The Toxic Avenger (2025)

DJ Nik and Keith Bliss are joined by Xan Sprouse to review "The Toxic Avenger" !!! Enjoy ! If you would like to come on and discuss YOUR favourite movie send us a email with your movie of choice to : [e-mail] . Check out our great tiers on Patreon : patreon.com/happinessindarkness !!!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
On. Political extremists have taken hostages downtown. Somebody doing something.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
Wait, wait, stop, we'll get you all of that. Just relax.

Speaker 3 (00:17):
Okay, we'd lost Shelly a year ago. These days it's
just me and the kid.

Speaker 1 (00:26):
Looks great. Let's just scrape off the black part.

Speaker 3 (00:29):
That per's pretty good.

Speaker 1 (00:31):
Now giving back. I don't want to hurt him. Why
didn't you do anything?

Speaker 2 (00:37):
Sometimes it's better to do nothing. It's uh, it's going good.

Speaker 1 (00:44):
You're saying that this corporation.

Speaker 3 (00:49):
What knowingly poison its own customers just to boast their
own profit lodges, summon the nuts. Okay, summoning the nuts.
I didn't want any of this. I'm a monster. You're

(01:12):
not a monster. Show him your good heart.

Speaker 2 (01:16):
Hey, buddy, I'm your dad.

Speaker 3 (01:20):
What Doug?

Speaker 2 (01:22):
God, I wasn't even involved, but sometimes you gotta do something.

Speaker 3 (01:31):
Who the fuck are you just some dude.

Speaker 2 (01:35):
With a mob.

Speaker 3 (01:38):
How does it feel to be a hero?

Speaker 1 (01:40):
Assume? Do you realize what's at stake? Here?

Speaker 3 (01:44):
Every man? Find him, bring him here. There's your arm.

Speaker 1 (01:49):
That was just self defense.

Speaker 3 (01:51):
You haven't killed anyone else? Have you? See?

Speaker 2 (01:53):
When you say, uh, self defense, that's.

Speaker 3 (02:04):
The toxic avenger.

Speaker 1 (02:06):
That's what the kids are calling him. I think it's
so well.

Speaker 3 (02:11):
Shum up, people, and welcome to our three hundred and
ninth episode of Happiness and Darkness, the Superhero Movie Podcast,
where we discuss superhero movies Marble, DC, Dark Horse, Image
and Beyond. Naturally, there will be spoilers, folks, so you
have been warned. I'm one of your co hosts, Didjinick
and this is always joining me is my superhero partner,
and Ger I'm the one only. Keith Bliss, Hey, Keith,

(02:34):
how's life treating you today?

Speaker 4 (02:35):
Well, you know, it's like two degrees colder than the
surface of the moon because I don't know what happened
in North Carolina, but I missed the memo, so I
am freezing my biscuits off and I'm going to apologize
ahead of time to our fans for this movie because
it was my recommendation and I love it well.

Speaker 3 (02:50):
I think there will definitely be quite a lot to
talk about, and we could not talk this particular film
without a very special person, of course, one of my
co hosts on gold Standard the Oscar Podcast, The Ghost
would go herself, Zan Sprouse, Hey, Zan, how are you?
And welcome back?

Speaker 1 (03:06):
Thank you I'm happy to be back, and I'm not
trying to make it weird. I just got to pee
on my face for a second.

Speaker 4 (03:10):
It's okay, You're not a weirdo.

Speaker 3 (03:12):
That's totally totally fine. Well, I mean today is a
rather weird movie anyways, because we are discussing the Toxic
Avenger from twenty twenty three, though it was only released
to theaters this year. Twenty twenty five was directed and
written by Macon Blair, while the score was by Will
Blair and Brooke Blair. So I guess it was kind
of a Blair project. I guess. That said, we do

(03:33):
not have the budget for this movie, but so far
it has made three million at the box office. So Zan,
starting with you, as you are our guest today, you
and I, of course many moons ago, discuss the og
Toxic Avenger. What did you make of this this version?

Speaker 1 (03:49):
I had a great time with this movie. I was
supposed to see it at my local independent theater and
something happened to the projector. The projector broke so we
weren't able to see it there. And then a friend
of Mineset, my friend Matt, was like, I'm going to
go up to AMC and watch it. There they have
the unrated version. I want to let's just go see that.
So we went up to an AMC theater, sat through

(04:14):
probably fifteen minutes of trailers, not a whole thirty minutes,
but a decent amount, and we saw the unrated version
and it was a gory, disgusting, lude, crude, infantile joy
of a ride. It was just everybody in this you
can tell, had an appreciation for the concept of Toxy,

(04:36):
for the concept of trauma, and they were just there
to be batshit crazy. And I really love that. I mean,
reboots are hard, reboots are difficult, and this was a
reboot that this is probably the reboot with the most
low the reboot of the lowest budget movie that has
now the most famous people in it.

Speaker 3 (04:56):
You know.

Speaker 1 (04:57):
So we've got you know, we've got a couple, We've
got an Oscar nominee in this movie. We've got a
lot of a lot going on here. And you know,
we've got I believe we have an Emmy winner for sure.
So and then we have a horror movie royalty in
Kevin Bacon. So yeah, everybody was just down for what

(05:19):
Toxi and Troma mean. Just down for this kind of
you know, renegade filmmaking, and I just I couldn't have
been happier with how this turned out.

Speaker 3 (05:27):
Very well said and the Keith, you know you originally
hail from New Jersey, where Troma calls home. So what
did you make of this remake?

Speaker 4 (05:37):
Whatever you want, mutation of the original, cause you know,
we're just gonna stick to the theme here. New Jersey is
not the cesspool that this movie makes us out to be.
I mean, is it a shithole? Yes, but hey, you
know we do have mountains and lakes and normal looking
critters from time to time. I'm not saying, you know,
everybody's a chemical plant away from you know, growing a
third arm, but there are areas of Jersey that are

(06:01):
like that. This just happens to take that and like
ratchet up to seventy two because it's just it's pure chaos.
I am a fan of the original. I'm more or
less like this one. There's a couple scenes that I
was like, Ugh, they're dragging this on. But for as
I will use your saying, Nick, by and large, I

(06:22):
did have a good time. I did enjoy it. I
saw the unrated version and I didn't realize it until
like the very end there was like unrated. I just
want to know what the hell they cut out of
this to make it a R rated movie, because it
is so unhinged. I it basically it is just like
the opening credits, hig, I'm a mutant, and then the
credits end, like that's all they could show from this movie.

(06:42):
And as Zen mentioned, the cast is just ridiculous. We
now have another movie or a cast of individuals we
can add to the sixth degree of Kevin Bacon game.
Because clearly, you know, everybody at some point has worked
with somebody that worked with Kevin Bacon, and this is
just you know, case in point.

Speaker 3 (07:00):
I very much agree with you. And the thing is this,
I was really looking forward to this one because I
came into the whole Toxic Avenger franchise very late in life.
I mean, I think pretty much when I was starting
this podcast and when you know, Zan and I reviewed
that film once again many many moons ago. I was
familiar with the concept. I was told this film is

(07:22):
incredibly ridiculous and so on. But what I really loved
about that film when we did that review was the
big the messages. It was trying to tell while being
incredibly silly and ridiculous. I mean there, of course, we
had the whole idea of you know, radiation and pollution
being a big problem, and all these kinds of gym culture,
of course, which was a big thing for that time. Hear.

(07:43):
What I appreciated about what Macon Blair did with this
is he very much embraced that concept of what a
toxic Avenger movie entails. It has to be completely off
the wall. But at the same time, if you try
and look at the subtext, aside from all the gore
and guts and everything else, I think they're there are
some very important points being made, because there are some

(08:03):
some very some big messages which are unfortunately part of
real world life. You know, Zan and I were actually
talking about this off air briefly about the fact of
here you're dealing with the whole idea of medical insurance
being a huge problem for so many people, and how
many so many people can unable to afford care. The
idea of big farmer, I guess, being demonized in this

(08:25):
particular version where everybody's cruel and just wants to get
your money is not necessarily curing you. And of course,
you know. Pollution of course another another big one as
well here as well, because sadly the pollution problem has
not gone away. Possibly it's gotten worse. But other than that,
I love the performances. I thought it was great that
we got such such a stacked cast for a movie
like this, and I'm assuming probably it's because of the

(08:47):
you know that you guys mentioned for the love of
this franchise, because I don't know how much they even
got paid. They might just have done it because wow,
I get to be in a toxic Avenger movie. I'm down.
So that's probably what it was. And I think everybody's
having the time of their lives in this one. You
can clearly tell that. And aside from the silliness, I
think you get some really great performances, even though it's,

(09:07):
as I said, a very very ridiculous film. And if
they do make a sequel, I mean I'm for it.
I mean because I did like the story, I did
like the characters, and you know, to Keith's point, the
fact of you know New Jersey, you also being the
buttend of many jokes. From what I've learned in the States,
I think this also tries to portray the fact that
we're going through just hard times as a world culture,

(09:30):
whereas everybody seems to be mean to each other. Everybody's
so horrible, you know, nobody will help each other. Everything
is so grim and gritty and dark, and I think
it is kind of representative of, unfortunately, the times that
we are going through, as I said, as a human race.
So I appreciated that as well. So I really enjoyed this.
And I also saw the unrated version. And to your point, Keith,

(09:51):
I don't know what they could cut out to make it,
to rate it or allow it to go out there.
If you cut out anything, so well, I guess. Then
let's get to our characters the boards. Kicking off with
our titching the character, we have mister Peter Dinklage as
Winston Goo's aka the Toxic Avenger, while the superformer for
Toxy was Louisa Guerrero. So Keith, starting with you, what

(10:13):
did you make of our hero?

