November 5, 2025 • 53 mins
Can a Gang of Kids Really Save the World from Classic Monsters?Welcome to this episode of The Most Excellent 80s Movies Podcast, where hosts Krissy Lenz and Nathan Blackwell venture into completely new territory with The Monster Squad (1987)—a film neither had seen before. This nostalgic cult classic brings together Universal's greatest monsters in what should be the ultimate horror crossover, but does it hold up without those rose-tinted glasses of childhood? Join these first-time viewers as they dissect whether the magic works when you're encountering Dracula, Frankenstein's monster, and the Wolfman for the first time as adults.Coming at The Monster Squad cold, both hosts find themselves intrigued by the premise but puzzled by the execution. While the movie looks great and delivers some genuinely fun moments—like Dracula's lightning-rod cane and the mummy's slow-motion chase scenes—they struggle to connect with characters who feel more like archetypes than actual kids. The film's reliance on nostalgia for both 1980s adventure films and classic Universal monsters creates a double-edged sword: those with childhood memories may overlook its flaws, but newcomers are left wondering why the scary German neighbor is so accommodating and where all that dynamite came from. Still, they appreciate the earnest effort and Shane Black's co-writing credits, ultimately landing on a solid 6 out of 10 rating.Additional insights from the discussion:
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- The problematic language choices feel particularly jarring to modern ears, even accounting for 1980s context
- Fat Kid's pizza-as-weapon moment raises questions about just how sensitive vampires are to garlic
- The film's treatment of individual monsters feels uneven, with Wolfman getting a complete arc while the Mummy serves mainly as comic relief
- Frankenstein's redemption and the portal mechanics create unexpectedly emotional moments
- The army showing up because of a letter written in crayon perfectly captures the film's tone
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Thanks for tuning in to another episode of the Most
Excellent Eighties Movies Podcast. Want to skip those ads and
get early access, become a member at true story dot fm,
slash join and discover all the other great parks that
come with it. Hello and welcome to the Most Excellent
(00:30):
Eighties Movies Podcast. It's the podcast where a filmmaker and
a comedian battle their way across the spooky landscape of
the eighties movies we think we love or might have
missed with these our grown up eyes to see how
they hold up. And today we're talking about Monster Squad,
(00:51):
a movie selection from nineteen eighty seven, about which Letterbox
says you know who to call when you have ghosts, Yes,
but who do you call when you have monsters? Count
Dracula adjourns to Earth, accompanied by Frankenstein's Monster, the Wolfman,
(01:12):
the Mummy, and the gill Man. The Uglies are in
search of a powerful amulet that will grant them power
to rule the world. Our heroes, the Monster Squad, are
the only ones daring to stand in their way. If
it's so weird that it says he adjourns to Earth,
(01:34):
like what planet was he on before?
Speaker 2 (01:38):
All?
Speaker 1 (01:39):
Right?
Speaker 3 (01:39):
Uh? Huh the copyright safe? Gil Man?
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Yes, gill Man, all right, here comes the trailer.
Speaker 4 (01:53):
You know who to call when you have ghosts, but
who do you call when you haves with a monster squad?
A squad, it's like Miami advice. I think they're young
and inexperienced, naughty vergers. They're a bit disorganized. Monsters are
not real.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
We don't know that, sir.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
Two thousand year old dead guys do not get up
and walk away by the fell. But when strange things
start happening in town.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
There's a monster croo.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Scary burster.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
What happened?
Speaker 4 (02:31):
Do we have to wear one? They're the only ones
ready to do battles.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Let me down there killing people and with monsters.
Speaker 4 (02:39):
No one's good. Something about it? But up.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Monsters midnight in the world. Remember, maybe we could be
like Masquat Institute the books writing.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
It's all true. By midnight you go, they won't seem
so young anymore. The monster Squad's gone.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
The monster Squad. Okay, all right, I've never seen this movie.
Before we jump in, we have to say who we are.
I'm Christians. Uh. One of the directors of the Neighborhood
Comedy Theater in downtown Mace, Arizona.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
And I'm Nathan Blackwell, an independent filmmaker also from Phoenix, Arizona.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
And we've never seen Monster Squad.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Uh huh. Yeah, so this this was this is a
blind spot. This was you know, like, okay, truth be told.
I'm a sci fi kid and there's a lot of
I've got a lot of gaps in my horror filmography
and this is kind of like like I saw The Explorers,
(04:34):
which is kind of like the sci fi version of
Monster Squad.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
You know, which I've never seen.
Speaker 3 (04:40):
Yeah, kids have a Goonies type adventure, like, you know,
like their own little Ghostbusters light adventure for kids, you know.
But yeah, admitted there are there are a number of
horror films that I truly truly love that are part
of my like top one hundred. But in terms of
(05:02):
like what I and I and I'm genre adjacent, like
I'm sci fi and there's a lot of adjacency, but
I've got a lot of gaps in the horror and
the horror.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Yeah, I would say I put my foot in every genre.
And I don't know why I never saw this. It
was a favorite of my husband Dorian, and he's shown
it to the kids, and the kids really like it,
(05:35):
but I never watched it with them because I just
never thought I wanted to see it, And so sitting
down and actually putting my eyeballs on it was quite
an experience.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
Yeah, it's kind of like, you know, you get a
sense like you missed, you missed something that everyone has
or many people have these nostalgic feelings over, and it's
weird to gonna. It's weird. It's like walking into like
you and I had both seen Buckaroo Bonzai for the
first time as adults in their thirties or forties, you know,
(06:11):
and we were watching it and we were we were
watching it or discussing it on the podcast with people
who had grown up with it in their DNA. And
there's movies that I genuinely love that I that I
know are great, great, but it's possible that it's just
(06:32):
part of my DNA and they're okay, you know, yeah,
I'm sure we've covered most of them, you know. Yeah,
where people are like, oh, yeah, the first tron, I
don't know about that. It's like, what what are you
talking about? It's a classic.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
If the Angry Staples are back for more in twenty
twenty five.
Speaker 3 (06:53):
So but yeah, so I know there's I know that
I know nostalgia is a thing, and we're gonna have
to discuss nostalgia with this movie. This will be an
interesting opportunity to discuss nostalgia.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Yeah, because I could see when I was watching this,
I was like, Okay, I could see if this gets
into you as a kid, how you could love it,
and how the kid in me could like really latch
on to the plight of these children having to battle
these monsters and being left totally to their own devices,
(07:32):
to ride their bikes all over town and build weapons
in their shop class and smoke cigarettes all over town
with no one bothering to bat and eye. And yeah,
they could see these kids as being like cool misfits
like the Goonies, which is definitely one that got into
(07:54):
my DNA.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
As Yes, agreed, and I think with like the Goonies,
we both loved that movie. But also there's a lot
of elements that are really freaking weird about that movie
and are really strange and we just accept. Yeah, And
so that's so I acknowledge that I don't have any objectivity,
(08:17):
but I definitely came in abrasion with some stuff that
I think fans of this, you know.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
Just accept and I'm like and yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Yes, and I'm like, wtf huh.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Yeah, yeah, I'll say out the gate. It was shocking
to me how many times the f slur was uttered
by these innocent children. And I know that defenders of
this movie and defenders of not looking at the nineteen
(08:55):
eighties movies with a critical modern I will say that
was the vernacular of the time. It was a word
that was used. And I hear that argument. And you know,
one of my favorite movies, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure
has the f slur in it. It's just to me
shocking to hear.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
With the well, at least they pack it all in
them for ten minutes.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
They do, and it's but it's just outrageous to me
to hear out of these kids' mouths. And I know
it's a word that they would have said in the
nineteen eighties, but oh god, to me, it just like
rubs the wrong way.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
Yeah, you know, uh huh. I So the thing that
bumped me the most on this movie was I just
didn't get a sense of like the kid's personalities. I mean,
obviously there's the cool kid, and then there's like the
normal kid, and then he's there, and then there's and
(10:00):
then all the other normal kids.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
Yeah, then the fat kid they call fat kid.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Yes, yes, he's like my name.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Is Horace and it's like, okay, but they just call
him fat kid.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
It's so right. So Goonies was eighty five. This is
eighty seven, right.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
So they've had two years to come up with something.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Right. What Goonies did right is that they really sketched
each character in a very different kind of like personality.
You know, you had Seuan okay, the fat kid, and
then you had Data, who's inventing things. He's Asian, he's
got Asian parents.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
That's interesting, Yeah, new and different. You've got Mouth, who's
a snarky bad kid.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Friend of the podcast.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Yes, uh, pray feld name, yes.
Speaker 3 (10:56):
And then you've got the normal kid.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
You know, Sean Asketon, who is all of us.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
Yes he is, he is the everyman. But they were
just a little like, they were just a little more
I was trying to hook it into these these kids
to try to understand them or or but they're basically
just kids. They're just kids for the most part. And
(11:22):
then it was.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Inexplicable to me. So I understand why the little girl
was hanging out with them, because she's the little sister,
and like I could see the mom just being like,
go hang out with your brother. I don't want to
supervise you. Yes, But why was David Fostino with them? Eugi?
Why was he part of the monster squad?
Speaker 3 (11:45):
Items?
Speaker 1 (11:46):
Like, I don't know. It seemed like they needed another young,
young kid. Yeah, all right, let's get into it.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
So have Let's let's back up just a bit before
we get into it. Okay, So what we also talk
about nostalgia we're also talking about we're really talking about
nostalgia of universal horror monsters.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
Yes, so I think in there and their copyright proof adjacent.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
Yes, because Dracula and Frankenstein are public domain. Creature from
the Black Lagoon is not right? So Gilman, he's the
only one who's not mentioned by name. Yeah, yeah, everyone is.
But yeah, so there's a nostalgia for this movie in particular,
but there's also nostalgia for the universal horror monsters. You know,
(12:44):
which was the original door you enter in for this movie.
And I do have nostalgia for those Universal horror monsters.
You know, Okay, I don't, but at the same time
I'm I don't. So this is kind of like, oh
my god, this is like the Avengers of Universal Monster Monsters,
(13:09):
you know. And I didn't. I didn't quite feel the
oh my god, they're all coming together like charge from it.
