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Speaker 4: Hello and welcome to this episode of Superhero Ethics Friends.
Speaker 4: This is the first October in a number of years
Speaker 4: where we haven't had a new show by Mike Flanagan,
Speaker 4: and for those who don't know, Mike Flanagan is the
Speaker 4: person who's given us great things in the last couple
Speaker 4: of years, like the Haunting of Hillhouse and Blind Manner,
Speaker 4: Midnight Mass, Midnight Club, and of course, most recently, the
Speaker 4: Fall of the House of Usher and Danielle and I,
Speaker 4: Danielle has been a frequent guest on this show, have
Speaker 4: been talking about how important his stuff is and wanting
Speaker 4: to talk about horror and how he approaches horror as
Speaker 4: a way of talking about the kind of social issues
Speaker 4: that we love to talk about on this podcast. And
Speaker 4: I was just getting ready for that. I remember that
Speaker 4: Riki Hayashi, my co host on Star Wars, and as
Speaker 4: we were getting ready for that or a remembered, of
Speaker 4: course that Riki, our co host here, has for a
Speaker 4: long time been reminding me that he's a big horror
Speaker 4: fan and wants to do more in the genre of horror,
Speaker 4: and so I thought, you know what, this is a
Speaker 4: perfect time to bring both these folks together have a
Speaker 4: conversation about Mike Flanagan, the flannagan Verse, if you will,
Speaker 4: and sort of what he's doing with the horror genre
Speaker 4: and how that is appealing to those of us in
Speaker 4: the to talk about Mike Flanagan and what he's doing
Speaker 4: with the horror genre. So Rieki, let me actually start
Speaker 4: with you and let me just ask what is it
Speaker 4: about horror that you really love and that really speaks
Speaker 4: to you?
Speaker 5: So I love horror, and I'm so happy we're finally
Speaker 5: here talking about it. The weird thing is I don't
Speaker 5: I don't like horror, like a lot of the horror right,
Speaker 5: Like I don't like blood and gore that much. Jump
Speaker 5: scares are when they're done effectively, they're okay, but probably
Speaker 5: overdone in the genre in general. So it's like, what
Speaker 5: do I love about horror? It is actually like, as
Speaker 5: a fan of science fiction, I feel like horror has become,
Speaker 5: or maybe always has been, such a great reflection of
Speaker 5: our society and like reflecting it back to us and
Speaker 5: asking questions about, like what is going on in society
Speaker 5: right now? Like what are people afraid of? Right? Because
Speaker 5: that's like horror's fear. What are people afraid of? And
Speaker 5: how can we create like whether it's like supernatural or
Speaker 5: just like a human horror figure that represents that and
Speaker 5: is killing people or scaring people in a way that
Speaker 5: is fun as a movie or a TV show, but
Speaker 5: if you stop and think about it is a reflect
Speaker 5: of our society, and that to me like the history
Speaker 5: of horror, especially like for me, like starting around the
Speaker 5: seventies and eighties, like you can trace back like all
Speaker 5: of the scares going around in society and like thinking
Speaker 5: about like, oh yeah, this is actually a representation of
Speaker 5: like AIDS was a big one in the eighties, I
Speaker 5: guess if you go back like more to the fifties sixties,
Speaker 5: like sci fi horror crossover like obviously like nuclear proliferation,
Speaker 5: proliferation and fallout, like in movies like them like The
Speaker 5: Radioactive Monsters Gogita of course, which originally I do think
Speaker 5: was was a horror movie. So yeah, like that that
Speaker 5: to me, like I love horror because science fiction, I
Speaker 5: think has gotten kind of away from social commentary, at
Speaker 5: least in like television movies is often just like it's
Speaker 5: the future and there's like lasers and spaceships, and there's
Speaker 5: still good sci fi products that are asking questions and
Speaker 5: presenting humanity back to us. But I think horror like
Speaker 5: has has consistently been doing that, So that that is
Speaker 5: to me what I love about the genre.
Speaker 6: Nice and yelle, what about yourself.
Speaker 7: Yeah, it's kind of on a similar thread to what
Speaker 7: Riqui says. I love horror because it has so much
Speaker 7: to reflect and teach about life and also about I think,
Speaker 7: especially pain and grief and fear itself. Because whenever I'm watching, watching,
Speaker 7: or reading a really really good horror story, I'm not
Speaker 7: so much scared. I mean, yeah, it does make me
Speaker 7: a little scared and a little you know, like it's
Speaker 7: your adrenaline pumping a bit. But the best of them
Speaker 7: leaves me more, I think, hopeful, and more with a
Speaker 7: sense of understanding than it does terror. And I think
Speaker 7: that's also why I cling so much to Mike Flanagan,
Speaker 7: but also when it comes to like books, to more
Speaker 7: authors of authors of color, especially indigenous authors. I think, right,
Speaker 7: some of the best, like some of the best horror
Speaker 7: books I've ever read, have been written by indigenous authors,
Speaker 7: because I think they understand that and they're aiming for
Speaker 7: that sense of hope at the end instead of just
Speaker 7: pure terror. And that's what makes horror to me so
Speaker 7: good is that it's not afraid to go into the
Speaker 7: depths of darkness because it knows it's going to find
Speaker 7: its way back out in the end, and so that
Speaker 7: I just really appreciate that that kind of power it has.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'm really with you there, and I haven't read
Speaker 4: many of those books that you're talking about, but I
Speaker 4: think one of the most exciting horror filmmakers today right
Speaker 4: now is Jordan Peel, who did Get Out and then
Speaker 4: Us and other things like that which are very much
Speaker 4: about which are very much horror, but from very clearly
Speaker 4: a black perspective, and to explain that in some other ways.
Speaker 4: And I want to talk just a bit more about
Speaker 4: this historical point because Riaki, I'm not sure if this
Speaker 4: is your experience, but it sounds like we're kind of
Speaker 4: on the same page. I grew up in the age
Speaker 4: where horror movies meant Freddy Krueger and Jason and like
Speaker 4: the Friday the Thirteenth movies, the Nightmare and elm Street
Speaker 4: the Halloweens, which I think were all about jump scare
Speaker 4: and being as gory as possible and kind of like
Speaker 4: gross out as possible, and that's what I always associated
Speaker 4: horror with. I remember being at a panel at a
Speaker 4: science fiction discussion con that I went to a number
Speaker 4: of years ago and it really blew my mind talking
Speaker 4: about how what you're saying rieky about the six seventies
Speaker 4: and eighties, but even going all the way back to
Speaker 4: the fifties. I hadn't known this, but apparently because horror
Speaker 4: in the fifties was seen as so kind of it's
Speaker 4: just where teenagers go to drive ins to have on
Speaker 4: while they make out in cars and whatever, no one
Speaker 4: paid attention to it. And that included the McCarthy commission
Speaker 4: and all the Red Scare stuff, so things like Invasion
Speaker 4: of the Body Snatchers, which is very much political commentary.
Speaker 4: People started to realize they could get away with this
Speaker 4: stuff that McCarthy was going to cut and the blacklists
Speaker 4: were going to hit them with in any other genre
Speaker 4: if they did it in horror. And so yeah, I
Speaker 4: love that historical tradition is still very much alive. And
Speaker 4: I feel like that's exactly what Mike Flanagan does in
Speaker 4: terms of in his show. And we'll go into some
Speaker 4: of these specific questions, but in his shows, I think
Speaker 4: we've seen everything explored from you know, family trauma to
Speaker 4: the trauma of abuse, and how in both cases, like
Speaker 4: the metaphorical idea of trauma, creating ghosts becoming literal to
Speaker 4: religion as a scary concept in Midnight Mass and how
Speaker 4: that all plays out to all the stories in Fall
Speaker 4: of Usher, which are mostly about like human vice and
Speaker 4: the idea of where the horrors really the terrible things
Speaker 4: humans will do, and how that become expressed primarily for greed.
Speaker 4: So yeah, I just think there's just Plannagan especially seems
Speaker 4: really dedicated to this the idea of social commentary.
Speaker 6: So yeah, let's let's go more into that.
Speaker 4: And Danielle, you were starting that on that, if you
Speaker 4: want to talk a little bit more about what it
Speaker 4: is you think with Mike Flanagan is doing with the
Speaker 4: horror genre that's so new and interesting.
Speaker 7: Nat. Why was he does a podcast these days? I
Speaker 7: forget what it's called, but it's where he and another
Speaker 7: host go through kind of some horror films and they
Speaker 7: talk I think with the directors of them and stuff
Speaker 7: like that. And I think recently he talked about how
Speaker 7: he no longer ends his horror films or shows with
Speaker 7: a depressing ending. I think he said since before Hush.
Speaker 7: He has a film called Hush, which is really really good.
Speaker 7: I think it's on Netflix, but it just got released
Speaker 7: physically as well. It has its first physical release this
Speaker 7: past month, and he said that ever since then he went,
Speaker 7: he dedicated himself to not ending his horror in a
Speaker 7: depressing mode, because in his mind, horror has to end
Speaker 7: with some element of hope in order for it to
Speaker 7: be truly effective. And I absolutely agree with that because
Speaker 7: it teaches a lesson. I think in that case, it
Speaker 7: gives you something to take from it instead of just
Speaker 7: taking a piece of you with it, I think. And
Speaker 7: so I really like that, and I see with his
Speaker 7: shows with everyone, we get more and more social commentary
Speaker 7: slightly different versions of it too, which I think is
Speaker 7: really great. And a lot of that comes from Mike
Speaker 7: Flannagan's own experiences. Midnight Mass arguably, in my opinion, his
Speaker 7: greatest of his series. It was pulled directly from his
Speaker 7: own experiences in the Catholic Church. He grew up Catholic,
Speaker 7: and a lot of Zach Guildford's character, a lot of
Speaker 7: his like wonderings about philosophy and about life and religion,
Speaker 7: are Mike Flanagan's own wonderings about it. And I think
Speaker 7: also he used to be or he is, an alcoholic.
Speaker 7: I think of recovering alcoholic and so a lot of
Speaker 7: that went into it as well, well, and just such
Speaker 7: care because of his personal experiences with it, but also
Speaker 7: just just you know, general empathy for various parts of
Speaker 7: society and wanting to show the issues that everyone faces
Speaker 7: and how it doesn't have to be there. Their horror
Speaker 7: can spring from that, but that doesn't have to be
Speaker 7: all that there is. And so I view it as
Speaker 7: both a warning but also yeah, just kind of like
Speaker 7: hope at.
Speaker 4: The end, just to make sure folks know that Guildford
Speaker 4: he plays one of the one of the main protagonists
Speaker 4: of Midnight Mass, but many of us will probably know
Speaker 4: him best as Matt Saracen, and he that's always how
Speaker 4: I referred him. That's the first big role he played. Ricky,
Speaker 4: what about for you? A're gonna make some a little
Speaker 4: more discussions and start just all that back and forth.
Speaker 4: But I'm here for you. What was really about the
Speaker 4: Mike Flannagan shows that drew you in?
Speaker 5: It's funny, I've it turns out I have been a
Speaker 5: fan of Mike Flannagan before I guess his rise to
Speaker 5: One of my favorites of his is a movie called Oculus.
Speaker 5: It came out in twenty thirteen, and I didn't know,
Speaker 5: like until recently that it was of Mic planning it.
Speaker 5: But I remember watching it being like, yeah, I like this,
Speaker 5: Like this is good. It never really like followed up
Speaker 5: and like, oh, this is the guy that's doing all
Speaker 5: of the things right now that I'm also watching and enjoying.
