Hola, Sneakers! Welcome to Episode 586 of the Queen’s favourite podcast!
This week: math hallucination; look out behind you; freaky Friday; not dead yet; think pink; small major studios; passive income aggression; cheque checked; cooperative fleecing; sparking excitement; GPTChatbots; skull ring road; imaginary weights; le Terminateur; interhorse; birthday week; roller show; sexy key; hit song tips; arrange to see Tár; Coppolation; mindfuckery with The Endless; super Tubi; hot for In the Heat of the Night; mandated Cancon; take it down a notch; waffles vs. pancakes; elaborate milkshakes; immortal belated; Questions of the Week – Sneakers respond; try harder, Blake; animal welfare state; snake handling; beetle dung; home tested; cat scan; an ache in the UK; and, finally, toilet rock.
Question of the Week: What is a movie trope that bugs you?
Sub-question of the Week: Who was your favourite TV detective growing up?
Thanks for listening.
That Clio award-winning ad for Y: The Last Man:
That Super Clio award-winning ad for Tubi:
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My least favorite movie trope is the superhero three-point landing. It bothers me that movie makers think this is still cool and interesting now that we’ve seen it at least four dozen times. It’s like they want to call attention to their lack of creativity.
Remington Steele and Laura Holt were my favorite TV detectives growing up (in my teenage years, anyway). I liked their chemistry, I liked the con-artist aspect, I liked the twists, and I liked that they didn’t tell you who committed the crime at the beginning of the episode. It actually made me want to become a private investigator, but later I learned the reality of the job was a lot more boring. I went into a mild depression when the show finished!
Matthew, did you catch the scene in “Black Widow” about the three point landing? Florence Pugh pokes fun at Scarlet Johansson about it and whether she owns the move or not.
After our busy birthday-week weekend, we had the opposite this weekend: a very unseasonable late, large snowfall warning resulted in the cancellation of three things I had scheduled for the weekend, including a horse show on Sunday, which meant that I ended up at church instead. I got there just in time to hear Dave do a reading, I believe it was Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7, which I believe was something to do with rollerskating.
Anyway, moving on, Ian had asked about our horse’s names and here’s the story: as Dave said, many horses are named with the intention that it’s a nod to their lineage somehow. Our pony Harris’s full name is Devon Ridge Harris Hawk – Devon Ridge is the name of the farm up in Alberta where his mom came from and his dad was standing for a couple of years. His owner when he was born had just bought Harris’ mom Holly from Devon Ridge Farm, so for some reason she asked if she could use that farm’s prefix for Harris’s name, which is not the normal thing to do. I believe her own farm is called Birdsong so all of Harris’s younger siblings have that as the prefix or first part of their name and I think she names all her ponies after birds, hence Harris Hawk. Harris’s dad was called Fairyhill Hawk so I guess that’s why she went with a type of hawk for his name.
Archie was named by his previous owner, a girl who had him for a couple of years. I think she named him Archie because he is a red-head (chestnut). His original name (from birth to 2) was Bracken, as his registered name is Penny’s Bracken. Thoroughbreds don’t do the prefix/farm name thing most other horse breeds do. Archie’s mom’s name was Penny something-or-other. Yes, I agree – Archie’s registered name is a bad name. We did have another horse in the past whose name was Stop Inflation, so Archie’s name is officially not the worst horse name in the history of horse names, which is some consolation to me.
For detectives, I really liked Columbo, but I also like Scooby-doo. He was a dog detective, right?
I loved the Dung Beatle jokes and the bonus ones at the very end! 😂
Thanks a lot, Ed, for kicking off last episode’s descent into potty humour. That said…“Octopoosus Garden” and “Loo-cy in the Sky with Dung-mounds.”
The movie and TV trope that really bugs me, much like a dung beetle rolling and re-rolling its ball of excrement, is the “Exhuming the Tragic White Female Icon…Again” trope. Here is my “Let them Rest in Peace” Top 5:
5) Judy Garland
4) Marie Antoinette
3) Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onassis
2) Princess Diana
1) Marilyn Monroe
My sister and I watch as many Oscar-nominated movies as we can, but when the lead of Blonde was nominated, we said no thanks. We have nothing against Ana De Armas in the role, but it annoys me that the industry can’t seem to resist resurrecting Marilyn, much like a villain in a horror movie franchise.
