Speaker 1: Wait Wait, said in.
Speaker 2: Welcome Back to Midnight Viewing, where this season we're taking
Speaker 2: a look at George Romero's nineteen eighties television series Tales
Speaker 2: from the Dark Side. Sharing the midnight view with me.
Speaker 2: Are the Culture Cast, Chris Statue Forsooth, I Say You
Speaker 2: Are a Witch? And the Projection Booths Mike White don't
Speaker 2: have a Cutty Black sal Man. Tonight, we're taking a
Speaker 2: look at the next two episodes of season four, the
Speaker 2: final season of Tales from the Dark Side. Those are
Speaker 2: The Apprentice and The Cuddy Black Sow. The Apprentice Season four,
Speaker 2: episode thirteen, originally aired on May the first, nineteen eighty eight,
Speaker 2: Written by Ellen Sandhouse, directed by Eleanor Gabor, starring Haviland Morris,
Speaker 2: Marla Bloodstone from Gremlin's Two, Wayne Tippett, Catherine Newman, and
Speaker 2: Gary Lottie. Who I sat watching this episode staring at
Speaker 2: him the whole time and going, what the fuck do
Speaker 2: I know him? From? Oh, Night Riders? George Romeros from
Speaker 2: Night Riders. This is the story of a young woman
Speaker 2: who takes a job at a colonial reenactment village and
Speaker 2: she really commits to the job. What'd you think of
Speaker 2: this one? Mike Wow.
Speaker 3: I could see everything coming before it happened. As soon
Speaker 3: as she walked in the door, I knew exactly what
Speaker 3: was going to take place. Yeah, this was rough. Have
Speaker 3: we seen this before or is this just that obvious
Speaker 3: that I knew? Oh okay, Yeah, here's this dude gonna
Speaker 3: lurea in a person somehow. She's going to go back
Speaker 3: in time and get stuck in this village. I thought
Speaker 3: maybe they might have one day of normalcy where it's
Speaker 3: tourists coming in and making her feel bad. And you
Speaker 3: know what was that book that oh gosh, Chuck Poulinik
Speaker 3: wrote the.
Speaker 2: Reacting things.
Speaker 3: I was like, Okay, this will be cool, you know,
Speaker 3: show me a day of a reenactor and stuff. No, no,
Speaker 3: we have to jump right into the she's back in
Speaker 3: time now. And yeah. All I could do while I
Speaker 3: was watching our main actress was thinking about her having
Speaker 3: her hair caught in a door and having somebody cut
Speaker 3: it off the entire time. And then Wayne Tippett, he
Speaker 3: plays a bastard really well, and so at least he
Speaker 3: brought that energy to this, and I was pretty okay
Speaker 3: with him. But god, I mean medieval stuff, not medieval,
Speaker 3: but you know this like era of American history and
Speaker 3: everything is Oh, and you're a witch. Oh she pricked
Speaker 3: to you and you didn't feel it, and now I'm
Speaker 3: going to accuse you of witchcraft and all this stuff.
Speaker 3: Oh my god, it gets so old so fast. Yeah.
Speaker 3: In other words, I wasn't a big fan of this episode,
Speaker 3: and spoilers for the next episode not a fan of
Speaker 3: that one either. We got all kinds of witchcraft going
Speaker 3: on in this episode, and none of it is making
Speaker 3: me feel good.
Speaker 2: So Chris, how about yourself?
Speaker 4: Oh, it is, in fact witchcraft, folks, it's witchcraft. Good lord. Yeah,
Speaker 4: this is about as obvious another one of these, just
Speaker 4: like we know where you're going from a mile away,
Speaker 4: and hey, let's punish the feminist folks. Nothing says in
Speaker 4: nineteen eighty eight like putting a woman in her place,
Speaker 4: am I right? My god? I love the idea that
Speaker 4: she's just like the strong independent woman who gets burned
Speaker 4: at the stake at the end. Hilarious. I will say,
Speaker 4: I love how mean the episode is. I don't think
Speaker 4: anything that happens to Sarah McBride Havelin Morris's character is
Speaker 4: remotely justified. She just she's horny, I guess is kind
Speaker 4: of the way she's written, which is like fine because
Speaker 4: she's like a college student, so okay, she's horny and
Speaker 4: she's looking at guys and finding men attractive, and this
Speaker 4: is just some like bullshit summer job. Okay, why does
Speaker 4: she need to be punished and put to death again? Like,
Speaker 4: holy shit, episode we're just oh as Ron Burgundy said
Speaker 4: that escalating quickly, and it did. It's a fucking blackout sketch. Really, Oh,
Speaker 4: what it would happen if the feminist been back in
Speaker 4: time to Salem witch trial and she was burned at
Speaker 4: the stake? Okay, funny, it would have been funnier if
Speaker 4: she had deserved it. It just kind of feels really mean,
Speaker 4: which is again tails from the dark Side, But this
Speaker 4: show hasn't done that in such a long time that
Speaker 4: it almost feels a little unearned. However, I will say
Speaker 4: to spoil the next episode. The next episode is even
Speaker 4: funnier for cards. I don't know. Maybe it's meanstreak is
Speaker 4: back fallow alone.
