that you would only know if
you were a Mima or if you were stalking her.
So she's freaked out.

Speaker 4 (21:50):
For anyone that's ever had a scary paraspoxual experience, I
feel like that it's done really well here where she's like, oh,
this is so cool.

Speaker 3 (22:00):
Oh oh wait, there's.

Speaker 4 (22:02):
Like yeah, that's that's how that goes.

Speaker 3 (22:05):
Yeah. Yes. So then we cut to the set of
the show Double Bind again, Rumy and Tatakoro have another
conversation about Mima and her career. They learn that cham
is doing quite well without her, and they now have

(22:26):
a song on like the top one hundred list, which
they never had when Mima was a part of the group.
So they're sort of like this, Oh, did Mima do
the right thing? She's maybe having some hashtag ragretes kind
of thing. Though Mima is given a few more lines

(22:46):
on another episode of this show, so she returns to set.
The security guard seems to continue to be stalking her.
He's coming to set, he's videotaping her. Then the writer
of the show, mister Shibuya, writes a scene in which
Mima's character will be raped on the TV show. Rumy

(23:10):
doesn't want her to do the rape scene, but Tata
Quorro says it's important that Mima do this, so Mima
agrees to it. That night, on the Metro, Mima gets
a quick glimpse of her reflection, but it's not her reflection,
it's a different version of her in her like pop

(23:31):
girl outfit.

Speaker 4 (23:33):
Yeah, this is like one of the more obvious black
swan obviously ripped off, like this exact sequence.

Speaker 3 (23:39):
Yes. Then Mima is back on the set of Double
Bind shooting this rape scene and it is brutal. We
will talk more about it later, but it's very traumatic
for Mima, and the security guard is there watching the
whole thing. Mima goes home and has a breakdown. She

(24:02):
also discovers that her fish are dead, and it's like,
did someone kill them or did she just forget to
feed them again, We're not sure. She sees another vision
of this kind of like alternate version of herself, like
pop Idol Mima, and she's kind of real and kind
not because she's like floating and bouncing around not really

(24:25):
obeying the laws of gravity. So you're just like, is
this a hallucination? Is it a real person? We don't
really know. It also becomes clear that the security guard
is the one posting to Mima's room website and like
writing this diary under the alias Memania and similar to

(24:50):
the like pop Idle Vision Mima. He thinks it was
a mistake for Mima to leave the music group and
pursue acting. He's furious about it, and he maybe murders
the screenwriter about it, because that guy is brutally killed
one night, but we don't see who the assailant is.

Speaker 4 (25:12):
Yeah, but we hear cham yes, yes, cham on the
boombox haunting.

Speaker 3 (25:18):
Yeah. Again.

Speaker 4 (25:21):
It's just like it is so incredible, how seamless it
all kind of comes together of how many different sources
are literally put in words in Mima's mouth, whether it's
her fans or the screenwriter.

Speaker 3 (25:33):
I mean, at least for him.

Speaker 4 (25:34):
It's kind of hard to be like, oh no, the screenwriter,
like he's awful. Yeah, yeah, And who will mourn him.
But there are movies that try to say something simpler
that really bonk you over the head with it.

Speaker 3 (25:47):
But it just is so seamless here for sure. So
then Mima reluctantly participates in a nude photo shoot. Her
photos end up in magazine. The Stocker security guard buys
like all the copies of the magazine so that no

(26:07):
one else can see this version of Mima. He thinks
that she is an impostor, and the real Mima is
this like floating ethereal pop idol Mima. Cut back to
Mima filming scenes of Double Bind, where what's happening in

(26:27):
the show to Mima's character seems to be mimicking what's
happening to Mima in real life, where her character is
seeing things that aren't there and is confused about what's
real and what's not. And then real Mima sees pop
idle vision Mima again and starts chasing her, almost gets

(26:51):
hit by a bus or a truck or something.

Speaker 4 (26:53):
It should be said. At this point, pop Idle Mima
is wearing the outfit.

Speaker 3 (26:58):
Of the movie. Yes, red dress, not quite yet, She's
still We're not at red dress. We're not yet yeah,
there's so many sequels.

Speaker 4 (27:06):
Okay, well, buckle in, because I was really dazzled by
the Red Dress. It's so far beyond the point that
I'm like, let's take a moment for.

Speaker 3 (27:14):
The red dress. Yeah, it's currently still the like pink
and white dress. Yeah, still iconic, but for sure, but
not quite not the red dress. Right anyway, So there's
this whole chase sequence. But wait a minute, was it
just a dream? I don't know. Then Mima has a

(27:36):
conversation with Rumy about her distorted perception of reality. Then
that scene abruptly transitions to Mima back on set shooting
the same scene we just saw her shoot or was
that a dream? And then Mima's having another conversation with
Rumy and was that a dream? So basically, Mima's grasp
on reality is really falling apart. Cut to the psychiatrist's

(28:01):
character in Double bind saying that the murderer character in
the show is just an illusion that Mima's character fabricated.
But maybe that illusion found someone to possess and that's
who's killing all of the models in the show. Or
maybe Mima's character has dissociative identity disorder and it was

(28:24):
her committing the crimes when she's a different persona, and
that one such persona is a former pop idol turned
actor working in a drama series, and we're like, wait,
is that what's happening to Mima in real life?

Speaker 4 (28:41):
I had to rewatch that secuence like four times and
I'm still at the end. Was like, huh, we don't know,
and we're not supposed to know. Yeah, I know, but
I was like, I'll figure it out.

Speaker 3 (28:53):
No, no, no no. Then another man is brutally murdered,
I think the photographer who did the nude photo shoot.

Speaker 4 (29:04):
Yeah, with the iconic lass line, you're a weird pizza guy,
pizza boy, You're a weird pizza boy.

Speaker 3 (29:12):
And then curtainstead.

Speaker 5 (29:14):
Yeah, stab ice pick wow, yes, god you brutal death.

Speaker 3 (29:20):
Yeah, very basic instinct murder weapon. Anyway, so it seems
like maybe Mima is the weird pizza boy murderer, or
maybe that was just a delusion because she wakes up
from a nightmare. But then she also finds bloody clothes
in her closet, so maybe she is murdering. We don't know.

(29:44):
They finish shooting double bind and at this point Mima
like truly has no idea what's real and what is not.
Then the security guard abducts Mima. There's another brutal assault
scene the so Mima is able to fight him off
and get away. But wait, was that real or was

(30:06):
that a scene that they were shooting for Doublebind? We
don't know. And then we get a reveal that the
floating pop Idol vision version of Mima was maybe roomy
this whole time. And this is the Red Dress sequence
right now, we're there, Yeah, a moment for the Red Dress. Yes, yes,

(30:31):
it seems like maybe Rumy is trying to live vicariously
through Mima because Rumy is also a former pop idol
something that I didn't really pick up on from watching
the movie, but it's something I kept reading when I
was doing research for this movie. So it's one quick exchange.

Speaker 1 (30:52):
Okay, it's like one line, like when they're initially talking
about Mema pivoting into becoming an actress. I because I
think mister Tatacuorro says something about like, oh just because
like it didn't work out for you or something. It's
like something along those lines.