Like so I like, like any weird kid like you,
you kind of like have like I don't know if
this is the same with your kids, but it seemed
like every six months or maybe even even shorter, like
(13:32):
you were obsessed about something, you know, right, whether it's
like space or nights or you know. For for a
brief time, it was for me like the Universal Monsters,
and they weren't really scary because these these are all
(13:55):
black and white movies. But I think the thing that
jub started it is that I had these little figurines.
I had to google it, the Remco Universal Monsters from
nineteen eighty. It was a six pack. It was Frankenstein,
Phantom of the Opera, Creature from the Black Lagoon, Yeah, exactly,
(14:19):
a Wolfman, Dracula, and the Mummy. And so I had
these little figurines and I rewatched and that's when I
watched the movies and it was really more of the
figurines that were kind of my gateway. But to me
it was it was like a horror version but not
that a little scary, but not that scary, you know,
(14:40):
not nightmare on Elm Street scary, not like stay up
like they were kind of once. They were kind of
like aliens are like aliens are cool and different, and
people are afraid of them and they're running from them
and they try to attack them or try to survive
or whatever. But it wasn't like nightmare fuel for me,
(15:02):
you know, And so I was really into those guys.
But yeah, it it felt like when Monster Squad like
introduced them, it's like, oh, and then are you telling
me this mummy just escaped? And then the mummy is
just like hanging out with him. Like it never felt
(15:25):
like each of them were treated in a fantastical status.
Maybe with the exception of the werewolf, you know, where
we got the guy got to have.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
An arc, Yes, he got to have a story. Everyone
else was.
Speaker 3 (15:41):
Just like and he was a fun actor too, yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:44):
John Grees, Yeah, yeah, the uncle from Napoleon Dynamite. Yeah,
he's a he's a he's out there working, he's he's
a working Man.
Speaker 3 (15:54):
He's a journeyman.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
Yeah, he's he's great and he's so like you pity him.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
Yeah, which is that That's the thing. It's like with
the wolf Man. You have to pity like he's cursed,
you have to pity him. If anything, it's kind of
like a please kill me, just do it, thank you.
You know, he got the arc. I felt like he
was the only one who got the arc. Dracula was
just mustache twirling. Well, okay, to be fair, Frankenstein got
(16:27):
the arc too.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Yeah, that's true. Frankenstein got to go on a little
journey of love.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
But yeah, the Mummy for the most part was just
comic relief. And then gil Man just kind of shows
up at the end to die. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
Well he pops up for a jump scare once.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
Yeah, and he was always kind of my favorite, just
because he looked like a man character. Yeah, okay, but
I would say next in line would be the wolf Man.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
Yeah. I think Wolfman is one of the ones that
has the most lore. Like I would say the Mummy
like probably has the least, not rightwithstanding the brilliant Brendan
Fraser movie.
Speaker 3 (17:12):
Uh huh, yeah, that like the Boris Karlaff you know, mummy.
I'm really stretched to remember what the like, there's a curse,
you know, and then he's coming back and he's upset
about the curse. Yeah, that one. That one is a
(17:32):
little vague.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
But we all know what mummies are, you know, we
all know what mummies are.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
Did you know that in the twenties people used to
eat mummies And that's why there's not a lot of
mummies left is because it was like considered a delicacy
and an aphrodisiac to eat a piece of a mummy.
That's just a fact I have for you. Thank you
surving up facts. Yeah. Oh, by the way, way our
(18:00):
bonus content today, I'm gonna ask you have you eaten? Yes?
Uh no? What what really scares you? Like in the
real world?
Speaker 3 (18:13):
Yeah, okay, can't wait.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
That's our bonus content members, So giving you some time
to think it up, all right, are we ready to
jump in?
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Yes, let's jump in.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
Okay, So we get some opening crawl about how Van
Helsing and his gang we're trying to defeat the monsters
in the olden days but they totally blew it.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
Yeah, which is which is really which is a really
fun way to start a movie, you know.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Yeah, yeah, if you're gonna do an opening crawl, make
it funny.
Speaker 3 (18:46):
Yeah. Uh.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
And then we're at a castle with lots of coffins
and inexplicably armadillos which are native to the Americas and
not Transylvania. They're there.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
Yeah, invasive species.
Speaker 1 (19:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (19:04):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
Dracula is there. There's a dracula lady eating a possum yummy.
She gets killed. A girl reads to a glowing stone
and a portal opens up and the girl gets sucked
into the portal. And I was like, put a pin
in this because I want to know what happened to
(19:26):
that poor girl.
Speaker 3 (19:30):
How does the portal work? Yeah, wills that when we
get to the when we get back, we'll revisit how
the portals work.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
Uh. And then Zippity Zapati Zoo where in nineteen eighty
seven where the two because they totally blew it. Uh.
The Monster Club is in trouble for drawing monsters in class.
He's got a shirt that says stee King Rules, which
(20:01):
is like, I'm I'm wondering who's supervising these kids if
they're obsessed with monsters and drawing monster pictures in class?
And reading Stephen King. They're truly unsupervised. Uh. And they
get in a fight with a bully who's hassling their friend,
(20:23):
Fat Kid.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
The kid from the Yeah. So the kid from the
Wonder Years.
Speaker 1 (20:28):
Is EJ. He's the bully, yes, and he's hassling Fat Kid,
but a bigger bully with a cigarette who's in junior high.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Oh my god.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
He bullies the bully.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
Which we're all about.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
Yeah, and then they're like, we're gonna let this kid
into our gang. And it's like, what does he want
to be in the gang? And the answer is, I
guess yes, he does want to be in the gang,
which makes me wonder, what's this kid backstory? Why is
he so lonely?
Speaker 3 (21:03):
Why is he so Yeah? He seems like some of
these characters are missing a lot of subtext. You know,
there's a lot of tech.
Speaker 1 (21:14):
We're supposed to just make assumptions.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
So like, he's the cool kid and yes, I'm up
for it, but there's never any understanding of motivation of
why he's allowed to smoke and wear leather jackets and
in school, and then also why he's so quick to
join the monster Squad.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
Yeah, because like Bran and the older kids are with
the younger kids because in goonies, because they're related. Yeah,
he's the older brother, and the older kids are there
because Bran is there, So there's a connection. This kid
is just smoking cigarettes. And I guess maybe like when
(21:58):
he gets up to the car the clubhouse and starts
hanging out with the kids, he sees that he can
peep on the sister next door, right, and maybe that's
what's in it for him.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
It's just here and there, Like he doesn't ever seem
to be motivated to like he's not dismissing their stuff.
He wants to be in the club. How many questions
do I need to answer for this, you know, et cetera,
Like he's invested. If he was really just caring about
the vantage point, it just seems like a bonus. Like
(22:31):
if he really cared about it, then he would just
like ignore them and they would be trying to get
him on the team, and he's not. He's reluctant, you know.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
And he was not reluctant. He was like, yeah, I'll
answer your monster questions, let me into your monster club.
Speaker 3 (22:46):
M hm. Yeah. What could have been an interesting backstory
is if they were next door neighbors. Then they'd always
been intimidated by him, and it turns out that he's
actually kind of cool and protective of them.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
Yeah, but they sort of have that story in there
with the scary German.
Speaker 3 (23:04):
Guy, right exactly.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
Yeah, so that would have been a double up.
Speaker 3 (23:10):
Double up. Well, I think kids are scared.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
Of a lot of things, It's true, and so are adults,
which we will learn about in our member content. So
then we cut to a plane full of dead people's
coffins and bats, and Dracula punches the pilot, which is
not smart if you ever had intentions of landing. But
(23:36):
the coffin falls out of the hatch, which is like,
that's just going to fall on someone. Not smart, not smart,
But Dracula just flies out and follows, and then it's like,
what happens to this plane?
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Yeah? And so the co pilot is the werewolf guy,
right or Okay, I'm mistake that they look very similar,
like what's his name with a beard? Yeah? Okay, continue, Uh.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Dracula's at a scenic overlook talking about how he's gonna
take over the city. The kids. The kid is with
his dad, who's a cop. It seems like the parents
are going to go on a date, but it turns
out they're supposed to go to marriage counseling. So we're
(24:30):
adding in some divorce anxiety, which.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
Became a fad with ET, didn't.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
It It sure did. And the dad is like, I
have to leave. There's a crazy guy at the station
saying he's a werewolf. I gotta go. Sorry, our marriage
can wait, and the poor mom is just like, yeah,
I guess I'll serve dinner in my formal dress my
(25:00):
family without you, husband. So the cops they shoot the
werewolf guy. He doesn't die. Don't worry, he lives. They
go investigate the missing mummy, and the cop literally says,
(25:21):
this is too hard. What else? What else do you have?
Speaker 3 (25:27):
This is The scene starts with are you telling me
a two thousand year old mummy just disappeared on you?
Speaker 1 (25:36):
And it ends with him going I don't want this case.
I don't want to do police work.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
Yeah. So when I talk about like proper introductions, it's
like just the Mummy like hand. How they handle the Mummy,
which I always thought was a cool character, is just
so like they do use him for comedic effect, but
there's no like the Mummy doesn't have any like cool
like agency or power in the story. It's not like
(26:08):
we see him coming to life, like we're on team
Mummy at some point, you know.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
Yeah, it doesn't seem like he has any powers.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
Yeah, he's just kind of there and gone. However, he
does have a lot of like he's so slow moving
but has like if you cut off of him, he's
suddenly like capable of like these amazing off screen gymnastics,
you know, you know, like he's slowly, barely moving in
(26:38):
the closet and then before you know it, he's like
out the window. Yeah, or when they tried it seems
like he's going to run them over. And again he's
slow moving and it's like Mummy is so old, and
then he grabs the car mm hmm.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
But then he gets unraveled as hanging onto the car, which.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
Was That was a fun moment. That was a fun idea.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
That was a fun moment. Speaking of fun moments, so Dracula,
the Wolfman, the Mummy and the Swamp Guy drag Frankenstein's
coffin out of a pond and Dracula's cane has jumper
cables in it and is in fact a lightning rod.
Speaker 3 (27:29):
Now.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
I thought that was fun. I was like, okay, I'm
on board for this.