Speaker 5: But you mentioned Midnight mass being your favorite, I to me,
Speaker 5: the Haunting of hill House is it will always be
Speaker 5: I think my favorite. Planning in it is one of
Speaker 5: the few shows that we actually just like rewatch over
Speaker 5: and over again, probably like around this time around Halloween,
Speaker 5: because it's just so masterfully made in a way like
Speaker 5: a lot of people think of horror as jump scares, right,
Speaker 5: and like once you know that they're coming, they're less scary.
Speaker 5: But then like in the genre, like it's such a
Speaker 5: trope you can watch and be like oh, yeah, like
Speaker 5: they're filming this in a way that a jump scar
Speaker 5: is coming, so now it's not going to scare me,
Speaker 5: and now you have kind of like the fake out
Speaker 5: and the secondary jump scare. There's a jump scare in
Speaker 5: this in this TV show Hillhouse, even when you know
Speaker 5: it's coming, it's just like one of the most terrifying
Speaker 5: things because of like how well it's filmed and how
Speaker 5: well the tension builds to that moment. I just I
Speaker 5: love the show. There's one episode I think it's the
Speaker 5: Storm that that takes place in the funeral home, and
Speaker 5: it's mostly like one take. I think it's like three
Speaker 5: takes like come together very masterfully and it's amazing, like
Speaker 5: and I've watched behind the scenes footage of like how
Speaker 5: they filmed it. It is such a good episode, like
Speaker 5: just the top five television episode of all time in
Speaker 5: my opinion.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think, Yeah, I agree.
Speaker 7: Oh, I was just gonna say I wanted to add
Speaker 7: really quickly to my midnight Mass discussion because I forgot
Speaker 7: is that he mentioned because the element of religion in it,
Speaker 7: and I talked a little bit about how Mike Flanagan
Speaker 7: drew from his own experiences as growing up in the
Speaker 7: Catholic church. But also I feel like there's a stereotype
Speaker 7: with religion and horror that there's the expected like possession
Speaker 7: because that's been used for decades with it, and the
Speaker 7: kind of like mystical aspects of it and everything. And
Speaker 7: one thing I appreciate so much about Midnight Mass is
Speaker 7: that it doesn't have that. It's more it leans into
Speaker 7: something different, something, in my opinion, a lot deeper, and
Speaker 7: a lot that resonates a lot more with people who
Speaker 7: also grew up in the Catholic Church. That pools this
Speaker 7: I think unsettling feeling that a lot of us have
Speaker 7: had to the surface and examined it in a way
Speaker 7: that the possession trope doesn't really His possession is expected,
Speaker 7: and I mean to an extent, it's part of the
Speaker 7: Catholic teachings and everything. But what he does with the
Speaker 7: horror that he chooses to use instead is slightly less expected,
Speaker 7: but even more meaningful and powerful, I think, And so
Speaker 7: that's also why I appreciate it so much of all
Speaker 7: his work.
Speaker 4: I think that's a great point. And I wanted us
Speaker 4: to start jumping into the individual series, and so let's
Speaker 4: actually start by talking about Midnight Mass, because it's one
Speaker 4: that I think also really resonated with me, and I
Speaker 4: think really is one that is kind of foremost in
Speaker 4: a lot of people's minds for his stuff. And so
Speaker 4: for those who haven't seen it, who haven't seen it
Speaker 4: in a while, I'm going to try to make this
Speaker 4: somewhat spoiler free, but I'm gonna give you just kind
Speaker 4: of some of the overall outline of the plot. The
Speaker 4: show is about a small island off the coast of Maine,
Speaker 4: and this is somewhat intentional. If you're thinking, oh, that
Speaker 4: sounds like a Stephen King reference, Mike Flannagan is on
Speaker 4: record is being a very big Stephen King fan. He
Speaker 4: actually just made a movie based on some Stephen King stories,
Speaker 4: and so I think it's very intentional. This is a
Speaker 4: small New England town where there's kind of one church
Speaker 4: in town. Everyone's Catholic and that's kind of the center
Speaker 4: of the whole town. And the town has been dying
Speaker 4: for some time. People are moving to the mainland. A
Speaker 4: lot of the industries that help keep the town businesses
Speaker 4: going for a long time have failed. And into this
Speaker 4: situation there comes a young priest, and the priest is
Speaker 4: kind of new and full of ideas.
Speaker 6: The old priest, who is.
Speaker 4: Kind of really beloved but very much kind of like
Speaker 4: you know, had been there for a million years. He
Speaker 4: has retired and so now the town is kind of
Speaker 4: all swept up because this young priest comes in with
Speaker 4: all this energy and he's kind of making the Catholic
Speaker 4: Church seem fun and passionate and powerful and not as
Speaker 4: angry as it used to be, and he's showing that
Speaker 4: like miraculous things are possible, and even getting to the
Speaker 4: point of literal miracles starting to occur, and over the
Speaker 4: course of the story you come to realize that there's
Speaker 4: actually a lot of corruption happening and a terrible price
Speaker 4: being paid to make what is possible possible, And over
Speaker 4: the course.
Speaker 6: Of the story you come to realize that really.
Speaker 4: This is a story about corruption, and that the dream
Speaker 4: of the easy fix and of like everything being saved
Speaker 4: and wonderful can be corrupting and can blind us to
Speaker 4: the actual consequences of things that are happening, and that
Speaker 4: there are terrible, terrible consequences to what this priest is doing.
Speaker 4: And it becomes just this really beautiful story about how
Speaker 4: all that can unfold and how, in particular in the
Speaker 4: Catholic Church, these things can play out.
Speaker 6: And while it's a.
Speaker 4: Supernatural story, it's a horror story. It's very much a
Speaker 4: metaphor about the role that religion, and especially the Catholic
Speaker 4: Church can have in a lot of communities.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I agree, and that's I really like you pointing
Speaker 7: out that it is realized more on corruption, because it
Speaker 7: does at a certain point, like I mean, it is
Speaker 7: manipulation up until a certain point when it becomes I think,
Speaker 7: willful corruption, and the people are faced with what has
Speaker 7: been done to them, and a lot of them choose
Speaker 7: to keep going anyway, and some of them don't, but
Speaker 7: a lot of them do, and and I think that
Speaker 7: that was a really powerful way to show this. I
Speaker 7: also think that Zach Gilford's character whose name I can't remember,
Speaker 7: I want to say Tommy, but I.
Speaker 5: Can't remember what you.
Speaker 7: Riley, Riley, Yeah, that's it. That's it, Riley.
Speaker 4: Just to end up quickly, because I know there are
Speaker 4: many versions of Catholicism, and all of them I think
Speaker 4: share a lot of this, And Danielle, as a Catholic
Speaker 4: person yourself, I want to hear more about your perspective
Speaker 4: on it. But I'll also say that from being around
Speaker 4: a lot of that community, though a part of it,
Speaker 4: I know that Irish Catholicism is a very particular kind
Speaker 4: of thing, Mike Flannagan, and that's my clinical experience. And
Speaker 4: if you want to tell me a character is Irish,
Speaker 4: I don't know. Much more of an Irish name than
Speaker 4: Riley Flynn. So just kind of putting out that was
Speaker 4: very much lampshaded. Is like, this guy's Irish, Irish American.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 7: Yeah, And but with Riley, there's a particular scene that
Speaker 7: I don't I don't really want. I don't know if
Speaker 7: we should like just tell the specifics of what happens.
Speaker 7: But Riley. Riley is an alcoholic and a recovering alcoholic.
Speaker 7: He's back on the island from prison after a horrific
Speaker 7: accident that he caused while he was drunk, and a
Speaker 7: lot of his storyline is him coming to terms with
Speaker 7: how he can live with what he did, and whether
Speaker 7: he wants to live with what he did or not,
Speaker 7: and how faith plays into that, how how his perspective
Speaker 7: on life plays into it, like this this event as
Speaker 7: it should have drastically changed his life, and a lot
Speaker 7: of his monologues are around that, around uh, philosophy and
Speaker 7: and faith, and his last, the last monologue he gives,
Speaker 7: is to be one of the most powerful ones. I
Speaker 7: think they all are. I think all of Riley's monologues
Speaker 7: are probably some of my favorite monologues that I've ever
Speaker 7: that I've ever watched, uh, but the last one especially
Speaker 7: is just it's incredibly beautiful and it's a lot about
Speaker 7: what we're willing to sacrifice for our faith and what
Speaker 7: we're not, and what we're willing to sacrifice for our
Speaker 7: lives and what we're not. And as I'm no longer Catholic,
Speaker 7: but I guess I technically always are if you've confirmed no, no, yeah, technicalities,
Speaker 7: but you know, having grown up in it, like I
Speaker 7: could tell instantly, I knew that Mike Flanagan. I knew
Speaker 7: who Mike clanagan was because of his work. I didn't
Speaker 7: know so much of him at the point of watching
Speaker 7: Midnight Mass for the first time that I knew he
Speaker 7: was Catholic. And when I watched it, like from the
Speaker 7: first episode, I turned to my partner and I said,
Speaker 7: the person who made this is Catholic. There is no
Speaker 7: way that someone who didn't grow up and not just
Speaker 7: a converted Catholic, someone who grew up Catholic. There's no
Speaker 7: way that someone who didn't grow up Catholic made this show.
Speaker 7: Absolutely no way. Because I've seen shows in movies and
Speaker 7: read books that involve Catholicism that are by people who
Speaker 7: either came to Catholicism later in life, left it really
Speaker 7: really really early, to the point where they don't really
Speaker 7: remember that much or weren't Catholic at all, and you
Speaker 7: can tell, like it's like there are intricacies to midnight
Speaker 7: Mass that are so detailed and so specific, down to
Speaker 7: the like you only know that because you sat in
Speaker 7: a pew at her for the whole hour you went
Speaker 7: to actual midnight Mass during Christmas. You have experienced this
Speaker 7: on the most intimate level. And that is part of
Speaker 7: why I love it so much, because I've never felt
Speaker 7: really that before from something that wasn't trying to like
Speaker 7: reconvert me into Catholicism, but something that was showing it
Speaker 7: for all of the colors that it is. And that's
Speaker 7: the good feelings that you have towards it when you
Speaker 7: were brought up Catholic, the bad feelings you have towards
Speaker 7: it when you leave, and everything in between. It doesn't
Speaker 7: say this is absolutely horrible or this is the best
Speaker 7: thing in the world. It says that this is a complicated,
Speaker 7: really at times messed up, but sometimes beautiful thing. And
Speaker 7: all of those can coexist and we can talk about
Speaker 7: that and it can look like this it's funny.
Speaker 4: I'm most my friends know that I'm a former Christian pastor.
Speaker 4: I stillly am a Protestant Christian, but I'm not Catholic.