Speaker 5 (31:06):
Okay, yeah, yeah, got it, Like apparently she didn't fit
the beauty standards, and so that's why she ended up
having to quit or stop being an idol.

Speaker 4 (31:17):
I see, and that seems and it's like the I
don't know, I'm excited to talk about Roomy. Yes, same,
but this is like super common in entertainment, Like how
painful it has to be to be facilitating this for
other people and knowing all of the shortcomings and still
having to be like, nope, this is great. Great is
business in the world, Like you might find yourself putting

(31:41):
the red dress onto.

Speaker 3 (31:42):
I don't know. Oh yeah. So Roomy attacks Mima. They
start fighting. There's a chase sequence, but also like pop idol,
Mima is sometimes roomy and she's floating around again, and
we're like, wait, is this real? And it all culminates

(32:05):
in Roomy impaling herself on shards of glass and then
nearly being hit by a truck, but Mima pushes her
out of the way and saves her, and then we
cut to some time later. Both Mima and Rumy have
survived their multiple stab wounds. Mima visits Roumy, who is

(32:27):
a patient at a psychiatric hospital, fully convinced that she
is a pop idol. Mima, on the other hand, is
now a famous actor, and the movie ends with her
looking at herself in the rear view mirror of her
car being like, I'm real because she had overheard like

(32:49):
nurses at the hospital being like, is that the real Mima?
There's no way she would be here, and she's like, no,
I am real.

Speaker 4 (32:56):
Wink the end cue amazing credits music. So good.

Speaker 3 (33:03):
Oh yeah, yeah, So that's the movie. Let's take another
quick break and we'll come back to discuss, and we're back.

Speaker 4 (33:21):
We're back, chi kid, Jana, I will'll let you take
the reins here. Where would you like to start? There's
so much to talk about. Where does one begin with?

Speaker 1 (33:30):
Perfectly, Caitlin, I.

Speaker 4 (33:33):
Wanted to That was a really good summary given the
challenge you were up against.

Speaker 3 (33:38):
Yes, I really worked hard on it. It could not
have been easy.

Speaker 5 (33:43):
Chef's Kiss, especially the dream part where it was like,
oh wait, is she waking up? Did this happen? And
then again and.

Speaker 4 (33:50):
Then every two lines you have to be like or
is it right?

Speaker 3 (33:54):
Or is it It was definitely hard to summarize. But
there are different scenes in the movie where either like
Rumy or Tadakoro or like I can tell how hard
you tried Mima, and I feel like that. I'm like,
I tried so hard with this recap, so I'm glad
it went well.

Speaker 4 (34:13):
We could start by finishing the conversation we apparently were
very eager to have, which is the Aronofsky. Sure thing, Yeah,
I guess is there anything else that we wanted to
say to that? And I think the thing that stuck
out to me that like I hadn't read about but
it clicks very fast, is like this period of time.

(34:37):
This movie comes out in nineteen ninety seven.

Speaker 3 (34:41):
Same year as Titanic and my brother Wow, and so
a lot of incredible debuts this year, but that this
is a period of time that again I'm referring to
this animation obsessive post that we can link in the
description where there was a lot of movies and film

(35:01):
in the US and Japan about reality fuckery and double
images in a way that I mean, I think this
is like a really strong example that it's someone usually
a white American, borrowing too heavily from another artist.

Speaker 4 (35:20):
The example that I didn't know because I just I
am not a huge matrix head, but was how heavily
the witch House Keys were pulling from ghosts in the
Shell when pitching the Matrix, and that the Matrix, while
Ghost in the Shell, I think, did well, but like
the Matrix became this global phenomenon, and there is this

(35:41):
pattern of white American directors I think, really blurring the
line between homage and.

Speaker 3 (35:49):
Just lifting stealing.

Speaker 4 (35:51):
Yeah, I mean everyone's mileage is going to vary their
I don't even know how to feel about it in
certain places, I think narratively, I don't know.

Speaker 3 (35:59):
I hope that.

Speaker 4 (36:00):
I feel like Black Swan is different enough from Perfect Blue,
there are obvious similarities. I think that Aronofsky definitely needed
to acknowledge this influence and even better credit and compensate
Satoshi Khan in some way. Yeah, I think these are

(36:21):
two great movies that I don't know. I can see
that Aernofsky is also pulling from stuff that is not
Perfect Blue and Black Swan.

Speaker 3 (36:30):
For example, Swan Lake, he.

Speaker 4 (36:34):
Is pulling from pretty heavily that also features dueling images
and personas. Like I think Perfect Blue is a very
very clear, heavy influence, and it was insecure and gross
and disrespectful that he did not properly credit Satoshi Khan
for the influence he had in the work. But I

(36:55):
also don't fully buy that Black Swan's fully ripped off
of Perfect Blue due to the Swan like of it all.

Speaker 3 (37:01):
I don't know. Fair Yeah, he basically just like swapped
out this drama series Double Bind, and he's like, instead
of that, what if Swan Lake?

Speaker 4 (37:12):
Well, I don't know, because Perfect Blue is about a
forced career pivot. Yeah, Black Swan is more of a
promotion within a system, true true, which again does feel
like the dynamics of that are pretty different.

Speaker 3 (37:26):
I want to talk about the dynamics in Perfect.

Speaker 4 (37:28):
Blue of like this pivot. Yeah, that seems to be
happening basically against her will. I know that she's not
technically a child star. They say that she's twenty one, right,
but I feel like the dynamics of child stardom are
really present here.

Speaker 3 (37:44):
Yeah. Yeah, because it says that she was in She
started in Cham two and a half years ago, so
she would have been you know, like eighteen nineteen, so
she kind of started as like a teen star at
the very least, so very young. Yeah yeah, yeah, just
to provide a little bit more context on the development
of this movie, and then yeah, we can get into
more theme stuff. So this source material was originally supposed

(38:10):
to be adapted to a live action film. Sotoshi Khan
was approached and he agreed to do it, but there
were funding issues, so the project kept getting like quote
unquote downgraded to animated film, and the idea was that

(38:31):
Satoshi Kan basically had to make it as a straight
to video animated film. He took the source material and
the first version of the script, which was written by
Sadyuka Marai, and made quite a few changes to it,
but then he and the screenwriter worked together to write

(38:54):
a new script that introduces different things that Satoshi Kan
wanted to play around with, such as the like play
within a play component, the blurred lines between reality and dream.
He wanted to focus more on the main character, Mima's
inner struggle, things like that, and part of it was

(39:17):
that psychological thrillers were not a mainstream genre in anime
at the time, so there was like no real precedent
for this story to be adapted to an animated film.

Speaker 4 (39:31):
Which is how perhaps a young Chica ends up watching
it by accident.

Speaker 3 (39:37):
It's not what you would expect, it's right, and it
wasn't expected to do well at all. Everyone thought that
this movie would be immediately forgotten.

Speaker 4 (39:46):
Well, and it kind of didn't do well when it
first came out.