I liked Columbo too, but my next favorite Mystery Movie detective was Banacek, the Thomas Crown-like private eye who specialized in big ticket item theft: art, coins, race horses and so on. Preteen me liked that he was rich, arrogant and always quoted Polish proverbs. Later, I was a fan of the original Thomas Magnum. Although he appeared to be an easy-going hanger-on, living on a rich guy’s estate, he was actually a former Navy Seal. He rehabilitated the image of the Vietnam War vet who up until then was often stereotyped in film and TV as damaged, drug-addicted or psychotic. My favourite Canadian investigator was Constable Benton Fraser from Due South. The spirit of his dad was played by Gordon Pinsent who passed away this week. He was the voice of Babar on an animated series I worked on and he sang a song I wrote lyrics for called “My Savanna Sweetheart.” I saw him live onstage as Prospero in The Tempest so he was a performer with a lot of range.
You’re welcome Louise! It’s not a party without a potty joke or two or three or four… I came up with that at the last minute as I was answering the question, I’m honored to have inspired such a funny segment of the podcast. One more: “While My Bottom Gently Weeps”.
As a fellow Cat-Daddy, my heart goes out to Cohen and family. Two of my cats struggled with kidney issues and you’re right, it’s almost unavoidable in felines, my trusted veterinarian of 16 years told me the very same thing. My older female, Mina Harker had kidney problems and it took her quickly four years ago. My male, Mr. Jinx, who was much sturdier, bounced back and went another six years until his age and the failing kidneys caught up with him this past June. These brave little ones are tougher that we think but they depend on us to help them along when we need to….and its never easy.
I’ll section off my film tropes to one franchise, Star Trek. You know as well as I do that the list isn’t long, it’s just short and repeated. I’ll name a few of the best ones:
The Starfleet Admiral that’s gone bad
Pulling free from a nebula using a reverse tachyon emitter pulse
“You’re the only ship in the sector!”
Shields at 14%
The dilithium crystals need recharging
Holodeck malfunction
Replacing the conduits (Does Starfleet buy their parts from Radio Shack?)
And last but not least…The Enterprise gets a refit!
I’ll admit, I still love Star Trek in all it’s glory, I’m just happy when I see one of these tropes coming from a mile away. I suppose it becomes a hazard due to the longevity of the franchise and poking fun at what makes it great is part of the fandom. There’s even a series of books written called “The Nitpickers Guide to Star Trek” that really drills deep into each episode and film, I kept it close to my TV as I watched it for the 100th time. Really worth it.
My folks were big fans of James Garner, so “Rockford Files” was always on as I grew up. I remember how much I liked the theme song by Mike Post, so much that I’d call the radio station and ask them to play it. There were few others like “The Streets of San Francisco” and “Kojak” I can remember being on. I liked “Starsky & Hutch” quite a bit but I didn’t watch it religiously. My first wife and I watched every episode of “NYPD Blue” when it first aired all the way to the last season. The ABC affiliate wouldn’t air the first season due to a boycott, so I had my in-laws in Oklahoma tape it for me. By the time the second season rolled around, the show was such a hit that the affiliate couldn’t resist airing it for the ratings…boycott or not. I think the viewers missing out on “NYPD Blue” also became noisier than the boycott and Tuesday evenings were spent watching it from that point on.
My first girlfriend’s Mom was such a fan of “Columbo” that she’d set her alarm to wake her at 3:00 am so she could watch it and then go back to bed at 4:00 am. That’s a fan.
As for the Terminator’s weight, one of the more recent films where Schwarzenegger returned to play the part, I swear I remember a scene where his weight is discussed. Schwarzenegger has been disguising the fact that he’s a terminator and is hidden, living a normal life. I remember someone asking him how he disguised his weight or him stepping on a scale. Not really funny at all, just crush my skull already.
I think I’ll go count up some more Star Trek tropes now as I watch the new episode of “Picard”, there’s bound to be a few.
Live Long & Prosper Sneakers!
Kirk out.