Speaker 1: Welcome to Popcorn Psychology, the podcast where we watch blockbuster
movies and psychoanalyze them. My name is Brittany Brownfield and
I'm a child therapist and I'm joined by.
Speaker 2: Ben Stover, individual therapist.
Speaker 1: Hannah Espinozo, marriage and family therapists. We're all licensed clinical
professional counselors also known as therapists, who practice out of Chicago.
Even though we are licensed mental health professionals, this podcast
is purely for entertainment purposes and to fulfill our love
of dissecting pop culture and all forms.
Speaker 3: Please remember that, even though we are all licensed therapists,
we aren't your therapist.
Speaker 1: If you are struggling with mental health symptoms, please find
a local mental health provider. I feel good, I feel great,
I feel wonderful, guys, And just like that, we're talking
about what about Bob today, y'all.
Speaker 4: We're finally doing it, y'all.
Speaker 3: We've only talked about doing this one for eight years,
so it's a good thing.
Speaker 1: We're doing every season, every season we have talked about this.
It's incredible excited. So this is our official start to
season nine. Correct, Yes, this is our official start to
season nine. We're finally discussing what about Bob, the patron
saint of this podcast. I haven't watched this movie since
I was a kid. What about you, guys. I also
haven't watched this movie since I was a kid, but
I remember it pretty clearly. Honestly, I was a little
surprised by how well I remembered it.
Speaker 3: I watched it first, I think on a band trip
on the bus sure, of course, because our band director
was a interesting fellow and liked movies like this. We
watched this in Austin powers on said trip. I think
it was to Saint Louis for this one. And the
last time I watched it, I think I was in
my psychology and film class at Eastern Illinois, which is
more years ago then we're going to quantify.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 1: This movie it came out in nineteen ninety one. It
stars Bill Murray and Richard Dreyfuss, and it's about a
guy named Bob who has a collection of mental health
stuff that we will talk about, who goes to see
a new psychotherapist I think is his official title in
the movie, doctor Leo Marvin, And that is the movie
Bob follows him to on his vacation. That's all the
part I really remembered is a patient follows his psychiatrist
on vacation. Not remembering that and watching it now that
Bob meets this guy for ten minutes maybe less in
his office, imprints on him like a duck, and then
follows him for the next several days on vacation. So yes,
we'll be talking about just Bob and Leo. We'll be
taking turns talking about Bob first and the mental health
soup that is his character, and then we'll be talking
about Leo. Doctor Leo Marvin as a typical sort of
stereotype of like a narcissistic therapist, as I feel like
they were portrayed a lot in the eighties and nineties,
like a frasier up their own ass. It actually kind
of made me think of when we did Cruel Intentions
the Therapist in the beginning of that movie, where it's
all about hawk and a product and being a snob
seemed to be what we thought therapists were.
Speaker 4: At that time.
Speaker 3: It sure seems like the emphasis was on the expert
therapist model where you come into my office and I
sit behind a really big, powerful looking desk that communicates
how small my pen is exactly.
Speaker 1: That desk was a monstrosity and so uncomfortable, so uncomfortable. Yeah,
it definitely doesn't create a warm environment in way which
you feel. It definitely makes you feel like you're being interrogated.
Speaker 3: I have never done therapy sitting behind a desk, not
one time ever ever.
Speaker 1: No, even when I've had a desk, I've done which
I misimiting you guys all do, which is you face
away from your desk. Your desk faces the wall, and
you turn away from your desk and you face your
client with nothing between the two of you.
Speaker 3: My desk also faces the wall, so that I find
less things to distract myself with, which does not work.
Speaker 1: So I guess we coull just jump right into it
with mister Bob Wilie. So right away we're introduced to
this character who seems to have a collection of phobias.
Is how he's first introduced. I started keeping track of
them as I was watching. Let me know, guys if
I miss anything. So claustrophobia, because he is like when
he gets into his apartment building hallway and he starts
to get very like the walls are closing in on him,
and the elevator and the elevator. He walked all the
way up the stairs, which seems to be pretty far
in Leo's office because he can't handle getting on the elevator.
Does he go on the elevator in charch pretty four floors,
which I feel like he would be so late to
his appointment if he had to go forty four flights
of stairs.
Speaker 3: Except that he's very compulsive, so he's probably very early
walking up those stairs. Yeah, he looked like he was
about to have a heart attack when he did that
forty four flights.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I really don't know. You'd have to be pretty
fit to do that kind of bullshit. And a germophobe,
which isn't actually a psychological term.
Speaker 4: I looked it up.
Speaker 1: The term is misophobia, which is when you're scared of
germs touching stuff. So he uses a lot of tissues
in the movie to touch buttons, to touch anything that
was like a public item, and then like agoraphobia when
he goes out, it seems like he's overwhelmed by the
sound of the world.
Speaker 4: You know what kind of made me think of Hannah
as bo is afraid? I was just thinking that exact thing.
Speaker 1: I was the first frames of the film are so
similar to BoA's Afraid.
Speaker 4: You're absolutely right, but was Afraid.
Speaker 1: Is the horror horror the Lynchian horror nightmare version of
What About Bob?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it's probably inspired by paying homage to it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And he does describe things that also sound like panic,
like when he's talking to Siggy.
Speaker 4: We'll discuss that later, that poor child and his poor name.
Speaker 1: He he does bring up stuff that does sound like
actual panic symptoms, because he says like I get dizzy, spells, nauseous, trouble,
they say, trouble, breathing, trembling, cold sweat like. He does
name a lot of things that are legit panic, hot sweat,
hot sweat, cold sweats. So when we see him, he
does seem to be displayed a multitude of phobias. He
works from home. He doesn't seem like he goes outside
if he can help it. But we're why are we
calling it soup?
Speaker 3: Though?
Speaker 1: Why are we calling a mental health soup? Even though
I'm like naming all these actual diagnoses.
Speaker 3: Because they made up a diagnosis. Let's start there.
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, like what he says actually is
I guess a fancy way of saying mental soup multiphobic personality.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a made up diagnosis. That's why it's mental
health soup. What we see Bob displaying is two distinct
likely disorders, but none of them are multiphobic personality disorder
because it's not fucking real.
Speaker 1: I know, Bob does seem to be what we've talked
about a lot on this podcast, which is, we want
to put a crazy person in a movie, so we're
gonna just throw a bunch of symptoms and behaviors at
them in order to serve the story, not to like
represent anything accurately. And this is clearly a comedy.
Speaker 4: We get it, guys.
Speaker 1: It's a comedy and it's directed by Frank Oz. We
know it's not a movie supposed to take seriously. And
they do use a lot of terms in language that
is a part of our work as therapists.
Speaker 3: And most of it was represented poorly, but they did.
I feel like they just took exactly like you said,
how do we make the most Bonker's story about a
really bad patient and a bad therapist. And remember when
they introduced Bob to us, it's via his previous therapist,
who the subtext is telling us that person is quitting
therapy because of Bob.
Speaker 1: Bob drove him out of the job, out of the field,
he drove him, he clearing his office out. Yeah, like yeah,
And I do wonder when that therapist said we're a
dying breed to Leo. I was like, is this some
joke that I would understand when I first saw this
movie in like ninety one that I don't quite understand now.
Speaker 3: Psychiatrists that do therapy is my guess. Okay, but I
don't know, or maybe he was just referencing that people
who are experts like that are dying breed and was
saying exactly whatever he needed to to play to Leo's ego,
so he would take the patient without questioning too much. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Maybe, But yeah, Bob is yeah, he's it's basically a
vehicle for Bill Murray to act totally berserker. And like
I said, they just kind of throw a bunch of
phobias at him. And I think one thing we can
address though, is is it possible for someone to have
multiple diagnoses to have multiple phobias?
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: What feels suspicious about Bob as we get to know
him throughout the movie, though, is it seems like he more.
Speaker 4: Has has.
Speaker 1: Anxiety or perseverates on the idea of having different diagnoses
and phobias that necessarily has them.
Speaker 2: And he gets over them too fast, he gets over them.
Speaker 4: Well that's the biggest way.
Speaker 2: Absolutely.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's definitely one of the biggest problems in terms
of what they're displaying to us, as though as though
this ten minute conversation could do anything for someone with
as as ill as he is supposed to be presenting.
Speaker 2: Right, which.
Speaker 3: It points to CD for him, right, And if you
have multiple diagnoses, what you're describing is that he's worried
that he has the things. Yeah, but he doesn't actually
have them. And yes, problems with the movie that oh, look,
there's magic, but I think the movie's making fun of
that more than presenting that is real. Yeah, but if
Bob were a real person and he was displaying constant
worry that he has these disorders but then gets over
them quickly and just plays up to them, I don't
know that plays up to them isn't quite the right word,
because he's genuinely distressed. Like I don't think Bob doesn't
seem to present his fictitious disorder, which used to be
called Munchausen's.
Speaker 2: Okay, I don't buy that one quite well.
Speaker 1: Maybe what we can do right now is a little
psycho ed one on one about what Bob could actually
be presenting with because one thing is, yeah, you're talking
about Munchausen. I could see people positing that while watching
this movie. What makes you think that's not that?
Speaker 3: I think with Munchausen's people play into that almost an
unaware kind of way. There's like an intentionality, there's an
intention of a drivenness to it, and they believe they're ill.
And Bob, I think, worries that he's ill, but doesn't
necessarily believe it. He's trying not to get things, and
he's coming up with rituals to do to avoid them.
My good example of a ritual he clearly has is
when he starts talking about being afraid that he has turets. Yes,
but then he starts acting like he has turets to
prevent himself fro getting threats. That would be an example
of an obsession, yeah and a compulsion.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're right, because if he had like fictitious or
like Munchausen, he would just be saying I have tourettes.
Speaker 4: Correct and he'd be acting as if he had turets.
Speaker 2: He would. But what we're talking aboubout not afraid of it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but what.
Speaker 1: We're talking about is actually a version of OCD. I
don't think people know a lot about which is OCD
can present as an obsessive worry that you have something
like I've had people worry they weren't actually suicidal, but
they were worried they'd be suicidal. And that can be
something you have to be careful about differentiating as a therapist,
like do you are you actually experiencing SI societal ideation
or are you just having intrusive thoughts about like oh god,
what if I grab that knife and cut myself?
Speaker 4: Which is different?
Speaker 2: Is different?
