Welcome to Fear Coded, a podcast where we talk about media from the horror genre and take a queer reading of a single book, video game, film, podcast, or TV show to explore just how queer horror can be.

You thought themes were a thing of the past, but think again.

Like a killer returning to terrorize a small town on a significant date this month.

Love is in the air and blood is on the floor for it.

Is Halloween a celebration of romance in horror all February long?

And to kick us off, we are discussing the iconic 1981 slasher My Bloody Valentine.

I'm David.

I'm Marilee.

And I'm Tyler.

And we want to thank all the bats in our belfry for being part of our amazing community by supporting the Fear Coded Patreon.

Thank you to Will, Knight of Cups, Doug, Jacob, Alyssa, Blake, Puckish, Rogue, Tyler, Derek, Maureen, and John.

Now before we start cooking hot dogs for this Valentine's Day party, I want to check in with my Co host to see how things are going for them in a landscape of horrors that our real world has to offer.

What's making y'all scared or what is making you feel prepared?

I am going to go 1st and guys, I got to tell you, I'm real scared.

I'm really scared.

Is it I?

I'm just going to put out, I'm going to put out an ESP moment here merrily.

Is it weather related?

Is it is weather related?

Not to exactly date when this podcast is being recorded, but.

But but Ted Cruz just left the state that merrily lives in, which is a 100% sure sign that ice she is a coming.

Oh boy.

I mean, listen, Ice is already here and it's a real bummer because there's there's very little I can do about it.

Those motherfuckers are all over the place.

It's driving me fucking crazy.

But that's not the thing that I'm talking about.

Oh, different ice, different ice, Different ice, different ice you're talking about.

You're talking about the Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

I was talking about frozen water.

Yes, no, frozen water is what's currently have has me here.

I just throwing it out there.

Hey, if you work for ICE, if you just know somebody who works for ICE, stop listening to this podcast because I personally hate you.

Yeah, Fuck.

Fuck all the way off.

Fuck all the way off.

Yeah.

Don't listen.

Don't get joy.

No, you don't.

You don't deserve any joy.

Fuck all the way off.

You do not, and moreover specifically you do not deserve our queer joy.

Go home and sit in an empty box, you fucking loser.

Anyway, no, I mean the, the, the weather ice is really fucking scaring me.

There's going to be an ice storm.

I don't know how bad it's going to be, but Ted Cruz has of course fled the state because he's a fucking coward.

I can't believe we re elected him.

I mean, I didn't, but we collectively I just, it's going to be bad.

Merrily, merrily.

Do you have the supplies that you need to make it through the next few days?

Do you feel like you at least have that going for you?

I do, we have plenty of food.

We we will be able to like have water and stuff should we like lose water and things.

But I just, I'm a little concerned about like losing power, obviously because during snow vid in 2021, I lived at a different location.

I was on the same like power grid as a hospital.

So I never lost power, but I moved and now I no longer have that assurance.

And I'm just a little scared.

And by a little, I mean, I'm, I'm very, I'm a little, I, I was talking to somebody and I was like, yeah, you know, it's, it's, it's going to be a big deal, but it's hopefully not going to be that bad.

And I got the new news that Ted Cruz has gone.

I was like, Oh no, it's going to be so bad.

It's like the Jim Cantore arriving to your state, but of.

Evil.

Yes, exactly.

Yes, yes.

Of evil.

Marily.

I wish that I could.

I wish that I could send, I was going to say Nick Frost.

That is a totally different person.

What is Mr.

Frost?

What is the name?

What do we?

What do we?

What is Jack Frost?

'S name Jack Frost, Jesus Christ.

We've been out of this country for too long, David.

I know, right?

Just seeped out of my head.

I lost all my ragged mass.

It just came out.

I wish that I could I could banish Jack Frost so that he was not he was not laboring your precious, precious power grid.

Yeah.

Under the threat of winter weather.

It's so it's our crit just sucks so bad and there's no reason for it.

There's no reason, but it just is like this.

Everything in Texas is simply like this, and I simply have to survive.

Got it.

Can't, can't depend on that big federal government.

No, no, no.

What a shame.

What a shame.

Merrily.

I'm glad that you've got some assurances.

You've got that fire department sort of nearby.

Yes, there is a fire department directly across the road, which is why sometimes you hear.

I do.

Listeners have as well.

I do my best to get it out.

But if it's going by while Merrily's talking, you've heard the fire truck.

That's just how it.

Is inconvenient.

Fires have been getting in the way of our recording time.

How dare they?

How?

Dare they?

Truly, truly.

How how do they go and save lives?

I Whatever.

The nerve.

Yeah, the nerve.

What about you, Tyler?

How are you feeling?

I am also scared for the same reason.

I looked at a map of the United States and it is.

It's everywhere.

It's.

Yeah, it's like somehow not Colorado, but everything east of Colorado is like this scary blue in various gradients and you're both in some of those.

I probably should have looked a little more Clearly I was most looking for my other podcast recording since I was a little worried about some people who are in the darkest blue over the weekend.

Yeah.

Tyler, what portents do you see coming for winter weather in Ohio?

It's definitely going to be snowy.

There might be ice.

I've been warned about exploding trees.

Yeah, I heard about that.

That's insane.

And I've been looking askance at my tree outside my apartment often today.

Like, like it's an Ant and you're like, Oh my God, it's going to come to life.

It's going to come to life.

It's like the tree from Poltergeist, which we'll eventually cover.

Oh, I've seen Poltergeist and I know that tree and that treat kind of does explode in that movie.

It does, yeah.

Not from, not from cold weather, though.

No, this might explode from cold weather, but I'm, you know, really hoping it doesn't.

Thankfully, we are.

We're more prepared for a Snowmageddon, unlike poor Maryland.

In Texas, we kind of deal with this more often, even though Columbus doesn't normally have any like really major winter weather to like make things bad.

But, you know, Marshall's off this weekend.

So we're going to just kind of like huddle up and, and just wait for this to Passover.

I'm just trying to like find the right place somewhere between hurricane prep and not sweating.

It is where I'm trying to find myself right now.

And I keep on wanting to learn more towards hurricane prep, but hurricane prep is a lot worse.

Oh yeah, it's a little it's a little hard to hear the term exploding tree for the first time of your life.

Yeah, and and not not want to like grab some 2 by fours and be like, what?

What's going on here?

This dead tree will protect me from the attacking tree.

It oddly it is true.

Oddly it is true because the dead tree can't hold water like the living tree can.

And that is that is the problem.

Yes.

That is, that is one of the things that I was very disappointed didn't make it into that Jake Gyllenhaal disaster movie.

Day of tomorrow, the day after tomorrow.

The day after tomorrow.

Thank you.

Yeah.

We watch a lot of disaster movies in the household, and by which I mean they are disasters to watch fucking Jake Gyllenhaal's romantic entanglements.

In this film, the world is ending, get laid later.

But yeah, there was no exploding trees.

And it's about this, like, sudden onset of cold weather.

And that's the problem is it gets cold so fast that the water sort of freezes too quickly, and then the tree splits in weird ways and things fly out.

Yeah, and you're familiar with that, of course, with your harsh Michigan childhood.

Yes, it happened on the farm to a couple of our I would have described them as dead trees because that's how they looked.

They looked like the poltergeist tree but they were apparently still alive.

Like the portal song.

And then they blew up when it got really cold.

1 winter and it was the first time I'd ever seen it.

And truly not, I didn't see it happen, I only saw the the residue.

It's the only time I've ever been near an exploding tree and I so that is the only time I've ever experienced it.

