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Hubba-Wha?! Episode #24 - The Great Conjunction · Muppet Fan Podcasts with ToughPigs.com

• 0:03
  Another world, another time in the age of wonder. 1000 years
• 0:12
  ago this land was green and good until the crystal cracked for a
• 0:18
  single piece was lost. A Shard of the Crystal
• 0:42
  Welcome to Haba Wah, a Muppet quiz show brought to you by
• 0:47
  toughpigs.com. It's your favorite quiz show
• 0:50
  that's not like the others here. Muppet fans, Muppet
• 0:54
  Professionals, and everyone in between competes for fabulous
• 0:59
  prizes and to see who's this week's toughest pig.
• 1:03
  I'm your host, Becca Petunia of toughpigs.com.
• 1:08
  And today, the prophecy is finally fulfilled.
• 1:12
  That's right. After two seasons of dozens of
• 1:16
  fans begging and pleading, I've written an episode themed around
• 1:21
  Jim Henson's classic fantasy epic The Dark Crystal.
• 1:26
  That's right, everyone loves talking about The Dark Crystal.
• 1:30
  It's a beautiful, weird, unforgettable film.
• 1:35
  Look, I know that Tough Pigs founder Danny Horne once claimed
• 1:40
  that The Dark Crystal is the opposite of entertainment.
• 1:45
  But Danny, I promise I will make this episode entertaining.
• 1:50
  Well, just as Jen was taught by the Mystics, I was taught by the
• 1:55
  powerful elders who run Muppet Wiki.
• 1:58
  That's why I wrote these questions with help from that
• 2:02
  wonderful resource. This time I also referred to a
• 2:06
  couple of other sources, namely rewatching the film itself and
• 2:11
  the phenomenal documentary The World of the Dark Crystal.
• 2:16
  Also, I use some other sources that well, you'll hear a little
• 2:19
  bit about when we get there. But Speaking of all of that,
• 2:23
  let's agree to play fair today. Please don't look at Muppet,
• 2:27
  Wiki or any other resource during this game.
• 2:31
  Only someone as immoral as a skexis would cheat at something
• 2:35
  this important. Plus, how are you going to watch
• 2:38
  a documentary while recording a podcast?
• 2:42
  That's just rude? Anyway, before we can set off on
• 2:45
  our great quest, we've got to meet our heroes.
• 2:48
  That's why we're going to play our first game, to tell a face.
• 2:53
  Contestants buzz in to answer some questions about yourself.
• 2:58
  Whoever buzzes in first will get introduced first.
• 3:02
  Ready. Go.
• 3:05
  All right. Katie Lynn.
• 3:08
  So Katie Lynn, what is your name?
• 3:11
  My name is Katie Lynn. All right.
• 3:14
  And like we're doing this season, Katie Lynn, what
• 3:17
  pronouns should we use for you? Like Gonzo, I'm cool with
• 3:23
  whatever, but let's just go with they them for ease of ease of
• 3:26
  use. All right.
• 3:28
  Now, Katie Lynn, what is your history with The Muppets?
• 3:36
  You know, and Jim at the works of Jim Henson?
• 3:39
  You know, you are, I think, our newest tough Pig staff writer.
• 3:44
  And you also have been doing all of the transcripts for basically
• 3:50
  all of our podcasts at this point, something that I am so
• 3:55
  grateful for. But yeah, what's your history
• 3:59
  with The Muppets in general besides that?
• 4:02
  Of course, yeah, I'm trying. Tough Pigs is I've got a great
• 4:05
  catalogue of podcast. Definitely listen to all of
• 4:08
  them. My history with The Muppets is
• 4:11
  really lost in the mists of time, back in the age of, you
• 4:15
  know, wonder and et cetera, because I don't remember a time
• 4:19
  without The Muppets. Sesame Street was like one of
• 4:22
  the only things we could get at my grandmother's house.
• 4:25
  I even remember watching Fraggle Rock.
• 4:27
  I'm pretty sure when it aired. I'm not.
• 4:30
  We didn't have HBO. I'm not sure how that was
• 4:32
  possible. But you know, and you know,
• 4:35
  Fragger Rock being one of my favourites, and then, like, we
• 4:38
  just caught it anytime it was on TVI, just remember my family
• 4:43
  cackling over the Senior Wences episode of The Muppet Show.
• 4:47
  And since then, it's just been, I've gotten really into the, you
• 4:53
  know, the philosophy of Jim Henson and just how joyous all
• 4:57
  of his projects work, all of his projects were, and the wonderful
• 5:02
  things that people say that when people have worked on them.
• 5:05
  That is what I love most about Henson Properties.
• 5:08
  And so it's been How could I not enjoy what comes from joy?
• 5:14
  It's a very that's a very deep way to put it.
• 5:17
  And Katie Lynn, how about your history with The Dark Crystal?
• 5:21
  When did you first see this movie?
• 5:22
  Did you grow up with it or is it something you came to later?
• 5:26
  It's a movie that my mother particularly enjoyed and I think
• 5:32
  it had a lot to do with my development as a fantasy author
• 5:37
  because just the world building in this place, like it's it's
• 5:42
  everything that a fantasy writer dreams of being able to put into
• 5:46
  their books. And so, you know, just visually,
• 5:49
  it's been a huge influence. And I can't tell you when I
• 5:53
  first watched it, but again, whenever it was on television,
• 5:58
  my mother would stick it on and we would watch 'cause that's
• 6:00
  basically how we did most movies, you know, Doesn't matter
• 6:02
  how many times we saw it. We put it on and we watched it
• 6:04
  and it's, yeah, it just sticks in the the brain like that.
• 6:09
  Yeah, and I guess we should mention you are also a fantasy
• 6:12
  author like you said we didn't. We didn't mention that earlier,
• 6:15
  but. I mean, there's not much out
• 6:17
  there yet, so but we'll get to that at the end.
• 6:20
  OK, yes, that's true. And and hey, there will be This
• 6:23
  episode isn't being released for like, another three weeks, so
• 6:28
  maybe you'll have You'll have written the world's greatest
• 6:31
  book by then. There's time.
• 6:34
  Yeah, but either way, Katie Lynn, I am going to give you 20
• 6:38
  points for all of those wonderful answers.
• 6:42
  Heck yeah. And now let's move on to our
• 6:44
  second contestant. Second contestant?
• 6:47
  What is your name? My name is Ren, like Jen but
• 6:51
  with an R. That's true.
• 6:54
  That's how spelling works. And Ren, what?
• 6:58
  What pronouns should we use for you?
• 7:01
  Also they them please. OK, anyway, so Ren, what is your
• 7:09
  history with The Muppets in general?
• 7:13
  We were, yeah. So a lot like Katie Lynn I There
• 7:17
  was not that time before Sesame Street.
• 7:20
  I knew Sesame Street like I knew television and air.
• 7:25
  I wound up watching Sesame Street fairly long into my life.
• 7:32
  I think I stopped watching Sesame Street the year I turned
• 7:36
  11, which I know because it was the year that Abby Cadabby was
• 7:39
  introduced. And I had mixed feelings about
• 7:43
  that. And I was like, if I know enough
• 7:47
  about the production of Sesame Street and its new characters to
• 7:51
  have informed opinions, I should maybe step away from Sesame
• 7:55
  Street. You know, that's that's cringy,
• 7:59
  that's for children. And then I got really into, so I
• 8:05
  kind of stepped away from The Muppets for a little bit.
• 8:07
  And then as a teenager, I got really into the creature shop
• 8:11
  side of things. And we can talk about that more
• 8:13
  in the next question. But the core Muppet Canon, and
• 8:17
  this is where I'm like an outlier in a lot of Muppet fan
• 8:22
  stuff, kind of passed me by until COVID hit, really.
• 8:29
  So that's it's kind of different properties came into my life at
• 8:33
  different times. Yeah, that's really interesting,
• 8:36
  Ren. I you know, again that is part
• 8:40
  of why I brought you on is I know that your areas of
• 8:43
  expertise kind of lie outside of the quote UN quote core Muppets.
• 8:50
  But you do know a decent amount about those too.
• 8:52
  And of course, you wrote what was voted the best tough pigs
• 8:57
  article of all time, right? I'm.
• 9:00
  I'm blushing I. You beat me by one vote for that
• 9:06
  honor. And you know I couldn't.
• 9:09
  I couldn't have lost to a better article because you of course
• 9:13
  wrote the Gonzo the great non binary icon article which I'm
• 9:17
  sure I'll have LinkedIn, the show notes and.
• 9:21
  To date my one claim to fame on Tough Pigs, I feel.
• 9:24
  I feel like it's a little bit of stolen valor calling myself a
• 9:28
  tough pigs writer when I have one.
• 9:30
  You're gonna have more soon. You're gonna have more soon.
• 9:33
  We'll talk. Well, we will.