Speaker 3 (39:49):
No, but then it ended up like screening at various
festivals around the world and it gained a following. There's
some other like interesting distribution stuff, but it's not so
super relevant to our discussion. But yeah, so that's kind
of the context. As we hinted at, there's all these
themes that get explored. There's like things around the pressures

(40:12):
of becoming a celebrity, the pressure to acquiesce to the
demands of powerful entertainment industry people, the idea of like
becoming a commodity to be bought and sold, and.

Speaker 4 (40:28):
The idea that like there's like this repeated idea that
Mima should be grateful that this is happening, which is
obviously something we still see all the time, particularly with
young women, like it is critical that she does not acknowledge.

Speaker 3 (40:48):
The parts of this that are difficult or.

Speaker 4 (40:50):
You're ungrateful, and like again, it's from all of these
different angles. She needs to appease her agents because she should,
Like she says it explicitly at one point, like, well,
they've done so much for me, Like who am I
to push back?

Speaker 3 (41:05):
On what they want. Mm hmm.

Speaker 4 (41:07):
Same thing with her fans, where they're you know, it's
hard to cross a line more severely than her fans are,
but she has to be grateful for them. And then
there's like a line again that's explicitly like the fans
know what is best for you and we are going
to which is such a fan mentality. Oh like name

(41:27):
of fandom Where this is not present somewhere, it feels
like it really clearly understands contemporary internet culture, which is wild.

Speaker 1 (41:39):
Yeah for how old it is.

Speaker 3 (41:40):
Yeah. Yeah. There's another scene also where it's before the
photo shoot where Memon knows that she'll be photographed nude.
She has locked herself in her dressing room. She seems
very apprehensive about it, and Tadakoro is like pounding on
the door, being like, I thought you decided to go

(42:01):
through with this. Everyone's waiting for you. So just like
the pressure she feels, people are coercing her, not letting
her change her mind. It's all stuff that again like
still happens to this day. There's a long history of
people in the entertainment industry, particularly people of marginalized genders

(42:23):
and marginalized people in general. Being taken advantage of and
heavily exploited.

Speaker 4 (42:29):
And then asked to say thank you.

Speaker 1 (42:31):
Basically yeah, yeah.

Speaker 5 (42:33):
I think they even have like after she has to
do the rape scene, they essentially have her go on
this press tour talking about how she wants to be
a serious actress, and they had I think, just prior
to it even happening, Tadakuro is talking about Jodie Foster,

(42:54):
which I was just like, oh yes, oh okay, which
I was just like, I know more of her later work,
but I was like, let me go look back at
like in and around the time Perfect Blue was being made,
and I guess she had won an Oscar for the
Acquired where she was playing a character that ended up

(43:15):
getting raped.

Speaker 3 (43:17):
Oh wow, okay, and.

Speaker 5 (43:18):
Like the movies about like the legal case behind that
and her like trying to win that, and so it's
just like, oh, okay, there are more cultural ties within
this than I had originally thought of.

Speaker 4 (43:33):
I didn't know that specific I thought that was like
referencing the fact that she'd been a child start, but
like that totally makes oh my god, that's brutal.

Speaker 3 (43:43):
I thought it was referencing specifically her character in Taxi
driver where she plays like an underage sex worker.

Speaker 4 (43:50):
Right, But yeah, I think I can really only speak
to American culture with any sort of detail. But this
career phase that we're seeing Mima in we see all
the time. We still see now. It's like, what we
see with Mima is how something like this can go

(44:10):
when you don't have proper support. Yeah, you could really
kind of name any Disney or Nickelodeon pipeline child star
to go in quote unquote legit as a young adult
as an example of this. And sometimes it seems like,
again we just don't know. It seems like the young

(44:34):
actor has the support. Familiarly, we don't really see Mima's family.
She references them once and she's like, they probably won't
like seeing me get sexually assaulted on TV, but whatever,
Like her family is not engaged.

Speaker 1 (44:49):
Yeah, it seemed like when she was originally doing the pivot,
the career pivot, it seems like she was excited about acting,
like this new prospect of it, and she has that
phone call with her mother, and her mom's essentially like
putting all of that down, like guilting her about not
being a singer, saying how the whole family was waiting
on the next single and saying that's singing is what

(45:10):
you do best. So it almost feels like even if
she wanted to lean on her family for support, like
maybe she wouldn't get it because it's like, oh, well,
you made this choice. Now these are the consequences. You know.
It feels like she might get that kind of response.

Speaker 3 (45:23):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (45:23):
Yeah, like her just trying to I feel like her
becoming an idol was an uphill battle, and so now
her wanting to do something else, it's just like, but
we're used to you being an idol. Now we actually
like it now, like why would you change? And you know,
it's good to want to change, but then it's also

(45:44):
just as good to have people be able to accept
different versions of you.

Speaker 3 (45:49):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (45:50):
I also want to just note really quickly before any
of the listeners like read me the Riot Act the
Jodie Foster film is the accused. It's not the acquired.

Speaker 3 (45:59):
My bad. Okay, Okay, you're fine, you're fine. We didn't
know what existed, you're goodding, Yeah, didn't know the difference.

Speaker 4 (46:07):
I think this was like what struck me?

Speaker 3 (46:09):
Well, what do you think?

Speaker 4 (46:10):
Like it seems like Mima prefers to be a pop
idol to being a serious actress. But the more the
movie went on, I'm like, we never really hear her
explicitly state what she wants exactly. Yeah, we hear that
her family and obviously her fans and Roomy want her
to be a pop idol, and they have their reasons,

(46:32):
and that her agent and the director it's they want
her to be an actress. We don't really know, like
we can guess what Mima wants, but she's very young.
She's so like understandably sort of like pulling her hair
out over wanting to please everyone in an industry where
that's completely impossible. And I just it made me so

(46:53):
sad because like, I don't who knows what she wants.

Speaker 3 (46:56):
She probably doesn't know she exactly. Like she's still young
enough to be quite impressionable and not that young people
and you know, early twenties people can't have autonomy, but
like she is in a juncture in her life and
career where she thinks she needs to be listening to

(47:19):
the people who have more power and experience than her.

Speaker 4 (47:23):
Right, Like her entire adult life has been defined by
trying to please everyone, which is like obviously like a
super common experience, just rarely at this level. I do
like that they don't make her super super famous though,
because I do think that that makes her uniquely vulnerable, right,
because she does have these fans that she feels still

(47:47):
kind of accessible to, because she's still performing at the mall,
she still has her own shopping, she's still like she
lives in like a pretty normal looking apartment.

Speaker 3 (47:55):
Yeah, a studio apartment question Mark.

Speaker 4 (47:58):
Yeah, Like, I mean, but that's I can see that
being true. There's I mean, pop groups of the nineties
didn't make money at first. It was usually like their
managers that made money. Yeah, So it's like she's kind
of living a normal life, but also she's not and
there's no one protecting her. It's like a very kind

(48:19):
of scary level of notoriety to be at.