Speaker 4 (10:15):
This is gonna be my unpopular opinion, but I'm over
Peter Dinklage. I'm just gonna be honest, Like they just
try to cram him in everything now and you're like, oh,
you don't know who to put this put in Peter Dinklage,
he he was okay, and other stuff that I've seen
him in, you know, the What's.

Speaker 3 (10:33):
The movie for?

Speaker 4 (10:34):
Because I just totally blanked on that one, all the
Avengers movie, the X Men. It's like, oh great, He's
not a bad actor. It's just they want to make
him the next big thing. He's in Dexter and I'm like,
all right, cool or Dexter Reborn or whatever the new
Dexter series is. And it's like, he's not a bad actor.
It just again, does not have to be put into everything.

(10:54):
He his take on this character is entertaining. You know me,
you know, me bashing on him for the first Hunits,
you know, that is what it is. But his take
on this character. I know people like him in terms
of like just down on the lock. They can't catch
a break every little thing. You know, you he gets sick,

(11:16):
He has insurance, but he doesn't have the right insurance
because of some you know, minor issue or you know,
minor whatever some bs. So we all have known people
like Winston and to see him go through the struggles,
you know, and then for him to finally break when
he can't afford his insurance or the medication for the
drugs that would potentially care him from the drinking water

(11:38):
poison that he's been drinking the last however many years.
And then what's you do? He robs his boss, who
conveniently has a safe full of money, Like who does that?
Like this this is not eighteen ninety two where they
have to keep the guard bars of gold and all
the money in a safe in the back. We have banks,
or they have banks. So like just the fact that

(11:58):
he's like, I'm gonna go into the seeker room and
steal all this money, Like what the I'm waiting for
Batman to kick in a wall or something, just because
of like the level of silliness and there should be
a superhero somewhere. The Transformation, I don't know. I think
it's the suit that they designed for him. It just
it looked weird. There's no the best good way of

(12:20):
explaining anybody who remembers the original, there's a lot of
practical makeup on the actor and just a really bad mask.
This was a full bodysuit, and I think that kind
of distracted a little bit from everything else that was
going on, because anytime you saw him, you're just like, hey,
it's a rubber dude running around beating people up. I
do appreciate the spirit of him as the Toxic Avenger

(12:43):
growing up on the original movies and cartoons and all
the other shenanigans. So again, as you guys have both said, clearly,
everybody had fun in this movie, and you could tell.
I'm pretty sure you could see him laughing a little bit,
Like if you look at him close enough, he's laughing
a little bit just at the silliness that's going on.
And I can appreciate that. So, you know, if they

(13:05):
did make a sequel or made this a trilogy, I'd
still watch it. So I can't, you know, complain too
much about it.

Speaker 3 (13:11):
Sounds good. And Zang, what did you think of this
iteration of Toxi.

Speaker 1 (13:16):
I think my favorite thing about this iteration of Toxi
is that he he's like a little bit more grown up.
You know, the original Taxi was an adult, of course,
but he just sort of was just kind of a
weirdo and came in contact with jerks, which is kind
of all you needed to be made fun of in
the eighties was to be kind of a socially awkward weirdo.

(13:38):
Pretty much anybody all along. We've all seen eighties movies
all you need. You know, it just takes one Billy
Zabka to ruin a weirdo's day. So there's just more
to this version of the character because of him being
not just sick himself, but trying to be a dad to,
you know, to a kid that has real problems. I mean,

(13:59):
this poor kid lost his mom. He doesn't have his
biodad around. You know, this is a step dad and
I don't even think he Wait was he a stepdad?
Was he married to the mom? Yeah? I didn't think so.

Speaker 4 (14:11):
Yeah, right, and they were just straight stepdad.

Speaker 1 (14:14):
Yeah, just you know, just you know, mom's boyfriend is
who this kid has to live with. And you know
he he works long hours, he works a hard job.
I mean, he's still a janitor, and he's trying to
do the best he can for this kid who's having
the same kinds of problems as he is. So I
feel like there's just a lot at stake for this
Toxy because of how he's he's got, you know, twenty

(14:37):
first century problems now. And like you and I were
talking Nick before the before we started recording, this concept
of your insurance through your company. Not paying for the
condition you have because of the hazardous conditions of your
company is not fictional. Unfortunately, it's a very real situation

(15:01):
in this world for a lot of people, especially here
in the United States where we are. I don't care
what you think of us as Democrats or Republicans, were capitalists.
And when capitalism does things like privatize healthcare because it
has to privatize innovation, insurance is a bell curve and
these kinds of things happen. And at the end of
the day, for capitalism, you know, the bottom line is

(15:24):
the bottom line. And this movie really did put its
money where its mouth is. It took its advertising budget
and gave it to a nonprofit organization that helps people
pay their medical debts. And you know they will continue
to donate money based on box office. So if you

(15:46):
want to if you want to do something good, go
see this movie. I know that sounds strange, but they're
trying to erase millions of dollars of medical debt for people.
And that's what makes this movie incredibly real, because you know,
the like I said, the spirit of trauma is just
batshit crazy, which is what makes trauma wonderful and why

(16:06):
we all love it. But at the same time, it's
like put on this too too, and go kiss a sheep,
and you know, it just gets so strange. It's like
it's like strange shock value, magnetic poetry. Sometimes trying to
put the plot of a trauma movie together, and this
one just felt a little more. This is a weird
thing to say, a little more heartwarming because of this

(16:27):
version of Toxy. And you know, I love that Peter
dinklands has gone from hating mutants to becoming a mutant,
you know, going from Trask to Toxi. And I like
Peter dinklie And I've liked Peter Dinklage since the mid
nineties when he was he was in a movie. I'm sorry,
I'm laughing. I'm thinking of the scene he's in a
movie called Living in Oblivion, which is a movie about

(16:49):
Steve Bushmi trying to direct an independent film and just
nothing goes right. And there's this amazing scene where Peter
Dinklage is yelling at him asking why does the dream
sequence need a dwarf? And it's so making fun of
twin peaks. And I've loved him ever since then. So
I you know, when you were talking Keith about we're

(17:12):
putting in Peter Dinklins and everything, It's all I'm saying
is thank god that Toxy wasn't Tom Hanks, because I
feel like Tom Hanks is everybody at this point.

Speaker 4 (17:19):
That's fair, that could be true.

Speaker 3 (17:21):
Oh, Pedro Pascal at this point true.

Speaker 1 (17:24):
I don't want a movie where Pedro Pascal has anything
that makes him not look like Pedro Pascal.

Speaker 3 (17:30):
Stop it.

Speaker 1 (17:30):
So yeah, I mean we need to see his face
full on. I need a full two hours of face.
So I really liked that about this toxic and I
liked how he really was an avenger. You know, he
wasn't just getting vengeance, but he was an avenger. He
was an avenger working with someone who's trying to whistle

(17:51):
blow on this company that's doing all these horrible things,
and he's trying to help himself and other people like him,
and he's trying to save his step son. So I
really liked that about it. I liked also just the
sort of reluctance of his inability to understand what his

(18:12):
powers were, you know, just you know at this Also,
I love that the Minions are just this shitty band too,
where they're basically like.

Speaker 4 (18:20):
The insane posse.

Speaker 1 (18:21):
I was just gonna say, take take the worst juggalos
that have no musical talent whatsoever. And I'm not trying
to give a hard time to juggalos. I'm just saying
I'm talking about people who are just following a band
rather than have the musical ability to be in a band,
who have put together a band, And that's who these
people are. And so you know, when you know, we

(18:43):
have that scene where he's at the concert and he
just sort of kills everybody, and then Jacob trumpoay is like,
were those bad guys? Yeah? Kind of like he just
he doesn't quite know, and Toxi's kind of like this,
he kind of doesn't know his full capacity because how
would you He's mutating constantly, and how would you know
what to happen? And even you know, even when I
the joke I made earlier about him not trying to

(19:04):
make a weird and it's got to pee on my
face for a second, when he realizes that his urine
is acidic and things he can do and he doesn't
want this, but he'll use it. And I like that
they kept that, They kept that aspect of Toxy. I
like that that, you know, Toxi's not trying to be Toxy.
Toxi's just doing, you know, dealing. He's playing the best

(19:27):
hand with the hand he was dealt essentially. And I
feel like, like I said Toxi back at, you know,
original Toxi was a little bit I don't know, I
don't know how to say this, a little bit sort
of cookie cutter, Like I feel like trying to get
with a girl that is an obvious bully, isn't, you know,

(19:49):
just just And this is something that I've felt for
a long time, being one of the weirdos, being one
of the weird kids. Weird girls don't want to go
to prom with the captain the football team, and weird
guys don't always want the head cheerleader. It's like, weird
girls want a weird guy and weird guys want a
weird girl. And so I feel like the desperation of

(20:10):
him being led astray after crashing this party and hey,
just walk through that door. It's very you know, this
way to the egress type of thing. Just walk through
this door and then we'll help you. I feel like
there's a desperation there that's a little more relatable than
just I want to kiss a girl. And I like
that because if you are dying, and if your death

(20:32):
is going to further orphan and already orphaned kid who's
a good kid, you're going to be desperate and you're
going to do stupid crap. And the same thing when
you love a kid who is troubled and really kind
of only knows you as mom's boyfriend, but he's a
good kid and you like him and he's all you

(20:52):
have of the love of your life, you are going
to do desperate things like where a two two to
make him think that you're interested in his dancing interests.
I just I feel like all of the ridiculous things
that Toxi did in the original movie kind of make
a little more sense in this one. I feel like
we can all relate to desperately trying to get a

(21:12):
kid to open up to us, or desperately trying to
get our insurance company to listen to us, or our
HR department to listen to us, or something like that.
And I think that was good with this particular version
of Toxy And I like that he was just sort
of a sweet guy that was just struggling. You know,
he wasn't sort of sin him a weirdo one oh one.