• 9:37
  And so as you predicted, my next question is going to be, when
• 9:43
  did you first see The Dark Crystal?
• 9:47
  Also kind of a COVID project I think I mentioned a little bit
• 9:51
  before I got obsessed with David Bowie as a teenager.
• 9:55
  We had a copy of the works when I was again like 1112, so I kind
• 10:02
  of went straight from Sesame Street to Labyrinth, if you need
• 10:05
  to know why I am the way I am a little bit.
• 10:09
  The David Bowie obsession probably explains a little bit
• 10:12
  too, about why you are oh. Yeah, that you.
• 10:15
  Are. Absolutely.
• 10:16
  Very much. It's.
• 10:17
  It's interesting how all all us GNC folks had had our David
• 10:22
  Bowie face. That that little moment in the
• 10:26
  sun and that little all his different eras and
• 10:29
  transformations and Sysman transitions in his career.
• 10:35
  But yeah, so The Dark Crystal kind of emerged as a gap in my
• 10:40
  knowledge of Jim Henson's filmography that I then plugged
• 10:45
  up fairly recently during during my Little COVID binge of Henson
• 10:51
  and Muppet projects. You know, it is interesting
• 10:56
  though, because it seems like both of you came into Dark
• 11:00
  Crystal liking it, which is like surprisingly rare in the Muppet
• 11:07
  fan community. I as I joked about Danny Horn
• 11:12
  hating the Dark Crystal earlier. It feels like there was a
• 11:16
  prevailing theme on tough Pigs for years, that The Dark Crystal
• 11:21
  was the boring one no one liked and and we'd rather talk about
• 11:25
  all of the other movies instead. And you know, I'm glad to be
• 11:29
  doing, doing my part to sort of move away from that, even if I
• 11:33
  am the person who has got somewhat yelled at on Twitter
• 11:37
  for saying that. I think the documentary The
• 11:39
  World of The Dark Crystal is better than the movie The Dark
• 11:42
  Crystal, but well, we'll get there.
• 11:46
  Well, hey, if you want Dark Crystal hot takes, there's no
• 11:49
  one better than fans to actually give them.
• 11:52
  And I mean, we can talk about this later or you know, but I
• 11:58
  was also really into Lord of the Rings in high school.
• 12:01
  And I feel like it's not a one to one comparison.
• 12:05
  But I mean, Katie Lynn was talking about being a fantasy
• 12:09
  author, and I don't know if you want to engage in this
• 12:13
  digression on Tolkien and that mythology, but it's, it's very
• 12:18
  much of a kind I would say, with Tolkien's works, this expansive
• 12:25
  world that you can dive into little parts of.
• 12:29
  Yeah, just I preparing for this, I I scanned through the world of
• 12:32
  The Dark Crystal, the book, and it's like its own manuscript of,
• 12:39
  you know, found from the Agra. And it's like, wow, so like,
• 12:42
  yeah, you can get deep. Yeah.
• 12:46
  And. Both The Lord of the Rings and
• 12:48
  The Dark Crystal had a prequel TV show made for a streaming
• 12:53
  service, and one of them was good and one of them wasn't.
• 12:58
  So, Ren, I will give you 20 points, I will move on from any
• 13:02
  discourse about The Lord of the Rings TV show, and we will enter
• 13:07
  our first real trivia game. You know, one of the things
• 13:12
  about The Dark Crystal that you guys were just talking about is
• 13:15
  that it really has a much deeper lore system than most of the
• 13:20
  other Jim Henson projects. Even without reading any of the
• 13:25
  books, which I did not do to prepare for this episode or re
• 13:29
  watching the TV show, which I did not do to prepare for this
• 13:33
  episode, there's still so many specific creatures, cultures and
• 13:38
  customs in the world of Thra. And like any good fantasy
• 13:42
  series, all of these things have names.
• 13:46
  That's why we're going to play a game called What's the Word on
• 13:51
  the Street? Hi, I'm Murray from Sesame
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  Street and I'm looking for. The.
• 13:55
  Word on the street. What's the word on the street?
• 13:58
  In this game, I'm going to ask you both specific questions
• 14:02
  about specific words or terms from the film.
• 14:06
  That's it. Each of these questions will be
• 14:09
  worth one point. Just buzz in when you know the
• 14:13
  answer. But Please wait until I finish
• 14:15
  reading the question so the Podlings at home can play along.
• 14:19
  All right, let's go Question 1:00.
• 14:24
  During the great conjunction, what three objects are aligned?
• 14:33
  All right. Katie.
• 14:34
  Lynn the. Suns.
• 14:37
  It is the Suns, correct? Question two What's the name of
• 14:44
  the creatures that raised Kira Ren?
• 14:52
  The Podlings. Those are the podlings, correct?
• 14:57
  Question three, what's the name of the giant crab like monsters
• 15:02
  that the Skexes control? It was Katie Lynn by like 1/3 of
• 15:10
  a second Katie Lynn. Those are the Garthem.
• 15:13
  Those are the Garthem. What do the Skexys Want to
• 15:19
  extract from Kira Katie Lynn I. Think it was Wren.
• 15:27
  Oh, it was Wren. Look at that.
• 15:28
  You guys are so close that I'm like, I'm not seeing it.
• 15:32
  I'm sorry, Wren, you take this one.
• 15:34
  Her essence. Right.
• 15:36
  Or specifically the full the full name of this.
• 15:39
  Life essence. Well know the specific kind of
• 15:43
  essence that they're looking for.
• 15:45
  The Gelfling essence. Yeah, the essence of Gelfling.
• 15:49
  I'll give it to you for Gelfling essence.
• 15:51
  These are the gentle creatures known for their intense speed.
• 15:59
  That was Katie Lynn. The Land Striders.
• 16:03
  Those are the land striders, correct?
• 16:06
  Question 6. This is the process by which
• 16:09
  Gelflings can share memories. Wren.
• 16:18
  Dream fasting. That is dream fasting, correct?
• 16:22
  Which Jim Henson then took and gave 2 freckles.
• 16:25
  That's true. They can do that, and they can
• 16:27
  even do that in the new show. Where's the side bottom of Dark
• 16:31
  Crystal? Probably probably in one of the
• 16:36
  comics, because I have not read all of the comics, but there's
• 16:39
  probably like Gen. bottom Question 7.
• 16:47
  This is the ritual that the Skexes use to settle disputes.
• 16:56
  Katie Lynn, this is. Oh, I'm so glad you yelled it.
• 17:02
  I'm so glad you yelled it as well.
• 17:04
  Yes, thank you. Thank you for yelling it.
• 17:07
  And now we all just need to make weird guttural noises for like
• 17:11
  30 seconds straight after you yelled it.
• 17:15
  But listen, my voice is already going, so I'm not gonna do that.
• 17:21
  Question 8. This is the phrase that Jen uses
• 17:25
  when trying to define what writing is.
• 17:33
  Katie Lynn. Words that stay.
• 17:36
  Correct. Words that stay.
• 17:41
  This is a slimy aquatic creature whose meat is eaten by the
• 17:47
  Skexis Ren. Nebri.
• 17:54
  That is the Nebri, correct? Question 10.
• 17:58
  This is the device used to amplify the dark crystals
• 18:02
  effects and brainwash slaves. The Skexas call at this in the
• 18:07
  movie. You got me.
• 18:11
  This isn't even from the book. It is, of course, the reflector.
• 18:21
  I was gonna say a mirror just for.
• 18:24
  Something, I mean, it is a mirror.
• 18:29
  Basically. Question 11 These are the
• 18:32
  creatures that do reconnaissance for the Skexis.
• 18:40
  Katie Lynn. The crystal bats.
• 18:43
  The crystal bats, correct? And the last one of these?
• 18:48
  This is the creature that the Skexes eat for dessert.
• 18:58
  Ren. I'm sorry, what was that?
• 19:04
  I can do that without doing a Skex's impression, I promise.
• 19:07
  Crawley's. It is Crawley's or Ren.
• 19:11
  Can you take that Skexy's impression again, just just so I
• 19:13
  make sure I've got a clean recording of it?
• 19:18
  I think we. Should do all of this in
• 19:21
  skexics. Oh.
• 19:22
  God, the Skexis language. I'll probably, I'm almost
• 19:26
  definitely going to cut this out, but I've been working
• 19:29
  really hard. I actually now go to go to a
• 19:32
  voice trainer every week and I'm trying to like soften my voice
• 19:37
  because it's it's part of that the the transition process for
• 19:41
  me it's it makes me feel better about my transition and part of
• 19:45
  that is like trying to learn how to better take care of my voice.
• 19:50
  So let me tell you, I'm not sure I'm ready to do skexis voices
• 19:55
  right now. I think, I think that I think
• 19:59
  that Doctors is going to be a bit troubled if I come in doing
• 20:04
  skexis voices. We can do Mystic Chants I for
• 20:09
  you. Yes, OK.