Speaker 4: And there was a lot of the element The show
Speaker 4: is very theological in a way that's very interesting to me,
Speaker 4: and it is very critical of the Catholic Church, but
Speaker 4: it is still very interested in the theological questions around
Speaker 4: guilt and salvation and stuff like that. And so there
Speaker 4: were parts of it that I felt like I could
Speaker 4: engage in, but I definitely had that feeling of like,
Speaker 4: this is not about the Christianity that I understand that
Speaker 4: I'm a part of, and it is a very particular
Speaker 4: kind of thing, as you have the Catholicism. He uses
Speaker 4: these elements of religion and of the supernatural, but again
Speaker 4: show you that actually the scariest things are what we
Speaker 4: humans do. There's a plot at the beginning about how
Speaker 4: the new sheriff is Muslim and his son is Muslim,
Speaker 4: and the woman who is sort of the one of
Speaker 4: the people who helps to run the Catholic Church, and
Speaker 4: she's a whole over plotline as well. And a lot
Speaker 4: of my friends who who are women ministers and pastors
Speaker 4: and priests and the Episcopal Church have said how much
Speaker 4: they kind of relate to her character in some ways
Speaker 4: or have seen people like her character because she's someone
Speaker 4: who really loved the church and kind of would have
Speaker 4: wanted to be priest but couldn't because she was a woman,
Speaker 4: and sort of where that takes her and she winds
Speaker 4: up leading this crusade to like teach the Bible in
Speaker 4: school and being very fearful of this Muslim cop And
Speaker 4: as scary as all this supernatural it is, it's the
Speaker 4: human stuff that's the scariest. Mike Flanagan loves flashbacks, and
Speaker 4: Mike Flanagan loves to show you an image a couple
Speaker 4: of times that's clearly something a character is thinking about
Speaker 4: before letting you understand what the image is. And one
Speaker 4: of the images we get is when Riley is kind
Speaker 4: of having flashbacks or but before we know what he's
Speaker 4: having flashbacks too, is this image of a human face
Speaker 4: that looks like it has been the victim of something
Speaker 4: horrific and terrible and like at first, I think you
Speaker 4: only see half of the face or something like that,
Speaker 4: and it looks like something like, you know, maybe it's
Speaker 4: a monster itself or it was attacked by a monster,
Speaker 4: and eventually the camera pulls back enough on the subsequent
Speaker 4: viewings of it that you see that it is nothing
Speaker 4: to do with horror. It's the person who was in
Speaker 4: the other car who died because of the drunk driving
Speaker 4: accident that Riley Finn was in. But I certainly thought
Speaker 4: it was supposed to be an image of something monstrous,
Speaker 4: And I just that moment especially hit home for me
Speaker 4: how much he's really pointing this idea of like, yeah,
Speaker 4: horror is scary, but the stuff we humans do is
Speaker 4: actually even worse. We don't need the horror to be
Speaker 4: scared of humans.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I think, like I get emotional thinking about that
Speaker 7: because like h and I just I truly this is
Speaker 7: Zach Gilford's best performance. I think, like I love him
Speaker 7: as mats Aarrison, but as like an actor. To me,
Speaker 7: this is his this is his this is his thing,
Speaker 7: Like this is the kreme de la creme of his
Speaker 7: of his work. But and he it's because of that,
Speaker 7: like the way that he portrays Riley's guilt in a
Speaker 7: way that's like he doesn't want people to feel bad
Speaker 7: for him. He doesn't want anyone to make excuses for him.
Speaker 7: Or to say that you know, it's okay, you didn't
Speaker 7: mean it, because what worst thing could have happened than
Speaker 7: taking someone's life? And he didn't mean to, Like, what
Speaker 7: worst thing could could that happen could have happened, and
Speaker 7: he just he portrays that so well, not really with words,
Speaker 7: but just with his actions, his physicality and his eyes.
Speaker 7: And so every time he sees that face is to
Speaker 7: me just such such a powerful, powerful moment and a
Speaker 7: reminder of like you said, like, it's not just the horror,
Speaker 7: we create our own worst horrors, I think, and that
Speaker 7: is kind of the just an example of that, a
Speaker 7: reflection of that.
Speaker 4: Really, Riki, I'm curious for you, as someone who didn't
Speaker 4: grow up in any kind of Christianity, what was like
Speaker 4: for you watching this story that's so specific to that
Speaker 4: one religious tradition's ideas.
Speaker 5: Actually, I'm sorry to say, like I've never watched Midnight Mass,
Speaker 5: and that's it's actually because like I've come from a
Speaker 5: non religious, non Catholic background that I've always just scrolled
Speaker 5: past and maybe not this one. I I have been
Speaker 5: leaning towards wanting to watch it because of my enjoyment
Speaker 5: of Mike Flannagan's stuff, But.
Speaker 6: It's just it.
Speaker 5: It has never never grabbed me, I guess because it
Speaker 5: is so coded as religious.
Speaker 7: It's it's his most it's his most religious one. Like
Speaker 7: like I said, I mean, it's so religious that I
Speaker 7: clocked that a Catholic made it, Like.
Speaker 5: I did recently watch like two seasons of the TV
Speaker 5: show Evil, which is also like very Catholic. So I
Speaker 5: don't know. I will probably get into it later this year.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I'll be curious if you do, how you relate
Speaker 4: to because I think the character of the Muslim sheriff
Speaker 4: is a very interesting one because his experience is very
Speaker 4: much about being a non Christian in a Christian.
Speaker 6: World and how alienating that is.
Speaker 4: But he himself a very devout person of faith, So
Speaker 4: it's not quite very much not where you were coming from, necessarily,
Speaker 4: but kind of similar. And I'll also say, like I
Speaker 4: know people who are who are you know, feel like
Speaker 4: they were really treated horribly by the church, you know,
Speaker 4: laughed Catholics as well or whatever you want to call them,
Speaker 4: and they won't touch it with a ten foot poll
Speaker 4: because they're like I get to relive my therapy, I
Speaker 4: get I get to relive my experiences with colicism every
Speaker 4: time you go to therapy.
Speaker 6: I don't need to watch more shows about it.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 7: I know people who are like who watched the show,
Speaker 7: loved it and are in the same boat as me,
Speaker 7: like lapsed Catholic related to it too heavily, and that's
Speaker 7: why they can't watch it again. But for me, it's like,
Speaker 7: I don't know something something about that is like I
Speaker 7: felt so seen, Like I feel like Mike Flanagan and
Speaker 7: I are kind of one and the same when it
Speaker 7: comes to this, these complicated feelings we have. And so
Speaker 7: I was just continually just amazed by how he put
Speaker 7: that onto onto.
Speaker 4: Sor so say more about that. What what were some
Speaker 4: of those things that you clocked and that really kind
Speaker 4: of made you feel seen? In terms of your own experiences?
Speaker 7: Well, I think there a lot of the scenes take
Speaker 7: place in the church and are daring Mass, and there's
Speaker 7: something about Mass that, even as a lapsed Catholic, I
Speaker 7: still have some fond memories of it. I still think
Speaker 7: that a lot of it is really beautiful, and I
Speaker 7: think that some of the tradition, the non complicated and
Speaker 7: questionable tradition, is quite beautiful. And there's there's something about
Speaker 7: you know, having this routine and knowing it and whenever
Speaker 7: your entire life is you know kind of maybe like
Speaker 7: up in flames, that you have this one thing that
Speaker 7: is there, steady and the same. And even though that
Speaker 7: doesn't call to me anymore, I understand why it does
Speaker 7: to people, and I understand why it used to me.
Speaker 7: But there's now for me because I've separated myself from
Speaker 7: it more than I did when I was younger, and
Speaker 7: I've seen other perspectives of it, and I've I've allowed
Speaker 7: myself to question things that I didn't allow myself to before.
Speaker 7: There's an unsettling nature to it, and I think that
Speaker 7: those scenes Dering Mass perfectly, somehow perfectly encapsulate all of
Speaker 7: those complicated feelings for me, the sense of beauty, because
Speaker 7: I think I think I've seen Micha planning to talk
Speaker 7: about like there is something that still pulls to him
Speaker 7: about it, and it is like there is a sense
Speaker 7: of beauty to it. There's a sense of tradition and
Speaker 7: a sense of of like I said, routine that calls
Speaker 7: to you sometimes, but I don't want to go back
Speaker 7: to that. And those scenes in the church made me
Speaker 7: like felt like all of my feelings about that were
Speaker 7: being shown visually, and the same with you know, just
Speaker 7: how the characters, the different characters relate to Catholicism. I
Speaker 7: have been where Riley's been when it comes to like
Speaker 7: not wanting to have anything to do with the church
Speaker 7: at all and not understanding why anyone wants to at
Speaker 7: all and just being so like reluctant and ambivalent and
Speaker 7: you know, just kind of hateful towards it. But I've
Speaker 7: also been where now I can't remember any characters names anymore,
Speaker 7: but Kate Siegel's character, who is Riley's childhood friend slash
Speaker 7: former partner whatever. Maybe they might have dated a little
Speaker 7: bit when they were teenagers. She left the island, and
Speaker 7: I think leaving the island is also symbolic of leaving
Speaker 7: the church in my mass, and so she also left
Speaker 7: the island, left the church, didn't go to church for
Speaker 7: many many years, came back to the island, took over
Speaker 7: her childhood home and goes to church every Sunday, and
Speaker 7: her and Riley talk about this about how why did
Speaker 7: she come back? Why is he not coming back? Why
Speaker 7: why did he stay away? All of these things? And
Speaker 7: I was once at a point in my life where
Speaker 7: I left and I went back, and so I understand
Speaker 7: like what she's saying her monologues about it and what
Speaker 7: pulls her back to it, and so it was it
Speaker 7: was genuinely just every question and every thought I've ever
Speaker 7: had about the church is like I think people think
Speaker 7: that leaving the Catholic Church is an easy thing to do,
Speaker 7: but it's really it's really not, especially when when you
Speaker 7: were raised in it and when your entire family is
Speaker 7: in it. On both sides, it's a decision that you
Speaker 7: don't have to just explain to yourself, but you have
Speaker 7: to explain to every single person in your life, and
Speaker 7: to them a lot of the times, even if they're
Speaker 7: like casual Catholics, breaking away from the Catholic Church is
Speaker 7: one of the worst things that you could do. And
Speaker 7: they don't understand it. They don't want to understand it.
Speaker 7: They just want to pretend like it's not actually a
Speaker 7: thing that you've chosen. And so I just felt I
Speaker 7: felt so so seen in all of those those monologues
Speaker 7: and in the mass scenes too, because of that, and the.
Speaker 5: Way you're describing it makes it sound like the church,
Speaker 5: like the physical building of the church is almost a character.
Speaker 6: In this.
Speaker 7: Oh yeah, one, I would say like the Catholic I
Speaker 7: mean the Catholic Church in general, like every Catholic church
Speaker 7: usually is just so opulent to where it's meant to
Speaker 7: be like this living, breathing thing that is hard to
Speaker 7: tear yourself away from and that you want to be
Speaker 7: in because it is it's this beautiful place that is
Speaker 7: meant to be kind of like representative and reflective of
Speaker 7: all the beautiful things of God and of Christianity and
Speaker 7: things you should aspire to be, not necessarily things that
Speaker 7: you will ever be. And that's definitely how it is.
Speaker 7: And in Midnight Mass is I think they they spend
Speaker 7: funds to kind of you know, keep the church nice,
Speaker 7: to keep the hall. That was another thing every And
Speaker 7: I wonder, I want to know where my clanigan grew
Speaker 7: up if he grew up in a small town, because
Speaker 7: small town Catholic dioceses are very different than like big
Speaker 7: like if you go to a Catholic church in the city,
Speaker 7: because you usually have this this hall that they raise
Speaker 7: money for it. The money that goes in the collection,
Speaker 7: part of it goes to building that hall. And that
Speaker 7: is what happened in Midnight Mass. Too, like they people
Speaker 7: spent their last pennies giving too this uh, this fund
Speaker 7: to pay for that hall for an island that has
Speaker 7: like maybe fifty people.
Speaker 4: Population dwindling and dying like a.
Speaker 7: Yeah. And and I think Riley questions his parents, like
Speaker 7: what are you doing giving your money to this when
Speaker 7: you can barely afford to send my brother to school
Speaker 7: or you can't even afford that. You can't you can
Speaker 7: barely afford food, you can barely afford the repairs that
Speaker 7: your own house needs. And that is a question I've
Speaker 7: asked too of my family, is like why are you
Speaker 7: giving the last that you have or not the last
Speaker 7: that you have? But why are you giving so much?
