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Prequel to Warm Bodies - Frankenstein (2025) Fan Reaction, Ranking Del Toro Movies, Warm Bodies Preview · This Film is Lit

• 0:10
  Speaker A: On this week's prequel episode, we follow up on our Frankenstein listener polls and preview. Warm Bodies. Hello and welcome back to another prequel episode of this film is Lit. We talk about movies that are based on books. We have so much listener feedback to get to. Very excited about it. So we're gonna jump right in to our patron shoutouts. I put up with you because your father and mother were our finest patrons. That's why. One new patron this week at the $5 Hugo Award winning level, Brosiah. Welcome, Brosiah. Hope you check out and enjoy that bonus content that starts at the $5 level. If you want to listen to our bonus content, we just put out our episode on Nora. Oh, that was a while ago. So we haven't done February.
• 1:01
  Speaker B: We have not done February.
• 1:03
  Speaker A: Sorry, we did that one so early. That my brain. Yeah, right. So we have not put out Nora was our January episode. We have not put out our bonus episode for February yet.
• 1:13
  Speaker B: What's that on Megamind?
• 1:14
  Speaker A: Megamind, that's right. So look for that here before too long. If you want to see our episode on Megamind, all that starts at the $5 Hugo Award winning level. And as always, we need to recognize our Academy Award winning patrons. And they are. Amanda Nicole Goble, Harpo Rat, Nathan. Vic Blofeld, Matild Cottonwood. Steve. Ben Wilcox, Teresa Schwartz, Ian from Wine Country, Kelly Napier. Gratch. Just Gratch. Shelby will return in Avengers, Doomsday and that Darn Skag. Thank you all so much, so much for your continuing support. Could not appreciate you more, Katie. The people had thoughts about Frankenstein. Let's talk about them.
• 1:56
  Speaker B: Yeah, well, you know, that's just like your opinion, man. The people sure did have thoughts about Frankenstein.
• 2:05
  Speaker A: Sure did.
• 2:06
  Speaker B: Starting on Patreon, where we had six votes for the book, zero for the movie. This is going to be a recurring theme and one listener who couldn't decide. Our first comment was from Shelby, who said, I respect Del Toro as an artist much more than I like his movies.
• 2:27
  Speaker A: I will say I think that's not an uncommon.
• 2:30
  Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
• 2:32
  Speaker A: I have heard other people, plenty of people say that, that they respect what he's doing, but it's just like not their thing or whatever.
• 2:40
  Speaker B: I was initially excited about the Shape of Water, but once I heard more about it, I knew it wasn't going to be my thing. Crimson Peak frustrated the fuck out of me and I went in knowing it was a romance marketed as horror. So that's not why I remember Pan's Labyrinth being really well made. His movies are made with Great care. And the special effects are visually stunning. I appreciate all of that. I think between this and Crimson Peak, the problem for me is the focus on vibes and drama and aura farming over the characters and logic.
• 3:12
  Speaker A: Definitely agree that he focuses more on those things than the logic. I think in his best movies, he does not. The characters do not suffer for it. I think in this movie, they do.
• 3:25
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 3:25
  Speaker A: I think in his best films, the characters don't suffer from that.
• 3:29
  Speaker B: Right. In his best films, he's kind of floating on more of a magical realism kind of a thing, and I think that didn't quite work for Frankenstein.
• 3:42
  Speaker A: Yeah. Or, yeah. My point was just so that I think. I think he always is more focused on the vibes, the drama, the spectacle of it all. And in some of those movies, the characters are still really well realized and, like, work completely, and then in other ones, they don't as well. And I think this just happens to be one of the ones where the characters weren't as well realized.
• 4:04
  Speaker B: In Frankenstein, it kind of worked for me. I went in hopeful for a faithful adaptation, but once I recognized that, once again, the movie was doing its own thing, I noticed something else. This is maybe the fifth time I've read Frankenstein now. The first time, I picked it on my own in high school and we had to write an assignment about whatever we were reading. That assignment was just me venting about Victor not knowing that what I'll be with you on your wedding night means. My teacher did point out that killing the love interest wasn't an overused trope when it was written, which, okay, maybe, you know, I still think he was already killing people he loved anyway.
• 4:46
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 4:46
  Speaker B: My point is, I'm pretty familiar with this book, and I know the popular retellings, even if I haven't read or watched them all at some point. While watching this movie, I realized that Del Toro had taken the cultural associations of Frankenstein and the popular interpretations of the characters and tried to weave it together with the original novel. It's an ambitious idea, and I'm not sure it works, but I was certainly entertained first.
• 5:11
  Speaker A: I definitely think it's a movie that is wildly inspired by the cinema that came before it.
• 5:18
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 5:19
  Speaker A: Like, it is absolutely. Try. It is absolutely like a. His own version of not only the book, but of previous adaptations of the film and stuff.
• 5:30
  Speaker B: Yeah. I think this is a film that is, like you said, it's very inspired by, like, almost every iteration of.
• 5:36
  Speaker A: It's in conversation with all the rest of those in a way that some adaptations aren't but yeah, definitely, yeah.
• 5:44
  Speaker B: First, the Vibes. Frankenstein, the moral less mad scientist and his use of electricity and storms to reanimate his monster. While I prefer the selfish, cowardly Nepo baby version of Victor from the book, the the Vibes are stellar. Second, giving Victor the tragic backstory of the family member he couldn't save and it driving him to conquer death. Third, the creature being immortal. Fourth, Elizabeth getting to be more of a character with her own agency. In the book, she's the pretty blue eyed blonde orphan her parents adopt so she can be given to Victor as a wife. There's plenty of material there with the societal expectations and the movie does keep part of it. Elizabeth in the movie loves science, but is expected to marry a man and go do wife things instead. By dying defending the creature, she gets to make her own choices in the end, if only a little. After listening to your episode, I'm going with the book. It was a relief to see the creature handled better here than his usual stereotype. If only Victor could have gotten the same treatment. Maybe someday, I guess. I was honestly surprised to learn fans of Del Toro didn't love this. It's very much his movie with all of his usual things.
• 7:00
  Speaker A: Yeah, it is. It's just his. His movie like his things can vary in quantity in terms of like what he's doing. Well in that one, it's absolutely a Del Toro film. And that's the stuff I like most about it.
• 7:15
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 7:16
  Speaker A: Like is the Del Toro stuff. The stuff I don't like about it is some of the character writing. And again, more so not even the character writing so much as it is the character writing that I feel like is not in the film that should be. There is more so of my issue is the stuff that's not in the movie as opposed to the stuff that's actually in the movie. I have issues with some of this stuff, but generally it's more so of just. I feel like, like I said in the episode, I feel like that a Movie's missing like 30 minutes that would make it significantly better. And I think that was most people who are Del Toros fans issue with the movie isn't so much that they dislike the Del Toro stuff in the movie, it's that they dislike the other stuff that is not so much a Del Toro specific thing. Again. Right. Character motivations not feeling fully fleshed out is some. Is an aspect of some of his movies when they're archetypal characters. But in this one, the most important element of the story in the film is the relationship between Victor and the creatures. Kind of the most important thematic thing in the movie. And that is also the part of the movie that feels the most lacking in terms of character development and like and the writing. Whereas in a lot of other Del Toro movies, there are, like, broad characters that are kind of underwritten and rely on cliches or tropes or whatever, but they're usually in service of, not the main point of the film. So, like, for instance, Shape of Water, like the villain in Shape of Water, what's his name's character is Michael Shannon or Shannon, something like that? Michael Shannon, I think, is his name. His villain character is underwritten, arguably, and is very much relying on kind of archetypal. Like, he's a very archetypal character who I would say you could probably argue is maybe a little, like, underdeveloped in the film. But the important element is the relationship between whatever the main character. It's been a. We saw that movie in theaters when it came out and have not watched it since. But is the main character and her relationship to the creature in that movie. And that, to me, does not feel underdeveloped in that film. And so, as a result, for me, that movie works really well, among other things, with that movie that I like. But. So, yeah, I think it's just a matter of, like, what parts of Del Toro's. Yeah. Point being, yeah, it's. And there are also plenty of fans who are people who are big fans of Del Toro who also loved this movie. So I don't know. It's not exclusively that, because it's not like, there are plenty of people who did love this movie who are fans of Del Toro. I've seen their reviews now. I've since watched a few from people who were, like, big fans of the movie, and I don't know. I disagree, but I don't. Yeah.
• 10:07
  Speaker B: Anyways, Shelby rounded out her comment with PS Wanted to shout out a banger from Mary Shelley. Beware, for I am fearless and therefore powerful. Our next comment was from Nathan, who said, I honestly was underwhelmed by Frankenstein the book, but I thought the movie was just bad. So I got to go with the book.
• 10:36
  Speaker A: All right.
• 10:38
  Speaker B: The mo. The book is really uneven for me in its depiction of the monster. Victor thinks he is evil just based purely on his physical appearance, which, of course, is absurd, but then he turns out to be right. I would disagree with that assessment of the text because one of the larger kind of broader points that the book is making is that because the creature is ugly is monsterly and inhuman. People treat him poorly and it's because of that treatment that he becomes evil. He's not evil innately. Yes, he's evil due to the response that he gets from the world.
• 11:26
  Speaker A: Yeah, I don't think it's, I don't, I would not say it's accurate to, to, to summarize the, of saying that Victor hates him because purely based on his physical appearance and then turns out to be right.
• 11:37
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 11:38
  Speaker A: He ends up being the villain or the monster ends up, the creature ends up becoming quote unquote a bad guy or a true monster. But it is not because of his appearance. Or it is, but it's, it's more so because of his society's treatment of him for his appearance. So Victor is not right. Victor ends up being correct kind of at the end.
• 11:58
  Speaker B: That's kind of a self fulfilling prophecy.
• 12:00
  Speaker A: Yes, it's a self fulfilling prophecy. So I, I, I, that, yeah, I would not say that Victor is correct that he is evil purely based on his physical appearance. He becomes evil because of society's treatment of his physical appearance, which is a different, a very distinct thing.
• 12:13
  Speaker B: Yeah. And there are like multiple times throughout the book that the creature says, and I'm paraphrasing here, but says like, you think I'm evil, I'll show you evil.
