Hello and welcome to Geek History Lesson.I'm Ashley Victoria Robinson.
You have stumbled onto the podcast where a Canadian comic book writer and a screenwriter from Kansas teach you everything you need to know about a character, construct, or team in pop culture in about an hour.But this week
It's going to get a little different.It's going to get a little darker.It's going to get a little spookier.We have really been enjoying GHL Spooky Season 2024 here in Your Mind University.
And today, because we're coinciding with the week of Halloween, we thought we would give you our horror movie mega episode, including some amazing guests like horror movie nights, Matt Kelly, joining us to chat.
Everything unique about this genre, horror movies and horror tropes are something that we've covered pretty sparsely here.So this feels like the appropriate time to give a big old celebration to the genre of the season.
We've also included in this a never before heard on main podcast feed.So exciting. episode of Geek History Lesson Extra, which is our Patreon exclusive podcast, where Matt Kelly came to recommend best movies to watch on Halloween.
So, enjoy our discussion of that, of the top five horror movie villains, and a complete history beginning with the comic book, that's right, comic book origin of The Addams Family.Happy Samhain, happy Halloween.
Take it away, pass Jason, and pass Ashley.
It's almost time for All Hallows Eve and that means that we must decide the Top 5 Horror Movie Villains.
Hello and welcome to Geek History Lesson.I'm Ashley Victoria Robinson.
And I'm Jason Spooky Inman.Welcome to your Mind University, because we are the podcast called Geek History Lesson, where we take one character or concept or movie and we talk about them in less than an hour.But today we're not doing that at all.
Today we're going to talk about a list.A list of what, Ashley?
We are talking about our top five horror movie villains, because as you alluded to in our intro, it is almost all Hallow's Eve, and there's very few things in this world that you and I are more scared of than a big two retcon, and they are some of these characters.
I don't understand that joke at all reference at all.
Well, because we complain about retcons, they're scary, they wipe out our favorite characters and they die.
Is a retcon on your list?
No, but we talk about retcons a lot.
I guess this joke isn't funny if you have to explain it, Harley Quinn.I was like, is a retcon an actual movie villain?I want to see that movie.
You can tweet me at Ashley V. Robinson and tell me if you thought that joke was funny or not.
I think it was funny.I was very confused.It's very early morning, and that's why I'm thankful that we have a guest here to help us out, a horror movie expert, if you will.Ashley, who is that person?
Well, he is the host of the Horror Movie Night podcast, which I am a big fan of.Go subscribe to that everywhere.Fine.Podcasts are located.And he's a contributor to Geekscape, a longtime friend of ours and fellow survivor of San Diego Comic-Con.
It is Mr. Matthew Kelly.Thank you for joining us.
Thank you for having me.Being such a medium potatoes type podcast, it's exciting to be on the show.
Don't sell yourself short like that.This has been a long time in the making and it came together very quickly and we're so thrilled to have you.
Yeah, we want to let the listeners know Matthew actually pitched this idea to us last year and we were going to do it last year.We just ran out of time or I think Iron Fist dropped or something like that.
It's all Danny Rand's fault So we had to bump the episode, but I'm glad we finally were able to make this episode happen Yeah, I'm excited.
It was very difficult Before we get into the list here Matthew why?Why would you consider yourself a horror expert a lover of horror movies?I guess Why did we bring you on this podcast, I guess?
Tell us your bona fides.So I feel like I was terrified to watch horror movies for a really, really, really long time.It wasn't until maybe junior high that I started to watch them. It's that kind of the adrenaline rush that they give you.
But for me, I'm weird because a lot of people, they're like, oh, this movie is so scary.That's what I like about it.For me, it's the more fun I have.
So I like a lot of the dumb like horror comedies or the slasher films or the, you know, living puppets or giant alligator movies like that's kind of my bread and butter.
But I've become, people have started to refer to me as an expert because especially with the horror movie night podcasts as it's continued to grow and grow and grow, people,
Found out that I have over 3,000 titles on DVD in my basement of horror films So I've kind of watched and and studied and you know at one point I wanted to become a college professor to teach classes on horror because I think it's I didn't appreciate genre.
Oh, yeah That's why I bought so many was I was going to go back to school to get a teaching degree and then I got the job that I had now which allowed me to do a lot of the podcasting stuff instead and
Wow, so you're a literal teacher.You're a literal professor of horror.
Yeah, you could say that without me literally having a degree to back it up.
That needs to be the title of your biography or your memoir, Professor of Horror bracket with no credits to back it up.
I'm very excited about this.I think you adequately explained your bona fides.You now have more right to the title of professor than we do.I'm a little jealous.But let's start this list here.
Real quickly to everybody out there, this is not, of course, an objective list.This is our personal favorites.These are the ones that we believe in the most.So, of course, they will vary to your list.
As well, and we didn't put any caveats or rules on this It was just like if you thought a movie was scary guess what that character becomes a horror movie villain Yeah, so actually let's start the list with number five.Who is your fifth favorite?
We're not really judging this scary, but who do you think, if top five list, who's number five for your top five movie villain?
My number five is a character that I only watched but a few days ago after a lot of peer pressure from our good friend Adam Drozen to finally watch this movie.
This character is an animal and draws a lot of significance from satanic and masonic imagery.It is Black Phillip from The Witch. It came out in 2016.I know Jason hasn't seen this movie, so this is going to be fun.
But, Jason, I think you might be afraid of him because Black Phillip is a black goat.It's a literal goat.It's an actual animal in the movie.
I'm not afraid of goats.I hate goats.Now, we need to explain to the audience.I grew up on a goat farm.We had other stuff, but we had goats, and they are the dumbest creatures on the planet.
So that's why he makes an excellent villain.The witch is referred to as a New England folklore.It is heavily inspired by diaries and newspaper accounts and reports from witch hunts, witch trials of the time.
This is pre Salem, Massachusetts, and it tells the story of a family.They think they're cursed by a witch.They move away from their city, they move into the country, and they have this goat named Black Phillip.
And Black Phillip talks to the two youngest members of the family, these creepy little twins.
Well, we don't know from a movie.And then in the end, he brutally murders the father with his horns.By the way, we're going to spoil all of these movies.And it is revealed that he does speak and he is of the devil.He is a representation or maybe a
derivative of Baphomet, who is the goat-headed man who's a representative.A lot of people think he's a satanic image.He's actually a masonic figure slash godhead that has been adopted by modern Satanism.
Baphomet, not Black Philip.
Baphomet, yes.Black Philip is representative of, or derivative of.
But what I find so creepy about this villain, and one of the reasons why I wanted to include him on the list is, first of all, I think it's incredibly creative storytelling, and I really love when horror movies can be scary by being really smart.
So he's always in the weeks since I watched him, has stuck out to me as an incredibly creative use of something that society is already afraid of.It's fascinating to go through a movie and have the villain be kind of a cute animal the entire time.
It's like, what if Disney decided to murder you?It preys on a lot of modern society's expectations about witchcraft.And ultimately, I just think it's one of the most creative uses of an animal in a movie, so Black Phillip is my number three.
Also, P.S., if you ever go online and you Google The Witch or Black Phillip on Etsy, they make a lot of really weird, really cute toys and pins and stuff like that.
So I may or may not wind up with a collection of Black Phillip plushies by the end of this episode.
So, Ashley, I want to ask you, you just saw this movie a week ago.What was it about this character that made such an impression on you?Is it the dichotomy of cute and evil?
You saw this movie seven days ago that it jumped to number five on this top horror movie
I think that's part of what it is.I also do have a soft spot for animals, so he was probably going to make it on the list.I also watched this movie at 1230 in the afternoon.
And by the end of it, I was curled up in a little ball like I do think it is deeply creepy.
And even though Black Philip only has two lines, by the end of the movie, when a big spoiler, he transforms into his human form and you see exactly how creepy and how corrupting he can be.
The idea that a character who only speaks two lines can have that much impact, I think, is incredible.
And I think it's something that's probably derivative of some of the slasher movies, because when Michael Myers had that Captain Kirk mask on, he obviously couldn't speak a lot.And when he did, it had to really count. I just think it's so creative.
I think it's so interesting.And I think that he's going to be a character that's going to... I've also read a lot of interviews and articles about it in the week since I saw it.
I think he's going to be a character that's going to go down in horror history and in film history for his impact.And he's just so creepy.
All right.He's weirdly also become very memed as of late.He's a goat.Of course.
The amount of, not to have a shameless plug this early on, but the amount of people on the Horror Movie Night Facebook page that are posting Black Phillip memes this last week or so.Do you want to live deliciously?
Yeah, like I did not expect there to be that much of a following for that goat, but.
My very favorite piece of art that I've seen so far is it's the Babadook with a rainbow pride flag scarf riding on Black Phillip. And I was like, I'd be here for that.That's cool.
Is live deliciously like a line from the movie?Yeah.
He says to her, so the girl who they think is a witch the whole time, who, spoiler alert, decides to actually become a witch by the end of the movie, he turns into a human and says, what's that like to live deliciously?
Because her family's very Christian and they live, you know, they're very wet. Christian.They're British.They're off the boat to America, British.And they're very, very conservative.
Oh, this is set in the 1600s?
Yes, I said that at the start.
As soon as we got into meme talk, I think my brain autocorrected this to modern days.
Yeah, so they're like Puritans, so they live very Spartanly, so he kind of corrupts her at the end of the movie by offering her.
This movie sounds interesting.
I was trying to tell you, you wouldn't listen to me.It's very good.
Alright, speaking of not listening, Matthew, who's your number five?That's a very interesting choice.Who's your number five?
Okay, so this was a really difficult list in general to create because there were so many different factors that I had to throw into my head.
It was difficult for me as well, by the way.
I also believe Matthew's first email back to me was, I'll have to cut it down from 50.
Oh mama.So what I ended up trying to settle on was that it had to hit at least two of the following things.
It had to be someone that was at least iconic or left an impression on me or was like an embodiment of extreme evil to be like one of the top horror guys.So number five is actually the most personal one on the list for me.
Probably Billy Loomis from Scream because Scream is actually the movie that got me into horror films. And Billy is just, you know, he's so charming in the first hour of the movie Scream.
He's the main character's boyfriend, and he just seems like a really good, supportive boyfriend.And then the last 30 minutes, it's him, Skeet Ulrich, you know, during that two years that everyone was really about Skeet Ulrich, just
Manic, covered in blood, he's screaming, he's stabbing his friend, and then his friend is stabbing him in order to make sure that it looks like they're victims and not the killers before they do everything, because it's all a giant frame job, and he's just so manipulative and cruel, and that last 20 minutes of scream I genuinely think is some of the best
moments in a slasher movie I've ever seen.It's just intense, it's creepy, but it still has what I think is important in a slasher movie.It's kind of fun in the insanity, because you're just like, it's like a rollercoaster.
You're just on the edge, losing your mind at what's happening.And I remember the first time that I saw it, I was like, it's the boyfriend, no way!Like it just felt so off guard.So I always have loved Scream.
I knew that Scream was gonna have to be on my list so far. From the second that this was pitched, so I'm putting Billy Loomis at my number five spot.
Nice, well done.I considered Ghostface.Can you call him Ghostface?
Yeah, I mean, Ghostface definitely encapsulates all four films to me.It's specifically Billy.
I have never seen a Scream movie.
Well, I was going to say, I considered briefly putting Ghostface on this list.
Also a very memed character.
Yep, and very popular at Halloween.It's a great iconic look.
Absolutely.It's so simple.
And that first Scream movie is a really good movie.It actually still holds up.
What year did it come out?
95?Yeah, same year as Batman Forever.
Wow.Well, I think what worked was that it's a slasher horror film, but it's written by the guy who wrote Dawson's Creek.So it's got a very like teen flick feel to it the entire time, which makes it very accessible to people.
That's cool.I think it's a great choice.
I didn't know that.That's fascinating.
Directed by Wes Craven, right?Yeah.
Yes.May he rest in hell, Wes Craven.I don't know. All right, let's go to my number five here.My number five is probably somebody that would not make many horror movie villain lists.Mine was a goat.
For me, well my character's not even really in a horror movie, but he always scared me the first time I saw him, and to me I think he has an iconic look.
He is actually quite scary when he's done right, and I think that this character could return to horror and actually dominate the franchise.I am talking about The Predator.
Oh, I think that's an acceptable choice.
Well, I would factor that as a horror.It's a sci-fi horror.Yeah.
This is mainly this is mainly around the first film where it's about the 1987 film where, you know, Arnold Schwarzenegger and his mercenary army people are wandering through the jungles and they're being hunted one by one by one by this impossible creature that is just nigh unstoppable in his armor.
And then when they finally take off the mask.He's a disgusting creature with little pinchers on his mouth underneath.Now, as a kid, for me, the Predator was quite scary.
Now, I also saw Predator 2 when I was a kid, and some of the luster, the scaredness went away, but Predator 1, to me, really, really comes off as this monster is unstoppable, like he is a true monster.
Now, later versions of the character have taken him to, you know, sci fi heights and he is an alien and stuff like that.But the idea that this thing I mean, the predator in that first movie, he mimics the voices of the squad.So he tricks several.
That's how he kills a couple of them.He has active camouflage.So he can be right next to you and you would never know it.And he slices off your head.And then
At any time in that movie, when you saw the three little target dots on one of the men, you were just like, oh no, he's dead, he's dead, he's dead, run, run, run, run!It was always one of these moments.
But it's also interesting, in that movie, for me, especially when Arnold Schwarzenegger beats him in the end, and you see the scene between Arnold Schwarzenegger and the dying Predator.
Arnold Schwarzenegger sort of has this realization on his face where it's like, oh, the monster is what we can become as soldiers, like because that predator is actually just a soldier just like him.
You find that idea kind of profound.
Well, and it also goes back to where you're going to see a common thread through many of my horror villains, with the exception of one of them.They're just basically I don't I think human beings are the other scariest people, not demons.
I would agree, and with the exception of my goat.
All of mine are actual humans.Well, your goat becomes a human.
Yeah, but he's definitely... He's faking it.
He's a saint.To me, the Predator, any person that could stop Arnold Schwarzenegger and Jesse the Body Ventura together on the same team is definitely scary.That's why the Predator is my number five.
Well, I think that the Predator, and this is going to be something that comes up, I think when we talk about a couple other 80s icon horror things, the Predator was like part of this really weird thing where growing up as a kid, I didn't watch horror movies.
I didn't watch R-rated movies, but I knew who these characters were because they were so in the, like, the zeitgeist.Absolutely.Yeah. I had action figures of the Predator when I was like six.
It's insane that there was children's toys of this thing, because it is not a movie for a six-year-old.It's an R-rated movie, yeah.