Speaker 3: What makes yeah OCD it in particular show up like
this is the obsession is the worry that something's wrong,
and the compulsion is seeking reassurance.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because what the client I'm thinking of would ask
a lot of questions. They would go to It was
a younger client, so they would go to their parents
and ask them a bajillion questions over and over again,
like will I really do that?
Speaker 4: Will I really hurt myself? And so you're right, like
there is.
Speaker 1: The thought, and then the accompanying behavior to try to
feel safe if possible.
Speaker 3: And he seems to be aware that it's ridiculous, which
is another thing that makes it point away from fictitious disorder.
Speaker 2: He's not convinced he has something.
Speaker 3: But where we do see is that Bob displays he said,
can people have two yep, and Bob imprints on Leo
like a little baby duck, and clearly imprinted on his
last therapist, and also in prints on Leo's family and
on the elderly couple.
Speaker 2: Although they got they have their own beef the agenda.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was a weird character that I don't think
was necessary. Agree, and they kept like panning to them, yeah,
to get their reaction shots to when bad things would
happen to Leo.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean they're clearly setting Bob on him. They're
encouraging Bob. They sure Leo deflects him and they just
bring him right back.
Speaker 1: They're they're honestly, I can kind of understand, Yeah, someone
who can engage in pettiness. They're like, you need somewhere
to stay, you can stay with us, Bob.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: But what we do see Bob displays his dependent personality disorder.
He is unsure of what his identity is without someone
else validating that, without being attached to somebody else. Leo
is the greatest doctor that's ever existed, and he can't
possibly do anything without him. And he gets so scared
when he finds out Leo's going on vacation that he
acts like he's the insurance police and tracks him down
by getting the call center to tell him where doctor
Marvin is.
Speaker 2: And watching that scene just made me scream in my
head goes like, oh my god, that might actually work.
Speaker 1: I know. I feel kind of bad for the for
the Answering Service because you don't think people are going
to act like that in real life, you know what
I mean, like.
Speaker 4: Be that out of pocket.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so I can see where you would accidentally do
something even feels so awful.
Speaker 4: After the fact, I felt really bad.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, agreed. And just the fact that he that
was so that was just so wild. All of that
part was so incredibly wild. And then faking that he
completed suicide in order to oh because when he when
he goes to the and he says he killed himself,
that's why.
Speaker 4: We're investigating it. Yeah, Yeah, Which that's.
Speaker 1: Another thing where because I think what you were starting
to say earlier, Ben is someone who has these phobias,
genuinely has these phobias, wouldn't be able to overcome them
enough to stalk their therapist to his vacation exactly. Like
this movie tries to kind of bullshit that, Yeah, I
like him having a hard time getting on the bus
and stuff, but he gets over all that stuff so
quickly in his pursuit of Leo.
Speaker 2: He does.
Speaker 3: I mean, he clearly made everybody on the bus miserable,
so he's actively trying. But because he's on such a mission.
But like I didn't explain fictitious disorder enough, and with
factitious disorder, he'd be doing it for the attention. He'd
be faking the illness to get the attention, and you're
going to great lengths to do so. I don't see
that in Bob. I'd accept the mental health soup argument
where they played some aspects of that, but I don't
feel like Bob would randomly fake symptoms. At moments where
things got tough, he just kept singing the praises of
how doctor Marvin's the only person who can fix it,
and displayed blatantly inappropriate Bonker's behavior, but it didn't seem
like he played up symptoms to get the attention. He
just soaked up all the attention he could get, but
didn't use his symptoms to get it. And it wasn't
like he looked up a disorder and was faking it.
It seems like he's afraid he has a disorder. So
that's where the separation comes in.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And so this is where I guess, if nothing else,
Bob is a good practice for like differentiating diagnosis, which
is does he have OCD, does he have fictitious Munchausen's,
Does he have dependent personality disorder? Does he just have
like a bunch of random phobias multiphobic personality? I guess
is that we could put it and like we're saying,
the phobia thing kind of falls apart by how easily
is able to overcome them, because I work with people
who have like phobic levels of stuff and it's hard
for It's like they miss important stuffs in their life,
you know what I mean, Like their phobias get in
the way of their functioning of things that really mean
something to them. So the fact that he's able to
push through all of that, so quickly to get all
the way to where Leo is kind of blows the
phobia diagnosis out of the water, right.
Speaker 3: Whereas when we talk about dependent personality disorder, listen to
these traits and tell me if this sounds like Bob.
This is where we do what's called differential diagnosing. Lots
of things have mimicking symptoms, But when I start listening
to these intense, pervasive need to be taken care of,
submissive clinging behavior, extreme fear of separation, this sounds like Bob.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's Bob. Definitely, that makes a lot of sense.
I feel like that's the one that I picked up
on first, besides the phobias. But I really like the
way that you guys are talking about how it's that
he's just so afraid that he has something, because I
think that definitely is a part of a part of
what's going on for him.
Speaker 3: I think when you look at Bob, he does fit
the combination of these two really well, at least as
well as going to a from the early nineties with
Bill Murray being a maniac and apparently he was actually
a maniac on set, and I think the animosity that
Richard Dreyfush shows him was real because he he threw.
Speaker 2: An ashtray at his face. Bill Murray threw it. Bill
Murray was being like a bully in a giant asshole.
Speaker 4: Apparently you know that method. Acting bullshit is bullshit?
Speaker 2: Yeah, it is.
Speaker 3: I don't even know if he was doing that or
just Bill Murray was a maniac at this exact fase
in his career.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 3: I haven't studied up on my Bill Murray history, but
the behavior we see in the film is clearly obsessed
and afraid, but also having a deep need to be
taken care of. But I don't think they overlap. I
don't think Bob is doing all this to fake that
he has something. I think he's genuinely terrified that something's
wrong with him. But it's not inventing shit to be that.
I can see the argument for it, but I don't
think so.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like I would be more open to the idea
that maybe he has some anxiety OCD about having specific
illnesses and maybe also having dependent personality disorder, Like you
can have a personality disorder and have another mental health illness.
I don't know how much people know that either, because
I think people I don't know the modern The current
way of thinking about personality disorders is not very kind.
And the way I kind of hear it be talked
about in the mainstream is, if you have a personality disorder,
nothing's really wrong with you, quote unquote except for your
personality in terms of diagnosing. But actually a lot of
people with personal disorders can have comorbidities with other diagnoses.
So he could be someone who has anxiety and dependent
personality disorder, and anxiety could come out as perseverating on
illnesses to an OCD level.
Speaker 3: Perhaps, Yeah, I certainly see the OCD. He's clearly fixated,
and he has lots of little things that he does,
and we're seeing all of that combined. Like you said,
I think where you're I draw the separation again, is
that in fictitious disorder. The best example we've seen on
that on movies we've done was an it where we
saw Munchausen's by Proxy with the one kid's mom who
was medicating him for anxiety and like making him take
pills and arguing with the doctors and doctor shopping and
manipulating results and telling everybody to get attention that her
son was so sick Bob's not doing any of that.
There's none of the malicious representation. Bob is genuinely terrified
that something's wrong with him. It's just super dependent at
the same time. And that's a real interesting divide in
mental health soup. We've got going on with Bob here.
Speaker 1: Absolutely, And I was just going to add that another
really good example of Munchausen is in the HBO limited.
Speaker 4: Series called Sharp Objects.
Speaker 1: That's another really good portrayal of Munchausen's and the lengths
that someone will go through to prove that their child
is ill.
Speaker 2: Or that they are right.
Speaker 3: And I just don't see it here, but I do
see all the things Brittany was talking about, like he's fixating,
he's worried, he's doing things to make the fear go away.
He's where it's bonkers and that he shouldn't be like that.
That's why he's seeking treatment. But he's also showing some
rigidities and other little tiny rituals, like we see him
jumping cracks on the sidewalk, we see him touching buttons
with a kleenex.
Speaker 1: He walks up the stairs, he goes to the side,
he had to turn sideways to go up the stairs.
Speaker 2: And there's all kinds of little things.
Speaker 3: But I do want to specify too that in differential diagnosis,
there are two obsessive compulsive diagnoses, and people sometimes get
them confused. Obsessive compulsive personality disorder is marked by like
stark rigidity, people that can't tolerate if their pencils are
lined up in a certain way out of their desk,
that it's one's turned a little bit and would have
to have things in order. It almost present a little
bit like we see when there's neurotypical things where people
can't tolerate the break from routines, but it would present
with stark rigidity. Angela from the Office would probably be
a great example of that, like everything has to be
these certain ways, everything needs to be this way, and
she'd be a pretty good TV example of that, and
Jim would be her worst nightmare.
Speaker 1: And I think something that I use as a way
to understand OCPD is that someone who has OCPD, it's
actually very tough to treat.
Speaker 4: Supposedly.
Speaker 1: I've never worked with it myself, but supposedly it's tough
to treat because kind of similar to Angela from the Office,
when people have OCPD, they're more likely to think that
the way they do things is the way you're supposed
to do things, like they're the correct ones, kind of
like type A on steroids.
Speaker 2: Right, and there is no other way? Yeah, so its wrong. Yeah.
Speaker 1: Whereas OCD, there is this awareness that the way that
I'm thinking is not quite sane and it's causing me
to stress. It doesn't feel like it's adding anything to
my life. It's just like getting in the way of stuff.
I would also say, like another diagnosis we probably should
make sure to rule out or talk through is hypochondria,
which is actually somatic disorder or sematics disorder. Why would
we not consider him having that either when we're thinking
about all these things he's worried about having.
Speaker 3: None of the things he's mentioning are medical illnesses. That
would be the top reason why. That one pretty much
ruled itself out of my brain pretty quick, locked right
into dependent personality disorder OCD took me some thinking and
some reading, but locked right into depending I think we
all did us when we were talking offline, We're like,
so he's got dependent personality disorder, right, right, Okay, absolutely,
but hypochondria would have him afraid of disease period, and
he's afraid of germs from touching things and he's doing
things to avoid it, but he's not afraid of illness
in general period, and that he's thinking he's always going
to get sick or is sick, or something's always wrong
with him.
