Latest / Did That Age Well? / #194 - Did Brave Little Toaster age well? (w/ Jed Heneberry)

Transcript

#194 - Did Brave Little Toaster age well? (w/ Jed Heneberry) · Did That Age Well?

0:00
Hi everybody, welcome to Did That Age Well.
0:03
Today is such an exciting episode.
0:06
Today we have a real life kid here to tell us her thoughts on
0:12
an old school movie. We are also joined by the lovely
0:15
Jed from Be Kind and Funny. If you remember an excellent
0:21
episode that we had with Kelly, this is her person and my
0:27
friend. And today we're talking about
0:30
Brave Little Toaster. And Brave Little Toaster was a
0:34
pretty bizarre movie. It's really.
0:36
Bizarre. It was pretty bizarre and we are
0:38
so fortunate to have my friend Winnie in the studio today.
0:43
Not just the dog Winnie, but also human kid Winnie to tell us
0:48
some of her thoughts on Brave Little Toaster.
0:51
Winnie, how old are you? I'm nine.
0:53
You're 9 awesome. I am so curious, what did you
0:58
think about Brave Little Toaster?
1:00
I didn't really like it and I thought it was just like, sad.
1:05
I I also thought it was really sad.
1:08
I thought that it was there were there were times where I really
1:12
wanted to cry, honestly. Yeah, sad and horrifying and
1:16
scary and dark. And yeah, I was the one who
1:20
picked this movie because I remembered liking it as a kid.
1:25
Watching it as an adult, I don't why?
1:27
Why did we like this sad, scary movie?
1:31
Right. That's what you said when it
1:33
finished. Yeah, you said, Jed, why did you
1:35
like this? When he said why didn't they
1:40
just stay in the forest where it was like happy and nice?
1:46
Yeah. End of movie.
1:47
Totally. We got out of the scary house.
1:50
We're in the forest. We're good.
1:51
Yeah, but yeah. That would have been nice, but
1:55
they had to keep going. What was the scariest part for
1:58
you? When the toaster sacrifices
2:02
himself. Oh, at the end.
2:03
Oh my gosh, when he gets stuck in the gears to to save the the
2:09
guy that was I thought was outrageous.
2:12
We can talk about the toaster's gender identity later.
2:15
Maybe because it's voiced by a female?
2:19
That's right. We we weren't sure what the
2:21
toaster supposed. Yeah.
2:24
But yeah, that part. To tell?
2:26
Hard to tell. That part was pretty terrifying.
2:29
Yeah. And the that whole, like,
2:31
junkyard scene, everybody in the room was like, I don't really
2:35
remember this movie, but I remember a junkyard.
2:38
And that was. Yeah.
2:40
That was a really crazy climax. Yeah, apparently they made-up
2:43
that ending. The there's a book, The Brave
2:48
Little Toaster. That's right.
2:49
And the Bella and the Toaster didn't do anything brave.
2:53
Yeah. So they needed something in a
2:55
movie. And so it dove into the gears.
2:58
Yeah. How about that?
2:59
What was the other scary part you thought?
3:04
I actually thought it was scary when the when the and air
3:14
conditioner blow up. Oh my gosh, that part, that part
3:18
was really scary. It was almost scarier than if it
3:22
had been real life. Like the cartoon version makes
3:25
it kind of scary, Yeah, in my opinion for.
3:28
Sure. Yeah, I was thinking about that
3:30
because I was this came out in 1987, so I would have been three
3:37
at that point, but I didn't watch it at three.
3:39
I think that air conditioner is the first on screen movie death
3:43
I ever saw in it freaked me out when it came on.
3:48
It was like, Oh yeah, this air conditioner is about to be crazy
3:52
A. A core memory?
3:54
Yep. Wow.
3:55
Yeah, and that clown too. That firefighter clown that
3:58
comes in for four seconds for no reason, just.
4:01
To yeah, they just needed a a a scary clown.
4:04
They said we don't have 1 yet but then this is a 1980s kids.
4:07
Never explained or ref Yeah, right.
4:09
Like we we got a piggyback up. I wonder which came out first,
4:13
if it was around or if that like somebody saw that and was like
4:16
we need to make a clown horror movie.
4:19
Spooky. Spooky, if you ask me.
4:23
Did you enjoy certain parts? And, you know, there were
4:26
certain parts that I enjoyed. I liked some of the music.
4:31
I thought the music was kind of funny.
4:34
It was funny that the music was so serious for a cartoon, but I
4:39
kind of liked it. And I also I liked that the that
4:44
the ending overall was happy. I was glad that they that the
4:50
toaster survived. I was glad that even though it
4:53
was really scary, they all ended up OK.
4:56
But other than that, I did think it was pretty weird too.
5:00
I did. I had watched this before, but
5:03
it had been maybe, I don't know, 2025 years since I'd seen it.
5:09
So there were a couple of things, too, that once we got to
5:12
the junkyard, I said, oh, I do remember this.
5:15
Yeah, yeah. I'm curious, what are some of
5:21
your favorite movies or shows? Winnie I like.
5:27
Percy Jackson. Cool.
5:29
What do you like about Percy Jackson?
5:31
I I like the show Percy Jackson because it was more like the
5:34
book than the movie was. Oh, OK, very.
5:38
Cool. Oh, yeah.
5:40
I like that show. That's pretty good.
5:42
Yeah, Yeah. One of the things I think that
5:45
kids shows do now, we noticed in watching this is like, explain
5:48
what's happening. Mm hmm.
5:50
This movie didn't explain anything.
5:52
You just show up. And so we spent when we were
5:55
watching it with your family, like a lot of time going like,
6:00
why are they in this house? Like do they work only when
6:04
they're plugged in or like not when they're plugged in, right?
6:07
Like they're they didn't explain any of the rules up front.
6:11
You're just thrown in, no? They didn't even tell us, like,
6:15
why they had to pretend like they weren't alive when a human
6:20
was around. It's like if they can move
6:22
around on their own, don't you think that?
6:25
Yeah, that could be cool. Yeah, Wouldn't you love clock
6:27
radio if it could move around? Yeah, but shows like Percy
6:31
Jackson, like, does it? I don't know if it is a
6:33
narrator, but like, they explain like, this is Percy Jackson and
6:39
this is what he's gonna do. And the toaster Not.
6:42
Not so much. Not so much.
6:44
Yeah. Are there other older movies or
6:47
shows that your dad has shown you that you like or any that
6:52
you don't like? Quack.
6:56
Quack. Quack.
6:57
Quack, quack, quack, quack, quack.
7:03
Yeah. So you love the ducks?
7:06
We should have done that movie. I think I thought it was like
7:11
funny because they were so bad and then he taught them to cheat
7:15
and then he changed his mind. He was like, oh, I'm finding
7:18
myself. Yeah, and then that is exactly
7:21
what he does. Yeah, much more fun movie than
7:27
The Brave Little Toaster, right? The Mighty Ducks, Yeah.
7:30
Yeah, and. It also got me into
7:32
rollerblading. That is awesome, I love that.
7:35
Where do you like to go rollerblading in?
7:37
My alley. That's so cool.
7:40
That's so cool that you have an alley to go rollerblading in.
7:43
Do you think that your rollerblades may be come alive
7:48
when you're not watching? Yeah, the rollerblades, are they
7:53
electric rollerblades? No, they're correct.
7:56
OK. Then they then probably not,
7:58
right? We did talk a lot about like
8:00
what, you know, what appliance would you be?
8:04
What are the rules about what can come alive and what can't
8:07
come alive, right? Seems like it has to have a plug
8:10
but like there's a lot of cordless devices these days so
8:13
we didn't know what to do some. Of these devices in this movie
8:16
movie are not even relevant today.
8:19
The clock radio, I mean. One of my favorite questions
8:23
during watching the movie, Winnie said.
8:25
What even is that blanket we had?
8:32
We had to like, pause and explain electric blankets.
8:36
Yeah. And then, but we couldn't agree
8:40
as a group like whether the the nose was a button or a knob, you
8:44
know? Like I thought it was a knob.
8:48
Yeah, yeah. But it was pretty unclear.