But it also feels like a very 1990s era, 80s, 90s marketing move, where like, it's an alien, kids will like it.
Yeah, that is a fair point.The 80s horror movie genre does this thing where it creates these iconic characters, and no decade since then has been able to replicate that.
I'm going to I'm going to go a little bit off the beaten track, but when I was making this, like, what are you going to do?Be like the white family from get out the monster from a quiet place like there are really interesting.
I mean, I think I think the Babadook is the last one.
I would say the Babadook is maybe the last one.And part of that is because, again, if it can become meme, it's a good last thing.
Iconic maybe jigsaw.He has replaced the action figures, I think.Yeah, you're probably right.You're probably right.
But now we get better action figures, which is really cool.
There are some great Predator action figures out there, by the way.Just throwing that out there.Alright, Ashley, what is your number four?
My number four, the more I get involved in fan culture and the more I get involved in entertainment journalism... Oh, I know where this is going.
The more I come to appreciate as a powerful representative of toxic fandom, the first Stephen King character to make it onto our list.This is Annie Wilkes, if you don't recognize that name.
I guess people think her name is Misery, but this is the Kathy Barnes villainess, I guess, from that movie.
Actually, Misery is the name of the fictional character that is in his nanaboos.
I know that, but I think people think that's her name.Yeah, totally. And what I like about her, again, it's a very smart crafting of a character.It's a very intelligent in.The three of us know what it's like to be fans.
We've had the fortune to become professional fans and then professionals ourselves with our own fan bases. It's wild to me that this movie came out in 1990.Sorry, I don't know when the book came out, but I know it was before 1990.Yeah, 80-something.
So Stephen King, because of his notoriety and because of his talent, he was experiencing that level of toxic fandom as a writer way before the Internet ever came around.
The novel came out in 1987.
Thank you very much.And he harnessed that into this incredibly powerful story.And the movie itself is not especially gory.No.
But the scene where she's got James Kahn tied up in the bed and she just places that brick down and brings out that sledgehammer like my feet hurt talking about it.
And I think the most interesting part of the character is when you first meet her, she's just a sweet older lady.And you think, I didn't I hadn't read the book.I didn't know anything going into this movie.
So the twist for me was a was pleasant and was a pleasant surprise.You think maybe they're going to get through it together and then things just keep getting worse and worse and worse and worse.
And the more I go on on my journey in pop culture, the more I just come to appreciate what this character represents, the deftness of the performance.Like I think Kathy Bates is a criminally underrated actor.
And I think this is arguably her best performance.Hmm.
Yeah, it's definitely in our top five.
Yeah.Yeah.I think it depends on how you want to stack them up.Maybe top three.I'm just saying I go with that. But I just think she's so creepy.And I also, when I was making my list, I wanted to get a couple ladies on here.
And she was the first person who came to mind for me.So, the creepiest fan, Twitter incarnate. Twitter incarnate?Fanfiction.net, writ large, Annie Wilkes.I love her so much.
I also like all the characters that I put on my list, even though they're horrible sociopaths.
You'd be friends with them, even the goat?
I would be friends with them.I'd totally be friends with Black Phillip.I would live deliciously.I've said on the podcast before that I would become a vampire to live forever.I'll eat someone, that's fine.
I would accept witchcraft if it gave me actual magic powers.Sure, why not?Black Phillip can tweet me anytime.
It's interesting.I considered putting her on this list as well, but for me, it came down to I would have only put her on this list because of the moment where she basically cripples James Caan.
And to be fair, she does not have the iconography or the Recognizability?That's not a word.
Recognition.Thank you.I've only had half my cup of coffee of a character like a Freddie or a Jason.But this is my list.Gosh darn it.And I picked it.I filled it with characters that I like.
If anybody disagrees with you, I think you should tie them down on a bed and break their legs.
Well, the government's probably listening, so I won't.I won't do that, but I'll send them that gif on Twitter.
They don't care.All right, Matthew, who is your number four?
So my number four is gonna get a little bit of controversy from some of the hardcore horror people listening to this episode, and you can at me at at St.Mort with your complaints.
But, because they're gonna argue that this isn't even a horror movie, but I don't care.I wanted to have a classic film on my list, and I wanted to have a film that genuinely unsettled me.
So my number four is Baby Jane Hudson from Whatever Happened to Baby Jane.
Betty Davis's performance in this movie is so unsettling every step of the way.She's got her sister, she hit her sister with a car, supposedly, and has her tied up in a bed upstairs the entire movie.
She's feeding her rats and her pets and killing her birds and trying to seduce young men and is dressing up like she's eight years old and singing, I'm writing a letter to daddy to impress people and she's just,
Completely insane and then you know you hear the stories of the filming of this movie and How you know the the hatred of Betty Davis and Joan Crawford really kind of made this movie something special But it's just this it's it's like camp before camp existed at points, and it's just so
Dark and macabre and creepy and well, it's not technically a horror film It is scary as hell and it feels like a horror film the entire time.So if you haven't seen whatever happened, baby Jane Watch it.Yes.It's in black and white get over it.
You'll love it and Just admire how insane baby Jane Hudson truly is in this film.There's a great choice.I
I also just want to add that if people watch that and enjoy it and they haven't checked out Feud, that's a great companion series to whatever happened to Baby Jane.Also, there's a ton of drag parodies that are very funny.
I'm really glad that we're getting into some more classic stuff.I think that's very cool.
Alright Superfriends, I have to interrupt the podcast real quick because I have to talk about one of our sponsors for this episode, HelloFresh.
If you don't know what HelloFresh is, HelloFresh is a meal kit delivery service that shops, plans, and delivers step-by-step recipes and pre-measured ingredients so you can just cook, eat, and enjoy it.
And I think if you don't know what HelloFresh is, then obviously, I don't know how many podcasts you listen to, but you should listen to more podcasts because HelloFresh can deliver some meals right to your doorsteps.
We just had the chicken cheddar fajitas with bell peppers, lime, crema, I don't even know if that's saying that right, crema, crema, I don't know.But it was delicious and I didn't have to measure any of my ingredients.
They gave me an awesome, awesome step-by-step list on how to cook it. And I looked quite impressive to myself, to me, when I cooked the meal for me.It was delicious and I made sure that I got out my recipe rut and I made some amazing fajitas.
So if you want to get some HelloFresh straight to your door for a total of $60 off, that's $20 off your first three boxes, you can visit HelloFresh.com slash GeekHistory60.That 60 is very important.And then you enter the promo code GeekHistory60.
So, it's like six meals free, basically, if you do that.So, hellofresh.com slash GeekHistory60 and enter the code GeekHistory60.And now, back to the episode.
This is three ladies in a row, I'm so proud of us.
She's only 12 years old, so I don't know if she's technically, is she a lady at 12?
That depends on your standards for ladies.
Well, I guarantee you Regan McNeil would come after you for that comment.Regan McNeil, if you don't know, is the 12-year-old girl in The Exorcist, which in my humble opinion, is my favorite horror movie of all time, is The Exorcist.
Let me tell you a little story about Regan.She plays the Ouija board, of course, like the devil kids shouldn't do.And she begins acting very strangely.She crawls upside down, down a flight of stairs.She uses excessive foul language.
She shows signs of abnormal strength.And then, finally, she kills somebody.And that's the point where mom is like, maybe I should bring in some priests or some exorcists and get rid of this evil spirit.
chooses to, will not relinquish control of Regan.So, there is some truly disturbing moments with this little girl in The Exorcist.The idea that she stabs herself with a crucifix, she turns her head around, she projectile green vomits everywhere.
That good pea soup.Yeah, it's just, for me,
It's when I think of horror movies, I think of the face of this little girl and hearing her voice and, you know, seeing the cold breath, which, by the way, fun fact, was something the director did to make the actor shiver on set was that he put them inside of a refrigerator box like that set of Regan's room is inside a refrigerator.
Aw, SAG rules didn't exist!
Yeah, so all of these people, their breath is real, and they're actually dying, like Max von Sydow, and I forget the other actor, are just dying from shivering.Interesting.
But Regan McNeil, to me, is very iconic, she's very scary, and again, she's another altered human.
She's a human that like, oh, man, like, again, I truly think that the scary stuff is what happens to us when we're like twisted or altered or taken away.So, yeah, Regan McNeil from The Exorcist, my number four.
Can I tell you guys a weird exorcist story really quick?
Sure.So my father watched this in the cinema when it came out and he was a jock and he was on the hockey team because he was Canadian.And him and one of his fellow hockey players went to see it together.
And I guess there's a scene where they put a needle in her neck.And when that happened, his buddy fainted in the cinema because it was so scary and they had to stop the movie and get him out of there before they could finish watching it.
And whenever I think of The Exorcist, I think of that story of like the sort of strapping high school jock losing his mind over it.
And I just want to take a quick puff from my inhaler and slide my glasses up my nose to say that technically the horror villain in that is Captain Howdy, the demon that possesses Regan, not Regan.I just don't like that name, Captain Howdy.
Gentlemen, gentlemen, you're both right.But I know Matt would have his card revoked if he didn't say that.
Sure, sure, sure.It's Regan. Regan's such a better name.Alright, Ashley, what is your number three?
My number three is also a teenage girl.She's covered in blood.She's played by Sissy Spacek.It's Carrie!Another Stephen King.Another scary lady.
You don't like Stephen King either, so that's very interesting.
I don't not like Stephen King.I just don't think... No, I've seen your letters.
I just think Joe Hill is better.And I just don't have the affection for him that every single other person in the world seems to have.So I'm probably wrong.Carrie is the one Stephen King book I've read.And I have seen the original film.
I've not seen the remake.I think she is one of the most intelligent,
female villains or horror characters that we've seen because she represents everything that men are afraid of about women, harnessed into a very interesting story that's also deeply relatable.
I didn't go to my high school prom, but I was not popular in high school.And so I very much empathized with her journey from that perspective.My mom didn't lock me in closets. But I wasn't necessarily popular.
I love that they take the use of blood imagery that's obviously ties into menstruation and being a female and they amp that up.She represents puberty and growing up and coming of age.And that's a scary time, whether you're a man or a woman.
And to take that and pivot that into X-Men level power that leads to murder is very cool.And it also sparks the part of my brain that likes comic books.I mean, she's just Magneto under different circumstances, taken to the nth degree in a pink dress.
And the fact that her home environment so heavily affects the outpouring of her powers and how we see it play out, I think is very intelligent.She's not just that happy little girl.
She's basically the character from Pretty in Pink, but if evil, even though Pretty in Pink came way after Carrie.It's such a great idea.It's such a great execution.And she's so iconic that we've made two films and a crappy musical out of it.
Oh, I forgot about the musical.
The musical, by the way, is not as bad as everyone says it is, but it's the kind of musical that should be addressed the way you go into watching like the Evil Dead musical.Like you should look at it as parody.
You shouldn't look at it as serious musical theater because then it's not awesome.But it is very fun.It's very campy.I think more people should do it.I really, really do.And I think we're going to get at least one more Carrie reboot in our lifetimes.
We'll probably get two, to be honest with you.
And for me, when I sit here and I think about iconic female horror characters or even iconic female murderers, it's pretty much Aileen Wuornos and Carrie.So I didn't feel good putting Monster on this list, so I have put Kerry's a good choice.
I personally, when I was thinking about this list, Kerry never crossed my mind, but she's a great choice.And the reason why I think she's a great choice, again, I never thought of her, but you are correct.She's a scary villain.
I also like the idea that she's a child.It's also probably because I'm short.
She's also an altered human.
Yes, she is.But she's a small girl, whereas Annie Wilkes is like a big, powerful, strong lady.So they're powerful.They're scary on different levels.But it appeals to me that Carrie is like a whiff of a girl. Sorry, Matthew, I cut you off.
No, I was going to say I almost for me, Carrie didn't make my list.And I think the biggest reasons that I have trouble even seeing her as a villain, because I sympathize with her so much.
But I think that that's a good thing, too, is, you know, I kind of went. With my list, I was like, let me go with, you know, if the good guys wear white hats, I'm going with the guys with the blackest hats possible.
But you also pick someone with a very gray hat.And I like that a lot, actually.
I think it makes for an interesting character.And I think we could probably sit here and debate all day whether some of these characters, you know, you could make the same argument, like you pointed out about Regan.Is Regan, is she the bad guy?
Or is it Christianity?I'm going to say it.Or the predator.
Or with the predator.Is it him or is it just his society?
Maybe he's a nice guy.Maybe he wanted to be a lawyer, but his society made him into a murderous monster.
Does he have a family of predators at home?
I'm certain he does.We've seen predator dogs, so we know that he has a domesticated family life of some type.
All right, Matt, what is your number three?Well, there is no gray lining on this one.I went with number three, my favorite slasher of all time, Freddy Krueger from the Nightmare on Elm Street series.Nice.He is, you know, we talk about
Jason, you know, you've got your Jason's in your Mike Mike Myers and all that but Freddy to me had a level of pop culture Importance that none of them came close to Freddy had a hotline.He had children's pajamas, which is terrifying
There was a 1-800 hotline that you could call in where Freddy would wish you good night before you went to bed.Oh, so he'd be like, good night, kiddies!
One second, I'm gonna see if this comes up on the microphone or not, but I have a talking Freddy Krueger doll directly behind me from the 80s.Oh my god.Like, there is... so much that this guy was marketed as, and it's crazy.
Again, for children, movie, not for children.His character murdered children.So, like Freddy Krueger, but he, you know, just expertly played by Robert Anglin.
And, you know, the film, the sequels can kind of hurt a little bit, but the first movie, he's just so creepy and
Taking advantage of the surreal nature that comes with a dream demon is really, really cool, because you've got stuff, you know, there's no other horror movie where you can see someone turn into a cockroach to die, or get turned into a human puppet, or any of that stuff, but because it's all in dreams, you can just go wherever your imagination takes you, and it led to some of the most
Unsettling but also like really cool special effects deaths in all of horror, so I have to put pretty on my list Is there besides the cockroach is there a favorite death that stands out for you?
Okay, well obviously the cockroach is my number one I think that's most Kruger fans number one, but I mean dream warriors has a lot of really really good ones And I did mention the puppet when I think the puppet one is pretty
probably my number two i i i just think it's such an unsettling one or uh... there's freddie's dead uh... starring a lot of nineties people but particularly breckenmayer that has uh... sequence where someone has a hearing aid and he corrupts the hearing aid and makes their head explode by scraping his nails on a chalkboard until i remember that's awful yeah it's it's
That one's a goofy movie, but I really like some of the dream sequences in it.
I'm going to be honest, I'm kind of surprised that our first sort of iconic slasher is middle of the list.Yeah.We'll see where we go from here.All right, Jason, the time has come.What's your number three?