Speaker 2: He's not doing any of those things.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I wanted to just name that because I
could understand listening to this podcast episode and being like,
why aren't they much in hypochondria because he's so fixated
on all these different illnesses that he might have or
that he thinks he has. But Yeah, you're making the
good differentiation, which is that in order to have that
specific diagnosis, it's physical illnesses that you think you're having,
and you can be so concerned that you have these
different illnesses that you can actually give yourself like physical pain,
Like I've worked with people that have like legit back pain,
stuff like that as a result of sematic disorder.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and having a sematic disorder means you're genuinely speaking,
refusing to deal or it's just presenting physically, and if
people aren't processing the emotion, the body then feels the
painful emotion through physical pain and I'm not hearing any
reports of that from Bob. I don't know if you
guys heard, but I didn't catch any of those.
Speaker 1: No, I don't think so, because he doesn't really talk
about any medical any kind of descriptions of physical symptoms
except for when he's being interviewed by Leo initially when
he makes all that list of like dizzyness, nausea. That's
really the only time that he talks about it. He
doesn't really talk about it at any other time of
the film.
Speaker 2: No, I don't think so. I think you're right, Like,
it's just.
Speaker 3: I think we can just wipe that one off of
and like, but it's one we should look at and
going like, but he's afraid of being sick. But nope,
just it's more touching, it's touching dirty things.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's more of those.
Speaker 1: It's more the phobic OCD version of being afraid of
germs or illness. Not so much like I think I
have these things all the time. Because that's actually in it,
that kid ends up kind of getting somatic disorder because
his mom has like the Munchausen right, Like, he starts
to develop his reaction to that, which is probably just
his internal trauma from his mom and being like fucked
over by her and thinking, you.
Speaker 4: Know, nightmare nightmare status guys.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, And with Bob there was something I wanted
to mention with five. I don't remem it was five
or tr OCD got changed. It used to require both
obsessions and compulsions, and it no longer does. People can
have one or the other. Now they do not have
to have both. You do not have to have ritualistic
things that you do. And it used to be in
DSM four that that was locked in. It had to
be both or you could not get this diagnosis. Under
the modern version of this, Bob would be eligible. Under
the past version of this, Bob would be eligible, I think.
But when you see there are people who don't necessarily
perseverate so much. There are people who just compulsively do
things to seek reassurance, and it is they can have
worries without having fixated worries, but still have a compulsive
response to them. So it's where differential diagnosis is important.
And for the love of God, stop diagnosing yourselves with AI.
Speaker 2: Stop it, stop.
Speaker 1: It, We'll stop trying to do it. Here's the thing,
as humans, we don't have all the answers to the universe.
So neither does AI because AI is just because AI
is just to us. They don't know they have all
the answers. Stop it, and it's just like WebMD on
you know, steroids. Yeah, I would say something I also
want to point out about Bob and if we're going
to go off of the dependent personality disorder diagnosis is
something that I think, I'm sure makes us all lean
more towards that. Well, it's a few things, but one
is what's very clear throughout the course of this movie
is how he relates to other people, you know, not
just not just Leo, but his whole family. And a
common component of personality disorders is struggling relationally, struggling to
relate to people in a way that's appropriate. Whether it's
I can't quite relate to people, or I can't quite
figure out relationships, or I don't know how to make friendships,
or I don't know well with him, it's more like
I don't know what's appropriate and what's not. And that's
a big component of Bob throughout this movie is he
doesn't seem to have any social intelligence. He has no
awareness of legit. How scary it would be to show
up at a person's house unannounced that you've only met
once for ten minutes. My clients would understand how unnerving
it would be if they just showed up at my house.
Well one, that they would know where I lived, and
that they would show up at my house unannounced. There's
like that social awareness of how off putting that would
be and also how that would ruin your relationship to
your therapist. And he has he seems to have no
social awareness of how he comes off, of how off
putting he's behaving, and how if he really wants to
work with Theo, I mean, if he really wants to
work with Leo psychiatrically, that he's ruining it by showing
up at his house the way he is.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, there's a zero percent chance Leo's going to
work with him. Even if this movie isn't bonkers.
Speaker 4: There's even if it doesn't end in attempted murder.
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, which got ignored.
Speaker 4: By the way, and then he marries his sister.
Speaker 3: And I guess family just like playing right into it. Yeah,
it's unbelievable, it's outrageous, but yeah, he has no awaren
that lack of awareness actually made me wonder if he's
somewhere on the spectrum with like is like not perceiving
social cues and it's.
Speaker 2: That's where it's mental health too.
Speaker 3: It's real difficult to kind of suss that out of
a Bob shows a lot of autism sectual traits a lot.
Speaker 1: Well, he's also the victim of I feel like this
time in understanding mental health, like autism wasn't even understood
the way we understand it now. They're giving him sort
of the thing that they would do back then, which is,
aren't people with mental health stuff so eccentric and wacky
and weird? And they will just do wacky, weird, eccentric stuff.
Speaker 3: And then we let Bill Murray completely off the chain.
I guarantee he improvised the living crap out of this movie.
Speaker 5: And yeah, but you just you watch it and go like, uh,
that lack of perception that this is weird like that
that seems to go beyond even personality disorder, like the
imprinting and I just needed I needed I needed that,
and the compulsion to do it makes sense, But it
seems like there's something else missing that that would probably cover.
Speaker 3: And you're right, they that wouldn't have been remotely considered.
But he absolutely does not perceive boundaries, anyone's boundaries at all,
And he doesn't seem to recognize or tolerate well being
told no or deviated from his plan, whatever his ideas are.
But that doesn't appear malicious or like premeditated. He seems
like he's just doing stuff like he's He seems like
the embodiment of do I look like a guy with
a plan. I'm just a dog chasing cars. That's what
he seems like he is.
Speaker 1: Don't even don't insult the joker like that, and also,
don't make me say something like that, Okay, got him,
but I hear what you're saying though. Also, and something
we've talked about on different episode odes and why this
is mental health soup, is someone who is as mentally
unwell as Bob would also be so plan oriented, like
the way that he makes the whole, like getting the
outfit and the fake badge together, going to the answering
service office, working the answering operate well, working the operators
the way that he does, like his ability to hold
it together and deceive people. That does not also coincide
with someone who can't seem to leave his apartment without
doing all this ritualistic stuff and can't seem to get
on the bus without making a scene like the movie's
doing that thing that movies do where they're picking and choosing. Also,
where he's ill, and when it works for the plot
for him to be stable and with it, he's with it.
But when it works for a plot to for him
to be totally out there, he's out there. And the
fact that even with the way that he goes about
defrauding the answering service, is that it is also him
practicing some awareness of how the world works and how
I was just thinking the exact same thing that him
being able to do that and engage in and be
charming with them.
Speaker 4: Yeah, that's more antisocial.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like that feels like something completely different. Being able
to be to appear that confident and that comfortable in
that way just doesn't match everything else that we see,
Like it just really doesn't even come close.
Speaker 4: It doesn't. It just doesn't track.
Speaker 3: It's that's where it's difficult to suss out, because right
he's showing like a lack of understanding that you can't
just imprint onto everybody. This is not your family, but
you don't know these people and they're just being kind
to you.
Speaker 2: But this you're not.
Speaker 3: You're not man's house, you're in his pajamas, and that
you came back and now you're playing with the kids.
If that didn't feel so spontaneous and childlike, it would
be way more concerning from Bob. I think it's just
he's really not perceiving it. Where like antisocial would, there'd
be an agenda, it'd be manipulative, be no, you're going
to do this, so you do what I want and
Bob Bob is missing that. I do not see that,
but it's worth looking at because that shit is scary.
Speaker 1: And it then it calls into question like is he
being fake the whole movie? Which is what I which
is what I was just thinking, So that is just
all fucking made up and he's really just a horrible person,
or like when he takes me to the hospital at
the end of the towards the end of the movie
and he's charming all the staff. But I do think
that is where the movie is like picking and choosing
what works for the plot, not necessarily anything that makes sense.
And what we talk about a lot in this podcast
is how it also paints people who are of mental
health disorders in a very negative light, like they can
pick and choose when they're acting ill, that they can
manipulate their diagnoses to get what they want, like when
he calls a narcissist and a psychopath at the end Leo,
which is also bad luck on him because I was like, Uh,
look in the mirror, babe. But it does do the
disservice to people who actually have these diagnoses to make
it seem like they could just pull their shit together
when it works for them and then fall apart when
it does it. And I also think the way that
he engages with Leo's son, Siggy also flies in the
face of when we're talking about like that more nefarious
antisocial behavior, because he does have these moments where with
the kids that seem so genuine and childlike and is
accessing an ability to connect that doesn't line up with
these other things we're talking about.
Speaker 3: It really doesn't, and we're all agreeing here, like it's
it's a little too spontaneous, it's a little too authentic,
it's too genuine there, you're not seeing manipulative acting like
he's a baby or a child to then get something
out of it. It seems like he really just needs
that and is accessing a part of his self that
is hurt more than he's trying to control the situation.
Like he definitely wants care, but he seems to want
care and not understand that what he's doing is bananas.
And that's a really big difference in understanding it and
doing it anyway because you want it and don't care
or can't care. Yeah, I think that that one. We
seem to be in agreement, like it's worth talking, but
now don't see it, Patrick Bateman, that and you know
who else shows some of that stuff, Doctor Lee Marvin.
Speaker 4: So should we take a break here?
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think we've covered Bob. People. I don't have
much else to say about Bob, do you guys?
Speaker 4: I don't think I have anything else to say about Bob?
Speaker 2: No, but what about pop?
Speaker 4: What about Bob?
Speaker 2: What about?
Speaker 4: But about says? Is that the titled movie over and
over again.
Speaker 1: I was like, you gotta be kidding me, you gotta
be kidnaming nineties? Yeah, I was actually the one last
thing I want to say about Bob?
Speaker 2: What about Bob? Brittany?
Speaker 1: Is that what the family does? Maybe it's actually fits
more the next part. But I think also a disservice
this movie does to people similar to Bob is that
it does a different kind of stigmatizing a lot of
the movies you talked about where they have stigma around
people with mental health disorders, especially significant ones like Bob
probably has, is that they're like violent, scary, that kind
of stuff, Right, this movie actually kind of goes too far.
The other direction which it which is also how people
can be treated in a stigmatizing way, is that infant
fantalizing them. Like the mom literally says kids will be
kids about Bob when he shares the room with Siggy,
and I'm like, he's not a fucking kid. They all
talk about him like his brain is like a four
year old's, And that's also very disrespectful.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that they set him up in the room and
like left him with their child has me going like,
what what are you?