Speaker 7: Like you calculate it. You give five dollars every Sunday,
Speaker 7: you go to church every Sunday. What does that add
Speaker 7: up to, like you know, and adds up to a
Speaker 7: lot of money? And what is it going towards? Two?
Speaker 7: And that's a question that Benni Mass asks as well.
Speaker 7: Is I think not just what the church is making
Speaker 7: you do, but what people allow themselves to to believe
Speaker 7: and to buy into from the church as well.
Speaker 4: My memory is that in the show this is said
Speaker 4: explicitly it might be more that it's implied, but the
Speaker 4: idea of like, how do you have a logical conversation
Speaker 4: when you have a truth claim that is that claims
Speaker 4: to be infallible, to be undeniable, you know, And so
Speaker 4: that if you start with this idea of everything that
Speaker 4: happens is God's will, first of all, no one actually
Speaker 4: applies that across the board, but but that you know
Speaker 4: the things that you're seeing because you know, eventually these
Speaker 4: people are you know, becoming something like vampires.
Speaker 6: But they are.
Speaker 4: They're they're doing things that you would think would be
Speaker 4: complete and total violations of the Catholic ideas and really are,
Speaker 4: but because they still think they're doing it for these
Speaker 4: Catholic reasons, because of the way that the regulation has happened.
Speaker 4: The finger is right on the pulse of everything that's
Speaker 4: going on in a world, and I love how specific
Speaker 4: it is to Catholicism, and I feel like I learned
Speaker 4: a lot about that. But I also feel like I
Speaker 4: never felt like because I wasn't a Catholic, that I
Speaker 4: wasn't getting it, you know, I felt like I could
Speaker 4: understand everything else as well.
Speaker 7: Yeah, Yeah, I think he does. Mike Clanigan does an
Speaker 7: excellent job of kind of walking that line between and
Speaker 7: like we'll talk about the Paul of House Swasher later,
Speaker 7: but I think it's the same with that, is that
Speaker 7: this is this is accessible to people who don't know
Speaker 7: what going to mass every Sunday is like, who don't
Speaker 7: know what Catholic guilt is like. But it's also if
Speaker 7: you do know, you're gonna feel more seen and recognize
Speaker 7: these things like to a like an insane level that
Speaker 7: I just I love. I love when creators are able
Speaker 7: to balance.
Speaker 5: So quick biographical thing about Mike Flangan. First off, he
Speaker 5: was born in Salem, Massachusetts, which which is a little
Speaker 5: on point, my guy, it's like the type of detail.
Speaker 5: But he went to high school in Maryland. And it
Speaker 5: looks like this is kind of like the outskirts of Baltimore.
Speaker 5: The town has a population of about fifty to sixty
Speaker 5: thousand people. It's not I would not call this a
Speaker 5: suburb of Baltimore. I would definitely say it's like outside
Speaker 5: of Baltimore.
Speaker 7: Yeah, interesting, Yeah, yeah there you go, thank you for
Speaker 7: looking that up.
Speaker 4: Yeah, but the Salon person there, especially when you realize
Speaker 4: how currently anti Catholic the Pilgrims were like that.
Speaker 6: They were one of the first real breakaway groups.
Speaker 4: And I think some of the people who got caught
Speaker 4: up in Salem witch trials were accused of a lot
Speaker 4: of it was just sexism and racism, but some of
Speaker 4: the people who got accused of witchcraft was because of
Speaker 4: all the rituals of Catholicism that they were still practicing.
Speaker 4: So yeah, itvis I've been on both sides.
Speaker 6: That for sure. Like, let's talk about the first one
Speaker 6: he made, The Haunting of Hillhouse.
Speaker 5: The broad stroke is this is based on a novel
Speaker 5: by Shirley Jackson. Like it's a very classic horror novel,
Speaker 5: the Haunting of Hillhouse, that has been made into movies
Speaker 5: several times under the name The Haunting, and there was
Speaker 5: one in like the late nineties that is is not
Speaker 5: a very good movie. Like it's also that period of
Speaker 5: everyone was trying to make CGI a thing, and they
Speaker 5: have some very bad like CGI ghost effects in this
Speaker 5: movie that have become kind of panned and people love
Speaker 5: making fun of it. But the Haunting of hill House,
Speaker 5: the TV series, the Mike Flannagan TV Show uses very
Speaker 5: little CGI for its scares, and I think that is
Speaker 5: to me what stood out while watching it and is
Speaker 5: one of my most endearing memories of it. And we
Speaker 5: talked about jump scares earlier, and there's a very effective
Speaker 5: jump scare in this show, but the scariest thing about
Speaker 5: this show are the non jump scares. There are static ghosts,
Speaker 5: just like faces and figures hidden in the background throughout
Speaker 5: the run of the show that just like never interact
Speaker 5: with the characters. They're just standing there, and the first
Speaker 5: time you notice one in the background, you just like
Speaker 5: freak the heck out, And then you start to watch
Speaker 5: and you're like looking very intently.
Speaker 6: Like I saw one.
Speaker 5: I saw one, right, they look like and then like
Speaker 5: sometimes you can't quite tell if it's actually there, if
Speaker 5: it's supposed to be a thing, And that really plays
Speaker 5: into the like that fear of like right out of
Speaker 5: the corner of your eye, like did I just see something?
Speaker 5: Like you look around, like what was that like? And
Speaker 5: and it just like captured that so effectively in a
Speaker 5: way that I had very rarely experienced in horror. Is
Speaker 5: just like something that's there, and it one of the
Speaker 5: most interesting things about it is that it makes you
Speaker 5: watch the show once you realize what's going on, once
Speaker 5: you see your first one, so much of media, like
Speaker 5: for me at least, like I'm on my phone, maybe
Speaker 5: I'm like playing a game on my phone or like
Speaker 5: scrolling through like you know, social media. This show you
Speaker 5: have to watch it, like you have to be watching
Speaker 5: it actively because you want to see those, you want
Speaker 5: to be scared by those, and that like that's one
Speaker 5: of the best things that it did.
Speaker 4: My partner Mary and I realized early on, I think
Speaker 4: after the second flannagan thing, we saw that we had
Speaker 4: to just decide on a Friday night to watch the
Speaker 4: show because we knew we weren't gonna stop, and we
Speaker 4: had to just start early enough and plan to do
Speaker 4: nothing the next day, because the first time we started,
Speaker 4: I think it was with Hillhouse, we started watching it
Speaker 4: on a Wednesday, planning to go watch two episodes and
Speaker 4: then go to bed. After like the fifth episode, we
Speaker 4: forced ourselves to go to bed because one in the morning,
Speaker 4: we got nothing done the rest of the next day
Speaker 4: because all we wanted to do was watch it and
Speaker 4: then stayed up two in the morning the next night
Speaker 4: watching it.
Speaker 5: And it's just and to to pull back a little
Speaker 5: so that it is about a haunted house and a
Speaker 5: family that lives in this haunted house. They are I
Speaker 5: believe they're trying to renovate it, like a house flipping
Speaker 5: type of thing. And the house is just like a
Speaker 5: giant mansion. It has a history like obviously, like people
Speaker 5: have died there, and there's the implication that the house
Speaker 5: is itself is an entity or is like a possessed locale,
Speaker 5: although it's never explained or made clear like why or how.
Speaker 5: And then that's one of the things that I think
Speaker 5: is very effective about this is like you just have
Speaker 5: to accept, Hey, this house is haunted. Things happen, and
Speaker 5: then what is the show about, Like, it's not about
Speaker 5: really the haunting or the ghosts. It is about this
Speaker 5: family and how they have been shaped by a traumatic
Speaker 5: event and how they deal with with their grief over
Speaker 5: this event and you know, they've lost. It takes place
Speaker 5: in two different time periods, like when the original incident
Speaker 5: happens and then like many years later when they're revisiting
Speaker 5: the incident and coming back to the house together and
Speaker 5: like talking to each other and dealing with the trauma.
Speaker 5: And it's really about the trauma of the family and
Speaker 5: how you overcome grief.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I like I say it like Midnight Mass is
Speaker 7: my favorite. Haunting of Hillhouse and Haunting a Blind Manner,
Speaker 7: which we'll talk about later, have such like special places
Speaker 7: in my heart because of how how emotional they are,
Speaker 7: I think when it comes to the idea of family
Speaker 7: and and love and and what what they explore in
Speaker 7: those regards. And with hill House, I think I think
Speaker 7: i'd say Hillhouse and Blind Manner both have some of
Speaker 7: the best character development. And these aren't long seasons, Like
Speaker 7: I don't know how many episodes is hill House? Is
Speaker 7: it like eight?
Speaker 6: Yeah? I think they're both sick. I think all of
Speaker 6: his shows are sixty eight episodes.
Speaker 5: Hillhouse is ten, Okay, that's a decent amount.
Speaker 6: Never trust me.
Speaker 5: That Man is nine.
Speaker 7: Nine okay, so longer than we're used to these days,
Speaker 7: by about two or three, but still shorter than then,
Speaker 7: you know what we used to have. But even even
Speaker 7: with that, thecharacter development is so so good that you
Speaker 7: get the texts of these characters, you get you get
Speaker 7: them down to the bow and I think very quickly
Speaker 7: you care a lot. Yeah, yeah, it doesn't take until
Speaker 7: just the end. You understand them better by the end.
Speaker 7: But for me, within the first episode, I was like Oh,
Speaker 7: like I can, I can group these characters immediately based
Speaker 7: because that's how much you know about them, And and
Speaker 7: I just I think that that was one of the
Speaker 7: strongest aspects of Hunting Pillhouse for sure. Yeah, I just
Speaker 7: absolutely I love it too. The line that Nell says,
Speaker 7: the rest is just confetti gets me every time in
Speaker 7: context too of what it is. Yeah, I love this.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 5: For me, Like when we're talking about characters and the
Speaker 5: character development, I think what's missing from a lot of
Speaker 5: other TV shows is the willingness to trust either your
Speaker 5: character and or your actor to devote like an entire
Speaker 5: episode to that character. I think like what this show
Speaker 5: does is that it kind of like goes through each
Speaker 5: member of the family in the beginning and like focuses
Speaker 5: a lot of the action of one entire episode on
Speaker 5: that character. Like the other characters interact with them and
Speaker 5: exist and maybe have like subplots, but it's usually like
Speaker 5: the one character, like we're gonna follow them for this episode,
Speaker 5: and then they come together I think in that storm episode,
Speaker 5: and the show really like takes off from there and
Speaker 5: then never stops. But it devotes that time in the
Speaker 5: first half to the characters so that we get to
Speaker 5: know them so well.
Speaker 4: And I think part of why they can do that.
Speaker 4: I mean the first episode, maybe the first season, there's
Speaker 4: less of this, but it goes on. Mike Flannagan kind
Speaker 4: of develops like an acting troll. Yeah, you know, if
Speaker 4: you think about like a group of people, the same
Speaker 4: actors and a lot of the same technical people keep
Speaker 4: coming up in his stuff, and it's like, you know,
Speaker 4: it's kind of again like that acting group of like, Okay,
Speaker 4: this time you're gonna get to be the star, and
Speaker 4: you were the star last time. You're more of a
Speaker 4: side character now, but we're all gonna be in this.
Speaker 4: And it was always so funny to me because to me,
Speaker 4: he accomplishes these two things and I think often are
Speaker 4: odds with each other, which is both that from a
Speaker 4: technical filmmaking standpoint, it is utter brilliance, you know, things
Speaker 4: like the ghosts that appear. It's I think all of
Speaker 4: his shows, but especially Hill House, is one of the
Speaker 4: most rewatchable, like the third time, the fourth time you
Speaker 4: watch it, you're gonna be finding new things every time.