My number three can be served up with a nice candy and a sign of fava beans.
That's just a horrible sound.Why do people like ASMR?You're all disgusting.
I'm talking about Hannibal Lecter.There is no horror movie villain list without Hannibal Lecter on it.
And that is primarily because of the Oscar winning performance of Anthony Hopkins for lead actor, by the way, when he's in less than 15 minutes of the movie.
He is in less than 15 minutes of Silence of the Lambs, and he won Best Actor, not Best Supported Actor.Southwick.Good for him.Good for his managers.
Good for their marketing campaign.
Silence of the Lambs is about Clarice.It's about Jodie Foster.Everybody remembers Hannibal Lecter in that movie because of Anthony Hopkins.Basically, he's a psychiatrist revealed to be a homicidal cannibal.
He's locked up in a cell, but over the course of the movie, spoilers, He breaks out, of course, and his whole escape sequence is terrifying.
Every time you watch a scene with Hannibal Lecter, because he is a psychiatrist, he is trying to pick you apart.But the thing I like about Hannibal Lecter is he does not kill you. unless you're rude.He only kills if you are offensive and impolite.
And that's the reason why he never touches Clarice, because Clarice is nice to him.
I'm going to go out on a limb here.Not a bad way to live your life.
That's true.He eats the brains of Ray Liotta in Hannibal, which the less said about that movie, the better.Mainly Silence of the Lambs, he is so...
just ingeniously scary so iconic and his eyes and the way the shot like he lives in your dreams he is one of these characters that are fictional characters that are so real so terrifying and just his cadence his tempo his temperament the way he stands that
I think anybody would be scared to meet him in real life.He would be terrifying to talk to.And you know that the minute you start talking to him, you have to go on guard because you have to figure out, what is he trying to get from me?
Or how is he trying to take this to his advantage?Because he is. every time.There is no conversation with Hannibal Lecter where he's not trying to get something from you.
Even if the only thing that he's trying to get from you is to make you feel embarrassed, which is what he does a couple of times in Silence of the Lambs.
All he's looking for is to make you embarrassed, but he's that good, he's that terrifying, he's that smart.Hannibal Lecter definitely in the top.I almost made him my number one, but I gave my number one slot to the person that I think
in terms of horror movies deserves it the most.
Now, I want to ask you, because he has one very celebrated movie and a bunch of other media sort of of three other not so good movies and a TV show of questionable content.Do you like? any of the other Hannibal stuff except Silence of the Lambs?
I'll say this, I love the Hannibal Lecter books.I've read Red Dragon, Silence of the Lambs, and Hannibal the book.Hannibal the book is just not great.Anything called Hannibal is just not great.
But Red Dragon and Silence of the Lambs, the books, Red Dragon the book is just as scary as Silence of the Lambs the movies. But when they translated it over to a movie, it didn't pull it off.
For some reason in live action, for me, only Silence of the Lambs has been able to bring across Hannibal Lecter.But in the books, in Red Dragon especially, you feel the same thing.You feel like, oh, Hannibal Lecter is a scary AF.
He has more bad appearances than good, definitely.
Jason, have you seen Manhunter?
Yes, the original because it's Brian Cox's Hannibal Lecter.
Yeah, which I actually think is I mean, it's not a perfect movie, but it is definitely a better version of Red Dragon than the Red Dragon that we got years later.
Brian Cox is a good casting choice for anything.
And then the it was the lead of the guy who was the original lead of CSI was William Peterson.Yeah.He was the opposite of Grissom.Yeah.
Oh, no.That character's name is Will Graham.My brain was saying Will Ferrell, and I knew that was definitely wrong.
So many Wills.But yeah, it's William Peterson and Brian Cox, and they called it Manhunter.
That actually sounds really good.I think it was directed by Michael Mann.It was.Yeah.Yeah.Who later did Heat?Wow.
Maybe I'm going to watch that.
Yeah.But yeah.Yeah.I don't know.Hannibal Lecter.I think simply off of his 15 minutes in Sons of the Lambs with Anthony Hopkins, that's why he deserves to be on this list. I think that's a great choice.Alright, we are going into our number twos.
Ashley, we're in the top two.This is where it gets real.Your choices better be terrifying.Just the mention of their names better make us shiver.
Okay, I thought you were going to say another word that started with S-H instead of shiver.What?Just keep going.
first debuted in 1922, and I picked this character for their iconography and because of the lasting effect that this film has had on the genre, even though I would hazard if people check this movie out, which they absolutely will, they will not find it particularly scary by modern standards, but I picked Nosferatu.
The German expressionist film, which you can often find playing at your local art museum or gallery, because they love to play it around this time of year, and it is in the public domain. One of the best, if not the best portrayals of vampirism.
It's very dark.The makeup is amazing.This is where you get the bald head, pointy ears.
The look is so iconic that what we do in the shadows had a version of a Nosferatu living in their basement.Like it is so permeated popular culture that if you just see Nosferatu, the actor in a still,
you know exactly that you're looking at a vampire.And this film created a lot of the shorthand of what we know about vampirism in modern popular culture.
Now, yes, you can make the argument that this was laid down in books like Dracula and Camilla and then later editions like Interview with a Vampire.But I think this is the film that popularized it in a way that we had never seen before.
This is why we know the rules about sunlight.This is why we know the rules about Christian iconography and things like that.And I think If you can, you know, like like like Matt said, like, yes, it's in black and white.
Yes, this is for all intents and purposes, a silent movie.But like, grow up, change your headspace a little bit and watch it.And I think you'll be pleasantly surprised how twisted it is.
And you'll see where a lot of other movies took their inspiration, even the way this is shot, the way it's lit, the way the sets are constructed.
I think Nosferatu and then the cabinet of Dr. Caligari are not given their due for how influential they are on horror, suspense, and adventure storytelling into the modern day.
So while maybe when we think of vampires, Dracula comes to mind before Nosferatu, the convention started here, the movie still holds up, and it's very accessible.So please go watch it.
Either of you have seen the movie that came out in the mid-2000s called Shadow of the Vampire, which starred Willem Dafoe, but the idea that Nosferatu was a real vampire, that was a great movie.
It could be due for a really good remake as well.
Nosferatu?Oh, 100%.That's a great choice.
Very old school.Matthew, what's your number two? I also have a vampire at my number two actually.
Heck yeah!Count Chocula?Yes!
I want it to represent the classic Universal Monsters but at the heart of it I feel like a lot of like I watch those movies when I was too scared to watch real horror movies so like Wolfman and Creature and that stuff doesn't do anything for me.
I almost put Creature on my list.I love it that's my favorite of the Universal Monsters but There is one performance of Dracula that to this day is still my favorite performance that anyone has ever done of Dracula.
And it is from 1987's The Monster Squad.Look at Dracula in that.He's so creepy.He's so evil.He's grabbing a little girl by her throat and cursing at her.Like he is insane and it's a kids movie. And it's still to this day one of my favorite movies.
Shameless plug, there's a documentary about Monster Squad called Wolfman's Got Nards.I'm in it, you should see it.It is one of the best kids horror films of all time.It probably gets watched monthly in my house.
But yes, that performance of Dracula is the creepiest.But I'll use that to say all Dracula and universal creatures.But Dracula for Monster Squad.
I think that's a very interesting choice and someone is going to tweet you.All right, super friends and interrupting again to tell you about another awesome sponsor.This sponsor is Care. of.
You may be asking, what should I care of?Well, you should care of, because Careof is a company that delivers completely personalized vitamin and supplement packs right to your door.
Basically, you go to their site, they give you an online quiz, they ask you about your diet, your health goals, your lifestyle choices, your superhero choices, basically what's your favorite book that you've ever read, and it takes about five minutes, and it basically gives you some choices that they can send right
straight to your door.Your vitamins get delivered right to your door in personalized, easy-to-remember daily packs, perfect for the busy, on-the-go lifestyle.
And also, fun fact, there are some vegan and vegetarian supplement options that are available to match your dietary needs.I, myself, got some vitamins to help with some sleep.
and help with some focus, because writing all these lessons takes a lot of focus, takes a lot of time to remember how many different crises and crisis-ses and flashpoints that there are, and hopefully care of awesome vitamins can put me on the right track.
20% off your first month of personalized care of vitamins, visit TakeCareOf.com and enter the code GEEKHISTORY.That's T-A-K-E-C-A-R-E-O-F.TakeCareOf.com and enter the code GEEKHISTORY.
So, make sure you want some vitamins straight to your door, you want some healthy, you want a health focus, you want to make sure that you're on track for a great 2019, go to TakeCareOf.com, enter Geek History for your code, get you some vitamins, be healthy, you know, make sure you remember the next crisis when it comes around.
And now, back to the episode.
All right, Jason, what is your number two?
So this is the part of the list, I had a very difficult time with this list and trying to figure out who was scary to me and who I thought should be on this list.And this person was a person that actually scared me as a kid.
Now, I don't know if I've said this on the podcast before, I'm pretty certain I have, that my parents had rules of when I was very young, they sat me down and they said that this movies are pretend.And so I very much,
From a very early age, like under 10, got to see a lot of R-rated movies and horror movies when I was under 10, which I actually really appreciate that my parents, because of that, I've seen a lot of 80s R-rated movies that a lot of other people just have never seen, and because of that, movies never really scared me.
But every once in a while, a movie will really bother me, and this is led by a character called Pinhead. who is from the Hellraiser movies, 1987 Hellraiser, played by Doug Bradley.
Now, whenever you configure this puzzle box, the Lament Configuration Puzzle Box, Pinhead and his Cenobites would just show up and usually torture you to death.And it was pretty horrific torture, and a lot of it usually
ended up putting hooks in you and stretching your face and doing all kinds of stuff like that.
There is a Hellraiser movie where Andrew Robinson, who later goes on to play Garrick in DSpace9, he gets hooks in every part of his body and his face is stretched out flat, kind of like the face of Moe in a Doctor Who episode, and he can still talk.
And it's pretty horrifying.And so because of that, I kind of equated that any time Pinhead shows up, you's a gonna be tortured.And it was not a fun time.
And you did not want to put, for me, as a kid, I was always like, why do they keep putting the puzzle box together?Stop!The bad guys show up when you do it, stop!
Was it the body horror that creeped you out so much?
A lot of it, and the torture.You were just like, if these guys, and again, it's another one of these things where it's like, Pinhead's sort of an altered human.Yeah.Although he's like a demonic human.But it's this idea.He's possessed by a goat.
It's the idea that, to me, I always put that Pinhead must have been one of these people.And I saw that there was an origin of Pinhead.I've not seen that Hellraiser movie, so whatever.
But I always got the idea from just from Hellraiser 1 that like Pinhead was one of these people that like opened the box and got tortured as well.And that's why he's Pinhead.And so it's one of the ideas that
you know, you could be these terrible monsters as well.And that like, oh, my God, like how much torture could it take to get you to that point?
So that's the reason why Pinhead is my number two, because as a child, he was one of the very few because I was never.I'm going to be honest with you.I'm going to say this right now.
Jason and Freddie are not on my list because they never once scared me.Not once. I always thought they were kind of silly, goofy monsters.
Like Freddy, I think the imagery of him is scary, but every time he'd make a dumb joke, I was just like, wah, wah.Even as a kid, I was like, wah, wah.I got it.I wasn't afraid of Freddy.
And then Jason, it just seemed like, well, go around a corner and run.You'll beat him.
Yeah, you know Jason's not even on my honorable mentions list like I think he's kind of overrated I had hellraiser on one of my honorable mentions, but not pinhead actually I had the character of Frank To me in that movie He is the villain like pinhead only has I think maybe seven minutes of screen time in the original hellraiser And it's more this weird
family drama of Frank who escapes from hell and Convinces his brother's wife to kill for him so that he can regain his body And that's just super evil and creepy to me, but yeah, man, the Cenobites are just terrifying all of the time they're so creepy and
Well done, and yeah the second movie does tell you the entire history of how pinhead became I did not know that well as I've proven before with other choices in this list I prefer monsters that have very little screen time all right, so Another character with a very iconic look he's creepy.
Yeah So Ashley yeah, we're here.This is the monster or villain that we're all going to judge you on.If it's not a certain person, you're wrong.No, there are no right or wrongs.Ashley, what's your No.1 best movie horror villain, according to you?
This is a character that I just really like.And as soon as we were talking about doing this list, I knew that this character was going to be my number one.It is the psycho himself, Mr. Norman Bates, as played by Anthony Perkins in the 1960 film.
I saw Psycho without knowing the twist at the end, even though it is something that has been ripped off in popular culture, right?
Like we all know, spoiler alert for a movie from 1960, we all know that Norman Bates is pretending to be his mom and that he's got her desiccated body in his basement.
And when I saw the movie, Anthony Perkins is so good that even though the rest of the movie is very dated and it's filmed in black and white, despite being 1960, to sort of add to the ambiance.So it feels even more dated because of that.
His performance feels modern.He feels like he's in a different movie than everyone else.He's so singular.He's so creepy.And I As a woman who has traveled by herself, he represents everything that I am most afraid of.
A nice man who seems like he has your best interest in mind and then fixates on you and murders you when you're at your most vulnerable, when you're literally naked and completely unprotected.He's a very simple villain in that way.
Yes, there's some deep psychosis and there's interesting things to get into there.I watched all of Bates Motel.It's not a good show, but I loved it. And they try to explore some of those under a very weird, out of context, modern setting.
But even if you push all of that aside, he preys on the fears and the things that I, as a person, also feel most vulnerable about, but it's dressed up. entrappings that are fascinating.They're compelling.It's shot beautifully.
And when I think about what I want out of a horror movie and what has struck me and what I've spent the most time thinking about, and I mentioned A Quiet Place and I mentioned Get Out, and I guess you could even consider something like I'm Sorry to Bother You, because there's a good amount of body horror in that.
What is interesting to me about those films all comes from psycho and was all executed very well here decades and decades earlier.
And I think also because, like I talked about with Nosferatu, because it lays the groundwork for so many things that we've already seen, I think he deserves to be held in esteem.
And I think one of the reasons why it's lampooned in popular culture, why we've seen a Simpsons parody of this is because it's impactful and because it's iconic.And I really just love the character of Norman Bates.
I don't want to be his friend, but I think he's fascinating.So I had to put him at number one for killing exactly two people.Two people?
Yeah.It depends on if you abide by the Bates Motel mythology, where it's more like maybe 10 people.But per the movie and per the book, which the book is very strange. And not good.It's only two people.
It's one of the few cases where the film adaptation is so much better than the book.The book is so weird.I'm sure you can get it at your local library.Please patronize your local libraries.And then, yeah, also rent Psycho and check it out.