Speaker 4: Wild fucking behavior, unrecking.
Speaker 2: Believable couch couch the couch.
Speaker 1: I would be like, I don't care where you sleep,
Get the fuck away from my house.
Speaker 2: Yeah. No, I mean Leo was not wrong for being a.
Speaker 1: Poll well before we get to on that, yeah, let's
take a break care and we'll be right back, all right,
So doctor Leo Marvin, everybody unclench your jaws and let's
swallow them whole. What do we think about, doctor Leo Marvin?
Speaker 2: And you chose to say, we know what?
Speaker 4: He who we would love to swallow whole, Sigmund for aid.
Speaker 2: That is quite evident.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which it's like do we not know? And I
mean that's just typical. Also, like every therapist and psychiatrist
and everybody must be obsessed with Sigmund.
Speaker 3: Freud, especially if they're the expot therapist motto.
Speaker 1: Like you're gonna have a bust of him in your office,
You're gonn name your home only son after.
Speaker 2: Him, and your daughter after his daughter.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, Anna, I knew that. I didn't even catch
that till I was like, I think Anna is also
the name of something else, but I just couldn't remember.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Anna Freud.
Speaker 3: Do you know that he actually a you know, quite
successful uh theorist herself, and her theories on childhood actually
significantly improved and were better than her father's, and like
the dynamic between those two especially.
Speaker 2: We'll talk about the puppets, but.
Speaker 4: Yes, we will talk about the buckets, can't forget.
Speaker 3: The puppets, but the yeah, naming your children after I
mean they were it was really some like on the nose,
like we're really going to lean into how unwell Leo
Marvin is and obsessed himself.
Speaker 1: Well, and also this betrayal, which like I said, is
up top, is not unfortunately a typical of this time
period that all people in mental health spaces like his
are these elitist money grubbers who write books and who
are like just trying to hawk their wares, and they
all want to become some like psychological celebrity with their
own modality that makes them famous like baby steps. Is
his right, this idea that also well, this is an
idea that also encourages us to not trust therapists, not
trust mental health providers because we're out, we're out, we're
in it for our own gain, which is hilarious because
actually a lot of therapists and stuff don't make a
lot of money, especially early especially or ever some or
ever some times. But he's probably I bet you he's
the kind of psychiatrist so that takes no insurance.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, it's all which.
Speaker 1: Is like, then how do you get someone like Bob,
who I can't imagine has a lot of money and
resources given where we see him living.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think, you know, understanding even what plans
would have covered mental health back then is something we're
all a little just too young to know or understand.
Since the ACA, they all have to which means prior
to the ACA they did not. So therapists only charging
cash would have been much more common.
Speaker 2: And now it's kind of.
Speaker 3: A small percentage of people are like, look, i'll give
you a super bill, but I'm not messing around with insurance.
And people that have written books and are super fancy
and downtown offices might be a little more likely to
follow that model, but it's not nearly as common.
Speaker 2: But I wonder what it was in ninety one.
Speaker 1: But I think off the rip, we need to talk
about what we see him do that is unethical. One
is the idea, Well one, this interview intake that's only
five and a half minutes or whatever where totally insane. Yeah,
so that's like Also, if he's billing Bob for that
whole hour, that's shitty, Like whatever he's billing Bob on
top of giving him a book and billing him for
the book. Billing him for the book is crazy, crazy crazy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, totally sued.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And it's okay to give a client a book
you wrote. It's okay to offer a book for sale.
What is not okay is to give a book and
then charge for it later, where a client might feel
compelled to pay and feel like they might have to
pay or they won't be seen. And that is unethical.
That would be very very unethical and shady behavior. And
Leo clearly obsessed with the book and just well, I mean, obviously.
Speaker 2: I wrote it, so I have to charge for it. No,
you don't. You can eat that cost. You should never do.
Speaker 1: That, even just writing him off the way that he does,
writing him off the way that he does, ending the session,
giving him this one note answer for all of his problems.
Like an intake usually takes at least and sometimes an
intake takes several sessions, Like an intake can take a
long time, Diagnosing somebody with a personality disorder with meeting
them within the first ten minutes is unethical. Personality disorders
take time to diagnose because it's a lot of relational
it's a lot of behaviors, and so it takes time
to really get a good idea of why somebody is
engaging the behavior they're engaging in. So personality disorders, you
don't unless somebody comes in with that diagnosis. That's not
a diagnosis that you just offhandedly give to someone after
talking to them for five to time minutes.
Speaker 3: No, and frankly would I have to cover with baby
therapists all the time. Is we can't diagnose those at
our level of licensure. You have to do testing or
be a psychiatrist to diagnose personality disorders. You have to
have evidence for these, and we are not qualified to
diagnose those. There are limited number of things we're not
qualified to diagnose. Most we are. But we're saying a
character in a movie displays these traits, but we would
not diagnose a real person with dependent personality disorder. We
would refer them to testing or a psychiatrist to make
that because you cannot. I can't say you can't make
that diagnosis in four minutes. And you Leo Marvin set
himself up for Bob by portraying himself as a god
who can answer him with baby steps and read my
book and like just baby steps, like just just baby steps,
Like how do I stop all this stuff, baby steps,
leaving Bob with the impression that he can be cured
so quickly, all because they wanted to go on vacation.
Speaker 1: Another reason why him charging him for the book is
unethical is because he is taking advantage of the power
dynamic between him and the client, because he knows that
the client, like you were saying, Ben, like the client
might feel compelled to pay for the book and not
say anything about it. So taking advantage or taking advantage
of the client like that is what he's doing.
Speaker 4: So I feel like between that and he's just horrible.
Speaker 2: I don't even I.
Speaker 1: Don't even know what else to say. Like, just his
the again, that expert model that like I am. I
think he does think he is god. I really do
think that that's how he feels about it, or at
least he's a god about this book or whatever. Well,
he definitely likes the smell of his own farts and
he washed that shit. Oh he's just he's bottling it
and inhaling.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: He's like President Schloob from Spaceballs, like when he's got
the air in a can.
Speaker 2: But that's his own farce. He's just like.
Speaker 1: I love Balls as a kid, But yeah, I think
a good point that you're both bringing up that I
hadn't really thought of, but is a part of the
ethical nature of our work and the pardynamic of our work,
and why having an ego when you do our work
is one of the worst things you can have as
a therapist, because one, it keeps you from learning and growing,
like having an ego and anything does. And then two,
it allows you to make more mistakes than you would
typically make.
Speaker 4: And a big.
Speaker 1: Mistake he makes is putting, like you said, putting himself
in this position with Bob as a oracle figure. It's
like that he has all the answers and then throwing
him out the door.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: And also something too, which I think displays his ego
and I think can be a common misunderstanding of mental
health practitioners, is that almost we can read your aura
and know, like immediately what's wrong with you. The way
he says multifo personality with acute separation, anxiety and like
a need for family connection or something like, how the
fuck would you get all of that from talking to
him for four minutes? Could you make an argument that
he's someone that's getting referred from another practitioner, and maybe
that's why he knows he did no, but he didn't
get any info from that guy yet because he literally
referred him and then like thirty minutes later, Bob's at
his door, so he also it wasn't even long enough
for him to get the chart, if you will, from
the other practitioner, to have something to build on, because
the only way that would fly is if he was
just piggybacking on the diagnosis that was already made by
the previous therapist or psychiatrist.
Speaker 4: But he doesn't even have that.
Speaker 1: He literally meets Bob for five seconds and makes these
sweeping assumptions, but they don't talk about BOP's past. They
don't talk about his family issues, Like that's also stuff
you'd need to know if you were going to make
any assumptions about his familial bonding about separation anxiety, Like
it's so wild, how far reaching it is. But there
are mental health practitioners who fucking walk around like that,
I'm not gonna look, that's not true. Like there are
some that really do like the smell of their own
farts and think that they can like eyeball a bitch
and like know everything that's wrong with them and you
Sometimes you see those on social media like this is
where I also will you know as we're shitting on
AI also will shit on social media.
Speaker 4: Mental health practitioners.
Speaker 2: Yeah, pop psychology, Yeah, who will porn? Which is what
we do. It's different. Yeah, this is about movies.
Speaker 1: But these are the kind of people that will make
a stitch on social media about maybe real people on
a on a like a reality show and be like
they have this, this, this and this, and I'm like,
you don't know that you haven't talked to this per
at length. You're not there, You're not their doctor or
their therapist. And those people also feel this misunderstanding that
we as therapists have this almost psychic ability to read
someone within like a conversation.
Speaker 3: Which, newsflash, we don't. Can we pick up on your aura, yes,
yes we can. Can we figure out okay, something's going
on here?
Speaker 2: Yes?
Speaker 3: But are we also using trained and practiced I at
watching your effect, how you say things, what makes you squirm,
what makes you tense, what changes your facial expression, your tone,
what causes micro emotional releases or expressions? Yes, because we
also have sat for thousands of hours with people and
studying this, and we're trained on how to watch for
the changes that are displayed. So there's a lot of
unconscious movements that people do that we watch. But anybody
that's saying I can fix you versus let's see if
we can help but that will figure it out, is
a clue to stay the flock away, or.
Speaker 1: That I can talk to you for five minutes, I
know you have mommy issues or some shit, you know
what I mean, Like I can see within you and
I know everything that's up with you. Yeah, it's so
wild to make any of those to make any of
those assumptions about a client. I think it's wild that
therapists are diagnosing people who are on reality TV shows,
like besides the fact that they are in a very
specific environment and it's probably scripted, Like you literally have
no idea this person could be. We could be only
getting cuts of this one way that they act, like
what the fuck are you even talking about? You have
absolutely no idea what is going on? And thinking that
and telling somebody that you have the answer and that
you already know what it is and that you can
help and read this book and then you'll be fine
is wild and is completely unethical.
Speaker 4: It's unhelpful, it's.
Speaker 1: Unkind like it is what are you doing in this
field if you think you know everything, because babe, you
don't know shit.