Speaker 2: What did you think in a cage for every unclean
Speaker 2: and hateful bird of prey? That's what I think of
Speaker 2: this episode. I don't know that he quoted that for
Speaker 2: no good reason. I do think if this was like
Speaker 2: a first person short story about somebody getting a job
Speaker 2: at a colonial reenacting and then feeling dizzy and waking
Speaker 2: up and not realizing for some time that their job
Speaker 2: is actually now the time and place that they think
Speaker 2: that they're reenacting, that could be interesting. But this feels
Speaker 2: like all the other Tales from the Dark Side episodes
Speaker 2: where they deal with like time travel or a portal
Speaker 2: to another dimension or something. It always feels like there's
Speaker 2: an additional thirty to forty minutes of story that we
Speaker 2: are not privy to, and it's just rushing us through
Speaker 2: plot points to get us to other places. But it's
Speaker 2: all so convoluted, and anytime you start dealing with people
Speaker 2: from our present going to the past, it's look, this
Speaker 2: is like two hundred three hundred years she travels back.
Speaker 2: Anything that came out of her mouth, people would be
Speaker 2: like she's a witch. Just the vocal patterns alone and
Speaker 2: how they're speaking. It's just it's they don't even make
Speaker 2: the wherefore art that was sort of attempt with the
Speaker 2: dialogue here. I do like the idea of witches in
Speaker 2: Salem Village just being prime travelers from the twentieth century.
Speaker 2: There there's another good idea, but they're not interested in that.
Speaker 2: They're just I don't know what they're interested in. Like
Speaker 2: you said, Chris, is it just the punishing feminists? Like
Speaker 2: this is how you would fare back then? Because that's
Speaker 2: the problem is that she starts mouthing off. You listen
Speaker 2: to this guy, fuck him. Fuck here. By the way,
Speaker 2: as soon as she has one consation with that girl,
Speaker 2: she would have known where she was. I mean, this
Speaker 2: girl's there isn't even an attempt to have Okay, quit
Speaker 2: fucking the method acting and fucking speak to me, like
Speaker 2: where are you from, what town are you from? What
Speaker 2: kind of car do you drive? There's no conversation at
Speaker 2: all like that. It's just it's I don't know, it's
Speaker 2: very poor, very poor.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I thought for sure we were going to get some
Speaker 3: sort of because he makes very clear get rid of
Speaker 3: everything modern. She keeps a cigarette lighter that plays badly
Speaker 3: for her. I thought we were going to get some
Speaker 3: sort of somewhere in time scenario where she would have
Speaker 3: a penny with the current year on it and then boom,
Speaker 3: she wakes up in the current year something. But instead
Speaker 3: we do get that moment I was talking about as
Speaker 3: far as let's see how shitty it is to work
Speaker 3: in one of these reenactment places, but it just doesn't
Speaker 3: pay off. I mean, it's the girl from the past
Speaker 3: coming in and having these morons coming in and taking
Speaker 3: pictures of her and stuff. Again, it should played out
Speaker 3: for a longer time. It feels like this episode was
Speaker 3: so weird when it comes to how long they're going
Speaker 3: to spend on each thing. And I really thought that
Speaker 3: was the moment where it was like, Okay, this is great.
Speaker 3: Let's see her now because the other girl's dead or
Speaker 3: going to be burned at the stake. Now, let's see
Speaker 3: the horrible fate of this other girl. We're gonna go
Speaker 3: bad and fuck you to all of our protagonists here.
Speaker 3: Let's go ahead, let's do it. Let's make her life
Speaker 3: a living hell in the twentieth century exactly.
Speaker 2: And they want both of their characters to be in hell.
Speaker 2: I guess the idea is that a modern woman in
Speaker 2: ancient times would be considered a witch and end up trapped,
Speaker 2: and a time traveling elder woman would also be equally trapped,
Speaker 2: but in a different way. Because they don't even consider
Speaker 2: how fucked this woman's life is now this woman from
Speaker 2: sixteen ninety two who doesn't speak in our language, she
Speaker 2: doesn't have a driver's license, scurity guard like she's working
Speaker 2: at this job, who knows, like what is even happening?
Speaker 2: Who's hiring her? Her dad is stuck in the past
Speaker 2: because he destroyed the amazing time machine of the wagon
Speaker 2: wheel affixed to a wall. Apparently that's how easy it
Speaker 2: is to create. Doc Brown had it all wrong. Man
Speaker 2: using fucking plutonium.
Speaker 4: So I have a question, is that guy from the past.
Speaker 3: That's a good question, That is a good question back
Speaker 3: and forth.
Speaker 4: Or is he from the future. And he's like, here's
Speaker 4: the way I would write this. You have a guy
Speaker 4: in the current day who finds a way to go
Speaker 4: to the past, and his whole thing is he's a
Speaker 4: foolproof way to kill women that he doesn't like, in
Speaker 4: this case feminists, by just sending them back in time
Speaker 4: to get them killed because they think that they're witches,
Speaker 4: because like you said, Father Milone, they're melding off. And
Speaker 4: so you have this out and again like these you
Speaker 4: know you put it so apptly, Father Malone have said
Speaker 4: this so many times. If there was someone from one
Speaker 4: hundred years ago. That's one hundred years ago dropped into
Speaker 4: modern day times square today, they would die. Their brain
Speaker 4: would fucking explode because there'd be so there would be
Speaker 4: so many things you'd have to explain to them that
Speaker 4: we take for granted, Like what we're doing right now
Speaker 4: is a fucking To try and explain this to someone
Speaker 4: who has no ability to even understand what a computer
Speaker 4: is would be like, oh, you're taking No, you're not
Speaker 4: in the same room as someone like it's it's really
Speaker 4: fucked because the thing that this episode doesn't do is
Speaker 4: it doesn't contextualize why he's doing what he's doing. And
Speaker 4: that would have been the most interesting thing of this
Speaker 4: entire episode. Is this guy from the past or the
Speaker 4: future or the current of the past has figured out
Speaker 4: a way to go back in time or go to
Speaker 4: the future, and this is what he's choosing to do
Speaker 4: with it. Why that question is never answered, And that's
Speaker 4: the most interesting question that is never answered, and it's
Speaker 4: the thing that drives this entire goddamn episode.