Speaker 3 (27:33):
Yeah, I agree. I like to think that he has
multiple canes. It's like, okay, we're gonna bring the lightning
rod cane today.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Yeah, because we gotta resurrect our friend Frankenstein's monster.
Speaker 3 (27:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Yeah, it was super fun. So the kids are all
gathered and they're like, we're the monster squat and we
gotta do something about these darn monsters and frank are like,
the children have the diary, kill them. Kill these kids.
He just says, get the diary and if you have
(28:11):
to kill them, kill them. And Frankenstein's like, okay, what
if I don't want to? And it turns out he
doesn't want to. The scary German neighbor helps them read
the diary.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
He's the only very accommodating. He's very accommodating.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
He just wants these kids to hang out and have pie. Yes,
and he reads it and he tells them that there's
an amulet that can only be destroyed at midnight. But
also someone can do a ceremony to open a hole
to send the bad guys to Limbo. And this is
where I'm like, oh no, that poor girl went in.
(28:54):
Has she been in limbo this whole time? Uh?
Speaker 3 (28:57):
Huh, I guess that's the rules, Like that's how it works.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Oh, I don't like so is so?
Speaker 3 (29:04):
Is it just? I guess it's anything that gets anything
they get sucked into the portal is get sucked into limbo? Right,
They're just using this like that's not the only way
to defeat these monsters. They defeat pretty much everyone but
Dracula and Frankenstein.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Head ahead of the portal.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
Yeah, yeah, ahead of the portal, like the portal is.
They're just their most convenient method to defeat Dracula.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
But Dracula wants the amulet because at midnight he can
also do a spell that will undo the balance of
good and evil and let the monsters take over the world.
Is that right?
Speaker 3 (29:48):
That sounds about right. I'm not sure if the SPECIFX.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
But because Dracula really wants the amulet.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
Yes, yeah, a lot. I mean he is a mustache
twirling villain. There's not we don't really get too. We
don't really get any moments to where he's kind of
like monologuing and describing what he wants.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
His monologues are very short.
Speaker 3 (30:13):
I could have done with like a vision board or
something like that. Look at this, Admire my vision board.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
Here's what I want. I want to have the whole
town in my thrall, I went.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
A big library with two stories of books.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
And more than three wives this time.
Speaker 3 (30:35):
Here's some photos that I kept out of magazines.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Yes, but dracula vision board is something that we needed
because I just was not I was sure of his plan,
but unsure of his motivations. Right, all right, So Phoebe's like, oh,
and it's tomorrow night at midnight when all this is
going to go down. And Phoebe's like, I found Frankenstein.
(31:01):
He is my friend.
Speaker 3 (31:02):
Now she's a little girl, Phoebe.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
Yeah, she's tiny, she's very very tiny.
Speaker 3 (31:09):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
And Dracula's at his house. He finds the amulet. There's
a getting ready montage where the kids are getting ready
for their monster siege. And Rudy, Rudy, the bad kid
who smokes, is the most useful because he's in shop
class making bullets out of silver and sharpening steak.
Speaker 3 (31:32):
He's melting down silver.
Speaker 1 (31:35):
Yeah, he's smelting like he's.
Speaker 3 (31:37):
Learned a lot and is yeah, he is all in.
He is all in.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
And he is still completely on supervised because no one's like,
are you making bullets? Is this a problem we should address?
But he's also like a perv.
Speaker 3 (32:02):
You know, you could say that for like all fifteen
year olds.
Speaker 1 (32:06):
Okay, so yeah, yeah, the wolf Man is being drugged
by Dracula because he's in his daytime form. Right, Where
did Dracula get prescription drugs?
Speaker 3 (32:21):
It's so it's tough, like, how so the full So
technically he only becomes a werewolf during a full moon?
But does that is that full moon period just one
night a week or can you kind of like grandfather
it in like the night before or the night after,
so you get kind of like three nights of coverage.
Speaker 1 (32:42):
That's what they always did on Buffy.
Speaker 3 (32:44):
Yeah, where it's like like like a ninety five percent
full moon still counts as a full moon.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
Yeah, but where did Dracula get.
Speaker 3 (32:57):
Sedatives from the grocery store? Okay?
Speaker 1 (33:06):
Okay? Also I did not get the sense that this
was around Halloween time. Was it around Halloween time or
was this just any old time?
Speaker 3 (33:15):
I don't remember any Halloween specific stuff.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Me neither me neither.
Speaker 3 (33:21):
It would have been nice. That would have been nice
as a joke moment, you know, to have someone like
Halloween display and then there's just the Mummy standing in it,
you know.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yeah, it could have excused them walking around the town.
Hey you're in your Halloween costume, early palm. But I
don't recall any of that happening, all right, So there's
but the Wolfman spits out the drugs and escapes and
(33:54):
calls up the cop Dad and is like, I'm aware, wolf,
they've got an amulet. Bad shit, it's gonna go down.
You gotta do something. And he turns into a were wolf.
But it's like he's trying to warn the people. M
He's not fully on their side. When he's in there
is wolf form, he's on their side. When he's just
(34:15):
a man, he's not on their side.
Speaker 3 (34:17):
Yeah, he's uncontrollable for the most part as a wolfman,
although he does seem to take orders.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:24):
Yeah, it's the the nature of these creatures themselves. Like
the Mummy was, as far as I remember, was just
like a force of evil. You know. The creature from
the Black Lagoon is a is a man creature. But
Frankenstein and the Wolfman were always torn with the good
(34:47):
part of themselves and the bad part of themselves.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
Right, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, and we get to see
that in this movie, which is nice. So they find
the sister who they've been photographing in her window and
they're like, are you a virgin? And she's like sure,
(35:11):
and they're like great, then we need you. And they're
blackmailing her with the photo, which I did not like.
So the kids all go to Dracula's house. Dracula is
using dynamite to get the amulet. M m, there's a
big explosion. The maid kid finds the amulet, Dracula attacks them,
(35:32):
fat kid fends him off with a piece of pizza.
Speaker 3 (35:36):
Right. How much garlic was in that pizza? I would
assume a lot because it burns Dracula's face like it's
a hot coal. You know, that's a lot. That's got
to be a lot of garlic. Or is he just
that sensitive, you know, like he can't walk past like
Italian restaurants because just.
Speaker 1 (35:57):
Without getting hives.
Speaker 3 (35:58):
Yeah, that would be rough. That would be.
Speaker 1 (36:02):
Rough, Yeah, especially as like who knows where that myth
comes from that he can't be near garlic? Like okay,
all right, but I like that fact it had some
pizza and a foil and was like, does that does.
Speaker 3 (36:16):
That make Italy the safest place to be if you're
worried about vampires?
Speaker 1 (36:21):
I think so we should all go there.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
If they're that sensitive.
Speaker 1 (36:25):
Mm hmm. Yeah. And it makes it make total sense
that you could just wear a chain of garlic around
your neck and be totally safe.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
I'm sure it was. It was like an old superstition
that got carried over to vampires. You know, that people
would hang garlic or wear garlic to ward off evil spirits,
and then at some point it just got kind of
transferred over to vampires. Yeah, to draculas.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
So they get away with the ambult. The kids all
get together and they're in the scary German guy's car
and they're like, Okay, we need to go somewhere to
create this portal. Let's go to a church. The mummy
attacks them, he gets unraveled, and the cool kid says,
see you later, band aid breath. So I bet Shane
Black was really high fiving himself. We haven't talked about
(37:20):
how Shane Black wrote this movie.
Speaker 3 (37:22):
No, well, he co wrote it. He co wrote it.
I feel like, yeah, so the director Fred Decker also
wrote this. Yeah with anything it's hard to know what
(37:42):
gets changed in production, what writer did what, So it's
always tough to discuss the screenplay and then the story
that we see in the movie.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
But didn't this come out the same year as Lee
Theal Weapons? So like Shane Black is like, got two
scripts on his desk. One is Monster Squad and one
is lethal Weapon.
Speaker 3 (38:06):
Yeah it's it's I don't know the backstory.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
But yeah, kids, kids got range. Yes, all right? So,
uh the cop Dad is like on the case. Which
I really appreciated in this movie was that he's never
like this is ridiculous. You kids are stupid. He's like, yeah,
all right, I'll go fight these monsters. I got to
(38:30):
investigate this.
Speaker 3 (38:31):
Uh huh uh.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
Dracula blows up the clubhouse with dynamite mm hmmm, and
it's fully on fire in the kid's backyard. He turns
into a bat and leaves. Yeah, the church is locked,
and the kids are like, well, we can't figure out
a way around that, so they do the ritual on
(38:55):
the front steps.
Speaker 3 (38:56):
Uhhh, Yeah, they were. The assumption is that the church
which would give them some sort of holy protection, and
maybe they're right, but the truth would have been is
that they would have opened a portal that would have
totally trashed the church.
Speaker 1 (39:09):
Yeah, so the church was right to lock its doors
and keep these kids out. Rudy confronts Dracula's brides, and
we never really confront in this movie that he's killing people.
Like we see these three young girls before they become
Dracula's brides, and like we're just supposed to like be
(39:31):
thrilled that he's impaling them with a crossbow and sharpened stakes,
but it's like these were young women.
Speaker 3 (39:40):
All of these monsters are really slow walkers, it's true,
and they are ready to be attacked, like if you
get close to them, very very dangerous. But you get
a lot of time to prepare beforehand. So they're in
a great situation to where they're in a long like downtown,
(40:00):
you know, town square where you can see for half
a mile, and so you can see them slowly walk
towards him. He's got plenty of time.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
Yeah, he can load up his crossbow and they're like
all spread out. So he takes down Dracula's brides, easy, pasy,
no problem. They blow up the Wolfman. There's so much
dynamite in this movie. Dynamite is everywhere, paid for by Dynamite. Yeah,
(40:31):
Big Dynamite brought you this movie. They blow up the
Wolfman and I'm like, oh, it made me really sad.
And then they determined that the sister is not a virgin.
Speaker 3 (40:42):
Uh huh.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
And she says Steve doesn't count uh huh, and they're
all like, apparently he does.
Speaker 3 (40:56):
That's not what God thinks.