Speaker 3: And learning what you don't know is the first thing
that we're all taught by any good supervisor we ever
had is okay, the first thing I want you to
learn and tell me is what you don't know. I mean,
you guys have worked with me in that capacity, and
I probably can echo this is that because I had
good supervisors. It's the supervisor I become as I'll sit
with people and if I'm interviewing you, I'm like, I
want to know why you do this. I want to
know what you're good at, and I want to know
what you're not good at. I want you to know
that because you need to know how to to clients
who you are and how you fit in the salad
of therapy. As a tomato, you are not an end
all be all, and people are like, oh no, I'm
good at everything, Like bye, yeah, I'm not okay. So
your homework is to go home. If I wasn't in
charge of hiring your homework, because I would not hire
that person. But you're your homework is to go home
and tell me what you're not good at and what
you don't know, because you don't. And none of us understand.
The education we get on a great number of things
in school does not remotely prepare you for reality. It
prepares you to open your mind to learn and start seeing,
but not be ready. And people are like.
Speaker 2: No, I'm a LBC, I just graduated. I'm ready to
treat trauma. Bye.
Speaker 4: You don't know what you're talking about, babes, We don't know.
Speaker 1: Well. The social media therapist is probably the modern day
version of this. Yeah, like Leo yes, Like they're the
modern day version of like giving therapists a bad name,
acting like they know every thing, doing it because they
like attention, yeah, and seeming like they're a genius yeah,
and liking the yeah, the power and the attention that
that gives them, then actually practicing ethically right.
Speaker 3: And you know, I think hopefully people are hearing us say,
even though we're doing media stuff, that what we're not
doing and what we've never done is diagnosed real people. Yeah,
And we've never offered comments on real people. We might
say like fuck that person, but not a formal opinion
or diagnosis. And I think it's critical to recognize the
difference between We're looking at movies that show us a
pretty intimate look into someone for two hours and give
you an opportunity to explore an accelerated time frame that
was deliberately crafted, but talking to real people is different.
And the way people present on shows, yes, Hannah is
it's it's scripted and or in couraged. I had a
friend who was a producer on The Bachelor, like brag, No, yes, brag,
all right, where's shit to throw a Brittany I need?
Speaker 2: Well?
Speaker 1: And also too, it just makes us look bad as
a as a as a provider.
Speaker 4: It makes us just look bad as a profession.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and people don't realize that you're the attention you're
drawing to yourself is for the wrong reasons.
Speaker 1: And you can and you can smell the bullshit like
you can smell clear bullshit. Well, you can smell like
the It just also just belittle trust in what we do. Yeah,
and that it makes people think that therapists or psychiatrists
get into that work because they get they get the
rocks off right in some capacity.
Speaker 3: All right, So clearly we have some opinions on a
doctor Marvin type and some of the stuff we've seen
in really but let's take a quick break here and
we'll talk a little bit more about some of the
things that might be driving Leo.
Speaker 2: So Leo Marvin.
Speaker 3: Clearly, we've hinted that we have some opinions that we're
seeing some things that drive him.
Speaker 2: What's his deal?
Speaker 1: I mean, I think his deal is that he enjoys
the status of being a psychiatrist, But I don't know
how much he actually enjoys the ethical work of it,
like the the humbling part of the work, which is
that you are like a in my opinion, you are
like a social like social serving kind of you know
what I mean. Like you are you are a provider
to the.
Speaker 4: People if you will.
Speaker 1: And it's not it shouldn't be about a claim because
you get in your own way, like we've been talking about.
And it also stifles you because I'll tell you this,
baby steps, as he explained, it is booboo like baby
steps is like CBT one oh one bullshit. It's nothing
revolutionary as he's described it.
Speaker 3: No, and even by nineteen ninety one, CBT came out.
In what the seventies, CBT and RBT came out around
the same time the cognitive based things, and I think
RBT was first, and then CBT. I think RBT was
in the sixties, the late sixties, and CBT early seventies
or around the same time. But either way, this should
have been out for thirty years by this point, and
he's absolutely not making anything revolutionary. But he certainly seems
to be interested in surrounding himself with people that will
provide an sense of grandiosity and self or otherwise obtained
a grandization. And those start to sound a little bit
like diagnostic words, do they not? What other things do
we see from good old doctor Marvin. Do we see
a pattern of grandiosity over one need for admiration, Yeah,
a lack of empathy for others, particularly his son and
Bob and the what's the name of the family?
Speaker 4: Oh, I don't remember.
Speaker 1: I just put down the local community hates Leo, but
like the Bonnets or the Bennetts or something something like that.
Speaker 3: But you know, we're seeing grandiose self of a sense
of self importance. Does anyone think Leo is better than
Leo thinks Leo.
Speaker 1: Is, well, yeah, he definitely thinks he knows everything and
well because also what's blinding him this whole movie. Is
he so fixated on this Good Morning America interview and
what it means to his book. And he was comparing
himself to other people that have had these fancy situations happen.
I can't remember who exactly he references, but doctor Ruth. Okay,
keep saying doctor doctor Ruth also did an interview from
her home or some sand vacation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and she sucks, does she something like that? Yeah?
Speaker 4: I thought that was your opinion.
Speaker 1: No, I don't really know anything about doctor Ruth having
firm opinion on her.
Speaker 2: No, he he is like trashing her a little bit.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's like no one can be better than him either.
Speaker 3: He only belongs in the elite company and he's the best,
and he's most fixated on upholding that.
Speaker 1: And also like naming his kid Sigmund. So he's already
setting up his kid, his son, to be a vessel
for his own interests, his own identity. You know, he's
he's already setting his kid up to not be his
own person by giving him the name one of the
most famous specific names there are.
Speaker 4: There's not like a lot of kids running around named Sigmund.
Speaker 2: Not in America. No, I've never heard.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so also not thinking about the position he's putting
his kid in by naming him. What's sicky is cute,
but that's still like not common.
Speaker 3: So I'm starting to detect We're circling something here, what
might be?
Speaker 2: What is it we might be circling here?
Speaker 4: Our scissistic personality disorder?
Speaker 3: What a grandiose self of self importance do we have that?
Speaker 4: Yes?
Speaker 3: Preoccupied with fantasies of unlimited success, power, brilliance. Yes, yeah,
not so much beauty or ideal love, but the other ones, Uh,
belief that they are special and can only be understood
by others, special or high status people.
Speaker 4: Yeah, oh yeah for sure.
Speaker 1: The way he talks to his family too, Yeah, like
they're all below.
Speaker 3: Him, require excessive admiration, absolutely, sense of entitlement, color perscon
take advantage of others to achieve their own ends.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, does that what the book think? In
the beginning of the book and also the whole his
lack of comprehension about why the community hates him, like
when he yells at that couple, all.
Speaker 2: Right, every right to buy this house, to buy this.
Speaker 1: House, like, having no concept of why he's I mean,
it's the same thing we talk about with Bob, which
is like this true like disconnect about how they make
other people feel and how to relate to people.
Speaker 3: Lack of empathy, believes others are envious of them, although
the couple is actually envious of him. But you know,
show arrogant or haughty behaviors or attitudes.
Speaker 1: Absolutely couldn't be haughtier in those socks and those short shorts.
Speaker 2: What about the bucket head?
Speaker 1: The bucket I was a lot and I yeah, I
think the whole diving situation with his son is such
a good example of this. Like you are a psychotherapist,
is how he portrays himself like a psychiatrist who does therapy.
And yet the way that you're engaging with your son
is not the way you're supposed to talk to a
kid or anyone who's scared to do something. Is basically
just like strong arming them and like berating them.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's not being super encouraging, and even when he is,
his patience runs out very quickly. And it's more about
how the son reflects on him and whether or not
he's able to help his son be successful than it
is about his son being scared.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's not about I want my kid to overcome
this fear of diving because it'll help him feel actualized
and empowered. It's yeah, the way he behaves is like,
it looks bad on me that I have a son
who can't dive. Who gives a shit if you're a
kid can dive.
Speaker 4: Such a weird thing to want, but that's what to do. People.
Speaker 1: Ye, they get stuck on things, start mean things to
them that don't make any sense, set or just kind
of seem random.
Speaker 3: What also seemed like he made it unless I'm inventing it.
He made a comment about because of the school his
son goes to that this is like a thing that
people do there and they have diving, and like they're
in high society and you know, your son might be
an Olympian or get scholarships or whatever. But it's like,
you know, it's like it's a crew or polo or
you know, yeah, I expected things at some private academy
that has ivy on the fence.
Speaker 1: Well, he definitely Well, they make it very clear in
the movie that he's one of those parents that was
waiting to have a version of a son that he
was a speculating he would have. They're not actually getting
to know the son they actually have, the child they
actually have.
Speaker 4: Because Siggy is wearing he's like a little.
Speaker 1: Goth, you know what I mean, Like he's wearing all
black outside my favorite.
Speaker 4: I do love him.
Speaker 1: I love him and this Annon hook. This kid's attitude
is my favorite. Yeah, he was just like fuck all, y'all.
And and he's obsessed with death. He's kind of neurotic already.
Like he is not an outdoor kid. He's not an
outdoor kid. He's an indoor kid.
Speaker 2: He's listening to the cure. Guys.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he's an indoor kid. And his dad doesn't either
care about that, doesn't perceive that, disregards it. Like I
feel like he doesn't even perceive it. I feel like
he doesn't even look at his son truly, do you
know what I mean? Puppet, Yeah, wearing all black.
Speaker 4: Look back at that puppet. Is it time to talk
about the puppets? Guys?
Speaker 2: It might be time to talk about the puppets.
Speaker 3: So three was like, okay, two one, what the Hannah fuck?
Speaker 1: The puppets are so crazy, like so creepy weird, and
like I know that's the point, but yeah, well and
Brittany brought up as we were walking in, she brought up.
Having them displayed like that in that way is also
very odd.
Speaker 4: Like having them on the mantle. Having them on the mantle.
Speaker 1: Basically he just uses it to try to get them
to believe him. Well, he uses it. It's like instead
of being able to have like a hard heeart with
his daughter, he got to bring the puppet out. It's
like he can't get there with his daughter unless they're
using the puppets as a which is also like, roxy,
how are you a psychiatrist? If you don't, what are
you doing? Well, he thinks he knows what he's doing right,
Like he has he has convinced himself. I assume that
using the puppets is the correct psychological way to get
at quote unquote hard conversations instead of using actual social
skills social intelligence, emotional intelligence, which is one that your
daughter is way too.
Speaker 4: Fucking old to my using puddets.