Was it scary looking?

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Because, like, shards of bark were all over the place.

And if this tree had been near anything that was fragile, it would have been broken.

Oh my God.

Yeah, sorry, that probably didn't help it.

It is also kind of rare.

I think the warning is very important, but it doesn't happen a ton.

Yep, David, how are you feeling today?

Prepared or scared?

Listen, I am also feeling scared so I hate to do this for all three of us, but I told Marilyn Tyler before we logged in.

I've been having a weird health week, plural.

I have edited last week's episode and boy, I've got some Marge Simpson going on that one.

So I was recovering from some sort of deep voiced sexy thing, but I got some other treatments this week and that involves some injections and those had a different effect on my body.

Cuz like we don't how does science work?

We're not quite sure we're going to figure it out.

And so I wasn't able to walk for a couple days.

So I had to sort of be escorted to the restroom and around the house like a queen, like the queen that I am.

But I am now happily a little bit more mobile.

I am sitting in a very like specific way.

If the podcast goes over 2 hours today, I'm worried that I will start to lean over and not be able to catch myself.

So the the timer's on for the podcast today.

Don't worry David, I don't think this is going to be one of our longer episodes.

No, probably not as Suspiria.

Probably.

Maybe not as much symbolism here as 2018 Suspiria.

I don't know what could possibly mean by that.

Of of the things we've covered, this is probably the most What you see is what you get film that we've covered for the podcast in quite some time.

Maybe ever.

Maybe ever.

It's a very straightforward film.

Yeah, well, and to why even put it off any longer?

Today we are talking about the classic Canadian film My Bloody Valentine from 1981.

It was directed by George Mihalka with a story by John Beard, based on a concept by Stephen Miller.

Not that one, The good one.

This year it is so celebrating it's 45th anniversary.

Wow.

Well happy birthday My Bloody Valentine.

This movie is about the small mining town Valentine's Bluff and its first Valentine's annual dance in 20 years when tragedy strikes again.

They stopped having a dance after a mining accident on Valentine's Day killed 4 people, and then one year later the sole survivor, Harry Warden, got violent revenge on the men responsible for the tragedy.

Now, with the killer miner on the loose, it seems like Harry has returned for revenge.

Or has he?

Dun Dun Dun.

My Bloody Valentine had a hard time getting into theaters with sensors removing 9 full minutes of gore effects.

When it did finally reach audiences, it got mixed reviews and while making a profit, was considered a box office disappointment.

Over the years though, it became a beloved cult classic, inspiring a remake in 2009.

My Bloody Valentine 3-DA fan sequel in 2021 on Indiegogo.

Valentine Bluff's my a My Bloody Valentine fan film and there is a reboot currently in production at Blumhouse.

Oh cool.

What's everyone's experience with My Bloody Valentine 1981?

Genuinely, I'd never even heard of this before we put it on the schedule.

I I famously haven't been that into horror, would not have gone out and sought this.

And I don't think about the minor as like one of the classic slashers that are out there in the world, which is kind of a shame because he's awesome.

Yeah, like, I think this was a more fun movie than I expected.

It's not gonna, like, win awards or anything, but I think it was still like a fun time.

It's kind of like the platonic ideal of a slasher movie, just being like, there's a guy and he's chasing after some misbehaving young people and he's killing them in violent ways.

That's it.

That's what you get.

I had watched the remake before the week first, you know, it came out in 2009.

I watched it I think in 2009 or 10.

It's extremely bad actually it is not a good movie.

So when I years later did watch this version, I was really pleasantly surprised by how good it is because I do think this is a legit good slasher and I had a much better time with this.

Have either of you guys sought out the the extra like the uncensored version of this movie?

I kind of feel like I had, I must have watched that because I saw kills that I feel like would have been censored.

Like I saw gore effects that felt like if they were going to cut things out, that those would have been cut out.

I have a quick easy way to tell if you did or didn't in the hot dog kill.

Did you see any hot dogs in the water or was it just him putting his head in the in there?

I saw hot dogs.

In the water and I saw his like makeup face.

Then yes, you did see the uncensored uncensored version.

Yeah, cool.

I saw both.

I mean, there was a moment that was just his face and it was, you could see like the makeup effect, but like at one point in time there's like eyeballs gouged out.

Yeah, the eyeball is another easy way to tell.

I I think I watched I I just have to assume because of some of them like more intense gore effects that if if they cut 9 minutes out, I think I saw those 9 minutes.

You sure did.

I made sure to watch the theatrical edition because I thought for sure that that's what you guys were going to watch.

Very disappointed that I couldn't.

I I didn't let myself have the treat of the really good effects then.

I really liked the effects and you could still cut 9 minutes out of this film, so find a different 9 minutes I would say yeah.

Truly, there's perhaps too much going on in this movie, but I watched my version on Canopy which is provided by my local library.

So shout out to your local library.

Watch movies by getting the library card.

Yes, and I watched it on the Internet Archive.

I love that for you guys, I.

Just I got the Internet library.

Yes, exactly.

The Shout Factory put out a 25th anniversary like edition that I got at Half Price Books a couple years ago.

Nice.

Oh God I miss half price books.

Same.

It's it's a good I love that store.

I'm.

Just so sad all my books are there.

When I left Texas, like I went all, I went to a Half Price Books and I just left them all there.

It's like goodbye, goodbye books.

Did you get any money or is this just an act of charity?

A lot of them were an active charity.

They're like, we don't care about your social workbooks.

These are going to resell.

And I was like, someone will buy them.

Yeah, yeah, I know exactly what you mean.

Well, goodbye to David's books and hello to our themes.

So we are down to 2 themes today, so let's go ahead and dive into our first one for My Bloody Valentine from 1981.

So our first theme is horror never settles for a simple Tuesday.

People like holidays, so it makes sense they would be a popular setting for horror movies.

There's something about them, maybe the stress of a group of people trying to spend time together they usually wouldn't, or the expectations of the holiday itself.

But when tensions rise, it's very satisfying when the blood starts to spill all over the gathered cast.

This is so fascinating to me.

I think I've talked about this on pod before but one of the podcasts that I listened to is called Screen Drafts.

They draft like 7 movies with a theme and one time they did holiday horror, not Halloween, not Christmas and I had to go back and look.

My Bloody Valentine did make the list but I don't remember them.

Sometimes when they when they talk about like what films they're picking, I add them to my watch list on letterbox.

And I didn't add my Bloody Valentine based on their conversation.

So it, it feels like it must have been lower in or conversation or whatever and just didn't grip, just didn't grip me the way that other things did.

This is famously where they're also like, Oh yeah, well, Jaws is a holiday movie because it's about the 4th of July.

And I felt so stupid.

And I was like, well, duh.

I would have picked that too.

I'm not, you know, cuz when I went in to listen to that, I was like, what horror happens on a on, on like Thanksgiving?

There needs to be more pick other holidays.

Arbor Day exploding trees.

You know, Arbor Day could be the happening.

Should be.

The happening don't the one with.

No, Yeah, that.

Tyler, it's such a good movie that is wrapped with so much bad movie.

Yeah, the core of that movie is so good because they are.

They're like killer trees.

Or are they?

Who knows?

But it's so bad.

It's so bad.

Mark Wahlberg.

Oh, get out of here.

I know, terribly terrible movie, terrible choice.

But we're not talking about that movie.

Instead, we're talking about this movie that is just OK.

This is yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.

But yeah, I think it's kind of fun to do Valentine's Day.