8:50
But yeah. You've never seen an electric
8:52
blanket in your whole life. No, no, That one wasn't a thing.
8:55
Yeah. What would you be, do you think,
8:58
if you were? I'd either be a video game.
9:04
Oh, a video game. OK.
9:06
Or a electric toilet. An electric toilet.
9:14
That is awesome, Winnie. And why?
9:17
Why would you be an electric toilet or a video game?
9:20
If I were a video game, then I could just play myself.
9:24
That's so fun, you'd always be entertained.
9:28
Yes, and if I wear electric toilet and I'd poop.
9:34
And that's like a bonus. That's like a thing we want.
9:37
It's funny. Winnie, they said prepare some
9:46
jokes for the podcast. I didn't know we were going to
9:48
get that one. Didn't know we were going to get
9:50
some poop humor on the podcast, but look, that is it's another
9:54
day on. Did that age Well?
9:56
No matter. No matter how old we are, we're
9:58
still making. Poop jokes always age as well
10:01
it. Always does.
10:02
It really does. There were jokes in the movie
10:04
that like were actually older than the movie.
10:08
So I think it's interesting that they had jokes about World War
10:11
2, but it was like what, 8 year old?
10:14
I don't know. Yeah, like that specifically
10:17
like that joke doesn't age well. Just make just make fart jokes.
10:21
Yeah, that's time. Don't make D-Day jokes in the in
10:25
the kids movie like. No one knows what that is.
10:30
Winnie, do you have any other thoughts about Brave Little
10:32
Toaster that you'd like to share with us?
10:36
I know you were. You took some great notes.
10:38
Yeah, yeah, the store part. We wanted to talk about how
10:41
weird the repair store was. Oh yeah, What did you think of
10:45
the repair store and Brave Little Toaster?
10:47
I thought it was just weird like like like the same customer
10:54
would come back when we saw him and he just had weird teeth.
10:58
Yeah, yeah. And then there was a character
11:01
that you, I thought this was a great point of view that you had
11:05
because like, there's the terrifying song and there's like
11:11
the destruction of all the things.
11:13
Like it's really creepy. You think that they're going to
11:17
all just get taken apart and then they escape and like who
11:21
chases them? The dog and the monster truck.
11:25
Yeah, yeah. And what what did you think
11:28
about that dog? I thought he, it was just
11:31
strange that he, it was just strange that he cared about the
11:35
shop. Like if I were a dog, if these
11:39
things ran away, I'd just be confused.
11:41
I'd be like do they move or not? That is another really good
11:47
question. Like, yeah, the objects have to
11:50
pretend like they're not alive when they're around people, but
11:52
what about dogs? Do they have to pretend like
11:55
they're not alive when they're around animals?
11:59
That's that's a question that they did not answer.
12:02
Yeah, to my satisfaction. And I couldn't agree with you
12:05
more, Winnie. Why would the dog care?
12:08
The dog cares about the economic viability of the repair shop so
12:12
much. He's like, yeah, right.
12:15
Yeah. The dogs on the side have kept
12:17
in this like, anti consumerist movie.
12:19
The dog is on the side of, yeah, well, we're small business.
12:23
I don't actually know what that guy is, if he represents
12:27
capitalism, small business or what.
12:30
That is, that is confusing, and they were not gonna answer that
12:33
for us. Certainly not.
12:36
What else? Winnie, do you have any other
12:37
thoughts about Brave Little Toaster?
12:41
Well, I have a question. Oh, a question.
12:50
Absolutely. That was never really answered.
12:53
Well, let's hear it. Why did the master never come
12:57
back? Yeah, yeah.
13:00
How long had it been a vacant Mountain Home?
13:05
Right. And is it, I mean, so he used to
13:09
go up there in the summers, right?
13:11
That's what he told us is that he would go and visit.
13:14
So did the place just stay empty the whole rest of the year and
13:19
did he just not come back for years?
13:21
I agree that's a question I have as.
13:23
Well, when they meet him, he's going to college.
13:25
Yeah. And he left as a child.
13:28
And they say it's too bad we have to sell this place.
13:31
And I was like, really? You haven't been there in 17
13:35
years? Like, these appliances miss you.
13:39
Yeah. They haven't seen you since you
13:40
were a child. Why didn't the family use that?
13:45
Yeah, 'cause obviously it seemed like his his girlfriend thought
13:48
it was a cool place. He could have taken her up there
13:51
before. Yeah, they said it's too bad we
13:53
have to sell it. I didn't get why.
13:55
I mean, I guess because they never go there.
13:58
It was like we. Literally never have been here.
14:01
We've owned this for 17 years. We haven't set foot in this
14:04
House. Yeah.
14:06
That was pretty, pretty weird. Yeah, we didn't.
14:10
Yeah, we didn't get that pothole, but, you know, in a
14:16
movie where a vacuum cleaner can, like, swim underwater.
14:21
Yeah. You know, okay.
14:24
Yeah, Winnie, we call that the suspension of disbelief.
14:28
It means you come into a movie and you know, there's some
14:32
things that are not going to be totally real and we just got to
14:36
kind of accept it when we go into the movie.
14:38
But I think that you're right on that.
14:41
There are some big questions that they leave unanswered that
14:44
I wish that they would have answered.
14:47
I have another question for you, Winnie.
14:49
Of all of the appliances in your house, which ones do you wish
14:55
were like could come to life? Like if any of them came to
14:59
life, which ones would you hope would be the ones?
15:04
I would hope the video games if I want.
15:07
I wish it would come to life. That would be so cool.
15:11
Do you want to be in Streets of Rage too?
15:13
Is that the game you would pick? Or maybe, maybe, yeah, you just
15:24
punch some people on the street. She's got a sweet face, but you
15:33
just never know that's. The game you'd want to come
15:36
alive? Yeah.
15:38
Interesting. What would you pick for your
15:43
house? Do you have a favorite?
15:46
I think for me, it would probably be, it would probably
15:52
be my oven because it's probably like, you know, it's big.
15:57
It's like my biggest appliance, that or the refrigerator.
16:00
I imagine it would have kind of like a big booming voice.
16:04
Yeah and yeah. At our house we are weird and
16:09
name all our smart devices different actors.
16:15
I wrote in my notes if anyone had living objects in their
16:18
house, it would be Jed and Kelly.
16:19
Yeah, don't you think so are? Oven, like usually British
16:24
actors, we, but not not exclusively.
16:29
So our Wi-fi's name is Paul Giamatti.
16:32
Love it. And then our oven's name is
16:34
Clive Owen because they were in Shoot Em Up.
16:38
Yeah. Well, no, just because he was in
16:40
Shoot Em Up with. Well, it's not like rational,
16:45
but when, like what pops up on our TV, which is, gosh, I think
16:50
the TV is Judi Dench, and it says Clive Owen has finished
16:55
preheating. Well, yeah, that's what we do
16:58
with all our smart choices. Samuel Jackson.
17:02
I guess they're not all British, just a few of them.
17:04
What do you think about that, Winnie?
17:06
It's pretty weird, right? You're used to me and Kelly
17:09
being pretty weird, I think. Yeah, but I have named my toilet
17:12
something. What?
17:14
What did you name your? Toilet Winnie, Darth.
17:16
Vader, there's a long. Back story.
17:21
Oh my gosh. Well, sometime I would love to
17:24
hear that story. Well, Winnie, thank you so much
17:28
for coming on the podcast. Is there anything else that you
17:31
wanna share about Brave Little Toaster or about any of your
17:35
favorite movies or anything like that?
17:39
If you could pick one movie that Molly should do on did That age
17:43
well? Out of these, what would you
17:44
pick for her next movie? Maybe you should pick Spaceballs
17:48
for your next movie. That would be a great idea.
17:51
That's a perfect idea. I haven't done it yet.
17:54
Cool. OK, that's cool.
17:56
Yeah, thanks. Win 5.
17:57
It was awesome to have you here. Thank you.
18:00
Thanks, Winnie. All right, Judd, that was so
18:03
awesome having Winnie here. This is that's the first time
18:06
I've ever had a kid on the podcast.
18:08
Well, I think one of the first times we met, two or three
18:13
times, we, like, you met Winnie at the same time.