Speaker 5 (48:23):
It seems like, Yeah, it made me feel more critical
of like that kind of pop star to sex symbol
transition that a lot of musicians like go through all
of the time. I know, especially like the Disney Stars.
It's like, Okay, they did Disney and then it's like, Okay,
I'm breaking out. I'm grown now, so I'm either going

(48:47):
to put out like more sexually charged music or maybe
they will pivot into acting and doing very serious roles.
But I never thought that. I think I was just
under the impression that was something that they wanted. I
never thought that maybe that transition itself could be manufactured

(49:09):
for the benefit of other people.

Speaker 3 (49:11):
Well, I got the impression, and maybe this is just
kind of like my head canon, but that it wasn't
Mima's idea at all to leave the group and pivot
to acting. It's what her managers and specifically mister Tadakoro
thought it was best because there's different conversations about how,
you know, pop idols are not taken seriously. And then

(49:35):
like the gap that my mind filled in is, oh,
probably because it's a medium of entertainment that tends to
appeal to people of marginalized genders and sexualities girls, so
she has to become a quote unquote serious actress doing
dramatic roles.

Speaker 4 (49:51):
Yeah, it seems like he's just trying to like flesh
out his like roster. And also it's so bizarre how
many times he's like, well, girl groups aren't serious, one
of the two remaining members of.

Speaker 3 (50:01):
The girl group. Yeah, yeah, right, But the idea is
that also that pop stars at least at the level
that they're at, and as we see evidenced by the
studio apartment that Mima lives in, like, they don't make
much money, but actors make more money. So it seems
like part of Tadacoro's motivation for wanting Mema to pivot

(50:23):
to acting is so that he can exploit her more
and make more money off of her. And it goes
back to the whole like commodifying human beings thing. And
there's all these scenes where they are talking about Mema
as if she is a commodity. Sometimes Mima will be
in the room, sometimes she's not there, but either way,

(50:44):
they're never treating her like a person. They're never considering
her feelings and her comfort level and what she wants.
They're just like, and then we're doing this for you,
and then we landed you this role and you are
quitting the group and did it. All this stuff it's
just again very endble of what happens a lot in
real life.

Speaker 4 (51:03):
And Mima, like, I think of like a scene that
the towards the very beginning with Rumy and Tatacuoro, where
you know, I think that we are sort of led
to believe I mean intentionally by the movie that Rumy
has more what's in Mima's best interest? She you know,
a broken clock is right twice a day, where you know,

(51:26):
I agree with Rumy. When Rumy is like, you shouldn't
have to be in this really exploitive rape scene if
you are not completely comfortable with it, which Mima is not,
but she is afraid to say so. Rumy tries to
give her the opportunity to bow out of it. But
the reason she does that has to do with her.

(51:46):
It doesn't have to do with Mema and so. But
just anyways, that scene at the beginning where Mima is
just sitting there and like passively listening to them argue
over her future, like that's normal for her, That's It's like,
clearly that is just the dynamic that she has been
conditioned to feel like she should be grateful to have
in the first place.

Speaker 3 (52:08):
I just I love her.

Speaker 1 (52:11):
I know.

Speaker 3 (52:13):
I want to talk more about the rape scene, and
again we'll place another content warning here because it is long,
it's brutal. It being animated does not make it any
less hard to watch. I'm interested in everyone's thoughts on this,
but to me, there was a troubling kind of visual

(52:38):
juxtaposition of on one hand, it's clear how horrific this
is for Mima, and as you're watching it, you're often
forgetting it's a staged scene that they're filming for TV.
Oftentimes you're just like, oh, this feels like an actual

(52:59):
rape that I'm watching, So it's it's really traumatic and brutal.
But on the other hand, the way it's like quote
unquote shot slash animated is in a way that is
similar to how a lot of porn is shot. Like
it seems to be reveling in the in the sexual violence,

(53:20):
but like this emphasis on the sexual the like you know,
it's almost presented in a way that it's like this
is sexy, right, Like the way it's framed Again, is
this weird juxtaposition between like this is horrific, but also
like look at how like I don't know, I don't
know if I'm making sense. Yeah, no, it's it's I

(53:42):
don't like it. I don't like it.

Speaker 1 (53:45):
Yeah, me neither.

Speaker 3 (53:46):
It feels very exploitative to me.

Speaker 4 (53:48):
It was the case of like attempting to comment on
the thing, but then just kind of doing it right. Yeah,
I didn't think that there was the commentary around that
was not meaningful enough. I don't know if there is
any Maybe that's my hot take.

Speaker 3 (54:06):
It's like, I don't know if.

Speaker 4 (54:07):
There's really any explanation of staging a sequence like that,
even an animation where it is making meaningful commentary enough
to justify it happening.

Speaker 3 (54:18):
I just don't think that's true.

Speaker 4 (54:20):
And I always especially side eye it when it's like
men men, men at the top, I'm like, yeah.

Speaker 3 (54:25):
Well, where the fuck do you get off?

Speaker 4 (54:27):
Yeah, Like, I just didn't.

Speaker 3 (54:30):
I didn't like it. I didn't think it said anything.

Speaker 1 (54:33):
Yeah, I'm very much with you on that. I think
something that, at least for me, made it. We know
it's fake, we know it's staged and it's acting. I'm
doing air quotes for people who can't see. Yeah, but
I think the reason why it feels so real is
because we know that she's uncomfortable filming it, so it
may as well be real. The fact that it goes

(54:56):
on for so long and it's like, you know, she's
just so she eating to cope like that is that
is real. That is real trauma happening to this person,
and we're experiencing it too, And also, like Jamie was saying,
just knowing like men made this scene is also I like,
I feel violated a little bit watching that as a woman,

(55:18):
you know, mm hmm.

Speaker 5 (55:19):
I was also very uncomfortable, and I was just kind
of like, when is it in?

Speaker 3 (55:24):
Like okay, yeah, yeah, when does it? It's so long?

Speaker 5 (55:29):
Once the light went out of her eye, I'm just like,
I think it's done.

Speaker 3 (55:32):
We get it.

Speaker 1 (55:33):
Yeah, Yeah, the point was made. The point was made.
Like I I literally had tears in my eyes watching
that scene, and it took me off guard to be like,
oh I'm crying like that. It really affected me.

Speaker 3 (55:43):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (55:44):
The one thing that I will say is that that
sequence made me at least grateful that this was not
adapted into live action.

Speaker 3 (55:52):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (55:53):
Right, But that's about all I can say for it,
I think.

Speaker 3 (55:58):
Yeah, I mean, and to your point, Jamie, I did consider, like, well,
this is a show within a movie, so perhaps it
is the movie perfect Blue commenting on the way that
other media tends to, you know, like glamorize, slash, pornografy rape,

(56:19):
or if it's just the movie also doing that. And
I did read that Satashi Khan made the like, you know,
show within the movie Double Bind as a sort of
like parody, like his intention was to criticize Japanese TV
dramas that tend to like imitate Hollywood fads and tropes,

(56:42):
and that he was aware of movies like Basic Instinct
and Silence of the Lambs and things like that. Well sure,
but again it's also the movie still showing this very exploitative,
very again pornografied rape scene. And I'm not saying this
to like disporn inherently, but just the way that like,

(57:07):
again I'm not articulating myself. Well, but you're watching the
scene and you're just like, oh, why are her like
titties bouncing so pornographically? Yeah? Right, and why does the
murder sound like sex? Yeah? Sorry, you know what I mean.