Speaker 1: Two that she's out in the world you guys are
like out at like the docks and stuff doing this,
and then three like oh out in public, two public
like a seventeen year old oor and just that that
actually like gets in the way of the situation. But
he's doing that thing people can do when they're up
thrown butt, which is they everything that they're using that
might actually be like an avoidance or like a crutch
or something like that, is them having like a great idea.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I think we're the writing on this is brilliant.
In particular is that I think what this really is
it's a I think it's a double joke because the
director is Frank Oz, who is one of the most
famous puppeteers in the world. He does Miss Piggy and Yoda,
and Sam Niagle is a classic Henson guy. Him and
Jim Henson were like the ones and twos of muppets,
but also anaphroid used puppets all the time. So there's
like a double self referencing joke here that the daughter's
name is Anna and he's making her use puppets, and
she used puppets. Although again with we covered Andofhoid was
actually a brilliant child therapist. She pioneered a lot of
work and some of her stuff is still used. But
she would use toys to and puppets to help people
talk and do one baby whisper or one dollar whisper
at a time which I think we're really tying into
some meta jokes here, which fits the throne of this movie.
But as you see that also like the ick that
you get from like, oh my god, can you imagine
being a teenager and your dad being outside in short
shorts all those ninety one so that probably is common,
but still a teenager having your dad make you talk
to him with a puppet outside where people are boating
and looking at you because they have nothing fucking else
to do, because they're not a boring ass lake.
Speaker 1: I would take that puppet and crush it and say,
this is what you can do with your puppet.
Speaker 4: Asshole.
Speaker 1: Well, for me, that puppet wouldn't exist any longer, But
at that time I was set. By the time I
was seventeen, I would have destroyed that puppet in some capacity.
I would have lit it on fire. We're thrown it away,
we're up to apart. Maybe would have made a new one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, But I think also there's a nice lake right there.
I mean, it's just so apad.
Speaker 1: I would have been like, you've got to be goddamn
crazy if you think I'm about to talk like That's
also something that's so interesting about this movie weird. Interesting
is how much his family just goes along. They're so
appeasing of everybody and so appeasing of him, Like the
only one who really pushes back is Siggy, and the
how like submissive almost like his I maybe we could
get into a whole thing with that, like mom and daughter.
I mean his wife and daughter are But also I
think he does that thing which also I think sometimes
happens in real life, but I think it is also
a tell is when someone like him puts on their
therapist hat to talk to people in their personal life.
You know, like that's also totally distancing behavior. Though that's
that's me saying I can't relate to you interpersonally, so
I'm going to put on my therapist mask to talk
to you. So it's a way to hide. And so
it's actually like a distancing technique, a distancing strategy. It's
not an intimacy strategy. And that's why, as people in
my personal life probably know, like I don't, therapists me
and person me are different, not me being like a
whole different fake person. I'm a therapist, but the way
I talk to clients, it's not the way I talk
to people in my personal life because that would be
I think, one, patronizing, but two it's like a distancing thing,
like I'm putting myself in a different space than you.
I'm removing myself from you personally. By putting on a
therapist's voice. Was also very demeaning and and you can
feel very cold, like if I was his daughter, I'd
be like, talk to me like a fucking like you're
my fucking dad. Like That's what pissed me off, maybe
even more than the puppets is put that puppets away,
because that means you're gonna be talking to me like
doctor Marvin and not my fucking dad.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he's not winning here.
Speaker 3: It's it's really disturbing, creepy behavior, and you can see
that he's struggling to connect, which yet again rings true
of personality disorders, because you narcissistic personality disorder people are
people that have that. One of the things that they're
truly struggling with. Underneath all that is a deep fear
that they are inadequate. And they go through all this
effort and get completely intolerant of being exposed, and the
behavior can ramp up drastically. You know, usually not to
the point of tying bombs or on your patient's neck
and trying to blow them up.
Speaker 1: But it is it is a clever way to hide,
like it's a clever way to hide that you are struggling,
that you are having in inadequacy, you know, like by
putting on his expert hat. This also is like in
Crueltians when in the very beginning with that therapist when
her daughter's like, don't fucking talk to me, Like, I'm
one of your fucking patients. And there are people that
do that, Like I've been around enough therapists that I
have run into therapists that I've tried to get to
know personally that do that shit, and it puts me off.
And I'm in the field, you know what I mean.
And so I think, if nothing else, the fact that
he has those puppets about his family, I think just
says so much about how he he acts like the
family therapist, the family psychiatrist, and not like their dad,
which is also probably why he doesn't have a lot
of actual clout when something like Bob happens where he
because one thing that I can't understand about Leo is
he's not wrong with how much he's like, Bob is
not well, why are you hanging with Bob? Bob can't
sleep in our son's room, Bob has to go home,
Bob can't go voting with you. Like, he's not wrong,
but I think he has demoralized his position in the
family so much that they don't take him seriously in
that way.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think you're right. I think that they're so
sick of that expert model that they're just even passively
resisting it. And they're like, nah, Bro, we don't even care.
Like Bob's nice, Bob is fun. I think that was
the thing that they like used it and like Bob
is fun and and I can be fun.
Speaker 2: I'm fun? Am I fun?
Speaker 1: Well he's using he's using their whole vacation as like
to get ready for his photo shoot interview, Like their
vacation gets co opted by by that too, which I
feel like also a teenager, the two kids would have
more of us think about that in real life too,
like fuck you, we don't even have a real vacation.
You're just I'm a prop right, his daughter is not
mean enough. I could really pump that.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, oh yeah for sure.
Speaker 3: Oh and the one thing that the daughter said, I
am thinking about this having an eight year old and
a two year old, like or having eight year old
and two year od daughters. Right when he was like
asking them about like should I put the gun up
or like the Puppets or like the bust or whatever,
and like I about fell out of my chair laughing
when she was like, no, Day, you should put up
the gun. It makes you like it, but it communicates virility,
Like what teenager would.
Speaker 4: That in Cosmo?
Speaker 3: But what what teenager would say that with a degree
of encouragement and not roasting your bitch ass. And I'm like, yeah,
maybe it's clear you're having some virility problems. Maybe you
should use the gun. That I could see a teenage
girl saying to a parent not oh yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah. That totally was like, I mean, I know it's
a joke, but like, goddamn well.
Speaker 1: And also, if he really is someone with NPD and
we don't know, I mean, he goes he literally has
like a psychotic break in this movie, you.
Speaker 2: Know, but oh yeah, he goes catatonic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but if he's someone that maybe does have tantrums
fits whatever at home, which would be more aligned with
someone who actually has NPD.
Speaker 4: Then you could argue that, like.
Speaker 1: All these responses that his wife and daughter giving him
specifically is like fawning, right, they're just trying to appease him,
make him feel good, because if dad feels good, then
it's chill and he makes money. So we'll just, you know,
we'll just focus on the fact that he provides for
us when we get nice stuff, and we'll just suck
up to him so that everything's copastic. We'll use his
fucking puppets when he wants to use the fucking puppets.
Speaker 2: I don't think you're wrong. I don't think you're slightly wrong.
Speaker 3: I think that's a very relevant perspective here, because they
are trying to survive too, and if he's going to
be ridiculous and level up, and maybe I don't know,
ty gunpowder satchels around their necks, if they're not compliant,
maybe it's easier to compliment them.
Speaker 1: I will say there were a few things that he
does do that I wanted to highlight as provider appropriate,
you know, because this movie does that thing where I
think they try to legitimize him by having him do
enough things that an actual provider would do.
Speaker 2: In the beginning in the.
Speaker 3: First beginning second acts of the movie, absolutely when he's like, yeah.
Speaker 1: Like he provides a temporary provider for Bob when he's
going to go on vacation. He's like, you can talk
to doctor et cetera while I'm on vacation.
Speaker 4: Which is something that you do, especially when you.
Speaker 1: Have clientele that you know need someone they can reach
out to, like they're more crisis oriented or high level,
Like even if you're going to go away for like
a long weekend, you might need to provide a touch
person that they can get in contact with, especially someone
who's unknown to him supposedly like Bob. He also tells
Bob to go to the er when he first calls him,
right when he's on vacation, and he's like he tries
to have boundaries with him in the beginning, which isn't
bad either. And I will say him pointing out that
it was a positive when Bob made it all the
way to the vacation home would also be something I
could see me doing, Well, you know, it's great that
you made it all the way here, like with your
recophobia and stuff, like framing them as a positive and
then also trying to set boundaries again, like go home, Bob. Yeah,
but go home, Bob, I'll.
Speaker 2: Call you in three hours. Yeah.
Speaker 1: But something he doesn't do, which I think is more
the movie than necessarily even anything about Leo, unless you
guys think differently, is no one takes Bob seriously enough.
Like if I was in Leo's position and I had
a client who was new to me, who's already done
all this like stocky stuff to me, and my family's there,
like the fact that like there's no conversation around, like Bob,
if you don't go, I will have to call the police,
Like you have to show me that you have control
over yourself. You know, someone like Bob would probably get
hospitalized very quickly into the and then there wouldn't be
a movie. But someone presenting like Bob with their psychiatrists
would get hospitalized. Oh well he got hospitals out of
spite very late into the movie.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, he got hospitalized.
Speaker 1: And there's no and maybe this is the ego part
of Leo, but there's no urgency around how what is
actually concerning about Bob is how unpredictable he is, how
far he's willing to go. He's an unknown quantity to
Leo other than what he's showing Leo, which is that
I don't have boundaries. I don't know when to say no,
I don't accept no as an answer. I don't know
how far I'll go hang out with you, I'll go
find your kids if I can't have access to you.
And that is really troubling, and Leo gives him a
lot of opportunities to turn it around and he doesn't.
Speaker 3: True, But because the movie is the movie, I do
feel like in this there's like some interesting caveats. Is
that Bob did comply, but Bob was easily tilted back
by the old married couple and his daughter because remember
Bob was just gonna walk.
Speaker 2: Bob left.
Speaker 3: He did comply, and the daughter picked him up all
by herself.
Speaker 2: That was her own doing, and that you know, like
looped things back in which.
Speaker 3: If it were my daughter and also surrounded forever, that
feels bizarre too.
Speaker 1: And maybe it's the nineties, I don't know, but I
feel like nowadays so weird. If I was with my
family and someone that they knew was one of my
clients just shut up out of the blue and was
acting against what I was saying to them, I think
they'd be more troubled than like curious or like hey, Bob,
don't get discouraged. They would be like, uh, we saw
that guy on the street. You might need to call
the cops, or you might have to call someone because
I think he needs help.