Like, I mean, it's a little bit of like there's only so many holidays in the year that they're going to focus on.

Valentine's Day is a fun one.

I thought it was kind of interesting that this was not like really based off of like unrequited love or a broken heart or anything like that.

It was more like the town is hanging out for a Valentine's Day party and people wanted to party too much so they didn't do their jobs.

I do like the writers room being like, OK, my bloody Valentine let's it's, it's on Valentine's Day and we're going to set it in Valentine Peak or whatever.

Valentine Bluffs.

Valentine Bluffs.

And I was like, no, this, this is too much.

It's too much Valentine.

Yeah, I definitely feel like they had the title My Bloody Valentine and worked backwards from there, however.

Totally.

That's fine, That's fine.

You can do.

You can do that for some things, but it there was maybe just a different town name would have because This is why I think this is a hard a hard movie to sequel because it's just it's too much and it it's hard for this to break out.

Like the miner can't go to Manhattan.

He must be in in Valentine Bluff or he could go down to Valentine Valley or the Valentine nursing home.

But there's there's just not enough more to do here.

And and that made it kind of unique in like singular and that was kind of cool.

But I kind of, I like what I like what you're both talking about.

There was not like it.

It otherwise wasn't really about Valentine's Day, just it was sort of in name only.

I think it's really Valentine's Day.

But it does.

It does not care about the tropes of Valentine's and the heart.

Yeah, and stuff.

I mean, we do have like bloody hearts and that's fun, and then the upside down hearts.

And then there's decorations, but that's really about it.

It's kind of like the whole, the whole argument about like, is it a Christmas movie or is it a movie that takes place on Christmas, right?

This definitely is like a horror movie that takes place on Valentine's Day, not a Valentine's Day horror movie.

Right, right, right.

Right, I hear me out here I have like an even grander big brain theory for.

Me OK.

I think this is part of a series of movies that are about labour relations.

Yes, OK, OK, OK.

Because it is the labourer that suffered when the manager, the bourgeoisie went off to go have fun and left the poor miners to suffer and die.

And then one of them go mad from cannibalism, you know.

And I think we we could add like Norma Rae to this list of movies.

Silkwood, that's another one.

I think these are all part of the same conversation.

I, I thought you were going to make a pitch that this was like A Christmas Carol because like, this is Bob Cratchit down in the mines going crazy and Scrooge was like, I'm going to go to Mr.

Fezimic's party or whatever.

Alas, the the young people are too annoying and don't really fit in with the.

The whole that is true, that is.

True, the whole framework.

Yeah, my boys there are spoiler alert for for this whole podcast recording.

There are a lot of boys in this film and we got we got a team Edward, we got a team Jacob and and then the rest of them are just just, they're just men everywhere all the time on the screen.

Except there's one person that David and I.

There's one person we probably should have warned merrily before we started recording.

This will be a 90 minute recorded Love Love letter.

No, don't.

Don't worry.

The first time I put this movie on after we started, like we knew that it was it was coming and I was like, okay, I'm going to watch this.

I think it was the first time in like 3 or 4 years that I've seen this movie.

The certain man pops up on the screen.

It was like, Oh my God, David and Tyler are going to have such a crush.

And so I I knew the whole time.

Don't worry.

Yeah, okay, good valedictorian from the Arbor Gas School.

Oh agreed agreed And I it took me a while to watch this movie because I kept going back and screenshotting pictures of this man.

I love you guys so very dearly, I need you to know that.

I need you to know that when I was watching the movie yesterday, I messaged David.

It just said like I'm in love with this man.

You did need to do that.

A That's incredible.

B Very hurt you didn't do it in the channel that I'm there also, so I could not spread like sharing your joy.

I thought about it but I didn't wanted to have just like a spam of thirst just in case.

I did not look up Keith Knight by the way, but this is the actor who plays him.

Famously also was the voice of the White Rabbit in the Care Bears adventure film.

Oh, alright then, OK.

OK then.

All right then.

Well, our next theme is small.

It's all 80s.

We'll we'll say that it's all part of it, like an 80s thing.

Our second theme is small town slashers.

So Valentine Bluffs is a very small rural community that depends on the mind for stability and employment.

It's not the type of place the residents could picture a masked maniac killing in, which is why it makes for the perfect location to set a horror movie.

Yeah, I, we talked about this briefly.

Like This is set in earliest filmed in Nova Scotia and is crude and presumably full of Nova Scotians and other Canadians in the cast with all very, you know, relatively mild to very strong Nova Scotian accents, which are very unique and I don't think I've really ever heard on film before.

Yeah, did.

But the film wasn't actually set there, right?

This was just sort of a nondescript mining town.

I think it was like a nondescript mining town, but I think Nova Scotia is like a heavily mined or was heavily mining and resource based economy.

Because there was Kate Beaton who did the Harka Vagrant comics.

I don't know if folks remember those, but she wrote a comic about her time working in oil sands in Nova Scotia.

That's called Ducks.

That was really something I always wanted to read, but I'm getting off track here.

Yeah.

This is set in, like, presumably Nova Scotia or some nondescript rural area of Canada.

And I thought that was actually like really unique.

You know, I think it felt different than something that's set like in Appalachia, which I think would be like the closest, like analogy to it.

But it was like Appalachia without the Appalachianess of that identity.

And I thought that made it kind of like a unique setting just because, well, we don't really have many horror film set in mining rural parts of Canada.

Yeah, I just, you know, I feel like even with the the class divide, which I do think is like very real thing that you you touched there, like the whole film is very, very working class in a way that I don't think you see a lot like even the other movies that one could have in like this holiday early 80s vibe situation of like Black Christmas and Halloween.

Those are definitely like higher class than here.

This is a working class community who has everybody has a job in the mine, which is very blue collar, you know what I mean?

And I think that that is one of the things that make this movie so different.

Even then, the remake which was very 2009 and separated very far from that blue collar aesthetic.

Yeah, yeah.

It's funny, when they were walking at one point in time, Sarah is walking around town and I was like, Oh my God, is she on the island from Midnight Mass?

Like it just, that's just what it felt like.

It felt.

It felt very, I just felt rural, rural and like isolated.

Yes.

And I, I think that's important.

That's important for the story and, and that that was true in Midnight Mass.

It's true here in My Bloody Valentine.

Yeah, because, you know, the Midnight Mass was also a small working town because they were all Fisher fishing instead of mining.

But definitely the same sort of vibe and feeling.

Yeah, for sure.

Oh my gosh, we're done with themes.

That's it.

It's not a deep movie.

I tried really hard but I couldn't think of those.

As not a deep movie at all, it's.

Not a deep movie, but we do have to ask some questions about the movie regardless of its depth.

Whether we're in the kiddie pool or we're diving in an Olympic swimming pool, we must ask one of two questions that we ask of every media that we cover for this podcast.

The first of which is, is it horror?

Were you scared watching this film?

Does it belong in a conversation about horror media?

Yeah, there were a couple jump scares that got me.

I would not say I was very afraid of this movie.

No, the miner is a very methodically He's going to come and get you, but he's not, you know, he's not supernatural.

Yeah, he's very much just a guy.

A guy with a pickaxe and an axe to grind, one could say.

But.

Yeah, here's what I'll say about it.

Like this had all the horror tropes, like there were mutilation, there was gore.

There was a a man who looked directly into the camera and said you kids will be sorry.

Like I was like Friday the 13th.

Yes, bring it on.

Yeah, here we are.

I no, I I definitely feel like this is horror.

I mean, I'll reiterate one of the points I made earlier.

