Hola, Sneakers. Welcome to Episode 472 of the longest podcast hosted by us!
This week: Be yourself; my best friend television; we grow up too fast; uncomfortable comedy; back to that movie; chronological racism; the obnoxious sound; back to the cuckold; rockabilly cats and their kittens; pop culture Joan of Arc; historical just desserts; you’re not Henry the VIIIth; Beatles to the future; the secret of Dr. Brown; inaccurate future; aliens are real; the Ursula K. Leguiniverse; how did the French communicate; the humane killing device; big brother; electro-shock memory; deep remembering; mathematical stress dreams; vaccines are real; killer booze; emotional times; true believers; fake believers; hateful church; parable lines; whip it; pregnancy doom; movie talk – The Kid Detective and Tenet; Question of the Week – Sneakers respond; cavalier attitudes; and, finally, Fantastic Four play.
Thanks for listening.
Question of the week: Do you believe in aliens? Would you like to meet them?
Sub-question of the week: What’s your favourite high-concept movie or novel? (Not based on an existing IP [intellectual property])
Thanks for listening!
Department of Corections:
Chuck Berry was accused of having sexual intercourse with a 14-year old Apache waitress – not a white woman – whom he had transported across state lines to work as a hat check girl at his club.
Berry was tried, convicted, and sentenced in 1959. Although he succesfully appealed the sentence – arguing the judge was racist and had prejudiced the jury – he still ended up being convicted and spent a year and a half in jail.
Berry was 23 at the time of the original charge.
Department of Sainthood:
David shouldn’t have second guessed himself, Joan of Arc did indeed communicate with angels: notably the archangel Michael, as well as the saints Margaret and Catherine of Alexandria.
Department of Video:
Christmas is coming and that means Christmas brunch! We highly recommend that you try Eggs Dedrick to end this sad year on a high note!
Screen Crush has some thoughts on the Fantastic Four:
And then here is a poem by John Cooper Clarke that is decidedly NSFW!!! Or not safe for home life with children, for that matter!!!
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Aliens? Hmmmm. I feel as if my comprehension of aliens has been jaded by pop culture, an entire collection of scenarios spring to mind when I think of what would really happen if they visited Earth. The events at the beginning of “Independence Day” terrify me, you wake up one morning and there’s monstrous ship floating above, what then? The same thing can be said of how “The Arrival” started. I think the only rational thought to have about aliens is to not have any at all, human comprehension of their existence and presence would be something our human minds weren’t meant to understand yet. Mankind as a whole hasn’t evolved enough to understand their existence. I’m sure the brightest and boldest would try to engage in what it takes to comprehend aliens but it’s something we’re not meant to understand yet. Maybe it’s happening already or happened years ago and the majority of the world has been kept from it due to a worldwide panic. But now this is sounding like a movie and I’ve already admitted that I’m affected by these cultural cues…or one of many conspiracy theories. Or both. Damn you Roswell.
I’ve invested a good deal of time into thinking which films have delivered the best idea of a high concept for me. Nolan’s films definitely do deliver on that level and I’ve enjoyed most of them, except for “Interstellar” which I need to re-watch again. I never finished that one. It’s a highly possible I may receive “Tenet” for Christmas, so I haven’t purchased it or seen it, I’m very curious and look forward to seeing it. I have two films that come to mind, films that really made me think and reflect about their message or their concept and how I’d deal with it if it were me. The first film is very popular this time of year, it’s Frank Capra’s “It’s a Wonderful Life”. (Not to be confused with the X-Rated “Tits a Wonderful Life). I remember when I was old enough to understand this film, it consumed me on a level I didn’t expect. The thought of one man’s existence and how it connected everyone around him like a Butterfly Effect fascinated me. Take that one man out of existence and everything changes, this excited and terrified me at the same time. For a classic film I think the same concept holds up today when I watch it, only now I think of myself as George Bailey and how my life would affect the world around me. I’m on the fence about knowing what the world would be like without me but like Clarence says in the film, “You’ve been given a rare gift, to see what the world would be like without you.” It’s tantalizing but maybe something we aren’t meant to know, perhaps we only know by bettering ourselves for those around us.