Speaker 4 (57:25):
It's just, yeah, I don't think that he because we.

Speaker 3 (57:29):
All know what he's referencing. Mm hmm.

Speaker 4 (57:32):
But at some point it's just like, I don't really
care what men think of that scene in general. Yeah, yes,
I'm not saying that men. Obviously, I have people of
all genders are affected by this, but in general, I'm
not really interested in what straight men think about that scene.
I do hope that it would make them uncomfortable, and

(57:53):
I wonder if that is like more what Stashi Kam
was going for is to take who would normally be
the intended audience for stuff like that and really make
them sit and consider, well, what if the actor performing
this didn't want to do it? And maybe that was
more where his head is at. But as someone who

(58:14):
like that content is not made for me and I
don't like it, I felt like punished and really made
uncomfortable by it.

Speaker 5 (58:24):
Yeah, yeah, I'll say that in the lecture series that
I like saw about it, which it's like, I'm glad
I watched it just because it provided me with more
context on this, and I think that's the thing, like
I had to watch this on streaming essentially, but we
don't get access to like, you know, those DVD extras

(58:47):
of like people talking about the scenes or talking about
stuff like that. But when he was talking about the
rape scene, he said, he said he went too far,
and that when he was making Perfect Blue, he was
not under the impression that it was going to be
like widely released. He thought it was going to be
like a home released type of thing, and so when

(59:11):
he saw the scene and it's like on a theater
side screen, he was like uncomfortable with it. Yeah, And
he essentially was saying that the rape scene itself was
like the death of her pop idol persona, which is
why like when she ends up being in like the

(59:34):
dressing room and she's wearing all black and stuff, because
she's mourning that version of herself like before it happened.
And so I was just like, oh, okay, well, I'm
glad you were uncomfortable because so was that right?

Speaker 1 (59:50):
We appreciate a self aware king.

Speaker 4 (59:53):
I do appreciate that he I mean, I wish more
directors were willing to like interact because it's like, you know,
it doesn't excuse it.

Speaker 3 (01:00:01):
But the nineties, I mean, that's.

Speaker 4 (01:00:03):
A lot of what he's referencing, Like erotic thrillers in
the eighties and nineties were.

Speaker 3 (01:00:08):
Full of shit like this.

Speaker 4 (01:00:09):
I am interested that about because I hadn't I hadn't
seen that quote, and I guess something that I don't
quite know. I'm just curious what you all think, because
I was like, eh, am, I okay. There feels like
there's sort of this more conservative idea than most of
this movie holds up, that her being sexually assaulted in
reality or on screen means that she is permanently damaged.

(01:00:35):
Good the idea that once something horrific has happened to
you that was completely out of your control, you can
no longer sing pop music, question work. I just find
that to be a very weirdly patriarchal idea that it
doesn't feel like the movie's really pushing back on. I

(01:00:55):
don't know, because it's obviously like I'm a survivor of
it myself. It certainly changes your life in many many ways,
but I don't really like the implication that it means
that you cannot return to your passions or and you
have a total and permanent loss of self, because I

(01:01:19):
just don't think that's true. I was sort of like,
maybe I'm overly projecting, but it didn't feel like that
idea was pushed back on very much.

Speaker 3 (01:01:27):
Yeah, I mean, we've talked about this on different episodes,
and it's almost always media written and directed by men,
where there will be someone, usually a woman, who is
a survivor of sexual assault, and that is her defining
trait as a character. That's kind of the only thing

(01:01:48):
we know about her, that's what's motivating her every choice,
and that is obviously not true for survivors of sexual
assault in real life. But there's just this tendency to
like revel in sexual violence, and that manifests in different ways.

(01:02:08):
It manifests how a rape seem will be framed, It
manifests how a survivor will be characterized. But it's just, yeah,
it's a lot of men not knowing how this actually
manifests for real survivors.

Speaker 5 (01:02:25):
Definitely. I think there's just also this overall idea of
Mema trying to find out who she is, but it's like,
who is Mima without the male gaze. At one point,
she's this pop idol and she's put on this pedestal
by her fans, which are mostly like men. Then she's

(01:02:49):
doing this TV series Double Bind, and she is now
following this script by this man where if she's leading
her pop girl image, if she wants to be taken seriously,
then I'll add a rape scene and she has to
access out and then even when the scene was happening,

(01:03:13):
So so she kind of had mentioned the fact that
it's also a commentary sort of on like the amount
of spectators that come, because I guess this was I mean,
since it's in the nineties, I don't know if intimacy
coordinators existed in the nineties, Nah, I did not, But
it's like pre intimacy coordinators, pre security because who are

(01:03:36):
all of these random people that are not normally there?
That's not like Crewe and.

Speaker 3 (01:03:41):
The one security guard is is her number one stalker?

Speaker 4 (01:03:44):
Yeah yeah, And that part felt like intentional commentary, But
again it's like, if that's his intentional commentary, that still
doesn't justify showing a long exploitative rape.

Speaker 3 (01:03:56):
Yeah yeah, scene.

Speaker 4 (01:03:57):
Okay, I'm glad we're all on the same page about
that because I was, like I was, but it's such
a good movie, and also that happens in it, right,
This kind of switches focus to Roomy a little bit.
I'm curious what everyone thinks about Roomy, because again, I
think it was kind of a mixed bag for me,
where I think that there is some interesting commentary going

(01:04:18):
on with Rumy, but I also feel like there are
some tropes at play because.

Speaker 3 (01:04:23):
We don't really know her well enough.

Speaker 4 (01:04:26):
We get like that little information that she had briefly
been a pop idol or she was aspiring to be bigger,
and then Tadakuoro just basically says it didn't work out
for you, But it's implied that it has to do
with her looks and her body type, and that she's
almost trying to like live out this dream she couldn't
have through Mima.

Speaker 3 (01:04:50):
I don't know, how do we feel?

Speaker 1 (01:04:52):
I was confused about the direction they took Roomy because like,
it's an interesting twist for sure to be like, oh,
like Rumy's jealous of her. I think the hardest left
for me is I think they heavily implied, because you
know they're doing the double bind, has this plot an
idea going on, and it's also being mimicked by real life.

(01:05:15):
Is it determined at the end when Rumy is in
the mental hospital that she has the ID. I don't
because I think that's heavily implied. I think it's implied, Okay,
because that really bothers me. Yes, I like that's something
we talk about on the show a lot.

Speaker 4 (01:05:30):
Is like, Yeah, obviously you don't want to say mental
illness in film is off limits, but if you're doing
something like this, do not attribute it to a specific
mental illness.

Speaker 3 (01:05:41):
Yes.

Speaker 4 (01:05:42):
I think the ultimate example of that for me is
the opening sequence of Midsommar, and at the end they're
like bipolar and you're.