18:16
Yeah. And we were talking about how
18:18
Rob makes or invites his kids to watch old movies that he used to
18:24
like. Yeah.
18:25
And. And I was.
18:26
So we just started talking about it.
18:29
And he was like, OK, I'm nervous to go on a podcast.
18:32
Yeah. I might as well have my
18:34
emotional support, friend. Absolutely, yeah.
18:36
And, and you have no reason to be nervous because you have,
18:41
first of all, picked one of the most bizarre movies that we
18:43
could talk about. And that's the, and that's a
18:46
sign of a great guest is someone who's not gonna, who's not gonna
18:48
pick what you expect, but it's gonna say.
18:50
I wonder how the movie Brave Little Toaster holds up.
18:54
Yeah. Yeah, it was 2 reasons.
18:57
One was I didn't want it to be like an easy answer, like, oh,
19:01
the movie's racist or sexist, like so many old movies.
19:05
But they're, yeah, with these, they are appliances.
19:08
There are no races or sexes. Yeah, so it will be weird in
19:12
different ways than like those simple ways.
19:15
And two, tell me if you had this, but we talked about this
19:19
wasn't a movie that I we had at home on VHS.
19:25
It was a movie that was somewhere, whether it was an
19:28
aunt's house, I don't really remember.
19:31
But it was one of those that you would watch when you went there.
19:34
Yeah. So I, I don't have the same
19:36
memory as like Mighty Ducks or something like that.
19:40
Did you have a movie like that where you would watch it like a
19:42
grandparents house or just every time you went there?
19:45
My grandpa had the hugest collection of VHSS and DVDs.
19:51
So pretty much every time I went to my grandparents house, I
19:54
would watch something weird. I would watch something I hadn't
19:57
heard of before. But there were some movies that
20:00
like I would watch consistently when I went to their house.
20:04
But for the most part, it was like they had so many movies
20:07
that that's where I would where I would go and I'd be like, OK,
20:11
we're just. Gonna get the genesis of this
20:13
podcast. Oh my God.
20:15
Thanks, Grandpa Bear. Their DVD collection?
20:18
Are they film buffs or? Yeah, yeah.
20:21
OK, well, I don't know who had this one.
20:23
They probably weren't a film buff, but like, I there was
20:28
something in my head like, I like the Brave Little Toaster.
20:31
I haven't seen that in a while. Yeah.
20:33
And then I watched it and I was like, what did you like about
20:36
this? I gotta say it was a really
20:40
thought provoking film. Yeah, it was not a kids movie.
20:43
It was like an adult parable about like obsolescence and what
20:48
happens like existentialist, what happens when we're when we
20:52
die? Right.
20:53
It's like what happens when someone newer and younger or
20:58
someone who, like, adopts technology in a different way
21:03
comes along and renders us obsolete.
21:06
Yeah, that's really what this movie is about.
21:08
This movie is about planned obsolescence.
21:11
Yeah. And if you like, I thought of
21:14
this today looking at the news of like, will AI take all our
21:19
jobs? The threat of AI taking all our
21:21
jobs is causing us to go crazy. Like every headline was just
21:25
like, to play an obsolescence of humanity happening with AI.
21:29
Yeah. And so I was like, wow, that's
21:31
just the Brave Little Toaster. Like, it is there.
21:34
We're ready to have a live action remake of The Brave
21:37
Little Toaster. Absolutely.
21:39
It won't be nearly as scary though, because there is
21:41
something about that animation that is so freaky to me.
21:46
We. So Kel and I watched Beauty and
21:50
the Beast to sort of compare, like, interesting.
21:53
They're around the same era. Yeah.
21:56
One of the one of the Brave Little Toaster facts I learned
22:00
was that Disney had it first and then was like, Nah, you can go
22:03
make it like independently. OK, well, they kind of.
22:07
Making that. Yeah, they said.
22:09
I don't know, It's a little weird.
22:11
Yeah. And so like, it's so not a
22:14
Disney movie like Beauty and the Beast.
22:18
Crucially, there's a prologue where they say like this is
22:21
what's. Happening.
22:23
And so you're like, OK, I get it.
22:27
But the art is just so much like richer and brighter.
22:31
And it took Kelly like 4 seconds to say like, oh, the art, the
22:36
art's better than this. And I was like, why?
22:37
She's like, because it's better, Why is it better?
22:40
She said just look at And so then I did a side by side and
22:44
Brave Little Toaster is like flat and dark the whole time.
22:48
They did a really good job creating an insanely creepy
22:52
atmosphere. And there's like a
22:55
claustrophobic sense in that house.
22:58
And it just kicks off with Phil Hartman doing a Jack Nicholson
23:03
impression as an air conditioner and like, like having an
23:10
aneurysm kind. Of yeah, like basically.
23:13
I think that was one of the scary things is the, the things
23:17
that the these appliances go through are like real, like the,
23:24
the, the what's it called where they the vacuum cleaner?
23:30
Cheese. All I could think of was that it
23:33
was played by the dude who sings You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch.
23:36
Exactly. That guy.
23:37
Yeah, that guy, when he's like eating his cord and having an
23:40
anxiety attack around the, it's like a real anxiety attack.
23:44
Yeah, it's very, it's deeply human.
23:46
They all have these really distinct personalities.
23:50
They each even kind of have their own score, Like the score
23:54
sort of has like a little theme music for each of them.
23:57
It's like very they. Didn't even catch that.
23:58
OK. It's very like theatrical.
24:03
It's very like old Hollywood. Even so, old Hollywood they.
24:06
Break into song in a way that is so old Hollywood.
24:09
And yeah, we cannot stress enough that these are
24:12
appliances, these are toasters and.
24:14
Vacuums. Yeah, which is why it feels.
24:17
Like well animated toasters and vacuums either.
24:20
Yeah, it's like this is a square with a face.
24:23
It's a toaster. But yeah, then all of a sudden
24:25
they're doing kind of a show tune.
24:27
Yeah, But the jokes. And that's so.
24:29
Jon Lovitz plays a radio or his voices the radio, Yeah.
24:33
And all his jokes are like vaudeville, old Hollywood jokes.
24:38
It's very weird. Yeah.
24:41
And that's where, Yeah, it doesn't like play well for a
24:44
nine year old. Right, not even a nine year old
24:46
in 1980s because they don't know.
24:51
Like they don't know. They don't know shit about,
24:53
sorry, they don't know anything about World War 2.
24:56
They don't know. Yeah, they don't know about.
24:58
They don't know about old Hollywood.
25:00
This isn't for them. These I really think that these
25:02
film makers made this movie for themselves.
25:05
IA 1000% agree and apparently like a little bit on the cheap I
25:10
think too. But there were some things that
25:13
in in maybe like, yeah, the movie itself doesn't age well,
25:18
but I think it aged well for me in that like 2 future SNL cast
25:25
members were in it. So when I first started watching
25:28
SNL reruns or whatever, I was like, I love this show.
25:31
And I'm not sure I was like, that's the voice of the radio
25:34
and Brave Little Toaster. It was just like, Jon Lovitz is
25:37
funny. And so I guess he went almost
25:40
straight from voicing this to like, getting on SNL.
25:44
Yeah, they somehow hired the Groundlings voice actors right
25:47
before they all got big. Yeah, and they didn't really
25:50
have much else to do with that time.
25:52
Like they hadn't gotten that big yet.
25:54
Yeah. So yeah, I think that makes it
25:56
better and more interesting and sets up like, oh cool, like
25:59
those were talented people in this movie.
26:01
Totally. But yeah, the the themes of it,
26:05
I think obviously they were like, well, we're exploring this
26:09
and like, I don't care if a kid likes you, don't watch it.
26:13
They were like, that's what they do.
26:14
Kids watch cartoons, so they'll have.
26:16
To they're like, OK, well, they're, they're singing and
26:20
there's colors and they're like on the screen.
26:24
So this is really just for kids to kind of like zone out and
26:28
then for parents to pay attention and be like thinking
26:32
philosophically about like how obsolete they may have become.
26:37
And in reading the like reviews now on the Internet, kids did
26:41
not zone out. Kids were like, what is
26:43
happening? We were all terrified.