Speaker 2: That's what I'm saying. Like the other episodes that came
Speaker 2: before this, it feels like there's more plot going on
Speaker 2: either before or after the episode begins or ends, and
Speaker 2: all of that is more tantalizing than the story we got.
Speaker 4: Yeah, well that exactly it is. What we get on
Speaker 4: screen is just kind of nothing. Really. Ultimately, it doesn't
Speaker 4: feel like much of anything. It just feels every one
Speaker 4: of these things we've seen before where someone gets trapped
Speaker 4: in the past, from the future or the present day.
Speaker 4: I guess that's every single one of these has been
Speaker 4: the same goddamn thing every time. Every time there's and
Speaker 4: where are the Stake's there?
Speaker 2: The guy is from the past because he describes the
Speaker 2: situation that they were sort of desperate and then their
Speaker 2: situation improved once he started feeding them witches scape. So
Speaker 2: that means this man from sixteen ninety two has a
Speaker 2: machine that allows him to travel to the twentieth century,
Speaker 2: the late twentieth century, and what he chooses to do
Speaker 2: is continue to go back. Why what the fuck are
Speaker 2: you talking about? Go back, gather as much fucking gold
Speaker 2: as you can. I bet you can get a lot
Speaker 2: compared to what we have now, and then come back
Speaker 2: through and be a fucking billionaire. What the what are
Speaker 2: you doing? What's anyone? The problem with most time traveling
Speaker 2: things is that it is so limited in its thought
Speaker 2: and what you could potentially do. I mean, if you
Speaker 2: want to be a criminal, you could really be a
Speaker 2: criminal with a time machine. You know, if you wanted
Speaker 2: to do good things, you could really do good things.
Speaker 2: So but nobody ever thinks beyond I don't know whatever.
Speaker 2: The little point they're trying to make the idea of
Speaker 2: a serial killer using a time machine is fucking also awesome, Chris, Like,
Speaker 2: there are so many potential like good things here and
Speaker 2: all of it is squandered, including all of these people.
Speaker 4: The body disappears permanently and nobody ever has to worry
Speaker 4: about it.
Speaker 2: Like, I guess that's a looper, right, that's the same
Speaker 2: that's pot of looper. Looper is time Yeah, well.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's it's more time after, but nobody's done it since,
Speaker 4: Like it's it is such a because here's the thing
Speaker 4: that you just take the body and dump it wherever
Speaker 4: the fuck in the middle of the desert and there
Speaker 4: you go, Like it doesn't even matter. But the idea that, yeah,
Speaker 4: this guy is just using it to do this is
Speaker 4: so like mind numb.
Speaker 2: Let's say he's this guy from the past and he
Speaker 2: has convinced the community that he can suss out witches
Speaker 2: right at a certain point, aren't the rest of the
Speaker 2: theligers going to go? We've noticed that all of the
Speaker 2: witches are coming out of your house. I think maybe
Speaker 2: we ought to try you, sir, because you know, men
Speaker 2: were not above witchcraft accusations and trials. There were plenty
Speaker 2: of men put to death.
Speaker 3: To one of them is see if he weighs as
Speaker 3: much as a duck, and if he does, he's a witch.
Speaker 2: You know what they would actually do in Salem, They
Speaker 2: would press him quote unquote where they yet they stack
Speaker 2: stones on you to get you to confess, and eventually
Speaker 2: there's a famous man witch.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, the most famous was his last words were more weight.
Speaker 2: He was just like, fuck, you add more weight before
Speaker 2: I confess to being a minion of Satan.
Speaker 4: That story already, that you just told in the most
Speaker 4: basic three fucking words, three sentences, was better than this
Speaker 4: entire episode. Cause you beat me and yeah, no, you
Speaker 4: beat me to it. That's when I thought the episode
Speaker 4: was going where it was going towards the end, I
Speaker 4: was like, Oh, was Sarah McBride a real person at Salem?
Speaker 4: And that's what they were doing? Oh? That would have
Speaker 4: been kind of clever. Nope, that wasn't even it like that,
Speaker 4: And I would have given the episode a little bit
Speaker 4: of credit if they had done that, to just tie
Speaker 4: it in, to be like, oh, one of the real
Speaker 4: people at Salem. Actually that was okay, that's kind of fun. Nope,
Speaker 4: they did. They did. They couldn't even be bothered to
Speaker 4: do that little bit of research.
Speaker 2: Come on, remember when they did this on Twilight soon
Speaker 2: eighty five with James Cromwell. They did a time travel
Speaker 2: episode or a sort of rain transference through time episode,
Speaker 2: and that was pretty good. They actually went out on
Speaker 2: location and gave us some pilgrim. I mean, it was California,
Speaker 2: but at least they gave us some geography. Here we're
Speaker 2: trapped in this really poor set. Clearly doesn't seem to
Speaker 2: age at all. I mean, dirtying up one painting does
Speaker 2: not equal three hundred years of progress.
Speaker 3: Why is the paint too clean?
Speaker 2: Oh okay, yeah, that's what she knowed. Yeah yeah, not
Speaker 2: I say not the bugs crawling everywhere, not the fucking
Speaker 2: odor coming off of everyone around her.