Speaker 1 (40:58):
Yeah. So the Wolfman reassembles and I'm like, oh, thank god,
he's not dead.
Speaker 4 (41:06):
Do it?
Speaker 3 (41:07):
Like the Wolfman can only be killed by a silver bullet,
so instead of making him immune to all things, instead
he's like the T one thousand where he can reassemble himself.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
Yeah, even if he doesn't want to. He doesn't want to. Yeah,
his body's gonna do it of its own accord.
Speaker 3 (41:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (41:31):
And so Rudy shoots him in the chest with a
silver bullet and he's like, thank you guy.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Yeah. He transforms back into a human.
Speaker 1 (41:45):
Which is like, is Rudy not gonna have some questions
to answer? He shot a man in the chest.
Speaker 3 (41:51):
This is after he killed all those women.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
Yeah, all right. Uh. So fat Kid shoots the swamp thing, the.
Speaker 3 (42:01):
Creature of the Black Lagoon, who again, so each of
the each of these these these monsters attack one at
a time. It would have seen it would have been cool. Again,
this is kind of like like Spider Man Homecoming, seeing
these villains overlap on each other, like having to deal
with the creature from the Black Lagoon and the werewolf
(42:22):
at the same time, you know, mm hmm. Instead, it's
just kind of everyone is taking a short break while
the other one attacks.
Speaker 1 (42:31):
Yeah yeah, uh, very ninja style.
Speaker 3 (42:36):
Well, to be honest, we don't see anyone eat or
use the restroom, so maybe it's during these times that
they're doing that.
Speaker 1 (42:44):
M yeah, could be, m could be. So they're like, well,
this little girl is definitely a virgin, so let's have
heard you the chant, And what they're doing is having
the scary German guy read to her and she just
repeats what he says, so she's doing the chant. Dracula
(43:05):
slowly saunters over and Frankenstein saves the little girl. Yes,
the portal opens, Van Helsing comes roaring down. He's just
been waiting at tat.
Speaker 3 (43:19):
He's learned to thrive in the portal. He's learned to
thrive in the limbo. You don't agent here. You can
eat whatever you want not kat around. Right, I've been
watching lots of TV. That's how I learned how to
do the thumbs up.
Speaker 1 (43:35):
Yeah, he grabs Dracula and does a thumbs up Fonsie
style to the kids.
Speaker 3 (43:41):
Right, like like the portal sucks everything in, like cars
fly in.
Speaker 1 (43:47):
It seemed like some whole bunch of bits of fencing
fly in right, stuck.
Speaker 3 (43:52):
In limbo forever. But but the dog.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
They have a little gang dog who's a big, fat
bas a hound, and they're just holding him by the
tail so he doesn't get sucked into limbo.
Speaker 3 (44:06):
It's interesting. So I guess the rules is that it
just sucks in whatever. Like Frankenstein didn't have to go.
He just got.
Speaker 1 (44:14):
Sad when Frankenstein got sucked in.
Speaker 3 (44:17):
Yeah, it's not like it was a magic spell that
that like sucks up monsters. It just sucks up anything,
you know, mm hmm.
Speaker 1 (44:28):
And they I don't know how they close it.
Speaker 3 (44:34):
The portal. The portal is full.
Speaker 1 (44:38):
Okay, it's got enough pieces of fencing. Yes, all right,
So the portal closes. The army shows up based on
a letter written to them in crayon, which.
Speaker 3 (44:51):
Is a very right. And we've kind of got this
Ghostbusters ending, you know, where the every you know, it's
like where they're they're like wiping themselves off with a towel,
patting themselves off of the back as there's like big
pandemonium and like where the Monster Squad. We did it?
Speaker 1 (45:10):
We're the Monster Squad.
Speaker 3 (45:12):
Yeah, and then like a you know, and the music plays.
Speaker 1 (45:17):
And there's a rap. I have the lyrics to the rap.
Speaker 3 (45:20):
Okay, great.
Speaker 1 (45:22):
In one hundred years, in the Darkest Night, the forces
of evil come out to fight the Amulet. They must
destroy or spend forever in the darkest void. Who can
stop their deadly mte or who will stand up for
the right? From the mouth of Babes comes dynamite. The
Monster Squad is gonna groove tonight. And it goes on
(45:45):
and on and on. It's very long, but that's the
beginning of the Monster Squad. Rap. That's great, And that's
the Monster Squad.
Speaker 3 (45:54):
Right, jeez, Louise. Yeah. So I don't want to pooh
pooh anyone who is who it was connected to this
movie via nostalgia. I see you, I see your joy.
I don't want to take away from it.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
But on a scale of one stick of dynamite, to
ten sticks of dynamite, which you need to fight evil? Right,
how many sticks of dynamite are you serving up for
the monster squad?
Speaker 3 (46:26):
So just for my own again, these are just my
own personal feelings. My vibe was six out of ten,
so that would be like three out of five. But
you know, if this was letterboxed, just out of my
own personal coming into cold having not seen it, having
not grown up on it, my own personal enjoyment, I M.
(46:54):
I know, it's tough.
Speaker 1 (46:56):
I agree with you, though, I think it's a six.
I didn't. I didn't. I wasn't neutral on it. I
thought there was a lot of fun.
Speaker 3 (47:05):
Yeah, the movie looks great. Like the movie looks great,
you know, like the nostalgia and the lighting.
Speaker 1 (47:15):
Yeah, it just it didn't get its hooks in me.
Speaker 3 (47:19):
Yes, just purely on a gut level.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
Yeah, I agree. So I think this movie is a
six out of ten or three out of five if
you're a letterboxing So what's your deep cut recommendation? I
have two?
Speaker 3 (47:36):
Okay, mine is similar more recent, I mean obviously, like
the closest comparisons are like Explorers and Goonies. I'm going
to recommend Super eight, which is you know, jj Abrams
kind of very like, you know, version of this where
(47:59):
kids in counter a fantastical thing in this case an alien,
you know, and then gear up to stop it and
connections with the dad, and then the army shows up
at the end. But yeah, it's it's not a perfect movie,
but it's one that I really enjoy and kind of
(48:20):
has some of the stuff that that didn't work for
me in this one, where you got a sense of
what the kids wanted and what their their struggle was,
you know. Yeah. So super eight it's a great, great,
it's a good one to revisit.
Speaker 1 (48:39):
I've never seen it.
Speaker 3 (48:41):
Revisit it though, Okay.
Speaker 1 (48:44):
I will visit it and then visit it again. Great,
I have too. One of them is very specific. It's Supernatural,
the television show season five, episode eleven, Sam Interrupted is.
It stars John Greese or Wolfman, as a frightened former
(49:06):
hunter who has to face a wraith with the boys,
And so as soon as I saw him, I was like, oh, hey,
he's from Sam Interrupted. Hey I can recommend an episode
of Supernatural. But also in keeping with my affection for
the Wolfman, I want to recommend I don't know if
you've seen this but you haven't. I recommend it. It's
(49:28):
called Wolf Like Me. It's on Peacock. It's got two seasons.
It's stars Josh Gad and Isla Fisher, and it's the
story of a man who falls in love with the
lady were wolf and how they try and manage their lives.
Speaker 3 (49:49):
That's nice.
Speaker 1 (49:50):
It looks fun, it is fun. It's very good. I
highly recommend it. It's a very good show. I really
enjoyed it, and I think you I would enjoy it too.
Speaker 3 (50:01):
Okay, cool, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (50:03):
If you need something spooky to watch around, spooky. All right,
So we did it. We did Monster Squad.
Speaker 3 (50:13):
How do we feel? I feel good good, Yeah, I
feel yeah, I do. I do know. I mean, I
don't know anyone personally that has talked about having love
for Monster Squad, but I know.
Speaker 1 (50:28):
They're out there, yeah, Dorian, Yes.
Speaker 3 (50:32):
I know he's out there somewhere.
Speaker 1 (50:35):
He's out there in the world, somewhere doing his thing.
Speaker 3 (50:38):
Yes, And I don't want to that's the problem with
doing the podcast and then basing it the discussion off
of our reaction of something. And I know people are
cherry picking episodes, they're picking ones that they have a
connection with. You know, and I really don't want to
(50:59):
poop poop their experiences.
Speaker 1 (51:04):
No, So so here's what you do if we missed
something in this movie. Uh, become a member, join our
discord and let me know, or hop on Instagram at
Most Excellent Pod, Most Excellent Pod, Most Excellent Pod, and
shoot me a comment when this episode comes out and
(51:26):
let me know what what did we get wrong? I
don't think we poo pooed it.
Speaker 3 (51:31):
I hope not. I hope. Yeah. I mean if they
really hated what we said, they wouldn't have listened this
far to the back. So uh cool. All right, well,
thanks everyone for listening to another episode.
Speaker 1 (51:47):
Yeah. Where can people find you doing your filmmaker magic?
Speaker 3 (51:53):
Well, the best places Squishy Studios dot com. We are
there's a link to my movie last movie Ever Made
in our shorts and web series and stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (52:04):
Excellent. You can find me at the Neighborhood Comedy Theater
in downtown Mace, Arizona, every Friday and Saturday night doing
improv comedy. If you mention that you're a listener to
the Most Excellent Eighties Movies Podcast, I will buy you
a drink at the Sacred Pint, which is the tap
house in front of our in front of our little theater.
(52:27):
And also if you want to listen to me talk
about Supernatural specifically season five, episode eleven, Sam Interrupted, listen
to Gank That Drank, a supernatural drinking game podcast. Also
a product of true story FM. And if you want
more of us, you can become a member. Like we said,
(52:50):
go to true story dot fm, click on our little podcast,
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(53:16):
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(53:39):
Be excellent to each other and
Thanks for tuning in to another episode of the Most
Excellent Eighties Movies Podcast. Want to skip those ads and
get early access, become a member at true story dot fm,
slash join and discover all the other great parks that
come with it. Hello and welcome to the Most Excellent
(00:30):
Eighties Movies Podcast. It's the podcast where a filmmaker and
a comedian battle their way across the spooky landscape of
the eighties movies we think we love or might have
missed with these our grown up eyes to see how
they hold up. And today we're talking about Monster Squad,
(00:51):
a movie selection from nineteen eighty seven, about which Letterbox
says you know who to call when you have ghosts, Yes,
but who do you call when you have monsters? Count
Dracula adjourns to Earth, accompanied by Frankenstein's Monster, the Wolfman,
(01:12):
the Mummy, and the gill Man. The Uglies are in
search of a powerful amulet that will grant them power
to rule the world. Our heroes, the Monster Squad, are
the only ones daring to stand in their way. If
it's so weird that it says he adjourns to Earth,
(01:34):
like what planet was he on before?