I'm surprised that the miner isn't more of a of a staple in the world.

I, I, I think the, I think, I think the costume for the minor is very good.

I think it's an effective horror costume because it hides who he is.

It's sort of, it's Ghostface esque in that anyone could be the minor.

It's got sort of, we do minor POV only very, very limited, which is kind of a bummer because when it happened, it was awesome.

Yeah.

But then we were doing like Darth Vader sounds because he's like breathing through an apparatus, which was that?

That fucking rocked.

It was giving me like moaner energy.

It was kind of cool.

You know the director did specifically say the one movie he took inspiration from was Black Christmas with the Moaner.

So basically dense.

Yeah, Good.

Wow.

Oh, my God, it's happening.

I'm.

I'm becoming a horror person now.

We got him.

I see.

I see the sinewy tissue between all of these things as it is tumbling dry right in front of my eyes.

Yeah, let's.

Just say My Bloody Valentine is kind of directly on the nose, especially if you're watching the uncensored version like Chibi.

Goran Yeah, yeah, yeah.

A pickaxe to the chest happens a couple times and it's a pretty awesome way to go.

And I think good job, good job film, good job film.

Love is in the air.

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But yadda yadda yadda, horror this, horror that.

To be on Fear Coded, you have to be more than just scary.

You have to be queer.

So let's look at this movie through the lens of queer theory.

Do we?

Can we find any queerness here?

I mean, I found it in like the second scene, which was like all these men in a fucking shower together, but that was over.

Yeah, it's a very straight movie.

It's very straight.

Yeah, unfortunately so.

Yeah, I think, I think the whole problem with this being sort of like a Twilight story of being like, who will she pick?

It's got to be me.

No, it's got to be me.

I wish that wasn't in this because it it always sort of grinds the the actual narrative to a halt because like there's a killer on the loose.

Who cares who she loves.

I do think that it's important for the the reveal at the end that it was one of these suitors, 2 Princess stand before me, and one of them is like an axe killer, a pick axe killer.

What a strange thing to say, what a strange combination of words.

But it's just, it's very straight.

Everyone's in a heterosexual pairing.

Or wants to be.

Or wants to be, I don't know it.

Yeah, there's there's not, there's not even a lot that I can pull from.

And, and I would say this because the, the minor character, even though I really like the design, there's, there's no, not a lot of character there.

So there's not a lot to it.

Like interpret even from like, is there some queer coding in this villain?

There's, there's like, there's just nothing to interpret because it is just sort of what you see is what you get, which is fine.

Yeah, I mean, it's not even like he's going after couples.

He's just killing anybody that he can find.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

There just not seem to be a lot of rhyme or reason that we could even use as fodder for being like, well, he's disrupting heteronormativity because he's disrupting Valentine's Day.

No, it seems like vengeance, and vengeance is, I don't know, pretty.

That's pretty straight, I guess.

Mm hmm.

Mm hmm.

Are we, are we vengeful as queer people?

Is that something that we do?

Petty revenge?

Yeah.

Listen.

I support queer wrongs.

I think we could have more revenge narratives, frankly.

Yeah, I think it's so.

I think we're allowed some revenge as a treat.

It's so busy to hold a grudge, I can't even keep it.

There's too many people have wronged me.

It is really exhausting, but yeah, you know.

Which is why it's so satisfying when we see somebody else do it, I guess.

Yeah, maybe that's what it is.

That's what it is, yeah.

I would like to talk about Sarah for this part.

I don't think she's a queer character, but Sarah is the object of affection between the two suitors.

She is like this blonde girl that's running around and like for a while there she's just kind of like a prop that she is the object of affection and that's really all she is.

There's not much character for her otherwise.

But later on when the the, yeah, it's it's getting down to the wire and the minor is out to get them and people have died and Sarah is down in this vine.

She does do a little bit of like early badass lady sort of vibes where she's like, OK, we got to get it together.

We got to go.

We got to get the hell out of here.

She's like grabbing tools and she's fighting back against the minor when one of the other suitors is fighting the minor.

And I think that's nice.

I think it's like not queer, but it's certainly gender Y like it's certainly a woman stepping up.

And at this point, I don't think we're seeing like that many bad ass like final girls.

Like, you know, we had, you know, we had Laurie Stroud in Halloween a few years earlier and she was more of like the screamy final girl type, I guess where where she's like more trying to get by on her wits.

Ripley is in 1979 with Alien and that changes like so much like that is so that is such like a huge shadow that will be cast and Aliens with Ripley, I think really helps cement that into stone.

But then of course, we have like Sarah Connor, that's going to come later.

And Sarah, I think is it's nice to see her sort of achieve similar goals in this movie.

Considering it's such a small movie, it's not really talked about very often.

I think it's nice to have had that.

But I think that's the only thing going for this movie that kind of makes it like stand out a little bit more.

Everything else feels like very cookie cutter, which includes how straight everything is.

Male dominated.

I was going to say there, there's this moment when Sarah is walking with her best friend.

And sorry, the women were just as interchangeable as the men were.

If, if you, if you weren't Sarah, I'd I sort of everybody sort of mixed up for me.

I did the notes this week.

I it was very difficult for me to get names for everybody.

I got most of the important people and that was that.

That was hard.

There's a lot of white people, just a lot of white people.

Her name is Patty.

Patty, thank you.

OK, so Patty though Patty does have a moment of having some like really elevated sense of control of her sexuality.

She's going to wear a dress with a cut down to here and a slip up to here.

And I did really love that sequence.

And I, I was prepared to really like Patty, but then Patty sort of vanished immediately after being like kind of fun, being sort of the, the kind of character that we would normally on this podcast be like, Oh my God, I love her.

Like we did with Malign and the sister from last week.

But she was like gone immediately after this like cute bit of dialogue.

And then I was like, well, I can't do that anymore Cuz we gotta spend time with the TJ Axel show of being like, we're so into this woman that we both like, cuz she's blonde.

I don't know.

Yeah.

So like I feel Tyler said something really smart when he talked about how she only really got a personality when they went into the mines.

And I feel that kind of about everyone.

I think Hollis, TJ and Axel maybe you could say have a little bit of a personality.

But as soon as like we hit that third act, we finally have a fine, like an actual distinguishing characteristic about everybody.

And I think that if they had really, I know that this movie, this is I didn't mention it on top, but like this had a really insane like production schedule.

It had to be in theaters less than a year after.

Like they decided to make the movie.

So they didn't they did not have time.

I really feel like it could have used an extra pass through on the script and we would have gotten more of from everybody.

Yeah, but they wanted releases on Valentine's Day.

That makes sense.

Like, yeah, I get it.

I get it.

I get it.

Well then, are we ready to talk about the plot beat by beat of the 1981 film My Bloody Valentine?

Let's do it.

Let's do It.

The movie opens with two people in full mining gear going into an unused area in the mine.

One strips and reveals she's a sexy blonde, and the other refuses to take off their mining helmet.

Undeterred, the lady starts to make a move, only for the minor to see a heart-shaped tattoo on her breast.

He impales her through the tattooed heart on his pickaxe and we go into the title card, My Bloody Valentine.

This is so like drive in movie coded Oh.

My God.

Oh my God.

Science fiction double feature.

You are not fucking kidding Tyler.

This is Drive in movie coded.

Absolutely.

I just this opening sequence has such a really strange quality to me.

It, it almost felt dreamlike.

It was like I was watching Carrie again.

And I don't know what it is.