26:46
We were like all learning about that we were going to die and we
26:51
didn't love it. And there weren't enough songs.
26:54
I know that you said you like the songs but one of the things
26:57
with Beauty and the Beast like that like opening song hits in 5
27:03
minutes and I'm pretty sure it took 2025 minutes for the first
27:07
song and Brave little toaster. Yeah.
27:09
You don't know it's a musical until the music starts much
27:13
later, for sure. And you forget it's a musical
27:16
until they start singing again. Yeah.
27:18
Yeah. What was your favorite song?
27:21
I think it's AB movie. It's probably my favorite one.
27:25
It's the one that they sing when they're in the repair shop.
27:29
Yeah, yeah, the floating, Yeah, that one's creepy.
27:32
It's. Creepy.
27:33
I really like Worthless. She's like.
27:37
Again, the song is called Worthless.
27:39
It's like the climax of the movie and all these cars that
27:44
are at the junkyard who are about to get crushed are talking
27:48
about how they're worthless and like.
27:50
About to go to their death. Yeah, but singing about the best
27:53
day of their life while they do it.
27:55
Like I once drove a Texan to a wedding.
27:59
I could not stop laughing that like, you know, you're, you're
28:04
you're like getting wheeled out and you know it.
28:07
It's the end. And you're like.
28:08
But that one day, Yeah, I drove this guy from Texas to that.
28:12
That day I was like, not worthless.
28:16
Yeah. But now I am.
28:19
Not because not because I'm broken, but because the newer
28:23
thing has come along and rendered me obsolete.
28:26
Yeah. You know, the air conditioner is
28:28
really the only one that, like, breaks down.
28:30
You know what I mean? Yeah.
28:32
The rest of them, like they just kind of become irrelevant
28:36
because they one live in a house where nobody.
28:40
Nobody. Yeah.
28:41
They're just like really lucky. We have, we have so many homes.
28:44
Yeah, like so many. It's really too bad we have to
28:47
sell one. Gonna sell that one.
28:49
Do you think it's set in Colorado?
28:52
Speaking of that home. You know, baby, because I don't
28:56
know, maybe in the 80s people could like build houses and buy
29:01
them and afford them. What do you?
29:03
Think we We think that the city's New York, but it's vague.
29:09
Maybe it's like the the cabin is in like upstate New York or in
29:13
New Hampshire or. Something there's some pretty
29:16
big mountains that they drive across.
29:19
One of the things that's like, you know, it's, you said
29:24
suspension of disbelief. It's a fake movie, right?
29:27
But there was a point where we were.
29:28
Like. How far does like the vacuum
29:31
have to go? Right.
29:33
And they do get lucky that they get driven in a monster truck a
29:37
lot of the way. Yeah.
29:38
Which was way out of left field. Yeah.
29:41
For the monster truck to show up for that.
29:43
Like. Like he he that choice alone
29:49
that the the guy who runs a repair shop casually drives a
29:53
monster truck around the streets all the time was like, so
29:58
inexplicably insane that I loved it.
30:01
And same because like I guess you know, business is good at
30:06
the repair shop and so you can. Business is good.
30:11
The business model is go to the swamp, pick things out of
30:14
quicksand and then RIP them apart for fuses and sell them to
30:19
the same guy. Yeah, and he has enough money to
30:22
buy a monster truck. Yeah, and and keep a dog.
30:26
I bet he probably is gonna buy that house in the cabin.
30:29
He's the guy. He's the guy who's like, he's
30:31
like, what I do is I buy cabins hoping that there's toasters and
30:41
he'll be, he'll be so sad that there's just an air conditioner
30:45
left. Totally.
30:46
What? Why do you think the toaster is
30:49
the protagonist of this movie? They just picked 1 randomly I
30:52
think. I truly think that they were
30:54
just like Brave little radio doesn't sound as cute as Brave
30:59
little toaster. I think that they truly were
31:01
just like OK what? What sounds best?
31:05
Yeah, I wrote this question. Is the toaster brave?
31:09
Like the toaster is brave like you said because he sacrifices
31:15
himself at the very end. Before that, I think he's just
31:18
as brave as the rest of the appliances.
31:21
He doesn't really stand out as braver than the others until
31:24
that final moment. Except the blanket blankets.
31:28
You're right. You're.
31:29
Doesn't have a backbone, No at. All not at all.
31:32
Well, that's 'cause he's a blanket.
31:33
Yeah, You know, it's kind of a. The blanket came on at night,
31:38
leaned over to Rob Winnie's dad, and I was like, I remember not
31:42
really liking this blanket at all.
31:45
And that proved out I I still like, I have a lot of like
31:51
empathy. Even when the the hurricane
31:54
blows blankie into the trees. It's just so annoying to me
31:59
upfront that that I I like. I must have, as a kid, been
32:05
like, come on or something. There's like, old emotions about
32:09
that blanket where I was just like, no, this one, this guy's
32:12
not for me. I did enjoy the You're a Mean
32:15
one, Mr. Grinch vacuum cleaner. Yeah.
32:19
Wasn't the biggest fan of the lamp?
32:22
The desk lamp? Annoying.
32:23
Yeah, the lamp was annoying. Yeah.
32:26
Well, I'll say it. And they said it too.
32:29
One of the things that we noticed about this movie, like
32:33
they were really mean to each other.
32:36
All the characters really insulting in a way that like you
32:40
really don't see anymore in kids movies like.
32:43
Right. They're like, OK, this is about
32:46
cooperation. We're friends here.
32:48
Yeah. These really, these really are
32:50
more like, they're more like comrades.
32:52
They're more like operatives who have to work together because
32:56
they're going toward a common goal, not because they all want
32:59
to hang out and be friends. Yeah, but also they like,
33:02
they're just casually like, you're stupid and stuff like
33:05
that. And like, they don't say that
33:07
stuff in kids Movies Now. Like Zootopia 2 doesn't like
33:11
only bad characters do anything mean now it's very clear, like
33:17
who's what. And yeah, when they're they,
33:19
they like casually fight and insult each other for about half
33:23
the movie, if not more. And the lamp is like, there's a
33:27
scene where he's like, why are you being nice to the blanket
33:30
and the toaster's like, why not? And he's like, used to not be
33:34
nice, now you're being nice. I don't like it.
33:39
That's like, there's no explanation.
33:41
It doesn't go anywhere in the plot.
33:42
There's just a part where it's like, you're not supposed to be
33:44
nice to people. Right.
33:46
It's not that these these appliances become nice either.
33:49
It's like that's not a part of the arc.
33:51
It's not like no, and they're like, oh, and you know, blankie,
33:55
I actually really appreciate you and I was wrong to make fun of
33:58
you. It's like, no, they just they're
34:01
accepted again by the kid. Which so we should talk about.
34:06
It's the. Master Yeah, that's tough.
34:09
That's tough because, you know, slavery.
34:14
But we don't really say that anymore.
34:19
And thank God for that, because it is insane to think about your
34:25
relationship to your stuff as like, you are the master.
34:31
Yeah, that's insane. I'm sorry.
34:33
It was a really hard part of the movie to just like every time
34:37
they said it, it was like, it was like and.
34:40
So he's enslaving the alliances. What does this mean?
34:45
I wasn't sure also if it was like a religious allegory right
34:49
where the kid is God, the master and only.
34:54
But like there are no I didn't catch.
34:58
I grew up religious. I'm like sensitive to all those
35:01
overtones and those things. I didn't catch a lot of others
35:04
in the movie. It's not like I didn't feel like
35:06
they were making a religious comment.
35:09
Unless the toaster sacrificing himself was like Christ like but
35:14
the thing. Is.
35:15
Yeah, he like he gets all like banged up and then Rob, that's
35:18
the kids name, right? Oh that's I honestly have no
35:22
idea. The cartoon.
35:23
Is the girlfriend. That's right, Yeah.
35:25
So Rob like fixes him up. I just call him Mass, whatever
35:29
it's like I call. I call him God, sorry.
35:34
Sorry, Rob. Yeah, Rob.
35:36
He hammers the Yeah, he like. Back together.