Speaker 4: Not the lack of noise.
Speaker 2: The lack of noise. How about the amount of oxygen
Speaker 2: in the air like her lungs suddenly fucking screaming because
Speaker 2: it's gotten more than it has ever received in its
Speaker 2: entire life.
Speaker 4: Time travel, for me, is always so lazy because the
Speaker 4: things that are ignored are the things that could be interesting,
Speaker 4: and just nobody cares because it's Oh, you know, if
Speaker 4: you add somebody from the bass Rabble to the future,
Speaker 4: of course they would understand immediately, like no, they would not.
Speaker 4: Their brain would explode inside of their head, their eyes
Speaker 4: would roll into the back of their head, and they'd
Speaker 4: be dead because they wouldn't even understand a cell phone
Speaker 4: you fire from your hand, magic fire, that's a lighter.
Speaker 4: Can you imagine trying to explain simple circuits to these
Speaker 4: fucking morons, let alone like how a fucking lighter works?
Speaker 2: Nothing.
Speaker 4: It's so lazy. I hate this kind of shit, especially
Speaker 4: when it's in short form narratives. Even this is where
Speaker 4: the Dodges and cheets really happen.
Speaker 3: You gotta get a ron silver and go back in
Speaker 3: time and like trade stocks and do all that kind
Speaker 3: of stuff. As long as Jean Claude van Dam doesn't
Speaker 3: get wind of it, you are on easy street. My friend,
Speaker 3: Jean Vandam will always get wind of it. Oh no,
Speaker 3: he is a time cop after all.
Speaker 2: That's true. It's time.
Speaker 4: If I had a time machine, I would be such
Speaker 4: a fucking so banal. I would just go make money,
Speaker 4: Just make money, Like why would I go give a
Speaker 4: shit about anything else? Like, not anything that any one
Speaker 4: of us could do with a time machine to stop
Speaker 4: anything that's happened. But to this point, I feel like, so,
Speaker 4: no matter how many good decisions I could go and make,
Speaker 4: just make some money and try to insulate myself from
Speaker 4: all the bad things that are happening. But or, you know,
Speaker 4: just get women to die and Salem at the cross
Speaker 4: because they're witches. That's funnier, right.
Speaker 2: My favorite recent time travel thing, and by recent, I
Speaker 2: mean a decade ago Leam Lynch, the comedian, the director
Speaker 2: of Tenacious D's Pick of Destiny. He has his own
Speaker 2: web series and he has a segment called Time Taggers,
Speaker 2: which is just this idiot tagger who goes back in
Speaker 2: time and tags things like so he goes back out
Speaker 2: to fucking tag that ship. He does, and then he
Speaker 2: gets back into the time machine.
Speaker 4: Yeah, what would happen if an idiot had a time machine?
Speaker 4: I don't really care about What would happen if a
Speaker 4: smart person at a time machine? What happened if a moron?
Speaker 2: It a total dunce.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, it's like that character from the Good Place.
Speaker 3: Imagine him with a time machine. He would just be shawing.
Speaker 3: Oh god, can you imagine Jason with the time machine?
Speaker 2: Yes, I want to see that series. Actually, I think
Speaker 2: that would be a good spin off.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 4: I just give me Dexter with the time machine and
Speaker 4: we're good going back in. You know, that show's jumped
Speaker 4: the shark at this point. Who fucking cares.
Speaker 2: I liked this latest season.
Speaker 4: I'm not saying it was sad, but you know what
Speaker 4: I mean, we've gone around the bend to this point
Speaker 4: where it's like Simpson's postmodern, where we're just like, we
Speaker 4: don't even care about reality anymore.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, yeah, the show should have not cared about
Speaker 2: reality after season two with that fucking serial killer conceit.
Speaker 2: They should have been having a blast a long time ago.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and you know what, like a time killing serial killer.
Speaker 4: I think that is a thing that we have yet
Speaker 4: to really see. And this has that idea, it's that
Speaker 4: nugget in it, and it's that's for me. It should
Speaker 4: have been more interesting than it is. But a wagon
Speaker 4: wheel on a wall is not. That's not doing it
Speaker 4: for me.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry.
Speaker 2: The Cutty Black Sow Season four, episode fourteen. This aired
Speaker 2: originally on May the eighth, nineteen eighty eight. Written by
Speaker 2: Michael McDowell from a story by Thomas Montalioni and directed
Speaker 2: by Richard Glass, this one stars Huckleberry Fox not Kidding,
Speaker 2: Paula Truman, Timothy Landfield, and Mary Griffin as a Gloria
Speaker 2: That's the little Sister. When a young boy's great grandmother
Speaker 2: dies on Halloween, he's tasked with saving the souls of
Speaker 2: his family before an ancient legend can snatch him away.
Speaker 2: I'll take the lead on this one because it sounds
Speaker 2: like you two are ready to beat up on it,
Speaker 2: and I fucking love this. Or Okay, this is as
Speaker 2: old a ghost story as I've ever heard, and I've
Speaker 2: heard variations of this growing up, so this is not
Speaker 2: un known to me, this story of the Cutty Black Sow.