• 20:10
  OK. I appreciate it.
• 20:13
  Well, either way, nice work there.
• 20:15
  Now you don't need a whole orare like Agra to predict what time
• 20:20
  it is, because it's time for. Beat the time.
• 20:27
  In today's Beat the Time, we're going to be talking about the
• 20:30
  Skexys and the Mystics. Obviously, these creatures are
• 20:35
  the most memorable part of The Dark Crystal.
• 20:38
  Now, as you probably know, in the film there are 10 skexis and
• 20:44
  10 Mystics. But do you remember what jobs
• 20:50
  each of them have? J is for jobs, and today at
• 20:54
  school we're going to be learning about all kinds of
• 20:56
  jobs, starting with Ren. Name a job title of a Skexis or
• 21:05
  a Mystic. We will go back and forth
• 21:07
  between the two of you to see who can name more.
• 21:11
  If you can't remember one or you get the answer wrong, your
• 21:14
  opponent will have the chance to steal.
• 21:18
  So let me just clarify. We're only looking for the 20
• 21:22
  Skexys and Mystics featured in the film The Dark Crystal, once
• 21:27
  added later for the TV show or the the books do not count.
• 21:33
  We're also looking for titles, not names, because I wanted to
• 21:38
  make this a little easier for you both.
• 21:41
  So for instance, on the TV show they introduce a Skechsis named
• 21:46
  Skechmal the Hunter if he counted, which he doesn't.
• 21:53
  I would be looking for you to say the Hunter, not Skechmal,
• 21:58
  right? They each have a name and like a
• 22:00
  job. I'm looking for the jobs and
• 22:02
  these are of course these are the jobs that they the job
• 22:06
  titles that they are referred to solely as in the final credits
• 22:11
  to the film The Dark Crystal. Their Skechmal type names are
• 22:16
  not mentioned in the credits, but all of their like jobs are
• 22:21
  listed there. OK 'cause for a second I
• 22:23
  thought. I was very scared that it was
• 22:26
  going to be matching the names to the titles.
• 22:28
  No, I don't. I I just didn't think that was
• 22:31
  really possible for for most, most fans.
• 22:35
  But I know some of these are memorable, some of them, so not
• 22:40
  all of them, but some of them. So of course you don't need to
• 22:45
  get all of them. You both know how beat the time
• 22:47
  works. But we are gonna get started
• 22:50
  with Ren. Name a Skexis or a Mystic.
• 22:56
  Gotta go with the classics, Gotta go with the Chamberlain
• 22:58
  first. The Chamberlain?
• 23:00
  Absolutely, Katie Lynn. Let's go with the chanter.
• 23:08
  The Chanter is one of the Mystics, correct?
• 23:13
  Wren the Ornamentalist. The Ornamentalist, Correct.
• 23:20
  Katie Lynn. Go back to the Mystics, the
• 23:22
  Weaver. The Weaver correct Wren.
• 23:28
  Gonna try and steal Katie Lynn's Mystic Thunder and go for the
• 23:32
  Numerologist. The numerologist correct?
• 23:37
  Welcome back to the Skeksis and the Treasurer 'cause every group
• 23:44
  needs a treasurer. It's true.
• 23:47
  Ren the gourmand, The gourmand, Correct.
• 23:54
  And the Mystic, the Mystic counterpart is the cook.
• 23:58
  The. Cook Absolutely.
• 24:00
  OK, the scientist, The tech technologist.
• 24:08
  It's the scientist. You were right with the first
• 24:10
  one. Yep.
• 24:11
  Its name is Skec Tech so. That's the only one whose name I
• 24:16
  remember. I think A Skec Tech is just so
• 24:19
  much fun to say and also because he was voiced by Mark Hamill in
• 24:24
  the the TV show. So good.
• 24:27
  So good. All right.
• 24:29
  Back to you, Katie Lynn. I will go with The Alchemist.
• 24:34
  All right, correct. We'll say the herbalist.
• 24:40
  The herbalist, Correct. Jeez, I am.
• 24:44
  I am impressed with how many of these you are getting because I
• 24:49
  know some, but I don't think I knew all of the Mystics at
• 24:51
  least. Anyway, Katie Lynn.
• 24:54
  All right, the Scribe Mystic. The scribe correct, Ren.
• 25:04
  I want to say so Jen's mentor the teacher is.
• 25:12
  Is their title just the The wisest Mystic?
• 25:16
  It is not the wisest Mystic. You know who I'm talking about.
• 25:20
  I have a title. They do have a title, and it is
• 25:24
  not the Jen calls them the wisest, but that is not not how
• 25:28
  they're referred in the credits at least, which is what I'm
• 25:32
  basing this on. I sat there.
• 25:34
  I rewatched my DVD. I paused it on the credits.
• 25:36
  I wrote these all down. So unfortunately we are gonna
• 25:40
  switch to to Katie Lynn. Katie Lynn can Can You Steal?
• 25:45
  That Mystic would be the Master. That is the master.
• 25:49
  Oh, OK, but wait, do I get to go again?
• 25:52
  No 'cause it's now Katie Lynn's turns OK.
• 25:56
  Well, just steal this one. The Emperor.
• 25:59
  Correct. The Master's counterpart is the
• 26:01
  Emperor. Now it's renn's turn.
• 26:05
  OK, so right. Yep, I as soon as I thought of
• 26:09
  that, I should have said the Emperor first, but we'll say the
• 26:13
  High priest. Is that another one of them?
• 26:18
  There is none called the high priest either.
• 26:23
  I'm sorry. So, Katie Lynn, you get to
• 26:26
  steal. Yeah, I think one of them acts
• 26:29
  as that. But yeah, it's not their
• 26:30
  official title. Yeah, again, I'm just basing
• 26:33
  this off of the names and the credits.
• 26:36
  This is this. Is about pedantry.
• 26:37
  You can do this to me. It's fine.
• 26:39
  Don't. Don't apologize for how you
• 26:41
  know. Whoever wrote these credits
• 26:43
  wrote these credits. And I do also wanna, you know,
• 26:46
  say also again, maybe there's a high priest who's in one of the
• 26:49
  books or the TV show, because there's a lot there's like a
• 26:52
  Mariner or something like it's. It's one of Jerry Nelson's
• 26:56
  credits. I know that much.
• 27:00
  I've absorbed in my studying for this episode.
• 27:04
  Sure, because Jerry Nelson's The Emperor, right?
• 27:07
  Right. So I think that was.
• 27:08
  But he might have been. Secondary sort of right.
• 27:12
  Anyway, Katie Lynn, you get to steal and then it is your turn.
• 27:16
  So the ritual master. Is, I think, what you might be
• 27:20
  thinking of by the High Priest. I wouldn't doubt that and I'm
• 27:25
  sure that's right. And then Katie Lynn, another
• 27:28
  one. For the Mystics, it would be the
• 27:30
  ritual keeper. It is not the ritual keeper.
• 27:35
  So now Ren, you get to go twice in a row.
• 27:38
  OK, the general who becomes the emperor, I don't think we've
• 27:44
  said. No, he is not called the
• 27:47
  General. Oh, is he called the Gotham
• 27:51
  Master? He is called the Gotham Master.
• 27:53
  So that was your real turn. You don't get a steal on the one
• 27:56
  you stole. But now, now we are gonna bounce
• 27:59
  back to Katie Lynn. You get one Katie Lynn.
• 28:03
  I know this is getting confusing because of right and wrong
• 28:06
  answers. All right, who?
• 28:09
  How many do we have left at this point?
• 28:11
  There are one, there's two of each, and I do not know if these
• 28:16
  are counterparts. The two of no, they're not,
• 28:18
  because some of them you've gotten without their
• 28:21
  counterpart. But there are two of each
• 28:23
  remaining. So now it just becomes
• 28:27
  remembering who we haven't said we said this Scroll keeper.
• 28:38
  We did not say the stroll keeper, so that is 1.
• 28:41
  Back to Ren now. I might be confusing this with
• 28:46
  the show, but the artificer. The artificer is from the show
• 28:53
  Katie Lynn. If you wanna take two, take two,
• 28:56
  you can. Let's see who is left.
• 29:05
  Someone knows us? I.
• 29:08
  Think I think we know who's yelling at us.
• 29:12
  It's our friend. It's our friend Cypress.
• 29:14
  I Nope, I I can't think of one. I'm sure it's in there, but at
• 29:19
  this point. Well then I then I am gonna call
• 29:22
  it. So first of all, the one you
• 29:25
  were thinking when you said the ritual keeper, that Mystic is
• 29:29
  referred to as the ritual guardian, the ritual guardian.
• 29:34
  So basically you just chose another word for keeper, but I
• 29:37
  wasn't going to give it to you. Then the remaining Mystic that
• 29:41
  you did not name was the Healer, and I think that one is actually
• 29:45
  referred to in the film itself. I'm not sure, but I think maybe.