35:38
So then that's kind of like, oh, OK, well, I guess like the
35:41
Christ allegory is gone, but it's like, yeah, there wasn't
35:45
really any other, like, religious overtone or undertone
35:49
to this. But that is very like, I don't
35:53
know. It's also interesting because,
35:54
like, the kid didn't buy the toaster.
36:00
His parents bought the toaster. So why is the kid the master of
36:05
the toaster? Yeah.
36:07
So we talked about this afterwards.
36:11
The thinking is in in the Anderson O'Connell Henneberry
36:16
household that watched this movie that he's so good at
36:21
fixing things that they they just love him like nobody else
36:27
can fix. This kid is a genius.
36:30
That's what he's going to college for.
36:32
And he's just going to be the best kind of engineer fix it
36:36
person ever. And that these appliances are
36:40
just like very lucky to have him.
36:42
And that that has to be why? Because we don't, we honestly
36:46
don't know why. Yeah.
36:47
And he does fix the air conditioner at the end as proof
36:51
of like, maybe he does have that talent.
36:56
But it just felt really weird. And I think a movie that does
37:03
this so much better is just Toy Story, right?
37:06
This is just bad toy. Story just gonna bring that up.
37:09
And it is similar to Toy Story in the fact that, OK, in Toy
37:13
Story 3, when they're all like going toward that, like they're
37:16
all about to die, they're all facing their own mortality that
37:21
like, I mean, I felt that same feeling, but just less so when I
37:26
was watching Brave Little Toaster and they were going
37:28
toward the big crushing machine. But Toy Story is a way better
37:32
example of a human to object relationship because it's toys.
37:38
Yeah, we get it. They like being played with,
37:42
like the toaster liking that it can make toast and the kid eats
37:46
it in one bite. Yeah, I guess.
37:49
But like Woody being like, oh, he used to like, play with me
37:52
for hours. That makes sense.
37:54
Well, here's the difference between the appliances and the
37:58
toys. Is that like the the kid Andy in
38:03
Toy Story wants to play with? The toys, the appliances and
38:08
Brave Little Toaster are necessary.
38:11
They like complete a task, they're useful, you know what I
38:14
mean? It's like they have to be used
38:17
for their purpose, and so they want to be.
38:19
And they don't do anything other than that.
38:22
Yeah, like this is. Not this is He's not making
38:25
toast for pleasure. He's making toast because he has
38:28
to, because the because he needs the bread to be to be toasted.
38:33
Whereas like Woody the the the cowboy, he's just there to like,
38:40
entertain. Yeah, we and we talked about Toy
38:43
Story. You it's funny you mentioned Toy
38:45
Story 3 like because we were saying like that's widely
38:47
regarded, I think as like the best.
38:49
It's emotional. But they worked up for three
38:52
movies to do that. The first one, the stakes were
38:55
just like Woody and Buzz. Yeah, like that would be like
38:59
Brave Little Toaster 1 is like, are we following the lamp or the
39:02
toaster, right, Instead of like we're going to follow a bunch of
39:07
kind of unlikable appliances who hate each other.
39:09
Right, And are kind of mean to each.
39:11
Other they instantly in Toy Story are like these two people
39:14
are cool. You can follow them and like, we
39:17
have jokes and we have other stuff, but they, the stakes
39:21
aren't people getting crushed to death in a junkyard like in the
39:28
first movie. Yeah, it takes a while and you
39:30
get attached to them. And yeah, we age like, yeah, I,
39:34
I don't know. I, I do agree with you.
39:36
It it does come back to the like they made this for themselves.
39:40
They were struggling with like, Disney just fired us.
39:43
Yeah. We don't know what we're gonna
39:45
do. Yeah, computers are coming.
39:47
Like, our animation's not gonna like, let's make this allegory
39:52
that we're all eventually going to the junkyard, right?
39:57
Yeah. Yeah, I think that they were
39:59
really just like, what can we get away with that we couldn't
40:02
do at Disney? They didn't stop to ask whether
40:05
they should. They were just like, oh, we can.
40:09
We can do this. But they didn't stop to say, why
40:13
wouldn't Disney like or why would Disney not want us to make
40:19
these toys be mean to each other or like, why would Disney not
40:23
want us to, you know, have this big, scary, crushing machine?
40:30
Yeah. Or like Disney says, we need a
40:32
hit song. Yeah, and we don't think so.
40:35
Yeah, like we are not going to make a song that you could play
40:37
on the radio. And I did not think I was going
40:40
to show up here and be like, well, maybe Disney really does
40:43
know how to make a kids movie. But God, they really do.
40:46
Yeah. They they actually just do.
40:49
Yeah. It was noticeable within moments
40:52
of Beauty and the Beast. And like, I still, like, I
40:55
remember being sad at both of these movies as a child.
40:58
Like, yeah, you know, there's still the the when the beast got
41:01
thrown off the castle. I mean, I was in tears.
41:05
So like, yeah, you know, I don't know why so many cartoons around
41:12
that time were like, no, we really have to tell these kids
41:14
about death. Like, it's our job.
41:17
Yeah. Like we can't make a movie where
41:20
they just, like, have a singing competition and like, win, like
41:24
someone's gonna die. These stakes have to be life and
41:28
death. One thing I read about Brave
41:30
Little Toaster was that they were like, oh, we can make this
41:33
a little bit scarier and darker than other movies because it's
41:36
not Disney. But I think about movies in the
41:38
80s, kids movies in the 80s, because I'm like, they were kind
41:42
of all dark and weird and had to tell kids something about their
41:49
own we. Had to warn us, warn them or
41:51
scare them or something like that.
41:53
Yeah, I there's one of the things that I like.
42:01
Yeah. You were saying dark means.
42:03
Oh, man. Where are we?
42:07
Yeah, this is weird. OK, so there's a part where the
42:09
vacuum says this is weird. And Winnie's mom, Shannon, who I
42:15
think is Shannon, makes me laugh so much.
42:17
She has like a dry sense of humor.
42:19
She just burst out laughing because she was like, yeah,
42:23
yeah, yeah. You said it.
42:24
Vacuum. This is really weird.
42:28
And they say it, they're they're self aware enough.
42:31
So I think to your point, like there's some self-awareness of
42:33
like, we're doing this and we're making this and we're making it
42:38
weird and bizarre and we want kids to know this lesson.
42:41
And like, I don't know. Are you?
42:43
Do you watch the have you seen the K Pop Demon Hunters movie?
42:48
OK, that's awesome. That's an awesome movie.
42:51
That song is like playing on the radio.
42:54
Oh, yeah. And Winnie, Winnie and Harriet
42:56
introduced us to that and every other child that we know.
43:00
But like that movie's really good and fun and I I don't know
43:06
when it it probably shifted with money and consumerism which is
43:09
like 1 interesting part of this movie is that I think it's like
43:13
pretty anti consumerist. I would say so.
43:16
I think that it's interesting. They're both like, they're both
43:19
giving like this human like value and quality to objects
43:24
that you can consume. But at the same time, they're
43:27
criticizing consumerism in the planned obsolescence and the,
43:31
you know, the need to like, keep getting the next bigger and
43:35
better and newer thing. But it's like you're also.
43:39
You gave love this stuff. You gave a name to this stuff.
43:42
Yeah, you know. And so I, I think it's anti
43:46
consumerist, but I also think that like with consumerism
43:50
getting into or just being able, oh, there's money in the kids
43:54
market, right? The quality goes up.
43:56
Yeah, to some extent. Or at least like the quality of
43:59
some things goes up. Yeah, One thing on the anti
44:02
consumerism and the kid and the fixing thing things up that we
44:05
found super strange was like what he chose to bring to
44:08
college. So like, what did you bring to
44:11
college? Not a toaster.
44:12
I'll say that they didn't let us have toasters in the dorm room.
44:16
No, I did not bring a vacuum cleaner.
44:18
They barely let us. I think microwaves were not.
44:20
I mean, yeah, they at least. Yeah.
44:22
Yeah, we had vacuum. Would you have brought a vacuum
44:24
cleaner? Of of these objects, I didn't
44:27
bring a radio. I did not bring.
44:30
Did you bring a radio to college?
44:32
Oh yeah, like a boom A5 disc CD chair are.
44:34
You serious? Yeah, like a but like a but like
44:37
a an alarm clock radio thing. It's a good question.