Speaker 3 (01:05:49):
Like, no, all right, No.

Speaker 4 (01:05:52):
I wasn't sure if that was suggested in I mean,
I was confused.

Speaker 3 (01:05:55):
It's a confusing movie.

Speaker 4 (01:05:56):
I didn't know if that was happening in the text
of the TV show because TV shows do that all
the time and it was commentary, or if they were
just saying that this is how did manifests.

Speaker 3 (01:06:09):
Or if this scene where Mima is going to visit
Roomy at this hospital, if that's just another figment of
Mima's imagination and this is her kind of compartmentalizing that
persona or like, we don't know, especially with the little
like wink and nod at the end where Mima looks
in the mirror and she's like I'm real and it's like.

Speaker 5 (01:06:31):
But are you?

Speaker 4 (01:06:32):
We don't know.

Speaker 3 (01:06:33):
But either way, there is certainly, I think a demonization
of mental illness and specifically of dissociative identity disorder, and
it's implying that if you have this, you're going to murder.

Speaker 1 (01:06:48):
Yeah. I think like they had said something about like
sometimes the regular Roomy comes back and then like sometimes
she's someone else. I thought that they had said something
like that towards the end which it really implies the
DD thing. Yeah right, I know, like back then there
was more of a misunderstanding on the disorder and so
people were using it as like plot points.

Speaker 3 (01:07:09):
Oh but it's I mean, I'm not.

Speaker 1 (01:07:11):
At all excusing that because it's equally frustrating, but yeah,
I didn't like the usage of that at all.

Speaker 5 (01:07:17):
It made me think of because I think that was
also just before the film came out, like when Selena
was murdered.

Speaker 3 (01:07:26):
Yes, yeah, I thought that as well.

Speaker 5 (01:07:29):
Like I haven't seen any quotes from him, being like
I saw that and then I decided Rumy is going
to partially be inspired by.

Speaker 3 (01:07:40):
I like Yolanda Salzavar, I thought that too.

Speaker 5 (01:07:42):
Yeah, but yeah, I don't like how they kind of
demonize mental illness and stuff, and like, of course we
don't get to see a trial or anything like that.
But then it's just like, okay, well there was mister Shibuya,
there was Tata Korro, there was the me Mania guy, Like.

Speaker 3 (01:08:03):
Right, what was going on there? I also think in
regards to Rumy's character, that there is fat phobia in
that she is a little thicker than your typical, you know,
beauty standard super thin woman.

Speaker 4 (01:08:20):
And it's implied that that's part of why she wasn't successful, right, yeah,
which is a.

Speaker 3 (01:08:25):
Thing that happens, but that this has led to this
deep murderous resentment and the fact that she's the only
you know, female character who has a bigger body, and
that she's this delusional, resentful killer.

Speaker 4 (01:08:39):
I didn't like that trace at all. And also just
that her stalker, who's the security guard, is physically othered
in a way that feels like it's telegraphing, like well,
because he is not conventionally like western beauty standards handsome,
of course he would do this Like there is just
that you know that hmm. Some we've seen in villains

(01:09:02):
from time immemorial of physically uthering someone as a shorthand
to say like, don't trust this person, and they're trying
to hurt the beautiful, virginal young woman.

Speaker 3 (01:09:16):
It's like hundreds of thousands of movies.

Speaker 4 (01:09:18):
But it's again, there's just like these really basic othering
tropes that this movie is not above including.

Speaker 3 (01:09:27):
So the young men who are causing trouble at the
concert at the very beginning, the main instigator of this
trouble making is a darker skinned person has hair that
looks kind of like dreadlocks. It seems like it might
be a black character. And I don't know a lot

(01:09:48):
about anti black racism in Japan specifically, but I do
know that it exists everywhere around the world, and it
just feels like a very racist choice for the one
or at least dark skinned character to be this like violent. Yeah,
he's you know, punching people, he's threatening people in the crowd.

(01:10:10):
It feels like it's just playing into very racist tropes.

Speaker 5 (01:10:14):
Yeah, and throwing things on stage two. Yeah, which people
are doing that came back. I don't know why they
are doing that again now.

Speaker 4 (01:10:21):
Yeah, like we whipping bottles at puffsters.

Speaker 3 (01:10:24):
Or cell phones. Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:10:26):
But yeah, and then he was the he was Memnia's
first victim too, I believe.

Speaker 3 (01:10:33):
Yeah, it's so subtle, but there's just like a little
like poster somewhere and it's implying that that young man
is like missing or maybe has been murdered. But yeah,
that happens off screen, but we do see this like
image of that young guy as if he has been
abducted or murdered. Yeah. Another thing was and again not

(01:10:57):
clear if this is the movie. Commenting on media tropes,
or if it's just the movie doing the trope or
a little bit of both. But the TV drama series
that Mima gets cast in, Mima plays a character whose
older sister has been murdered, and in one of the
episodes we learn that the sister was murdered by this

(01:11:22):
I don't know if it was a serial killer or what,
but someone who kills women and peels off their skin
because he wants to wear it in order to become
a woman, or at least that's what the psychiatrist's character speculates.
And it's the whole, you know, transphobic silence of the
Lambs storyline, where a person who was assigned male at

(01:11:45):
birth murders cis women to wear their skin and become
a woman. Again, we don't know if it's just like
that's almost satire in the movies, like commenting on this trope,
or it's just doing the trope, but it's certainly there.

Speaker 4 (01:12:04):
Yeah, and this is maybe too hard of a line,
but like I feel like if you cannot discern that answer,
then it's you're just doing the trope.

Speaker 3 (01:12:12):
It's not effective.

Speaker 1 (01:12:14):
Yeah, Yep, that's exactly what I was thinking. I'm like,
if we have to think that hard and look into
the tiniest crack to figure out if it's satire or not.
I don't think it's really effective satire.

Speaker 4 (01:12:24):
Right sure, Like effective satire can be surprising and like
horrifying and clear like all at once.

Speaker 3 (01:12:32):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:12:33):
Again, It's like this movie is in conversation with so
much that happens before and after in media, where it's
hard not to think about Silence of the Lambs when
that idea is introduced, right, because that was like the
not that it was the only that was the movie,
the Prestige movie that came out just a couple of
years earlier that used that same plot point. But if

(01:12:54):
it's a reference, it's not being subverted or commented on,
So it's just almost being like, there, remember Silence of
the Lambs.

Speaker 1 (01:13:03):
Did you like it?

Speaker 4 (01:13:04):
Like I don't know what the yeah, which just feels
covertly transphobic.

Speaker 3 (01:13:08):
And just like, yeah, nasty stuff. Yeah, for sure. Does
anyone have anything else they'd like to talk about?

Speaker 5 (01:13:15):
I would say, well, this has definitely happened after the fact.
But like when it comes to idols either being harmed
by their fans or killed by their fans, I could
say that one case is like Christina Grimmy. She was
a singer that got big because of the voice, and

(01:13:38):
then one of her fans killed her at one of
her autograph signings, and that was in June twenty sixteen.
But then the month prior in Japan, there was a
jay idol I guess singer actress. Her name's Mayutomita, and
her stalker found out where she lived and then ended

(01:14:00):
up stabbing her multiple times because she had returned gifts
I guess expensive gifts that he had.