Speaker 4: And I think a lot of his shows are best
Speaker 4: the second time because like you said once, you know,
Speaker 4: those ghosts are there you go back and watch and
Speaker 4: you start seeing them all the time and wondering why
Speaker 4: didn't to see them before, or.
Speaker 5: Like something that changing positions, Like there are scenes where
Speaker 5: they do like a one shot they were like panned
Speaker 5: down a hall and then like they pan to a character,
Speaker 5: the character talks and they pan back to the hall
Speaker 5: and something has changed, and it's just it's just like
Speaker 5: terrifying in like a not scary way, like wait, what
Speaker 5: the heck is going on here?
Speaker 7: Well?
Speaker 4: Yeah, time though I miss most of those things, and
Speaker 4: I still completely love it because the character work is
Speaker 4: so done, the writing and the acting, And for me,
Speaker 4: what really blew me away about Haunting of Hillhouse was
Speaker 4: again I feel like this idea of horror is plot device,
Speaker 4: it's not the focus, because I think more than anything,
Speaker 4: it's one of the best shows I've seen about.
Speaker 6: Like if I had someone who had.
Speaker 4: Like a family member die and their family was all
Speaker 4: fighting about it and dealing with it, I might be like, look,
Speaker 4: whether or not you're like ghosts, you can go to
Speaker 4: the ghost part, but watch this because it's such a
Speaker 4: good story about it, because you know, and part of
Speaker 4: the idea is that the tragedy that happened. Originally they
Speaker 4: might have been supernatural. But now twenty five years later,
Speaker 4: some of them still believe it's supernatural. Some of them
Speaker 4: have just come to terms with understand that it wasn't supernatural,
Speaker 4: It was just random accidents. They kind of explained it away.
Speaker 4: Some of them have developed a drug problems. One of
Speaker 4: one character in particular, is kind of marketing it and
Speaker 4: has made himself into like I am one of those
Speaker 4: ghost hunter people, and he you know, he doesn't believe it.
Speaker 4: But because there's all this like cachet around the story,
Speaker 4: and I think you can watch it specifically because you
Speaker 4: like the idea of supernatural at a haunted house, but
Speaker 4: I also think you can watch it and see you
Speaker 4: understand that all these things are metaphors. You know that
Speaker 4: there's a traumatic event that happens in a family, and
Speaker 4: twenty five years later, everyone remembers it a different way,
Speaker 4: and everyone relates to it a different way, and everyone's
Speaker 4: kind of isolated from each other because they don't want
Speaker 4: their reality of it to bounce up against someone else's,
Speaker 4: you know, and like so much of it just felt
Speaker 4: so real, like that even in this movie, there's also
Speaker 4: about a haunted house and ghosts and jump scares and
Speaker 4: all this kind of stuff.
Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, And I think that, like one of you
Speaker 7: mentioned about, you know, trusting your actors, I think it
Speaker 7: was uicky to me. Most if not all, of the
Speaker 7: actors in every Mike Flanagan work produce their best work
Speaker 7: for him and or some of their best work for him.
Speaker 7: I'm thinking like Elizabeth Reezer in Haunting at Hill House,
Speaker 7: I think that's her best performance that I've seen from
Speaker 7: her is in in that show. I already said, I
Speaker 7: think Zach Gilford's best performance is in Midnight Mass. Kate
Speaker 7: Siegel gives the best performance of her life in every
Speaker 7: single show Mike Flanagan project. And I think that that
Speaker 7: says a lot about him because I've heard from all
Speaker 7: of these actors they say that how wonderful he is
Speaker 7: to work with, and I really think that there's a
Speaker 7: collaborative effort there and that he inspires the best in
Speaker 7: these actors because of the way that he approaches this
Speaker 7: and probably the trust he puts in them. I think
Speaker 7: bringing them back for projects is also a sign of
Speaker 7: his trust in them. And it's funny because I see
Speaker 7: him bringing these actors back differently than I see Ryan
Speaker 7: Murphy bringing actors back for his.
Speaker 6: And I don't.
Speaker 7: I don't know why, but there's there's something different there,
Speaker 7: and I don't know if it's that. I truly feel
Speaker 7: like these characters are so different every time we see them,
Speaker 7: even though it's the same actor, and that Mike Flanagan
Speaker 7: maybe takes something some aspects of that actor and puts
Speaker 7: it into those characters so that it's it's recognizable enough
Speaker 7: but still completely different. But I just I think that
Speaker 7: the stories wouldn't be as good if there wasn't that
Speaker 7: sense of trust and collaboration I think behind the camera
Speaker 7: as well.
Speaker 5: Yeah, so Ryan Ryan Murphy you mentioned is American Horror
Speaker 5: Story and I yeah, I used to love American Horror
Speaker 5: Story and just like the last I think two or
Speaker 5: three season, like, I think I'm done with this and
Speaker 5: I agree like they are in anthology, but every season
Speaker 5: they bring back a number of the core cast and
Speaker 5: it has rotated over the years. But but yeah, something
Speaker 5: has become lost and maybe it's just the stories that
Speaker 5: they're telling have become much of tropes and less.
Speaker 7: Of Yeah, I feel like there's not inspiration.
Speaker 4: I think you could a really interesting like one of
Speaker 4: those like little tests to understand what kind of a
Speaker 4: person you are. When you think of Ryan Murphy, is
Speaker 4: your first thought American horror story or.
Speaker 6: Is it Glee? Oh? Sure, yeah, because I'm definitely on
Speaker 6: the Glee side of things.
Speaker 5: I've enjoyed both, which is like, yeah, the two personalities
Speaker 5: within you, the two wolves are Glee and American Horse.
Speaker 4: Exactly. Well, we're already almost in an hour. I'd love
Speaker 4: to talk about all five, but I think lets you
Speaker 4: focus on as a last one, and then we'll probably
Speaker 4: I think this stuff's gonna come up more conversations going forward,
Speaker 4: and maybe we'll watch that new movie and and and
Speaker 4: come back to do an episode.
Speaker 6: Later later in the year.
Speaker 4: But Fall the House of Usher, I think it's another
Speaker 4: one of his like really seminal works. I think Blind
Speaker 4: Manner people like, but I think was not as it's
Speaker 4: generally regarded as not quite as good. And Midnight Club
Speaker 4: is one of those that like really needed a second
Speaker 4: season but just got one season.
Speaker 5: I can't quick like, if we're gonna skip Blind Manner,
Speaker 5: there's one there's one thing I want to highlight. So
Speaker 5: in Hillhouse we talked about the kind of like the
Speaker 5: hidden background ghosts right. One of the things that they
Speaker 5: do in blind manner is that they film a lot
Speaker 5: of scenes with the what's the technical term is a
Speaker 5: split diopter, Like I've I watched a video on this
Speaker 5: where they basically like it's it's two different focuses. So
Speaker 5: they'll focus on the foreground character and then like something's
Speaker 5: happening in the background that's blurry, and then they switch
Speaker 5: the folk to the background when when they want the
Speaker 5: audience to notice the background. What they do on this
Speaker 5: show is they have split diopter shots like that where
Speaker 5: there's absolutely nothing in the background, but the focus will
Speaker 5: shift because there's a ghost there, so it's not even
Speaker 5: like a hidden ghost, it's just like an invisible ghost.
Speaker 5: And it's again, it's so unsettling because we are so
Speaker 5: used to these shots and the focus shifts and it's like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 5: now I'm focusing on thinking the background and you don't
Speaker 5: even realize like what's going like is there something there?
Speaker 5: Like I don't see anything, there's nothing there, but like
Speaker 5: the focus is shifted, and it is absolutely like masterful,
Speaker 5: Like going back and watching some of these shots and
Speaker 5: realizing that when you watched it the first time, yeah,
Speaker 5: like you were unsettled by the shot of just a
Speaker 5: character talking because they switched the focus of the camera.
Speaker 7: Yeah, an you don't find out that it's the ghost.
Speaker 7: Yeah show and then you realize you see it from
Speaker 7: that perspective. Yeah, yeah, I know, I do. I actually
Speaker 7: really love my manner. And I'll just say really quickly
Speaker 7: and we can go to the follow the house susure
Speaker 7: is that one of the reasons, and and that has
Speaker 7: such a soft warm place in my heart is because
Speaker 7: of the character Danny, the main character who is also
Speaker 7: in fall a haunting at Hillhouse. There's a like sexuality
Speaker 7: awakening by by awakening maybe or lesbian awakening for for
Speaker 7: her and as you know, someone I'm by and I
Speaker 7: only came to that really like true realization you know,
Speaker 7: later in life. And I think the that incorporation into
Speaker 7: this horror story is just so beautiful because that's not
Speaker 7: the horror, that is like the light in the dark
Speaker 7: of this, and her relationship becomes the like the one
Speaker 7: solid foundation that always pulls her back. And I just
Speaker 7: think that that is so so beautiful and such a
Speaker 7: beautiful take on this. Some people say that it's kill
Speaker 7: your gaze, but it's not. And adamantly against that. It's not.
Speaker 7: The relationship is a beautiful, fulfilled relationship that has a
Speaker 7: somewhat but we're not sure yet sad ending And I
Speaker 7: just I just think it's abolutely beautiful and it makes
Speaker 7: me cry every every single time.
Speaker 4: And I know that people there, we know for a
Speaker 4: fact that Flanagan worked with lesbian writers in the writing
Speaker 4: of that and really wanted some input from Like he
Speaker 4: showed drafts with like sensitivy readers and stuff like that,
Speaker 4: not to make sure there's an offensive us, like I'm
Speaker 4: writing a story that isn't mine, you know, I want
Speaker 4: to make sure I'm writing this in a way that
Speaker 4: makes sense to others. And yeah, I thought that was
Speaker 4: really beautiful. And so let's go talk about Fall the
Speaker 4: House of Usher.
Speaker 7: The Fall of the House of Usher is a short
Speaker 7: story by Poe and it is loosely adapted in this show,
Speaker 7: like quite loosely. The only real similarities are the two
Speaker 7: of the main characters, Roderick and Madeleine, and the house
Speaker 7: that they grow up in that becomes like kind of
Speaker 7: you know that they keep, and and the fact that
Speaker 7: it fall like that it has this this foundational crumbling
Speaker 7: that is a metaphor for the family actually crumbling, and
Speaker 7: not necessarily the actual house. But yes, Roderick has several children,
Speaker 7: all from different all but two of them from different women,
Speaker 7: and he has kept in touch with all of them,
Speaker 7: and they all have a part in his very big
Speaker 7: pharmaceutical empire, and eventually, due to situations that you find
Speaker 7: out later in the show, each of his children And
Speaker 7: this isn't a spoiler because this literally is the like
Speaker 7: foundation of the show. They say it within the first
Speaker 7: couple of minutes of the show. All of his children
Speaker 7: eventually die, and each episode is dedicated to one of
Speaker 7: those children and how they meet their ultimate demice. And
Speaker 7: each episode is titled after a different Poe work. Each
Speaker 7: character is titled after either a or is named after
Speaker 7: either a Poe character or someone from edgroulland Poe's life.