Speaker 2: The story that we're given here is this great grandmother
Speaker 2: is on her deathbed. By the way, don't bring your
Speaker 2: children to great grandma's deathbed, because if the child is
Speaker 2: just going to say, is she really gonna die over
Speaker 2: and over again. That's probably not good for her mental
Speaker 2: health as she's slowly passing away anyway. So the setup
Speaker 2: is that great Grandma is dying and is going to
Speaker 2: die on Halloween, and it is revealed that from her
Speaker 2: Scottish heritage that if that were to occur, that everyone
Speaker 2: in the family's soul is at risk because the cutty
Speaker 2: black Sow will be on the way to grab some
Speaker 2: souls and the only way to prevent that is to
Speaker 2: have a rock that represents each of your family members souls.
Speaker 2: You keep that in a fire. As long as they
Speaker 2: stay in that fire, they'll be Okay, this is a
Speaker 2: real myth from the UK. Okay, Michael McDowell, who is
Speaker 2: obviously of Scottish descent, has said it as a Scottish myth.
Speaker 2: I don't know why, because this whole thing is Welsh
Speaker 2: as Welsh as Welsh can be. This is actually knows
Speaker 2: Kalan Gott, which is the Welsh equivalent of Halloween, takes
Speaker 2: place on November the first, which is the first day
Speaker 2: of winter, and the cuddy Black Sow is leave it
Speaker 2: to the Welsh to actually personify those demonic forces because
Speaker 2: in Ireland, where all Hallows Eve actually originates from It's
Speaker 2: fucking It's just spirits might get you here. It's one
Speaker 2: spirit's coming for you. So they created the original Michael
Speaker 2: Myers in Wales with this character. I liked how simple
Speaker 2: this story was. I liked how well written each of
Speaker 2: the characters, where this is Michael McDowell obviously working here.
Speaker 2: I liked that the fact that the kids when dealing
Speaker 2: with one another, felt like children. Obviously Huckleberry Fox, I
Speaker 2: don't know why we didn't see more and more and
Speaker 2: more of him. The kid is preternatural. We're so used
Speaker 2: to precocious thanks to fucking so many years of night
Speaker 2: Gallery that anytime I see a child performer who doesn't
Speaker 2: suck completely and actually seems not precocious but with it
Speaker 2: like this kid did, oh my god, he's fucking again.
Speaker 2: I don't know why he didn't do more and more stuff.
Speaker 2: And I including Mary Griffin as his little sister because
Speaker 2: she's just as good as him.
Speaker 4: I liked there a diplomat to the United States Department
Speaker 4: of Agriculture, that's why Fox. Yeah, he became like a
Speaker 4: like a government dude, like he had a master's in
Speaker 4: animal science and shit and a PhD In plant medicine.
Speaker 4: He was a smart guy, so he was probably good
Speaker 4: at acting, but probably good at a lot of other things.
Speaker 4: And by the way, passed away last year at the
Speaker 4: age of fifty.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 4: Wow, that's smart, dude. That's why. So to answer your
Speaker 4: to give you an answer immediately, there's why.
Speaker 2: I like the simplicity of this story. And this might
Speaker 2: be just me relating more than y'all, but there's something
Speaker 2: about the connection as like a grandchild or a great
Speaker 2: grandchild in some cases, and that relative that doesn't sort
Speaker 2: of exist between the parents and them. I don't know.
Speaker 2: There's something special about her and the fact that it
Speaker 2: turns into this quest for this kid and he takes
Speaker 2: so seriously and spoilers. This is as tails from the
Speaker 2: Dark Side as you can get as far as an
Speaker 2: ending goes. He does everything right and for his troubles
Speaker 2: when it's revealed that he's the soul that fell out
Speaker 2: of the fire and there's a bang on the window.
Speaker 2: Actually jumped. I've seen this episode a dozen times. Actually jump.
Speaker 2: The creature at the end is wonderful. It is they
Speaker 2: unlike most Dark Side where they're just relying on the
Speaker 2: effect because the effect is great. They shoot this really
Speaker 2: sort of murkily, and it comes off as very scary
Speaker 2: when it stands up and opens its mouth, fucking freak
Speaker 2: me out. Anyway, that was my take on it. How
Speaker 2: about you, Chris.
Speaker 4: I am so glad that somebody repurposed the monster from
Speaker 4: Ernest Scared Stupid into something else, because that is what
Speaker 4: the creature at the end of this episode looks like.
Speaker 4: Is the troll from Trantor. It has that same like
Speaker 4: weird pig nos thing, So I don't think it was
Speaker 4: inspired by this at all, but it's that same weird
Speaker 4: like pig poor sign face and that character design in
Speaker 4: that movie, So it would like really reminded me of that.
Speaker 4: It is scary, I will give you that. Like I
Speaker 4: think it's a very atmospheric episode. I can't help but
Speaker 4: wonder if I would have enjoyed it more if this
Speaker 4: had been the first time I'd seen something like this.
Speaker 4: But because I've seen so many of these now, it
Speaker 4: does feel a little old hat, but it does feel
Speaker 4: more well. It feels better executed than the other ones
Speaker 4: have been. It reminds me of some of the other
Speaker 4: episodes like this that we've seen where it's two kids
Speaker 4: at home or a kid at home by himself being
Speaker 4: tormented and plagued by something. And I mean again, you're
Speaker 4: trafficking and a kid at home by himself or themselves,
Speaker 4: and that's scary enough as it is, and then you
Speaker 4: have the possibility of there being this demonic pig woman
Speaker 4: that walks on her fucking rear legs, which is scary,
Speaker 4: like beyond scary. Really, Like, you don't have to sell
Speaker 4: me on that being scary episode, Like I get it.