(21:35):
You know, no, no, I'm not saying anything bad about Lloyd, Okay,
But like I said, in the eighties, there was kind
of a formula for weirdos and bullies, and I think
when it came to Toxi, they broke the mold more
for the bullies than they did for the weirdos. And
I think that was perfectly fine at the time because
that's what audiences were used to. But I think the

(21:58):
way this character, this version of the character was done,
made him strangely more relatable. You know. You know, he
does have his joker moment of falling into the vat
and you know, becoming a mutant and things that would
never someone would never survive, you know, So there is that,
you know, you have to balance your suspension of disbelief,

(22:21):
Like if we are going to believe that somebody's going
to be dropped in a vat of goo and still
be alive and then you know have like superhuman strength
and acidic urine and all the other things that talks
he can do. It helps if we relate to him
as a person, and it helps if we are sympathetic
towards him as a person, and we really are with

(22:41):
this character. And I like that. And I also love
that we'll talk about this when we talk about the ending,
that all he wants is to just be okay and
live his life, you know, and at the end of
the day, if he and his kid are just in
that same apartment, happy doing their thing, that's enough for him.

Speaker 2 (22:59):
You know.

Speaker 1 (23:00):
He doesn't want the world. He doesn't want to be
He doesn't want the fame that comes with being the
toxic Avenger. He doesn't and he's not even he's not
even in it as much. I mean, of course he
wants the vengeance. We all want him to get back
at Kevin Bacon. We all want Kevin Bacon to go down.
Even in this movie, the government wants him to go down.
He's a terrible person in this company's a terrible company,

(23:20):
But he just wants everybody to be okay, which I
love because I feel like that makes him more of
more of an Avenger, I guess, is the best way
to put it.

Speaker 3 (23:30):
I definitely think so. I do think that this version
of the tox he does have more urgency also because
I think the style of filmmaking one you know, to
you guys, point has changed so much since the eighties
and since we're back when and I think, you know,
we were talking about the fact that Troma is notorious
for making these absurd films and may not necessarily have

(23:52):
a plot line that makes any sense, but it brings
the message through. I think I've seen a few Trail
films myself, aside in the Toxic Avenger. It seems that
most of them are trying to give you a message
through silliness, and this I think is similar to what
we get here, except narratively, things I think make more
sense and are more cohesive and and so definitely applaud

(24:15):
to making as a director and as a writer doing
this keeping the spirit of the movie of the Troma
while trying to tell a story that somewhat makes sense.
And I agree, I think we definitely feel more for
this version of Toxic because he is incredibly relatable. I mean,
you know, because Keith was mentioned was as a guy
down in his luck and to your point, Zan as well,
he's a single dad trying to do his best for

(24:38):
Wade and be there for him and show enthusiasm with
the things that Wade does, but at the same time,
I think there's also great sadness to him because like,
will I ever be enough for this kid? And obviously
he clearly still misses his girlfriend understandably, the fact that
we see him wake up and almost having this imaginary
conversation with the photograph it is very heartwarming and there
I see even heartbreaking at the same time. And yes,

(25:00):
he then gets up of these crazy antics. He destroys
people with this, with his broom and what have you.
But I think the core of this is trying to
to create a character that folks who feel that they
have been they're hard done by can relate to and
can almost see as their icon and the guy that
they can say as our hero because he is very much,

(25:24):
I think, the working class hero. And it maybe also
shows you what what the working class is capable of
when they are pushed too far. And I think this
is exactly what Toxic Toxy's concept is. As Cipheron obviously
wanting to protect his is his son, he's also I
think a voice for the masses. It's like the people
at the top are destroying us. We need somebody who

(25:46):
understands what we're what our our our troubles are rise
up and be a voice and be the flag bearer
for these people, and I think that's exactly what this
version of Toxy does now. But if we want to
applaud both Peter and Louisa but doing such a great
job with this character. I liked the design. I thought
it was fun. There were some moments who I was like, oh,
that's so ridiculous, but I did laugh out loud. And

(26:07):
I'm glad that we tried to tell a different story
where it wasn't you know, to your point, Zan, Toxy
looking for a girlfriend or say, even hooking up with JJ.
By the end of this film, I'm kind of glad
it was a different story and it definitely worked for me.
Was I was very pleased, and I can't get enough
of Peter. I have to admit I loved him in
Dexter Resurrection and I loved him here as well. So

(26:30):
let's get to the other members of Team Toxi. We
have the afore mentioned Jacob Trumblet as Wade Taylor Page
as JJ Doherty, and David Yao as Guffree Stockins. So, Zan,
starting with you, what did you make of the rest
of Team Toxy?

Speaker 1 (26:45):
Well, I'm going to start with Wade because I just
thought he was such an adorable kid. I love Jacob Tremblay.
I think he's really growing into a fine actor. You know,
we saw, you know, we a lot of people first
really saw him in Room, which was nominated for Oscars,

(27:07):
and we all remember his face when the Star Wars
Robots came on on stage. He was such a cute
little kid. He's in a little he's in a tuxedo,
he's with all these adult people and the robots. He's like,
oh hey, robots. It was adorable. And I will love
this kid forever because of that. And he's just such
a perfect example of a kid that just can't catch

(27:28):
a break and just can't seem to find his way
in the world. You know, he has this you know,
first of all, he's lost his mom, he's lost his dad,
and he has this talent that he wants to nurture,
but it's kind of a weird thing. There's no real
light club for that in school. And he has this
very Napoleon Dynamite esque talent show experience, and so he's

(27:52):
just kind of a kind of just a real fish
out of water kind of kid. And I think Jacob
Tremblay does a perfect job at this because and even
the way he looks, you know, he's just you know,
he's a you know, he's not this he's not a
Billy's advocate type of character. You know, he's he's more
in the vein of a Timothy Shallome look looking kind

(28:14):
of a kid a delicate feature, is very thin and
just very much the type of kid that you would
think would get picked on in high school. And you know,
and I will just say that both of those kids
have more badassory in one of their little fingernails than
any high school bully ever will, So there's that to
be said about them. And just going through what he

(28:35):
goes through, I just think he makes this even more
of a believable, not believable, but a relatable story. And
it's so sweet that he's got as much of a
support system as he can get from Winston. But you know,
there's it's just sort of not enough. This poor kid.
You know, he's going you know, he's going brokes and
in this kid to therapy and everything. But I'm not

(28:55):
trying to sound money python here, but all this kid
really wants to do is dance, you know, and he's
he just wants to be able to be himself and
be loved for who he is. But he is dealing
with grief and it is very difficult and it isn't
particularly easy for him to find his people. And it's
not easy for anybody in high school to find your people.

(29:16):
You know, you need to be you know, it's a
big world and to find your people, you need access
to a bigger world. And of course it's getting easier
for kids with you know, the Internet is such a
blessing and a curse to be able to find your world.
That's like, maybe you think you've found your people, and
sometimes you think you found your people and you're getting catfish.
So it's it's a it's terrible and wonderful all at
the same time. But you know, this kid is he's,

(29:40):
like I said, there's really not much to say other
than he's just he's just a good kid and you're
really rooting for him, and you're rooting for him to
be who he needs to be, and you're rooting for
him to understand that Winston's there for him, and he's
I don't know, I don't know how to say. It's
just sort of you know, once, once he's a bull

(30:00):
to accept what is there for him, he's going to
be able to flourish. And like I said, we see
that kind of at the end of this movie. And JJ,
I like J. I like the concept of JJ's character
in this because she is a way for us to
realize that this is bigger than just what's happening to Winston.

(30:23):
This is a bigger deal. This is a terrible, terrible company.
And it's not just some batshit crazy, weirdo guy megalamaniacal
freak just picking on his employees and being a bad employer.
This guy is poisoning the world and he needs to
be stopped. And we, you know, we have our subplot

(30:43):
of you know, all of his investors coming after him
and the government coming after him, and you know, we
talk a little bit about you know, women being being
there to just be the advancement of male characters. I
wouldn't say that about this character. I would say that
this one is there to be the downfall of our

(31:05):
villain more than anything else. I think she's because Toxy,
you know, he does need somebody, you know, he, like
you said, he has Guthrie. But Guthrie can only do
so much. You know, you know Guthrie's Guthrie is a
good friend to have, but you know, Guthrie doesn't have
the resources or or anything like that to be able

(31:29):
to really help bring this down. And JJ really does
have the resources to help bring this down. The JJ
versus Kevin Bacon would be enough of a movie. I
think the fact that that character is there to make
you realize that the toxic Avenger is really avenging something

(31:50):
I think is great. And like I said, I would
rather see a woman character be there to bring down
the male protagonist than to help further advance the male
or the male antagonist rather than further advance the male protagonist.
I love that. That's perfectly fine with me. And I
like how this character from the beginning has her own

(32:11):
fight as well. It's like she and Toxy are two
great tastes that go great together. It's not like she's
she hasn't enlisted him as the face of her cause
and he hasn't enlisted her to get dirt on somebody
to help him. It's like they're both fighting their own
fight and then they happen to come together, and then
that's what that's what makes them both even stronger, which

(32:34):
I think is a good way. I think is a
good way of doing it, because you could, I mean,
there could be a lot of ways that you know,
Toxy could get used by a say maybe there's another
sort of not so on the level environmental group out
there that would want to use him for their own agenda.