• 29:52
  And then the only the only Skechsis you forgot was, of
• 29:56
  course the slave master. I mean.
• 30:00
  But that was, that was better than I, better than I thought.
• 30:03
  And I don't mean that as an insult against, you know, to to
• 30:05
  you guys. Some of these, again very few of
• 30:08
  them are named in the film, really.
• 30:11
  Just the Emperor, the Chamberlain, the Gotham Master,
• 30:17
  the Scientist. Like it's very few.
• 30:19
  I it's like 5 of them. But anyway, let me just tally up
• 30:22
  the points real quick I. Think you're winning?
• 30:25
  It's actually a fairly close game, I will say.
• 30:28
  Hey I have points so. Katie, Katie Lynn.
• 30:31
  Katie Lynn is in the lead, but right now actually I can share
• 30:37
  the score, which I don't usually do this early, but it's a really
• 30:40
  close game. Katie Lynn is in the lead with
• 30:43
  36 points, but Ren, you are trailing with 31 points so
• 30:48
  really not not that far off. So and of course nice work
• 30:53
  there. And of course, naming the Skexis
• 30:56
  and the Mystics sure gets easier after the movie is over and
• 31:02
  there are no Skexis or Mystics to name anymore.
• 31:08
  But anyway, one of the most interesting parts of The Dark
• 31:11
  Crystal to me is all the behind the scenes stuff.
• 31:15
  And I know I said that. For me, I almost prefer watching
• 31:20
  the documentary, The Making of Documentary, than the film
• 31:23
  itself because I'm so interested in how all of these ideas and
• 31:28
  characters came to be. So I decided that I was going to
• 31:34
  rewatch that documentary and I decided that I was going to
• 31:38
  bring back a game from last season that I call Secrets of
• 31:43
  The Muppets. In this game I will ask you
• 31:46
  questions about the making of the Dark Crystal.
• 31:51
  Most of this info comes from the documentary, although some of it
• 31:55
  comes from Muppet Wiki. Each of these questions is worth
• 31:59
  2 points. Buzz in if you know the answer,
• 32:02
  but again, let's wait until I finish saying the question
• 32:06
  first. The story of the Dark Crystal
• 32:09
  concerns A Gelfling whose name is Jen.
• 32:13
  He has lived with creatures called the Mystics who are very
• 32:18
  gentle all his life. But he was orphaned and they
• 32:23
  they saved him and now he's he's about to go on a quest.
• 32:30
  Question One, The Dark Crystal was released in 1982.
• 32:36
  When did Jim Henson start planning the film?
• 32:43
  Katie Lynn. In 1977.
• 32:49
  It is 1977 correct? I just remembered that it was
• 32:53
  five years before and then I had to do math real quick.
• 32:56
  And yeah, it was. It was.
• 32:58
  It was five years from its its inception to release Question 2.
• 33:05
  Jim Henson was inspired to make The Dark Crystal after seeing
• 33:09
  the work of which fantasy artist?
• 33:16
  That was Katie Lynn. Again by again a fraction of a
• 33:20
  second. Bryan Fraud.
• 33:22
  It is Bryan Fraud who of course did all of the character design
• 33:26
  for the movie, but Jim had seen some of his earlier works 1st
• 33:30
  and was interested to make a movie with him.
• 33:33
  It's all so gorgeous. I mean that that artwork?
• 33:37
  Probably not Bryan Fraud personally, but maybe Bryan
• 33:40
  Fraud personally. And I love watching him draw it
• 33:45
  in the documentary, right? It's amazing.
• 33:47
  You can see that in the documentary.
• 33:49
  Like, I I mean, I I fancy myself a bit of an artist, although
• 33:55
  like all artists, I'm a little hard on myself and always insult
• 33:59
  myself. But I can't imagine just he
• 34:03
  makes it look so effortless and I know he does that by just
• 34:06
  drawing constantly, but he looks so effortless and you just see
• 34:10
  all of the shapes come together in this really beautiful way.
• 34:14
  It's really, it's really something.
• 34:18
  Question three according to Jim Henson.
• 34:20
  What aspect of religion inspired the Skexes designs?
• 34:30
  I mean, I can guess, Ren. I'm just going to say that
• 34:35
  devil, the manifestation of evil, is that.
• 34:38
  It is not a religious concept. Yeah.
• 34:40
  I mean, OK, I would count that as a religious concept, but it
• 34:43
  is not the devil. But you're thinking a little
• 34:45
  along the right lines. Katie Lynn can.
• 34:50
  You repeat the question. Yeah, so Jim Henson in the
• 34:54
  documentary mentions that a certain aspect of religious
• 34:58
  culture inspired the ideas for the Skexis.
• 35:03
  What is this? What is this like aspect of
• 35:05
  religious culture? I I guess it's dualism.
• 35:10
  Good versus evil. It is not.
• 35:12
  It is the seven deadly sins The original idea was that there was
• 35:17
  going to be one for. Each.
• 35:19
  I guess you do still see that with the Gormand and the the
• 35:23
  Gotham Master as potentially gluttony and and wrath.
• 35:28
  My ball got envy. Yeah, well, especially the
• 35:31
  Chamber, If we had to choose one.
• 35:33
  It's the Chamberlain, right? But like, yeah, I I feel like
• 35:38
  the ornamentalist. Distribution of Wrath as well.
• 35:41
  Yeah, I was gonna say. I mean it, it didn't stick.
• 35:44
  And obviously there are 10, so it especially didn't stick.
• 35:48
  But he mentions that in the film, I mean in the documentary,
• 35:51
  and I thought that was super interesting.
• 35:52
  He does. I wrote it down.
• 35:56
  I didn't know what to call that other than an aspect of religion
• 35:59
  and culture. Like I don't know.
• 36:02
  But anyway, question 4. According to Brian Froud, the
• 36:05
  Podlings are based on which food item?
• 36:13
  Katie Lynn. Potatoes.
• 36:15
  It is potatoes. He also said that originally he
• 36:20
  wanted to put eyes all over them, but then it didn't quite
• 36:23
  work for as a design. He was just really stuck on
• 36:28
  potatoes. Yeah, I mean that would make
• 36:30
  them much less cute seeming than they are.
• 36:33
  I think he he made the right choice.
• 36:35
  Yeah, no, it's, you know, again, sometimes you have to Kill Your
• 36:39
  Darlings, and sometimes those darlings are 20 other eyes.
• 36:43
  You have to blind your darlings. Yeah, Question 5.
• 36:48
  The design of the land Striders was based on the talent of which
• 36:53
  type of performer Ren by a second.
• 37:00
  Stilt walkers. It is Stilt walkers, literally.
• 37:03
  They saw somebody walking on stilts on all fours and said we
• 37:08
  should probably design A creature based on that.
• 37:12
  Just make it a horse. Take this very difficult thing
• 37:17
  and make them do it, yeah. Question 6 Yeah.
• 37:21
  Can you run while doing that as well?
• 37:23
  Could you run run on stilts? I need you to be the fastest of
• 37:27
  all the animals while you're on stilts.
• 37:30
  Question 6 Jim Henson feels that this race of creatures was the
• 37:35
  hardest to design. Ren.
• 37:42
  Gelfling. It is the Gelflings Question 7
• 37:47
  related Jim Henson claims that this race of creatures was the
• 37:51
  hardest to perform. Katie Lynn.
• 37:59
  The Mystics. It is the Mystics.
• 38:02
  I was a little surprised by that when I was watching the
• 38:05
  documentary, but the idea of walking on your your like
• 38:10
  walking hunched over was apparently very difficult.
• 38:14
  None of those things sound like a piece of cake.
• 38:17
  Yeah, that's what maybe the. Podlings who are just smaller
• 38:21
  and less articulated. The Podlings are just kind of
• 38:24
  like regular Muppets. I mean with a more realistic
• 38:28
  design obviously, but like. They're like Proto Fraggles.
• 38:33
  Yeah, that's. They got, they got an easy one
• 38:36
  in there. You know, and the Gelflings work
• 38:39
  similarly, but there's a lot of like subtle nuance to how you
• 38:42
  have to perform them when they tried to make it so.
• 38:45
  Skewing. Yeah, but they are performed,
• 38:48
  you know, like Kermit, of course.
• 38:52
  Also, I should say performing a Muppet like Kermit or a Fraggle
• 38:55
  is also not easy, but I guess I figured it would be by this
• 39:00
  point for Jim. Question 8.
• 39:02
  The Skeksis originally spoke a language constructed by Alan
• 39:06
  Garner, Which two ancient languages inspired Alan Garner's
• 39:13
  new language, Katie Lynn. Ancient Greek and Ancient
• 39:21
  Egyptian. It is Ancient Greek and Ancient
• 39:24
  Egyptian. So I remember when I learned the
• 39:27
  fact that in the movie originally the Skeksis, all of
• 39:32
  their scenes did not have any English dialogue.