Speaker 4: I don't know. I guess I'm just a little worn
Speaker 4: down by these kinds of episodes and pairing it up
Speaker 4: with something like The Apprentice, which feels very thematically similar,
Speaker 4: and I wasn't jiving with that episode. It probably didn't
Speaker 4: help it. But I didn't actually disliked this episode. I
Speaker 4: just kind of it was fine. It was fine. It
Speaker 4: just maybe took a little long to get where it
Speaker 4: was going. Mike, what did you think?
Speaker 2: Not a fan?
Speaker 3: I'm glad that you explained the mythos of this, because
Speaker 3: I just kept go what is he doing with these
Speaker 3: stonees and the fire? And he just kept saying the
Speaker 3: same stuff over and over again. I was just like,
Speaker 3: I just I'm not connecting with what he's supposed to
Speaker 3: be doing. And I don't get this myth. I've never
Speaker 3: heard of this myth before. So I'm just like something
Speaker 3: something stones. Okay, he's got a little sister, is she
Speaker 3: going to get eaten? Our parents not going to believe him? No,
Speaker 3: they're not going to believe him. And I don't know.
Speaker 3: I just kept thinking back to the gosh, was that
Speaker 3: the first season of this show? Or was it even Yeah,
Speaker 3: I think it was the first season of this or
Speaker 3: maybe it was Twilight's own eighty five with the Grandma's
Speaker 3: story from Stephen King that I felt was a lot
Speaker 3: scarier because the Grandma and that was scary rather than dead.
Speaker 4: That is what this reminded me of. It did have
Speaker 4: Grandma in its DNA for sure.
Speaker 2: This actually reminded me more of Trick or Treat the
Speaker 2: very first episode of the season. Here. This felt to
Speaker 2: me like what they were trying to shoot for for
Speaker 2: the entire series, because the look of this one is great.
Speaker 2: It doesn't feel like a set at all. That I've
Speaker 2: always said Tamson dark Side feels the best when it
Speaker 2: feels like a short film. This felt like a short film.
Speaker 2: Didn't feel like they were on some sound stage somewhere
Speaker 2: just banging this out. It seemed like that there was
Speaker 2: care taken with the shots and the setups and everything.
Speaker 2: It's a lot of mythology just sort of cram in here.
Speaker 2: And again, this is just a fucking quibble. But why,
Speaker 2: Michael McDonnell is, did you suddenly decide it was Scotland.
Speaker 2: I talked to my friend way Else today and she
Speaker 2: was like, well, it doesn't really matter. It's just Gaelic nonsense.
Speaker 2: No matter where you go, there's always some variation on it,
Speaker 2: so don't sweat it too much. But at the same time,
Speaker 2: like they have fucking they got the they got a
Speaker 2: bagpipe lament going on here. At one point in Victoria
Speaker 2: was like, why why are you so focused on that? Anyway?
Speaker 2: Why am I so focused on it?
Speaker 4: Well, no, let's let's let's break it down for a second.
Speaker 4: To be fair, the cutting black saw is not something
Speaker 4: that if you even go and google it, you're gonna
Speaker 4: get a whole lot of information about. And so if
Speaker 4: you're gonna go out of your way, and this is
Speaker 4: something I realized in doing scary stories. We tell if
Speaker 4: you're gonna go out of your way, to pick something
Speaker 4: specific like this, Why why not do it the justice
Speaker 4: that it deserves, because there were very few things about
Speaker 4: the cutty black sow out there, which is a Gaelic
Speaker 4: thing that is not being correctly interpreted in this episode,
Speaker 4: but they went out of their way to mention it.
Speaker 4: They could have said anything else they said.
Speaker 2: They could have said nothing, but oh and the only
Speaker 2: reason we know it, other than the fact that fucking
Speaker 2: bagpipes are playing every ten second, is that the grandmother
Speaker 2: keeps referring to Halloween as all hallows and which is
Speaker 2: you know, the original By the way, remember when that
Speaker 2: was unknown to people, like in the eighties if you
Speaker 2: said all hallows and they'd be like, oh, really, that's
Speaker 2: the actual work comes on from interesting anyway, we take you.
Speaker 4: Granted the ability to google shit now, like I know,
Speaker 4: really do you know?
Speaker 2: So she says all hallows even and they're like what
Speaker 2: and the husband's like, oh, that's what they how they
Speaker 2: used to say it in Scotland, Like oh, okay, so now
Speaker 2: we're dealing with a Scottish myth. Gotcha.
Speaker 4: Why do you think when we have an episode like this,
Speaker 4: why do you think the kid had to die at
Speaker 4: the end? Is my question. I'm so curious, like I,
Speaker 4: is it just Tails from the Dark Side being Tales
Speaker 4: from the Dark Side? Okay, cool, because I appreciate this
Speaker 4: show so much for that because Tales from the Crypt
Speaker 4: didn't even do that. Yeah, and that was a show
Speaker 4: that was on fucking HBO. Yeah, I appreciate the means.
Speaker 4: Like I know that the last episode was also rather
Speaker 4: mean spirited, but this one really owes for it and
Speaker 4: I appreciate that about it because this is supposed to be,
Speaker 4: you know, a fairy tale or cautionary tale for children.
Speaker 4: I mean it. You know, they're telling the story. There's
Speaker 4: some metaaness to this story, right because they're telling the
Speaker 4: story about the cutty black Sow. But the story that
Speaker 4: we are seeing could be told to a child about
Speaker 4: the cutty black sow, about this kid and his interaction
Speaker 4: with it, and the way that it ends is that
Speaker 4: cautionary tale of you know, be careful and meddling in
Speaker 4: things you don't understand. But he's learning about it within
Speaker 4: this story. So there's some metainess to what we're seeing.