(32:56):
But that's not what's happening here. These are two people
who are just trying to make their way in life,
and this company is preventing that one way in one
way or another, either by just being terrible employers or
terrible in the world, or just this is a terrible company.
These are terrible people, and the fact that their fights

(33:16):
come together I think is a is a great way
of doing it.

Speaker 3 (33:19):
Great stuff. And uh, Keith, what did you make of
way to JJ and Guffrie, they're all stupid, stupid doodo heads.
Now I'm just kidding, But you.

Speaker 4 (33:27):
Know, I can't really top Zan on any of this,
so I'm just gonna go what Zen said, And now
I'm just kidding I with some of this stuff. I
don't know if you guys cracked up, But the fact
that one of the characters name is JJ and she's
a reporter. I'm like, really, we're gonna go little, you know,
hit that nail on the head. You know, if everybody
knows who jjo and and Jamison from Spider Man. There

(33:50):
you go, there's your homage as it's were up. I
actually I wanted more of her character, as Zan said,
I would have been fine with just JJ versus Kevin
Bak because that in itself would have been a fun story. Still,
the crazy toxic stuff in the background, not so much
with toxic Avenger, but her fighting the everybody else. I

(34:11):
would have been fine with that. That would have been
a fun movie to watch. Same thing with Wade, which,
by the way, I had no idea who this kid was.
I had to go look up his IMDb profile. I apologize,
I'm just naive like that, and I did not realize
he had done so much voice work of shows I've watched,
like he's in the Harley Quinn cartoon. Didn't realize that
and some other shows. I'm like, oh, I actually know

(34:33):
who this kid is. I just never had seen his
face before, so I just assumed this was a unfortunately
like a nobody or a very new young actor to
the industry. But no, I just don't watch enough damn
TV apparently, and he's been on a bunch of stuff.
So I like those two characters. I actually like the
actors that portrayed them, and I grew with everything Zan

(34:53):
said with He's very much a Napoleon Dynamite esque child,
where he has all this talent, just doesn't know how
to focus this or point this in a direction where
he can express it. And you see Winston trying to
relate by doing the crazy dance to the music and
failing miserably like most step parents do when they try

(35:16):
to relate to their significant others children. I've failed myself
on numerous occasions, so I know that feeling. But you know,
to live and learn kind of thing. I again, I
liked the supporting cat. Weirdly, I liked the supporting cast
a little bit more than Toxy. And it's not that
you know, I was batching him before it just the

(35:38):
story was so interesting with them Way losing his mother
due to illness that in itself, her taking up the
cause to bring down you know, Big Evil Corporation could
have been the soul story to this movie. We didn't
necessarily need the toxic Avenger angle to it was it
fun sure, and then you have the wise hobo who

(36:02):
was just there to be slightly crazy and kind of
saying occasionally and just never the same. At the same time,
I kind of liked the fact that he was that
crazy off the rails, the fact that he's like, I'm
a doctor, and then however many excusing yeah, right then
he goes that whole one who told you I was
the doctor Dudd and he's like, I don't know what

(36:24):
you're talking about. Like, just the fact that he flipped
so like quickly, that actually did make me laugh because
that's what I was expecting at some point in the
movie for him to have that exact interaction with Peter's
character excuse me, Toxy. So just the fact that actually happened,
I was like, oh, yeah, that was the payoff. I
like that one because they, as we all know, they

(36:45):
introduced a character for a very specific joke or gag,
and that was a specific joker gag. I knew they
were setting up when he had that whole like I'm
a doctor and then we're destroying the planet and all
we're all dying, like where he goes on these the
rants with him talking about Toxy dying I thought it
was great. That made me laugh, just the fact he's
in the woods yelling.

Speaker 3 (37:05):
Hey, this guy's gonna die, hey.

Speaker 4 (37:08):
And he's just flipping out. And then he's like, news flash, Champ,
where we all are? And that's when Toxi kind of
had that oh yeah, fair enough moment, which I thought
was a great because he was so down on his luck,
he forgot that literally everybody on the planet is in
the exact same boat he is. It just he's getting
there a little bit faster than everybody else. So I

(37:29):
think he was just the right level of comedy relief
for the complete insanity that was going on in this movie. Again,
these three could have ran the movie without Toxi. I
would have been fine with that movie without them. All
these characters had very interesting stories. Hell, I would have
been fine talking about the wise Hobo some more, just

(37:51):
to find out because even he makes a passing comment
as to like why he's out here, and you're like okay,
and you just continue on and you accept it as
no big deal. But we get a lot more backstory
with Wade and JJ, and I just think they kind
of short changed him a little bit. And I get
it for you know, for times sake, they had to
sacrifice somebody from the story, and he just happened to

(38:13):
be the sacrificial goat, no pun intended. If everybody knows
the end of up movie, and it was again enough
to break him up. I like the fact that you know,
Toxi has to save JJ and he realizes like, hey,
I can heal her and literally drills a hand a
hole into his hand and just slaps his magic goo
on her and she's like, all right, I'm good. And

(38:34):
like the next scene, the whole fact that they didn't
think to just to milk him dry for his blood
to create this super magic ooze. That was a missed
story point. They were too busy, like, let's refine it
and make it better. Clearly, he just needs to spit
on you and you're good. But that's a rent for
a whole different day.

Speaker 3 (38:53):
Well set. And I mean, I will say this, I
have not seen the other movies, all the Toxic Avengel
you know, from way back when, so I don't know
if there were situations where Toxy was in any particular peril,
because if that's the case, then my point will be moot.
But here I think the fact that and you know
you brought that up, Keith, you know, just to to

(39:13):
go on that piggyback on that point is this is
one of the first times we actually saw Toxy in
peril because we seeing the first one. He there is
some danger, but he's never really a major major danger. Here.
I was literally feeling his pain as he was being drained, like, please,
don't do it again. It almost hurt me to see
him suffer that way. And I'm also glad as a
cat person that the very beginning of the movie the

(39:34):
cat did not die, so I was very happy about
that that, you know, before he underwent his mutation, Winston
did save the cat, so I was very glad about it.
I'm like, please, let's not kill the cat, and we didn't,
which I was very glad, thank you Macan. So when
it comes to these characters, yeah, I want to start
here with Guthrie because he is probably one of my
favorite characters in this film, next to Winston, and I

(39:57):
would do I agree with you, Keith, and I wish
we'd had more of him because I love this guy
to bits. I mean, I think we got enough, but
I would have liked just a little bit more because
he is very much Toxy's mentor, and we do get
that homage and you know, kind of making fun of
the mentor teaching the would be hero, you know, with
the broom and in search of giving and literally making

(40:20):
almost like a holy item that that will be now
his instrument of vengeance. It makes me think a little
bit of kill Bill when Beatrix Kiddo is given the sword,
so it has that almost moment of reverence that this
is going to be the weapon that will allow you
to to have to have your vengeance. I thought it
was wonderful. And yes, even the rant that he makes
at first, but it's like, oh, you're gonna die, We'll

(40:41):
have a parade and everything. It's it was very Ricky Gervase.
I think when he's like, oh we're all going to die,
who cares kind of thing. It's like we're all in
the same boat, like you said, but he's getting there
a little bit faster. But it was great to have
the wise hobo in this film. And if we ever
do get sequels, I hope that Guthrie will get more
to do because also I think David Yalder did just

(41:02):
a great job just bring this character to life. JJ
Doherty I think, yeah, I do appreciate you to Zan's point,
the fact that she's not there for the advancement of Toxy,
but she's there for her own mission because she has
lost family due to what the Garbingers, or Bob Garbinger
in particular and his company had been doing. And I'm
also glad that they didn't make her too environmentalist, if

(41:24):
you were where like we're being preachy here, because the
environment is going to hell in a handbasket. It is.
But I think had it been more done in the
typical I know, either a Greta Thumberg kind of way,
maybe people wouldn't have enjoyed her as much they made her.
They gave her a reason to be against this company,
not just because they're destroying lives and destroying the planet,
but because, as I would say now, it's personal. And

(41:47):
that's I think why her and her in Toxic can
relate so well because they've both lost people and a
and have suffered major, major things because of Bob and
the company. So will they work great as a team.
So hopefully once again we'll be able to see more
of them if further movies are made. And yeah, Wade
is just a sweet kid. I think that's the best
way to describe him. Jacob Trumblad does always a great

(42:09):
job no matter what he's in. I absolutely adored him
in Room. He did such a fabulous job with such
difficult material. I do want to rewatch Room again. I've
seen a couple of times where it's always very painful
to watch, but just for for the performances there, him
and Brie Larsen. I think it's just such a great,
greater film, as small of a film as it is.
And yeah, he is a talented kid. And I agree.