I want to chime in real quick with Psycho.In the 80s and early 90s during the VHS boom, there'd be a lot of these cheapo compilation releases.
One of the ones that I always loved was It Came From Hollywood, where it's just all these clips from different old horror movies with Cheech and Chong and Dan Aykroyd and Gilbert Radner doing Mystery Science Theater 3000 commentary over the clips.
It sounds like a YouTube mashup before YouTube was a thing.
that I had rented as a kid was called Coming Soon, and it was narrated by Jamie Lee Curtis, and all it was was a collection of trailers for movies that Universal had put out, specifically horror films.
And the trailer for Psycho scared me more than anything in my childhood for years.
And it's just Alfred Hitchcock giving you a tour of the motel, and it's like this long five minute trailer, and he walks into the bathroom, and then he looks at the shower curtain, and he throws it open and just cuts to a screaming face, and that's the end.
And it wrecked me as a child.That's the power of Psycho, is that you don't even have to show a scene from it, and it can chill someone to their bone.It's such a good classic horror film.
There's also a trailer for it that's just Marion driving, and it's just her amazing Twiggy-esque eyeliner, and it's just a shot of her driving in the rain.I also think the music in Psycho is another reason why it's remained iconic, because
And I know the first Halloween movie took direct and makes direct reference to Psycho, but the themes and the musical score also, I think, influenced a lot of what we saw becoming really popular in the 80s with the genre as well.
Yeah.I mean, it is considered the film that kicked off the slasher genre, and with good reason.It's still the best of the entire genre.
Yeah, but... Matthew, speaking of the best, you have a villain that you think is just as good as Norman Bates.Who's your number one?
So this is going to lead to a lot of virals.I'm going to be called a hipster.I'm going to be called a lot of things.So I'm prepared for the hate.The Babadook.No, no.So my number one, I went with the person who scared me the most.
And it's actually a fairly newish movie.It's the Water Street Butcher from a film called Poughkeepsie Tapes.
And the thing with Poughkeepsie Tapes is that it's probably the most unsettling film that I've ever seen and it's because of the Water Street Butcher.
The Poughkeepsie Tapes starts off with a police camera crew as the police are raiding this house and inside the house they find hundreds of VHS tapes that are just marked 1 to like 300.
and the entire film plays out like an episode of the forensic files where they're interviewing the policemen and the investigators that have to go through all of these tapes and it's a documentation of an unknown never seen serial killer who is using an old VHS camera documented everything that he's done over a twenty year period and it is
So creepy and unsettling to see everything through his POV for a full 90 minutes And just listening to like these actors who are playing different Interrogators and crimeologists and all of that.It's it's a very well put together movie that I
Played at I want to say South by Southwest in 2007 according to Wikipedia which we currently have open it debuted at Tribeca in Tribeca is its credit is being made in 07 But it says it was released in 08 at Tribeca.
Yeah, so it was made in 07 and Released in the film festivals.
I forget what studio bought it, but then they just never put it out, and it wasn't until the MGM It was probably forgotten about yeah, so it wasn't until this past year scream factory acquired it and finally gave it a beautiful blu-ray release and
that's worth watching.It's just a very, it unsettled me so bad, and I've watched it a couple times, and I watched it on a bootleg years ago, because that was the only way that you could see it, and it was almost creepier.
Yeah, actually, I'm just reading the tiny little synopsis while you've been talking about it.I have not heard of this film, and this sounds great.
You have to get past the fact that it was definitely made by a bunch of locals and it is like local actor quality.
But if you can shut your brain off and just imagine that what you're watching is a real episode of a TV show and not just a film, it will really creep you the hell out.So I highly recommend the Poughkeepsie tapes.
Sorry that I didn't pick someone that everyone knows that's like an iconic.I went with the most obscure thing on my entire list, but whatever.
No, then that's one of the things that I love about the list that we do is it's truly what strikes you the most.And then when we bring on guests and we get something else to watch, that's just a bonus.
I'm sorry that Jason and I can't speak to this at all. I'm gonna say thank you for recommending it.I'm sure it's great and Hey, Jason.
Why don't you tell us about your number one?
My number one is a tiny black goat, but no Recording You could, it's 90 minutes.I'm actually surprised that my number one didn't make it on either of your lists, because I thought actually he would appear on every one of our lists.
When I think about horror movie villains, to me there is one singular image that always comes to my mind immediately.And the fact of the matter that this character has been rebooted, not once, but twice,
Actually, no, three times, to me, says that there is something so iconic and scary.Now, I think a lot of it comes from his very first film, but I, of course, am talking about the man who wears a mask of a man who once said, risk is a business.
I am talking about Michael Myers, because there is something about the ridiculousness of a killer that wears the mask of William Shatner.Now, a lot of people have said they don't understand, it doesn't look like William Shatner.
It's funny, I actually just saw on the Internet very recently the exact frame from Star Trek that that mask is based on.And when you see it side-by-side, you perfectly see it.
The idea why the mask doesn't look that great is because mask-making wasn't great in the 70s. So he has been in almost every Halloween movie.They rebooted him for H2O.They rebooted him recently where they think they made Tyler Mayne Michael Myers.
And now we're rebooting him back to the original franchise.The fact that we are still
making films about Michael Myers, to me, goes back to the power of the very first Halloween film, which I actually think is truly a scary film, because it is just this man from an insane asylum chasing teenage girls through a suburban neighborhood.
There's no hint of superpowers.There's no nothing.He is the boogeyman that every parent has warned your kids about where it's like, check your backseat, look in the closet.Don't just go in the room because he is there.
He is the personification of the boogeyman.And that's why I think Michael Myers, besides having an iconic look, but Michael Myers could happen tomorrow. literally any person could break the crazy man of Michael Myers is a real person in our world.
I mean, if you do any reading about Richard Romero as the Night Stalker, I think you would find that those people do exist.I almost put him on my list.The first he was an honorable mention for me to the first horror movie I ever saw.
I was 12 years old, was Halloween H2O. And my friend, I remember my friend Kelsey, whose house I went over to, said, I was going to rent Scream, but I figured you'd already seen it.And I was like, I've literally never seen a horror movie.
It scared me so bad.I didn't sleep for three days.And then I slept in my parents' bed because I was so scared.How old were you? 13.Wow.I'm a very sensitive flower.And I've never gone back and watched a Halloween movie since.
I'm sure by now I could watch it and take it with a grain of salt.But I kind of hate that character because of my experience.
I mean, I want to I actually I want to see.And at the time of this recording, none of us have seen the new Halloween movie.I'm excited for it.I actually really am.
And I because I think, again, you just like Danny McBride.
No, I do like Danny McBride, but a lot of it is that, just like what I was saying with The Predator, the concept of Michael Myers is so good that it's one of these... I think you could just pump out Halloween movies until the cows come home.
The problem is that they went fantastical with him, and that they made him super cute.They made him like Jason and Freddy, where they gave him superhuman strength, and it's like, no, no, no, no.
You just need to make it about this crazy dude that goes into the next town and starts murdering people.That's it.
If you keep it set in the 80s, you could literally, yeah, just have him go the next town over, or three towns over.They're never gonna have heard of him.
That's the thing. If you keep it simple, the simple what freaks us out about Michael Myers again, is that he's just the dude.Yeah.
That mask that puts on a mask, doesn't say a word and stands in our closet until we stand there like he just creepily stands in the backyard until you're there.That's it.Right.
That's why I love that they took away, from what the trailers seem to imply in this new movie, they took away the storyline that Jamie Lee Curtis' character of Laurie was his sister.
Yeah, that's a bad choice as well, yeah.
Yeah, because it makes it all the more creepy that it's like, no, there's no rhyme or reason to why he's here.
I love that Jamie Lee Curtis, who is obviously a giant star, is just like, I'll come back. She's like, this is where I started.Heck yeah, I'll come back.I think that's amazing.
The other thing, too, is I do remember reading an interview with Danny McBride.I don't want to turn this into talking about the Halloween remake, but Danny McBride said that his first pitch for the project was to ground it.
He was like, Michael is not a superhuman.He's just a crazy man.And I like that.But to me, Michael Myers... I don't know, besides being just visually iconic, there's something so elemental about him that to me, he's number one.
There's no doubt he's number one, in my opinion.
I think it's a good choice.All right, cool.It's good.It's a good choice.Actually, you've made me regret that I put him on my honorable mentions list.
I've convinced you.Now, just to let everybody know, we usually do recommended reading after each episode, but for today, the recommended reading will be some of the great films that we have chosen for this list.
Hello and welcome to Geek History Lesson Extra.I am Jason Michael Myers Inman.
I am Ashley Victoria Robinson, but you already knew that because you're beautiful, sexy patrons who support us over here on Patreon.com and you came to listen to us talk more.Jason, what are we talking about today?
Today, since we have a horror film expert here, Ashley, who is that?
It is Mr. Matthew Kelly.Matthew, tell everyone real quick where they can find you all over the Internet.
HMNpodcast.com and Disney Podcast.com are the two podcasts that I do.But for this particular one, we're going to talk about HMNpodcast.com, which is our movie night podcast.
Well, today, I thought since we had a horror movie expert, and in the regular episode, Matthew already introduced me to a horror film that sounds great that I've never heard of, the Poughkeepsie Tapes, I thought we could talk about and pick Matthew's brain about what would be a great film
Scary movie to watch on Halloween or what do we think is a great movie?spooky movie to watch on Halloween and Matthew Are there any picks that stand up to you off the top of your head?
Okay, so I mentioned it in my list So I do want to say that if you've got little kids around and you're looking for a movie that you want to watch with with the whole family I do recommend monster squad and then obviously
The Disney fan of me has got to say, I mean, Hocus Pocus does a great job, too, if you're trying to watch it with the family.It actually is a good Halloween movie, Hocus Pocus.And it's got Talking Cat.
It came out in August, which makes no sense to me what Disney was thinking.Talk to Bette Midler's agent.
But if we're talking about, you're just going to sit, you're going to shut off the lights, it's just you, the trick-or-treaters have left, and you're about to spook yourself, then, man, there's so many to choose from.
There's a recent one that a lot of people haven't watched yet, but if you have Shudder, it should be available.And it's a weird little movie called, and I'm just looking to make sure I say the call letters correctly, WNUF Halloween Special.
And this strange little indie film out of Baltimore is presented as a fake VHS tape that was taping a, like,
Geraldo Rivera Halloween special and it's got all these fake cheesy 80s commercials in between segments of it and sometimes the tape will rewind or fast-forward while you're watching it and The tracking will get all weird, but basically there's a supposedly haunted house and he's gonna do a hour-long I'm going inside the house with paranormal experts investigation and then spooky creepy things happen while he's inside of the house and
And it's just very well done.It's well shot.It's a great example of what you can do with a very minimal budget The guys who made the movie were very brilliant in their marketing was that they shot it and
And then they literally put it on old VHS tapes and just slapped a label across the front that said WNUF Halloween Special and just put it at random horror conventions in random like bathrooms so people would just discover it and watch it.
Which I just thought was such a cool viral marketing to get eyes on their indie film.So I mean that's super Halloween centric.That's a good new one for people to check out.
That's pretty awesome.I like that.I like the idea of this VHS.It's weird.
It's weird how movies or horror movies have sort of become this analog or the idea to like bring in horror or these analog ideas that we can't control, because that is something that is going on in horror movies right now of how do you get past cell phones?
Because you always have to separate your characters, and you can't have your characters talk to each other and do stuff like that.
And you have to address in Get Out, like, I don't have any reception.Oh, my phone's dying.Oh, they're always unplugging.You have to have them say now why we're not able to just call 911 and get the heck out of there.
I also think horror movies, maybe it's because if you look at the majority of them, they are indie movies.But I think they embrace indie and viral marketing in some of the most interesting ways.
I mean, obviously, Blair Witch set such a huge precedent for that.And I think everyone is chasing that.But I always love to learn what people do to get eyes on their projects.And I think the idea of putting it on a VHS tape
is clever, but also something I would have never thought of.But we know a bunch of people who also watch VHS movies on a Lark.
Yeah, which is weird that they'll buy a VHS tape and a VCR and they're watching VHS movies and you're just like, why?
Well, here's my counter to you, though.Would you rather watch the grainy old version of Star Wars that you grew up on or the high definition one with a CGI Jabba the Hutt in the middle of it and and Greedo shooting first?
I'm going to be honest with you, I would rather watch the HD version because I can get past CGI-Java, but I hate VHS tracking.
As a person who had a VCR and was very poor, the amount of time that we had to make our VCR player work for our movies was well beyond the years that it should have.And we were constantly putting in that cleaning tape and adjusting the tracking.
I cursed VCRs until the day... The end of my days, I was so glad when they died.
So I think the big thing with horror and its love for VHS, and I think it's also tied to the filmmakers, is because of the low quality of VHS, you can A, hide a lot of the nuts and bolts of your practical effects a little bit better in the graininess of it.
I think sci-fi is the same thing.
Yeah.We were talking about Star Wars earlier. Yeah, you cover up more because it's kind of like low quality.And I think it also, there's certain movies where I think it actually works to the aesthetic.
I think something like Texas Chainsaw Massacre is, you know, it's so grainy.It feels like you're watching someone's home video.So to like, put that in HD it almost ruins what makes it work.
What makes it work is that it's grainy and it's bad and it doesn't look clean and it makes you feel like you're watching something you're not supposed to be watching.I think that's the fun of horror.I heard someone say on a podcast one time that
They don't like the fact that parents are so open to watch horror movies with their kids, not because they think that those kids shouldn't watch those movies, but the biggest part of horror is the like, ooh, I shouldn't be doing this factor of it, where it's like you watch it at a sleepover with your friends while the parents are asleep.
It's not something that you just sit in the living room with your mom and dad at two in the afternoon and watch.
Ashley, are there any movies that you think really work on Halloween night?
For a really long time, my parents didn't let me go trick-or-treating after I was 11, which I'm going to be honest, I think is the correct thing to do.11 or 12, I think, after that.You're too old.
buy them some candy and like let the little children's have it.I used to watch Wizard of Oz on Halloween for a really, really long time.
And I know we don't traditionally think of that as being a scary movie because now I think we've all probably watched it from the time we were little baby children ourselves.But I think it really works for that time.
The Wicked Witch of the West stands up as, I think, one of the all time scariest witches, even though even though there's flying monkeys and even though it's brightly colored.But that was the movie that I used to watch for a really long time.
I also think there are a lot of great classic Disney movies that you could revisit, just to hop on that.Like, I don't think enough people have seen Black Cauldron.I don't think enough people have seen Sword and Stone.
And those are things that you can sit and watch with your whole family.