• 39:37
  It blew my mind that they would try to make this into a movie.
• 39:43
  I'm of the opinion it would have been better.
• 39:46
  Well, do you know, and this is not a question that I wrote
• 39:49
  down, but do you know, and I think I asked this on another
• 39:54
  episode of Hubblewa last season, do you know who wrote the
• 39:59
  dialogue for the later English translated Skexas scenes?
• 40:06
  I definitely came across that in my readings.
• 40:11
  Well, it was mentioned, I'm double checking this fact.
• 40:15
  In the deep texts sounds like something a Mystic with or the
• 40:22
  sex is with sky. So what I what I said in the
• 40:26
  last season episode of Hubble Wah and it is so the correct
• 40:32
  answer is actually of that is Dennis Lee the lyricist of
• 40:36
  Fraggle Rock was again and this was before Fraggle Rock but was
• 40:42
  brought in to rewrite some of the dialogue and help with ADR
• 40:48
  for in particular the Skexis being retranslated into English
• 40:53
  question 9 in the documentary Frank Oz estimates the weight of
• 40:59
  the Gotham puppet. How heavy is a Gotham?
• 41:02
  I'll give it to you if you're within 10 lbs.
• 41:09
  Katie Lynn. 75 lbs. You are within 10 lbs.
• 41:14
  It is. It is 70 lbs.
• 41:18
  The Gotham costumes weigh 70 lbs.
• 41:21
  I almost mentioned that during our earlier a bit of discussion.
• 41:25
  I'm like wait, I do not want to question.
• 41:29
  No additional trivia, None. No trivia in the discussions,
• 41:33
  only discussions of Tolkien and unrelated things.
• 41:37
  Did that happen in an earlier episode?
• 41:40
  Did what happened? Did.
• 41:42
  Because I think in the Park Hopper episode, someone
• 41:45
  mentioned something and you were like.
• 41:47
  Oh yeah, it's. Right.
• 41:49
  Like, don't stop talking about stuff.
• 41:50
  They were talking about the Great Muppet Movie Ride and it
• 41:54
  wasn't so much like, but it was like it was like, well, that is
• 41:58
  what we're gonna be talking about later.
• 42:00
  Like that didn't reveal the answer to anything, but it was
• 42:03
  like you guys are getting ahead of things like we we.
• 42:06
  Have a whole you know too much. Which they both did, which is
• 42:10
  again, what usually happens on these shows.
• 42:13
  And the last question in this round, only three puppeteers
• 42:17
  from the usual Henson crew from The Muppet Show and Sesame
• 42:21
  Street have speaking roles in The Dark Crystal.
• 42:26
  Name those 3 puppeteers Ren. Jerry Nelson.
• 42:35
  Jerry Nelson is 1. Steve Whitmire.
• 42:39
  Steve Whitmire is another. I'll give you points for those
• 42:43
  two. This is where we get into, I'm
• 42:48
  pretty sure. Are we counting Brian Meal?
• 42:52
  I am counting Brian Meal because he was a regular on Sesame
• 42:55
  Street at this point. Oh, at the time, yeah.
• 42:58
  Bravo. You know, I'm gonna give you a
• 43:01
  little. I'm gonna give you 4 points for
• 43:03
  that, because you did just name 3 puppeteers.
• 43:05
  So I'll at least give you a little more.
• 43:07
  Oh wait, was was the answer not to do all three?
• 43:11
  It was Oh. Wait, so just give me the amount
• 43:15
  of points you said you were going to give me.
• 43:16
  OK, fine. I'll be mean and take away two
• 43:20
  points. You know what, Brian?
• 43:22
  Meal? You don't deserve extra points.
• 43:27
  No, he does. He's wonderful.
• 43:29
  Telly is great. Barkley is great.
• 43:31
  Wonderful. But.
• 43:33
  I almost said Louise Gold, and I'm glad I didn't.
• 43:36
  Yeah, no, she doesn't apparently have a speaking role.
• 43:39
  It's. But I'm thinking of the TV
• 43:40
  shows, I think. What's happening?
• 43:42
  It's so interesting to me what they did, like, what voices they
• 43:47
  did keep in and what they didn't and why.
• 43:51
  It's also so funny to me because like a couple of months ago I
• 43:54
  was talking to a non Muppet fan friend of mine and he was like,
• 43:58
  I hated The Dark Crystal. You're just watching these weird
• 44:01
  puppets go, these weird creatures go around and they all
• 44:04
  sound like Miss Piggy. And I was thinking to myself,
• 44:06
  it's so weird because Frank Oz doesn't speak at all in this
• 44:10
  movie and basically none of the regular Muppet guys speak in
• 44:15
  this movie. But.
• 44:17
  And even Jerry Nelson isn't really identifiable unless you
• 44:22
  know Sqred as well, which who knows Sqred.
• 44:25
  Yeah, I mean, I can tell it's Jerry Nelson and I can tell, but
• 44:29
  like Steve Whitmire and Brian Meal, definitely you can't tell.
• 44:33
  And like Jerry you can tell. But Jerry also just has a voice
• 44:37
  like, I don't know, it's not like a silly.
• 44:39
  Voice. You could do it.
• 44:40
  Steve Steve Whitmire does sound like his Fraggle character
• 44:43
  Marlon. Oh, that's true.
• 44:46
  He is kind of like Marlon. Anyway, It is now time for
• 44:50
  something completely different. When The Dark Crystal was
• 44:54
  originally released, there wasn't much in the way of
• 44:57
  merchandise. However, you both know that I
• 45:00
  love talking about merchandise and you also probably know that
• 45:04
  40 years later we're getting new Dark Crystal merch all the time.
• 45:10
  This year, 2023, we got some amazing things.
• 45:16
  We got a one to one scale replica of the Crystal Shard.
• 45:20
  We got various Dark Crystal skate decks.
• 45:26
  You can buy them with or without wheels.
• 45:29
  And of course, most famously, we got some Dark Crystal hot sauces
• 45:36
  from Jade City Foods. Now listen, I haven't tried
• 45:41
  these hot sauces. Jade City Foods, if you're
• 45:44
  listening and I will tag you in this, I have a great idea to
• 45:48
  record some videos using your hot sauces and put them on tough
• 45:51
  pigs. So I hope you're listening.
• 45:54
  If you can send me a box, I love it.
• 45:57
  I do some videos, It'd be great. But I'm going to give you free
• 46:03
  publicity anyway, because in this game, which I'm calling
• 46:08
  Monster Foodies, you are going to answer trivia questions about
• 46:14
  the Jade City Foods Dark Crystal hot sauces.
• 46:19
  Oh boy. I hope you're ready for a lot of
• 46:22
  silence. Just roll with it, OK?
• 46:24
  Each of these hot sauce themed questions is going to be worth 3
• 46:29
  points, so really, it's anyone's game.
• 46:32
  As always, wait until I finish reading the question before you
• 46:36
  buzz in. It's fine.
• 46:39
  You're fine. You're both.
• 46:40
  You're both gonna be fine. Here we go.
• 46:42
  Of course we can help you, because we are monster foodies.
• 46:50
  OK, what we do first, Chef Goner question one.
• 46:53
  The least spicy of all of the Dark Crystal hot sauces is a
• 46:58
  sweet and smoky sriracha mix with a three out of 10 heat
• 47:02
  index. Which character is it named
• 47:05
  after Katie Lynn? Fizz Gig.
• 47:13
  It is Fizz Gig, correct? That hot sauce is of course
• 47:19
  called Fizz Gig's Fury. Question two.
• 47:23
  I guess given the name of this hot sauce that Scotch, bonnet,
• 47:28
  Peppers, mango, and pineapple represent, which part of the
• 47:33
  Dark Crystal Ren? The Crystal Shard.
• 47:42
  Not the Crystal Shard, No Katielynn.
• 47:45
  Care to steal I. Mean that's That's the part of
• 47:48
  it. Oh, I mean the film, The Dark
• 47:53
  Crystal. The film, not the object.
• 47:55
  You know what, Ren? Let's buzz in again, because I
• 47:58
  meant the film, the film. You're right that.
• 48:01
  There's only one. Part of the.
• 48:06
  That is also how I understood it.
• 48:08
  Yeah. It's it's in a big part and a
• 48:11
  little part and that's the whole movie.
• 48:15
  So listen, what you guys don't understand is it's in italics in
• 48:20
  my notes, so I don't know why you couldn't hear that.
• 48:25
  You should tell your your, your speech coach that you need to
• 48:28
  learn to speak in italics. Some part of this movie is
• 48:31
  represented by Scotch, bonnet, Peppers, Mango, and pineapple.
• 48:37
  Feel like my first guest was the only good guest.
• 48:40
  Katie Lynn. The three sons.