• 12:26
  Speaker A: Yeah, he says that in the movie too. Essentially at the end with his confrontation with Victor. I think in the cave when he like breaks his nose, he says essentially the exact same thing, which is. Yes, that is the point. It is not. Victor is not correct. Again, he turns him evil and it's part of the forces that create the evil. But he's not correct that the creature is evil because he's, because of his physical appearance.
• 12:51
  Speaker B: By far my favorite part of the book is the creature's time watching the cabin. I think it does a fantastic job of portraying the innocence and good of the creature. I truly felt the heartbreak when he was still rejected, but what I didn't feel was rage. He explicitly considers violence against his attacker, but doesn't strike him because he is just sad. Then later he kills William in a fit of rage. And even worse, cold bloodedly frames Justine because he thinks she is the type of pretty he can never be. People contain multitudes, so you always expect consistent consistency. But in a novel one would expect a reason for the change in behavior and there is none, provided nothing happens between his decision not to harm someone attacking him and his murders. To motivate this change is that I.
• 13:41
  Speaker A: Haven'T read it so. But my understanding is that based on what you're saying, that that's not the way you read it, that there are things that happen which is the way people treat him.
• 13:50
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 13:51
  Speaker A: Maybe Nathan's looking for a distinct, like, action or moment that. I don't know.
• 13:56
  Speaker B: Okay. Yeah. There is actually something really specific that happens in between there. So in the book, when he strikes out with the cottage family and does not end up getting lovingly accepted into the fold, he leaves. So he finds these papers in his pocket that have Victor Frankenstein's name and where he lives on them.
• 14:25
  Speaker A: So that correlates to the movie where he goes back and finds the address.
• 14:28
  Speaker B: Yeah, where he goes back and finds the address and he decides that he's going to strike out and he's going to find the guy who created him, his father, essentially. And then on his way there. So I have a quote written down here. This is immediately after he gets rejected by the family for the first time. The feelings of revenge and hatred filled my bosom, and I did not strive to control them. But allowing myself to be borne away by the stream, I bent my mind towards injury and death.
• 15:01
  Speaker A: Yeah. So it's the rejection of the family.
• 15:03
  Speaker B: Yeah. And then he destroys their garden and burns down their cottage, strikes out for Geneva to find Frankenste Stein, and then he sees a girl drowning and saves her from drowning. And then the guy who's with her sees him and shoots him with a gun.
• 15:20
  Speaker A: So another. So even though he was already. So the family rejects him. He. He has that line about, like, now my heart is hardened like Pharaoh or whatever, I'm gonna go murder spree.
• 15:30
  Speaker B: But then he says he still saves.
• 15:32
  Speaker A: Somebody, and then is again immediately.
• 15:35
  Speaker B: And then I have another quote written down here. This was the reward of my benevolence.
• 15:40
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 15:40
  Speaker B: And then he gets lucky and he happens upon William, who in the book is Frankenstein's much younger brother. He's like a little kid. And at first he sees this kid and he's like, oh, maybe I can kidnap him and, like, raise him to be my companion, and then I won't be lonely. But then it comes out, as he's trying to do that, William says that his father is Monsieur Frankenstein. And the creature's like, oh, you're related to Frankenstein. Fuck you, I'm going to kill you.
• 16:13
  Speaker A: Yeah. So, yeah, it seems like there's multiple.
• 16:16
  Speaker B: Yeah, there's a lot of stuff that happens in there.
• 16:18
  Speaker A: Yeah. But I mean that, to me, the way you've laid that out seems like a pretty direct line chain of events that lead from, hey, I won't even kill somebody in self defense or whatever, to fuck this, I'm going to burn the whole world down. Because like again, being rejected by that family, trying to save a little girl, and then immediately being shot by the person, her father or whatever, like those are some very direct things that I think are the reason you're looking for to explain the changes in his behavior. At least that's what it seems like to me, having not read it, but just based on your kind of recounting there.
• 16:52
  Speaker B: So Nathan went on to say, I would love a book where the gradual shift occurs, but this book spends too much time on Victor to allow for that to happen. I, Yeah, I wouldn't say that the shift in the monster is gradual. It's kind of like it's definitely a.
• 17:10
  Speaker A: Little sudden based on what you're saying. Yeah, but it seems understandable.
• 17:15
  Speaker B: It's not like I wouldn't necessarily describe the storytelling going on in this book as like, subtle.
• 17:22
  Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 17:24
  Speaker B: But I do agree that the book spends too much time on Victor.
• 17:28
  Speaker A: That could be fair. Yeah, yeah.
• 17:30
  Speaker B: I think the monster story, the creature story is more interesting.
• 17:33
  Speaker A: Right.
• 17:34
  Speaker B: On the subject of Victor, I find his handling to be equally confusing. We are definitely meant to ponder whether his playing God is inherently immoral or wrong. But the book kind of cops out on the answer. The experiment fails not because there was inherently any problem with Victor's actions as a scientist, but rather his behavior afterwards. He's a terrible parent, but if he had been a good one, the effects of playing God might not have been negative at all.
• 18:02
  Speaker A: That does tie into something I said in the movie about the. Go ahead. Sorry.
• 18:05
  Speaker B: Well, I was just going to say that I. And this is the read that I got from it. Obviously you read it differently. Personally, I feel like the, the, the basic question, is it wrong to play God? Is something that is a little bit more asked by adaptations of Frankenstein. And I feel like the book, the book isn't not asking was it wrong for him to play God, but I think the book is approaching it a little differently. Whereas the book, in my opinion is essentially asking was it wrong for Victor, that is God, to create a being and then immediately abandon his creation? Yes, it's like a slightly different question.
• 19:00
  Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. And because I had a similar. I will say I had a similar kind of toughness with what the movie was saying about that, where it does feel like at times the movie is talking about. Well, the issue, the problem is that Victor deigns to play God and reanimate a corpse or whatever. And that is inherently immoral or bad in some way. It feels like that is part of what the movie is saying. But then at other times, it definitely does feel like. And I kind of tried to touch on this in the episode and didn't feel I had a good. Went. I had a good place to go with it because I hadn't really thought through it entirely. But then at other times, it does feel like actually what the movie is focusing on is kind of what Nathan's getting at here. The issue isn't whether or not he created this life. The issue is that he abandons it and is an bad father to this creature. That is more so what the movie seems to be judging Victor for, but it also does seem to present the idea that, like, hey, maybe this whole thing was bad, but then never really kind of grapples with that and instead moves on to the more personal and I think, more interesting question and more maybe, like, approachable, like. Or not even approachable, but the more, like, important question in terms of, like, the fact that it's attainable because we're not going to reanimate corpses. Like, realistically, it's probably just not a thing we're ever going to be able to do. So that's actually not even that. You can expand that to different scientific questions if you want, but, like, that specific question is not super relevant. But the question of, okay, but what is your duty of care once you have created this thing? Whether that be this science experiment or an actual child or whatever. Yeah, it's examining that. And I'm once again still hitting up against, like, not really having a great way to discuss this, because I do think there is a messiness in that thematic messaging of where it does feel like initially the film is setting up the question of morality being, is it okay for him to do this at all? And then that question becomes okay, actually, is it?
• 20:59
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 20:59
  Speaker A: Like, what is his responsibility after that? You know what I mean?
• 21:02
  Speaker B: I think the book is kind of the same in the way that it does that. And it almost makes me wonder if Mary Shelley, like, started out with the first question and then, like, found a more interesting question as she was writing. But I also think that the, like, popular culture perception of Frankenstein tends to focus more on the first question because.
• 21:28
  Speaker A: That'S like, the Jurassic park question.
• 21:29
  Speaker B: Yes. And I think that that can trip people up.
• 21:31
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 21:32
  Speaker B: All that said, I still found the book interesting enough and was truly engaged with the parts from the creature's perspective. The movie didn't really engage me at all. Its primary flaw is that it was just too long and too full of pointless extra stuff while failing to set up any character.
• 21:50
  Speaker A: I agree it failed to set up the character development. I don't feel like it was stuffed with extra stuff. Pointless extra stuff. Personally, I could see it being too long if you're just not into it. I. Again, I might. I've said I think it should have been longer because they needed more time to set up that character development. But I didn't feel. I don't know, I would have to go back and watch it again. But there wasn't anything particularly that stood out to me in the film other than one specific subplot, which we're going to talk about here in a second. There was. Other than that subplot, which is fairly minor. And even some of that, I'm fine with it being there like this, the beginning part of it. I'm fine with it being there as the explanation for whatever. Just kind of the. Where it ends. But other than. And I'll just say it, other than the. The Harlander subplot.
• 22:32
  Speaker B: Yeah, I totally agree.
• 22:34
  Speaker A: I don't. There was nothing. To me where I was like, well, this doesn't need to be here. This feels extraneous or pointless.
• 22:39
  Speaker B: Yeah, that was. That subplot was like the one big thing that I would consider. Like, I would have taken that out.
• 22:45
  Speaker A: I think that could have been removed. Again, I don't even.
• 22:48
  Speaker B: I think that it could have been removed, and I don't think the movie would have suffered for it.
• 22:52
  Speaker A: Yeah, I think it would have been fine, too, if you even have the beginning part where he shows up and offers to bankroll it. And they have their initial discussion, basically using him as a sounding board to explain some of what.
• 23:04
  Speaker B: Right.
• 23:04
  Speaker A: He's basically. Because him and Victor get to talk about what Victor's doing in a way to help explain it to us for the audience. And I think that initial use of that character makes sense. I just don't know if he needed.
• 23:18
  Speaker B: To be.
• 23:21
  Speaker A: Involved going forward as he was from there.
• 23:24
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 23:24
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 23:25
  Speaker B: The part from the creature's perspective is so far into the movie that while I liked Elordi in the role, I was already exhausted by the movie and had a hard time getting interested again. Brian mentioned that he would watch a longer cut with more character development. And I agree partially, if somebody made Del Toro cut the film down, there were so many things that could have gone. Christoph Walls, as much as I love him, didn't need to be in this film at all, he mostly serves to provide the funds and provide a backward for Victor to explain how he plans to raise the dead. The book showed neither of these is necessary. The discussion of the technology, it just turns into pseudo jargon that is confusing and meaningless. Walls also leaves no impact on the film. After he is gone, he damages a part that ultimately works anyway and potentially could have upset Elizabeth or William in his death, but that never comes up. Del Toro made a bad editing choice if he cut relevant character development instead of an original character with no real impact on the story.