I also think that if you are looking for a movie to cozy up with a significant other on and it's not going to scare someone with delicate sensibilities, I'm going to say it again, I think The Witch is a really great movie because it's mostly historical fiction and it's not that violent.
Game of Thrones is more violent than that entire film.Are there any that stand out for you?
Not really, because I never really had a tradition of watching Halloween movies on Halloween.I was always out doing stuff, so I would just recommend Halloween.The movie called Halloween I think is a great movie to watch on Halloween.
I think it's a good choice. Matthew, since you are our horror expert, you've dropped a couple ones on there, but I'm going to pick your brain one more time.
Is there another film out there, horror film, that you think is just brilliant, that you haven't mentioned yet, that you're surprised more people don't know about?
I'm gonna name two, if that's cool.The one is probably one of my top five favorite movies.Not even horror movies, but movies.And it's a film starring Michael J. Fox called The Frighteners.I love that movie.Peter Jackson!
That's a great Halloween movie. And it still doesn't have the following that I feel like it deserves because it is just a fun movie I'm a movie on blu-ray.
Oh, it's so good It's so beautiful and you can kind of see like it's one of those movies that you watch Because if you watch the old Peter Jackson movies, you're like how the hell did this guy ever get Lord of the Rings?
But you watch that and you're like no I get it This guy is on a whole nother level with with special effects and visuals and stuff and then the other one is
One that I just think is really fun, but I don't think a lot of people talk about it because it's a very slow burn.It's from 1981 and it's called The Fun House.It was directed by Tobey Hooper of Texas Chainsaw Massacre fame and it's about these
Four kids who decide to spend the night in a local funhouse and while they're there, they witness a murder happen and then the person who committed the murder realizes that there were witnesses and he turns on the funhouse and is sleeping, like kind of sneaking around in there trying to get these teenagers.
But what I really like about the movie is that it's an hour and maybe 40 minutes long, but they don't decide to spend the night in the funhouse until an hour and 10 minutes into it.And the first hour is just
really setting the tone of this carnival and introducing all these characters that seem minor throughout the first hour but they're all major players in the final 30 minutes and having you go through this funhouse multiple times so that you really get a vibe for the layout of the funhouse.
I just think it was a very well-paced horror film that I didn't like as a kid because it was too slow.But when I watched it as an adult, I thought, oh, this is almost better than Texas Chainsaw Massacre as far as to be Hooper films go.
So I would love to see that movie get a little bit more of a following.
Cool.I like those choices.Those are great.All right, Matthew.So please tell our listeners one last time where they can find you online, because I find your insights fascinating.I think they should, too.
uh... thank you uh... you can follow me directly at at saint mort on twitter uh... but i would say primarily car movie night if you search it you'll find our face book page which i'm always on posting and is always very active in there's uh... a pretty decent chunk of hardcore heartburn zero we sharing funny memes or their opinions of new movies
And then, obviously, hmnpodcast.com, where you can find all of the episodes of the shows that we've done, and our Patreon page, patreon.com backslash hmnpodcast.
And then, once again, if you're a Disney fan that's an adult that likes some drinking and cursing in your Disney conversations, then disneydopodcast.com.
All right, thank you so much for joining us and thank you to all the patrons who have made this extra podcast.
We're potty and we're casty and sometimes text is gassy.Your GHL will be on the Addams Family.Hello and welcome to Geek History Lesson.I'm Ashley Victoria Robinson.
I'm Jason The Thing Inman.Welcome to Your Mind University.
That is a title because this is a podcast where you can learn, observe, hypotenuse, and all those crazy scientific terms to figure out things about pop culture because this is the podcast where we give you everything you need to know about a TV show, a cartoon, and a couple of live action movies in a little bit less than an hour.
And today we are talking about who, Ashley?We're talking about the Addams Family. So weird.They have been cartoons.They have been comics.They have been comic strips.They have been live action movies.They have been toys.
And now they're going to be in a new animated movie opening at the time of this recording this week.
Yeah.Are you excited for it?
I'm the only person in the world excited for this movie.
We're going to go see it.It'll be good.Yeah.Yeah.The Addams Family is an interesting pop culture construct because it has been all around and all kinds of mediums.It's a term that I mean, everybody knows who the Addams Family are.I think so.
But they're not around anymore.They're kind of gone.They go in these waves, man.Because in the 90s, they came back real big.They were huge in the 90s and the early aughts.And I think in the world of Hot Topic, they would kill, as well.
Can you imagine how many people would dress up as Morticia if that suit was the Gomez suit? Put that in that big square pinstripe suit.That's right.
Speaking of wearing cool suits and doing all kinds of things, guys, we want to tell you, if you are going to Los Angeles Comic Con, which is going to be this weekend at the time of this recording, October 11th through the 13th, Ashley and I are going to be there.
We have a couple of panels.We're going to be there on Sunday, October 13th on 2019.We have three panels. where you can meet us, talk to us, say hi to us.One of them is a Geek History lesson live.
Now Ashley, what are these panels that we're doing on Sunday, October 13th at LA Comic Con at the Los Angeles Convention Center?
So the first one is at 11 a.m.It is How to Write Sci-Fi Fiction Based on Real Science, where we will be joined by some fellow comic book writers to talk about our new comic book science, elements of dark energy, and how we crafted that. story.
We're answering questions at the end of all of these, so come with your questions, come with your comments.Then at 1 p.m., you can catch us doing Geek History Lesson Live Flash versus Arrow in room 306AB.
We are going to be joined by Collider Staples, Jay Washington, and John Rocha, and Celeste Klaus will be joining us.We're going to be debating which of the shows is better and why in a friendly way.
We're also, assuming everything goes well, recording that episode.So hopefully everyone will be hearing that at a later date.
And then in the same room at 2 p.m., we are doing Indie Comic Secrets, How to Run a Successful Kickstarter, where we talk about making your own comic books in this amazing new world.
And Charlie Stickney, who is famed for his White Ash series, will be joining us for that.So we have three panels almost right in a row on Sunday.
So yes, if you're going to L.A.Comic Con from October 11th to the 13th, we will be there on the 13th.I'll also be there on the 12th.I have a small panel at 5 p.m.I'm certain I'll have it over social media.
But the Los Angeles Convention Center, October 11th to the 13th will be the 13th.I know many people have reached out to us and they're like, hey, I want to say hi to you.Hey, can I get a copy of Super Soldier signed?All the kinds of stuff like that.
The best places to do that would be either before or after any of these panels.But we also want you to come to these panels. because I think they're going to be pretty great.
Yeah, they're going to be great.
So cool.All right.Now for that, we're going to move into the 10 cent origin of the Addams Family.What's that, Jason?
That is where we take the CliffsNotes version of everything you need to know about the Addams Family and tell you in case you are invited over to the Addams Family mansion.And at that cocktail party, Cousin Itch goes...
I said, I meant it.My mouth didn't work.
Back off, internet.Jason, I'm the internet.
Ashley, give us a Tencent order.
The Addams Family is, of course, a famous cartoon franchise created by Charles Addams.
If you haven't checked him out, the first image that comes up of him is him sitting in front of a suit of armor, but he's wearing the helmet from the suit of armor, looking appropriately eccentric.Highly recommend.
Fun fact, he is a distant relative of the United States President John Adams and John Quincy Adams, even though he spells his surname with two D's and they only spell it with one D. And here's my favorite fun fact about Charles Adams.In 1933,
He joined the layout department of True Detective Magazine, where he had to retouch photos of corpses that appeared in the magazine stories because they told true crime stories.
And he complained that, quote, there was a lot of those corpses were more interesting the way they were before I retouched them. Cause he had to make them less gory.Alright.
The Addams Family cartoons were originally developed for the New Yorker and they debuted in 1938 and ran until 1988 when Charles Addams passed away.He drew hundreds of thousands of comics for the New Yorker.
The Addams Family only appear in exactly 150 of them.
And they are described as a satirical inversion of the ideal 20th century American family, an odd wealthy aristocratic clan who delight in the macabre and the seemingly unaware or do not care that other people find them bizarre or frightening.
I guess they are aristocratic, but I never think they're rich.They are upper class.I never think about that. Well, it's because they don't act bougie, right?Or is it because their mansion's never clean?I mean, it's full of cobwebs and it's dusty.
But that's what they like, right?So again, the inversion of what one would expect.Okay, cool.Can you name all members of the Adams family?
Okay, I'm going to ask you really quickly here.By all members, do you mean I got to name my grandpa and cousins?
No, like the main one, two, three, four, five, six, the main cast.
Okay, cool, cool, cool.Because I was like, there are a lot of weirdos.
There are hundreds of Adamses, yes.
It's Gomez is the dad.Morticia is the wife.Wednesday is oldest.She's older than him.And then Pugsley is the brother. Then there's Uncle Fester, who's not in everyone.There's Lurch the butler.And then I believe it's Grandma.Grandmama.Grandmama.Yes.
I wasn't certain if that's... You're missing one member.Well, I mean, if... There's two members that I would consider on this list, but I don't know which one you're thinking about.I mean, there is Thing the butler, who is the walking around hand.
Cousin It would be the other one, but he rarely appears.So the Addamseseses have appeared in one short film, four full length feature films, four network television shows, two television specials, two musicals, one pinball machine and one video game.
Do we want to talk about the pinball machine now?
No, we'll talk about it later.Okay.Angelica Houston portrayed Morticia Adams twice in live action, and she was nominated for a Golden Globe for Best Actress both of those times, which I think is really, really cool.Wow.
That is your 10 cent origin of the Addams Family.Now let's move into the meet cute.
The meet cute is where Ashley and I are going to tell you where we first meted and cuted this property, the Addams Family.It's a term that we stole from romantic comedies.This has nothing romantic nor comedy.Well, I guess a lot of comedy.
Ashley, where'd you first discover the Addams Family?
I mean, for me, it was the 90s cartoon.Mi Familia de Addams.Yes. I think I'm older than the cartoon, but I would have been a little tiny infant when it started.So that was my first introduction to the family.
And then, like all girls who self-identify as weird, Wednesday became a favorite character of mine and a real touchstone growing up.
But I have consumed, I think, the Adamses in every medium in which they are currently available, besides the new movie, which we haven't seen at the time of this recording. But yeah, it was the 90s cartoon, of course.How about you?
What's your meet cute for the Addams Family?
Apologies, I was trying to Google the year that the 90s cartoon, 92.92, yes, there you go.
Because it technically spins out of the first movie.
Yes, it has two seasons.Yeah.Yes.It's great.For me, it's the for me, I knew about the movie first, but I didn't get to see the movie until after the cartoon and the same 92 93 cartoon.And I remember, yeah, like, you know, that theme song.
It's pretty amazing.Both movies are great.I remember
The if anybody knows what I'm talking about when I say a syndicated television show, you know, where your local affiliates buy a certain number of TV shows like The Andy Griffith Show or Happy Days or whatever.I don't know why I said happy days.
I don't know.I said like that because you're happy anyways because of the success of the first movie. And I will look up, I don't know if you're going to have the box office totals of that.Oh, I do.I have a lot of stats about the movies.Great.
They're huge.One of the local stations, I believe it was the local... NBC affiliate, I think it was KSN in Joplin, Missouri Where I was one of the channels I can pick it up.
I Remember I believe is them I remember one of those stations bought the original black and white Adams family TV show and started playing it in the afternoons because of the success of the movie So I got to see a lot of the episodes of the old Adams family cool.
So there you go.Very long me cute.I apologize
That's fine.Let's move into the History 101, shall we?
This is the main meat of the lesson.Some might say pepperoni.No.Some might say provolone.
It is.I meant to say bruschetta.I'm sorry. This is where we mainly talk about the podcast.I'm really screwing this one up.
This lesson is going to be about half personal history of Charles Adams and half the Adams family.So let's drop in, kid.
Well, he's technically a member of the Adams family.He's the patriarch.So I think it works.
So Charles Chaz Adams grew up in Westfield, New Jersey, and he lived in a great big old Victorian mansion on Elm Street. So if you're ever wondering why Nightmare on Elm Street is set on Elm Street, it's in an homage to Chaz Adams.
I did not know that.Yep.I want to start with this detail specifically because his childhood house, as well as a specific house a couple streets over on Dudley Avenue, are the direct inspiration for the Adams family mansion.
He is quoted as saying, we had a dumb waiter in our house and I'd get inside on the ground floor and then very quietly I'd haul myself up to my grandmother's floor and then I'd knock on the door and when she came to open the door, I would jump out and scare the wits out of her.
He was also known as being, quote, something of a rascal around the neighborhood.And I love these details because any Adams family fan, I think will recognize both Wednesday and Pugsley in the childhood reflection of himself.
And if he grew up having his grandmother living in his family home, then that would explain why grandma is a classic part of the Adams family lineup.
And I read a couple articles about what this house is like and whether or not it's been preserved or not.Can you visit it?You can.It's still standing.It's not a museum and it's not really preserved in any way.
Unfortunately, double shame.
Yeah.But the alternative press dot com visited Westfield into this whole write up about it.And they describe, quote, the Presbyterian cemetery that used to fascinate him as a child.
The streets that he played on, the routes that he walked on to and from high school.And If he lived near the cemetery, that also explains why in the Adams family, in the early, early cartoons, they have a view of a nearby cemetery.
And they point out that there is no statue to him in town.They also described the big Victorian homes.
And while there might not be a statue of him in Westfield, New Jersey, the University of Pennsylvania does have a building called the Charles Adams Fine Arts Hall in Philadelphia.There's a sculpture of him out front.
And they have a 14 foot by four foot mural that he, the only mural he ever painted of the Adams family called the Adams Family Holiday while they are going out on vacation.And I really, really want to go and see it.Cool.
So he actually didn't go to the University of Pennsylvania.He attended the Grand Central School for Art in New York City.His first cartoon ran in the New Yorker while he was still a student there.And it features a window washer.It's kind of boring.
Beginning in 1937, his cartoons were picked up regularly, and one year after that, the first Addams Family cartoon ran.And the Addams Family ran The New Yorker for the next 50 years, exactly, until he died.He remained a freelancer the entire time.
He was never offered anything more than a freelancer job by The New Yorker.
Yeah, but he showed them. Oh, true.He was able to take these comic strips and make a television show.
Yes, but now he didn't see the movie.But I understand your point.Yes.The first cartoon features Morticia and maybe Lurch, maybe Gomez and a vacuum cleaner salesman.I've given Jason a copy to look at of it.I will also share this on all of our socials.
I'm going to argue, so I'm looking at this right now, the man that is standing behind Marticia has a very thick beard and a very thick head of hair, but the way he's kind of squared off and he's bigger, I kind of think he's Lurch.Yeah, I don't.