• 48:42
  It is the three sons. That's right.
• 48:45
  Each of those yellow foods is a different sun.
• 48:51
  I feel like the triangle is right.
• 48:53
  Pineapple, mango, and Scotch. Bonnie.
• 48:55
  Exactly. Question 3.
• 48:59
  The essence of Gelflame Hot Sauce reveals that the Skexys
• 49:03
  were drinking a habanero hot sauce with what kind of fruit as
• 49:08
  the primary ingredient. So if you were going to make a
• 49:11
  hot sauce called Essence of Gelflame, you'd obviously use
• 49:14
  Habanero, But what fruit would you throw in Ren?
• 49:19
  Let's say Peach. Not Peach.
• 49:21
  Good guess. Katie wouldn't guess a fruit.
• 49:25
  Lime. It's not lime, this is a cherry
• 49:29
  based hot sauce. Cherry.
• 49:33
  Very Gelfling. I mean, they already used
• 49:36
  pineapple and mango, so that's what I was.
• 49:39
  I had ruled those out. Question 4.
• 49:45
  Feel the Power of the Dark Crystal with this hot sauce
• 49:49
  named Feel the Power of the Dark Crystal.
• 49:53
  It seems to be basically identical to the essence of
• 49:57
  Gelfling, except it uses this fruit instead of cherries.
• 50:03
  What fruit's the primary ingredient here, Ren?
• 50:11
  I'm gonna say Peach again. I buzzed in to say Peach again.
• 50:15
  It's not Peach. One of these tough times.
• 50:18
  It's gonna be Peach. Putting in all my chips, all the
• 50:21
  chips on Peach. Katie Lynn, Would you care to
• 50:23
  steal Name A Fruit? We'll go with lime again.
• 50:28
  It's not lime, it's blueberries. Sure, why not?
• 50:36
  And the last question in this little round because there's
• 50:40
  only 5 hot sauces, so I I really couldn't stretch this one.
• 50:45
  Question 5. Speaking of the three Suns, the
• 50:48
  hottest of all the Dark Crystal hot sauces is called the Great
• 50:53
  Conjunction. Thanks in part to this kind of
• 50:57
  pepper, it reaches a nine out of 10 on the listed heat index.
• 51:03
  Name the pepper Katie Lynn. The Carolina Reaper.
• 51:11
  It is the Carolina Reaper, correct?
• 51:14
  Notoriously the hottest pepper I think they have yet engineered.
• 51:18
  You know, they're always coming up with new ones.
• 51:20
  They're just like we've been in the lab for the last five years,
• 51:23
  making something that will kill your tongue.
• 51:25
  Skek tech the scientist is at it.
• 51:28
  So I do want to also say other ingredients in here include
• 51:31
  habaneros, which is just basically in all of them.
• 51:34
  I think it's just a base. Blackberries are the fruit of
• 51:38
  choice for the great conjunction.
• 51:41
  Not Peaches or limes. No, neither.
• 51:44
  I also do feel like I need to stress here that there is
• 51:49
  activated charcoal in this one. So I do wanna warn our audience
• 51:54
  if you are taking something like antidepressants or something
• 52:00
  like that, you should not eat the great.
• 52:02
  Birth control, yeah. Yeah, birth control as well.
• 52:06
  Yeah, a lot of diseases. Activated charcoal will absorb
• 52:10
  the drugs out of your body. So be careful with the Great
• 52:15
  Conjunction Hot Sauce, and not just because it reaches a nine
• 52:19
  out of 10 on the listed heat index.
• 52:22
  Odd cast with a disclaimer. Listen, I I I need to warn
• 52:26
  people. It doesn't affect the taste at
• 52:28
  all. I would assume it just.
• 52:30
  It's I turn it black to. Be yeah to goth.
• 52:34
  Well, it's dark during the great conjunction and and that's why
• 52:38
  there are black berries, even though black berries are not
• 52:41
  black once you crush them. I was doing a mortal mortar and
• 52:46
  pestle you you. That's what that was.
• 52:51
  But anyway. Jade.
• 52:52
  Jade City Foods. I'm still interested.
• 52:54
  Please hit me up. You've got labyrinth hot sauces
• 52:56
  too. I'll do a roundabout Labyrinth
• 52:59
  hot sauces. It's fine.
• 53:01
  I got this. I'm very excited to to to eat
• 53:04
  all of these foods. But now we're going to move on
• 53:08
  to our classic Stump the host game, the Anything in the World
• 53:13
  prize game. As you know, in this round you
• 53:16
  too will be able to ask me anything in the world about the
• 53:20
  universe of the Dark Crystal. If you stomp me, you'll earn 20
• 53:25
  points. So let's start with Ren.
• 53:29
  Would you like to ask me a question about The Dark Crystal?
• 53:33
  Yes, and I have it typed out in Discords.
• 53:38
  Let me just pull that up. OK, so in the graphic novel
• 53:42
  series The Dark Crystal Creation Myths, it introduces a character
• 53:47
  who is Agra's adopted son, who is a trickster from a world
• 53:51
  beyond Thra. What is this character's name?
• 53:56
  This character's name is, of course, Bobert from Aliens in
• 54:01
  the Family. He's he's Bobert.
• 54:04
  Excuse me, Sorry, Ryan, it's it's Bobert.
• 54:07
  I know, but I can only think of 1 Trickster from Another world
• 54:11
  and that's Bobert. Incorrect.
• 54:16
  Can I tell you what it is? Yes, of course.
• 54:18
  OK. It is raw NIP or raw NIP?
• 54:22
  Sure. I didn't read that one.
• 54:26
  But Ren, you've earned yourself 20 points.
• 54:29
  Katie Lynn, do you have a question about The Dark Crystal?
• 54:32
  I do. I have a couple, but trying to
• 54:36
  think of which one would be more fun to say on the podcast.
• 54:42
  Let's bring in the the Star Wars listeners and get this
• 54:46
  listenership up here. Crossover.
• 54:49
  Exactly. You got to, you got to market
• 54:52
  this stuff, so. Always be plugging.
• 54:56
  Always be plugging. So there was a lot of crossover
• 55:00
  between The Dark Crystal and Star Wars during this time
• 55:04
  because they were filming basically simultaneously and a
• 55:12
  tiny piece of Star Wars merchandise was repurposed as an
• 55:19
  accessory for one of the Skexis. What was the piece of merch and
• 55:28
  what was it on the Skexis? I don't know.
• 55:31
  I'm gonna guess the ornamentalist is wearing a TIE
• 55:35
  fighter on her. It his their necklace.
• 55:42
  You know what? That is pretty close, OK,
• 55:45
  because it is the TIE fighter. It's a miniature TIE fighter.
• 55:48
  Well, that's the coolest design of all of the the the early Star
• 55:51
  Trek, Star Trek, Star Wars. But you just blew it.
• 55:55
  All the stars? I don't know.
• 55:56
  We lost everyone. Bye, that's the show, folks.
• 56:02
  So yeah, it's a miniature TIE fighter with Darth Vader inside,
• 56:05
  and it was repurposed as Skectec, the scientist's
• 56:09
  eyepiece. I gotta look for that now that's
• 56:13
  really interesting. I also didn't know that.
• 56:16
  You're gonna get 20 points as well, though.
• 56:19
  Well, we're gonna move on to our last stand, which is going to be
• 56:24
  a little different than usual. We're going to do something a
• 56:28
  little, a little different because for our final game, say
• 56:32
  the word. I thought it would be good if we
• 56:34
  could maybe, maybe bring in bring in some, some, some
• 56:38
  outside help here. But before we get into some
• 56:40
  outside help, Nope, that that was a coincidence that my fiance
• 56:44
  walked by. It's OK.
• 56:47
  But before we bring in outside help, let's check the scores.
• 56:52
  So our game is still pretty close, but maybe a little less
• 56:57
  close than before. It's been fun.
• 57:02
  It is. This has been very fun.
• 57:04
  So right now Katie Lynn has a score of 77 and Ren you have a
• 57:10
  score of 57. So honestly still pretty close.
• 57:15
  And in our final round, say the word.
• 57:19
  You can wager any amount of points.
• 57:22
  The winner gets those points, the loser loses them.
• 57:26
  You will get to hear the question before you wager.
• 57:29
  Now those of you who have been on Tough Pigs or the so-called
• 57:34
  Muppets Twitter know that there's one person who knows
• 57:38
  more about The Dark Crystal than anyone.
• 57:43
  And I am, of course, Speaking of our good friend Cypress, AKA
• 57:48
  Moomin. You might, of course, remember
• 57:51
  for when, when I was doing Tough Pigs Pride month this June, I
• 57:57
  called in Cypress to write a lovely article about his queer
• 58:02
  readings of The Dark Crystal. And I was like, you know, I want
• 58:08
  to have Katie, Lynn and Ren on, but it just wouldn't feel like a
• 58:12
  tough Pig's Dark Crystal moment if I didn't bring in our good
• 58:17
  friend Cypress, AKA Moomin. So I did.