Speaker 2 (01:38):
All?
Speaker 1 (01:39):
Right?
Speaker 3 (01:39):
Uh? Huh the copyright safe? Gil Man?
Speaker 1 (01:43):
Yes, gill Man, all right, here comes the trailer.
Speaker 4 (01:53):
You know who to call when you have ghosts, but
who do you call when you haves with a monster squad?
A squad, it's like Miami advice. I think they're young
and inexperienced, naughty vergers. They're a bit disorganized. Monsters are
not real.
Speaker 1 (02:13):
We don't know that, sir.
Speaker 4 (02:15):
Two thousand year old dead guys do not get up
and walk away by the fell. But when strange things
start happening in town.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
There's a monster croo.
Speaker 3 (02:27):
Scary burster.
Speaker 1 (02:30):
What happened?
Speaker 4 (02:31):
Do we have to wear one? They're the only ones
ready to do battles.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
Let me down there killing people and with monsters.
Speaker 4 (02:39):
No one's good. Something about it? But up.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Monsters midnight in the world. Remember, maybe we could be
like Masquat Institute the books writing.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
It's all true. By midnight you go, they won't seem
so young anymore. The monster Squad's gone.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
The monster Squad. Okay, all right, I've never seen this movie.
Before we jump in, we have to say who we are.
I'm Christians. Uh. One of the directors of the Neighborhood
Comedy Theater in downtown Mace, Arizona.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
And I'm Nathan Blackwell, an independent filmmaker also from Phoenix, Arizona.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
And we've never seen Monster Squad.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
Uh huh. Yeah, so this this was this is a
blind spot. This was you know, like, okay, truth be told.
I'm a sci fi kid and there's a lot of
I've got a lot of gaps in my horror filmography
and this is kind of like like I saw The Explorers,
(04:34):
which is kind of like the sci fi version of
Monster Squad.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
You know, which I've never seen.
Speaker 3 (04:40):
Yeah, kids have a Goonies type adventure, like, you know,
like their own little Ghostbusters light adventure for kids, you know.
But yeah, admitted there are there are a number of
horror films that I truly truly love that are part
of my like top one hundred. But in terms of
(05:02):
like what I and I and I'm genre adjacent, like
I'm sci fi and there's a lot of adjacency, but
I've got a lot of gaps in the horror and
the horror.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Yeah, I would say I put my foot in every genre.
And I don't know why I never saw this. It
was a favorite of my husband Dorian, and he's shown
it to the kids, and the kids really like it,
(05:35):
but I never watched it with them because I just
never thought I wanted to see it, And so sitting
down and actually putting my eyeballs on it was quite
an experience.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
Yeah, it's kind of like, you know, you get a
sense like you missed, you missed something that everyone has
or many people have these nostalgic feelings over, and it's
weird to gonna. It's weird. It's like walking into like
you and I had both seen Buckaroo Bonzai for the
first time as adults in their thirties or forties, you know,
(06:11):
and we were watching it and we were we were
watching it or discussing it on the podcast with people
who had grown up with it in their DNA. And
there's movies that I genuinely love that I that I
know are great, great, but it's possible that it's just
(06:32):
part of my DNA and they're okay, you know, yeah,
I'm sure we've covered most of them, you know. Yeah,
where people are like, oh, yeah, the first tron, I
don't know about that. It's like, what what are you
talking about? It's a classic.
Speaker 1 (06:49):
If the Angry Staples are back for more in twenty
twenty five.
Speaker 3 (06:53):
So but yeah, so I know there's I know that
I know nostalgia is a thing, and we're gonna have
to discuss nostalgia with this movie. This will be an
interesting opportunity to discuss nostalgia.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Yeah, because I could see when I was watching this,
I was like, Okay, I could see if this gets
into you as a kid, how you could love it,
and how the kid in me could like really latch
on to the plight of these children having to battle
these monsters and being left totally to their own devices,
(07:32):
to ride their bikes all over town and build weapons
in their shop class and smoke cigarettes all over town
with no one bothering to bat and eye. And yeah,
they could see these kids as being like cool misfits
like the Goonies, which is definitely one that got into
(07:54):
my DNA.
Speaker 3 (07:54):
As Yes, agreed, and I think with like the Goonies,
we both loved that movie. But also there's a lot
of elements that are really freaking weird about that movie
and are really strange and we just accept. Yeah, And
so that's so I acknowledge that I don't have any objectivity,
(08:17):
but I definitely came in abrasion with some stuff that
I think fans of this, you know.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
Just accept and I'm like and yeah.
Speaker 3 (08:31):
Yes, and I'm like, wtf huh.
Speaker 1 (08:34):
Yeah, yeah, I'll say out the gate. It was shocking
to me how many times the f slur was uttered
by these innocent children. And I know that defenders of
this movie and defenders of not looking at the nineteen
(08:55):
eighties movies with a critical modern I will say that
was the vernacular of the time. It was a word
that was used. And I hear that argument. And you know,
one of my favorite movies, Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure
has the f slur in it. It's just to me
shocking to hear.
Speaker 3 (09:17):
With the well, at least they pack it all in
them for ten minutes.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
They do, and it's but it's just outrageous to me
to hear out of these kids' mouths. And I know
it's a word that they would have said in the
nineteen eighties, but oh god, to me, it just like
rubs the wrong way.
Speaker 3 (09:38):
Yeah, you know, uh huh. I So the thing that
bumped me the most on this movie was I just
didn't get a sense of like the kid's personalities. I mean,
obviously there's the cool kid, and then there's like the
normal kid, and then he's there, and then there's and
(10:00):
then all the other normal kids.
Speaker 1 (10:02):
Yeah, then the fat kid they call fat kid.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Yes, yes, he's like my name.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Is Horace and it's like, okay, but they just call
him fat kid.
Speaker 3 (10:14):
It's so right. So Goonies was eighty five. This is
eighty seven, right.
Speaker 1 (10:20):
So they've had two years to come up with something.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Right. What Goonies did right is that they really sketched
each character in a very different kind of like personality.
You know, you had Seuan okay, the fat kid, and
then you had Data, who's inventing things. He's Asian, he's
got Asian parents.
Speaker 1 (10:43):
That's interesting, Yeah, new and different. You've got Mouth, who's
a snarky bad kid.
Speaker 3 (10:52):
Friend of the podcast.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Yes, uh, pray feld name, yes.
Speaker 3 (10:56):
And then you've got the normal kid.
Speaker 1 (10:57):
You know, Sean Asketon, who is all of us.
Speaker 3 (11:02):
Yes he is, he is the everyman. But they were
just a little like, they were just a little more
I was trying to hook it into these these kids
to try to understand them or or but they're basically
just kids. They're just kids for the most part. And
(11:22):
then it was.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Inexplicable to me. So I understand why the little girl
was hanging out with them, because she's the little sister,
and like I could see the mom just being like,
go hang out with your brother. I don't want to
supervise you. Yes, But why was David Fostino with them? Eugi?
Why was he part of the monster squad?
Speaker 3 (11:45):
Items?
Speaker 1 (11:46):
Like, I don't know. It seemed like they needed another young,
young kid. Yeah, all right, let's get into it.
Speaker 3 (11:59):
So have Let's let's back up just a bit before
we get into it. Okay, So what we also talk
about nostalgia we're also talking about we're really talking about
nostalgia of universal horror monsters.
Speaker 1 (12:12):
Yes, so I think in there and their copyright proof adjacent.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
Yes, because Dracula and Frankenstein are public domain. Creature from
the Black Lagoon is not right? So Gilman, he's the
only one who's not mentioned by name. Yeah, yeah, everyone is.
But yeah, so there's a nostalgia for this movie in particular,
but there's also nostalgia for the universal horror monsters. You know,
(12:44):
which was the original door you enter in for this movie.
And I do have nostalgia for those Universal horror monsters.
You know, Okay, I don't, but at the same time
I'm I don't. So this is kind of like, oh
my god, this is like the Avengers of Universal Monster Monsters,
(13:09):
you know. And I didn't. I didn't quite feel the
oh my god, they're all coming together like charge from it.
Like so I like, like any weird kid like you,
you kind of like have like I don't know if
this is the same with your kids, but it seemed
like every six months or maybe even even shorter, like
(13:32):
you were obsessed about something, you know, right, whether it's
like space or nights or you know. For for a
brief time, it was for me like the Universal Monsters,
and they weren't really scary because these these are all
(13:55):
black and white movies. But I think the thing that
jub started it is that I had these little figurines.
I had to google it, the Remco Universal Monsters from
nineteen eighty. It was a six pack. It was Frankenstein,
Phantom of the Opera, Creature from the Black Lagoon, Yeah, exactly,
(14:19):
a Wolfman, Dracula, and the Mummy. And so I had
these little figurines and I rewatched and that's when I
watched the movies and it was really more of the
figurines that were kind of my gateway. But to me
it was it was like a horror version but not
that a little scary, but not that scary, you know,
(14:40):
not nightmare on Elm Street scary, not like stay up
like they were kind of once. They were kind of
like aliens are like aliens are cool and different, and
people are afraid of them and they're running from them
and they try to attack them or try to survive
or whatever. But it wasn't like nightmare fuel for me,
(15:02):
you know, And so I was really into those guys.
But yeah, it it felt like when Monster Squad like
introduced them, it's like, oh, and then are you telling
me this mummy just escaped? And then the mummy is
just like hanging out with him. Like it never felt
(15:25):
like each of them were treated in a fantastical status.
Maybe with the exception of the werewolf, you know, where
we got the guy got to have.