• 24:27
  Speaker A: That I agree with entirely. Like that part. But that's. To me, that's the only thing. Like, I don't know what else would be.
• 24:33
  Speaker B: Well, and particularly because his. I mean, Nathan's right. His influence on the story completely vanishes after he dies.
• 24:41
  Speaker A: Even his death is not that important.
• 24:43
  Speaker B: Not really important.
• 24:43
  Speaker A: They do leave because of it. Like, William sees. He tells William that he died or whatever. And that kind of spurs them leaving at that one point. But that doesn't even seem that important. They could have a million reasons. They.
• 24:54
  Speaker B: Whatever.
• 24:55
  Speaker A: It just. It does feel particularly underutilized and not super interesting. And definitely, again, if. If that would be what I would cut.
• 25:06
  Speaker B: Yeah, I mean, personally, I think that would be the only thing I would consider.
• 25:10
  Speaker A: But that's the thing. That's the only thing I would say. And I don't even agree necessarily that the discussion of the technology at the beginning is confusing and meaningless. It's a little confusing, but I think it does add to the fun world building, like sci fi fantasy element of this and gives us an avenue for some of the fun spectacle of a mad scientist. That is part of what I want when I'm going to watch this Del Toro's Frankenstein. I want to see crazy science experiment, like a crazy lab with all kinds of stuff. And I want to see a guy, a corpse tied to a table, flayed open. You know, like, that is what I want visually. And so I think having the kind of jargony nonsense science explanations at the beginning are fine. And I don't. Because I don't think it even takes up that much time in the narrative. Like that, to me, was not the issue again. But I completely agree about Harlander. I think he. You can maybe use him at the very beginning to introduce it and then he can.
• 26:14
  Speaker B: Yeah, he can get out of the story.
• 26:16
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 26:18
  Speaker B: I thought the creature looked like Vision from Marvel. And while that's not necessarily a bad thing, it was kind of boring, especially coming from Del Toro. Like, I guess he should be uglier and instead he just looks mildly cool.
• 26:33
  Speaker A: I don't disagree with that entirely. The creature's design, I was like, I thought it was fine. I wasn't blown away by it, but I thought it was fine. And there were elements of it that I really liked, like I talked about in the episode, but it wasn't something where I was like, now that is super cool and original. That was like, that is a perfectly fine version of Frankenstein's monster. That is not. Yeah, not reinventing the wheel, but also not like, I thought it was fine.
• 27:02
  Speaker B: I definitely preferred the book's version of the creature watching the family, because the book can be more explicitly in the creature's head. I feel his innocence as he learns and his pathos upon rejection. I think the death of the old man is a bit too much because the real pain comes from the rejection by the people the creature has come to love. It creates a level of violence and anger that overwhelms the sadness, which I think is a mistake. I will say that fundamentally, I don't have any problem with raising the dead, and it's odd to see it portrayed as such a tense discussion. Perhaps as an atheist, I miss the parts tied into attempting to undo the will of God, but absent any sign that people were murdered only for their body parts, I don't see anything unethical or horrible about what Victor did. He did create a life without making sure the life wanted to exist, but that's true when folks are born the normal way.
• 27:57
  Speaker A: Yeah, I don't. My feelings on this are unexplored and probably complicated. I don't necessarily have an issue with the idea of bringing a. I don't know, I have to examine it more. Again, I'm also an atheist who I, I, my, my knee jerk reaction is to be dismissive of concerns about stuff like that because it does hearken to a magical thinking in a way that I am not sympathetic to. Of like, well, oh, well, this is disrespectful to the soul or to God or. All of these are things I do not believe in. I do not believe in a soul. I do not believe in God. I do not believe in any sort of magical essence to humans or anything like that. That being said, what I think if you extract it beyond the very specific question of is it fine for humans to, like, bring a corpse back to life? I think that already is an interesting. I think there's more difficulty in that question than maybe even on it from an atheist perspective. I think there's more philosophical sticking points to that are initially apparent by just going, well, none of that's real. Like all the magic stuff isn't real. So obviously it's fine. I think there's more to it than that that I haven't really examined as fully as I would like to, to have this discussion. But if you go beyond even that, I think it's very, I think with the, the what the movie is presenting, that I think is a very important question, which is again, kind of just the Jurassic park moral thing, which is we should be way more reflective or critical of the decisions we make in the name of scientific advancement purely because it would be a scientific advancement, if that makes sense. I think like the movie isn't so much saying, hey, it's immoral to like, it's blanket moral immoral to like reanimate a dead corpse. The movie's point is Victor didn't think about what that actually meant and what the extent of the repercussions of that would be. And that's what we need to think about before we do stuff like that. And this kind of goes back to the earlier point about like the, the question switching from the act at all of like playing God versus like him abandoning the creation. It's a similar thing of like, I think what the important moral question that the movie and the story is raising isn't necessarily specifically is it morally okay to play God in this way? Because again, to me God doesn't exist. So what? Who cares? Who am I offending? I'm not offending God, but making sure that you think through what the actual repercussions of these actions will be on everybody, including the thing that you are bringing back from the dead. That is something that it should not be just dismissed as like, oh, that's wooey magical thing. Like that is a genuine physical, real world result that you're going to have to come to terms with and deal with. And so you have to like think about that.
• 31:10
  Speaker B: Yeah, no, I agree. It's. I, I mean, I think, yeah, you're right. It's the Jurassic park kind of you, you know, you didn't think about the consequences. You just did this because you could.
• 31:21
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 31:22
  Speaker B: And now look what you've done.
• 31:23
  Speaker A: Yeah. Which again, I think is incredibly relevant and important moral message in our current environment, in our current technological landscape. I think that is a very important thing, is we should be more measured and more considerate of the, the effects that our actions will have. Even if we're not worried about offending God. Or whatever. Because I agree that's dumb. Who cares? But what we should be worried about is how will this affect us? How will this affect the world? How will this affect the creatures that here exist and physically? Because that is also a thing that should be considered. And the point is that Victor did not consider that. He just said, I can do this. This is fucking cool and worth doing. And he had his own reasons for that. Again, that tie back to childhood trauma and all that sort of stuff. But, yeah, so, yeah, I. That's. That's kind of where it lands for me.
• 32:17
  Speaker B: The line in the book and movie about the monster being big so Victor could work on a larger scale makes no sense. The parts were all human sized, and that's what he would be working on. Making it bigger just means he would have to sew more bodies together.
• 32:32
  Speaker A: Yeah, I. I don't remember that line in the movie. But it does not make big, a ton of sense because, yeah, he would still have to. Most of the parts are the size they are, right? Like, if you're. If you're sewing arteries and stuff together, the arteries aren't bigger because you're creating a bigger person.
• 32:50
  Speaker B: I don't know.
• 32:51
  Speaker A: You know what I mean? Like, that doesn't really make sense.
• 32:53
  Speaker B: And like I said in the episode, the book is pretty vague on, like, the science part of it. But, I mean, when I read that in the book, I honestly was just envisioning him, like, going out to the morgue or whatever and being like, okay, I'm looking for the biggest legs I can possibly get and, like, stitching together just, like, the absolute largest pieces of everything he could possibly find.
• 33:20
  Speaker A: Which, to be fair, at the period where this book. This book was written in the 1700s, right. Or whatever, like the.
• 33:25
  Speaker B: Oh, my God. 18. 18.
• 33:28
  Speaker A: Okay, 18. 18. Scientifically, medical knowledge was not great at the time.
• 33:33
  Speaker B: Yes.
• 33:34
  Speaker A: So I think in the book that line makes sense from that perspective of. She's not thinking about all of the intricacies that we now know would be required in stitching together a body.
• 33:48
  Speaker B: Right?
• 33:48
  Speaker A: She's thinking big chunks of meat, sewing them together with thread or whatever. You know what I mean? And so bigger chunks of meat, easier to sew together than tiny chunks of meat is the idea. Your point, Nathan, which is fair, is that we know that if you're doing all this, you're gonna have to connect all of the blood vessels and all of that shit, which that doesn't. A bigger person doesn't have. Not. Not substantially. So in a way that matters bigger, you Know, blood vessels and all. They do a little bit, but not in a way where it really matters. And so to your point, yes, the scale doesn't really matter, but I. From the perspective of 18. 18, I can understand why she would think that that might be the case.
• 34:27
  Speaker B: Right. To me, Mia Goth looks virtually identical in the two roles except as the mom. She has eyebrows.
• 34:35
  Speaker A: That's crazy. She didn't look anything alike to me. She looked like a whole different person.
• 34:39
  Speaker B: As the eye, I mean, I.
• 34:40
  Speaker A: She has cheek prosthetics on. I'm like 99%.
• 34:43
  Speaker B: I could tell it was her. I mostly noticed that they did like an old age makeup on her to be the mom.
• 34:50
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 34:50
  Speaker B: They added a little bit according to the Internet. They also modified her nose, but I don't really see it.
• 34:57
  Speaker A: I did. That's wild to me because I felt like she looked almost like a different person between the two roles.
• 35:03
  Speaker B: I would have to look at her.
• 35:04
  Speaker A: I could tell it was her again, but she looked almost like an entirely different person to me.
• 35:10
  Speaker B: I don't really understand why she plays both roles, but I think it is just a fun, weird thing with no real meaning in the story. Beyond that. I kind of assume. Beyond that. I kind of assume that Mia Goth just likes weird acting choices. And this is one. So they did definitely invokes Freudian mommy issues, but that doesn't really come up in the film. Beyond that.
• 35:31
  Speaker A: No. That's the reason. It has nothing to do with Miagoff's acting choices. Personally, I don't think. I think Del Toro. That was a Del Toro decision because it's the underlying. Victor's obsession with his mother because she was the only one who cared for him and he had a good relationship as a child. Losing her. And then. Yes, the Freudian Oedipal undertones by having Mia Goth play.
• 35:59
  Speaker B: Yeah. Because the only reason that he has any interest in Elizabeth is because she looks like his mom, in my opinion.