Speaker 4: But I love that this show just is refuses to
Speaker 4: pull punches when it comes to kids. In this show,
Speaker 4: and like preteens and young adults, and like the main
Speaker 4: characters who do everything they can, do everything they can
Speaker 4: to the best of their abilities, still failing. I appreciate
Speaker 4: that this show goes there because a lot of these
Speaker 4: anthology shows don't go the full distance, and I don't
Speaker 4: know why, Like there's no reason not to.
Speaker 2: You could say that on Nike coll they weren't going
Speaker 2: to kill a kid. I think Rod probably would put
Speaker 2: an end to that sort of nonsense. And Tails from
Speaker 2: the Crypt really very rarely had children at the center.
Speaker 2: Like I can think of three basically off the top
Speaker 2: of my head, and those might be the only three
Speaker 2: that exists on Telsmith. But here on tarc side Man,
Speaker 2: the kids are literally on the menu.
Speaker 1: All the time.
Speaker 4: That fucking teddy bear that kills the kid, the giant
Speaker 4: goddamn teddy bear that busts through the door that kills
Speaker 4: the mom and kid. There's another episode that ends similarly
Speaker 4: to this one, isn't there where it's just like the
Speaker 4: shot of essentially the monster just like looming over the
Speaker 4: kid in first person, Like there's another episode of the show.
Speaker 2: Well, there would be seasons of belief with the Grither,
Speaker 2: which ends up fucking killing the parents and then just leaving,
Speaker 2: leaving the kids sitting there with their dead parents at
Speaker 2: Christmas time. All right, Michael McDowell, all.
Speaker 4: Right, breaking the parents necks giant, horrifying.
Speaker 2: Hand AND's as big as basketball.
Speaker 4: Still a strange size comparative, but all right, what what
Speaker 4: a great name is Huckleberry Fox?
Speaker 2: By the way, my parents dropped the ball.
Speaker 3: So when he introduces himself to people, does he go,
Speaker 3: I'm a Huckleberry?
Speaker 2: I bet he has?
Speaker 4: I bet George Miller Fox was his was his birth name?
Speaker 2: Oh so Huckleberry is just a stage name, nickname, maybe
Speaker 2: Boo take away.
Speaker 4: Out of Alone.
Speaker 2: Come on, now, it's all show biz. That's right, because
Speaker 2: but you know what, Look, my name is never going
Speaker 2: to be Father as my first name. His name potentially
Speaker 2: could have been Huckleberry, which would have been cool.
Speaker 4: Well that's what he was built in this episode.
Speaker 2: As I do want to see you're thinking as Huckleberry.
Speaker 4: I do want to ask you, guys, because you mentioned
Speaker 4: it in an opening of this Father Malone, and it
Speaker 4: got me thinking, what in God's name were these parents
Speaker 4: thinking bringing their kids to the bedside of her grandmother?
Speaker 4: That is the most you know, the Cuddy blacksoul is
Speaker 4: disturbing obviously, Like the practical effect is very like it's
Speaker 4: weird and it's gross and it's creepy, and the way
Speaker 4: that they shoot it.
Speaker 2: With the eyes it's great.
Speaker 4: But the real horrifying part of this episode are these
Speaker 4: kids next to the bed of the dying grandmother and
Speaker 4: she's just like, I'm dying. I'm dying. Oh, I'm dying.
Speaker 4: What the fuck were you thinking?
Speaker 2: Well, look were you thinking? First of all, they do
Speaker 2: send the kids away before she dies, and wow, and
Speaker 2: they'd gather her. They gather them there to say goodbye
Speaker 2: to her, and is what the idea was. But they
Speaker 2: get so caught up an exposition at that moment that
Speaker 2: you don't really get that sort of tender moment. It's
Speaker 2: good and really really the whole scene is just about
Speaker 2: the grandson and the great or the great grandson and
Speaker 2: great grandmother. In fact, I'm not sure why they even
Speaker 2: had the rest of the family there. He should have
Speaker 2: snuck into her room or something.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I don't Yeah, I don't understand either.
Speaker 2: Other than to father to give exposition, which is what
Speaker 2: we got.
Speaker 4: Right. Well, there's only twenty three minutes.
Speaker 2: So I'll say this and one of the reasons that
Speaker 2: I do like this one in particular, and why the
Speaker 2: ending resonates it, and maybe it's not just a dark
Speaker 2: side thing here, because with most sort of Celtic myths,
Speaker 2: as far as or not myths but fables, there is
Speaker 2: a level of inevitability to them that once the sort
Speaker 2: of die has been cast, there is no redemption from it.
Speaker 2: There comes a part in all of their in most
Speaker 2: of these stories where once a character has been cursed,
Speaker 2: that's it and we're just waiting out the clock. There's
Speaker 2: no ultimate last minute win for these things. And knowing
Speaker 2: that this was a Celtic myth to begin with, as
Speaker 2: soon as that stone turned over, I was like, oh man,
Speaker 2: that's perfect. I can't not that I can't wait to
Speaker 2: watch a kid die or something, but you know, I
Speaker 2: can't wait to see how this plays out. What's great
Speaker 2: is even with the sort of acceptance and the inevitability
Speaker 2: of it, it's still a horrifying end.
Speaker 4: And that he dies, we're not even sure that he dies.