(42:31):
Now that we do have things like the Internet and
what have you, it is easy to find your people,
to Zan's point, but he obviously is still suffering from grief.
And I guess now it's him and Winston. I guess
they were never particularly close, and now that Winston's trying
to create that connection with his step son, it feels
maybe forced to Wade. And he never calls him dad.

(42:51):
He only calls him dad if he knows. At the
very end of the film, he's always calling him by
his first name because he's never seen him as a
father figure. And I was also so glad that Wade
did not die because when we get that explosion where
he's held prison. I'm like, no, are you serious? They
just killed Wade. I'm so glad that was not the case,
because you never know in a film like this, so
I appreciated him was and I think at this point

(43:14):
that Winston and Wade will be all right. I really do,
And I'm glad this whole ordeal has strengthened their bond.
So let's round off our characters with our villains, one
of which ultimately finds redemption. We have the afore mentioned
Kevin Bacon as Bob Garbinger, Julia Davis as Kissy Sternovan,
and of course Elijah Wood as Fritz Garbinger. So Keith,

(43:36):
starting with you, what did you make of the Garbinger
brothers and Kissy?

Speaker 4 (43:40):
Well, Kissy just reminded me of an individual many Americans
may or may not be familiar with from the nineties
that happened to be married to the current person in
charge of this disaster. She reminded me of Ivana and
I won't say last name because everybody can fill it

(44:01):
in themselves. Just with the bond and the accent and
the silly suits and everything, just totally reminded me of
that individual, and Kevin Bacon's character potentially could have remind
you of a younger iteration of said person as well.
Anybody who grew up in New Jersey in the nineties
and early thousands are very familiar with these types of individuals.

(44:25):
They are money grubbing and he played it to the tea.
This is Kevin Bacon. Kevin Bacon is like my Peter Dnklish.
You could stick of everything and I would watch it
and I would not be opposed to it, because Kevin
Bacon can do no wrong. So that is my hill
I will die on. Everybody has their own, and I've
never to go on a random side rant. I have

(44:47):
not seen a bad, terrible movie, I should say with
Kevin Bacon. And you can tell again like how Peter
Dinklage and all the other actors in this movie were
just having a grand old time. You could tell he
was having a blast doing this just to the silliness
over the top and the constant blood transfusions which were there.
Were never going to explain to you why he was

(45:08):
always hooked up to something to get some sort of transfusion.
We're just not going to talk about this. He's just
constantly getting his blood filtered, and I'm assuming it's because
they literally live right next to the swamp they're dumping
in and he's trying to, I don't know, purify his blood.
Maybe I don't know, but the whole him getting pushed

(45:31):
around by the mobsters, that was funny. I enjoyed that
all of their interactions were so much fun to watch,
especially Elijah Woods hunched.

Speaker 3 (45:40):
Over with the shoes.

Speaker 4 (45:42):
That were two different sizes, and the cane, and just
anytime he was on scene. The minute he popped up,
I started laughing because you knew it was going to
be silly, not in a bad way. Just like when
he had the henchmen going after Peter and JJ they
shoot the wrong person, He's like, oh, damn it, fine, whatever,
just get rid of the body, like just like it's

(46:03):
not the first time this has happened. And he's like,
oh for crying out loud, and just make it go away.
And they throw Peter in the toxic sludge, and it's
just everything. And even he's afraid of his own brother
because his brother is the good looking brains of the family,
and you hear him mumbling to himself every time he's
trying to confront his brother, and Kevin Bacon's characters like

(46:23):
what'd you say? He's like bar and she's like, no, no,
he's just talking to himself. Don't mind him. So it's
not until Kissy at the very end gets a small
dose of the mutation formula that she kind of like
jumps out for a lack of a better term, and
really stands on her own two feet. And I enjoyed

(46:44):
when she lost her mind and just started like they
had that shoving fight, her and JJ and they start
wrestling and fighting and whatnot. And even when she runs
was a pipe. I think it was through Toxi's back
and through his throat. Again, you can tell they are
having a good time because you just look on her
face while she's trying to be quote unquote mean, like

(47:06):
you could just tell she was having too much fun,
like they could not hide it, like they just And
I appreciate that with all of these characters, because again,
other than Kevin Bacon who had to get done up
with that weird demon horn mutation costume whatever, everybody else
just had to really try to stoneface it most of
the movie. If you pay attention to every so often,

(47:28):
you can see him crack and kind of chuckle and
have a good time. So I liked it with Fritz.
I would like to have known what happened to cause that,
because clearly his brother got the good genes for a
lack of a better term, in the family. And you
see him, he's all tan, he's in shape, and obviously
that's probably due to the blood transfusions, But what happened
to his brother?

Speaker 3 (47:48):
Why is he like this?

Speaker 4 (47:49):
What caused this severe deformity? Was he born like this?
Was it because he worked in the factory with the
other mutates, or like was it something else? So there's
a little bit of missed opportunity with these characters. And
I get it, he's just a hench person, so they're
not going to really focus too much on his origin.

(48:10):
As you said, if they make a sequel, i'd love
to see him in it, because now he has that
little voice box modulator going on, and to take him
even less seriously, he's gonna be a hunched over Penguin
esque looking character with a voice modulator. Again, You're gonna
not be able to not laugh at him while he's
trying to be serious doing whatever he's trying to do. Kissy. Eh,

(48:34):
it'd be fun to see these guys, these two come
back Kissy and Kevin Bacon's character, find out that they
do have the healing abilities that Toxy does, and then
see them as like the reoccurring villain. Every time they
think they've killed each other, they just pop back up again,
like swamp Thing has done in his movies. Every time
they think they've obliterated the hero, he just regenerates over time.

Speaker 3 (48:57):
I guess we'll never know. Even though it was entertaining
to see a b gets his woodchuck a moment kind
of like in Fargo, I suppose and said he was
just kind of like blended by the end of this
this this thing so is and Zion, what did you
make of Bob, Kissy and Fritz Keith.

Speaker 1 (49:12):
I think it's a perfect assessment of Kissy. She's very
much there as a character for the Her character is
very much just there for the advancement of our antagonist,
which is kind of hilarious because, as we know, with
everything that's going on with you know, all of these
you know, mobster investors, our antagonist is kind of a dumbass,

(49:36):
you know, he's you know, Bob is not good at
what he does, and so he's he's built this this
empire on nothing and now and now it's time to
pay and he can't. He can't do it. And I
love that aspect of this character. Again, I think you're
spot on with some other people that we might know

(49:56):
when it comes to that aspect of this character. Bob
is so fantastic. Just Kevin Bacon does such an incredible
job in this and it's almost like somebody said, Hey,
we're gonna do this movie. He's like, dude, I rented
that on video back in the eighties. I can't we
were we all we all sat around and watched that

(50:18):
when we were making Footloose. I don't even know it's
the Footloots is older than this, but you know what
I'm talking about that he just very obviously seems like
he was a fan of this concept and just took
this and ran because he took the ridiculous villain character
and just took it and ran. He's horrible, he's a
bad employer, he's bad to the environment, he's and the

(50:40):
the blood transfusion thing reminded me of there. There is
a deleted scene in Spinal Tap where this kid comes
to their record signing and wants them to sign this
record of Train Sounds and they're like, what the hell,
this isn't even our record. He's like, yeah, well I
play this record along with your record, and so it's

(51:03):
like your music and the train Sounds that goes that
goes really well together. And they're like, well, they're like, oh,
so you have two record places, like no, I use
my parents record player when they go for transfusions and
spinal tab is like what and he's like, yeah, my
parents they go they get blood transfusions. It's like kind
of like an oil change. So and I'm thinking to
myself watching this movie, going, are they referencing a deleted scene?

(51:23):
I mean, who knows, but you know, very obviously it
is something that an evil villain would do. I mean
it's it's a real skechies move to do something like that.
So of course he's going he's going to do that.
Of course he's going to take blood that should be
used for actual sick people in actual hospitals and use
it for his own longevity purposes and experimental you know everything.

(51:47):
Of course he's going to do all these things. He's
so he's such a batshit crazy villain that you're not
scared of him, you are amused by him, and you
will put nothing past him. There You're never going to
expect a redemption arc from this character. You expect him
to be his own downfall, and he is, you know,

(52:07):
with you know, essentially using his own mutagen. And that's
where you know this is going. And like I said,
you're not scared of him in that traditional way, You're
just sort of like, this is a pure psychopath and
I put nothing past him. Nothing good is going to
come from this guy. And he has to be stopped.