• 36:07
  Speaker A: I don't think that's the case.
• 36:08
  Speaker B: I do.
• 36:09
  Speaker A: Oh, that's interesting. That was not my interpretation.
• 36:11
  Speaker B: I think. I think he sees her and like that, like, Oedipal thing kicks in. I think if she had been. Not if she didn't look like his mom, like, I don't think he would have been interested in.
• 36:23
  Speaker A: Interesting. That was not my read on it, but I could see that my read on it was that. That the similarity in their looks is for us, the viewer, not for Victor. The character was. Was how I interpreted it. Interpreted it. But it's for us to go okay. To connect in our brains. I agree. The movie doesn't really go anywhere super deep with that. It's a sub theme of the movie is his obsession with his mother.
• 36:48
  Speaker B: I mean, and the book doesn't really like because the book has those kind of incest vibes, but doesn't really do a whole lot with it either, which.
• 36:55
  Speaker A: I don't think all of those little things like that have to be fully explored for them to be useful and compelling in a movie. Like in this particular instance, I think it makes you, the viewer go, oh, that's interesting. Why is she playing both? And then you're thinking about, okay, well, he has this obsession with his mother and then he later he kind of becomes obsessed with Elizabeth and this ties into the trauma from his childhood and oh, the fact that they're played by the same character. Like there's something there like that he's clearly. It lets you connect in your brain as a viewer that, oh, he's clearly attaching to her because of some underlying childhood trauma related to his mother. And that is part of what is motivating not only his obsession with conquering death, but also his, his kind of connection to Elizabeth. And, and yeah, if you want to go the extra step and say that actually the fact that she does look like his mom is another layer to why that's the case, I think that's fine. That's not how I read it, but, but I do absolutely think that it's, it has meaning.
• 37:54
  Speaker B: So Brian is correct about how silly the brothers line about Frankenstein being the real monster is. I think that whole conversation is silly, honestly. The whole movie is about telling and not showing. If the brother is scared of Victor, why did we never see it before? William just seemed a bit dismissive of Victor being not at all surprised he got kicked out of the medical group, but ultimately helpful in creating the lab. There is no fear played, just love and a bit of frustration at being taken for granted.
• 38:23
  Speaker A: I completely agree with that. That's one of the failings in the movie. That's the character writing that I think the movie fails at most is establishing stuff like that.
• 38:34
  Speaker B: I lightly disagree. I think that the movie definitely could have done more to establish what their relationship was. But to me, that first interaction that Victor and William have when they're both adults, to me belied a kind of discomfort. I felt like William was uncomfortable around Victor.
• 39:07
  Speaker A: I agree with that and I got that. I think it's just that it, I would have to watch it again. I, I, my, my recollection of Their relationship, it does feel like. What did feel like. There was definitely discomfort, and you could tell their relationship was not like hunky dory, but the. The line at the end where he's like, I've always feared you, I fear like that felt like that did not necessarily capture the nature of their relationship as depicted in the film prior to.
• 39:35
  Speaker B: That's fair. That scene, I don't disagree with you, but I do feel like I can squint and see that in the first part.
• 39:44
  Speaker A: I agree with that. You can squint and see it, but that's one of my fault things in the movie is that I feel like it needs to be better developed.
• 39:52
  Speaker B: But yeah, it's not just the stuff at the end either. The film does this throughout. Elizabeth's introduction is like this when she calls out Victor's motivations. That's a valid point. But the movie hasn't really developed before this scene, so it seems very much like the movie is worried you won't get it when they develop it later. This movie is pretty, but just fundamentally bad at developing characters or the plot.
• 40:17
  Speaker A: I agree about characters. I don't necessarily agree about the plot. I think it does a fine ish job with the plot, but definitely with the characters. I don't think it does. I don't agree about the conversation with Elizabeth's introduction. I think that that is the movie introducing that plot point in a way that I thought was compelling by having it be this. It does a lot of work in that. It's my favorite scene in the movie. I think it does a lot of work, not only introducing this new character as a, one, as a love interest, but two, as a intellectual rival to Victor, and three, as setting up that she fundamentally disagrees with his endeavor, at least in some ways, and kind of explores that in a way that I thought, to me, the writing in that scene, while not super nuanced and subtle, is some of the more subtle writing in the film that felt supernaturalistic to me and did not feel like just hitting, like the point over the head with a hammer like some of the other scenes did. That one felt like a pretty solid. Again, that was my read on it, but.
• 41:20
  Speaker B: All right, our next comment was from Kelly.
• 41:23
  Speaker A: Thank you, Nathan, for your comments. Yes, thank you, love. Love arguing with you. Our next comment correspondence.
• 41:32
  Speaker B: Oh, God. It kind of is, isn't it?
• 41:34
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 41:35
  Speaker B: All right, our next comment was from Kelly Napier, who said, before I started reading the book, I thought I knew the story of Frankenstein similarly to Dracula. The idea of the story is so prevalent in our culture that I assumed what I was getting into. Then I started reading. I was so confused by it, starting with a ship frozen in ice, that I checked two or three times to make sure I was reading the right book. As I kept reading, I was surprised to learn that this is not a horror story, as I had always assumed, but rather a story about revenge and the arrogance of man. I found it to be a fascinating look at what can happen when man dabbles in things he shouldn't and how the way we treat others can affect the type of people they become. There were things in the book I preferred. I liked the way Elizabeth was presented in the book over the movie because I thought her death was more of a blow to Frankenstein's psyche due to his personal relationship with her from childhood and not just being this chick he had a crush on. I. I definitely can see that. I also think, though, that the movie is doing something a little bit different where, like, I. I don't know, that Victor in the movie was, like, crushed by Elizabeth's death.
• 42:54
  Speaker A: No, no.
• 42:56
  Speaker B: I think that what we see in the movie is. Is him dealing with a blow to his ego more than anything else. So at that, like, that change is fine for me, but definitely, I can see what you're saying. I liked the idea that he was responsible for the death of the maid because he refused to speak up when he knew what really happened to the little boy. I actually missed that storyline in the movie, but with the way Del Toro told the story, it wouldn't have made a lot of sense. I liked how all of the people the creature killed in the book were intentional. The creature said he would ruin Frankenstein's life, and he did. In the movie, all the deaths were unintentional, like Elizabeth jumping in front of the creature or William being thrown and hitting his head. The creature in the story was scary because he stated his intentions and then followed through without remorse.
• 43:50
  Speaker A: Yeah, I mean, that's what we. That's kind of the main thing we talked about in the.
• 43:53
  Speaker B: Yeah, they're just doing two different.
• 43:55
  Speaker A: Two different things of the. The book is he becomes the monster, legitimately becomes the monster because society forces him to. Whereas in the movie, he's framed as the monster and kind of becomes Victor's monster, but is not, like, evil in the way that the book does, because, again, Del Toro doesn't.
• 44:18
  Speaker B: Del Toro doesn't do that.
• 44:19
  Speaker A: Doesn't do evil monsters. Sorry. He does. They're just white guys. And I say.
• 44:27
  Speaker B: Not like he's wrong.
• 44:28
  Speaker A: No.
• 44:29
  Speaker B: In the movie. I preferred the way the creature story was told. Him being able to spend more time with the blind man and cultivate a relationship based on mutual respect helped me buy into what a blow it was to the creature when the rest of the family discovered and rejected him. He felt acceptance making the loss of it that much more awful. I also preferred the movie bringing the creature to the ship at the end to have one final confrontation and then Victor's death finally bringing the creature some closure. He proves he does have a sense of humanity after all by helping to free the ship from the ice. I didn't really prefer one medium over the other, so I copped out and said I couldn't decide. That is perfectly fine. That's.
• 45:13
  Speaker A: That's allowed.
• 45:14
  Speaker B: I do will say, though, I do agree that I always feel like I'm copping out when I can't.
• 45:19
  Speaker A: Yes, it does feel that way, but you are allowed to do it.
• 45:23
  Speaker B: I always feel like I'm taking the cowards route.
• 45:26
  Speaker A: Yeah, it does feel that way.
• 45:28
  Speaker B: Okay. Our last comment on Patreon was from Page from a book and Paige from a book said so first of all, I want to say that I loved this movie and I'll get into it more here in a minute. But I chose the book solely for the reason that the specific book got me into science fiction even more so than I already had been. I grew up on Star wars and things like it, but when I first read Frankenstein in high school, I knew that this was going to be the genre that kept me in with science fiction and fantasy. I love the book for what it is. I wish I could read it again for the first time. I do want to explain why I love this movie and part of the reason is because of the last bit that Brian did not like with the creature telling his story and Victor being, I don't know, apologetic.
• 46:20
  Speaker A: I want to stress in quotes. I want to stress. It's not that I didn't like that part. I actually liked that part potentially. I just. And now maybe you're going to talk more about. I don't know. We'll see where your comment goes. But it's not that I didn't. I liked the idea of that scene. I just didn't like what led up to that scene.
• 46:39
  Speaker B: I agree. I like the idea of it. I just didn't think that the movie earned it.
• 46:43
  Speaker A: Yes, that was my issue. It's not so much that I had an issue with that scene, but. But I have read this comment through once and I don't remember all the details of it. And I think you are going to go to explain that maybe that your interpretation of that scene is probably different. Your interpretation of what that scene was attempting is different than my interpretation of what that scene was attempting.
• 47:01
  Speaker B: All right, let's jump in. I watched the behind the Scenes right after I watched the movie. Del Toro wanted this to be different from the book because this book has a ton of renditions. He wanted this to be something to go back on and be proud of, which makes sense. He loves the book, but it's hard to come up with some stylized differences when it more than likely already exists. I like the way he told this story. Is it his best? No. But I'd be lying if I said I never wanted to watch it again.
• 47:33
  Speaker A: I didn't like this movie, and I want to watch it again when they release a director's cut.
• 47:37
  Speaker B: So now onto why I specifically liked this movie. I don't know if any of you have gone through being a child of a narcissist or even a narcissistic tendency type parent, but Victor is someone I could see having narcissistic tendencies. Oh, hella. For sure.
• 47:56
  Speaker A: Yes. I think that is explicit within the text of the film that Victor is a. And the book, probably, at least. But definitely in this film. Definitely in the film, Victor is a giant narcissist.