Speaker 2: Correct.
Speaker 3: I think i'd have, you know, probably need to come
over with a handsdal from my wife. That means immediately
call the police. Let's take a break. How have we
not talked about the fact that Bob said he was
fucking dead. Then Leo got the call that Bob killed
himself and he's like.
Speaker 4: Oh that okay, I gotta be real.
Speaker 1: That made me laugh when he because because it's supposed
to make you laugh, right, when Leo gets that call
and he says, oh to his wife that kind of
his head kill himself, Okay, Like I did laugh because
it was so absurd, like the the mood change or
the mood shift. But I think that just says more
about Leo and his bullshit.
Speaker 2: Leo like his response.
Speaker 4: His response is insane.
Speaker 3: It's insane, it's super narcissistic, like all all but got
to get my beauty sleep for the interview.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like it just sees my brain and I do
think there's a certain level of compartmentalizing we do at
this job because you kind of have to. But even
if I only met with someone once, it would still
like shake me like that would probably if nothing else,
lay awake in bed for like another hour, just kind
of thinking about it.
Speaker 3: Let me speak to someone that does has happened to
all of those things. And it was the real deal
for me. I got I had seen a person once
and that was it. And Leo's response was ridiculous, we'd
get messed up that even if you only see one once,
you won't feel responsible. But still you're not going to
just be like clap on, clap off. No, it's gonna
mess you up, and you're gonna wonder and you're gonna
be anxious and upset. And if you have any degree
of empathy as a human, you know, somebody died and
you probably won't feel like you could help them if
you're a reasonable human. But it's still going across your
mind and you're gonna be able to talk yourself out
of it the first you know, five minutes, you're gonna
be oh my god, what did I miss?
Speaker 2: And Leo's just like, well.
Speaker 1: That was definitely a point in the rioting to show
us that Leo is a bus of shits.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and also that.
Speaker 1: He says, well, we're not gonna let it ruin our
vacationer the bar.
Speaker 4: Fuck yeah, that quick.
Speaker 1: I don't fucking think so, Bro, you would be I
would be a fucking wreck.
Speaker 2: No, I would be a wreck.
Speaker 4: How could you not be?
Speaker 2: Well?
Speaker 4: And also because no.
Speaker 3: You get messed up with human you can associated. I
associated for a bit, I bet, like when I happened again,
I felt terrible. But anybody I know that that's happened
to because it will happen to all of us. They
tell you in school, is gonna happen to you. And
that Leo was such a piece of shit about it
offended me as a therapist, But I mean he's supposed to.
Speaker 2: He's literally the fucking worst. Hey, it's the worst.
Speaker 1: Because I think a through line through all of it,
like I said, is that he doesn't take Bob's erraticism seriously,
like even in the office, like I can see when
he first meets Bob and Bob's like rolling around on
the ground, Like I don't think it's a bad response
to not get caught up in that you know, like
I could definitely see me. Especially if I think this
is like a tension seeking behavior, it's not a bad
therapeutic response to not get caught up in it. So
just kind of the what he does there, which is
just kind of sits there and waits for him to
be done doing whatever he's doing, you know what I mean,
that's that's appropriate if you know the client and you
know why they do that, right, And I've worked with
plenty of kids where I'm like, I'm not gonna get
riled up by whatever you think you're doing. But like saying,
like throughout this whole movie, he's not taking it seriously,
and even like this, he's not taking that seriously or
even doing the thing, which is a little more self serving,
but I think also happens to therapist when you get
in your head about did I miss something?
Speaker 2: Did I fuck up?
Speaker 1: Even if you're worried about your own ass, the fact
that he just is so off his own I mean,
this goes back to the ego part, right, Like he
doesn't even have that beat of like, oh shit, I'm
the last point of contact that this guy had before
he died by suicide. Did I miss something up? Did
I miss something. Am I going to get in trouble?
And the only time he takes Bob seriously in terms
of like go to the hospital is that despite because
Bob is ruining his life and not because Bob needs
to be in the hospital, because he is making a
lot of impulsive, inappropriate, potentially dangerous choices.
Speaker 4: Where he could be harming himself for someone else.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and he didn't even.
Speaker 3: Rationally explain that he's just like dropped if at the hospital,
which means the psychiatrist there did the appropriate thing of
they assessed him. All the staff everyone is like, he's fine,
I can't keep him here.
Speaker 1: Well, that psych doctor was she was actually a real
one in this movie, and that she assesses him as
like a favor quote unquote to doctor Leo. But also
I could see him being like, I'm gonna trust you
that you're bringing someone in because he's acting.
Speaker 4: Who knows what Leo.
Speaker 1: Told her really, But she goes she like in thirty seconds,
she does a better job of being a psych provider
than he does. Where she goes, nothing's wrong with him,
I'm not going to keep him here at your request.
If I've assessed that he's fine, I'm going to let
you off the hook for this because this could be
your ass. Like she also does him a favor by saying,
like you can get him now or you cannot, and
then we're gonna have a problem basically like I'm not
like I'm And then she also says you shouldn't let
him sleep in your pajamas. So she also says to him,
this is your fault too. You blurred the lines with him,
and so now it's weird. Now it's weird, and that's
and now you're done putting up with him. So now
he is to go to hospital when you reinforce this
this relationship. Just how truly irresponsible he is in most
aspects of portraying this and just what uh what a
fucking asshole, you know, like a shit for brains? Yeah,
just like what are you again? Like what are you
doing in this field? Well, and with someone like Bob,
how much mixed messaging he's giving him exactly need to
go away, but I'll talk to you once, like you
need to go away, but you can sleep in his bedroom.
If someone had the diagnoses that we're giving to Bob
and they were truly in distress in a real way,
blowing them off or reinforcing their behavior is such.
Speaker 4: It's like the opposite of what you should be doing.
Speaker 2: Like that's what I mean.
Speaker 1: Like it's so comically bad. He's such an awful provider
he has.
Speaker 2: It's so.
Speaker 1: Blatant with like no no sense of any consequences, well
of any kind. It's just like wild to see that
kind of dismissive person.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Bob should have been hospitalized immediately. Someone is that
unwell that they're not perceiving consequences, they're showing an inability
to care for self, detachment from reality that this is okay.
Probably should be hospitalized at least evaluated at a hospital immediately,
not dismissed, not out of your sight, Call an ambulance,
get him on it, so that he is now adequately
cared for and in the hands of someone else. But
if he shows up on your doorstep, yeah, if he's
not being unsafe, you can, you know, get him into
an ambulance.
Speaker 2: But he hasn't got to go to the hospital.
Speaker 1: And also, one thing he never says to Bob, which
is maybe neither here nor they're given the context is Bob,
if you really want to work with me, if you
really want to work with me after this, Like in
the very beginning of this movie, like when he first
shows up, we can't be friends, we can't hang out,
we can't have a dual relationship. So he doesn't even
try to meet Bob, where maybe Bob is thinking like
buy in from Bob, Like if I was really going
to give Bob the benefit of the doubt and be like, hey, buddy,
it seems like you really want to work with me,
that's great. And if we develop this personal dynamic because
you're here on vacation where I am, and if.
Speaker 4: When he says like we don't have to work, we
can just be friends.
Speaker 1: What he says that later in the movie, I think
it says so much about how silly, stupid whatever Leo
is that he doesn't use that to his advantage in
a therapeutic way of like, hey, you really want to
work with me, that's great. And if you can't go away, basically,
if you can't keep our relationship professional, we can't work together.
You you're gonna poison it. And once we have this
personal dynamic, we I can't be your psychiatrists at all.
And he doesn't even bring up that part of it
that like what's inappropriate is like the dual relationship aspect
of nothing else, none of it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so seems like we're pretty pretty clear here that
Leo Marvin is up there with among the worst psych providers,
the worst examples.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean he tries to kill him by the end,
so we haven't even talked about that part he tries
to He just tried.
Speaker 2: To trust.
Speaker 3: Him up, like yeah, well and then here's where it
gets like good, the epilogue little PostScript thing made me
fucking die laughing.
Speaker 2: That was brilliant comedy. That Bob marries his sister.
Speaker 3: And went back to school to become a psychologist and
invent and then wrote a book called death Therapy because
he thought what Leo was trying to do to him
wasn't kill him, but teach him to overcome his fear
of death, like exposure therapy, exposure therapy and prolonged exposure
therapy in particular. Right, but Leo Marvin was suing him
for the rights like absolute narcissistic personality move like oh no,
you can't use the thing I invented.
Speaker 2: To try to kill you. I was having a psychotic
break trying to kill you. You blew up my house
and now I'm going to sue you for the rights
of the method. I almost killed you with what.
Speaker 1: Well, it's that thing whereas he has if he has NPD,
which is he can't lose, he cannot do it. He
cannot give ground or anything he perceives as losing, and
he can't lose to Bob. I mean, that's where this
movie goes, is he can't lose to Bob. And Bob
also fucked up the interview. Bob was getting more of
the attention, like we didn't even talk about all that
stuff like the good Morning American.
Speaker 4: Right like a beat that's the movie Bingers.
Speaker 1: And just talk about it in chronological order. But like
even that part him saying that Bob's my patient, having
Bob there, like.
Speaker 4: The way this hip hop was hip a thing in
nineteen nine.
Speaker 1: It was ninety six, okay, but but still, like like
I said, once again, this mixed messaging he's sending Bob,
which is so irresponsible of like he's doing that push
pull thing that will mix them with personal disorder. Go
absolutely batchit and not their fault, you know what I mean,
Like that really fucks with someone with person disorder, which
is like go away.
Speaker 4: But you can sit here, next meeting, there's interview. Go away.
You can sleep in my pajamas in my kid's bedroom.
Speaker 2: Oh no, Bob identified himself. He said he's a local
man and Bob'sadva's patient.
Speaker 4: Oh okay.
Speaker 2: Bob identified himself, and the producer grabbed him.
Speaker 3: It's like, oh, you have a patient here, you're seeing patient,
and since you're home, like yeah, and Leo couldn't then
break face and just go.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I'm sorry, No, he's he's not part of this.
Speaker 4: But then it becomes that thing of like who's gonna
win me or Bob?
Speaker 2: And also how do I keep the attention?