• 58:21
  I asked Cypress to write the hardest Dark Crystal question
• 58:25
  that he could think of. And I'm gonna.
• 58:28
  I'm gonna. Well, I think I can actually
• 58:31
  play the clip. Hi, I'm Cypress.
• 58:35
  My pronouns are he, him. And Becca's asked me to give you
• 58:38
  all a really hard Dark Crystal question.
• 58:41
  So what are the names of the three Suns and moons of Throng?
• 58:46
  So what I will say is whoever gets more of these correct will
• 58:54
  earn whatever points they bet. So as you know, in this round
• 59:00
  you can bet any number of points as long as you have them.
• 59:05
  And again, Katie Lynn, you have 77 points.
• 59:08
  Ren, you have 57 points. Your job is to list as many of
• 59:13
  the names of Suns and moons as you can.
• 59:15
  Whoever gets more of them right will earn their points back.
• 59:23
  OK, well we've got some answers. So each of you guessed different
• 59:30
  names for the Suns and moons, and some of you guessed right on
• 59:37
  some of them at least. But many of you did not.
• 59:40
  And by many of you, I mean one of you really did not.
• 59:45
  So let's start with Ren. Ren, you bet 0 points.
• 59:51
  And the reason that I bet that is because I do not know the
• 59:55
  answer and I included this in my message to you.
• 59:59
  But I have to say aloud, I'm sorry Mubin, I'll never get it.
• 1:00:02
  Never and. OK, what are your guesses?
• 1:00:07
  My guesses are the Suns I called Doe, Ray and me and the moons I
• 1:00:14
  called Vulcan, Klingon, and Romulus.
• 1:00:16
  And all of those are right. No, no, no.
• 1:00:19
  Those are right. Those are some other things.
• 1:00:21
  Those are you named things you were thinking of Star Wars.
• 1:00:25
  I mean Star Trek that time I did it on purpose.
• 1:00:28
  It's. A.
• 1:00:30
  Joke. We're joking, nerds.
• 1:00:32
  If you can't be right, be funny. Yeah.
• 1:00:34
  Well, that's how I did it on purpose.
• 1:00:36
  But Katie Lynn, not to spoil things, but you got some of
• 1:00:40
  these, right? So.
• 1:00:42
  So, Katie Lynn, what did you, what did you guess?
• 1:00:47
  So for the Suns I put Rose Sun, Dying Sun and Great Sun, and the
• 1:00:52
  moons I put the Heart Moon, the Harvest Moon and the Cheesy
• 1:00:57
  Moon. Well, actually the only one of
• 1:01:00
  those that's right is the cheesy Moon, the no.
• 1:01:04
  So the three Suns which Cypress stresses to us are of course
• 1:01:12
  also known as the Three Brothers are called the Rose Sun, the the
• 1:01:21
  Dying Sun and the Greater Sun, not the Great Sun.
• 1:01:27
  But you still got two of those, so that's still more than Ren
• 1:01:33
  and the Three Moons. Also called the Three Sisters
• 1:01:40
  are The Blue Moon, the Pearl Moon, and the Hidden Moon.
• 1:01:45
  So no, I'm sorry, but by the rules of the game that I set up,
• 1:01:51
  you have earned 20 points, giving you 97 points to Ren's.
• 1:01:56
  57 points. But wait.
• 1:02:02
  Oh no. Before I asked Lubin for a
• 1:02:05
  question, I had a question and I don't.
• 1:02:08
  I don't want to be upstaged fully here, so I'm going to ask
• 1:02:11
  my question as well. So guess what?
• 1:02:15
  For the first time, we are doing a second say the word.
• 1:02:20
  As we know, Jim Henson and his team worked hard on The Dark
• 1:02:24
  Crystal. However, during Jim's lifetime,
• 1:02:27
  there was no real attempt to extend the series beyond the
• 1:02:30
  single film. In fact, while clips from The
• 1:02:33
  Dark Crystal appeared in some specials, almost all of the
• 1:02:37
  puppets themselves were never reused or never referenced in
• 1:02:40
  other projects. However, in one project from
• 1:02:45
  Jim's lifetime, a major character has a name that is a
• 1:02:50
  sly reference to The Dark Crystal.
• 1:02:55
  What major character from a post Dark Crystal pre Jim Henson's
• 1:03:01
  Death project has a name that is a Dark Crystal joke?
• 1:03:06
  So place your bets. Katie Lynn, you've now got 97
• 1:03:10
  points, and Ren, you've got 57 points.
• 1:03:13
  There aren't too many projects from between The Dark Crystal
• 1:03:16
  and Jim Henson's death, and it's one of the main characters who
• 1:03:20
  has a name that is secretly a Dark Crystal joke.
• 1:03:29
  Why is your question harder than the hardest question movement
• 1:03:32
  can come up with? I will say, I will say I shared
• 1:03:39
  my question with Movement and movement did not know the answer
• 1:03:43
  to this one. Well, how the world turns.
• 1:03:52
  How the world turns because now Katie Lynn has bet zero points.
• 1:03:59
  Katie Lynn, what have you guessed?
• 1:04:01
  I guessed the dog from Storyteller, whose name I do not
• 1:04:05
  know. Well, I'll give you a hint.
• 1:04:07
  The dog from Storyteller is named the Dog.
• 1:04:12
  OK, good. Which is not a Dark Crystal
• 1:04:16
  reference, but you bet zero points Ren you bet the farm.
• 1:04:22
  You bet All in all in, baby. You bet. 57 points.
• 1:04:28
  Ren. Which character from a post Dark
• 1:04:32
  Crystal project has a name? That's a Dark Crystal joke.
• 1:04:38
  Doc. Crystal Doc, the main human
• 1:04:42
  character of Fraggle Rock. His last name is Crystal.
• 1:04:46
  That is correct. Doc's Doc from Fraggle Rock has
• 1:04:50
  the last name Crystal making his name Doc Crystal.
• 1:04:56
  How did I not know that? It is only mentioned in the
• 1:05:01
  final episode of Fraggle Rock. Oh, and I haven't.
• 1:05:05
  Oh, wow. Have you not seen the final
• 1:05:08
  episode? Not for a a while.
• 1:05:10
  I keep restarting my RE watches and get to like season 3.
• 1:05:14
  Same, same. I'm I'm, I made it through
• 1:05:16
  halfway through Season 2 on my last one.
• 1:05:19
  I think at this point I'm just going to wait for Fraggle talk
• 1:05:22
  to get there and I'll just watch along with them once they get.
• 1:05:27
  Because, yeah, last year I watched season one and half of
• 1:05:29
  season 2. But yeah, in the last episode
• 1:05:33
  they needed a full they needed he like reads an official
• 1:05:38
  letter. So they needed it to have an
• 1:05:40
  official name and it's it's addressed to, he reads aloud
• 1:05:44
  like Dear Mr. Crystal. And Jerry Jewell chose to name
• 1:05:49
  him Doc Crystal because he thought it would be funny.
• 1:05:56
  That is hilarious. And I wow and it must not have
• 1:06:02
  like the last time I saw it. It must not have like clicked
• 1:06:05
  that. I don't know if they ever again
• 1:06:08
  if they ever say Doc Crystal. I think they just say Mr.
• 1:06:12
  Crystal and you you leave it you like.
• 1:06:15
  They leave it up to you to put that together.
• 1:06:18
  But yes, Doc's name is Mr. Crystal.
• 1:06:22
  Well, listen, and I I will say, I will say I certainly owe
• 1:06:26
  Eubank for all the work that you do anyway.
• 1:06:29
  So I will be sending you a gift as well.
• 1:06:31
  Katie Lynn. Listen, I was expecting to lose
• 1:06:35
  hard. You technically won.
• 1:06:37
  It's only because I asked a second question.
• 1:06:42
  But it was an amazing question. Ren, you were right and again in
• 1:06:49
  a in a in a massive upset caused by me changing the rules of the
• 1:06:53
  game, our winner is is Ren. Ren, you are our winner and
• 1:06:59
  today's toughest pig. Ren.
• 1:07:02
  You win your choice of a stone that you could have a trial over
• 1:07:10
  or a little art card. I did of the Chamberlain.
• 1:07:14
  Or I should say I'm in the process of doing because it's
• 1:07:17
  not done yet, but I have the line art done.
• 1:07:19
  It'll be done tonight. Well, you know, I'm a pacifist
• 1:07:23
  and I don't really want to challenge anyone to trial by
• 1:07:26
  stone, so I will take the art. All right.
• 1:07:28
  I will send that your way. And Katie Lynn, you technically
• 1:07:32
  won. You would have won if I didn't.
• 1:07:36
  Decide this feels dirty a little bit.