• 48:05
  Speaker B: I think we could probably argue a back and forth forth a little bit more in the book. If he is. Or if he's just, like, immature and over his head.
• 48:13
  Speaker A: Yes. But no. In the movie, in those movie, a.
• 48:17
  Speaker B: Narcissist, everything is about him. Everything is everybody else.
• 48:22
  Speaker A: Also, I have not have experience of being the child of a narcissist.
• 48:26
  Speaker B: I do.
• 48:26
  Speaker A: Okay. I do not. Because my. Not my issue, did not have my.
• 48:32
  Speaker B: Stepfather just to reassure my mom that.
• 48:35
  Speaker A: I'm talking about you.
• 48:38
  Speaker B: Although I don't think she would think that.
• 48:39
  Speaker A: No.
• 48:40
  Speaker B: Okay, continuing with his comment. Everything is about him. Everything is everybody else's fault. He doesn't care about anybody else. He thinks he cares about Elizabeth, but he doesn't. And the only reason he thinks he cares about her is because she looks like his mom. Yes, Victor did love his mom, but she died while he was at a young age and he had to go through that trauma. Then he went through the trauma of his dad being abusive and wanting to make him just like him. I can kind of understand why Victor was the way he was, especially seeing as he was treated vastly different from his brother.
• 49:15
  Speaker A: Yeah. No, I can explicitly see why Victor is the way he was the movie goes to great lengths to make it clear that he is this narcissist, raging narcissistic asshole. Because his father was a raging narcissistic asshole.
• 49:26
  Speaker B: And what did he learn? Yeah, Nothing. Yeah, I grew up with a narcissistic tendency mother. And she very much embodied the hurt and everything that came with the childhood that she had at her parents and the hurt she had when my grandpa passed away. So all of the stuff that Victor went through as a child was very much stuff that, in a very dramatic way, my mom did too. Yet instead of breaking that cycle, she kept that cycle going and going, not just with me, but with my brother as well. So when it came time for the creature to tell his story and be like, this is what you did, I don't think Victor was apologetic. I think it was empty for a reason, or at least the way I interpreted it.
• 50:10
  Speaker A: That's interesting.
• 50:11
  Speaker B: Yeah, I think that's a really interesting.
• 50:12
  Speaker A: It's a really interesting read of that scene.
• 50:14
  Speaker B: My mom has said that she's been sorry all my life, but nothing ever changed. Nothing ever was fixed. There was no way to fix it because it was a one sided deal. She thought she wanted to fix things, but then she would go back and forth on the things that she said she was going to fix. She wasn't sorry. She just wanted control. The biggest difference is Victor died almost immediately after apologizing. So who knows? We don't know if he changed his mind for real or if it was just an in the moment. I kind of feel empathy for my creation because he's telling me what's going on. I've told my mom what's going on a lot. And even though she would apologize, she would also say, oh, I'm a bad mother if it ever came up again. Like it would magically go away if she just said sorry. Yeah, I very much related to the creature in this aspect, where the creature was the one that was going to break the cycle. I am the cycle breaker. Our relationship is dead. I don't talk to my mother anymore because of each empty promise and apology. It's almost like poetic justice that the creature doesn't have to deal with Victor anymore. He can heal now. I think because I related to this story that Del Toro was saying, telling and showing us that I liked it a lot more than some other people will. I can understand the reasons why people don't like it and why they think it's not a good adaptation, but at the same time, I don't think it was Going for a direct one to one of Mary Shelley's story would have had the same effect either.
• 51:47
  Speaker A: Yeah, I don't have any issue with the changing things. Obviously I didn't read the book, so. And we've gone at length on this show. I think anybody who listens knows that we're not looking for. We have much matured past the point of looking for like direct adaptations of the novels. We want adaptations that are saying something, doing something interesting with it. Making a point in a way that feels like it honors the original. You know, like you want something that feels like it honors the point of the original, assuming that the point of the original is worth honoring.
• 52:15
  Speaker B: But yeah, and sometimes that looks like a one to one adaptation and sometimes.
• 52:18
  Speaker A: It looks like a one to adaptation. Often it doesn't and often it does. So, yeah, not definitely wasn't looking for that, but I do think it's totally true. I could absolutely buy that if, you know, if you can. Because what I think that Paige from a book might be relaying here is that what I. Some of the elements of the story that I felt were missing and underdeveloped. If you have the specific experience that I think their name might be Paige.
• 52:45
  Speaker B: I think so.
• 52:45
  Speaker A: Okay. I don't know for sure. Paige from a book here is describing, I think what their point may be that their experience allows them to kind of subconsciously fill in some of the. The missing, you know, sinew that I was looking for, that I felt like the movie needed where for. To me it was. Yeah, it. Missing those pieces resulted in the ending not landing the way I wanted it to. Whereas if you don't need those pieces because it's. It's something you're connecting to much more directly, then yeah, I could see that working in a way that it wouldn't for other people.
• 53:25
  Speaker B: And that is quite a lovely thing about storytelling.
• 53:27
  Speaker A: It is absolutely. Yeah. And I think that is absolutely a way and a reason why. It's clearly the reason why people connect with stories, different stories differently, where, you know, there are movies that, for me that can hit me that way, that make me, I mean, a good example and this is a very cheesy example, but. And it's not nearly on the same level as this, but just comparing back to Scott Pilgrim like that, the journey that Scott Pilgrim goes on and what he's doing there. I connect with a lot more than other people do because I have experienced that. I've been there. I know what that kind of like Arrested development, figuring out how to not be an asshole. Thing. And so, you know, I can fill in some of the blanks to where his character development works a lot better for me than it does for other people.
• 54:12
  Speaker B: So, yeah, for sure. This movie is definitely not on my top five list of Del Toro movies. I will say that. Okay, mine either.
• 54:23
  Speaker A: We'll get to that in a second.
• 54:24
  Speaker B: But I loved the romantic Goth look to everything on set.
• 54:28
  Speaker A: No disagreement there.
• 54:29
  Speaker B: The Medusa head was by far one of my favorites. I also loved how everyone had a different color palette. Like, when Mia Goth is playing the mom, she had a red color palette, but when she was Elizabeth, she had a blue color palette. So the exact opposite on the color wheel. I found that extremely awesome. I mean, everyone had a different color palette if you pay attention to the costumes closely. I was even like, wow, she wears a lot of blues and greens and noticed all of the reds in the beginning of the movie. And Frankenstein was always in the same color palette. I also really liked the practical effects and sets built for this movie. I agree with Del Toro. No more AI art. I wouldn't even call it art.
• 55:10
  Speaker A: Nope.
• 55:11
  Speaker B: Regardless, I really liked this movie because of how Victor and the creature's relationship was. Seemed to me like the creature was going to keep living and break that cycle. And this entire thing, because I'm talking out loud with the speaked text, made me have an extreme epiphany about the entire thing. So thanks for the free therapy session.
• 55:31
  Speaker A: You're welcome. Thank you for sharing it with us. No, that was. I. That was genuinely a really interesting comment. Again, specifically, that kind of reading of that final scene is definitely different from the way I was reading it, where I think I still. And again, I would have to rewatch it. But my interpretation on the first viewing was that we were supposed to find Victor's apology at the end genuine and moving and not an example of just another broken, narcissistic guy kind of saying what he feels like he should say in that moment. You know what I mean? Again, but that was my interpretation of it. But that is definitely an interesting way to read that scene. One minor note that I had. I agree with all the stuff about the color wheel, but my brain, it stuck in my brain. I couldn't not think about it. The opposite of red on the color wheel is not blue. It's green. But that's a minor thing.
• 56:20
  Speaker B: She does wear green.
• 56:21
  Speaker A: Yes, she does. I'm just saying.
• 56:22
  Speaker B: Yeah, A green. Blue color palette.
• 56:24
  Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. I'm just. They specifically point said that blue is the opposite side of the color wheel from Red. Red. Which. It's on the other side, kind of. But green is the direct opposite.
• 56:33
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 56:34
  Speaker A: Red on the color. It's not. It doesn't matter. I'm just saying.
• 56:36
  Speaker B: All right, Mr. Color Theory. Okay. That's that for Patreon. Over on Facebook, we had four votes for the book and zero for the movie. Austin said, gotta give it to the book. Both the novel and its author are absolute icons, and I will never not sing the praises of Mary Shelley Fair. With that said, I will also sing the praises of this movie. It was making its debut in the local film festival on the evening that my wife and I were celebrating our anniversary last year. So we had the good fortune of experiencing it on the big screen. And it is one of the most gorgeous pieces of cinema I have ever seen.
• 57:19
  Speaker A: I wish I could agree.
• 57:22
  Speaker B: The fact that we were both already huge fans of Guillermo del Toro didn't hurt either. Despite casting my vote for the book, I remember thinking as we left the theater that Mary Shelley would very likely have loved what del Toro had done with her story.
• 57:36
  Speaker A: Probably. Maybe. I don't know. Yeah.
• 57:38
  Speaker B: The respect and love for the source material was evident in every single frame of that movie.
• 57:43
  Speaker A: Yeah, that seems true to me. I don't anybody who would say, like, oh, he doesn't care about the story, or is, like, disrespecting the story. I don't. I don't think that's accurate at all. I think it's very obvious, the amount of care he put into that. And again, he's telling his version of that story, but it's a good looking piece of cinema. I just.
• 58:04
  Speaker B: I agree that I think Mary Shelley would like it.
• 58:06
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 58:07
  Speaker B: I think if we could resurrect her from the dead, she'd be like, this is sick.
• 58:12
  Speaker A: Yeah. No, absolutely.
• 58:13
  Speaker B: Our next comment was from Ian. Ian from Wine Country. He signed his comment so we would know he was Ian from Wine country. And Ian said book. The source material is so iconic that no iteration of it can possibly stand up to the legend of the original.
• 58:31
  Speaker A: I don't know if I agree with that concrete statement, but point stands. I. You know, you're allowed to pick the book. I think it's possible that you could make an adaptation better than the book. Maybe.
• 58:43
  Speaker B: I think that's possible no matter what I'm. Book, it is.