Maybe like the the the tinkling sound or maybe the fact that this this hot chick was like, yeah, it still does it for me that you have the full mining gear and aren't taking off your clothes.

Let me sensually rub the air tube and like, I don't know what it was, but it's it was, it was, there was certainly a vibe.

I don't know what the vibe was but there was 1.

I was baffled by this.

Was so like, was this a dream?

No.

I think it was a dream, but it was certainly weird energy.

Yeah, it was a dream like vibe, but I think it must have been real because like I feel like that her heart was the one that was in the chocolate box that we see next.

So like, clearly this was a real human woman.

I don't know why anybody in town isn't missing her, but I do think that she's a little bit older than our main cast of characters.

Like, I think Axel is supposed to be 25, and so I kind of place everybody else around that age.

So she's a little bit older than them, but still, somebody's got to be missing this girl.

Nope, no mention of her the rest of the film.

Yeah, it reminded me of like a mediocre version of the beginning of Jaws.

Oh my God, you're so smart.

Yeah, yeah.

And like they miss that girl.

Yes, exactly.

You're both quoting excellent movies that both start with these sort of dreamlike things, except then they're like critically important to the plot and no one's like, hey, I'm missing a set of mining gear or my set of mining gear smells like perfume.

Did I go with this?

I there's like, there's no connective tissue.

Besides, what I I might argue is is Marilee's head cannon that the the heart from this girl is the heart they see later.

They specifically say this is the heart of a 30 year old woman.

I don't.

Where else is the 30 year old woman going to come from?

I don't know because the the town only has two people, old people and teenagers.

Like, I don't know what to tell you, Marilee.

This is a weird town.

All the workers are teens and then you got grumpy old men who are the cops and Sayers of doom.

That's that's the entire population of the city.

She was the 130 year old in the whole village.

130 year old.

Yeah, so people should miss her for, is what we're saying.

You know what, I'm kind of thinking about it now merrily.

And like, I think that dream like quality of it, part of this felt a little bit like like a old porn in that beginning.

Yeah.

Like the vibes kind of feel like, oh, this is like the start of like an old like seventies 80s like porno.

Yeah.

Like she's like doing weird motions with the mask and it's shot in that weird like dream dreamlike way that like.

I, I think from what I've like seen clips of on TV in the past is meant to be kind of like old 70s style porn, like like a Deep Throat sort of vibe.

I never watched any porn from that era, but I'm going to assume like that was kind of like what they had in mind.

And then it was like, surprise, it's a horror movie.

Right, right, right, right.

And her her scream is great.

I love the scream in the title.

I thought that was fantastic.

It was well done, no complaints there.

I just, I'm willing to believe that it was just for vibes.

I'm willing to believe that the entire cold open was just for vibes.

I think it was like, I think it I think it happened because I agree with Verily, because that's the plot.

But it the way it is shot is just so, so strange.

But I feel like we also have to remember we got to take things at face value with this movie.

That's true.

That's.

True, this is not a movie that is very interested in getting into like the Freudian aspects of the slasher.

It's just like.

Well, good, there's a.

There's a killer miner on the loose on Valentine's Day Day.

He hate, he hate, he hates Valentine's Day all he hates Valentine's Day.

Yeah, he sees.

The cars he hates out.

Not only does he hate Valentine's Day, he also hates the days leading up to Valentine's Day, which that's true.

We will begin my scene with so on Thursday, February 12th.

You know, before Valentine's Day, a train car thank.

You, Tyler.

Thank you, Tyler for that.

Thank you Tyler for that one.

It's just making it clear, just making it clear for everyone.

So on Thursday, February 12th, a train car full of minors head off shift telling their supervisor that they shouldn't need gas vests anymore, but there's still methane down there.

Sounds like you still need your gas to my guy.

Your gas vests, my guy.

Agreed, I was like what the fuck is happening here?

But whatever, fine, go down into your mind, get your coal or whatever the fuck is down there.

Well, they're going to get there.

Nevermind.

In a group shower, the guys joke around talking about their plans for Valentine's Day on Saturday, until one of them mentions that Axel is now dating Sarah, who TJ dated until he tried to move out of town.

But TJ insists he doesn't mind.

He also looks like Billy Joel Armstrong, the lead senior of Green Day.

Oh my God, he so does.

This man was I I listen.

Hollis.

Hollis for life.

Hollis tattoo in my chest but TJ not far behind Hollis.

Yeah, I agree.

He was, he was Moody.

He was despondent.

I could fix him.

I could fix TJ.

He looks a little bit like like a like a shonen main character from like a 70s manga and speed racer sort.

Of vibes.

So TJ.

His character is played by Jensen Ackles in the remake and honestly, it is not a bad likeness.

No, I agree.

He's got some Jensen for him, yeah.

Yeah, so these miners all head to the union hall after their shift, and many find their girlfriends already there, setting up for the big Valentine's Day dance.

The Mayor, Chief Newbie and Mabel, head of the decorating committee, all arrived to check in on everyone, while the Mayor discovers that an anonymous box of chocolates was left for him.

Delighted, he takes it with him as he and Chief Newbie head to their next stop.

But he opens the box and discovers a human heart inside, along with a warning poem.

Chief Newby turns the car around and the mayor exclaims it can't be happening again.

OK, OK, OK, OK, OK the vibes.

So this was The thing is I was having trouble finding where to set my dial on on where we were at the end of this.

I I'm totally in camp Ville and I was happy and I was there for the rest of the movie and it was great.

But at at first I was kind of like, what are we what, what is happening here?

Are we sort of doing like these guys are all in danger?

Is one of them the killer?

Does it matter who these people are dating?

There's sort of a fake scare when they show up to the union hall.

There's a lot of this end media race like this, this kid who does the fake scare, the shocking to see the word mayor in the scene description merrily because I was like, all the old dudes are cops.

It's fine.

Just deal with it, David.

Great.

So the mayor is like, how dare you make fun of this?

And there's like some good aside with Mabel.

Like maybe there's a good reason there hasn't been a dance in 20 years.

That all is delicious, but until we get into the car and there's a fucking human heart in this box of chocolates, I could have taken all of that seriously and this could have been a little bit more.

Friday the 13th, like this is actually conflict.

Once we unbox the chocolate box and there's a heart in it, I was like, no, we're this is great.

We're in Campbell because they both react to the heart, but I wouldn't describe their reaction as the reaction that I would have if I opened a box of chocolates and there was a human heart in it.

Their reaction is muted somewhat.

They're kind of like a human heart.

Fuck, we got this shit to deal with again.

It's the again that really kills me.

I the first time I again, I had seen the the original movie that my original movie, excuse me, I saw was the the remake.

And so like, I knew that there was some sort of killer minor or whatever, but like the way that they kept going about it is like a really delightful unwrapping of a surprise.

And then the human heart.

Not again.

Let's not talk about the business 20 years ago.

They're just so tantalizing, like with the mystery.

I really enjoyed that, frankly.

And, and I'm going to be honest, he might not be the mayor.

I just kind of assumed that he was because he's not in charge of the police.

I He's either the mayor or the owner of the mine.

One of those two.

I don't know you got.

You got old dudes, young dudes and and a dude who warns of doom.

Those are your men.

That's all you got.

Yep, the two dudes that are in love with Sarah.

I think we've we've already touched on this, so I won't go too much into it, but it's such a chore.

This whole plot line is such a chore.

It feels like a lazy way to try to build out characterization and there's not much there to begin with.

So it's just kind of like trying to put a hat on air.

There's just nothing really there.

There's.

Nothing there.