44:41
Probably right? Probably OK.
44:43
Probably had a clock radio. I guess I did.
44:46
I did. But Rob and I lived together for
44:47
several years in college, and I promise you, we did not have a
44:50
vacuum. Right.
44:53
Believe that. No, when people left clothes at
44:57
the house at the dorm for a party we would just nail them to
45:00
the wall of course so that if they came back they could find
45:03
them. It was like a lost and found art
45:05
project. We did not.
45:07
We they once dropped off a stack of phone books outside the dorm.
45:13
Literally like 50 phone books and we were like who even needs
45:18
this in college? So we took all of them and used
45:20
them as paper towels for the rest of this.
45:23
Like really effective. That is so economical.
45:27
Yeah, we didn't. Need to bring appliances?
45:30
No, you didn't need. OK, I will say I brought a desk
45:34
lamp. To college yeah, we all that's.
45:37
But I didn't bring an electric blanket.
45:40
That was the one that made the most sense is the.
45:42
Lamp. Yeah, the lamp makes sense.
45:45
You read, you study, you. Need a lamp and your roommate
45:49
goes to sleep and you need a lamp.
45:51
That's like the one the toaster. Yeah, the blanket.
45:54
None of the others. And he specifically was looking
45:59
for them to take those to. He drove out to be like, I gotta
46:03
get the old toaster to bring it to bring to my college dorm
46:08
room. And that was probably the most
46:11
insane part of the movie to me, based on the things that we
46:17
valued or brought to college. And also it was weird to me that
46:21
the mom was like, take my stuff when when like I'm sorry, but he
46:29
didn't buy the stuff that's at the cabin.
46:31
That's her stuff too, that I'm sorry, but like that, the lamp
46:37
that she had at home, at her house was just as much her.
46:40
Like, you sound like a parent who's just like, this is my
46:43
you're under my roof. Like this is all yeah, I paid
46:46
for. All of that, yeah.
46:48
But yeah, it is a good point. It is a good point.
46:51
The mom Yeah just take my like huge reel to reel movie tape
46:58
player can I didn't know what the moms.
47:01
What was her deal? She was like, oh, yeah, take my
47:04
lamp. And he's like, well, then you
47:06
won't have a lamp. She's like, I'll use candles or
47:08
I just won't read whatever. I was like, what is this?
47:12
What is this codependent that they're just like brushing past?
47:17
Like, OK, now we have a codependent mom who said who
47:21
said in like, you know, the production team there.
47:24
Well, they wouldn't let me put my codependent mom in this other
47:28
Disney film, so I guess I'm going to have to make a notch.
47:31
Turn here. Like, yeah, one of the one of
47:34
the animators was like, can I do this?
47:37
Like, I really. Yeah, I got a bone to pick.
47:40
They wouldn't let me do that at Disney.
47:41
You guys get it? My mom stopped reading books
47:45
because I borrowed her lamb. I got to put it in the movie.
47:50
I got it in the movie. But yeah, I just like, I really
47:55
didn't get it on the rewatch just as a whole, Like I, I, I, I
48:02
don't know what it was that stuck in my head for 35 so many
48:08
years about like, you know what movie I like Brave Little
48:11
Toaster. Well.
48:12
I remember liking it because of just the whimsy of regular
48:18
objects that seem uninterested, having personalities, having a
48:23
life when I'm not watching. My dad used to tell me these
48:26
bedtime stories about there's this, there's this.
48:30
OK, this is gonna get into cultural appropriation
48:33
territory. Sorry but your.
48:34
Dad did it it. Was my dad it's OK, he's not
48:38
here he's not here. He can't defend himself.
48:40
It's fine. I'm on the microphone, man.
48:42
I talked so much shit about sorry I talked so poorly about
48:45
my sister last week on the podcast and she was not here to
48:50
defend herself either. I guess.
48:51
Mom, you're you're coming you're coming up next.
48:54
But my dad would tell me these this story about in the it's
48:59
either in Milwaukee or Madison. There's this, there's this
49:05
statue collection in their Museum of this like Native
49:11
American tribe. And it's like, oh, God, I wish I
49:14
could remember the name of it. But basically it's like this
49:18
really cool, like art installation.
49:20
And my dad would tell us stories about how, like, it was truly
49:24
like night at the museum before that was a thing.
49:27
He thought of it first, really, that, like, the statues would
49:32
come to life and like, they'd go on these adventures.
49:35
The Chief, his name was Chief. He would like, he like went
49:38
surfing and he went like, you know, sledding and he did all
49:42
these things and then they would have to like go back and then
49:45
like pretend to be statues again.
49:48
But it was like these inanimate objects that came to life.
49:51
Obviously that's different because they're statues of
49:53
people, but like I. Always.
49:55
I loved it. I loved it.
49:57
I loved the idea that there were these things that were lifeless
50:03
that could have a life of their own when I'm not looking.
50:07
And I always would like, I don't know, I don't know if this is
50:12
like a weird neurodivergent thing or if other kids do this
50:15
too, but I would kind of like look for the faces in
50:18
everything. Like I'd see a I'd see like a
50:21
chair and be like, where are the eyes on that chair?
50:23
Or like you see a car and you're like, where's the smile on the?
50:27
Car headlights and the this. I totally get what you're
50:30
saying. Yeah, I've seen those do.
50:31
That. Winnie, do kids do that?
50:36
No, just you. That's just Molly.
50:39
I'm looking over there, though, and I'm like, look, those tape,
50:41
that could be eyes. Like, yeah, once you start
50:43
thinking that way, it is cool to think that.
50:45
Like, obviously it's a trope that every movie or a lot of
50:51
movies since were like, this works.
50:52
Like, you can do this, Things can come alive and yeah, and we
50:57
can do it. Would we have?
50:58
Cars without Brave Little Toaster.
51:01
Would we have cars like? Cars as in the movie?
51:04
Cars I. Was like.
51:06
Like literally, it's like cars were invented.
51:08
Cars were, I think, no, no, no. I'll have to check.
51:14
No, I don't think or we would because I think to your point,
51:17
like it's it's maybe an it's a good story.
51:20
Yeah. So somebody would have told some
51:22
story about something. Yeah.
51:24
Yeah. I don't it'll be.
51:26
I don't know if like Brave Little Toaster was a pioneer.
51:31
Yeah, I think it was. But somebody could just go like,
51:35
no, the first one of those was in 1970, Like you missed it.
51:39
But yeah, Cars, Toy Story, Beauty and the Beast was an
51:43
interesting one because it was, they were humans changed into
51:48
something and changed back. Yeah.
51:49
And that's something that has been like through Shakespeare,
51:52
right? Of course.
51:53
Yeah, since the like the oldest, Yeah, like ancient stories have
51:58
like people turning into objects and things.
52:01
One of the coolest things in the past few years Winnie was in
52:06
Denver does, like, a Shakespeare day.
52:08
So all the kids across the whole, like, city do a scene
52:13
from a play. Cool.
52:14
And Winnie's class had Midsummer Night's Dream.
52:17
And in that they were turned into different things.
52:20
They're all. And like, that's funny in the
52:23
1600s. Yeah.
52:25
And it's funny now. So like, I do think, yeah, maybe
52:31
maybe if Shakespeare's doing it brave little toasters ripping
52:35
off something. But like, yeah, it does feel
52:37
like it paved the way for cars, for Toy Story, for these kinds
52:40
of things. Yeah, one of the, so I was
52:44
saying Beauty and the Beast, I found this to be like a
52:46
interesting comparable movie where the people get changed
52:52
into objects and then like saying be our guest 'cause they
52:56
want to be useful too, but they're people like who have
53:02
real jobs, who are trying to do their jobs.
53:06
But then I think it's still asks the question of like, are we
53:09
just what we're useful for, or are we worth something just by
53:14
being ourselves? That's why I think Toy Story
53:17
really tells a more valuable story because like their purpose
53:23
is to like, is to create like a sense of community, a sense of
53:29
like togetherness, a sense of like play and awe and
53:34
entertainment. I mean, I guess entertainment is
53:37
like a fulfilling a use, but it's like, you know, there's
53:40
sort of this like, I don't know. Well, there's like joy in the
53:44
community or family that they create.