I don't know, because Morticia is obviously Morticia.Like, she came out the womb.Well, and the girl, there's a little girl at the top of the stairs looking down at them.And the little girl doesn't really look like Wednesday either.
I don't know if that's supposed to be a little girl or like, is that grandmama?And she's like, is she being held up there against her will?
No, no, no, no, no.It's a kid like peeking.It's is what it is.
But it doesn't look like the classic Wednesday.
No, but it has black hair and a bow.
Yes, which are Wednesday attributes.And the caption is the vacuum cleaner salesman speaking, and he says, vibrationless, noiseless, and a great time and back saver.No well-appointed home should be without it.
I think the gag is supposed to be because the mansion is quite unkempt.We have all of the spider webs that are usually in place.
There's a bat flying through the top of the frames.
Yeah. Jason, I'm not super familiar with New Yorker cartoons.Are you?
Is this a good example of a New Yorker cartoon?Now, I know you weren't reading the magazine in the 30s, but does this strike you as... Oh, if I only had the chance to read a New Yorker in the 30s.You can find it all online.It's very accessible.
A lot of jokes like this, eh?Because I'm going to argue that this is not funny.
Actually, I'm going to give you the secret about the New Yorker magazine, and I apologize if this offends anybody who enjoys the New Yorker.Most of their cartoons are not funny, and that's kind of the point of the New Yorker cartoons.
Okay, because I have since, doing research for this episode, read every 150 Addams Family cartoons that appeared in the New Yorker.Some of them are kind of funny. Um, this one's not funny, so I'm surprised that we got more of it.
But so this is a good example of a typical New Yorker cartoon, in your opinion.
Oh, yes.The fact that it makes no sense and you're kind of like, what am I?
And it feels like intentionally obtuse, like it's trying to make you feel dumb.
Everything in The New Yorker is intentionally trying to make you feel dumb.
Well, I read a couple New Yorker articles about Charles Adams.I thought they were quite good.But OK, so this is so in your opinion, this is a good example.
Yes, I think this is a great example.As George Costanza would say, it's no Ziggy.
Fair.Ziggy's terrible.Ziggy is terrible.The Addams Family was actually not the only ongoing cartoon project that Charles Addams had from 1955 to 1979.He had a syndicated single panel comic called Out of This World.
And he was published in many other magazines, including Drawn and Quarterly, Monster Alley, Mademoiselle.He was featured in calendars and so much more.
In 1961, his cartoon work was granted an Edgar Award, which is an award given by the Mystery Writers of America for his body of work, which I think is really cool.
I think he's either the only or the first comic book or comic artist to have received an Edgar Award.
He even went on to illustrate legendary science fiction writer Ray Bradbury's short story Homecoming, which is about the Elliotts, a family of vampires living in Illinois.It's a really fun story.You can find excerpts from it online.
They anthologized it in a collection called From the Dust Returned, which was only printed a few years ago.
Bradbury said in an interview with Indie Bound, quote, I was 26 years old when I met Adams in New York, and he had just done a painting for Mademoiselle.When I saw it, I realized he was a kindred spirit, so we made plans to write a book together.
They were going to write an ongoing horror anthology, but the project didn't come to fruition because Adams demanded too much money, and all the publishers said, screw you, go back to the New Yorker.
Fun fact, all of the Addams Family characters went unnamed until the television series was developed in the 1960s.
Now, if you don't know this, that's fine.Did the television show name them?Yes.
Well, he named them for the television show.So they came to him and they were like, they need names and they're too broad, so we need to specify them.
It was gonna be funny if a 60s Hollywood producer was the one who named, kind of like how the Superman radio show was the one that named Krypton.
Yes.No, he named them but at the behest of studio executives.So I'm going to give you kind of a list of traits of general Addams Family cartoons and how the characters behaved using the names they did not have at the time.Got it.
Wednesday and Pugsley are literally disposable and die constantly. It's evident even in the early comic panels that Morticia does function as the head of the family.Grandmama tends to wander off easily.
She's led astray and her lack of control leads most of the family into dire situations.The family's extremely tight-knit.Morticia and Gomez share a passionate love.
Later in the television show, she can evoke kisses from Gomez just by speaking French, which kind of gets condensed down to him going, tish, that's French.
And they are hospitable to strangers, but they won't shy away from killing someone who gets in their way or oversteps boundaries.So that's kind of the basics of what the cartoons are like.
Another important detail is that the fictional Addams family is part of a much larger Addams clan.We hear about a plethora of other relatives that Jason alluded to at the beginning, and family events and reunions.
going on all over the world basically all the time.The movie continuity introduces the family motto, Sic Gorgiamus Allos Subjectatus Nunc.Do you know what it means?
I don't remember, but I do remember the nunc.
Okay, don't feel bad because it's not grammatically sound in Latin, but it is supposed to mean we gladly feast on those who subdue us.
So that's kind of fun.But yeah, it's not functional Latin. In the comics, the Addams Family home is located in Cemetery Ridge.
I was going to say New Jersey.
I mean, I always thought it was New Jersey.I would assume since he is from New Jersey.Yeah.And they do.They reference New York a lot.
But the Broadway musical states that the house is in Central Park.There's no houses in Central Park.
The musical says it's in Central Park?It's like we're in New York.God forbid we set this anywhere.It's like a Marvel comic.
No, I'm sorry.No, not in Central Park.They're in the middle of nowhere.
Because they're in the spooky haunted house.
Yeah, exactly. Fun fact, filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock owned two original Addams Family cartoons and he has Cary Grant's character in North by Northwest mention Charles Addams.He shouts, quote, the three of you together.
Now that's a picture only Charles Addams could draw.
Except it's Cary Grant.Yeah.The three of you together.That's that's a picture only Charles Addams could draw. You'd be a good Cary Grant.
Okay, so now I want to kind of veer off a little bit and talk specifically about Morticia.
Because she's based on two of Charles Adams's wives.
Oh, how many times was he married?
He wasn't good at being married.All right, got it.Or having a family, ironically.
Well, let's just say this.If we know the, no pun intended, the Adams family values. Then I think we can inter why he doesn't stay married.Yes.
So his first wife was named Barbara Jean Day.They met during World War Two.At the time, he was working for the Signal Chorus Photographic Center, animating training films for the U.S.Army. Which I think is really cool.
Morticia is rumored to physically resemble her.You can find pictures of her.She's slinky.She's got the wavy hair.
They divorce after eight years because Charles Adams hated children and refused to adopt one, which is perhaps why Wednesday and Pugsley are evil, evil little monsters.
So then he married his second wife, Estelle Barbara Barb, in 1954.The New York Times describes her as follows.She, quote, combined morticia-like looks with diabolical legal scheming, end quote.
Diabolical legal scheming.
She was a lawyer.She wound up with control over the Adams family TV and film rights. She arrested them away from him.What?They divorced in 1954 after she tried to convince him to take out a $100,000 in 1956.$100,000 life insurance policy.
And he joked that she was trying to kill him, comparing her to Barbara Stanwyck's character in Double Indemnity, who winds up killing her husband for a life insurance policy.
But even though they divorced, she retained control of the TV and film rights.
But they divorced in 1956?
More on that. Yes, before the show.So in 1964, producer David Levy, who was most famous for producing a bunch of Addams Family stuff, developed the Addams Family for ABC.
The Addams Family debuted on September 8th, 1964, 10 years after their divorce, and ran for two seasons with a total of 64 episodes.
Everybody complains about, like, 13 episodes is too many.Can you imagine 28?Yeah.
So the show was actually supposed to have began years earlier, but Estelle demanded that she be bought out of the film and TV rights for a lot of, lot of money.And ABC ultimately paid her what she asked for.The number has never been disclosed.
OK, so they divorced. She kept film and TV rights.
But how back then, even before it was, oh, the television show was supposed to happen.Yeah.OK, I'm sorry.Yeah.
But she wouldn't give up the rights to them unless she was paid a lot of money.So it took 10 years to get her the money.
I was just misunderstanding when they I didn't realize they actually wanted to make that show 10 years ago.And it was the divorce that made it complicated.Yeah.Wow, man.And she. So she probably saw a lot of money from the movies in the 90s.
No, because they bought her out of the rights to make the TV show.
My bad.But for a lot of money.I don't understand legalese, everybody.
It's OK.Wow, good for her.
Yeah, good for her.So suddenly all of these characters got real names.They got personality.So we're going to go over them now in case you've made it this far and you're like, I don't know who these people are.
We're also going to talk a little bit about the actors and we're going to have a John Astin corner.So hold on.Oh, yes, we are. So Morticia Adams is played by Carolyn Jones.
She is described as a cultivated and beautiful woman who knits, dabbles in art, plays the samson, raises carnivorous plants, and trims roses by clipping the buds off and arranging the thorny stems in a vase.
That's one of my favorite things that she does.She cuts off the roses' heads.With long, straight, ebony black hair, she's always attired in a long, floor-length, tight black dress.
And with her aristocratic bearing and attachment, she's often the calm center of the chaotic events of the household.
Now, Carolyn Jones, who portrayed her, was so defined by her role that her premiere biography is titled In Morticia's Shadow, The Life and Career of Carolyn Jones.Gomez Adams is portrayed by John Astin, father of Sean Astin.
Who does Sean Astin play, Ashley?
He is a retired lawyer of Castilian descent who is passionately in love with his wife, often referring to her in Spanish pet names such as querida and cara mia.He is very wealthy as a result of owning numerous companies and stocks.
and squanders the money in cavalier manners while remaining wealthy.His hobbies consist of detonating model trains and fencing.
He refers to Spain as his ancestral home and is regularly dressed in a double-breasted and chalk-pinned striped suit with a black tie, almost always seen smoking a cigar.
John Astin's added this trait of smoking the cigar to the character because he had already been a cigar smoker prior to the show's debut But he quit after the series ended, so I think he got his fill working on He probably smoked so many cigars over those eight-hour days that he's like forget this
grew this.Now, I didn't know a lot about John Astin until this morning, other than being Sean Astin's father, and Jason has gleefully informed me about just what a national treasure he is.So now we're going to have John Astin in the corner.
Okay, so if you guys don't know who John Astin is, you really need to Look, you need to look him up.He is a actor's actor.He's a great actor.He's a character actor.He's in so many things.
I mean, his first film role is in West Side Story, that great luminary musical film.But the thing that I brought up to Ashley was that what many people don't remember is that
John Astin was the Riddler in Season 2 of Batman 1966, the Adam West series.Now, you might be like, wait a minute, I know Frank Gorshwin, another amazing actor, was the Riddler.
Well, for the second season of that show, Frank Gorshwin asked for a pay raise.The producers were like, we're not going to do this. What other network was the Addams Family on?Oh, ABC, which also made Batman 1966.
So they just reached out to John Astin, and John Astin comes in and plays the Riddler for only season two, because just like what happens with a lot of actors, where they decide to not be involved in a television production for more money, Frank Gorshwin immediately begged to come back.
And Frank Gorshwin plays the Riddler in season three.Many people don't, And then there's even a debate about which Riddler is better.Some people hate the John Aston Riddler.Some people think he's sneakier.I don't know.We watched some clips.
He was pretty good.Yeah, I think we're going to put some clips on our Twitter at GHL podcast.But the thing is, is that ever since then, John Astin has been in so many television shows.He's in Murder, Charote, Gunsmoke, all these shows.
He was in one of my favorite movies of all time, The Frighteners, which is a really good movie.But if you look through his career, he's also in The Twilight Zone and Night Gallery, which means that Rod Serling must have really liked him.
We didn't I didn't know this, too, because I was unaware of this fact.I thought that John Astin had passed away.He's very much alive at the time of this recording. Also, just looks like an adorable old man.
The last role that he has on his current filmography, which I think is amazing.First, we're going to talk about... This is a little bit of spoilers for what Ashley's going to talk about later.He sort of becomes this voice actor later in his career.
In fact... You can spoil that.That's okay.He voices Gomez. in the 1992 to 1993 cartoon, which is amazing.And I even remember liking the Gomez voice back in the day, even though it's very different than Raul Julia.
But he starts he's a voice on Johnny Bravo.He's a voice on pinging in the brain. This is one of the best credits.He voices Grandpa Adams in the new Addams Family cartoon in 1998.Fun fact, he is Superintendent Skinner in Disney's Recess.
And his last role that I can find his filmography, which is great. is he is Uncle Dudley of the Shazam family in Justice League action.
Yeah.Like last year, two years ago.
It has this as 2017.Yeah.
So John Astin is an actor's actor.He is a legend.And guess what?He's a living legend.
So if you do not know about John Astin, if there's anything you should learn about this lesson is go explore the career of John Astin, because he is one of the I would I would put him as one of the greatest living actors.
I would I would definitely agree with that. So we all kind of know what Gomez looks like, a version of Gomez, whether it's the cartoon, the comics, anyone in the movies.
I want to take a minute to read you some descriptions from Charles Adams biography written by Linda H. Davis.She describes Charles Adams as, quote, sociable and debonair and a well-dressed courtly man with silvery black combed hair, a gentle manner.
He bore no resemblance to a fiend, end quote.And I think both of those descriptions could also be used for Gomez.
No pencil-thin mustache.He had a mustache, though.He had quite a mustache.Uncle Fester was played by Jackie Coogan.He's Morticia's exuberant uncle in the TV show.
Oh, that's a change for later.
Who's completely bald, dressed in a floor-length fur-collared coat, which also kind of changes later.He likes dynamite and blasting caps.He reclines on a bed of nails and enjoys torture racks.And he powers light bulbs by placing them in his mouth.
There you go.That's the most famous fact about Uncle Fester.
Yes.And in later incarnations, specifically in the movies and in the cartoons, basically everything post-1990, he's Gomez's brother.
Lurch is portrayed by Ted Cassidy, who was also in almost everything at the time, including Star Trek.The Addamses' loyal butler who mainly speaks in grunts and groans.
They summon him with a Hangman's News bell poll to which he immediately appears and replies.What does he say?
Oh, that's right.You rang.Yeah.
We'll get to, we'll talk about this show in a little, little bit, but there was a Canadian television show that came out in the late 90s in 1998.
I think it was called The New Addams Family.Okay.And Lurch in one episode gets a record deal and it's a rap version and he goes- It's a live action show?Yeah.
Where?He goes, you rang doo doo doo doo doo doo.You rang and he becomes a famous musician for the song you rang.
You have to find this clip and share it online.
Maybe we'll see.I don't know if it exists anymore.
He also made a cameo appearance as Lurch on an episode of Batman, the TV series.
while promoting a pop song called The Lurch, which has a dance move where you kind of shamble along like a crazy person.Grandmama Adams, played by Blossom Rock, is Gomez's mother and a witch.Wednesday Adam, played by Lisa Loring, did you find it?