• 1:07:38
  Well, listen, no, that was amazing.
• 1:07:41
  Plus, you got to keep everybody listening till the very end.
• 1:07:44
  It's got to be a. Nail biter, right?
• 1:07:49
  See, see. I promised.
• 1:07:50
  I promised Danny Horne that this would not be the opposite of
• 1:07:55
  entertainment. And look at that.
• 1:07:57
  I delivered A twist ending. But come.
• 1:08:00
  From Behind the Underdog story. I'll just go Thelma and Louise
• 1:08:04
  myself, right, Because I did read that article and just in
• 1:08:10
  case. I should have just asked about
• 1:08:13
  Thelma and Louise. It it is the remake of The Dark
• 1:08:18
  Crystal, as everybody knows. There should be an April Fool's
• 1:08:21
  Day episode of Hubba Wah. That's either all Farscape
• 1:08:26
  questions, or All Star Trek questions, or all Thelma and
• 1:08:29
  Louise questions. But Katie Lynn, what I was
• 1:08:32
  saying is you've done such great work for us, writing all of
• 1:08:36
  these transcripts for for my show and for everybody else's
• 1:08:40
  shows and also just writing for tough pigs in general.
• 1:08:46
  So I'm definitely gonna send you something as well.
• 1:08:50
  So again. Well deserved.
• 1:08:53
  Again, certainly well deserved. And I don't want anyone to think
• 1:08:57
  that I'm. I'm a dirty, rotten skexis for
• 1:09:00
  stealing, stealing, stealing the victory away from you.
• 1:09:05
  So Speaking of that, though, guess where can people find you
• 1:09:10
  if you wish to be found? Let's start with Wren.
• 1:09:15
  Sure. I am one of those people who
• 1:09:17
  never left Tumblr. I made a Tumblr in 2011 and I'm
• 1:09:22
  still on there talking a lot about Star Trek, Deep Space 9,
• 1:09:28
  and beloved 70s broadcast sitcom MASH.
• 1:09:33
  So you can find me there at Rag Doll like a Raggedy Ann Hyphen
• 1:09:38
  Ren Ren. I'm on Twitter and Blue Sky
• 1:09:43
  under those same handles, just without the hyphen.
• 1:09:47
  And I and I What was the rock I had to teach you about on on
• 1:09:50
  Tumblr the other day? Bismuth.
• 1:09:53
  You had to tell me that bismuth isn't naturally shiny, but that
• 1:09:56
  bismuth is a thing that exists in nature.
• 1:10:00
  It's true. It's true.
• 1:10:01
  Those crystals are man made, those weird squares.
• 1:10:03
  I had to learn about the dark crystals.
• 1:10:06
  Bismuth, naturally, is very dark, but there's things that
• 1:10:09
  humans can do to make them not dark.
• 1:10:11
  So Tumblr is a rock Tumblr, right?
• 1:10:14
  It's. Oh, that's true.
• 1:10:15
  Because it made this dark crystal into into something
• 1:10:18
  shiny. That's.
• 1:10:22
  Definitely what Tumblr is. Yeah.
• 1:10:24
  No a. Lot of people do like rocks on
• 1:10:26
  Tumblr. There is Rock Tumblr, I'm sure.
• 1:10:30
  I'm, I'm, I'm back on Tumblr and spending a lot less time on the
• 1:10:34
  other social media right now because yeah.
• 1:10:37
  Anyway, Katie Lynn, where can people find you if you wish to
• 1:10:41
  be found? People can find me riding for
• 1:10:45
  tough pigs. Most of my work is the
• 1:10:48
  transcripts for the many, many podcasts.
• 1:10:52
  And I'm. I'm trying to keep up, you know,
• 1:10:55
  like I said, many lovely podcasts.
• 1:10:58
  And then every once in a while I I get to write an article or a
• 1:11:00
  review, and that's nice. But if you'd like to follow me
• 1:11:05
  and keep tabs of that fantasy writer journey that I am on, I
• 1:11:09
  am on both Blue Sky and Mastodon, which is a very chill
• 1:11:14
  place. If you like chill vibes under KT
• 1:11:18
  Lynn and that's the letters K&T and then Lynn and I think on
• 1:11:23
  Mastodon I've got author tag to the end of the KT Lynn.
• 1:11:27
  So you can find me in those places and follow me and I'm.
• 1:11:30
  I'm just retweeting tough pig stuff all the time and posting
• 1:11:33
  pictures of flowers and Moss and my dogs.
• 1:11:40
  So if that sounds awesome, follow me.
• 1:11:43
  Always be plugging it's. True.
• 1:11:45
  It's true. Well, listen, you can also find
• 1:11:50
  me online and the best place is Tough Pigs.
• 1:11:54
  Because as I always say, Tough Pigs has been around for over 20
• 1:11:58
  years, which makes it actually the only website that I
• 1:12:04
  guarantee will not explode by the end of this year.
• 1:12:09
  I I am on Twitter at Uncle Petunio, but not as much as I
• 1:12:14
  used to be. Which is a weird thing to say,
• 1:12:17
  but true. I'm on all other social media
• 1:12:22
  platforms at tall girl Petunia. So Twitter is Uncle Petunia with
• 1:12:28
  an O and everything else is Tall Girl Petunia with an A.
• 1:12:33
  Because sometimes you transition in the middle of creating your
• 1:12:36
  social media profiles. No easy uncle joke there and the
• 1:12:42
  other. Oh, I there wasn't an easy one.
• 1:12:45
  And we've been going for a while anyway.
• 1:12:47
  Not as long as Betty Lou, but for a while.
• 1:12:52
  But so you can find me on Tough Pigs and you can find
• 1:12:56
  toughpigs@toughpigs.com or Tough Pigs on Twitter, Facebook,
• 1:13:00
  Instagram. I did restart the Tough Pigs
• 1:13:03
  Tumblr, although I've been forgetting to post lately
• 1:13:05
  because I've been under a lot of stress.
• 1:13:07
  But it it'll be back. It started.
• 1:13:10
  I'm, I'm posting. And hey, if you like tough pigs,
• 1:13:16
  you could consider donating to the Tough Pigs Patreon, where
• 1:13:19
  you could get even more free stuff.
• 1:13:21
  And of course, if you really like supporting tough pigs, you
• 1:13:25
  can also head to our Tea public page and buy shirts.
• 1:13:30
  Oh, look at that. Katie Lynn is sporting my my
• 1:13:33
  Whatever shirt, which I designed inspired by which I designed
• 1:13:39
  inspired by Ren's article. So honestly, wow.
• 1:13:43
  Look at that. We're we're all together.
• 1:13:45
  Ren. Synergy.
• 1:13:47
  There's a bunch of. It's the great conjunction.
• 1:13:52
  Three sons, three sons, three weird gender people.
• 1:13:58
  It's it's the same. But yeah, plenty of shirts.
• 1:14:03
  The whatever shirt that I designed.
• 1:14:06
  The whatever shirt. A shirt design a shirt inspired
• 1:14:09
  by the monster at the end of this book recently added a shirt
• 1:14:13
  I designed based on Lips's shirt from Muppets Mayhem.
• 1:14:18
  And also some shirts that I didn't design, including some
• 1:14:21
  great Muppet movie shirts that I want really badly but haven't
• 1:14:24
  ordered yet. So I'd like to thank some other
• 1:14:28
  people for helping out. Of course, both of our guests,
• 1:14:31
  thank you so much. I do want to thank me for
• 1:14:35
  writing, editing, producing and hosting this show.
• 1:14:37
  Thank you me thanks to Stacey Rosen for writing the theme
• 1:14:41
  music to this show. Thanks to Richard Gomez for
• 1:14:46
  doing our host artwork. Thanks to Katie Lynn Miller for.
• 1:14:51
  Writing. Yeah, for writing the
• 1:14:53
  transcripts of these episodes, you're gonna have to sit down
• 1:14:56
  and relive this bit by bit. You'll see.
• 1:15:00
  You'll know everything that got cut.
• 1:15:02
  You'll you know, behind the curtain.
• 1:15:05
  And here I say this. Yeah, no so, so if you'd like to
• 1:15:09
  swear now so I can cut that and you'll know.
• 1:15:14
  Thanks to Johannes, the Tough Pigs Muppet Fan Podcast
• 1:15:17
  Executive Producer. And thanks to the Mystics for
• 1:15:22
  teaching me to read the words that stay on Muppet Wiki.
• 1:15:26
  And lastly, thanks to all of you at home for being with us on
• 1:15:30
  Hubba Wah, the Muppet Quiz Show. And as always, yes, I'm.
• 1:15:45
  I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
• 1:15:47
  I'm sorry, Voice training. All right.
• 1:15:50
  Good night, everybody. I tell it Trial by stone.
• 1:16:05
  Trial by stone. Trial by stone.