Speaker 1 (15:37):
An arc, Yes, he got to have a story. Everyone
else was.
Speaker 3 (15:41):
Just like and he was a fun actor too, yeah.
Speaker 1 (15:44):
John Grees, Yeah, yeah, the uncle from Napoleon Dynamite. Yeah,
he's a he's a he's out there working, he's he's
a working Man.
Speaker 3 (15:54):
He's a journeyman.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
Yeah, he's he's great and he's so like you pity him.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
Yeah, which is that That's the thing. It's like with
the wolf Man. You have to pity like he's cursed,
you have to pity him. If anything, it's kind of
like a please kill me, just do it, thank you.
You know, he got the arc. I felt like he
was the only one who got the arc. Dracula was
just mustache twirling. Well, okay, to be fair, Frankenstein got
(16:27):
the arc too.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Yeah, that's true. Frankenstein got to go on a little
journey of love.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
But yeah, the Mummy for the most part was just
comic relief. And then gil Man just kind of shows
up at the end to die. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
Well he pops up for a jump scare once.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
Yeah, and he was always kind of my favorite, just
because he looked like a man character. Yeah, okay, but
I would say next in line would be the wolf Man.
Speaker 1 (16:57):
Yeah. I think Wolfman is one of the ones that
has the most lore. Like I would say the Mummy
like probably has the least, not rightwithstanding the brilliant Brendan
Fraser movie.
Speaker 3 (17:12):
Uh huh, yeah, that like the Boris Karlaff you know, mummy.
I'm really stretched to remember what the like, there's a curse,
you know, and then he's coming back and he's upset
about the curse. Yeah, that one. That one is a
(17:32):
little vague.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
But we all know what mummies are, you know, we
all know what mummies are.
Speaker 3 (17:36):
Yes.
Speaker 1 (17:38):
Did you know that in the twenties people used to
eat mummies And that's why there's not a lot of
mummies left is because it was like considered a delicacy
and an aphrodisiac to eat a piece of a mummy.
That's just a fact I have for you. Thank you
surving up facts. Yeah. Oh, by the way, way our
(18:00):
bonus content today, I'm gonna ask you have you eaten? Yes?
Uh no? What what really scares you? Like in the
real world?
Speaker 3 (18:13):
Yeah, okay, can't wait.
Speaker 1 (18:16):
That's our bonus content members, So giving you some time
to think it up, all right, are we ready to
jump in?
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Yes, let's jump in.
Speaker 1 (18:26):
Okay, So we get some opening crawl about how Van
Helsing and his gang we're trying to defeat the monsters
in the olden days but they totally blew it.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
Yeah, which is which is really which is a really
fun way to start a movie, you know.
Speaker 1 (18:42):
Yeah, yeah, if you're gonna do an opening crawl, make
it funny.
Speaker 3 (18:46):
Yeah. Uh.
Speaker 1 (18:48):
And then we're at a castle with lots of coffins
and inexplicably armadillos which are native to the Americas and
not Transylvania. They're there.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
Yeah, invasive species.
Speaker 1 (19:04):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (19:04):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
Dracula is there. There's a dracula lady eating a possum yummy.
She gets killed. A girl reads to a glowing stone
and a portal opens up and the girl gets sucked
into the portal. And I was like, put a pin
in this because I want to know what happened to
(19:26):
that poor girl.
Speaker 3 (19:30):
How does the portal work? Yeah, wills that when we
get to the when we get back, we'll revisit how
the portals work.
Speaker 1 (19:40):
Uh. And then Zippity Zapati Zoo where in nineteen eighty
seven where the two because they totally blew it. Uh.
The Monster Club is in trouble for drawing monsters in class.
He's got a shirt that says stee King Rules, which
(20:01):
is like, I'm I'm wondering who's supervising these kids if
they're obsessed with monsters and drawing monster pictures in class?
And reading Stephen King. They're truly unsupervised. Uh. And they
get in a fight with a bully who's hassling their friend,
(20:23):
Fat Kid.
Speaker 3 (20:24):
The kid from the Yeah. So the kid from the
Wonder Years.
Speaker 1 (20:28):
Is EJ. He's the bully, yes, and he's hassling Fat Kid,
but a bigger bully with a cigarette who's in junior high.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Oh my god.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
He bullies the bully.
Speaker 3 (20:44):
Which we're all about.
Speaker 1 (20:46):
Yeah, and then they're like, we're gonna let this kid
into our gang. And it's like, what does he want
to be in the gang? And the answer is, I
guess yes, he does want to be in the gang,
which makes me wonder, what's this kid backstory? Why is
he so lonely?
Speaker 3 (21:03):
Why is he so Yeah? He seems like some of
these characters are missing a lot of subtext. You know,
there's a lot of tech.
Speaker 1 (21:14):
We're supposed to just make assumptions.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
So like, he's the cool kid and yes, I'm up
for it, but there's never any understanding of motivation of
why he's allowed to smoke and wear leather jackets and
in school, and then also why he's so quick to
join the monster Squad.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
Yeah, because like Bran and the older kids are with
the younger kids because in goonies, because they're related. Yeah,
he's the older brother, and the older kids are there
because Bran is there, So there's a connection. This kid
is just smoking cigarettes. And I guess maybe like when
(21:58):
he gets up to the car the clubhouse and starts
hanging out with the kids, he sees that he can
peep on the sister next door, right, and maybe that's
what's in it for him.
Speaker 3 (22:10):
It's just here and there, Like he doesn't ever seem
to be motivated to like he's not dismissing their stuff.
He wants to be in the club. How many questions
do I need to answer for this, you know, et cetera,
Like he's invested. If he was really just caring about
the vantage point, it just seems like a bonus. Like
(22:31):
if he really cared about it, then he would just
like ignore them and they would be trying to get
him on the team, and he's not. He's reluctant, you know.
Speaker 1 (22:41):
And he was not reluctant. He was like, yeah, I'll
answer your monster questions, let me into your monster club.
Speaker 3 (22:46):
M hm. Yeah. What could have been an interesting backstory
is if they were next door neighbors. Then they'd always
been intimidated by him, and it turns out that he's
actually kind of cool and protective of them.
Speaker 1 (22:59):
Yeah, but they sort of have that story in there
with the scary German.
Speaker 3 (23:04):
Guy, right exactly.
Speaker 1 (23:06):
Yeah, so that would have been a double up.
Speaker 3 (23:10):
Double up. Well, I think kids are scared.
Speaker 1 (23:12):
Of a lot of things, It's true, and so are adults,
which we will learn about in our member content. So
then we cut to a plane full of dead people's
coffins and bats, and Dracula punches the pilot, which is
not smart if you ever had intentions of landing. But
(23:36):
the coffin falls out of the hatch, which is like,
that's just going to fall on someone. Not smart, not smart,
But Dracula just flies out and follows, and then it's like,
what happens to this plane?
Speaker 3 (23:50):
Yeah? And so the co pilot is the werewolf guy,
right or Okay, I'm mistake that they look very similar,
like what's his name with a beard? Yeah? Okay, continue, Uh.
Speaker 1 (24:07):
Dracula's at a scenic overlook talking about how he's gonna
take over the city. The kids. The kid is with
his dad, who's a cop. It seems like the parents
are going to go on a date, but it turns
out they're supposed to go to marriage counseling. So we're
(24:30):
adding in some divorce anxiety, which.
Speaker 3 (24:35):
Became a fad with ET, didn't.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
It It sure did. And the dad is like, I
have to leave. There's a crazy guy at the station
saying he's a werewolf. I gotta go. Sorry, our marriage
can wait, and the poor mom is just like, yeah,
I guess I'll serve dinner in my formal dress my
(25:00):
family without you, husband. So the cops they shoot the
werewolf guy. He doesn't die. Don't worry, he lives. They
go investigate the missing mummy, and the cop literally says,
(25:21):
this is too hard. What else? What else do you have?
Speaker 3 (25:27):
This is The scene starts with are you telling me
a two thousand year old mummy just disappeared on you?
Speaker 1 (25:36):
And it ends with him going I don't want this case.
I don't want to do police work.
Speaker 3 (25:44):
Yeah. So when I talk about like proper introductions, it's
like just the Mummy like hand. How they handle the Mummy,
which I always thought was a cool character, is just
so like they do use him for comedic effect, but
there's no like the Mummy doesn't have any like cool
like agency or power in the story. It's not like
(26:08):
we see him coming to life, like we're on team
Mummy at some point, you know.
Speaker 1 (26:14):
Yeah, it doesn't seem like he has any powers.
Speaker 3 (26:16):
Yeah, he's just kind of there and gone. However, he
does have a lot of like he's so slow moving
but has like if you cut off of him, he's
suddenly like capable of like these amazing off screen gymnastics,
you know, you know, like he's slowly, barely moving in
(26:38):
the closet and then before you know it, he's like
out the window. Yeah, or when they tried it seems
like he's going to run them over. And again he's
slow moving and it's like Mummy is so old, and
then he grabs the car mm hmm.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
But then he gets unraveled as hanging onto the car, which.
Speaker 3 (27:02):
Was That was a fun moment. That was a fun idea.
Speaker 1 (27:04):
That was a fun moment. Speaking of fun moments, so Dracula,
the Wolfman, the Mummy and the Swamp Guy drag Frankenstein's
coffin out of a pond and Dracula's cane has jumper
cables in it and is in fact a lightning rod.
Speaker 3 (27:29):
Now.
Speaker 1 (27:29):
I thought that was fun. I was like, okay, I'm
on board for this.
Speaker 3 (27:33):
Yeah, I agree. I like to think that he has
multiple canes. It's like, okay, we're gonna bring the lightning
rod cane today.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
Yeah, because we gotta resurrect our friend Frankenstein's monster.
Speaker 3 (27:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:49):
Yeah, it was super fun. So the kids are all
gathered and they're like, we're the monster squat and we
gotta do something about these darn monsters and frank are like,
the children have the diary, kill them. Kill these kids.
He just says, get the diary and if you have
(28:11):
to kill them, kill them. And Frankenstein's like, okay, what
if I don't want to? And it turns out he
doesn't want to. The scary German neighbor helps them read
the diary.