Speaker 2: No, it is therefore it's stolen, but really it's going
Speaker 2: to run away with you.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, again, who knows what the fate of someone
Speaker 4: whose soul is stolen in the universes, you know what
Speaker 4: I mean. That's you know, I don't know what that means,
Speaker 4: but that could be potentially worse, you know, just you know,
Speaker 4: comatized for the rest of your life.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 4: It's just it's that cautionary tale of the fate. Is
Speaker 4: awful and you don't even want to comprehend what it is.
Speaker 4: So maybe it's better just to die. I mean, it's
Speaker 4: better that the thing just fucking kills me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't want to know what a six foot
Speaker 2: black pig walking upright with glowing red eyes wants of me, soul.
Speaker 4: With soul stealing ability.
Speaker 3: I'm really serious? Is this sorry curious? That serious? I'm
Speaker 3: very curious. Is this where the one of the antagonists
Speaker 3: from that horrific Hellboy remake came from? Because there was
Speaker 3: a Scottish sounding pig man in that movie, and so
Speaker 3: while I was watching the end of this, I was
Speaker 3: just like, Oh, it's that guy from the Hellboy whatever,
Speaker 3: old and crooked man. The no, no, you guys are
Speaker 3: missing the one with David Harbor.
Speaker 4: That one, that one that hell.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd have to rewatch. But I mean, if it's a.
Speaker 4: Mike, you beat me. I don't think you have to, will.
Speaker 4: You know what, though, I take that back. Actually watched
Speaker 4: that movie and it wasn't terrible, But I did watch
Speaker 4: that other one beforehand, the newer one, and that one.
Speaker 3: Is pretty bad. That one Crooked Man Crooked Man was
Speaker 3: so bad. I mean, that makes the David Harbor one
Speaker 3: look like an Oscar contender.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I disagree, really yeah, I like like I like her.
Speaker 2: Really it's so cheap. It did look really cheap, but
Speaker 2: it felt like I mean, it felt like a television episode,
Speaker 2: is what it felt. And but it felt to me
Speaker 2: like just a really good one off of a bpr
Speaker 2: D comic. That's all that's fair.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I could get I can get behind that. I
Speaker 4: think that. I don't know, Mike, you maybe onto something
Speaker 4: with that being from that hell Boy movie. I just mean,
Speaker 4: you know, cutty black Salad is like when you google
Speaker 4: it like it's this, like it's this and one or
Speaker 4: two other things and very little else. And so to
Speaker 4: your point point from before father moment, get it right.
Speaker 4: If you're gonna do it at all, don't do Loveland
Speaker 4: Frog and then not mention Loveland. If you're gonna do
Speaker 4: the thing. There are some cryptids that you can get
Speaker 4: away with, like Bigfoot, but something.
Speaker 2: Right here in Wisconsin looking for the locknest monster.
Speaker 4: Buck are you talking about again? It's it reminds me
Speaker 4: a little bit of the misinterpretation of the Deal with
Speaker 4: the Devil episode from the last episode, where it's like,
Speaker 4: what why are you gonna go through all this effort?
Speaker 4: Not land the plane? Put the landing gear down, Folks Like,
Speaker 4: we're ninety nine percent of the way there. Don't do this.
Speaker 4: You had intent, could have done anything else, and you
Speaker 4: chose this, so why not commit to it completely?
Speaker 2: All right? On the next episode of mid nine Viewing,
Speaker 2: we'll be taking a look at the next two episodes
Speaker 2: of season four. Those are Do Not Open This Box
Speaker 2: and Family Reunion Midnight Viewing. The Horror Anthology podcast is
Speaker 2: a proud member of a weirding Way Media and the
Speaker 2: theme song was composed by HP with an assist by
Speaker 2: Donald Rubinstein. Until next time? What are you working on?
Speaker 2: Where can people find it? Chris stash you.
Speaker 4: Everything that I work on, including this show, can be
Speaker 4: found at weirdingwaymedia dot com, where I put the Weekly
Speaker 4: back in Weekly podcast with the Culture Cast, which is
Speaker 4: a show that I'm finally doing weekly once again after
Speaker 4: being on a hiatus for well a long time, so
Speaker 4: I'm back doing that. But more importantly, head on over
Speaker 4: to patreon dot com slash Father Malone because Father Malone
Speaker 4: is doing two episodes a week, which is a lot,
Speaker 4: and I'm not doing that. So if you're going to
Speaker 4: support someone financially who's busting their ass right now, specifically
Speaker 4: Father Malone, but support Father Malone, support Mike over his
Speaker 4: Patreon at patreon dot com, slash Projection booth or mine
Speaker 4: at patreon dot com, slash Culturecast all places you can
Speaker 4: go to help us out financially. But like rate and
Speaker 4: review anything that you listen to, regardless of who does
Speaker 4: it on iTunes, because that's where you can help any
Speaker 4: one of us out. So I don't know how many
Speaker 4: bases I covered, but I feel like a lot of them.
Speaker 4: So coick it to you, Mike, what about you?
Speaker 3: Yeah, same thing he has for me.
Speaker 2: You're listening to the show I do. Tune in on
Speaker 2: Mondays to Father Malone's a weekly round up where I
Speaker 2: look at the latest in the streaming and theatrical releases,
Speaker 2: and every Friday year they're gonna hear us talking about
Speaker 2: one of these anthology series. You're gonna hear one of
Speaker 2: our fests. Right now, we're involved in Morana's Fest looking
Speaker 2: at the movies of Rick Moranis and the books of Bloodfest.
Speaker 2: We're looking at all the movies based on the books
Speaker 2: of Blood from Clive Barker. Until next time, everybody, try
Speaker 2: to enjoy the daylight
Speaker 1: The shop to