The second film is “The Matrix”. This fucking film infested my mind so much after seeing it that I had to see it two more times. I realize it’s kind of a cultural and technological breakthrough in filmmaking but the whole “Forget everything you know” idea in the first film blew my mind aside from all the eye candy. I haven’t watched it in years and I’m waiting to re-watch it with my wife, who has never seen it. I wasn’t that enthralled with the next two films in the trilogy, but the first one really took my brain for a ride.
It was great to hear you mention Ursula K. Leguin in the podcast, her books were popular when I worked at Lone Star Comics. I’d say we sold her work on a pretty consistent basis given the fact that she won every award you can think of…all Hugo, Nebula and Locus winning novels and stories.
Is anyone else here yet? I hear an echo in here….
Hi David and Ian, and Merry Christmas! I just wanted to say thank you for all the hours of pleasure you’ve given us, especially this year.
It’s been such a hard year for everyone. All round the world. We’ve lost people. We’ve lost jobs. We’ve lost money. We’ve lost relationships. There can’t be many people who haven’t had their lives impacted in some way by this horrible disease.
Through it all however, you Dragons have somehow kept on Sneakin’. I can’t tell you what a comfort it’s been to have that weekly slice of familiar fun. One constant in the time of uncertainty and chaos. Just listening to you two chatting about everything and nothing has shown that life does go on. No matter what the world throws at us. Hearing every week from Ed, Louise and your other regular ‘writer-inners’ has been great too. It really helps to feel I’m part of a wee community around the world. I’ve even written in myself a few times. Not something I’ve done for any other podcast!
So to all the listeners around the world…. to Ian and David, and both their families…. to everyone, Merry Christmas and a much, much Happier New Year!
Stay safe, stay well, and stay sneaky.
Scott x
I liked many of the sci-fi films you mentioned, so here are two high concept fantasy rom-coms I like: Enchanted, where an 2-D animated princess falls out of her Disney-like fairy tale world into a live-action New York City. It has smart writing and nice comic performances all around, especially from then-newcomer Amy Adams with her “Happy Working Song.” And ‘tis the season, so I’ll give a shout-out to the Vancouver-shot Elf with its similar theme of a good-hearted innocent arriving to change our jaded hearts by reminding us of what’s truly important in life.
I’d also like to throw a Dollop of Trollope at you. I just finished Framley Parsonage which, I’m sorry to say, fell apart due to the wear and tear of 11 years of library borrowing. But I enjoyed it a lot. Trollope can get a little long-winded when it comes to church and political matters, although what he says about the pursuit of prestige, power and money in both institutions is as relevant as ever. I tend to forget between novels how realistically-drawn his characters are and how slyly he manipulates our opinions of them. And I was struck by a plot point that is very applicable to this pandemic year. The book’s ingénue, Lucy, volunteers to nurse the typhoid-stricken wife of a poor clergyman. A plan is made to remove the woman’s children to the title parsonage and to quarantine them in a separate out-building until they show no signs of infection. Lucy resists the temptation to go home for a visit while she’s taking care of the patient so as not to put others at risk. This was written 160 years ago. They knew how to avoid spreading disease even then! Come on, people!!! Lucy’s willingness to put her own health at risk becomes irrefutable proof of her good character and her worthiness to marry the guy she loves. So here’s to the front line workers. While there are probably not enough rich and handsome English lords or wealthy heiresses to go around, may they all be rewarded for their selflessness and dedication. Merry Christmas, everyone!