Speaker 7: And yeah, and each event is a post story or
Speaker 7: multiple post stories together, so they're not necessarily like the
Speaker 7: biggest adaptation within each episode isn't necessarily from the title
Speaker 7: of that episode from the work that it's titled after,
Speaker 7: but it does play a part in it, and so
Speaker 7: it's genuinely like, this is why I need to meet
Speaker 7: Mike Flinnick in one day because we need to have
Speaker 7: a serious discussion about Edgrow and Poe, because once again
Speaker 7: I watched this and I was like, I know a
Speaker 7: fellow Poe bro when I see one, because only only
Speaker 7: then would you know, like have the idea to put
Speaker 7: it together this way, or to include these little easter eggs, like,
Speaker 7: for example, the main characters their their their neighbor who
Speaker 7: he doesn't like as a child and who was very
Speaker 7: cruel to him and he ultimately kind of gets revenge
Speaker 7: against him, is named Longfellow. And uh, that's not a
Speaker 7: Poe character. But in Edgar Allan Poe's actual life, when
Speaker 7: he was a literary critic, which is where he got
Speaker 7: most of his notoriety from while he was alive, he
Speaker 7: tore to shreds the work of Longfellow, who is a
Speaker 7: very well renowned nineteenth century American poet wrote Paul Revere's Ride.
Speaker 7: But Edgar Allan Poe absolutely despised him, wrote horrible things
Speaker 7: about his work, called him a fraud, and I think
Speaker 7: accused him of plagiarism as well. And and so that's
Speaker 7: something that you don't know unless you know Poe's history,
Speaker 7: And like his life, and so I just thought that
Speaker 7: was a little like it's a thing that I think
Speaker 7: it's good for. I think people who don't know Poe
Speaker 7: as well was still enjoy it. But if you do,
Speaker 7: it's like again like Midnight Mass, If you get it,
Speaker 7: it's on another level. And so yeah, that's that's kind
Speaker 7: of the The gist of the show is that so
Speaker 7: many of Poe's works just kind of woven in to
Speaker 7: tell this bigger story that is ultimately uniquely Mike Flanagan.
Speaker 7: And I think I said in the video I did
Speaker 7: about this show, or I don't know if I did
Speaker 7: it in the video, but Poe's work is so like
Speaker 7: macabre and so just out there and at times like
Speaker 7: just really like I think crazy, especially for his time,
Speaker 7: and you read it sometimes you're like, how does someone
Speaker 7: like come up with this? Even if you are a
Speaker 7: horror fan, it's still just kind of like what were
Speaker 7: you thinking? And I love that about him. But as
Speaker 7: you know, times change, that type of style also changes
Speaker 7: to reflect our own society and our own you know,
Speaker 7: understandings of things, and so that type of like effing
Speaker 7: crazy stuff turns into something else and something more like
Speaker 7: what Mike Plan again has created with the Fall of
Speaker 7: the House Splasher, and so I've seen some people say
Speaker 7: that they don't think it's really a good reflection of
Speaker 7: Poe and his work, but I actually think it's one
Speaker 7: of the best. I think that it understands Poe on
Speaker 7: a very deep level, kind of further than the matic
Speaker 7: goes on a thematic level, but also deeper than that
Speaker 7: as well.
Speaker 5: I don't have the background in PO I read a
Speaker 5: few short stories many many years ago, so I don't
Speaker 5: I did not connect with it in that way, but
Speaker 5: I thoroughly enjoyed it, and I think that is the
Speaker 5: hallmark of a well crafted, multi layered story slash. I
Speaker 5: don't know, like appreciation for something that that people who
Speaker 5: are not fans of the thing or knowledgeable and the
Speaker 5: thing can enjoy like the surface level story in the
Speaker 5: way it's which I did. And I think, like this
Speaker 5: is like a thing that, for example, like Marvel stuff
Speaker 5: is starting to lose, right. It's like people are like,
Speaker 5: I don't understand this Marvel thing anymore because you need
Speaker 5: to have like a degree in Marvel, and you know,
Speaker 5: me a fan without a degree in PO, Like, I
Speaker 5: loved this, like it was so good and I I,
Speaker 5: you know, like you see the episode titles, like I
Speaker 5: recognize that I kind of vaguely remember the story, so
Speaker 5: I think this is going to happen, and it does.
Speaker 5: But it they they tie it in with what is
Speaker 5: going on in such a good way, and especially like
Speaker 5: with the modern world. The fact that the Usher family
Speaker 5: owns this pharmaceutical company was just like so on and
Speaker 5: so on, and I was like, oh yeah, So like
Speaker 5: immediately they're telling us like this guy has an a hole,
Speaker 5: he's evil, and he has exploited like people for for profits, right,
Speaker 5: and it's just like a good way to shorthand character.
Speaker 5: And then like showing the way that he did it
Speaker 5: in the flashbacks is like oh wow, yeah, Like I
Speaker 5: didn't I didn't know we were going to go that
Speaker 5: that evil.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I was.
Speaker 4: I was really shocked and surprised by it and loved
Speaker 4: it because, like you, Riki, I had don't know much
Speaker 4: about Poe. I have heard quoth the Raven Nevermore in
Speaker 4: everything from Simpsons to you know, eight other things. I
Speaker 4: had read The Cask of Mantiago in like eighth grade
Speaker 4: English class. I saw the episode that was based on
Speaker 4: it and was like, oh, they're just gonna do a
Speaker 4: metaphorical Oh my god, they're actually.
Speaker 6: Building the walls. It's just so cool, like, which is
Speaker 6: so fun.
Speaker 4: But I don't have the background, but I definitely downloaded
Speaker 4: an e copy of Fall of the House of Usher afterward.
Speaker 4: It's because it's like, I really want to know more
Speaker 4: about this, and they got twenty pages into it and
Speaker 4: their writing style is fantastic but very archaic for me.
Speaker 5: But yeah, and that's even even though it's written in
Speaker 5: the English language. Language has changed, and of course, like
Speaker 5: the times have changed, like vocabulary and all that. So
Speaker 5: to have a creator like Flannagan update Slash reinterpret these
Speaker 5: stories for us to be able to consume in the
Speaker 5: in the modern era, I think is a good thing.
Speaker 5: Like and if people want to go back and connect
Speaker 5: with the original material, they can, or they can try.
Speaker 5: It can be difficult, right, but this is hopefully like
Speaker 5: a is considered like a good way of honoring the
Speaker 5: work of po.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Well, especially because by by doing it this way, he
Speaker 4: really kind of is able to draw a thread through
Speaker 4: all of his stories. All the stories are reference, which
Speaker 4: is temptation. How far will you go when you're offered
Speaker 4: something amazing and wonderful or to get out of a
Speaker 4: terrible situation.
Speaker 6: But you have to.
Speaker 4: More and more compromise your values and your morals, so
Speaker 4: you're doing terrible things. Cle you're becoming like this guy.
Speaker 4: And I in one of I think the best castings
Speaker 4: that I've seen, one of the people who he brings
Speaker 4: back again and again that some parts of the internet
Speaker 4: are telling me he's married to other parts on me,
Speaker 4: he's not.
Speaker 6: I don't think he is.
Speaker 4: But Carla Gugino, I hope you'm pronouncing that name correctly,
Speaker 4: who is a phenomenal actress and has been kind of
Speaker 4: a great actress but also happily playing like the sexy
Speaker 4: femme fatale in this she's a woman in her late forties.
Speaker 4: Anyone ever made a remake of Missus Robinson and they
Speaker 4: didn't cast her for that part, I would think it
Speaker 4: was ridiculous, because like the way she is so seductive,
Speaker 4: but in as it's not oh hey, I want to
Speaker 4: have sex with you. It's I'm gonna just tease and
Speaker 4: I'm going to be alluring and I'm going to get
Speaker 4: you not only to want me, but to want what
Speaker 4: I'm offering. And when I say seductive, I don't just
Speaker 4: mean the seduction of her body, although that comes across,
Speaker 4: that comes. That is literally the case at least one
Speaker 4: or two cases. But it's seducing them into doing the
Speaker 4: things that she wants them to do. And it's the
Speaker 4: you know, to me, going back where we started, possession
Speaker 4: is boring, Manipulation is interesting, and manipulation should be when
Speaker 4: I know just the very subtle buttons to push to
Speaker 4: get you to do the worst thing that you can do,
Speaker 4: not because I made you, but because it's always been
Speaker 4: in you. I just needed to push the right buttons.
Speaker 7: Yeah, completely agree, Just two things. One has to do
Speaker 7: with it, one doesn't. Mike Flanagan is married to Kate Siegel.
Speaker 6: Got it? Okay, that's what I think you can.
Speaker 7: Yeah, yeah, and which I love saying them together. They're
Speaker 7: always on panels together. They're great. Should watch any live
Speaker 7: stream panelis see of it but too. Yes, Carla's character
Speaker 7: in all of Mike Clanning's projects that she's in is
Speaker 7: she's phenomenal. But I really do think that she was
Speaker 7: like the standout of Fallow the House of Usher, and
Speaker 7: her name in the show is Verna, and that is
Speaker 7: an anagram for Raven Okay, so she is she is
Speaker 7: the raven in this story.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I think in later episode she starts appearing
Speaker 4: with ravens and like an episode about the raven is
Speaker 4: she's kind of referred to as that, And yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: it makes it makes total sense and kind of like
Speaker 4: what you were saying about the haunted house in the
Speaker 4: first one Hill House, there's never an explanation given for
Speaker 4: it's never said like, oh, she's this kind of demon,
Speaker 4: or she's this kind of force, or even if she's real, it's.
Speaker 6: It's it's so.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's just Flanning in to me doesn't care about
Speaker 4: the how of the magic. When he cares about is
Speaker 4: the what does this tell us about ourselves?
Speaker 7: And what I love so much about her character is, like,
Speaker 7: really quickly is that she's not like maybe you start
Speaker 7: the show off thinking that she is the perpetrator of
Speaker 7: all this evil, but she's not. She is the mode
Speaker 7: through which it is transferred, and she doesn't. I think
Speaker 7: that she encourages to the point of just here's all
Speaker 7: your options laid out in front of you. Here's what
Speaker 7: it could look like. This is your choice, like you
Speaker 7: were saying, Matthew, and like there's moments in the show
Speaker 7: where you see that she doesn't want necessarily want people
Speaker 7: to choose the worst option, and that if there's a
Speaker 7: time with a person that she can give them grace
Speaker 7: to her best ability, because it's almost like she is
Speaker 7: forced to do these things as well, and if there's
Speaker 7: a moment where she can give someone grace who deserves it,
Speaker 7: she will, even if even as she has to perform
Speaker 7: these these acts that that aren't aren't nice to watch
Speaker 7: or aren't pretty to watch, she will try to give
Speaker 7: the people who deserve it peace and grace while doing that.
Speaker 7: And I think that that is such a a great
Speaker 7: way to show this character that starts off kind of
Speaker 7: as an antagonist and you realize as the show goes
Speaker 7: on it's a lot it's a lot more complicated than that.
Speaker 5: Yeah, she the way that she acts in that way
Speaker 5: reminded me a lot of John Cusack's assassin character and
Speaker 5: gross point blank where he says it's not me every
Speaker 5: time he's about to kill someone. And I agree like
Speaker 5: the the seductiveness of her character throughout this show. Like obviously,
Speaker 5: as the audience, I think we're meant to root for
Speaker 5: her because, like Roderick Usher, and his family are so despicable,
Speaker 5: and it's like, yeah, I guess so like that. That
Speaker 5: was the thing that got to me is it's set
Speaker 5: up in such a way that she's going about her
Speaker 5: actions and I just I loved it. I don't know,
Speaker 5: I don't know if love is ever. It's like, yes, dude, you're.