Are you, find a stopping place.Go ahead.All right, here we go.Here is the- You rang.The Addams Family hit, you rang.
Wednesday's helping him with his music video.Copy that.
This looks so bad.I love that show so much.That's it.The production quality on this show does not look great, Ashley.
I mean, I was eight when it came out, I think, eight or nine, so don't judge me.
I never knew that there was a second live action show.
I think it only played in Canada.
Wednesday Addams in the original show was portrayed by Lisa Loring.Pugsley Addams was portrayed by Ken Weatherwax.And then the show introduces Thing and Pugsley's pet octopus, Aristotle.
In the comics, you do see Aristotle and you do see disembodied hand, but Thing really only acts like Thing in the TV show.He is most often portrayed by Ted Cassidy's hand, one of the directors of the TV show.
Although sometimes assistant director Jack Vogelin would portray Thing, often when Lurch and Thing appear together.
And in this TV show in the 60s, he's usually in a bell jar or he's on top of a serving tray because they just didn't have the technologies that we have now.Lurch in the movies looks really, really good.
The show was always intended to be humorous and situational comedy spun around the Addams Family's disconnection from the outside world.So in 1973, ABC said, you know what we need?Another Addams Family show.
So they shot a pilot called The Addams Family Fun House that was supposed to be a variety show.And instead of casting the people from the 1960s show, they recast every single role. The only person I want to talk about them recasting is Pugsley.
Pugsley was played by an actor named Butch Patrick.Jason, do you know why Butch Patrick is famous?
He's most famous for playing Eddie Munster on The Munsters.
The bad Addams Family rip-off.
Which was a direct rival to The Addams Family on a separate network that garnered higher ratings, which was why the TV show The Addams Family was ultimately cancelled.
Yeah, I think it was a CBS TV show.
I think so.Although I think The Addams Family came out with a more powerful IP. in the end.
They won over at the Munsters.But you can tell because of the Addams Family comics, that's exactly where the Munsters got their idea.
Yes.Like Kiss, the Addams Family crossover several times into animated Scooby-Doo episodes, with many of the live-action actors reprising their roles in the voices from time to time.
Charles Addams retired with his third wife to a rich estate called The Swamp.
Oh, I was going to wait for you to say Skyfall.
In the 80s.Where he lived until he passed away in 1988, causing the property to lay fallow.And I actually don't think... It didn't lay fallow for very long.Well, it laid fallow for two whole years.Until the movies happened.
Nope. I apologize.91 is actually when the first movie comes out.
So let's talk about these movies because Jason and I have both seen them.We watched them together a few years ago and we both really like them.So 1991 sees the Addams family.
It deals with Fester returning to the family and not remembering that he's actually Fester, but thinking that he's there to pull off a heist until his memory comes back. It garnered $191 million at the worldwide box office.It spawned a new cartoon.
Do you know what the budget was?I don't have it written down, but it can very easily be found.Which picked up and told the same types of stories the original live-action movie was laying down, with cartoon levels of violence.
The budget of the 91 Addams Family movie was $30 million.And it made $191 million. I mean, $191 million now would be a great... Southwick.
Would be amazing, yeah.So, I don't know what inflation is, so I'm not going to pretend like I can find that for you.
My favorite thing about the animated live-action show, besides John Astin coming back as Gomez, is that Carol Channing provides the voice of Grandmama Adams.In the movie?In the animated cartoon.Oh, are we on the animated cartoon now?
Well, I'm just talking about how it spun out of the movie.
I was like, where are we going?
Jesus.And the Addams Family movie, the live action movie, spawned careers or revitalized careers for a lot of really powerful actors.Christina Ricci plays Wednesday Addams, a role which defines her to this very day.
The thing that's... punch my mic, I'm so excited. The thing that people are always asking for is another live-action Addams Family where she is playing Morticia.I think that would also be great.I would be more than happy for that.
Angelica Houston plays Morticia.Like we said, she was nominated for Golden Globes because she was just that good.Raul Julia plays Gomez.Gomez actually winds up being the last role he ever plays.We'll talk about when he passes away.
That's actually technically incorrect.
Oh, because the last role he played was Street Fighter.I was like it was Street Fighter or the other one.
No, it was Street Fighter.
Well, one of the last roles.
Because if you watch.Well, I think if you watch Adam's Family Values, you can tell that he's not well.He's not well.And then in Street Fighter, he looks really sick.
But he only did Street Fighter because he said, and I quote, My son was a big fan of the video games.
And Christopher Lloyd plays Fester.That's the last thing I wanted to say.
Yes.And it revitalized Christopher Lloyd's career post Back to the Future.Yeah.These movies shouldn't have been hits.They're so good. They're everything about them shouldn't work.
These movies are also we got to talk about a big factor in why these movies are great.Barry Sonnenfeld, great director, also directed Men in Black.He did the tick live action series.Weird, kooky director that doesn't get enough credit, I think.
And kind of for the pool of talent at the time, the perfect person to take this on.I know everyone wants Tim Burton to do these movies.He was supposed to do an animated movie that fell through and fell through and fell through.
I don't think I would have wanted to see Tim Burton's take on the Addams Family though.
Just some fun facts here I found. Angelica Huston said that during the filming of Adam's Family Values, it became increasingly clear that Raul Julia was sick.
He had trouble eating, and he actually died a year, within a year after the film was released.
Yeah, they were in pre-pro on the third movie when he passed.
Yeah, it was his death that I think stopped the third movie.Yeah, absolutely, we'll talk about it.Can we talk about the movies now, or do you want to wait?What do you feel?
Well, I was going to talk about the cartoon next and let you do what you wanted to bring up during the cartoon and then move on to the second movie.OK, let's do that then.OK.So we talked about how the animated series spun out of this first movie.
It's basically the same types of stories.There's just different physics and violence.And Jason wanted to bring up our new ongoing segment, Action Figure Spotlight.
Yeah.The cartoon.Oh, yeah.All right.Lay down what you got.Action Figure Spotlight. Jason just watched Rick and Morty for the first time.
The theme song is going to change every single time.I think previously it was like... I don't know what it is.I don't know.It's going to change every single time until somebody makes me a lyric that I'll never play.
You can email us at soundbite at... So action figure spotlight here.
I did not know this until recently because I'm a big fan of the Addams Family 90s animated series as well.Playmates.
the famous toy makers who famously make these 90s Star Trek action figures, did a line of the Addams Family action figures that tie into, the cartoon and they have all the cartoons designs.
Now, I can find all of Rebae sets of Lurch and Fester and Granny and Pugsley and Morticia and Gomez, but I cannot find a Wednesday Addams.They're actually on the back of the card.You can see that they made an action figure of Thing.
They made an action figure of Cousin It.They made an action figure of Wednesday, but it makes me wonder if that was the second line and they never released it. These figures look kind of cool.Uncle Fester looks creepy as hell.
But it's just kind of cool because I didn't realize that they had these action figures and they're such great designs.
Another thing I want to bring up is during one of the movies, whether it was the first movie or the second movie, I can remember seeing way back in my days of looking at the toys during Christmas in the J.C.Penney's catalog.
There was a remote control thing, the hand.What?And it would actually like walk and move.I think a lot of it was it had wheels in their fingers.I think actually now they actually do have a actual fingers walking thing.
But I remember wanting that so bad.
So there you go.There is an action figure.
Oh, yeah action figure spotlight The original Addams Family movie also spawned a popular pinball machine which has become the highest-selling pinball machine of all time with more than 20,000 units sold since 1992 when it debuted
Yes.And it's also considered by many to be the greatest pinball machine of all time.
So then in 1993, a year after the pinball machine came out, Adams family values came out.Loosened content restrictions allowed for the film to use more grotesque humor that strove to keep the original spirit of the Adams family cartoons.
In fact, several gags are lifted straight from the single panel cartoons.
It tells the story of a serial killer trying to marry Uncle Fester.Also, if you are only familiar with the Addams Family movies from the GIFs, this is the one where they send Pugsley and Wednesday to summer camp.And it gets real bloody, real fast.
Yeah, but the weakness of Addams Family Values is that the camp storyline is so funny.But the downside is that Morticia and Gomez's storyline is exactly the same storyline as one.Yeah, they have no growth.
And to me, as a huge fan of Uncle Fester, I don't like that we got two Addams Family live action movies where Uncle Fester basically doesn't act like Uncle Fester.
Yeah, where he's kind of a doofus the whole time.
Well, the first movie, he doesn't know he's actually Uncle Fester.
Yeah.He spends a lot of time freaking out in his bedroom.
Yep.And then the second movie is he doesn't act like Uncle Fester because he wants to marry this girl.Yeah.
So I'm like, we don't get either movie where Uncle Fester gets to act like Uncle Fester, which is a he's a psychotic man.Yes.
It was not as successful as the former, but it was successful enough for a third movie to go into development.It was called The Addams Family Reunion.The movie was cast.
And it was in active pre-production in 1994, but ultimately scrapped due to Raul Julia's death the same year.So now we can circle back to that if you would like to.
Well, I didn't know how much we wanted to talk about the movie.I don't know if anybody else remembers Too Legit to Quit from The Addams Family 1.Jason brought that up earlier too.
Too legit, too legit to quit, hey, hey.Yeah, they love to pair Lurch with bad music.
Well, Lurch, that's where you hear it, is Lurch's driving through.
Let me ask you.Lurch is the prime role, man.You don't gotta learn no lines.Can we talk about the movie for a little bit?
Yeah, yeah.It's such a weird movie. It is such a weird movie that somehow works.
Like there's so many, like when you think about the first movie with Gomez and Uncle Fester and the dancing scene and they do the baboosh guy, that is such, and that carries on for five minutes.
Catilano, they're not Ukrainian, so they would not, it would not be called bubush bubush because Ukrainian or Russian words, like it's not a Spanish word.
Also, Gomez is the only, Adams is an English name.
Gomez is the only one who is visibly ethnic, like grandmama is white, Fester is white.Very strange.
Yeah, yeah.I don't know.All right, we can move on.
Okay.So, in 95.They decided, let's just make Adam's family reunion anyway.So they made it.It went direct to video.It seems to be better left forgotten.I've not watched it.The reviews of it are terrible.
You should talk about who plays Gomez.
However, Tim Curry plays Gomez and Daryl Hannah plays Morticia in this movie.I actually think Tim Curry is an inspired choice for Gomez.
Really great.And to be honest with you, I'll tell you this.The problem is, is that I honestly think that if they had kept the cast of the movies and then just recast Gomez, just recast Tim Curry is a great choice for that part.
And he was it's not like he wasn't a name in the mid 90s.
I mean, but the problem was, is that in the mid 90s, Tim Curry kind of went through a little bit of a career fallout. Tim Curry in the 90s started being in all these really bad movies.I mean, he's in Congo.I mean, he's been in a lot of bad movies.
So I think that the studio probably didn't think that he could carry it.
I just think it's crazy that they recast the whole thing.Well, I understand that their budget would not have been anywhere near.
Yes.That's the reason why the rest of like you wouldn't have gotten Christopher Lloyd.You wouldn't have gotten Angelica Huston.Angelica Huston.
You probably could have gotten the kids, but I wonder if the whole cast kind of banded together and was like, if we can't do it with Raul, we're not going to do it at all.Yeah.Which I kind of admire.
Yeah.It also seems like the people who play Gomez all die.So, I mean, we need to form a human chain around John and protect him.So in 1998, we saw a new live action show produced in Canada called The New Addams Family.
That's the one you were talking about?
I used to watch this on YTV, youth television.I loved this show so much.I loved it so much.It has an all-new cast, of course.Gomez Adams is played by Glenn Taranto.T-A-R-A-N-T-O.Taranto?Taranto?I don't know. Morticia is played by Ellie Harvey.
I think Ellie might be French because she kind of has a funny, not a funny accent, she has an accent.But that works, that's fine for Morticia with me.
The show reworked several storylines from the original series while incorporating modern elements, jokes, and references to episodes from the original series.As Jason mentioned, John Astin has a recurring role as Grandpapa Adams.
Well, recurring of two episodes.
Well, it must say recurring because his credit must have been recurring guest star.
Because, yeah, two episodes is hardly returning.And Glenn Taranto, who played Gomez, stated that he patterned his performance off of Astin's original version of Gomez.
One of the notable differences from the original show is that Wednesday and Pugsley get expanded roles because this is on a kids network aimed for children.Wednesday is played by an actress named Nicole Fugere who has done almost nothing since then.
She played Wednesday in Adam's Family Reunion, the direct-to-video movie. She replaced Christina Ricci and I have not watched this as an adult.I remember having a humongous crush on her as a child.
Can we talk about something real quick?We should talk about there is an interesting idea that the portrayal of Wednesday changes in the original TV show and in a lot of these strips.
She's kind of considered to be happy go lucky, even though she's quite young, even though she has murderous intent and she smiles.She's the only one who smiles always.
Gomez smiles a bit, too, but Pugsley never smiles.
That doesn't change until the movie.
It's the opposite.Pugsley becomes the softer, more easygoing one, and Wednesday is evil.
But yeah, I wanted to bring that up.She becomes stone-faced in the movies.
Well, let's be honest.It's funnier if the little girl is the mean one because it plays against type.
Sure, but there is something to be said to her being happy about killing people.
I shared this weeks and weeks ago when this was released.I have shared this picture weeks and weeks ago on the Patreon lens.
There is a strip, it's my favorite of the original strips, where Gomez is pushing Wednesday on a swing, and the swing is a broom, so she looks like she's flying on a witch's broom.
They've reprised this in a promotional image for the Addams Family movie, and to me, That's classic Wednesday Addams.And then, yeah, Christina Ricci turns her into a homicidal maniac, which is fine.
The show re-embraced the humor and the YA sensibilities rather than the horror elements that the movies were moving closer and closer towards.
Then a musical based on the original cartoons started being worked on in 2007 written by Broadway veterans Marshall Brickman and Rick Ellis with Andrew Lippa providing the songs.Andrew Lippa is like such a good writer.Why do I know that name?
I mean, let me pull up his credits for you, because he's worked on so many Broadway things that you love.He did the music for Big Fish.That might be what you specifically know him from?
He wrote the music for The Little Princess, The Wild Party.He's worked on a lot of stuff.I believe you. You've probably listened to something that he composed.Nathan Lane was the original Gomez.In the Broadway show.
In the Broadway show, which opened in Chicago, then went to Broadway.Bebe Neuwirth was Morticia.Great choice.Krista Rodriguez was Wednesday, who was aged up to be 18 in the musical.That's fine.Adam Riegler is Pugsley, who's around 11 years old.