• 58:46
  Speaker A: That's my point, so. But your point stands. You're being a little hyperbolic there to say that. Yeah, it's pretty much impossible because it's that good of a book.
• 58:55
  Speaker B: I'm being pedantic Our next comment was from Milt. Who said Milt?
• 59:01
  Speaker A: It's a new comment.
• 59:02
  Speaker B: Yeah. I don't think we've encountered Milt priorly, but Milt said book. The film is not very good. Jacob Elordi was very good in the movie, but the script is weak overall. And it led to an otherwise outstanding actor, Oscar Isaac, turning in the worst performance of his career.
• 59:19
  Speaker A: That's interesting. I've seen that comment a lot that people think Oscar Isaac isn't good in this movie. I think he's pretty good.
• 59:26
  Speaker B: I've seen him be better, but I. I don't know that I would call this his worst performance.
• 59:32
  Speaker A: It's a type of performance that is not as subtle and restrained as he is capable of being like. It is not as nuanced or as layered of a performance as Oscar Isaac can put on film. But that's not. It's because that's not the performance that Del Toro wanted and that the movie was going for, which you allude to saying the script is weak overall and it led to an otherwise outstanding actor turning in the worst performance in his career. I think his performance works. Personally, I had no issue with his performance in this movie. I think that his bombastic, ridiculous, kind of villainy thing that he's doing works perfectly for what the movie is doing. So I think he turns in a good performance in a not great movie. It would be the way I would describe it. I think his performance is fine. I just think that it's. I think it fits the movie. It's just that the movie is like, maybe not as good as it could be. Yeah, is the way I would describe it.
• 1:00:32
  Speaker B: And our last comment on Facebook was from Nathan. Nathan took what I said to heart last time and left a comment on almost every single platform. Yeah, the only one he didn't leave a comment on was Blue sky or no threads. Sorry you're slacking on that one, Nathan. But on Facebook, Nathan said both are flawed, but the book is significantly better.
• 1:00:56
  Speaker A: There you go.
• 1:00:57
  Speaker B: Over on Instagram, we had three votes for the book and one for the movie, although our movie voter did not leave a comment to explain themselves. And we had a comment from Tim Wahoo that I think for once, is an actual, genuine comment.
• 1:01:13
  Speaker A: We're seeing characters development.
• 1:01:14
  Speaker B: Yes, we are.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker A: He has gone from just memes to actually engaging with the content.
• 1:01:23
  Speaker B: Tim Wahoo said I couldn't get past the chronic overacting the book or the old movies are better, in my opinion. In my Onion. In your Onion, it says onion. And I'm gonna read that one as biblically accurate in Tim Wahoo's Onion. The book, or the old movies.
• 1:01:40
  Speaker A: That's fact. Again, I did not read anything in the movie as overactive, and I, I didn't either. I'm very particular about that. I, I can very quickly be like, I do not like that performance. It feels too broad or whatever. To me, every performance in the movie felt perfectly at home in this movie. Again, I just think the movie's not that great, mainly because of the script. But I, I, I thought the performances were all, like, fine, bordering on, like, plenty of them were good. I think Elordi's good. I think Mia Goth was good. And I thought, I thought Oscar Isaac was good. Just not, like, amazing or anything.
• 1:02:15
  Speaker B: And our comment from Nathan on Instagram was, well, I hate to agree with the ironic voter, but the movie was bad, so definitely the book.
• 1:02:25
  Speaker A: See, and I, this is, I'm nitpicking, being pedanticy, and I wouldn't even call the movie bad. I would just call it.
• 1:02:30
  Speaker B: I wouldn't either. Not. Not as good as it could.
• 1:02:33
  Speaker A: I am being very pedantic here, because my score for it is like a 5 out of 10, which I think you could argue is probably a bad score, but I, I have such a hard time calling a movie like that bad. I have. Part of it for me is I've seen so many bad movies that are truly bad that when I watch.
• 1:02:51
  Speaker B: That is fair.
• 1:02:52
  Speaker A: Yes. When I watch a movie like Frankenstein, I go, this ain't a fucking bad movie. This is a movie with flaws. But this is a good movie with flaws. Like, this is not a bad movie. There are so many bad movies out there, and, And Frank Frankenstein doesn't fit that list. Now, that's probably. Again, I'm being pedantic, and that's not fair, because, you know, comparing it to. I'm grading on a curve there in a way, but like, But I also think you're grading on a curve.
• 1:03:15
  Speaker B: You're grading on a massive curve.
• 1:03:16
  Speaker A: Well, but I also think, to be fair, I think I'm grading on a. Maybe less of a curve. Because if you're only comparing, like, for Pete, let's say people who were watching only watch mostly good movies, you're grading on a curve there. Frankenstein is not a. That's actually grading on a curve. If you're comparing Frankenstein to, like, a bunch of other movies you've seen that are all better, but, like, you're mostly talking about movies that are generally pretty good movies and that's mostly what you watch, which is still mostly what I watch. I try to, you know, avoid watching bad movies, but I have also watched over 200 very bad movies legitimately.
• 1:03:52
  Speaker B: Very bad movies.
• 1:03:54
  Speaker A: And this is not a bad movie. This is a good movie with issues.
• 1:03:59
  Speaker B: Well, you heard it here from one of the foremost experts on bad movies.
• 1:04:05
  Speaker A: But I could also understand somebody pushing back on that and being like, it seems disingenuous to compare this to, like thanks Killing or what the fuck Ever or After Last Season or any of these other movies. Then maybe that feels disingenuous. But like, I don't know. To me though, they're all movies. And on the scale of movies, this is somewhere roundly in the middle, and I would not classify it as bad.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker B: All right, we didn't have any comments on Threads because Nathan was slacking, but we did have one vote for the book, none for the movie. Over on Blue sky we also had one vote for the book and zero for the movie. And Nathan said definitely the book. But props to Jacob Elordi for his work as the creature. I like that we're getting a slightly.
• 1:04:55
  Speaker A: Different he didn't just copy paste the same comment every time. Appreciate that.
• 1:05:00
  Speaker B: And on Goodreads we had two votes for the book, zero for the movie. Another comment from Nathan. This goes rather easily to the book. Not sure how Del Toro got so lost on making a monster flick, as this is his bailiwick or Ballywick.
• 1:05:18
  Speaker A: I always say ballywick, but I don't know how it's actually pronounced.
• 1:05:22
  Speaker B: But this film is an overlong, wandering mess. And also on Goodreads we had a comment from Mikko who said, I've not seen other Frankenstein adaptations, nor other Del Toro movies besides Hellboy and Pacific Rim, so this was an interesting watch.
• 1:05:41
  Speaker A: Good news about all the rest of Del Toro's movies. You'll see when we get to our list here in a second, but in our opinion, you're starting at the bottom and working your way up.
• 1:05:49
  Speaker B: So had I watched the movie before reading the novel, I'd probably have liked it more Frankenstein is a 200-year-old tale retold countless times, so I was not expecting a one to one adaptation, but I think Del Toro twists the parts I liked the most about the book while telling his own story. I did not care about Frankenstein shooting Elizabeth. I think that was the point where the movie finally derailed for good, that the you're the monster line and Frankenstein's change of heart made the ending just clunky in my mind the prevailing depiction of the monster in modern retellings is that of a misunderstood, sympathetic creature character.
• 1:06:32
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 1:06:33
  Speaker B: So I liked that. It's not so clear cut in the book. The creature kills and not just for self defense. I was not expecting the creature to be articulate, sympathetic, and murderous. I feel like most adaptations drop at least one of those aspects.
• 1:06:48
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 1:06:49
  Speaker B: Like Del Toro drops the intentional murders while the movie was fine. This goes easily to the book.
• 1:06:55
  Speaker A: I will say too, that my cultural understanding of Frankenstein is in line with Del Toro's depiction of Frankenstein, which is what you're saying here, which is that of a misunderstood, sympathetic character as opposed to one that becomes an actual villain. Like, I don't know if I knew that in the book he does as the evil stuff that he does.
• 1:07:18
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:07:18
  Speaker A: If you would have asked me, I would have assumed that it was much more in line with this movie's depiction where he. He does kill people and stuff. But it's usually either an accident or in self defense or whatever because people are attacking him. Not like, I'm gonna murder your little brother because you're an asshole.
• 1:07:35
  Speaker B: All right, so if you have been keeping track, you'll know that our winner this week was the book. With 17 votes to the movies one plus our one listener who couldn't decide.
• 1:07:48
  Speaker A: There you go. There you go. Before we get to our next segment, we did right here. We're going to wrap up by ranking the Del Toro films we've seen, which we is not as many as I would like to have. Although it's still, I think, about half of his.
• 1:08:03
  Speaker B: It's still a pretty good.
• 1:08:04
  Speaker A: It's a good chunk.
• 1:08:05
  Speaker B: A good chunk of his portfolio.
• 1:08:06
  Speaker A: But there are some more specifically that I specifically, I really want to watch. The Devil's Backbone, which is like one of his first movies. But we are gonna rank our rankings of Del Toro's films, and you can compare them and you can see where Frankenstein falls on this list. So I guess we'll start at the. We each had seen six of them. And it's the same six.
• 1:08:26
  Speaker B: It's the same six. I believe we watched them all together.
• 1:08:28
  Speaker A: I believe we've seen all of these together. We have not watched. Did we watch Pan's Labyrinth together?
• 1:08:32
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:08:32
  Speaker A: Did we?
• 1:08:33
  Speaker B: Okay.
• 1:08:33
  Speaker A: Very early on.
• 1:08:34
  Speaker B: That was a very long time ago.
• 1:08:35
  Speaker A: Because I had seen it prior to us being together, but the rest of these I think we've seen for the first time.
• 1:08:41
  Speaker B: I had seen Crimson Peak prior to us, I had not being together.
• 1:08:45
  Speaker A: But yeah, I had seen Pans labor and for Anyway, so we're gonna start at number six and work our way up. So my number six is Frankenstein. I, I, I genuinely think it's. Of the movies of his I've seen, I think it's the worst. Still wouldn't say it's a bad movie, but I think it's the worst.
• 1:09:02
  Speaker B: Okay, so I was not ranking on quality. I was ranking on my personal opinions.