Speaker 4: Yeah, I gotta boom. I gotta boom the fuck up.
Speaker 2: And save face.
Speaker 4: I gotta blow him up. The only way he kills him.
Speaker 2: I gotta kill you now, buddy, not shoot him. It's
too messy.
Speaker 1: That's when he starts to do that in the movie,
which I didn't remember this part at all. Yeah, I
don't remember that I went this this far. But he's
like talking, He's like that'd be too much. I was like,
oh my god, he's gonna trying to kill Bob.
Speaker 4: He has lost his mind, Like he has lost his mind. Yeah,
but anyway, should we take a break here and be back.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we're at one. I don't even know if we need.
Speaker 4: To do treatment. I think we've done a lot of
this is what you don't do.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I don't think this is a treatment movie. I
think this is a how did not be doctor Leo asshole?
Speaker 1: Instead of doing treatment, we're just gonna basically reiterate that
everything that Leo does in this movie is a therapist, psychiatrist, whatever.
Speaker 2: Don't do that.
Speaker 4: Everything he's doing isn't helpful for.
Speaker 1: Someone like Bob. Is the version of exposure therapy that
could work if he is OCD like we speculate, Yeah,
but not this.
Speaker 4: Well, it's not exposure therapy. He's trying to.
Speaker 2: He's trying to get therapy.
Speaker 4: It's death therapy.
Speaker 1: You know what you should do if you're if you're
client scared of death, bury him alive in.
Speaker 2: A box in a box, to bury you alive in
a box.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just like, yeah, so don't do what Leo
does honestly with someone like Bob. I guess the only
thing I would say for treatment is he could probably
benefit from a community mental health agency where like he
gets visited on a regular basis by someone yes, who
knows how to boundaries with him, like he'd be I
work for Thresholds.
Speaker 4: I think he'd be a good threshold member.
Speaker 1: Like we definitely work with people like Bob where they
just don't have like the best social skills. They because
they have stuff going on mental health wise that their
life small or their world small, or like they have
trouble making community getting their needs met.
Speaker 2: So and like he actually lives in.
Speaker 1: A room that's very similar to like rooms we've had
to visit people in like single room occupancies SROs Elwood.
Speaker 3: Blues was in one of the rooms you guys almost
certainly went to in the Blues Brothers.
Speaker 2: So these this kind of room was featured a lot
in movies of this era.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so he he would really benefit and I think
he would probably do really well with having social workers
who come to his place, encourage him to go out
in the world, are with him like a lot, like
with him if he wants to ride the bus, will
take in places like it's a very wrap around the
kind of service where we help people who struggle to
be in the world independently get like social interaction, get
community interaction, get their needs met like we help them
kind of with the baby step stuff actually, like we'll
ride the train with you, yeah, the l with you,
and then maybe you can try on your own yep,
And so I think he would really benefit from something
like that. I think him going to this like fancy
outpatient psychiatrist is not the right setting for someone like
Bob at all, even from like an affordability sense, but
just because that's not really what he needs. Like maybe
Leo could give him medication. Maybe that's about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Yeah, I think Bob clearly needs multiple layers, and
more on the social work end probably than on the
therapy end. Heuld probably benefit from both, but the full
wrap around of medical, counseling, psychological, and social work. There's
all professions covered a little bit different of an angle.
The social work end is what you're talking about with
community mental health think really that's more social work is
geared to do, how do we help you access services
and break down barriers to the systems that are full
of barriers and nonsense for chronically ill people, like proving
you are chronically ill every year with an illness that
everyone else knows goes away or never goes away. Apologies Yeah,
it's I think it's a brilliant idea for Bob, and
I don't really have anything to add on to it
beyond that because it's brilliant.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's the perfect response for someone like Bob.
I think it would be really I think it would
be really helpful. I think it would really give him
a lot of opportunities to experience things in a different
way versus the way that he perceives things, Like I
think it would be really helpful to have somebody with
him and going with him out in the world. I
think it would really I really don't think there'd be
a better treatment for Bob. And it's an opportunity to
get more in the real world social guidance, like with
people like Bob, Like I would do a lot of
like hey, actual, Like that's not the way that you
want to ask for that, Like, hey, actually, like this
is how it feels when you do that instead of that,
Like it allows for a lot more real world experiences
and where you can help guide them gently and correct
them as needed in terms of like the social skills
stuff that he has trouble with. Like, I've had a
lot of conversations with people about boundaries in the work
that we've done, to the point that we had one
person we worked with who would just as kind of
a joke but not really would always say boundaries at
me because she knew I was gonna say it first.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no tricks.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, let's take a break care and me back
with final thoughts. So who wants to go first?
Speaker 4: Talk about what about Bob? I'll go first.
Speaker 1: So I feel like in another life, I've watched this
movie a lot of times. I'm not really sure why,
but I watched it and realize that I know this
movie really well and did not realize that. So I
don't know that I'll watch it again, just because I
hadn't watched it in probably fifteen years. So I don't
know that I will seek it out, especially because Leo
is such an abomination of a provider. It's like uncomfortable
to sit through. So I don't think I would watched
the movie again. I did enjoy watching it. I do
love Bill Murray the end I can go next. I
bought this movie for seven ninety nine, so I probably
should watch it again because oh, I resisted that one
oh in this.
Speaker 4: Motion picture.
Speaker 1: Because I have such fun memories as to get watching it.
This was definitely like a TBST and T movie, like
maybe that was on TV oh.
Speaker 2: All the time, all the time, And they definitely cut
some stuff out.
Speaker 4: Yeah, oh for sure, and so can I.
Speaker 1: I don't know if I'll really revisit this movie at
my leisure. Bill Murray does crack my shit up, and
there were parts of this movie that did crack me up.
Like I've told you guys many times, I want his
shirt that says, don't hassle me, I'm a local, so bad,
so bad in that obnoxious nineties day cloass colors.
Speaker 2: Brittany, I think somebody can probably make that happen for you.
Speaker 1: Please someone, please send it to me, please one of us.
But but I will say it's like a funny movie.
If it wasn't so close to what we did, maybe
I could enjoy it more. But it definitely is a
movie that's just trying to like be haha, and the
the plot devices are just unfortunately so close to what
we actually do and have such like bad repercussions in
terms of like.
Speaker 4: The stuff we do.
Speaker 1: So I would say it's a funny movie. They are
parts of the genuinely made me laugh. I liked when
he was tied to the sailboat mast and he was like,
I'm sailing. Like, you're not sailing, dude, you are tied
to a boat. So Bill Murray is hilarious and I
do love Bill Murray. I have to fight my love
of him. You guy should watch Bill Murray's Christmas special
on at Flex if you're interested.
Speaker 2: Oh that's wild.
Speaker 4: But I don't know if I'll revisit this movie anytime soon.
Speaker 1: Just and also Richard Dreyfus, like something about him bristles
mey same hate him.
Speaker 4: But that's all I have to say about that.
Speaker 2: You know, those two are only three years apart. Soccer Blue.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 2: Wow, three years apart? Really yep?
Speaker 5: Wow.
Speaker 4: I guess when you sua de vive it, you know,
keeps you young.
Speaker 2: I guess you don't or he does. I don't know,
but but so I love this movie.
Speaker 3: I don't know how much I'll watch it, but I
think it passed the test of a all time comedy.
That my wife watched it and was laughing and like chartling.
Speaker 1: She can.
Speaker 3: My wife has a great sense of humor, but she
can also be a harsh judge. I don't know She's
not like a person that sits there and goes haha
or this isn't funny. But for her do they say,
sit and enjoy a comedy. It's going to be a
good one. And this one past that test. This is
a good one. It's really funny. But I share the
same sentiment because I do what I do now because
it's represented so.
Speaker 2: Terribly, it bugs me a little bit.
Speaker 3: But at least it was done deliberately, as opposed to
like every other show where they include a therapist and like,
wouldn't it be wild if we had the therapists fall
in love with their client again?
Speaker 4: Well, yeah, like Leo is is also a cartoon.
Speaker 2: He's a cartoon.
Speaker 4: I mean, he makes it more it's a it's a
cartoon movie.
Speaker 2: He turns into Wiley movie. It's for real, like literally
goes to the Acme starre.
Speaker 4: I mean her.
Speaker 2: Stop, I mean, yeah, nuts, and he starts monologuing. I mean,
it's just it's glorious in the way they did it.
Speaker 3: It's obvious, it's absurd, and that they're flipping the script
and the like Bob becomes the therapist is fucking hilarious.
So I mean, I'll probably watch the movie, and I
just it might be another fifteen years, but it is
worth the watch. It's worth the entertainment. Bill Murray is
a treasure, even though he was apparently a giant asshole
onness and Richard Dreyfus was mad at him.
Speaker 2: For thirty four years.
Speaker 3: Wow, he did not forgive him until twenty twenty five
last year.
Speaker 2: Yeah, damn, holy fuck. He was upset. But I mean
also through an ashtray his face. Yeah, that's like, it's
a lot. It was screaming, like, if you are a good.
Speaker 4: Actor, you don't have to do that kind of shit.
You don't have to be a mania.
Speaker 1: Just act when they say to act, Yeah.
Speaker 4: You don't have to be berserker.
Speaker 3: Well that was off. That wasn't cameras rolling. That was
like on the set he was being like a bullying kid.
Speaker 1: Well, you know, we'll wrap up here as always if
you would like to find us. We're not super active
on social media anymore because all social media is starting
to be occupied by technocrat horrible monsters. So right now
we're really only still on Instagram and Facebook at Popcorn Psychology.
Speaker 4: You can always email us, though.
Speaker 2: It would be we would respond.
Speaker 1: To you at popropsychologygmail dot com.
Speaker 4: That's a direct way to get to us.
Speaker 1: If you want to patronize us in any way, you
can buy some of our merch ontee public. You can
also become a Patreon patron and you can get early
undated access to some of our episodes, and if you're
a fifty dollars or more patren you can pick the
subject of an episode so you can tell us to
do whatever your version of what about Bob is. If
you want to support us for free, you can always
leave us ratings and reviews wherever you listen to podcasts.
It is actually the best way for new listeners to
find us, so we do really actually appreciate that, and
we read your reviews and appreciate those two. So everybody,
don't work with a doctor Leo if you can help it,
and welcome to season nine
Speaker 2: Later Testicle head Bosom Beaver, good job.