53:47
There's. Joy.
53:48
There is no moral to this story, no.
53:51
Which I think is like, you know, good existentialist stories
53:55
don't really have morals. They just like, end.
53:56
And you're like, that's it. And you're like, I really have
53:59
to think about what my purpose is.
54:02
Brave Little Toaster I. Don't know what that is yet.
54:04
Yeah, it's like the Camus of animated movies.
54:08
But like, it would have been nice to just have a little
54:11
message like, listen, you're OK just as you are.
54:16
You don't have to achieve like one of the when they remake this
54:21
or when our world remakes this and AI replaces us because
54:25
everybody's just so obsessed with like productivity all the
54:28
time instead of just being like, why?
54:30
What are we just good like? Yeah.
54:33
Can't I just like? Can't I just like, be?
54:37
And can't that be enough? And and that's why I think,
54:40
like, the moral I took in some ways was Winnie's question of
54:44
like, why didn't they just stay in nature?
54:47
Like, that was nice. And like, they seem to be making
54:53
friends with the animals. Like, yeah, let's just live in
54:58
the world. Let's not enslave ourselves to
55:01
somebody like. This is God like figure.
55:05
A kid named Rob. Yeah, sorry, no offense.
55:09
Yeah, yeah. Sorry Rob.
55:11
Sorry Rob. Dumb dumb name.
55:13
Yeah, yeah, I knew I hated him from the second but.
55:20
But here's the thing, I wonder how many kids developed like,
55:25
overly sentimental in an unhealthy way, relationships to
55:29
their appliances after this movie?
55:32
Like, you know, mom says the toaster doesn't work.
55:34
And they're like, no, that's my brave little toaster, you know?
55:39
That's a really good question. And were they right to question
55:42
that? Did anyone influence their mom
55:44
to say you know what I guess I'll fix it instead of get the
55:47
get the new air fryer which. The story that comes to mind is
55:51
not about an appliance and like is only vaguely related, but
55:54
this idea of like something dying or something like going
55:57
away where you're like, I don't want that to go away.
56:00
Like can't we fix it? Or like no, let's save it.
56:05
One day my mom told me that my fish dive dive got too big for
56:09
his bowl. Dive, dive.
56:11
Dive. Dive.
56:12
Yeah, I'm pretty sure he was named after AGI Joe Nice,
56:15
probably around the same time as the Brave Little Toaster.
56:19
And so she told me he got too big for his bowl and we had to
56:22
flush him down the toilet so he could go to the ocean and grow
56:25
big. And I was so sad, but I was
56:29
like, this is what we have to do.
56:31
So we did it. Wow.
56:32
So she, so she brought you along into it, into the ritual of.
56:37
I think she lied to me, but we did.
56:39
Lie, obviously. Yeah, I don't know.
56:41
There there was a ritual. We just did the thing.
56:43
But it's interesting that she was like, we are going to do
56:45
this rather than saying I flushed him down.
56:47
She may have again that I don't remember what.
56:51
I did to Darth Vader. Yeah, into Darth Vader.
56:54
But what I do remember is the first day of college when we're
56:57
going around in a circle in the icebreaker.
57:00
And it was like, what pets did you have?
57:02
And this person had a dog named Winnie.
57:03
And this person had a dog named Cooper.
57:05
Yeah. Yeah.
57:07
And I said, well, I had a fish once, but he got too big for his
57:10
bowl, so we had to flush him down the toilet.
57:13
So he, my fish died. I realized that.
57:16
Realized in that moment that your fish had died. 17 and I
57:20
just went like I blocked that out of my mind as a traumatic
57:24
memory. You're so lucky that you met Rob
57:28
and had a friend 'cause everybody else was like, like
57:32
that kid just realized that his fish died.
57:35
I, it was, it was a, it was a really like welcome to the real
57:40
world moment. That is first.
57:43
Day of college so like to that that point of like did anyone
57:48
get attached to their we have to throw the toaster away Yeah and
57:51
they're like no probably. I'm sure.
57:54
I mean, kids love their blankets like that for sure.
57:57
So like, there were probably people who liked that character
58:01
and yeah, made some talk to their blanket maybe.
58:04
I don't know. Here's the thing, though about
58:06
Blankie is that it's so different.
58:09
The relationship between like a kid and their like, you know,
58:12
comfort blanket, whatever. So different from the
58:16
relationship between a person and their electric blanket.
58:22
I'm sorry, but what kid is calling their electric blanket
58:26
blanket? If they even know what an
58:28
electric blanket is. Right.
58:29
It's usually like, I'm pretty sure my grandparents had one.
58:32
Like that's an old person thing. Old.
58:35
Person thing either like you have menstrual cramps or you're
58:38
85 or older, that those are the only times when electric
58:41
blankets are useful and you wouldn't let a young kid have
58:44
one because guess what? You plug it in and that's
58:47
dangerous. It can be a fire hazard.
58:48
It can be all kinds of things, like a kid doesn't have a
58:52
relationship to an electric blanket.
58:54
Like once the blanket becomes electric, it is an appliance.
58:58
It is no longer like a toy or a stuffed animal or something like
59:02
that, you know. It's a it's a very good point,
59:05
and it echoes Whitney's point. What even is that blanket like?
59:10
And honestly, I'm still asking myself the question, what even
59:12
is that? Blanket like it everywhere so
59:15
the fact that it has a cord is not a useful feature for can we
59:21
like I I know we've talked about like the abstract things
59:25
whatever, but like it is really annoying that sometimes they
59:28
have to be plugged in and sometimes they don't they.
59:30
Don't. Yeah.
59:31
It drove me nuts. Yeah, me too.
59:33
Because it's not like them being plugged in is like them charging
59:37
so that they can be cordless. No, this is 1980.
59:39
Seven, unless they do need to charge the battery through the
59:43
lightning strike that's. True.
59:45
The the the inconsistency of those rules.
59:52
Rob and I have watched a lot of movies together over the years,
59:55
from Frankenfish to Gladiator 2 I think.
1:00:00
And Rob will watch, like, Frankenfish, the most ridiculous
1:00:04
movies. Yeah, but as long as their
1:00:06
internal logic makes sense. Yes.
1:00:09
Like, that fish is nuts. It can eat anything.
1:00:12
We'll believe that. Yeah.
1:00:14
But if you introduce something that can't be explained or is
1:00:18
just like magic, yeah, Rob's out.
1:00:21
Totally. Especially if it's not
1:00:23
consistent. If they never had to be plugged
1:00:27
into work, then it's like, okay, we live in a world in which they
1:00:30
don't have to be plugged in. It's just magic.
1:00:32
Just like how they can talk. But if they have to be plugged
1:00:35
in sometimes and then not other times, that's where I say it
1:00:41
really. It really doesn't take an
1:00:42
electrical engineer to understand the basic concept of
1:00:46
how appliances work or don't work.
1:00:48
Yeah, yeah, yeah. And we're believing that they
1:00:50
can come to life and hop around and do all these things.
1:00:53
And swim even. But every once in a while
1:00:55
they're just like, no, we need to be plugged in.
1:00:59
We decided that the swimming was that the and maybe this was
1:01:03
obvious, but I didn't get it. The vacuum cleaner inhaled a
1:01:07
bunch of air so he could float. Well, OK.
1:01:10
That's what Kelly said. I was like, sure, totally great.
1:01:14
He can hold his nose, that's the thing, I guess.
1:01:17
Because a vacuum cleaner has a nose.
1:01:19
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. A lot of stuff that again, I
1:01:25
mean, I'm just like, Rob, like if if the movie says this is how
1:01:29
it works, then I'm on board. Sure.
1:01:31
But they have to, like, they have to give me something.
1:01:36
It can't just be whenever they want.
1:01:39
Yeah, whenever they want. Oh, a portal.
1:01:42
Oh, they can do this. And he doesn't like it.
1:01:45
I do think this set me up generally to like Quest movies.
1:01:51
I think that's a genre of movie I like.
1:01:53
I think part of it was like, this is a Quest movie with
1:01:56
different people. Yeah.