Yeah, for real.

There's nothing there.

I just the characters themselves, You're all right.

They're generic.

Typical for the time period in the genre.

I do think that the chemistry between the characters is actually very good and, and I do want to give them credit for that because I think it's a good cast.

They just had nothing to work with.

Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, no, the the we're all eating dinner on this drama is working for me.

Like the the sort of the sort of them all being together works.

I buy it.

It's it's when they have like individual motivations that don't ever seem to be built out that don't work for me.

Just have them be like they're all going to die individually.

Like this seems to be a little bit more like Saw and a little bit less like I have to give all these people individual things.

Make the kills inventive, Show me that and don't.

I don't need to know their back story.

One of them is like a trickster and he's like always telling jokes and stuff.

I don't care.

I don't know which one he is.

I get them confused.

I know who TJ is, I know who I know who Axel is, and I know who Hollis is.

That's all I need.

His name is Howard.

Yeah, he's going to die.

So.

It's true he is going to die and it's honestly not even one of the better deaths.

Sorry.

No, his is his is pretty poor I I hate to say.

Yeah, apparently the actor was really lovely to be around again.

I had the Shot Factory DVD.

There was a lot of interviews with the cast on it.

He apparently died tragically of, of brain cancer.

And so they asked, Yeah.

And so they asked everybody that they were interviewing if they had any memories of him.

And every person said the absolute loveliest things about about him, apparently, like the the jokester nature of his character was Larry in line with his own personality.

So he was funny.

He made everybody happy to be around him on the cast.

And he was also just very generous and and giving.

And that's all really nice to hear.

Absolutely nothing for the character though.

No, no, the character was completely forgettable.

Yeah, so at the bar, an old miner tells the legend of what happened 20 years ago.

On the night of the Valentine's dance, 2 supervisors snuck away early to join the rest of the town at the dance and left five men down below in the tunnels.

They didn't check the methane levels before they went, and there was an explosion, burying all five men alive.

After six weeks of searching, they found the men or what was left of them.

Harry Wharton was driven insane by what happened to him, and a year later he escaped the mental institution to get revenge on those two supervisors, killing them and putting their hearts in chocolate boxes.

He left a warning to never have another Valentine's dance ever again, with the old minor swearing that Harry comes back every year looking for someone to kill.

Nobody believes him.

This old man.

This old man, he's incredible.

I love him.

I love his little character.

I think I, I think I said this a week covered Friday the 13th.

I love when someone's like, well, we got some lore.

I got to dump it out at you.

I used to have my doctorate next position.

But now I work in a bar and I'm just going to give you everything you need to know.

And then I'm going to look directly at the camera and say Boo.

And then, like, the teens will not believe you.

Yeah.

Those troublesome teens they never do are.

Are you like, I know that you keep calling them teens.

I fully thought they were all like 2226.

Oh yeah.

I mean they are, but for all intents and purposes they're also just horny 16 year olds.

Like I just like.

That's they just real, yeah.

Yeah, they had some banned candy, but I do believe, I believe you're right, Marilyn.

I think they are of the correct age to be working in the mines.

I think that they are all adults and it sounds like TJ, like I, I think tried to go to Hollywood talking about head cannon.

They're just like you went to the West and it didn't work out.

Now you're back and you have to go to the mines.

On the Shout Factory, the DVD, that was a question that they asked, like, what do you think TJ went to West to do?

Like, what do you think that he failed so badly at?

And like, the actor who played TJ was like, I think he went to college and like didn't even last this semester.

Oh, oh, other people were like, I guess he went to like try out show business or like there were a bunch of different answers.

That's so real though.

Like the the thing about this setting that I really enjoy about it is that it definitely feels like a dead end small town, like people don't live here.

This is where you grow up and that's that's all there is to it.

And like even going to the mine, it's not like every other story I've ever seen involving mine workers where they're just like, I have to work in the mind.

It's a rough job, but I gotta do it.

It's what my dad always did, and my granddad before him.

And in this movie, it's just like, yeah, we go to the Mime 95.

This is just our job.

We don't mind down there, it's fine.

There's methane down there, it's fine.

That's just what you do.

And then you come back up and you party.

Yeah, no, because I have limited brain space.

I just said who went to the West and can I just use their storyline?

And so I said TJ is Maureen Prescott, Maureen Prescott is TJ.

And I just I filled in the blanks.

I was like, there you go.

I love that, makes sense to me.

Yes, poor TJ getting assaulted at a Hollywood party like that.

Whoa.

Wow, wow.

Sorry.

It's 19811981.

That is what happened to Marie Prescott.

It's not inaccurate.

No.

Anyway, I think Harry Worden definitely went to the Renfield school of looking up at someone and screaming after a really mind altering event because all I could think during that one shot the only time we see Harry Worden on screen was like oh shit it's like Renfield all over again.

I was genuinely expecting us to have some cannibalism like lore dumped out here as well.

I thought this was going to be a Wendigo thing.

I, I, I was like, Oh, no, we're in Until dawn again.

And there's not, not a, not an area sight of that which is.

I mean, there's a little bit of a hitch of it later, but they didn't touch it.

The DNA of this movie is in Until Dawn though.

Yeah, yes, yes.

It makes me wanna replay Until Dawn because all the minds of all of it, the cannibalism, the sort of like I'm your boyfriend, but I'm gonna trick you into thinking that there's murder happening.

A lot of it's there.

A lot of it's there.

Well at the police station, Chief Nobi can't find out any information about Harry Warden at the mental hospital.

They hope this is just a prank, but it is a real human heart from a 30 year old woman that was placed inside the chocolate box.

Looks like Harry might be back in town.

In the laundromat, Mabel is stalked by the miner.

He leaves her a box of chocolates and a warning poem before killing her.

The next morning, Chief Newbie finally gets in contact with someone from the mental hospital, but they have no record of Harry Warden, and 20 years is a long time for someone to slip between the cracks.

Chief Newbie heads over to talk to Mabel about canceling the dance and discovers her body cooking in one of the dryers.

Yes, my goodness.

This dryer reveal is so stupid laudatorily and I love it.

And more people should die in dryers.

You're so right.

You're so right.

Yeah.

They they tried to do the same thing in the remake, and it simply doesn't work as well because it's not like one of the big industrial dryers.

Yeah.

And like you, I was unbelievable how much she cooked in the remake, whereas this was completely believable.

Yes, yes, and.

Like they cooked when she cooked.

Stop it.

Yes.

And but like, there are industrial dryers.

Where do you take your comforter?

This is what cooked.

This woman is a comforter dryer.

And like, I was like, OK, when Chief Newby came in and there was a sound, I was like, God, she's in one of the dryers.

And then he opens one and he pulls out some clothes and was like, well, maybe this was a fake out.

And then no, she was just in the next one.

But it was camp, right?

Like the dryer kept spinning her after he opened the door, after she opened the door from her.

Only in the uncut.

Whatever.

That's yes, yes, yes.

That's just a good time for everyone.

That's just a good time for everyone.

Yeah, it was.

So.

It was delightful.

I genuinely, I think that they should have gotten so many awards for the makeup in this movie because it looks incredible.

It's disgusting.

I loved it.

I also thought, just a tiny little detail, the minor took the time to carefully flip all of the heart decorations in the entire laundry mat upside down.

It's just so stupid.

I loved it desperately.

When you're an ad man, that makes total sense.

He hates Valentine's Day.

He hates Valentine's Day.

And he hates those cartoon red hearts more than anything.

He'll kill over them.

He has killed over them.