(52:28):
And you know that because of the type of movie
this is, it's going to be batshit crazy on how
you get there. And that's what you're that's what you're
here for. You are at Toxic Avenger to see Toxicity
Avenged in the craziest way you can possibly see it,
and Kevin Bacon one hundred percent delivers. Yeah, Kevin Bacon

(52:51):
is another one Keith I. I adore Kevin Bacon. He's
He's that perfect mixture of an actor that can do
just about anything but also not take himself too seriously.
And that goes for his entire career, not just his
appearances on Saturday Night Live, he or his Christmas specials

(53:11):
with the Guardians of the Galaxy. It goes for everything
that he does. And there are a lot of us
out there that to Kevin Bacon, like I said, Kevin
Bacon is horror royalty, monster movie royalty because of Tremer's
so he knows how good he is. But he also knows,
you know, when you stirred out an animal house, like,
you have to know that there are audiences for everything,

(53:33):
and I think Kevin Bacon does, and I think he
definitely seems like he leapt at the chance for this.
He's not doing this because he needs a boat, Okay,
He's doing this because this is fun and this is
going to be something that is remembered by a And
here's We've talked about this before on Drug Cinema and

(53:54):
on Gold Standard that cult movie fans are some of
the most loyal people in the world. You know, he's
gonna have fans forever because of this move. And he
just goes all in. And I love it because this
character goes all in. This character like, what is this
business that you're making these products that can't sustain themselves,

(54:15):
so you have to borrow money from mobster, like this
business is ridiculous, but he's all in and he's never
going to say. He's never gonna admit defeat. He's never
gonna admit he's wrong again, failing business, never admit he's wrong.
Sound like anybody we know. So it's it's a wonderful,
wonderful villain. And Kevin Bacon does a fantastic job. Fritz

(54:38):
Fritz a fit. I did not expect Fritz at all.
When Elijah Wood comes out looking like warmed Over Oswald
Cobblepot cosplay, I lost my mind. I just it just
was so incredibly funny, Like this is here's the thing.
Some of us remember Elijah Wood being North. Some of

(55:01):
us remember Elijah Wood is Jamie Lee Curtis's son and
forever young. Some of us remember Elijah Wood from The
Good Son. Okay, we remember grow this. We've seen this
kid grow up. He's not just He's not just Frodo
Baggins to us, He's he's a big deal. And to
see somebody like Frodo like that one of the greatest

(55:23):
heroes in the history of heroes in fiction be this guy,
this pathetic little brother character, and just such the such
the polar opposite, pathetic, you know, the you know, the
the the bad feet, in the in the in the
hunch back, and you know, everything that we've ever had

(55:43):
in a villain. You know, it's like enter the Egor
plot with this character. Just everything you've had in a terrible,
terrible sort of sidekick monster. That's what we've got, and
that's what we've got here with with Fritz, and Fritz
is the one where you can expect the redemption story
and you get it and you at it because you
know Fritz, Fritz is the one that helps out. When

(56:06):
he helps out, wait when he's about to get he's
about to get blown up, because you have all of
this sort of unspoken understanding about this character. And I
love that it's unspoken. I'm totally fine with not knowing
the Fritz origin story and the Bob origin story because

(56:26):
I feel like we've seen these characters before. We've seen
the pathetic sibling toady type character before, and so you
know probably that there's parents that had a favorite or
at least the narrative of things were always easier for
my brother. Everything just came easy to him. Girls liked

(56:49):
him better, and he was smarter and better at school
and was just a good thing. It was just a
natural at basketball. You know, whatever, it doesn't it doesn't matter.
We've seen that before. So you know, when you see
Fritz see someone who is loved, you know that that's
going to get to him. Because Fritz didn't do this

(57:10):
to himself whereas Bob did. Bob made himself who who
he is. Fritz got the you know, got the fuzzy
end of the lollipop. This is not the life he
wanted for himself. He didn't he didn't want to play
second fiddle in the shadows to his evil, maniac brother.
There was a day that he wanted more for his life.

(57:30):
And I think as a not even just as a
cinema going public, as a consumer of fiction, I think
we all kind of can see that from the get go,
Like when we see what this character looks like compared
to his brother, and the jobs he's given and the
responsibilities he's given, and just basically he's there to put

(57:52):
his fingerprints on all of the illegal crap. You know,
he's sort of the sacrificial lamb of this family, and
so you know that he's going to be what brings
it down, and you are hoping for that, not just
for our heroes, but you're hoping for You're hoping for
a redemption from him. Like, yeah, maybe he should go
to prison for everything he did with his brothers and

(58:13):
with his brother's business and everything, and you know, hiring
this stupid band to go kill people and stuff. But
I've said before, movies create their own morality, and in
this story, you want Fritz to have a redemption arc.
You want him to do the right thing. And like
you were saying, Nick, when you see you know, Wade

(58:34):
locked up in that shed and then you see the
shed blow up, You're like, there's no, it's not ending
like this, How did this happen? And then when you
find out that it was Fritz, you're like, of course
it was. Thank thank goodness, because this is such a
good thing for Wade, and it's such a good thing
for Fritz. Fritz can sort of absolve himself for all
of the things that he did because his brother made him,

(58:56):
probably with the promise of being allowed to be considered
his brother. And like I said, I have no problem
with the fact that we have no backstory as to
why he looks like this. It's just a lifetime of
the other brother was better. And I just I love
that that's an unspoken thing and it assumes that the
audience is just gonna be like, oh yeah, this tracks.

Speaker 3 (59:17):
It most certainly does track for sure. I mean, yes,
I guess I will start with Fritz myself because he
was he was. They're definitely a very competing character, and
you did one to feel in the first when you
first meet him, like, yes, he's the henchman, and he
looks the way he does. He is very much the
eagle character if you were to the mad doctor that
is Bob. But then as things progress, you definitely realize

(59:38):
that there was a lot going on when and I
mean it would be nice, I guess to see a backstory,
but I think we can, like you were saying, Zanglan,
what the what the deal was, and then the relationship
that was between Bob and Fritz, and how Bob was,
you know, the more love beloved brother than the favorite
possibly from the Garbinger parents, whilst Fritz was considered the

(59:58):
literal spare but and I was, and you and you
definitely agree you're hoping for a redemption from him because
you can feel there is even though he does these
nefarious things and hires the nuts to do the dirty
work and being very much as a patsy for the company.
There is some good in him, and yes, and I
think when he realizes that you can be loved and

(01:00:19):
you don't have to deal with this all the time,
I think it plays back to what Guthrie was saying
about how the worm will turn, and I think this
is this is definitely the case when it comes to
Fritz Is. Eventually, you know, there's only so much you
can take, and he does draw the line killing kids.
I mean, granted, he did come up with the idea
of kidnap Wade so you will bring Wilson to you,
But I don't think he ever had any intention of

(01:00:41):
going to harm Wade at all or hurts him in
any way. And maybe he does see that in Wade,
or he sees some of himself in Wide the frightened child,
you know, being surrounded by all these menacing people, and
maybe that was the case for him. And and yes,
so I was, I was guy there he did that.
He didn't die in the end, and was and now

(01:01:01):
there might be a path for him and he might
be able to find somebody who appreciates him, and now
he's away from the literal toxicity, he might literally reform
even more so and be a good and positive member
of society. And Elijah did a fabulous job at playing him.
If I did not see that coming because I've not
read the cast members when it came to this, and
when Elijah Woods shows up, I'm like, wow, okay, it's

(01:01:23):
good to have you on board, Elijah, and definitely the
fabulous job. The relationship between Kissy and Bob is you know,
talk about a toxic relationship. I mean, this is this
is a very very I mean because she is literally
there for his advancement, and even though Bob is clearly dumb, kiss,
he seems to be the brains of the of the
of the whole thing, because even when he's having these meetings,
she's the one coming up with the with the right

(01:01:44):
things to say and and has a way better vocabulary
than he does. And I agree, once again, who does
that remind us of? But also the fact that her
undying loyalty to Bob, even though she probably realizes that
he is he is a dumb ass. I don't think
she is like I've broken find another guy because he
is my guy to the point of where she will
literally when he drinks the goo, she will go down

(01:02:08):
with a ship with him, and even though there's like
two drops left, she will take it because she doesn't
want to be away from this man. She if he
has to become a mutant, so will she. And so
ultimately that's what we get. And the fact that and
I think that shows you one her dedication to him,
but also the fact that that how tied up that
these two people are, which are Bob I don't think.

(01:02:28):
I don't know how much he really cares about Kissy,
to be honest, I think he's more about himself. She is,
you know, the good looking gal that he has around
and and you know, other than being she wants to
be his partner. He calls her his assistant. And already
there you can see that there's there's a little bit
of tens there going on because she wants to be noticed,
even though on one side she almost worships the ground
that Bob walks on. But at the same time, she

(01:02:50):
wants that recognition that she is a big part of
this company. So there is almost that conflict I think
within her. On one side, I will do anything for
this man, but on the other that I want to
be seen so and then yes, when everybody ultimately becomes
these crazy mutants.

Speaker 4 (01:03:04):
It was.

Speaker 3 (01:03:05):
It was just fantastic. And I loved the makeup on
Kissy when she uttered me mutates. Granted, she only had
a couple of drops, so it wasn't gonna be anything major,
but it was really cool. She seemed like an extra
from the Thriller video from Michael Jackson's Thriller video, and
I'm like, I love that. Look well done. The costume department,
I think did a fabulous, fabulous job when it came
to to this film. I can't say enough good things

(01:03:26):
about that. But a great batch of inns and yeah,
whatever Kevin is in, like this might actually fall into
my recommendation, so I'll leave it there. But whatever Kevin
is in, I will definitely watch. I mean, heck, he's
saved the entire town by dancing. Need I say more?

Speaker 1 (01:03:40):
So?

Speaker 3 (01:03:41):
Before we get to ratings, guys, is there anything you
would like to bring up about the film, either be
at the ending or anything else that we haven't talked about.