1:01:58
And they sort of each have their own, you know, the lamp gets
1:02:01
struck by lightning and the vacuum cleaner does this.
1:02:07
They each have their own value. But like, also not really, like,
1:02:11
not as much as a typical sort of quest where it's like, well,
1:02:15
this person's doing this and this.
1:02:16
I like when people have different jobs and they're all
1:02:19
working together. Yeah.
1:02:20
It's a genre I like. Yeah, I like that too.
1:02:23
I like my favorite version of a Quest movie is a buddy comedy, a
1:02:29
buddy road trip comedy kind of thing where it's like we know
1:02:33
that there is a destination every like a physical
1:02:37
destination where they have to go and on their way there they
1:02:41
have to work together in spite of their differences.
1:02:45
And you know, it's about it's about the friendship along the
1:02:48
way. This one was not about the.
1:02:49
Friendship. It was like it was exactly like
1:02:51
that, without the buddy or the comedy.
1:02:53
Or the comedy. It was just a destination,
1:02:57
really. Yeah.
1:02:58
But they're appliances. They're not used to having fun
1:03:01
and being friends. They are like I'm here to be
1:03:04
useful. Yeah, yeah.
1:03:08
I'm so glad I'm not an appliance.
1:03:10
Me too. I'm really glad that, like, I
1:03:13
mean that in other movies where they make objects
1:03:17
anthropomorphic, they understand that if something has a
1:03:21
personality, that means that it has to have some use beyond its,
1:03:28
like, stated use. Yeah.
1:03:30
Inside Out is like that, where they have personalities and they
1:03:33
have a use and they have a function, but like each one gets
1:03:37
to have a positive function. We were saying this like anger
1:03:40
isn't just like a caricature. Yeah, it's useful in the movie
1:03:44
and they they assume it's useful.
1:03:46
I think Inside Out is one that just nails this vibe way better
1:03:53
and actually has has cool things to think about positively.
1:03:57
Inside Out two even more like and so I feel like those will
1:04:04
age well. Yeah, 20 years I.
1:04:06
Hope so. Whereas like the 80s, yeah, they
1:04:10
were just really obsessed with scaring kids away from like, and
1:04:15
interestingly enough, probably made kids want to stick their
1:04:18
fingers into sockets. Probably.
1:04:20
Right. Yeah, I would.
1:04:22
Like you watch this movie and you're like, this is cool.
1:04:24
Yeah, I would. So like, while they're trying to
1:04:27
scare you away from certain things, they're also inviting a
1:04:29
lot of risky behavior. Yeah.
1:04:31
Like there's a scene where they throw a toaster into the toaster
1:04:35
as a nightmare where he's thrown into the bathtub.
1:04:38
And like, they don't explain that you're not supposed to do
1:04:41
that. Like, right.
1:04:42
They play it for like 5 seconds. And we know that that's bad for
1:04:46
the toaster. Yeah, but in a world where
1:04:48
electricity doesn't function the way it functions, right?
1:04:51
A small kid might be like, you could throw toasters in the
1:04:53
bathtub. This is.
1:04:54
Awesome. They don't understand that the
1:04:56
toaster is having nightmares because it's afraid of its own
1:04:59
death. Because they don't know what
1:05:00
death is yet. They're about to learn it by
1:05:02
watching this movie. Yeah, they haven't learned it
1:05:04
yet. With no like context or
1:05:07
awareness or anybody to sit them down afterwards and go.
1:05:10
That was scary, totally. Because their parents were at
1:05:13
work. Yes.
1:05:14
Latchkey kid parents were a generation.
1:05:16
They they, they did not have time.
1:05:18
Yeah. And, and understandably so.
1:05:21
They had to. They had to make the money so
1:05:23
that they could get their brave little toasters.
1:05:25
We to call back, we talked about this earlier, but the the show
1:05:31
you did with Jackie recently about daddy daycare, she
1:05:34
mentioned not knowing the movie Friday and you just mentioned
1:05:37
latchkey kids. My brother and I would just rent
1:05:41
movies from video paradise and watch them after school.
1:05:45
But we would rent every R rated growing up in South Central
1:05:53
movie that we could watch. That was our favorite genre and
1:05:57
they were we, they were not age appropriate for us, but we'd be
1:06:01
like, mom, Dead Presidents is about like history.
1:06:03
And so we'd watch Dead Presidents and Friday and all
1:06:06
these movies as like after school, like this is the best.
1:06:10
Yeah. Those are the ones that I think
1:06:12
I probably should have said did that age well because I would
1:06:15
look back and go. I don't think a 7 year old was
1:06:17
supposed to watch some of those movies.
1:06:20
That is one of my favorite things is when people come on
1:06:22
this podcast and I'm like, OK, so when did you first see the
1:06:25
movie? Like I had my friend Pat on here
1:06:27
talk about Major League. He's like, yeah, I watched it
1:06:29
when I was like 7 or 8. That's like a, that's like a
1:06:33
very R rated movie. But my dad didn't care about
1:06:36
ratings. We definitely watch that.
1:06:38
Yeah, that came up the other day because the dub of that movie on
1:06:42
TNT, there's a scene where they dub in MF and he's like, and
1:06:49
it's long, right? That word is long, but in the
1:06:52
dove you just go strike this guy out.
1:06:57
That's how they covered it. And I and me, I'm like, that's
1:07:01
not what they. Say.
1:07:03
I don't know what the word means that they say, but that's not
1:07:05
what they say. In that movie, guy.
1:07:09
I know what it is. Oh man, I love bad doves.
1:07:12
It is so funny. Yeah, well, Jed, here's the
1:07:17
thing. I'm so I know that you've sort
1:07:19
of been like critical of your own choice to talk about Brave
1:07:22
Little Toaster, and I wish that you wouldn't.
1:07:23
It's. A rich text it.
1:07:25
Really did get me thinking about a lot and I think that it really
1:07:30
gave us a great conversation with Winnie.
1:07:32
And also, this is not the last time you're going to be on this
1:07:35
podcast. Obviously.
1:07:37
You will come back, we will talk about something like Friday.
1:07:40
Maybe it'll get. I don't think I don't think you
1:07:42
want the old white man on the Friday I.
1:07:45
Don't want to white people to talk about Friday.
1:07:50
Put it in the comments. Put in the comments if you
1:07:52
think, yeah, those white people, one of whom was not even born
1:07:56
when this movie came out, should talk about that movie.
1:07:59
But you know something something else that maybe Jackie hasn't
1:08:02
seen so that we can encourage her to see it.
1:08:06
And you, listener, let us know what you want us to talk about,
1:08:09
because if there was something from the 80s and 90s that was
1:08:13
not age appropriate, but that Jed would have liked as a kid,
1:08:18
I'm sure that we can last. Boy Scout that was not You think
1:08:22
it's about Boy Scouts? You can trick your parents.
1:08:25
Scouts. It's about Boy Scouts.
1:08:26
It's about Boy Scouts. How bad could it be?
1:08:28
It's about cocaine, gambling. That's a rough one, Molly.
1:08:34
Thank you. This was super fun.
1:08:35
One of the things that Kelly and I do every year at the end of
1:08:39
the year, like on New Year's, is think back on who are new people
1:08:44
that we met for the first time and you were one of our favorite
1:08:46
people that we met in 2025. We both said Molly, we met her
1:08:50
this year. So this is super fun.
1:08:53
You guys are some of my favorite people who I met in 2025, too.
1:08:56
I don't even have to go back through and reflect on each
1:08:59
person I met in 2025. I know, yeah, that you guys are
1:09:03
some of my favorite people who I met last year.
1:09:05
I'm so glad that we're friends, so glad that you came on to talk
1:09:08
about Brave Little Toaster and and we really will have you on
1:09:12
again. I'm in.
1:09:13
The fans will demand it. They will demand it.
1:09:16
And listener, thank you so much for being here.
1:09:19
Be sure to follow, subscribe, blah, blah, blah.
1:09:21
You know what to do. And shout out to Spider Moving
1:09:24
and Storage for sponsoring this episode.
1:09:26
Love you guys. Go to spidermovie.com for a free
1:09:28
quote. OK, everybody, be safe and don't
1:09:32
put your toasters in the bathtub, Yeah?