Speaker 3 (28:25):
He's the only very accommodating. He's very accommodating.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
He just wants these kids to hang out and have pie. Yes,
and he reads it and he tells them that there's
an amulet that can only be destroyed at midnight. But
also someone can do a ceremony to open a hole
to send the bad guys to Limbo. And this is
where I'm like, oh no, that poor girl went in.
(28:54):
Has she been in limbo this whole time? Uh?
Speaker 3 (28:57):
Huh, I guess that's the rules, Like that's how it works.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
Oh, I don't like so is so?
Speaker 3 (29:04):
Is it just? I guess it's anything that gets anything
they get sucked into the portal is get sucked into limbo? Right,
They're just using this like that's not the only way
to defeat these monsters. They defeat pretty much everyone but
Dracula and Frankenstein.
Speaker 1 (29:22):
Head ahead of the portal.
Speaker 3 (29:25):
Yeah, yeah, ahead of the portal, like the portal is.
They're just their most convenient method to defeat Dracula.
Speaker 1 (29:33):
But Dracula wants the amulet because at midnight he can
also do a spell that will undo the balance of
good and evil and let the monsters take over the world.
Is that right?
Speaker 3 (29:48):
That sounds about right. I'm not sure if the SPECIFX.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
But because Dracula really wants the amulet.
Speaker 3 (29:55):
Yes, yeah, a lot. I mean he is a mustache
twirling villain. There's not we don't really get too. We
don't really get any moments to where he's kind of
like monologuing and describing what he wants.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
His monologues are very short.
Speaker 3 (30:13):
I could have done with like a vision board or
something like that. Look at this, Admire my vision board.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
Here's what I want. I want to have the whole
town in my thrall, I went.
Speaker 3 (30:28):
A big library with two stories of books.
Speaker 1 (30:32):
And more than three wives this time.
Speaker 3 (30:35):
Here's some photos that I kept out of magazines.
Speaker 1 (30:39):
Yes, but dracula vision board is something that we needed
because I just was not I was sure of his plan,
but unsure of his motivations. Right, all right, So Phoebe's like, oh,
and it's tomorrow night at midnight when all this is
going to go down. And Phoebe's like, I found Frankenstein.
(31:01):
He is my friend.
Speaker 3 (31:02):
Now she's a little girl, Phoebe.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
Yeah, she's tiny, she's very very tiny.
Speaker 3 (31:09):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (31:10):
And Dracula's at his house. He finds the amulet. There's
a getting ready montage where the kids are getting ready
for their monster siege. And Rudy, Rudy, the bad kid
who smokes, is the most useful because he's in shop
class making bullets out of silver and sharpening steak.
Speaker 3 (31:32):
He's melting down silver.
Speaker 1 (31:35):
Yeah, he's smelting like he's.
Speaker 3 (31:37):
Learned a lot and is yeah, he is all in.
He is all in.
Speaker 1 (31:43):
And he is still completely on supervised because no one's like,
are you making bullets? Is this a problem we should address?
But he's also like a perv.
Speaker 3 (32:02):
You know, you could say that for like all fifteen
year olds.
Speaker 1 (32:06):
Okay, so yeah, yeah, the wolf Man is being drugged
by Dracula because he's in his daytime form. Right, Where
did Dracula get prescription drugs?
Speaker 3 (32:21):
It's so it's tough, like, how so the full So
technically he only becomes a werewolf during a full moon?
But does that is that full moon period just one
night a week or can you kind of like grandfather
it in like the night before or the night after,
so you get kind of like three nights of coverage.
Speaker 1 (32:42):
That's what they always did on Buffy.
Speaker 3 (32:44):
Yeah, where it's like like like a ninety five percent
full moon still counts as a full moon.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
Yeah, but where did Dracula get.
Speaker 3 (32:57):
Sedatives from the grocery store? Okay?
Speaker 1 (33:06):
Okay? Also I did not get the sense that this
was around Halloween time. Was it around Halloween time or
was this just any old time?
Speaker 3 (33:15):
I don't remember any Halloween specific stuff.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Me neither me neither.
Speaker 3 (33:21):
It would have been nice. That would have been nice
as a joke moment, you know, to have someone like
Halloween display and then there's just the Mummy standing in it,
you know.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yeah, it could have excused them walking around the town.
Hey you're in your Halloween costume, early palm. But I
don't recall any of that happening, all right, So there's
but the Wolfman spits out the drugs and escapes and
(33:54):
calls up the cop Dad and is like, I'm aware, wolf,
they've got an amulet. Bad shit, it's gonna go down.
You gotta do something. And he turns into a were wolf.
But it's like he's trying to warn the people. M
He's not fully on their side. When he's in there
is wolf form, he's on their side. When he's just
(34:15):
a man, he's not on their side.
Speaker 3 (34:17):
Yeah, he's uncontrollable for the most part as a wolfman,
although he does seem to take orders.
Speaker 2 (34:23):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (34:24):
Yeah, it's the the nature of these creatures themselves. Like
the Mummy was, as far as I remember, was just
like a force of evil. You know. The creature from
the Black Lagoon is a is a man creature. But
Frankenstein and the Wolfman were always torn with the good
(34:47):
part of themselves and the bad part of themselves.
Speaker 1 (34:50):
Right, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, and we get to see
that in this movie, which is nice. So they find
the sister who they've been photographing in her window and
they're like, are you a virgin? And she's like sure,
(35:11):
and they're like great, then we need you. And they're
blackmailing her with the photo, which I did not like.
So the kids all go to Dracula's house. Dracula is
using dynamite to get the amulet. M m, there's a
big explosion. The maid kid finds the amulet, Dracula attacks them,
(35:32):
fat kid fends him off with a piece of pizza.
Speaker 3 (35:36):
Right. How much garlic was in that pizza? I would
assume a lot because it burns Dracula's face like it's
a hot coal. You know, that's a lot. That's got
to be a lot of garlic. Or is he just
that sensitive, you know, like he can't walk past like
Italian restaurants because just.
Speaker 1 (35:57):
Without getting hives.
Speaker 3 (35:58):
Yeah, that would be rough. That would be.
Speaker 1 (36:02):
Rough, Yeah, especially as like who knows where that myth
comes from that he can't be near garlic? Like okay,
all right, but I like that fact it had some
pizza and a foil and was like, does that does.
Speaker 3 (36:16):
That make Italy the safest place to be if you're
worried about vampires?
Speaker 1 (36:21):
I think so we should all go there.
Speaker 3 (36:23):
If they're that sensitive.
Speaker 1 (36:25):
Mm hmm. Yeah. And it makes it make total sense
that you could just wear a chain of garlic around
your neck and be totally safe.
Speaker 3 (36:34):
I'm sure it was. It was like an old superstition
that got carried over to vampires. You know, that people
would hang garlic or wear garlic to ward off evil spirits,
and then at some point it just got kind of
transferred over to vampires. Yeah, to draculas.
Speaker 1 (36:56):
So they get away with the ambult. The kids all
get together and they're in the scary German guy's car
and they're like, Okay, we need to go somewhere to
create this portal. Let's go to a church. The mummy
attacks them, he gets unraveled, and the cool kid says,
see you later, band aid breath. So I bet Shane
Black was really high fiving himself. We haven't talked about
(37:20):
how Shane Black wrote this movie.
Speaker 3 (37:22):
No, well, he co wrote it. He co wrote it.
I feel like, yeah, so the director Fred Decker also
wrote this. Yeah with anything it's hard to know what
(37:42):
gets changed in production, what writer did what, So it's
always tough to discuss the screenplay and then the story
that we see in the movie.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
But didn't this come out the same year as Lee
Theal Weapons? So like Shane Black is like, got two
scripts on his desk. One is Monster Squad and one
is lethal Weapon.
Speaker 3 (38:06):
Yeah it's it's I don't know the backstory.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
But yeah, kids, kids got range. Yes, all right? So,
uh the cop Dad is like on the case. Which
I really appreciated in this movie was that he's never
like this is ridiculous. You kids are stupid. He's like, yeah,
all right, I'll go fight these monsters. I got to
(38:30):
investigate this.
Speaker 3 (38:31):
Uh huh uh.
Speaker 1 (38:34):
Dracula blows up the clubhouse with dynamite mm hmmm, and
it's fully on fire in the kid's backyard. He turns
into a bat and leaves. Yeah, the church is locked,
and the kids are like, well, we can't figure out
a way around that, so they do the ritual on
(38:55):
the front steps.
Speaker 3 (38:56):
Uhhh, Yeah, they were. The assumption is that the church
which would give them some sort of holy protection, and
maybe they're right, but the truth would have been is
that they would have opened a portal that would have
totally trashed the church.
Speaker 1 (39:09):
Yeah, so the church was right to lock its doors
and keep these kids out. Rudy confronts Dracula's brides, and
we never really confront in this movie that he's killing people.
Like we see these three young girls before they become
Dracula's brides, and like we're just supposed to like be
(39:31):
thrilled that he's impaling them with a crossbow and sharpened stakes,
but it's like these were young women.
Speaker 3 (39:40):
All of these monsters are really slow walkers, it's true,
and they are ready to be attacked, like if you
get close to them, very very dangerous. But you get
a lot of time to prepare beforehand. So they're in
a great situation to where they're in a long like downtown,
(40:00):
you know, town square where you can see for half
a mile, and so you can see them slowly walk
towards him. He's got plenty of time.
Speaker 1 (40:10):
Yeah, he can load up his crossbow and they're like
all spread out. So he takes down Dracula's brides, easy, pasy,
no problem. They blow up the Wolfman. There's so much
dynamite in this movie. Dynamite is everywhere, paid for by Dynamite. Yeah,
(40:31):
Big Dynamite brought you this movie. They blow up the
Wolfman and I'm like, oh, it made me really sad.
And then they determined that the sister is not a virgin.
Speaker 3 (40:42):
Uh huh.
Speaker 1 (40:45):
And she says Steve doesn't count uh huh, and they're
all like, apparently he does.
Speaker 3 (40:56):
That's not what God thinks.
Speaker 1 (40:58):
Yeah. So the Wolfman reassembles and I'm like, oh, thank god,
he's not dead.