Here we go :
Question of the week numba one : Aliens Yeah ! You mean the other people ? Or me ? Because If you are referring to « the others » I thought they were just zombies…
Ok question 2, easy too (get it?), one multiple answer (one of each, as one multiply by one multiply by one is till one, 1 * 3 = 1, but 3*1 is 3, that why mathematics are so complicated), so : Donnie Darko, Usual suspects and requiem for a dream, and for the books the 5 of the best known trilogy of The Hitchicker Guide to The Galaxy
I think those new pills are working great.
Speaking of aliens, you know « the others », not me, and them crazy ideas about not wearing a masks because of liberty or the 7 days world building business as you state. It’s tiresome.
My mother got some sort of Alzheimer disease. And it made me think about it
So she’s loosing her immediate memory. She remembered things from the past, which sometimes get mangled with it’s present, because when your brain is missing something it takes something he got to replace it.
Like, she was a psychologist and regularly she tells me that she can’t stay at the nursing home because worrying things are happening. Like this young 25 old resident which had been beaten by the male nurses. When asked what’s the name of the young women, it’s like Henriette, a 80 year old grand Ma surname. And about yhe nurses, they are 99% female. We think that’s a memory of her past jobs when the mental intuitions where a tad more violent.
She is still reasoning quite well, but mistook her remote control from her cell phone (a clamshell), but she can use them « by reflex », when she want’s to watch TV or phone me.
Our brain got one, make it two, missions, keeping us alive and make our world coherent, even if he need making things up and lie.
So here I am. Hi ! I’m the sain one, Yeah I know maybe I started on the wrong foot to make this really believable, but let’s say, that I know, why she is where she is, I know globally what’s true and what’s false in what she says. But it sometimes takes some efforts and times to counter check some facts and try to make sens of what she says.
And i can’t argue with her about her reality and the real reality. Contradicting people with memory trouble is not a very good idea, it confuses them even more.That their reality. Shaking it create a lot of anxiety and stress . It’s why they sometimes begin to be mean, but they are not mean per se, they just are fighting for their sanity, which sadly is crumbling down.
It’s the same for the conspiracists or (mis)believers. They create their own reality, so anybody trying to arguing with it could only be a lier or a mad man.
Not that they are wrong, the reality is indeed very complex and in a way kind of fucked. The economic system is living a global crisis, and we can’t know what the future is going to be (not that we ever really do), a lot of things escape to us (we know more things, but do we know more ?). And they hate science for those two reasons, they just want simple (or simplistic) answers no doubts.
I hate entropy too, but I did not give it free will and intention. Coincidence and correlation are not reason. I’ve got three current mottos to help me:
« All the pieces matter »
« If it’s too good to be true, it’s false » (at 99%)
« When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth »
Is there aliens ? Ho, yes, our technologies are alien : think, in the 50’s, the zone 51 and at the same time we’ve got nuclear power, an agricultural revolution and the freezer ! Alien technologies ! They give them to us because…. hum… why not.
As Joan of Arc, or Jehanne D’arc, alien too. Read F’murrr (try with different numbers of R and M’s), a french cartoonist well known for the « génie des Alpages » comics (alp’s genius) and its crazy sheep herd. He wrote a BD (comic) to tell the truth about her, she was dating Attila (a nice guy by the way) and had a child with an Alien (Aspro, her son is Tim). Yann you will learn all you need to know about her and have fun in the process.
No wonder people liked X-Files the TV documentary series. Soooo true. And the new Scooby doo is correct, there are ghosts ! You should believe, believe me !
Or not… I like science not for what it states but for the methodologies it gives us to try verify our mistakes and try to correct them.
Arrgg F…ing too long. Soooorrryyyy…
PS: a take on Tenet and It’s « too much » exposition : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsqvmZbskGo BTW, Tenet is a palindrome and did you know that they can be recursive, like PHP which stand for Php Hypertext Processor.
Oh, or should I say Oh Oh Oh, I almost forgot, Merry Christmas for you two, your families, all the sneaky listeners and for all our fellow zombies and aliens…