If I may, the graphics in this movie, the special effects Terrifier 2.

More like Terrifier who?

Yeah, exactly.

Exactly, exactly.

This is way, way, way better.

Oh yeah.

If you want to like show off like the special effects of your gore to I feel like this is a more like pleasant way to do it because it's not so much like like I'm reveling in it because the way that it has been framed and laid out and not because we're spending the three minutes on like stabbing someone over and over.

Exactly.

Exactly.

And and chief newbie really sells how awful it is even in the theatrical version.

It's just, it's a great, it's a great scene all around.

The way he's set, like notices the smell first I thought it was like, that was clever because I don't think that comes up as often in these kind of like slasher movies where it's more like, what's that sound?

Not like what's that smell?

I think.

Like a yeah, like, like bodies smell.

Yeah, yeah.

Especially hers.

Yeah, cuz she's cooked.

I think it's because we can't smell it, right?

There's no smell of vision just yet.

Merrily.

Yeah, so so movies aren't as interested, but it makes so much sense for the lived reality of the characters.

Totally before we move on, there are some non plot important stuff, so we didn't touch on it, but there are a couple of scenes in this section that I just really want to shout out because again, there's not a lot of depth happening for the characters.

But even still, there's a really great scene between Patty and Sarah where they're going into their grocery store job, which this is, has the scene that that David mentioned with like Patty talking about how her great dress and how she has so excited about Valentine's Day.

As well as like there's a scene with all of the young men at like the junkyard.

I think, I don't fucking know, but they're all hanging out.

And there's a great scene between TJ and Hollis where they discuss the axle situation and how like TJ left and, and they're really great character builder moments for what little character we get for these characters.

Yeah.

Was this when they were in the junkyard?

Just like, I don't know, I'm doing whatever.

I like the I and I liked, I liked the filming in the junkyard because it was that horror.

Oh, something's going to get you.

Something's going to get you.

But it's just it's just guys being guys, you know?

Yeah, that's exactly it.

I will also say since we I forgot to mention this when we were talking about the old miner at the bar, but next to the old miner is this Thomas Wake looking motherfucker and like he's going to go tend to lighthouse in a little bit.

What the fuck was up with this guy?

Unanswered questions.

It's just like you said, David, this place is just, it's full of cranky old people and 20 something young people.

It's just, it was, it was like a lot of costume and makeup for like a character that doesn't speak and it's just there for like vibes.

I think that, you know, they this, this was a real town they filmed in.

Probably they had real people who were extras.

Maybe this is just a guy who looked like that.

Oh my God.

Well, you're dead now, but call me from 45 years ago.

We're going to invent time travel just so you can hook up with this man.

Well, no.

If I'm going back, if I'm going back to the filming of this set, I have eyes for only one man.

I'm hopping aboard that time machine.

Yep, and I will compete with you for his love, just like TJ and Axel compete for Sarah.

There's there's plenty of Hollis for all of us, so.

True.

Well, at the mine, tensions between Axel and TJ continue to rise until they almost get into a fight.

Down below.

Chief Newbie and the Mayor decide to cover up Mabel's murder to prevent a panic, but cancel the dance, much to the disappointment of all the younger crowd.

After work, TJ brings Sarah to their old spot to try and talk.

He begs her to take him back and they share a kiss.

Oh how tender.

Later at the bar, the old miner swears that Mabel was killed by Harry Warden.

But the younger crowd are only sad about the cancel dance.

TJ suggests having a Valentine's party at his father's mine instead.

That night the old miner breaks it to the mind to try and set up a scare for the kids tomorrow when the real miner kills them.

Yeah, For a second, the film becomes Footloose because these kids just want to dance.

And John will dance.

John Lithgow won't let them.

It's it's so weird that the dance is so.

But I guess it's it's a small town.

This doesn't matter, right?

Yeah.

Yeah.

It's just got now I'm thinking about like how this movie and Footloose are the same movie.

Very similar.

Way more similar than you'd think.

Give give John Lithgow A pickaxe and it's the same movie.

Speaking of pick axes, I just want to throw it out there.

The old minor repeatedly laughing at his own prank, just like opening the door, laughing, closing it, opening it again, closing it, and then to get got by the minor in the exact same manner as like his prank.

That was cinema, that was poetry.

I laughed so hard.

I fucking love that shit.

But.

Let me tell you, barely.

I had no idea that this is the same guy from the bar.

I was just like, it's another old man.

Who is he?

It doesn't matter.

It could have been the cop.

It could have been the mayor.

I don't know.

I was just like, OK, it's an old guy.

Got got.

I did like how he got, got.

He got got.

This was the one where it went up through his eyeball, right?

Yes.

And the other word.

That was excellent.

I really appreciated that.

An uppercut with a pickaxe.

Amen.

Do more of that.

Yes, for sure.

This one was if I'm remembering from the interview with the director and like the special effects people this this kill particularly had a hard time getting through the sensors.

At one point they were like you have to cut another frame and he was like we have cut all of the frames with the effects you are reacting to the noise that it is making.

I cannot cut anything else and it just insane.

Well, I thought that this was fun, so I don't know what those sensors are so worried about.

So fun they're they're wrong, and they're probably dead now too.

I hope they are fuckers.

Those fools, we are better because we are alive and they are dead.

Yes, exactly.

Exactly.

Silent majority by ass.

I just wish the movie kind of had this sort of tone like more often.

Yeah, the movie feels so self serious and like the campy elements are there because I agree with you David, I think so many of the elements are to this movie are campy.

I just don't think it was intended to be campy is the problem.

And if they had leaned into it, I think I would have had more fun.

Yeah, because even pickaxe through the eyeball is a little bit more of a scary movie death than a a scary movie death.

Like, yeah, it's almost, it's almost such a heightened campy gore way to die that it doesn't feel serious.

And so I imagine I didn't watch it because this was not gonna garner a a multiple watch through for me.

But I I that if I watched the censored version I probably would have thought that this movie was taking itself even more seriously cuz all the gore effects seemed to amp up the camp to me.

Yes, totally.

At one point of time, I just took a ton of screenshots of Helpless and maybe it was here, maybe I should have written down when it was.

And one more time, he breaks up a fight with TJ and Axel.

That's later.

OK, OK, well, that was very sexy.

That was my heated rivalry.

That was great.

That was hot.

Don't worry.

Any time he was on screen, yeah.

I mean.

Get ready to move those collars aside and fan yourself, because that's common.

Let me tell you.

And he's got a hat, listeners.

He's got a hat that says lick my.

And then there's a picture of a donkey.

I would obey that hat.

Yeah, same.

All right, so it's Valentine's Day at last.

The town isn't celebrating at all, but that night, the young folks break into the mining lounge and start setting up their own party.

Because it's Footloose.

Why just you?

Yes, exactly.

Because it's Footloose.

And you damn children.

Listen, they didn't know that there was a killer on the loose.

They thought they they did.

No, they didn't.

They thought the party was cancelled because Mabel had a heart attack and everybody was like, we can't have the party without.

Mabel, I I do.

I do.

No, no.

I think it was like, out of respect of her death.

They were like, oh, we can no longer dance out of respect.

Yeah, that was weak.

You should have just told them that she was murdered.

They would have solved a lot of problems, but it's fine.

At the police station, Chief Newbie gets a Valentine's chocolate box.

At first he thinks it's from Harry Wharton, but it's really just chocolate sent by Mabel before her death.

Saddened by this, Newbie decides to go check out the mines just in case, and discovers a different Valentine's Day box at the front doorstep of the police station with blood dripping from it.