Speaker 7: Watching these horrible things, but it's captivating. Yeah. It's like
Speaker 7: you're like, oh, I shouldn't want to see how this
Speaker 7: plays out, but you're making me really want to see
Speaker 7: how it's play out.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 4: No, it's so true, and it's I think another part
Speaker 4: of that is that we it's not the idea of
Speaker 4: kind of like the one bad day joker idea that
Speaker 4: you can go up to the most innocent person in
Speaker 4: the world and tempt them. In every case, she only
Speaker 4: appears when a person has already gotten themselves into kind
Speaker 4: of a bad situation because of their greed, because of
Speaker 4: their malfeasance, because of whatever else is going on in
Speaker 4: their lives, and and it's always a kind of like, well,
Speaker 4: I could get you out of this, but wouldn't you
Speaker 4: rather I, uh, you know, help you face justice, Like
Speaker 4: I think she would love Riley Finn you know, because
Speaker 4: Riley Finn feels guilt, and in some ways, I think
Speaker 4: that's she often wants people to confront the monstrosity of
Speaker 4: what they've done, but instead they're like, Nope, nope, let's
Speaker 4: cover it up, let's deny it more. And some of
Speaker 4: them are outwardly malicious, and others of them are convinced
Speaker 4: they're doing good things because they just won't accept looking
Speaker 4: at the horrible things they've done.
Speaker 7: Riley would admit it. He'd be like, I mean, that's
Speaker 7: essentially what he does in Midnight Mass. He's like like,
Speaker 7: come and take me. I guess, like, I don't know. Yeah, God,
Speaker 7: there's so much more I could say. I just don't
Speaker 7: want to spoil specific things about the Night Mass or
Speaker 7: this one.
Speaker 6: I know honestly, now, I just want to go what
Speaker 6: re watch all of them and you got.
Speaker 5: Me out and to go back. In the structure, Fall
Speaker 5: of the House of Usher is eight episodes, but these
Speaker 5: are quite long. It's listed as fifty seven to seventy
Speaker 5: seven minutes each, so the short the shortest episode is
Speaker 5: fifty seven minutes times eight. So I don't know. Like Matthew,
Speaker 5: you and I talk have talked a lot about television
Speaker 5: shows and structure, and for me, Mike Flanagan is doing
Speaker 5: it right. I cannot really like find fault in any
Speaker 5: of the shows of his I watched from like a
Speaker 5: structural run time and like pacing perspective. It's just like
Speaker 5: very very compelling, well made and satisfying.
Speaker 4: So good on him, well good, Like I think what
Speaker 4: we've talked about a lot is that TV can either
Speaker 4: be episodic, and that each episodic, each episode has a
Speaker 4: clear beginning and a story in and of itself that
Speaker 4: may or may not be part of a larger story,
Speaker 4: or it can just be one long story chopped up
Speaker 4: into parts, and that either of those can be good.
Speaker 4: But when it's episodic but it doesn't feel like it
Speaker 4: has to be, or when it's one long thing but
Speaker 4: it feels like it's chopped up in ways that don't
Speaker 4: make sense, like, both of those can be problematic.
Speaker 6: Here.
Speaker 4: I feel like he's very intentional about I am going
Speaker 4: to write each individual episode as an episode that you
Speaker 4: can watch and feel satisfied with, but also that they're
Speaker 4: all part of this larger story. And I think having
Speaker 4: each episode be kind of its own individual post story
Speaker 4: that also advances, this larger one is just such a
Speaker 4: brilliant way to do it.
Speaker 7: You're right, So, you know I feel about his shows,
Speaker 7: I think the way I feel about the structure of
Speaker 7: the Hunger Games books, which we've talked about this before,
Speaker 7: Matthew about how Suzanne Collins really uses it's a utilization
Speaker 7: of craft, and it's a honing and just kind of
Speaker 7: I guess expertise in your craft as well, that only
Speaker 7: comes with practice and you know, discipline, I think. But
Speaker 7: with the Hunger Games, each there's you know, the storytelling
Speaker 7: arc that you have. Each chapter has those three stages,
Speaker 7: and then there are each section. There's three sections. Each
Speaker 7: section or part of the book has that those you know,
Speaker 7: a rise, a climax, and you know a kind of resolution,
Speaker 7: but it still ends like right before the resolution. I
Speaker 7: guess there is some somewhat of a resolution, but ends
Speaker 7: right before enough to make you want to keep going.
Speaker 7: And so each chapter has that, each part has that,
Speaker 7: and the book as a whole has that. And that's
Speaker 7: kind of how I view Mike Plannigan's work is that
Speaker 7: for every show, each episode has that arc. You could
Speaker 7: take a group of episodes and say they have that arc.
Speaker 7: Like in The Haunting of Hill House, you have at
Speaker 7: the beginning each episode is kind of dedicated to a
Speaker 7: family member, a sibling. You get those bunch together, and
Speaker 7: then you go on to the to the kind of
Speaker 7: where they're all kind of mixing together. Once you have
Speaker 7: this understanding of it, and so I view it really
Speaker 7: as a like I said with Suzanne Collins, an understanding
Speaker 7: of the craft and a really really good execution of it.
Speaker 7: Once you understand it, then it becomes and once you
Speaker 7: put your own little twist and flare and signature to it,
Speaker 7: then it becomes maybe a bit easier to apply that
Speaker 7: to different stories.
Speaker 4: Yeah, the rewatchability I think because of that, because it's
Speaker 4: such a well done, step by step revelation of mystery.
Speaker 4: But it never makes you feel it never feels like
Speaker 4: you're frustrated, like oh my god. And I do think
Speaker 4: I will say I think that his shows are perfect
Speaker 4: for Netflix. I think personally that if I was watching them,
Speaker 4: if they were released one episode a week, I think
Speaker 4: I would feel very differently about them unless I had
Speaker 4: waited and seen them all at the same time. Yeah,
Speaker 4: because you're right, they're also well crafted, but they do
Speaker 4: still really have me like, Okay, but what now what next?
Speaker 7: I think blind Man and Hillhouse are probably the ones
Speaker 7: that could do best on weekly releases. The rest maybe
Speaker 7: also Midnight Club, but follow the House, Pusher and Midnight
Speaker 7: Mass kind of need to go all together, I think.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I would say, actually that to me, Usher is
Speaker 4: the most that I could do week to week because
Speaker 4: each one's like I would kind of want to be like, Okay,
Speaker 4: I just watched that no.
Speaker 6: One could be the story. Yeah, I just think about
Speaker 6: this one story.
Speaker 7: But yeah, there's a lot of dissect and analyze each one.
Speaker 5: Yeah, I'm trying to think back to like the The
Speaker 5: Haunting of Hillhouse. I still feel like each at least
Speaker 5: early on, like each one again like had such a
Speaker 5: central focus on an individual character that I think it
Speaker 5: is possible to consume it and then dwell on that
Speaker 5: character and what's happened in that episode. Yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 5: I'm just like, always been very satisfied with his TV shows.
Speaker 5: I mentioned, we mentioned the core actors that he works
Speaker 5: with pretty much consistently throughout, and that's the type of
Speaker 5: thing that like the trust between them and the understanding
Speaker 5: of their skills, like their strengths and weaknesses as actors,
Speaker 5: but also probably like challenging them and knowing like, hey,
Speaker 5: on this next project, I want to stretch you in
Speaker 5: this way that we haven't tried before. And probably like
Speaker 5: having those kinds of honest conversations is what leads to
Speaker 5: these performances. Like so many of these performances are just
Speaker 5: top notch, like it is. It is one of the
Speaker 5: best like performance based TV shows. I feel like that
Speaker 5: I watch because of this, and like you don't realize it,
Speaker 5: I think when you're watching it at first, but once
Speaker 5: you understand flanning In and his his people, you're like, Okay,
Speaker 5: this is starting to make more sense. Like I understand
Speaker 5: now like why these people keep showing up at shows,
Speaker 5: but also like why they're giving such great performances.
Speaker 7: Yeah, can I add off of that. I was watching
Speaker 7: a panel that he did recently with his wife Kate
Speaker 7: Siegal at some comic con recently, and he was talking
Speaker 7: about haunting a hillhouse and the filming for it, and
Speaker 7: they had this really really expensive, rare camera dolly that
Speaker 7: they needed because of the carpet in the house where
Speaker 7: they were filming, and it was the way it was
Speaker 7: set up was that it didn't leave any tracks in
Speaker 7: the carpet, and so they needed that because they would
Speaker 7: pull it around and they wouldn't want to see, you know,
Speaker 7: obviously in the scene that wheels have gone through the
Speaker 7: carpet and left it there. And so they used this
Speaker 7: for a while and when they got to the scene
Speaker 7: I can't remember when it is in the show, but
Speaker 7: it's when all the siblings are together and their fight.
Speaker 7: They're arguing and it's kind of like a one shot
Speaker 7: and the camera goes between them and around them and
Speaker 7: shows like their different perspectives as they're arguing with each other.
Speaker 7: And on the day they were filming this, the Dolly,
Speaker 7: the thing that made it not leave tracks in the carpet,
Speaker 7: was picking up these fibers from the carpet that was
Speaker 7: kind of corroding the metal and the and the the
Speaker 7: workability of it being able to move. And the person
Speaker 7: who was operating this went up to Mike and was like,
Speaker 7: we can't do much more with this, otherwise it's going
Speaker 7: to break. And he was like, well, can we get
Speaker 7: another one? The only place like within reasonable distance of
Speaker 7: them that had a one wouldn't be able to get
Speaker 7: it to them until a few days later, and he
Speaker 7: was like, the actors are in such a good position
Speaker 7: right now mentally and in there. You know they've been
Speaker 7: preparing for this all day. If we break and have
Speaker 7: them make them have to come back and try and
Speaker 7: get in that headspace again a few days l from now,
Speaker 7: we're not going to get the same performance that I
Speaker 7: know we can get today. And so he didn't want
Speaker 7: to tell them about this issue because he was like,
Speaker 7: we can do it one more time. We have to
Speaker 7: do this one more time, and we'll just give it that.
Speaker 7: He decided not to tell the actors that this was
Speaker 7: like do or die because he didn't want that on
Speaker 7: their minds and on their shoulders because it would inevitably
Speaker 7: probably make them mess up. And so he's like, Okay, guys,
Speaker 7: we're just gonna do this once one more time. Do
Speaker 7: not stop unless you hear cut. You don't hear cut,
Speaker 7: Keep going, I don't care what happens. Keep going. And
Speaker 7: within like the first couple of minutes of filming this scene,
Speaker 7: I think it's the dad is writing a letter or
Speaker 7: something and a ghost makes a noise in the background
Speaker 7: or something makes a noise in the background, and the
Speaker 7: actor missed his line. And he couldn't remember it. And
Speaker 7: in the scene he turns around and it's like he's
Speaker 7: looking because he heard a noise, but it's actually because
Speaker 7: he was looking at Mike Flanagan and was like, why
Speaker 7: aren't we cutting? I missed my line? And they were like,
Speaker 7: just keep going, just keep going, And so he turns
Speaker 7: back and keeps going and everyone was confused. The actors
Speaker 7: were like, we have made so many mistakes, why aren't
Speaker 7: they cutting that they were in this like pumped up
Speaker 7: adrenaline stage that made the fight so much better, like
Speaker 7: ten times better, Mike Clanigan said, than any other take
Speaker 7: they'd had of it, any other rehearsal they'd had of it.
Speaker 7: It was just the confusion kind of about was like,
Speaker 7: what's going on? Why aren't we cutting? Made them like
Speaker 7: really anxious, but in a good way, like in a
Speaker 7: way that brought out kind of the anxiety they needed
Speaker 7: to show in that scene to make it as as
Speaker 7: productive and good as it was.