• 1:09:07
  Speaker A: Yeah, so. So am I. But my. In this particular instance, my feelings match.
• 1:09:14
  Speaker B: Fair enough.
• 1:09:15
  Speaker A: Yeah.
• 1:09:15
  Speaker B: In this particular instance, my number six was Pacific Rim, because I don't really remember anything about it, and I feel like that is a good indication of how much I like it.
• 1:09:27
  Speaker A: That's fair. Pacific Rim is my number five. I think it's. It's a fine movie. I think it's good. We have a bonus episode about it if you want to hear us talk about it. I don't think it's like. Like a masterpiece, but I think it's good. And it has some interesting stuff that it's doing. But, yeah, it's. It's low on my list because it's. It's also, like, the least Del Toro of all of these.
• 1:09:48
  Speaker B: Yes, that is definitely it.
• 1:09:49
  Speaker A: It does the least of the stuff I like about him, generally speaking, but it's a fun movie.
• 1:09:56
  Speaker B: My number five was Hellboy. Not because I think it's bad. I thought it was a very good movie. Oh.
• 1:10:03
  Speaker A: Again, none of these. I don't think any of these are bad.
• 1:10:06
  Speaker B: Like, no, I don't think any of them are bad movies either. But, like, kind of similar to Pacific Rim. Hellboy, to me, was not like offering what I go to a Del Toro film for.
• 1:10:20
  Speaker A: Has more of it than Pacific Rim.
• 1:10:21
  Speaker B: More of it than Pacific Rim.
• 1:10:22
  Speaker A: But, yes, I would agree it's still not quite what you're generally going for, which, again, it's more of a specific genre film. But not all this stuff is genre stuff for the most part. But. But it's definitely more in line with something like Pacific Rim, where he's doing a very specific genre. He's doing a comic book movie or Pacific Rim. He's doing a Kaiju monster battle action.
• 1:10:45
  Speaker B: Yeah. And I don't have an issue with comic book movies or action movies. I like a lot of them, but it's also just not. Yeah, it's not what you're going to Del Toro for. It's not what I'm going to Del Toro for. And also, in general, it's not a genre that I gravitate to. So for me, those end up Being kind of.
• 1:11:06
  Speaker A: Yeah, the same. I. Those were. Again, my Hellboy is my number four. So, yeah, it was my next one up, but, yeah, those. Yeah, I would agree. I put Frankenstein below him just because I think it's. The script is worse for Frankenstein than it is for those two movies. But I think I like the ideas in Frankenstein more. I just think it's my experience and enjoyment watching it and its quality overall, I think just are worse than those two.
• 1:11:34
  Speaker B: My number four was Frankenstein because Frankenstein was, in fact, serving me a lot of the things that I come to a del Toro movie for.
• 1:11:43
  Speaker A: Oh, yes.
• 1:11:44
  Speaker B: But it was also kind of clunky.
• 1:11:47
  Speaker A: Yes.
• 1:11:48
  Speaker B: And could have been better.
• 1:11:50
  Speaker A: Yep. Yeah, I would agree with that. I just think. Yeah. Again, to me, the clunkiness just really. It was real clunky in a lot of ways. My number three is Crimson Peak. I like Crimson Peak. I liked it even more on a second viewing. We also have a bonus episode on Crimson Peak. Yes, we do, if you want to hear us talk about that. But I do like Crimson Peak quite a bit, and I definitely liked it more the second time. I believe I'd have to listen back, but I remember liking it more the second time than the first time.
• 1:12:21
  Speaker B: My number three was the Shape of Water. Not for any particular reason other than that. I really like Crimson Peak, which I'll talk more about in a minute.
• 1:12:30
  Speaker A: Yeah, Number two for me is Shape of Water. I think that I remember when it came out, we did it. We talked about it on the podcast way back in the day on a. Something I know we talked about, like.
• 1:12:42
  Speaker B: On a random, random episode, like. Yeah, because that. When did that movie come out?
• 1:12:48
  Speaker A: 2018. Yeah, it was pre pandemic. I don't know.
• 1:12:51
  Speaker B: Shortly after we.
• 1:12:52
  Speaker A: Yeah, right after we started the podcast. It wasn't like a full episode. I don't. I'm like.
• 1:12:58
  Speaker B: Before we had Patreon, we occasionally put out, like, short movie review episodes, and I think we probably did.
• 1:13:04
  Speaker A: Yeah. But so, yeah, that's my number two. I think the story in it is fantastic. I think it's beautiful. It's one of his prettiest films shot by the same cinematographer as Frankenstein. But, boy, I went back and watched the trailer for Shape of Water, and that movie just looks better than Frankenstein, in my opinion. Go watch. If you have not watched the Shape of Water, I highly recommend it. I think it's a great story told really well, and the whole vibe of it. I just really like.
• 1:13:34
  Speaker B: My number two is Crimson Peak. I know it's a flawed film.
• 1:13:39
  Speaker A: Yeah. I know. It's a controversial one.
• 1:13:40
  Speaker B: It's a controversial one. It's got its flaws, absolutely. But it is also a perfect combination of two things that I really love, which is gothic fiction and fairy tales. And beyond just being a fairy tale, it's also an adaptation of my absolute favorite weird, uncommon fairy tale, which Crimson Peak is more similar to the French variant, which is Bluebeard. But my absolute favorite ever weird fairy tale that does not ever get mentioned is the German variant, which is Fitcher's Bird. And I fucking love that one. And I love that there's kind of almost an adaptation of it, sort of.
• 1:14:33
  Speaker A: I think by process of elimination, everybody can figure out what both of our number ones is, which is Pan's Labyrinth, which I think is widely regarded as probably his best film, just broadly.
• 1:14:42
  Speaker B: Pan's Labyrinth is art.
• 1:14:45
  Speaker A: I think all of his movies are art. But Pan's Labyrinth is a masterpiece. I think Pan's Labyrinth is legitimately one of the greatest films ever, Ever made. It's been a long time since I've seen it, but I would put it very high on my list of, like, best movies that I've seen. I don't know where it would go, but it would go somewhere in the top 10. I feel very confident saying, I think it's just a brilliant film. It's. It's. You can get lost in it. It's the. The character designs, the creature designs. Not on top of that, obviously, the story it's telling is incredibly moving and important and timeless.
• 1:15:19
  Speaker B: Prescient.
• 1:15:20
  Speaker A: And. Yes, timeless and prescient. And just. It's a movie about fighting fascism, and it's. It's incredible. It's. It's. It's. Yeah, it's a masterpiece. I don't know if I would be surprised if any other Del Toro movies we watch that we haven't seen would unseat it, but I would be astonished. I would be astonished. But, yeah, so, yeah, that's our list. If you have want to rank your Del Toro films, what you think are his favorite or, you know, his best movies, your favorite of his movies. Drop that in the comments. We'd love to see what your rankings are. And I. I do want to watch, specifically, I really want to watch Devil's Backbone. That's a big one that we haven't seen that I would like to see where it fits, because that's one of his earliest films that I really want to see. Like, what he was doing then. It was, like, a couple years before Pan's Labyrinth, I believe, and Then I would like to see. I've heard it's not great, but I interested to see what the heck's going on with Nightmare Alley because I've heard it's, like, not great, but I wouldn't mind watching it to see how I feel. Pinocchio, I would like to see, but I'm not as, like, worried about. Yeah, yeah. Pinocchio as a story just doesn't do a lot for me.
• 1:16:26
  Speaker B: Same.
• 1:16:27
  Speaker A: I've never really, like, cared that much about it. Hellboy2, I've heard is good, but I actually.
• 1:16:33
  Speaker B: When we were ranking these, I had to go back to our bonus episode on Hellboy and make sure that we hadn't watched both of them because I could not remember. Oh, we didn't. We only watched the first one.
• 1:16:43
  Speaker A: I have another movie I can add to my list, and I think I would put it above Frankenstein. I just remembered I have seen Blade two, and I would put that.
• 1:16:51
  Speaker B: I have not.
• 1:16:53
  Speaker A: I actually can't put it on the list because I saw it when it came out in, like, I was like, 10. I don't remember anything. Like 11 or 12. I don't know, whatever year. I think that came out in, like, 99 or 2. No, like 2001. I was like, 13. And I just don't remember. I haven't seen it since, and I don't remember anything about it. A Mimic was another big one. So his first film was Kronos in 92, then Mimic in 97, then Devil's Backbone in 2001, then Blade 2, then Hellboy, then I didn't know Hellboy was before Pan's Labyrinth. That's crazy. I could have swore Pan's Labyrinth was before that. Then Pan's Labyrinth, then Hellboy 2. Pacific Rim, Crimson Peak, Shape of Water, Nightmare Alley, Pinocchio, Frankenstein. Yeah. So, yeah, we need. I would like to watch the rest of them. I have seen Blade two. I remember liking it, but it's also kind of a. A, It's. It's a perfectly serviceable comic book. Like, it's. You know, it's not super. I think I would probably put it below most of these for my memory. But it's a. I remember liking it. It just.
• 1:17:53
  Speaker B: But you were also 10 years old.
• 1:17:54
  Speaker A: I was also 13 or whatever when that came out. So, yeah. All right. That is our lists and all of the feedback for Frankenstein, our rating of Del Toro films. Like I said. Hop on. Let us know where your list is. Would love to hear it. Katie, though. So it's time now to preview our Next book, Warm Bodies.
• 1:18:15
  Speaker B: What am I doing with my life?
• 1:18:16
  Speaker A: I just want to connect. Why can't I connect with people?
• 1:18:20
  Speaker B: Oh, right. It's because I'm dead. I wish I could introduce myself, but I don't remember my name. I think it started with an R. That's all I have left.
• 1:18:30
  Speaker A: It's kind of a bummer.
• 1:18:32
  Speaker B: I shouldn't be so hard on myself.
• 1:18:33
  Speaker A: I mean, we're all dead. This is my best friend. We even have almost conversations sometimes.
• 1:18:41
  Speaker B: All right, this is gonna be nice and quick because I did not have a lot of fun facts. Warm Bodies is a 2010 paranormal romance novel by American author Isaac Marion. I thought this was a young adult novel, but that did not come up anywhere when I was researching this, so I guess maybe it's not.