Cameron Chamberlain is Uncle Faster, and Zachary James is Lurch.I saw this show in New York City.Okay, I have not seen this show.It closed down, right? Oh, yes.OK.I saw all of the original cast except Nathan Lane.
Oh, who was your Gomez?Do you remember Roger Reiss?
OK.Who West Wing fans will know.Yeah, I I think he's passed on Roger Reiss.Yes.
I mean, well, he's a great actor.He's Lord Marlbury on the West Wing.Yes.He's a great actor.Great choice for Gomez.I kind of imagine that.
Yes, he he passed on in 2015.He's a great actor.
If you don't know who he is, Google him.The Lord Malberry episode of West Wing is one of the greatest.It's on Netflix right now.
He's also one of those actors who in the 70s when PBS was filming all the Shakespeare's, he's in a whole bunch of them.
Yeah, he is an actor.He played, I believe, I'm pretty certain he is the Sheriff of Nottingham in Robin Hood Men in Tights.Yes, you are 1000% right.So that's what people might know him.Great choice for Gomez.
I imagine Nathan Lane probably would have made the show a little bit better. I don't know.But what did you think?Give me a review.It's bad.I've heard it's bad.It's so bad.And that's crazy because you know what?
I think the Addams Family with that cast could work.
You could 10,000, 100 million thousand percent write a great Addams Family musical.They don't even do the Addams Family theme.
By the way, have you ever seen the musical Batboy?
Never been to Broadway.That's what a style of the Addams Family musical needs to be, because Batboy the musical is great.
Yes, it needs to be that tone.No, it's too much of a classic musical.It's too schlocky.Fester falls in love with the moon and flies up to kiss her.What?It's so stupid.That's so dumb.And even Krista Rodriguez, who played Wednesday, I really liked her.
I was excited to see her.Sure.Bebe Neuwirth's great.
Lilith on Frasier, classically.
Yes, and Cheers.I know you're such a big Cheers fan, Ashley.I don't know, people know Cheers, right?The musical tells the story of Wednesday falls in love with a normal neighbor boy and we don't know what to do about it.
That's not a bad idea for a story.Do we embrace it?The parents come over to meet them. That's not a bad story.On paper, it's all good.The reviews were mostly negative.It closed after 722 performances, so about two years.
At the time of this recording, it is currently playing in the West End in the UK.And here's just a fun fact about my life.One of my go-to audition songs is Wednesday's first solo song called Pulled.
So whenever I get a singing audition, which is pretty rare, that's the song that I go to because it's the best song.It's a really good song.It's the only one I would truly recommend going and listening to.
And then, of course, there is an upcoming animated adaptation starring Oscar Isaac as Gomez Adams and Charlize Theron as Morticia Adams that opens on October 11th, 2019.So, my dear friends, this brings us to the end. of our Addams Family lesson.
I just want to give us a brief review here.I found one of the Broadway reviews by Matt Windman for the Addams Family musical.Shout out.
Says, considering the insane amount of hype that this show has received, the Addams Family would appear to be the biggest disappointment of this year's theater season.This was in 2010.
Yeah, I saw it in 2011.I paid $25 for a student ticket.
And at the end of it, I was like, it wasn't worth it.I'm really, some people are really great at it.It's just.All right.
It's too bad.Wow.We like The Addams Family everybody.We do like The Addams Family.We just don't like the musical.I'd do a movie respective with all the tips on the movies if people want it.
Hashtag Addams Family yes.
Yes. But something else that people should say yes to, Jason, is your book, Super Soldiers, because it's awesome.
Yeah, before we get into recommended reading, where we recommend books that are related to the Adams family, I thought I would recommend my book.
We talk about it a lot in this podcast, but Super Soldiers, a salute to the comic book heroes and villains who fought for their country.It's available on Barnes & Noble, Indie Bound, and Amazon right now.
It's my book that I wrote, put a lot of heart into, and I think everybody, the listeners out there, would enjoy as well. It's over 212 pages.One of the characters I talk about in here is Batwoman.
If you don't know from the title, my book, Super Soldiers, it's about relating the ideas, the common ideas between comic book superheroes and military real life heroes.
And I was in the military as well, and I use a lot of my career in there to examine these comic book characters.And the Addams Family are spooky, and a spooky hero is also Batwoman.So I thought I'd read you a little bit from the Batwoman chapter.
this chapter I titled, Define Definition. Many people think the world of Batman lends itself to a military structure.Batman is the general, while all of his various sidekicks and allies are lieutenants.
They execute his vision of a Gotham safe from crime.However, once you dive deep into the stories, you reveal the truth of Batman.
For all his order-giving and structured training, Batman is essentially a free agent vigilante, roaming around Gotham and punching anyone in the face without due process or the legal system to protect him or them. them.
No Miranda rights for you, chum," says Batman.Many stories present him as a rule-breaker who is willing to do anything to serve his preferred outcome, as long as no one is killed.The Dark Knight's no-killing rule is the one rule he will not bend.
For all the pompous ideas floating around inside his cow, Batman would make a terrible soldier.
There is one colleague in his menagerie who has been a soldier, still acts like a soldier, and is a perfect exploration of the combination of military and comic book superhero storytelling.Let me tell you all about the Batwoman, Kate Kane.
So there's a little taste from my Batwoman chapter.If that intrigues you, go check out my book, Super Soldiers on Amazon and Barnes and Noble right now.Put a lot of heart into it.And I think if you like this podcast, I think you'll like the book.
I'm going to be very honest.The Bad Woman chapter, I think, is one of your best chapters.
Oh, thank you.Thank you so much.And it fits in with the new CW show, Bad Woman.Imagine that.I'm CW.Not a plug.Let's speak about recommended reading.Recommended reading.Roger Reiss reading.
where if you go over to geekinactuallesson.com slash recommended reading, you can get some more materials on the Adams family.
Click on our little widgets, you go over to Amazon, you purchase it, and a little bit comes back to support the Mind University.In fact, if you buy anything on Amazon through those links, that will go back to support the Mind University.
helps us keep our cobwebs in tip-top shape.That's right.The first book that I want to recommend is Chaz Adams' A Cartoonist's Life by Linda H. Davis.This is his official biography.I read a lot of excerpts from it.
I found it really, really fascinating.Okay.And I mentioned a couple of the instances here in the lesson about how his art imitated his life, and I found him a very charming and interesting creative.
You kind of joked about this in the beginning, I think it's a real shame that there's not a Charles Adams Museum the way that there's a Charles M. Schultz Museum, or that there's not a great video or biopic about him.
Yeah, there should be a Charles Adams biopic.His life sounds fascinating.
So, read that book.It's really, really great.
I think there should be a John Astin biopic.
Just saying.Yeah, but you've got to die before they make your biopic.
The second one I'm going to recommend, I also talked about during the lesson, In Morticia's Shadow, The Life and Career of Carolyn Jones.It talks a lot about the show.It talks a lot about her evolution as Morticia and the power.
and mystique of that role for good and for ill.And then I want to recommend the Addams Family and Evolution.That's E-V-I-L-U-T-I-O-N.What's that?It is the collection of Addams Family New Yorker comics.Oh, cool.
And there's little anecdotes and there's stories and commentary in there.
I've read a bunch of them.The local library in Walnut, Kansas when I was growing up had some sort of Addams Family collection.It was a little soft cover book.It was great.
Yeah.This is kind of the most accessible one, the easiest one to find, so that's why I want to recommend it.
And then lastly, I want to recommend the DVD two-pack of The Addams Family and Addams Family Values because it'll- I mean, I hope you mean Blu-ray, Ashley.I don't know.
We don't want to watch this in low res.
I don't know if they're in, not everything's in Blu-ray.
Oh my god, I gotta look this up right now.
I'll just open the link that I put in my notes, but in a lot of ways, in my opinion, the movies are the best versions.
Oh, I found the Blu-ray two-pack.
Well, I only found them in DVD, so you send me that link and we will give people the Blu-rays.Okay.For my money, this is the easiest, best way to consume The Addams Family.
So, if you haven't seen those movies, they're also not streaming anywhere.I think they are more than worth the price of admission and they are worth having in physical media.
Jason, I want to ask you two discussion questions.
Two. He's a member of the Addams Family.
No, he's actually in it.It's a big family.
Here's the easy question.
Who is your favorite Addams Family character?
Uncle Fester.Gomez is a close second.
Yeah.They're all very charming in their way.
And do you think that Adam's family works in modern media or are they too much a staple?I mean, they come out of the American ideal white picket fence and they are the antithesis of that. Is lampooning that edgy anymore or is it expected?
Well, you know, that's an interesting conversation because if you go back to the 90s, there were a lot of television adaptations that were made into movies.
Well, I don't know.It really seemed like there were a lot in the 90s because there's the Addams Family.There's the Beverly Hillbillies.There's the Brady Bunch movies, which got a sequel as well.The Rugrats got a full length movie.
That's not quite where I'm going with my point.My favorite Martian got an adaptation.There's a bunch of them in that time.
Christopher Lloyd is the Martian.There were a lot of them in that time period, and that was 30 years ago.I think the Addams Family movies really work, but are we too far from that nuclear family 50s? Look, I think it could work.
The thing is, as though the thing you have to do is you will have to update the Adams family.You will have to bring them into the modern world because Wednesday and Pugsley with smartphones.
or their version of smartphones, or their mom and dad won't give them smartphones because X, Y, Z. But those 90s movies all made fun that these characters like the Beverly Hillbillies and the Bradys and the Addis family were not of the day.
And I think that that joke has played out.I think you have to, I think you'd have to update them a little bit, but they would mostly work, I think.
I want that to be the case.I hope you are correct.
Cause just make them more gothic.
I will say that earlier this year, I did go to an Addams Family art show that was pretty well attended.So, you know, people want it.They're good.
So go to Apple Podcasts in your country of choice and leave us a five star review and we will read it on the podcast.Thank you so much for doing that because it helps promote the podcast.Also, if you are, this is not enough.
for you, you can go over to patreon.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.com.
We're talking about comic strips that we think should be adapted into movies.
Oh, that's going to be a... I'll have to get a list for that one.Yeah, well, we have a list.Okay, great.So that'll be a fun discussion, and you can support the podcast.It keeps the podcast free to you.
It keeps the podcast going, that Patreon, so go over there and join that.You can follow me on Twitter and Instagram at Jawin, J-A-W-I-I-N.I've been doing a lot of fun trading card things on my Instagram stories.Ashley, you can follow her at
Ashley V. Robinson on Twitter and Instagram.She does all kinds of Instagram stories all the time, way more than me.She's better at Instagram than I am.Still have less followers than you.It doesn't matter. Follow me!
And then if they want to suggest us doing a retrospective on the Addams Family movie, hashtag AddamsFamilyYes, where can they do that on social media?
The best place to do that is on Twitter at GHL Podcast.You can also do that at Facebook.com slash GeekHistoryLesson.Visit GeekHistoryLesson.com or email us GeekHistoryLesson at gmail.com.
I would actually really love to do those retrospectives, so please request them.
Now, hashtag stick around, the last part of the podcast where we want you to stick around.Ashley, what are we talking about?
I think you may have told the story on the podcast before, but it's more topical than ever and also adorable.Tell us about the time that you dressed up as Uncle Fester for Halloween.
So it would have been either 91 or 92.I have a picture of it.I think I've showed it to you.
It's adorable.Because I loved the movie and I love the cartoon and Uncle Fester is my favorite character.So it was the first time I ever had an experience with a bald cap.How was it?Not fun.We also didn't do it that great.
My mom had to do a lot of the makeup.
I'm sure your mom did her best.
And I think I just wore, I think we bought the black cloak for the Grim Reaper.That's what I wore.And then, but I painted black around my eyes.My whole face is white and that's me.I remember the night most people not having any clue what I was.
I think they just thought I was like a ghoul or a demon.
Did you have a light bulb?
No.I mean, good on your mom for not letting you put a lightbulb in your mouth, but.I don't know if I did.I might've had a lightbulb and I put it in my mouth sometimes to show people.I don't remember.
No, what I did have though is I had a fake hand and that was Thing.Oh, that's cute.So I would like hold him up and I'd be like, oh, here's Thing.Yeah.Or he would be writing in my pumpkin pail, whatever you call it.Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jack-o'-lantern candy thing.What do you call those? I'll tell you what, I'm excited to see the Addams Family movie now.I'm so excited.
I hope it's good.The designs are based on the original cartoon designs, which is what I'm most excited about, and I just think Oscar Isaac is such a good casting choice, and you had posited him actually as a live action casting choice.
He'd be a great live, and we've said that Christina Ricci should just play, you know.Morticia?Yes, Morticia.Bette Midler is Grandmama.Great choice.And Allison Janney's in it as well.I wanted to see who wrote it.I love Allison Janney.
I'm very curious to see who wrote this movie.Screenplay by Matt Lieberman and Pamela Pettler. Is that the Matt Lieberman we know?Surely that can't be the Matt Lieberman that I know. Well, does he have a photo on his IMDb?No, he doesn't.
Well, this Matt Lieberman that wrote this movie, but I knew, we're friends, acquaintances, but people would know this, the Matt Lieberman from SourceFed.
Very nice gentleman, very good friend.I don't think he wrote this movie.Do you have his number?Text him.I think I do have his number.
Do you think he has a Wikipedia page?
This is thrilling radio.He doesn't have a Wikipedia.
I don't think it's him.I looked at his Twitter.I mean, if I had written the Addams Family movie, I'd be tweeting over it like crazy.Or sharing it.Yeah, and Mr. Matt, who is and is an awesome writer.
Oh, I found... The person who did it? This is the person who wrote it.I'm going to turn the computer around.That's the person who wrote it, because The Addams Family tweeted him out.
Yes, this is not the Matt Lieberman that I know, but it's spelled exactly the same way.
Well, I would say a very common name, but I'm not sure how common a name Lieberman is.
Well, that was some fun podcasting right there.
We don't know the man who co-wrote The Addams Family.
That's too bad.I was so going to be like, Matt, good for you, dude.Yeah, how did you keep this a secret?You didn't tell us your work on The Addams Family movie.This is compelling. All right.Let's just leave this.All right.
This is hashtag Addams Family.Yes.I want to talk about guys.I'll tell you what.There is a lot of fun behind the scenes stuff with the first movie, and we will bring it in the episode.I know there's some fun commentary tracks, all this kind of stuff.
Yeah, we obviously couldn't go into super depth on them here, because we had a lot to cover.And I wanted to focus, we always try to focus more on the original source material, which was the comics.All right, that's it.
Thank you so much for listening.
I have been Jason Babushka Inman.I've been Ashley Victoria Robinson.
And Ashley Wednesday Adams.Please, end this podcast.
Sign in