Speaker 5: And yet description too.
Speaker 7: Yeah. The the best part though, is that they got
Speaker 7: to the end of the argument. Mike Clanigan was watching
Speaker 7: on the screen. He was like, this is great, this
Speaker 7: is amazing. Oh my god, we got it they ended,
Speaker 7: he yelled cut, They moved the camera dolly like literally
Speaker 7: an inch and it broke.
Speaker 6: Oh no, so it.
Speaker 7: Lasted literally till they needed it too. And I was like,
Speaker 7: that is like the horror gods are are upon Mike
Speaker 7: Clan again.
Speaker 4: I just want to talk about Rahul Kohley, who is
Speaker 4: I'm probably miscouncing that name. I hope I'm not. With
Speaker 4: Carla One, probably one of my two favorite of his
Speaker 4: recurring actors. And what really blew me away is that
Speaker 4: he's in a number of things, but the two he
Speaker 4: has the biggest roles in are Midnight Mass where he's
Speaker 4: the one who plays the Muslim sheriff.
Speaker 6: And he's done.
Speaker 4: Some great interviews where he talks about what it was
Speaker 4: like for him to play what he describes as a
Speaker 4: brown bearded Muslim in America and just how politically laden
Speaker 4: that is. And there's this great story again talk about
Speaker 4: method and importance. He talks about growing up in Britain.
Speaker 4: His family, you know, is South Asian and has Muslim
Speaker 4: roots but were not necessarily Muslim, and he was an
Speaker 4: atheist from an early age, but he had a best
Speaker 4: friend who was Muslim, and so it's just trying to
Speaker 4: get into Hassan's character, the Sheriff, Asan is his character.
Speaker 4: He would contact his friend and say, like, when you
Speaker 4: were like, you know, a kid, what did you want
Speaker 4: to see from a Muslim hero, a Muslim superhero? And
Speaker 4: apparently when he like casually mentioned that he's having these
Speaker 4: conversations to Mike Flanagan, Flannagan was like, all right, well
Speaker 4: where is he. Let's get him a plane ticket and
Speaker 4: fly him here. And the guy was hired to be
Speaker 4: a consultant on the show. And I just love that
Speaker 4: in terms of how your work amentation works. But the
Speaker 4: two characters that I know him most of one is
Speaker 4: this very kind of like staid, moral upstanding, you know,
Speaker 4: praise to Mecca five times a day, like Uphold doesn't drink,
Speaker 4: doesn't do the things that Muslims aren't supposed to do.
Speaker 4: Is he understands it character and he plays the part brilliantly.
Speaker 4: And then I see fall the House of Ussher and
Speaker 4: I'm watching this guy who looks a little bit familiar,
Speaker 4: who's playing basically like in internet personality, and I think
Speaker 4: he's a is he a video game creator or a
Speaker 4: djit Like he's some kind of like he has a
Speaker 4: video game guy who's just is like he's living in
Speaker 4: a relationship with a man. He is having sex with
Speaker 4: women as well as men, Like he's openly by he's
Speaker 4: you know, kind of in an open relationship but not
Speaker 4: a very consensual one. But he's doing drugs all the time.
Speaker 4: He's sleeping with all these people. And I was like,
Speaker 4: I know that actor, where is that from? And then
Speaker 4: when Mary was like, oh, yes, they guy to play
Speaker 4: Sheriff Hassan, I was like no, because it's just And
Speaker 4: I think one thing a lot of people will do
Speaker 4: is they will like actors get typecast and especially by
Speaker 4: the same writers. And for Flanning him to be like, cool,
Speaker 4: you did such a great job for me playing that part.
Speaker 6: I'm now going to ask you to write a to
Speaker 6: play a.
Speaker 4: Completely different character, completely different set of acting. Chops and
Speaker 4: Flanning in both trusted him to do that, and then
Speaker 4: Coolee was able to do that is to me just
Speaker 4: such a testament to the skill of both writer and actor,
Speaker 4: but also of the trust they have for each other.
Speaker 7: Yeah, the I think I love that. The anecdote you
Speaker 7: shared about his role in Midnight Mass and what Mike
Speaker 7: Flanigan did for that, because it's truly like that's that's
Speaker 7: all you have to do is bring in that you know,
Speaker 7: trust that people understand this more than you as the
Speaker 7: writer do, and and bring them into help. There's no
Speaker 7: shame in asking for help. It makes your work stronger,
Speaker 7: I think. But yeah, I think that's what I love
Speaker 7: for Rahu COOLi is because he's such an amazing actor
Speaker 7: and in I don't want to say in Mike Clannigan's hands,
Speaker 7: but under Mike Clannigan's direction and trust, you really see
Speaker 7: everything that he's capable of. And it makes me kind
Speaker 7: of sad that not all direct that you know, not
Speaker 7: all directors are like that, but also that Hollywood in
Speaker 7: general is not as accommodating for that, I think, because
Speaker 7: what else could we who else could we see kind
Speaker 7: of flourish in this way? And I don't know, I
Speaker 7: think it's kind of telling that, you know, our who
Speaker 7: Couleia only really has gotten those roles from Mike Flanagan,
Speaker 7: And I think it's a shame because I think he
Speaker 7: should be insignificantly more than he is.
Speaker 4: Yeah, just one other anecdote about him, and also about Flannagan.
Speaker 4: Apparently in the original idea he was supposed to be,
Speaker 4: you know, kind of have a dad bod and be
Speaker 4: you know, kind of like an older guy and be
Speaker 4: more gray haired, and and and and he the actor
Speaker 4: actually gained thirty pounds for the role. And then, as
Speaker 4: he describes it, I just wanted to give young brown kids,
Speaker 4: and particularly Muslim kids, something to watch that they'd feel
Speaker 4: proud watching. And that's one of the other reasons I
Speaker 4: ended up losing the weight. If I'm going to represent us,
Speaker 4: let's look good, let's be brown hair, rush and forward
Speaker 4: and scowl and look off the distance and do all
Speaker 4: the hero shots. That's what I wanted to represent with
Speaker 4: his character. And I just love that thinking and also
Speaker 4: that my plannagains that will be like cool, Okay, yeah,
Speaker 4: lose the way that that makes.
Speaker 6: A lot of sense the character.
Speaker 7: And that's what I mean by like the collaborative effort
Speaker 7: between them, and that you know Mike Flanagan, it seems
Speaker 7: I don't know him personally, but from everything I've heard
Speaker 7: and everything I've watched, it's like he doesn't have a
Speaker 7: huge ego. He not to the point where where he
Speaker 7: doesn't allow his actors to come to him with ideas
Speaker 7: and and like he accepts those ideas, he genuinely takes
Speaker 7: them into consideration and sometimes they make it. But also,
Speaker 7: I just love that Rookley's story is in all the House.
Speaker 7: Swusher is my favorite post story, the Black Cat, which
Speaker 7: for Star Wars fans Star Wars Higher Public fans. Justina
Speaker 7: Ireland co wrote the Black Cat and episode. But yeah,
Speaker 7: read that. I highly reckon in reading that because it's
Speaker 7: a wild, wild story.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it sounds like I loved his story and I
Speaker 4: just loved his acting in both and and I mean
Speaker 4: he I'm talking about Carlo Gugino before. He's also an
Speaker 4: incredibly good looking man and what he plays in sheriff
Speaker 4: A's On, Like, it's funny that the other character is
Speaker 4: like very outwardly sexy, but I found sheriff A's On
Speaker 4: far more attractive because he's just I mean, he looked great.
Speaker 4: We're also just this like strong confident person in a
Speaker 4: very a situation that is entirely designed to make him
Speaker 4: feel off balanced, and yet he's just able to work
Speaker 4: with it.
Speaker 7: Inspired by Joel Miller. Nice is a big last for
Speaker 7: this man.
Speaker 6: Oh I love that. I love that, Riki, what do
Speaker 6: you have last thoughts?
Speaker 5: On my last thought. Oh okay, my last thought is
Speaker 5: that these stories are horror, and there are elements of
Speaker 5: it that the supernatural horror or the you know, the
Speaker 5: death scenes are just traditional horror. But the best parts,
Speaker 5: the parts that really remain with you, are about the people,
Speaker 5: right and the there's there's beauty to it, there's tragedy.
Speaker 5: I want to highlight. In Blind Manner, you mentioned rahul Coli,
Speaker 5: like he has a budding almost relationship with a with
Speaker 5: a woman played by Tania Miller, and the folk. The
Speaker 5: episode that focuses on them is.
Speaker 6: Just like so.
Speaker 5: Beautiful and tragic and it just gets me, Like they
Speaker 5: because the she's she's already dead, I think, and like
Speaker 5: trapped in the house and doesn't know. She's like it's
Speaker 5: like the ghost who doesn't know they're a ghost. And
Speaker 5: they they think they have something, they have a connection.
Speaker 5: They're like, okay, like we're gonna have this budding romance
Speaker 5: and then like the moment she realizes she's already dead
Speaker 5: and can't be with them, and like the way that
Speaker 5: they film that and do like a cut I think
Speaker 5: from talking to him and then to the moment and
Speaker 5: realizing she's she's already dead is just like one of
Speaker 5: the most devastating scenes of television that I've watched, Like, oh.
Speaker 7: My gosh, govering.
Speaker 5: Yeah, and that's just like it's littered throughout all of
Speaker 5: his stuff is like giving the characters time to breathe
Speaker 5: and for us to appreciate them, and then like taking
Speaker 5: something away from them and ultimately from us. It is
Speaker 5: just well crafted.
Speaker 4: Okay, there's so much more I can say, but we're
Speaker 4: at ninety minutes, so I'm gonna thank you both, Danielle
Speaker 4: for people who don't know where can they find more
Speaker 4: of your stuff.
Speaker 7: I am on TikTok at written in the Star Wars
Speaker 7: and on Twitter slash x at Danny as three ninety four,
Speaker 7: mostly talking about the Bear these days, guys, but because
Speaker 7: it is September and we're coming up to October, I
Speaker 7: have been posting about my planning and stuff and will
Speaker 7: probably do some other things about horror books and everything,
Speaker 7: so yeah, God for that. I also post articles occasionally
Speaker 7: on Temple Geek about a variety of things.
Speaker 6: Yeah, and we'll have links to that stuff the show notes.
Speaker 6: Check out everything.
Speaker 4: But TikTok's especially though, are just both very insightful and
Speaker 4: very funny. There's a lot of good stuff about clones
Speaker 4: in there from a number of different perspectives people can
Speaker 4: relate to. Yeah, definitely worthwhile checking out. And I will
Speaker 4: say that I have decided that I love food enough
Speaker 4: that in my opinion, and the ability to feed large
Speaker 4: numbers of people while being in a kitchen with lots
Speaker 4: of people you don't get along with is a superpower.
Speaker 4: So we will be talking about the bear at some point.
Speaker 4: We will not be discussing how many laughs per minut
Speaker 4: it you need to be to qualify to.
Speaker 6: Be a comedy.
Speaker 4: I've heard this and I disagree on that, but I
Speaker 4: do think it's an amazing show that you like. Whatever
Speaker 4: I think it deserved awards, whatever the category discussion, we
Speaker 4: will get into that. But yeah, definitely a great, great
Speaker 4: thing to check out, and we'll have Danielle back for that.
Speaker 6: So thank you all so much for listening. We're gonna
Speaker 6: have more in a member section.
Speaker 4: Of course, you become a member for just five dollars
Speaker 4: a month, fifty five dollars a year, all the invational
Speaker 4: of the show notes, but for everybody else, thank you
Speaker 4: so much.
Speaker 6: We have spoken