Speaker 1 (01:03:48):
Okay, if you are burning the edges of a grilled
cheese sandwich by putting the butter in the pan first,
your pan is too hot. I'm just gonna say that
the greatest grilled cheese sandwich is ever made are made
by Chris Sprouse, and he uses a fuck ton of
butter and he melts at the pan first and then
basically gets the bread pretty saturated with the melted butter

(01:04:10):
and then raises the heat. So I'm just gonna say that.
But yeah, I mean, if you're looking for something a
little faster, definitely butter the bread and do the edges.
Don't just brow the butter the bread part, butter the edges.
That makes them a little more edible. Mayonnaise some people
like to put mayonnaise on the outside of the bread
instead of butter. That works pretty well. One thing I

(01:04:31):
recommend is, don't just put mayonnaise on the bread like
you're making a cheese sandwich with mayonnaise. Make your grilled
cheese with shredded cheese, and then mix a little bit
of mayonnaise in, not a lot, just enough to sort
of make the cheese like cheese ballable, and then do
it that way and it gives you this nice sort
of creamy, melty sort of texture. And if you can

(01:04:53):
dance in the background while you're doing it. Even better,
this is one of the greatest credit sequences I've ever seen.
It's fantastic.

Speaker 4 (01:05:00):
Friends go ahead, and that friends is baking with Zan.
You can check her out every Mondays and Fridays on
some other place and some other time for all her cooking.

Speaker 1 (01:05:11):
That my my post drunk Cinema, drunk z and Tiktoks
are usually cooking shows.

Speaker 4 (01:05:15):
So see, there you go. You need me to meet
your announcer, though.

Speaker 1 (01:05:19):
I totally do. Next time I'm drunk, I'll call you.

Speaker 3 (01:05:21):
Oh my god, I have my announcer voice and everything fantastic.
You missed your calling in life, Keith. I definitely think so,
and I think it would be a great collaboration between
you and Zen. But I guess now I will have
to find a reason to head off to And I
have another reason now to head off to Ohio because
I'll have to sample Miss Chris's ro cheese sandwiches.

Speaker 1 (01:05:42):
Because yeah, only child Day and National Grilled Cheese Day
are the same day, so for me, it's basically like
my birthday. It's one of the greatest days of the year,
and Chris makes me a grilled cheese sandwich and it's delectable.

Speaker 3 (01:05:58):
Definitely sounds in Texas toast.

Speaker 4 (01:06:00):
I'm not you know, the thicker the thicker bread or
little thin crap bread.

Speaker 1 (01:06:04):
Uh, it's usually like a a decent like bakery bread.
I'm not a huge fan of Texas toast because it's
too much bread. I'm here for the cheese. There, cheese,
I just need it. But then it becomes like this
whopper of too much cheese. You know, you need enough
cheese that it's good and melty, but you don't. What
you don't want is like melted edges, but then still

(01:06:26):
being able to see the striations of the slices of
cheese that you put on when you bite into it.
You need the whole thing to melt. So another thing
I recommend with a grilled cheese is, like I said,
starting with a low heat to melt the butter, saturate
the bread, and then rising the heat, but take leave
the leave the top piece off and then put a

(01:06:47):
lid on your pan and that lets the cheese sort
of steam melt itself, and then put the bread back on.
Do your lower heat thing, melt your butter, flip your
sandwich over, do your saturated thing, and then put the
lid back on. The lid helps you melt the cheese throughout.

Speaker 3 (01:07:02):
Well, those are great recommendations. I hope all your listeners
out there have taken notes, because I'm definitely gonna be
sistening back to this just for for these these cooking recommendations. Keith,
do you have anything else you would like to add
on our movie before we we rate it? Uh?

Speaker 4 (01:07:16):
Yeah, I hate cheese.

Speaker 3 (01:07:17):
No, I've learned to her Yang.

Speaker 4 (01:07:20):
I hate cheese.

Speaker 3 (01:07:21):
Well, there was definitely a lot more than enough cheese
to go around, I think when it came to today's movie.
So let's I guess see what we made of it.
So yeah, Zen's starting with you. What do you give
the toxic Avenger out of ten?

Speaker 1 (01:07:32):
I'm gonna give this rating, and I'm gonna I'm gonna
just say this, you know, like like like salt and
pepper se this dance ain't for everybody, ell you know,
only the weird people. I don't recommend this to everyone.
Like I said, it is gross. It is. It is gory.
I I I joke. But but he does pee on

(01:07:53):
his own face like he has he has a cidicurine.
It's it's hilarious. He's like, he's like, I can get
us out of this. I just gotta take my dick
out for a second. I mean, it's just so ridiculously vulgar,
it's funny. It's like you can't even be offended. It's
so ridiculous. And he basically peas on his face to
melt away the chains around his neck. So it is gross.
It is gory. These deaths are very fast and bloody.

(01:08:14):
It's not torture porn. It's just the sort of fast
and crazy gory. So understand that this is still a
trauma picture. This is still a trauma movie. Saint Romaville.
You gotta love that it's Saint Roma. That's fantastic. We
have our Lloyd Kaufman cameo in this, so there's no

(01:08:34):
denying that this is at least trauma truma trauma friendly.
I'm gonna get this an eight because it is just
so batshit ridiculous. I would probably give original toxy In
eight as well. I don't remember what I gave it,
seven or eight something like that, but this one, I
think I'm giving it an eight because I was so

(01:08:54):
pleasantly surprised. It was so well done. It was very
obviously done love. It wasn't trying to be the original,
it was trying to be its own thing, but very
much made with love. And you know, I it And
it shows you that even the most seasoned performers and
the most respected actors can see the value of cult movies,

(01:09:19):
see the value of shock movies, see the value of showmanship,
all of that stuff. There's a place for all of it.
There's a place for everything in entertainment. And you know,
if if Kevin Bacon can see that, everybody should be
able to see that.

Speaker 3 (01:09:34):
I agree. And mister Bliss, what do you give this one? Wow?

Speaker 4 (01:09:39):
So formal, like I'm in trouble and shit, I don't
know because I have on one hand, I'm the the
horror cult movie junkie, and then on the other hand,
I'm the reasonable, sane adult. And then sometimes there's that
ven diagram where we overlap.

Speaker 1 (01:09:57):
In this Yeah, my rating doesn't mean go see it?

Speaker 4 (01:10:02):
Yeah, right, exactly, That's where I'm going with this one. So,
in good conscience, I know a handful of people that
we know that I one hundred percent will recommend this
movie too. The rest of the world, Please make sure
you are heavily intoxicated to watch the toxic Yeah, here's

(01:10:23):
my PSA. Hi, friends, Now make sure you've had one
or two drinks. Because I've spoken to individuals that did
not like this movie. I am not of that same group,
So I'm gonna give it a seven point eight out
of ten. I'm not gonna give it an eight because
I don't want to bite on Zam, but I'm not
gonna give like a seven and a half because it's
it's a fun movie and if you like the cults

(01:10:44):
classics and this is going to become a classic in
its own right that you know one hundred percent, go
ahead and see it. Just expect complete unhinged madness.

Speaker 3 (01:10:54):
Great job right there as well. I'm actually gonna go
with Zam on this one. I'm gonna give any out
of ten. I did not think I would enjoy this
film as much as I did, but I think I
guess coming off of how much I enjoyed the original,
I was really looking forward to this, and it took
us two years to actually get finally get to see
it because, as I mentioned earlier the top of this review,
this movie did come out in twenty twenty three. It

(01:11:14):
was shown that one convention, and then I guess they
had possibly trouble were finding a distributor for it. I
can probably see why, but unless unless I guess they
decided to just hold back, I don't know, but I mean,
Keith and I I've often talked about this prior to
it finally coming out. It's like, when are we ever
going to see the Toxic of Engine? They only a

(01:11:36):
chosen few got to actually see it in twenty three,
and now we finally get to see it. So I'm
really really gad it a lot, at least got an
audience to hit theaters and also the I'm giving it
also Nate, because I'm usually not a bit. I am
very picky with my comedies and especially when it comes
to the superhero realm. But when I watched this, I'm like, Deadpool,
hold my beer. I could literally see Toxic coming up going.

(01:11:59):
You think you're you're extreme and everything else. Here you go,
tell my beer and I'll show you how it's done.
And I think it me very much did.

Speaker 1 (01:12:06):
Now.

Speaker 3 (01:12:06):
I'm not saying I enjoyed this because it might be
edge lord you or it's like wow, they did this
and they did that, but I just was generally entertained
because I also think this movie has something to say
other than the gore fest that it is and the
ridiculous dialogues and everything else. I think I always appreciate
when a film, no matter how ridiculous it might be
on its face, does actually have a is trying to

(01:12:27):
make a point, and it's trying to literally say something
else to you, and not to mention as even Zam
was saying that the fact that anything that this movie
makes the box office goes out to help people with
real world problems, I cannot but tit my hat and
appreciate that even more so so it's a soliday out
of ten for me. So getting thus to recommendations, Keith,
starting with you, did you have anything you'd like to

(01:12:49):
recommend to the class who might actually enjoyed this film
or not.

Speaker 4 (01:12:54):
Well, you know, if you and I'm going to try
to go a little off the wall just because I
know Zan's gonna have some weird stuff just like I will.
But if you like this kind of unhinged style of
movies where you just turn your brain off and have fun,
I'm going to rotate. There you go. I apologize it
just had a stroke. I will recommend Death of a

(01:13:16):
Unicorn because that is a spectacular movie. And in the
same vein I'm gonna recommend Cocaine Bear for a totally
different reason, but it is another one of those just
turn your brain off and just have.