• 1:19:02
  Speaker A: I would have assumed that. I'll be honest. I actually thought this might be a. A graphic novel just based on, like, the movie.
• 1:19:09
  Speaker B: A novel novel?
• 1:19:09
  Speaker A: Yeah. To me, like, watching the trailer, I was like, this might be a graphic novel.
• 1:19:15
  Speaker B: No, but the novel began as a short story titled I Am a Zombie Filled with Love, before Marian expanded the idea into a full fledged book. I do have a review poll quote from Paste magazine. Quote, Marian explores the meaning of humanity through our journey towards personhood. A tale that gets grander in scale as his empathy builds and the book's true villains, cynicism, apathy, and status quo are revealed.
• 1:19:44
  Speaker A: Let's go.
• 1:19:45
  Speaker B: Yeah, that sounds good to me.
• 1:19:46
  Speaker A: Sounds good.
• 1:19:48
  Speaker B: Marion did follow up Warm Bodies by releasing a prequel novella in 2013, as well as two direct sequels, one in 2017 and one in 2018. And in May of 2019, a Warm Bodies television series adaptation was announced to be in development, produced by Lionsgate, but that series appears to be stuck in production. Hell, yeah.
• 1:20:14
  Speaker A: Probably Covid, like, probably shut it down or whatever.
• 1:20:18
  Speaker B: I tried to look up and like, the last thing that I saw about it was an article from like 2023 saying, like, no new news, basically.
• 1:20:26
  Speaker A: So unlikely.
• 1:20:27
  Speaker B: Seems unlikely.
• 1:20:29
  Speaker A: All right, let's go ahead now and preview Warm Bodies, the film.
• 1:20:34
  Speaker B: This is a corpse infected with the plague.
• 1:20:37
  Speaker A: It is uncaring, unfeeling, incapable of remorse. I don't understand. But he's changing and he feels and he's learning to be human again.
• 1:20:47
  Speaker B: Oh, my God. Is that him?
• 1:20:49
  Speaker A: Yeah. I also did not have a ton. There was not a whole lot on Wikipedia. And just out there, the IMDb trivia fun facts did not give me much. So, yeah, there wasn't a ton out there. So we're gonna keep and we had a ton of feedback. We're already long for a prequel episode, so I knew it wasn't gonna be an issue. Warm Bodies is a 2013 film written and directed by Jonathan Levine. Probably most known for the film 50 50, which is that movie with Joseph Gordon Levitt and Seth Rogen where he gets cancer or maybe he's gonna have cancer or something like that. The poster is him like shaving his head or something. I have not seen it. It's like a. I think I know.
• 1:21:29
  Speaker B: What you're talking about.
• 1:21:29
  Speaker A: It's like a comedy, but that is about like, like death and life and stuff like that I haven't seen. But that's probably his most well known movie other than this one.
• 1:21:38
  Speaker B: And I mean, this appears to also be a comedy about life and death.
• 1:21:42
  Speaker A: Sure, yeah, yeah. But he also did a film called the Wackness and one called Long Shot. Not the one from Good Bad or Bad Bad? If you fan of Good Bad or Bad Bad listening. The film stars Nicholas Holt, Teresa Palmer, Rob Cordry, Dave Franco, Leo Tipton, Corey Hadrisi and John Malkovich. The film has an 81% on Rotten Tomatoes, a 60 on Metacritic, and a 6.8 out of 10 on IMDb. It was nominated for a handful of Teen Choice Awards and Nicholas Hoult won the Teen Choice Award for movie breakout. It made 117 million against a budget of 35 million. So pretty, you know, pretty good. Did pretty well for All Things Considered. A couple little notes before we get to reviews here. Nicholas Hoult said that he actually pulled a lot of inspiration for his performance in the film and the physicality of performance, specifically from Edward Scissorhands. Interesting just because it's a character who doesn't talk much or at all, really. And so it's a lot of physicality and also very like he was going. He said he was going for a similar thing of like, very like kind of pathetic, sympathetic character. Kind of similar to how, like Elordi plays the creature in Frankenstein. That kind of performance. This is a quote that I wanted to read here just from Wikipedia. Jonathan Levine, the director, writer, director, really tried to pitch this movie to zombie lovers. This is probably on some press junket or whatever. He said, quote, I think this movie takes the mythology of zombies in a different direction and I think there is a lot there for die hard zombie fans. We're encouraging people to be open minded because it does take some liberties with the mythology, but at the same time it's very grounded in the science of zombie ism and uses that as a springboard for a more fantastic it may be divisive, but I think there's a lot there for zombie fans if they're open minded to a new take on it, and I hope they can be. I assume so. He was really, really pitching like, hey guys, I know it doesn't look like a normal zombie movie and you might be mad about that. This is in peak. The Internet's annoying about this kind of stuff. This 2013, I say peak. I don't know if it's ever really. I think we may still be in that peak.
• 1:23:53
  Speaker B: I was gonna say I don't know that it's ebbed.
• 1:23:55
  Speaker A: Yeah, okay, finally getting to some Richard Larson of Slant Magazine wrote, quote, the ubiquity of Shakespeare's original template of Romeo and Juliet allows warm bodies some leeway in terms of believability, where otherwise it sometimes strains against its own logic. But the film's persistent charm encourages us to look past a few festering surface wounds and see the human heart beating inside, which is really what love is all about. And he gave the film three out of four stars. Richard Roper, writing for the Chicago Sun Times, deemed the film, quote, a well paced, nicely directed, post apocalyptic love story with a terrific sense of humor and the guts to be unabashedly romantic and unapologetically optimistic. He's added, quote, the movie isn't perfect. It's a shame those bonies are mediocre special effects creations that run with a herky jerky style. But those are minor drawbacks. End quote. I assume when he says mediocre special effects creations, he means cgi. Maybe. Probably would be my guess. I don't know. But we'll see because I actually don't know what this is.
• 1:24:57
  Speaker B: Yeah, I don't know what. I don't know what he's referring to exactly there.
• 1:25:00
  Speaker A: Writing for Time, Mary Poles called the film, quote, an inventive charmer that visits all the typical movie scenarios of young love amid chaos and disaster. There are so many clever lines and bits of physical comedy worth revisiting that the movie seems like a likely cult classic. End quote and then some more mixed reviews. Stella Papa Michael at Digital Spy gave it three out of five stars, calling it, quote, a truly deadpan romantic comedy and a witty reinvention of the genre like Shaun of the Dead before it, drawing parallels between the apathy of youth and the zombie masses. And he added, quote, holt gets to deliver a wickedly dry voiceover. Chris Packham, writing for the Village Voice, gave it a negative review, saying, quote, the film's intentions are way too good for its own good, producing bloodless romance and more shamefully, bloodless carnage. Nobody kisses anyone else until it becomes clear that both art parties have pulses and everyone else. Sorry. Nobody kisses anyone until it becomes clear that both parties have pulses and everyone gets to keep all their limbs. End quote. I. Having not seen the movie, I'm not sure how to interpret that. Yeah, from the thing. So we'll see. And then finally, Michael o' Sullivan gave it one and a half stars writing for the Washington Post, and he said the film is, quote, cute without being especially clever. It's as pallid and as brain dead as its zombie antihero. It's less funny and self aware than Shaun of the Dead, less swooningly romantic than Twilight, and less scary than pretty much anything else out there with zombies in it. End quote. Which. That final part, like. I don't think it's trying to be scary based on my scary watching the trailer for the movie, but.
• 1:26:39
  Speaker B: And the romance of Twilight is debatable.
• 1:26:42
  Speaker A: Yeah, that's. I. I don't know. I. I would 100 believe it's less funny than Shaun of the Dead. Is it less self aware? We'll see. I don't know. But definitely. It's hard to be funnier than Shaun of the Dead for the most part, but in my opinion. But y. I don't know. We'll see. Katie, where can people watch this movie? I forgot what it was called. Warm Bodies.
• 1:27:05
  Speaker B: Well, as always, you can check with your local library. I have requested us a Blu Ray copy of the film through our library. Or if you still have a local video rental store, you can check with them. Otherwise you can stream this with a subscription to Hoopla. So if your library has access to Hoopla, you could check there. It's also streaming on something called Movie Sphere, or you can rent it for around $4 from Prime Video, Apple TV, YouTube or Fandango at home.
• 1:27:40
  Speaker A: Absolutely. Yeah. No, I'm excited for this, especially after seeing some of those reviews and hearing the one thing you said in your section about part about the apathy.
• 1:27:53
  Speaker B: Cynicism. Yes, cynicism. Yeah. Yeah, I'm interested. I vaguely remember when this came out.
• 1:27:59
  Speaker A: Yes, I remember seeing trailers for it, but I never saw it.
• 1:28:02
  Speaker B: I feel like I don't remember anybody, like, talking about it at the time. But when I announced that we were doing this on social media, I got like way more comments than I expected of people, like, excited about it, so.
• 1:28:14
  Speaker A: Interesting.
• 1:28:15
  Speaker B: Yeah.
• 1:28:15
  Speaker A: I don't know if I've ever heard a single person like, like recommend this movie. Which is wild. The fact that it seems like there are people interested in hearing us talk about it. Cuz yeah, I, I, I don't like I said, I, I, my experience was the same. I remember trailers when this movie came out and being like, you know, whatever looks fine. Like it just didn't super interest me at the time. So I never saw it.
• 1:28:35
  Speaker B: I was a little fatigued on teen paranormal romance at the time.
• 1:28:38
  Speaker A: Part of it too, I was just like. And yeah. So I, I am interested though to see how, yeah, how it holds up and especially now knowing that people do have a fondness for it, seemingly.
• 1:28:52
  Speaker B: For sure. And like I said at the end of the last episode, I have never seen anything that I disliked. Nicholas Houlton.
• 1:29:01
  Speaker A: Yes. So I, I feel confident Nicholas Holt will be great in it. Whether or not the movie will be good. We'll see. But I, he's, he's literally never bad in my experience so far. So yeah, no, should be a lot of fun. We'll be talking about warm bodies in exactly one week's time. Until that time, guys, gals, not binary pals. And everybody else keep reading books, watching.
• 1:29:23
  Speaker B: Movies, and keep being awesome.
• 1:29:34
  Speaker A: Sam.