Speaker 4 (41:06):
Do it?
Speaker 3 (41:07):
Like the Wolfman can only be killed by a silver bullet,
so instead of making him immune to all things, instead
he's like the T one thousand where he can reassemble himself.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
Yeah, even if he doesn't want to. He doesn't want to. Yeah,
his body's gonna do it of its own accord.
Speaker 3 (41:28):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (41:31):
And so Rudy shoots him in the chest with a
silver bullet and he's like, thank you guy.
Speaker 3 (41:41):
Yeah. He transforms back into a human.
Speaker 1 (41:45):
Which is like, is Rudy not gonna have some questions
to answer? He shot a man in the chest.
Speaker 3 (41:51):
This is after he killed all those women.
Speaker 1 (41:53):
Yeah, all right. Uh. So fat Kid shoots the swamp thing, the.
Speaker 3 (42:01):
Creature of the Black Lagoon, who again, so each of
the each of these these these monsters attack one at
a time. It would have seen it would have been cool. Again,
this is kind of like like Spider Man Homecoming, seeing
these villains overlap on each other, like having to deal
with the creature from the Black Lagoon and the werewolf
(42:22):
at the same time, you know, mm hmm. Instead, it's
just kind of everyone is taking a short break while
the other one attacks.
Speaker 1 (42:31):
Yeah yeah, uh, very ninja style.
Speaker 3 (42:36):
Well, to be honest, we don't see anyone eat or
use the restroom, so maybe it's during these times that
they're doing that.
Speaker 1 (42:44):
M yeah, could be, m could be. So they're like, well,
this little girl is definitely a virgin, so let's have
heard you the chant, And what they're doing is having
the scary German guy read to her and she just
repeats what he says, so she's doing the chant. Dracula
(43:05):
slowly saunters over and Frankenstein saves the little girl. Yes,
the portal opens, Van Helsing comes roaring down. He's just
been waiting at tat.
Speaker 3 (43:19):
He's learned to thrive in the portal. He's learned to
thrive in the limbo. You don't agent here. You can
eat whatever you want not kat around. Right, I've been
watching lots of TV. That's how I learned how to
do the thumbs up.
Speaker 1 (43:35):
Yeah, he grabs Dracula and does a thumbs up Fonsie
style to the kids.
Speaker 3 (43:41):
Right, like like the portal sucks everything in, like cars
fly in.
Speaker 1 (43:47):
It seemed like some whole bunch of bits of fencing
fly in right, stuck.
Speaker 3 (43:52):
In limbo forever. But but the dog.
Speaker 1 (43:57):
They have a little gang dog who's a big, fat
bas a hound, and they're just holding him by the
tail so he doesn't get sucked into limbo.
Speaker 3 (44:06):
It's interesting. So I guess the rules is that it
just sucks in whatever. Like Frankenstein didn't have to go.
He just got.
Speaker 1 (44:14):
Sad when Frankenstein got sucked in.
Speaker 3 (44:17):
Yeah, it's not like it was a magic spell that
that like sucks up monsters. It just sucks up anything,
you know, mm hmm.
Speaker 1 (44:28):
And they I don't know how they close it.
Speaker 3 (44:34):
The portal. The portal is full.
Speaker 1 (44:38):
Okay, it's got enough pieces of fencing. Yes, all right,
So the portal closes. The army shows up based on
a letter written to them in crayon, which.
Speaker 3 (44:51):
Is a very right. And we've kind of got this
Ghostbusters ending, you know, where the every you know, it's
like where they're they're like wiping themselves off with a towel,
patting themselves off of the back as there's like big
pandemonium and like where the Monster Squad. We did it?
Speaker 1 (45:10):
We're the Monster Squad.
Speaker 3 (45:12):
Yeah, and then like a you know, and the music plays.
Speaker 1 (45:17):
And there's a rap. I have the lyrics to the rap.
Speaker 3 (45:20):
Okay, great.
Speaker 1 (45:22):
In one hundred years, in the Darkest Night, the forces
of evil come out to fight the Amulet. They must
destroy or spend forever in the darkest void. Who can
stop their deadly mte or who will stand up for
the right? From the mouth of Babes comes dynamite. The
Monster Squad is gonna groove tonight. And it goes on
(45:45):
and on and on. It's very long, but that's the
beginning of the Monster Squad. Rap. That's great, And that's
the Monster Squad.
Speaker 3 (45:54):
Right, jeez, Louise. Yeah. So I don't want to pooh
pooh anyone who is who it was connected to this
movie via nostalgia. I see you, I see your joy.
I don't want to take away from it.
Speaker 1 (46:14):
But on a scale of one stick of dynamite, to
ten sticks of dynamite, which you need to fight evil? Right,
how many sticks of dynamite are you serving up for
the monster squad?
Speaker 3 (46:26):
So just for my own again, these are just my
own personal feelings. My vibe was six out of ten,
so that would be like three out of five. But
you know, if this was letterboxed, just out of my
own personal coming into cold having not seen it, having
not grown up on it, my own personal enjoyment, I M.
(46:54):
I know, it's tough.
Speaker 1 (46:56):
I agree with you, though, I think it's a six.
I didn't. I didn't. I wasn't neutral on it. I
thought there was a lot of fun.
Speaker 3 (47:05):
Yeah, the movie looks great. Like the movie looks great,
you know, like the nostalgia and the lighting.
Speaker 1 (47:15):
Yeah, it just it didn't get its hooks in me.
Speaker 3 (47:19):
Yes, just purely on a gut level.
Speaker 1 (47:23):
Yeah, I agree. So I think this movie is a
six out of ten or three out of five if
you're a letterboxing So what's your deep cut recommendation? I
have two?
Speaker 3 (47:36):
Okay, mine is similar more recent, I mean obviously, like
the closest comparisons are like Explorers and Goonies. I'm going
to recommend Super eight, which is you know, jj Abrams
kind of very like, you know, version of this where
(47:59):
kids in counter a fantastical thing in this case an alien,
you know, and then gear up to stop it and
connections with the dad, and then the army shows up
at the end. But yeah, it's it's not a perfect movie,
but it's one that I really enjoy and kind of
(48:20):
has some of the stuff that that didn't work for
me in this one, where you got a sense of
what the kids wanted and what their their struggle was,
you know. Yeah. So super eight it's a great, great,
it's a good one to revisit.
Speaker 1 (48:39):
I've never seen it.
Speaker 3 (48:41):
Revisit it though, Okay.
Speaker 1 (48:44):
I will visit it and then visit it again. Great,
I have too. One of them is very specific. It's Supernatural,
the television show season five, episode eleven, Sam Interrupted is.
It stars John Greese or Wolfman, as a frightened former
(49:06):
hunter who has to face a wraith with the boys,
And so as soon as I saw him, I was like, oh, hey,
he's from Sam Interrupted. Hey I can recommend an episode
of Supernatural. But also in keeping with my affection for
the Wolfman, I want to recommend I don't know if
you've seen this but you haven't. I recommend it. It's
(49:28):
called Wolf Like Me. It's on Peacock. It's got two seasons.
It's stars Josh Gad and Isla Fisher, and it's the
story of a man who falls in love with the
lady were wolf and how they try and manage their lives.
Speaker 3 (49:49):
That's nice.
Speaker 1 (49:50):
It looks fun, it is fun. It's very good. I
highly recommend it. It's a very good show. I really
enjoyed it, and I think you I would enjoy it too.
Speaker 3 (50:01):
Okay, cool, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (50:03):
If you need something spooky to watch around, spooky. All right,
So we did it. We did Monster Squad.
Speaker 3 (50:13):
How do we feel? I feel good good, Yeah, I
feel yeah, I do. I do know. I mean, I
don't know anyone personally that has talked about having love
for Monster Squad, but I know.
Speaker 1 (50:28):
They're out there, yeah, Dorian, Yes.
Speaker 3 (50:32):
I know he's out there somewhere.
Speaker 1 (50:35):
He's out there in the world, somewhere doing his thing.
Speaker 3 (50:38):
Yes, And I don't want to that's the problem with
doing the podcast and then basing it the discussion off
of our reaction of something. And I know people are
cherry picking episodes, they're picking ones that they have a
connection with. You know, and I really don't want to
(50:59):
poop poop their experiences.
Speaker 1 (51:04):
No, So so here's what you do if we missed
something in this movie. Uh, become a member, join our
discord and let me know, or hop on Instagram at
Most Excellent Pod, Most Excellent Pod, Most Excellent Pod, and
shoot me a comment when this episode comes out and
(51:26):
let me know what what did we get wrong? I
don't think we poo pooed it.
Speaker 3 (51:31):
I hope not. I hope. Yeah. I mean if they
really hated what we said, they wouldn't have listened this
far to the back. So uh cool. All right, well,
thanks everyone for listening to another episode.
Speaker 1 (51:47):
Yeah. Where can people find you doing your filmmaker magic?
Speaker 3 (51:53):
Well, the best places Squishy Studios dot com. We are
there's a link to my movie last movie Ever Made
in our shorts and web series and stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (52:04):
Excellent. You can find me at the Neighborhood Comedy Theater
in downtown Mace, Arizona, every Friday and Saturday night doing
improv comedy. If you mention that you're a listener to
the Most Excellent Eighties Movies Podcast, I will buy you
a drink at the Sacred Pint, which is the tap
house in front of our in front of our little theater.
(52:27):
And also if you want to listen to me talk
about Supernatural specifically season five, episode eleven, Sam Interrupted, listen
to Gank That Drank, a supernatural drinking game podcast. Also
a product of true story FM. And if you want
more of us, you can become a member. Like we said,
(52:50):
go to true story dot fm, click on our little podcast,
click on the little button there that says become a member,
and you get episodes early at ad free and with
some extra special bonus content where you can get to
know Nathan and Chrissy a little bit better and find
out what really truly scares us in this world. And
(53:16):
if you don't feel like spending money on the pod,
but you still want to show us a little bit
of love, it's easy to do. Like rate review, subscribe,
give us a five star review. It means so much
to us. And when you're out there in the world,
please keep the most excellent Eighties movies podcast motto in mind.
(53:39):
Be excellent to each other and
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