Speaker 3 (01:13:28):
Fun, solid recommendations. As always, Keith and Zan, what would
you like to recommend to our listeners today?

Speaker 1 (01:13:34):
I would like to tell our listeners that if you
if you have not experienced Tromaville, I definitely recommend experiencing Tromaville,
and specifically my favorite trauma movie. Sorry kabukam in NYPD
that that's that's my favorite of the traumas. Serf Nazis

(01:13:57):
Must Die is also a very good choice because any
kind of Nazis must die. But uh, Sergeant Kabuki Man
and it's a little it's a it's a little lighter.
I believe that Sergeant Kabuki Man was their first PG
thirteen movie. This was supposed to be like a family
friendly PG version of Toxic Avenger when they started knocking

(01:14:18):
this idea around back in twenty ten. I'm really glad
they didn't go that way, because you know, Toxi, he's
an avenger. He needs to avenge something, and the more
bat shit you make it the better, the better off
it is. Yeah, I definitely recommend Sergean ka Keith. Your
your recommendations are also fantastic, you know, because they they

(01:14:39):
kind of are exactly what they say they are. You know,
it's a death of a unicorn and it's a clown
in a cornfield. Oh no, you didn't say clown a corfee,
you said cocaine bear.

Speaker 4 (01:14:48):
Okay, we're on a cornfield from clown in a cornfield.

Speaker 1 (01:14:51):
Same thing. It is what it says it is.

Speaker 4 (01:14:53):
That's fair, it is.

Speaker 1 (01:14:54):
I just wouldn't necessarily recommend it, but it is. It
says what it is very much. Snakes on a plane.
Motherfucking snakes on a motherfucking plane. That's kind of all
you need to know. And it's batshit crazy, like why
does this happen? Who cares? It's not about why, it's
how do we survive? Motherfucking snakes on a motherfucking plane?

Speaker 4 (01:15:12):
So mother flipping plane? Get it right.

Speaker 1 (01:15:14):
You're watching too much T and T. So yeah, I
just yeah, go go for some of those crazy movies,
but definitely definitely find yourself some Sergeant kabooky Man Tremmers Drammers.
I feel like recommending Tremors at this point is like
recommending air or water.

Speaker 4 (01:15:32):
You know, Hey, there are enough people that have not
seen that movie that no idea that it had like
twelve movies in a TV series.

Speaker 1 (01:15:39):
That's the thing and did, and they're all fabulous, especially
the one that takes place in the eighteen hundreds. That
one's wonderful.

Speaker 3 (01:15:49):
Well, I suppose, yeah, go ahead, Gazan.

Speaker 1 (01:15:51):
I was just gonna say, there are some people, there
are some roles that people are just born to play.

Speaker 3 (01:15:58):
You know.

Speaker 1 (01:15:58):
We talked about this a little bit with Anthony Perkins,
with Psycho Charles, and I talk about it all the
time with Kyle McLachlan and Dale Cooper, Michael Gross and
Bert Gummer. Absolutely the role. He was born to play.
That role couldn't be anybody but him. He does such
a fantastic job. He's my all time I love that.

(01:16:18):
Michael Gross is my all time favorite TV dad, and
he's also Burt Gummer. I love it.

Speaker 3 (01:16:24):
That's absolutely wonderful. Well, I guess to kind of on
one side when it comes to the off the wall
kind of crazy films to suggest, I guess then I
would I would add to the pile Sharknado, any of them.
If you really want to see a shark in the tornado,
that is exactly what the what it is, and you
know it's true to its title. And I suppose if
you are not too attached to the Winnie the Pooh franchise,

(01:16:46):
I suppose you could check you check out Blood and Honey.
If you have yet to check that out, I would
throw those two in. And on a more serious note,
if you've not seen this fantastic TV show which I
madly fell in love with and I still miss to
this day, and that's a TV show answered the name
of the following, starring Kevin Bacon in this case as
a cop, and of course his nemesis played by James Purefoy.

(01:17:10):
They both of them do such a fabulous, fabulous job
of it. If you like a good police procedural and
a psychological thriller, definitely check out the following if you
have yet to do so, it is absolute gold. I
loved it. Recommended to my mom, who's usually not into
that kind of stuff. She adored it. Recommended some of
my mates and they also were like, wow, I didn't
even know this existed. And they were blown away and

(01:17:30):
is stellar performances there as well, So that's the following.
I'm going to thrown as well when it comes to
the non crazy crazy stuff. But other than that, yeah,
Sharknado I've thrown and the Blood and Honey. So of course,
the dear listeners, if you want to share your thoughts
on the films we discuss here, you can should email
to Happiness and Darkness how at gmail dot com. Once again,

(01:17:51):
Happiness and Darkness how at gmail dot com. If you're
not following us yet, we should have follow us on
our social media. You can find us on Facebook as
Happiness and Darkness or also on x as High Darkness Pod.
And of course if you're listening to us on such
platforms as Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pandora, others, be sure to
rate and review us, as that keeps the algorithm stimulated

(01:18:12):
and allows a little podcast to reach more like minded
is like yours, so big, thank you those who have
done so in the future, thank you to those who will.
And speaking of where we can be found, Zan, when
you're not here gracing us with your presence on Happiness
and Darkness, where can folks find you on the interwebs?

Speaker 1 (01:18:29):
You can find me with you and our friend Rachel
Friend on our podcast gold Standard, the Oscars Podcast, where
we discuss where we have caught up discussing all of
the Best Picture winners and now we're doing our favorites,
our listeners favorites and just basic quintessential cinema. And you
can find me with our friend Charles Scaggs on our
podcast Drunk Cinema, where we watch our favorite movies over

(01:18:53):
our favorite adult beverages and discuss them and record that
discussion for your entertainment. And if you're looking for me
on social media, your best bets would be Instagram, TikTok, Substack,
and Blue Sky, all of which my handle is Unenax.

Speaker 3 (01:19:08):
Nineteen fabulous fabulous stuff. And Keith Where can you be
found if of course you want to be found.

Speaker 4 (01:19:15):
I live under a rock in a cave, collecting moss.
I have no friends. I don't like people. I mean, hey, friends. Yeah,
you guys can find me obviously here every week. Occasionally
I torture you guys on Gold Standards with horrific movie selections.
And I've already planned out at least two one I've
shared with Zen and I'm not going to share with you, Nick.

(01:19:37):
I've been on the Hour of Comics scen Nick. I'm
just going to torch you forever and ever again. Our
comics is upon us. I was on that for a
little while. Star Trek the Undiscovered podcast Real Reactions. Apparently
I've done a lot of crap and just never realized it.
And then obviously you can find me on our Facebook
page if you just drop a comment request whatever. Moy's around,

(01:20:00):
talk about cartoons, colm books, lions, tiders and bears, all my.

Speaker 3 (01:20:03):
Great great stuff and folks. When it comes to myself,
you can find me hosting the radio show Whiskey and Cigarettes,
where we play the very best and nothing but the
best of country music for you guys from Malabama too,
but Bailey Zimmerman. For more information about that, you can
be is our website which is Whiskey and Cigarettes Show
dot com. Podcast Wise, of course, other than having the
pleasure of being a part of gold Standard the Oscars

(01:20:26):
podcast with Rachel and Zan, you can also find myself
and Charles Skaggs on What's another fandom Zone There you
go brain freeze right there. So, of course, if you
can find us of the fandom Zone where we're currently
reviewing the second season of Peacemaker and having a whale
of a time doing that, and when it comes to
this show, well, it will be a surprise when it

(01:20:48):
comes to what we will be reviewing next, but I'm
sure that we will. As always, we enjoy to delight
and entertain you, and I think it's going to be
a fun time as well. I will not mention the
title of the next week's movie just yet. You will
have to tune in to find out. So that said that, Zan,
thank you so much for joining us today on behalf
of myself and Keith. It was a real pleasure to
have you with us, and of course we defin definitely

(01:21:09):
look forward to having you back sooner rather than later anytime.
The movie we discussed takes your fancy.

Speaker 1 (01:21:15):
Thank you so much for having me. I'm always happy
to talk trauma and always happy to talk the weirder superheroes.

Speaker 3 (01:21:23):
You know.

Speaker 1 (01:21:24):
I I still can't believe you guys did the pum
and it didn't call me. I'm still mad about that.
This is this is helping, This is helping, but I'm
still mad about that.

Speaker 3 (01:21:33):
Yeah, this is this is the you know when when
the guy sends the girl flowers to say sorry. I
guess this is our way of saying sorry. Is are
we us sending you roses because we did something stupid previously?

Speaker 1 (01:21:45):
These are the These are the grocery store flowers on
the way home from the bar. Most definitely.

Speaker 4 (01:21:52):
We found in the street.

Speaker 1 (01:21:54):
Thank you, Thank you very much for having me well.

Speaker 3 (01:21:58):
The pleasure was certainly hours, Keith. Is anything you would
like to add to anything else before we sign off?

Speaker 4 (01:22:03):
No, I'm gonna be surprised like everybody else. I have
no idea what we're watching, so this could be your
first time watch. I get ovid of my collection.

Speaker 3 (01:22:09):
Who knows the fun never ends over here a happiness
and Darkner's my friends. So of course, folks, thanks as
always this day show and supporting us. We will see
you next time with mystery movie. Until then, thank you
so much for a privilege of your time, stay super show.
My people

Speaker 1 (01:23:19):
To