Speaker 3 (01:14:07):
Bought for her.

Speaker 5 (01:14:08):
And because of that particular case, Japan had to revise
their anti stocking laws to include online threats, which I thought, I.

Speaker 4 (01:14:18):
Thought that a woman has to die to get laws
like this changed, almost without fail.

Speaker 5 (01:14:24):
Yeah, yeah, I know Christina did.

Speaker 3 (01:14:26):
But Mayu.

Speaker 5 (01:14:27):
I think Mayo is still alive and she was able
to I think she also sued the government as well.
So it's like, but the fact that online threats only
just got added to their anti stocking laws in May
twenty sixteen is a lot.

Speaker 3 (01:14:45):
It's absurd.

Speaker 4 (01:14:47):
Yeah, it's like I also think about the attack at
the Ariana Grande concert around that same sort of period
of time as well, Like, yeah, I think like, ultimately
this movie needs to be called out for parts of
it that are dated, unclear, and more it seems like
shock than commentary. But what I do think this movie
encapsulates well, although it is still clearly I don't know,

(01:15:12):
at no point was I like, was this written by
a woman? Like it obviously isn't, But I do think
it kind of encapsulates the feeling of not belonging to
yourself very clearly in a way that is like very.

Speaker 3 (01:15:27):
Rooted in pop culture globally.

Speaker 4 (01:15:30):
Of like there's just no part of Mima that belongs
to herself, and it seems like at least, at very
least all of the creatives for all of these missteps
is very aware of that and presenting that as a
horror scenario. That's what really works about this movie, totally
showing this experience of her just not even having a

(01:15:52):
moment to be like who am I? What do I want?
You know, that's not a possibility for her, And at
the end, like it could be scene as like kind
of eerie ending, But I find it very sad because
if she is real, this is someone who's just like
all she's done is fulfilled.

Speaker 3 (01:16:12):
What Tadakora wanted for her.

Speaker 4 (01:16:15):
We still don't know that she's doing something that she
feels fulfilled by.

Speaker 3 (01:16:20):
We just note the victory is supposed.

Speaker 4 (01:16:22):
To be surviving the experience, right, and that's really depressing.

Speaker 3 (01:16:28):
Yeah, it is bleak, but no, it's very astute commentary.
Any other final thoughts.

Speaker 4 (01:16:36):
We made it, We did it. We made it.

Speaker 1 (01:16:38):
Yeah, we made it. I'm just like we can all
take a deep breath.

Speaker 4 (01:16:41):
This movie does pass the Vactel class. Not in particularly
pleasant ways, but it does.

Speaker 3 (01:16:46):
Yeah, but it is you know, Mima talking to her
mom about Mima's career, Mima talking to the actress that
she's in Double Bind with, and their scenes in the
show Double Bind also pass the Bechdel test. So it's
a pass within a pass.

Speaker 4 (01:17:06):
So in a way it was a feminist no yea, yeah,
it does pass quite a bit.

Speaker 3 (01:17:13):
And then obviously Mima and Rumy talk. But does the
whole sequence where Rumy is trying to stab Mima at
the end, does that pass the Bechdel test? You could
argue yes, because stabbing attempts are a form of communication.

Speaker 4 (01:17:30):
It counts.

Speaker 3 (01:17:31):
It's feminists, no notes, it counts to rate the movie
on the Bechdel cast nipple scale, where we rate it
zero to five nipples. Examining the movie through an intersectional
feminist lens, Well, now we're in a pickle. We are
in a pickle. Yeah, because again, there there's a lot

(01:17:53):
of themes that this movie explores very effectively, as far
as the commodification of celebrities and especially the way that
young women are heavily exploited. Of course, this extends to
marginalize people in general, and of course there are like Cis,

(01:18:13):
white men who are deeply exploited by the entertainment industry.
But it seems as though the like primary survivors of
this tend to be marginalized people.

Speaker 4 (01:18:26):
I mean, it is. It doesn't seem it is.

Speaker 3 (01:18:28):
Yeah, it is. It is. So the commentary and examination
of that and just again the pressure. I just kept
thinking about, how like there's this through line of against
something we see in real life all the time, of
women and other marginalized talent agreeing to something they don't

(01:18:49):
want to do because they don't want to be labeled
as being difficult and then.

Speaker 4 (01:18:53):
Being tried to and I think Chica you mentioned this earlier,
but like and then being trotted out to perform can
retroactively basically as a way of making people feel comfortable.

Speaker 3 (01:19:05):
Watching the exploitation. Yeah yeah, it's a very quick, kind
of almost throwaway moment in the movie. But there's a
quick scene where Mima is on her way into her
manager's office, and this is after things have started to
get pretty weird for her, and there's like a group
of like fanboy men standing outside being like hi, Mima,

(01:19:25):
and she walks past them and ignores them, and then
one of them says like, Oh, why do they become
so unfriendly when they become actresses? And it just like
makes you think of all of the you know, like
celebrities and actors who are women who have been labeled
as like, Oh I heard so and so is such
a bitch, And it's just like, is it that or
is it a woman responding to constantly being harassed and

(01:19:49):
exploited and mistreated.

Speaker 4 (01:19:51):
We can't retrudge the Chapel Roone discourse, but it comes
to mind, right, yeah, like requesting personal space makes.

Speaker 3 (01:19:58):
You it a bitch a bitch, right right? Establishing boundaries
makes you a bitch that kind of thing. So all
of these components and this commentary are really I think
effectively done in the movie, but then you have all
of these other moments of like, is it satire or
is it just playing into the trope? Not clear enough,
so it's probably just the trope. Again. The way in

(01:20:20):
which the brutal rape scene is framed and animated was
just again so exploitative and unnecessary and horrid. So I
don't know. I split down the middle two and a
half nipples. I'll give all of my nipples to the
red dress.

Speaker 4 (01:20:41):
At the end, I'm gonna go to baby. I almost
kind of want to go a little lower, which is tricky, big.
I mean whatever, This is just the intersectional feminist ranking
of it, because I do like this movie, and I
think that there's animation wise, as an animation head.

Speaker 3 (01:20:58):
It's fucking incredible.

Speaker 4 (01:21:00):
I feel like it captures one dynamic really well and
then a lot of other dynamics not well at all.
But I'll go too, because I do think that this
movie is acutely aware of the hyper exploitation, the hyper vigilance,
and was really early to call how internet culture was

(01:21:22):
going to factor into fans feeling even more entitled to
someone's time and body and future. I feel like that
is you know it's been attempted a lot of times
and rarely this well, and that that's really special. And
then there's, like we've talked about for the last hour

(01:21:42):
and a half, a lot of things, that this movie
just really needed more women at the top of the
creative chain, and that the mistakes this movie made, even
in nineteen ninety seven were largely avoidable because if this
creative team could captures so many ideas so clearly, so

(01:22:02):
far ahead of everyone else, it's like, almost without fail,
if you have a couple of women, just more than
one so they can talk to each other, a lot
of these things could have potentially been avoided. But I'm
gonna give it two. I'm going to give one to
Mima and I'm going to give one to her fish.
Her support system, I think that was her support system,

(01:22:25):
was unfortunately.

Speaker 3 (01:22:25):
A jar offish. Oh, and who died? Who died? Yeah,
leak you hate to see it? How about you, Chica
and Gianna?

Speaker 1 (01:22:34):
Oh, it's hard to find something to say that hasn't
already been said. To be honest, I'm so very much
on the same page as you both, because it did
accomplish things like commenting on the tropes, but at the
same time, it was like, are some of it satire?
But it was also so aware of the toxicity within
fan culture and portraying that in like an expert way.

(01:22:57):
But then there's the mental health aspect that's concerned. And again,
can't reiterate enough that more women at the top of
this really could have benefited the beats of those more
difficult to swallow parts of the movie. So I think
I'm going to agree with a two and a half.
But the question is where to give them.

Speaker 3 (01:23:17):
That's always the question.

Speaker 1 (01:23:19):
Oh the remaining members of cham Oh my God, of.

Speaker 4 (01:23:22):
Course, best of luck to them. Honestly, I kept thinking
of them as Kelly and Michelle I say three girls,
I'm like, that's Destiny's child.

Speaker 3 (01:23:35):
Yeah. I kept as I was watching this movie, being like, hmm,
this is what would happen if Josie and the Pussycats
went way more wrong than it does. Yeah, as far
as the dynamics of the band go.

Speaker 5 (01:23:49):
Yeah, okay, I think I would give it three nipples.
I feel the same way as you all. I think
it would have been way higher if a woman had
been because then it's like, okay, certain things, it's like,
this is too long what do you mean by this? Like,
I think if there had been at least a woman

(01:24:09):
on the team, or multiple women on the team that
could like push back at certain stuff, then this would
have been higher for me. But as to who I'd
give it to, think I'd also give it to Champ,
So it's like Cham. I think Yu, Kiko and y
are their names. But if I'm wrong, don't quote me.

Speaker 1 (01:24:28):
Uh.

Speaker 5 (01:24:29):
I would also the mom in the beginning, because even
though she was kind of pushing back and stuff, she
was still like, Hey, I'm sort of invested in your career.

Speaker 3 (01:24:42):
I don't really know that.

Speaker 5 (01:24:44):
I like where you're going with it.

Speaker 3 (01:24:45):
But classic mom behavior.

Speaker 5 (01:24:47):
Yeah, classic mom behavior. So it's like mom and I
guess the third one is just Mima being able to
survive at all, or like get out of all of that,
because I was just like, oh, especially when the truck
was coming, I was like, oh, it's over, she's done
for truck Cunn has got her.

Speaker 3 (01:25:07):
Oh okay, never mind.

Speaker 5 (01:25:10):
Yeah, So her being able to move out of it,
Although I think I would have liked it if that
story was kind of discussed a bit more of like
how was she able to get a stronger sense of
self to then even decide to visit Roomy in the
first place to see like how she was doing and
stuff like yeah, because I don't know if I would

(01:25:34):
visit somebody that was trying to stab me.

Speaker 1 (01:25:37):
Yeah right, yeah, side note, I know we're on final thoughts,
but like, why did she push her out of the
way truck? If I'm so honest, it would have been
by for me, Like right, she.

Speaker 5 (01:25:50):
Put her hands up in the air, and I was
just like, I guess you know.

Speaker 1 (01:25:53):
This is your choice.

Speaker 4 (01:25:53):
She was ready to go, right, Yeah, okay, yeah, I
did wonder. I was like, were we supposed to that?
Like there was a mother daughter thing between them, and
that was why she was protective of her, because I
if that was what the aim was, it didn't come across.

Speaker 3 (01:26:12):
Oh, that didn't even occur to me.

Speaker 4 (01:26:13):
Yeah, maybe that's just me coping and trying to figure
out what he's going for. But like, I don't get
why Mima would be like, no, we've got to I mean,
it is tragic that Rumy was not able to have
the career that she probably deserved to have. But if
someone stabbed me, I would let.

Speaker 3 (01:26:31):
Them get hit by a truck.

Speaker 4 (01:26:33):
Especially if they just stabbed me, like just yeah, that's
divine intervention.

Speaker 1 (01:26:40):
Yeah, that feels like instant karma.

Speaker 5 (01:26:42):
Yeah, it's like I wonder if it was the whole
because then the wig part happened where she took the
wig off and suddenly she was Roomy again, and then
she put it back on and then she was Mima.
Then maybe real Mima was still kind of like, who
is the real Mima?

Speaker 3 (01:26:58):
So then she pushed is that me?

Speaker 1 (01:27:01):
Oh right?

Speaker 5 (01:27:02):
Yeah right, so is she pushing herself out? And then
it's like, oh, that was actually Roomy? Who stabbed me?
Why did I do that? But well we will never know.

Speaker 3 (01:27:14):
Yeah, we truly won't.

Speaker 4 (01:27:15):
But it has been wonderful trying to figure it out
with you. But thank you so much for coming on
the show truly. Where can we find your work?

Speaker 1 (01:27:25):
So you can find us across socials at show show
Sunday on Blue Sky. We're at Showsuresunday dot com. We're
also on threads. Yeah, we're available to be heard on
podcast platforms, whatever preferred podcast platform you listen. We are
on there, yay.

Speaker 3 (01:27:46):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:27:46):
Yeah. And that show Joe with a You and Sunday
like ice Cream Sunday, and it is our anniversary month,
and we're nearing our one hundredth episode. So if y'all
are big, big fans of show Joe Anime or Jose Anime,
you can check out our catalog. We might have talked

(01:28:08):
about one of your favorite films or TV series.

Speaker 3 (01:28:13):
Yeah amazing. You can follow us on mostly Instagram at Bechdelcast.
You can subscribe to our Patreon aka Matreon, where we
have a whole back catalog of bonus episodes, plus two
new bonus episodes every month, all for five dollars a month.

(01:28:34):
What a bargain, I think, What a treat, What a dream.
It's sort of like a little Sunday of our own,
you know, with sprinkles and a cherry on top with that.

Speaker 4 (01:28:48):
Oh gosh, how do we dismount for perfectly?

Speaker 3 (01:28:50):
Let's go feed our fish to make sure they don't die.

Speaker 4 (01:28:55):
Remember to feature fish, do.

Speaker 3 (01:28:56):
Remember to feturefish for crying out loud, Ye bye bye.
The Bechdel Cast is a production of iHeartMedia, hosted by
Caitlin Derante and Jamie loftis produced by Sophie Lichterman, edited
by mo La Boord. Our theme song was composed by
Mike Kaplan with vocals by Katherine Voskresenski. Our logo in

(01:29:20):
Merch is designed by Jamie Loftis and a special thanks
to Aristotle Acevedo. For more information about the podcast, please
visit Linktree slash Bechdel Cast