Newbie is shocked at the love note saying that he didn't stop the party.

Said party.

A young man tries to get a hot dog from a pot of that's cookie on the stove, has his head shoved into the boiling water.

In the main room, Axel and Sarah get into an argument.

TJ makes things worse and Sarah walks away from both of them, so the men get into a physical fight.

Hollis breaks them up and Axel grabs a beer to walk it off.

All right, there's so much here, but let's start with chief newbie in the station, because I do think that this was a moment of it was a very nice moment of acting because he's like, oh, no, a chocolate box.

And then there's chocolates inside.

He's like, oh, yay, chocolates.

And then he reads the note and he's like, oh, Mabel, I, I didn't save you.

You're dead now.

And so it was it was a range of emotions.

I don't think I actually served anything particularly well outside of the fake out that like chocolate boxes also have chocolate in them sometimes and then led to the chocolate boxes in front of the station.

But I did, I did like a moment of seeing like a moding on screen.

Yeah, this.

This is where he earned his and the actor's name that I don't remember as chief newbie in the end of.

Credits, Yeah, Yeah, that's true.

That's true.

That's true.

I did.

There were a couple of those that I was like, wow, there's a lot of naming a lot of people in these credits.

Must be like big time Canadian actors from the time.

I guess.

Yeah, You know what else is big time drowning someone in hot dog water.

This Like OK, OK, that's camp, that is.

Yeah, Oh.

Totally, yeah.

Cuz like at certain points we're we're, we're putting a camera in the water or pointing up at him.

Instead, the hot dogs are floating around.

It's great.

So the hot dogs are floating around and it sounds like it merrily is in the uncensored or the censored version.

You don't get to see the cool makeup effect that they do on him, but he's I I believe the water is boiling.

Yes.

I don't think that's acted super well.

Sorry, sorry, hot dog water guy.

I just thought you were being water boarded in hot dog water, which is by itself kind of horrifying and cool, But that boiling would have added an extra layer to this.

I don't know.

It was just kind of, but that just on its face value is kind of campy to me.

It's like dying by being drowned in boiling hot dog water is like a Cards Against Humanity poll that you would, you would have like that, that that's that level of like words put together that forms something that is cohesive.

Yeah, it's also the queerest thing to happen in this movie.

Because the dog's in his face.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, he's got a whole bunch of meat in his face.

Yeah, probably in his mouth because he's drowning in hot dog water.

I've been in some hot dog water of my own in the past and you do not want your face to go down into it.

Oh my God.

Okay, okay, okay, that's true.

That's true.

So the effects for this were actually done really interestingly.

Again, the effects artists talked on the Shout Factory DVD.

They did it by applying the effects in layers so that as the makeup would get dissolved in the water, it would be like new burns and stuff appearing on his face.

And it's really cool.

It sucks that even the theatrical version you just see his face getting shoved into the pot and then it cuts to the next scene.

Yeah, Yeah.

That is cool.

That is cool.

Kind of like the birds if we did some layering there way back in the day.

Way back in the day.

Yeah, instead of like the film footage, they did it like on his face.

Physically it was.

It's very cool.

And then my other question for this section is why are there so many feral dogs in town?

That's why you need guns in schools.

Merrily, there's 30 to 50 feral dogs that just come.

Through feral hogs.

That was that was the joke.

It was the joke.

It rhymed merrily.

It rhymed.

Sorry.

In the mines entrance, a couple is making out.

Read the room.

But whatever the girl Sylvia asks for.

So sorry.

Can we go back?

We have to go back to the scene.

Yeah, OK.

When Axel leaves the scene after the fight, he grabs the spear and like, flicks it open.

That was so cool.

And I it why It is like unnecessarily cool.

You could just do that.

It was, it was just a wild moment of like it almost like going to the British and being like, oh, I can do cool things with a beer if you give me a beer.

It just was like cool hand play and I, it's really stood out to me.

Also Hollis.

Also.

Yeah, no, this is the scene where he's very hot.

I know.

For your Yeah, he breaks up the fight.

Hollis Yeah.

Yeah.

All right.

So in the mines entrance is a couple making out.

The girl, Sylvia, asks for some beer, and John leaves her to go get some.

In the kitchen, some girls find a heart in it with the hot dogs but assume that someone put it there as a prank, while John narrowly misses seeing the dead body that the heart belongs to in the refrigerator.

I think yes, while she's gone, or sorry, while she's alone, Sylvia gets killed by the miner.

John comes back down and discovers her body mounted on a shower head with water coming out.

I can't.

Chief Newbie arrives at the mines and gets a call on his radio from the hospital where Harry Warden was institutionalized, but we don't hear what is said.

We only see him turn around and speed away.

Patty, Hollis's girlfriend, convinces him to bring them down to the mine to cheer Sarah up.

It's like a roller coaster ride.

Mike, Harriet and Howard decide to come with.

TJ objects, but Hollis promises they'll go down and then come right back up.

Of course, once they get down there, they decide to take a quick look around and Mike and Patty separate from the main group.

Mike and Harriet Sorry, Harriet is Mike's girlfriend.

Sorry, that was my again the the women are very.

Interchangeable people.

And that's my, that's what I want to point out by this point, there is simply too much going on with too many people across different settings and locations.

And they're all congregating in the mind and they're all doing different things in the mind.

And it's all different parts of the mind, but all of the mind looks the same.

And so I started getting very confused from this point until the end of the movie.

Agreed completely agreed.

I was having so much trouble understanding what was happening.

I knew who my boys were.

I knew who Sarah was, but that's all I had.

So these are the girls, Patty, who I loved, but I loved you.

When I saw you in that cute like winter outfit going to the grocery store, I couldn't make heads or tail of you down in the mine.

You were just a brunette in the mine.

She was.

Yep.

I again, I've seen this movie a number of times.

The The first time I learned Patty his name was the second time I watched it this week when I was and like the second to last section of the notes where Sarah says Patty's name directly to her.

I was like, OK, great, that one's Patty.

Who's the other woman?

God only knows.

I I honestly think I had to look her up to see which what her name was.

Bonkers say each other's names frequently.

Say each other's names.

It's not hard.

We need to know who the people are in order to care about them.

Like John and Sylvia.

Do you have any idea how hard it was for me to get Sylvia's name?

It was not fucking easy is.

This their first time, really like appearing with speaking lines.

They're in a bunch of scenes, particularly the scene with like where all of the guys come into the the hall and their girlfriends are there.

Like they have a cute moment between the two of them.

The, the actor who plays John is actually one of the people on the Shout Factory like interview list.

And he has a very funny story where he's like, actually I kind of thought I was the killer for a moment because the way that I pick up my girlfriend by her face is like so reminiscent of how she's killed.

I thought maybe that was supposed to be like a hint that I was the one who did it because I could, I could do that.

But that it was like, but it was pretty obvious almost immediately after that that no, actually I didn't kill.

I wasn't the killer, which I thought was very funny.

Can we talk about Sylvia?

I mean, her death is awesome, yes.

But the the chase up to her death is like all of these outfits are falling from the ceiling at her.

And I was kind of like, what's what's happening here?

What where are they coming from?

Is this how you do?

You store your clothes up in the ceiling?

I think that they must.

We kind of see it in the very beginning of the movie, like during that homoerotic shower scene, we see like people hanging up their uniforms or whatever.

And like John even points out that this, this is how you get them down.

I have no idea why that's there, but I guess it's it's a real mind that they're filling in.

Yeah, I don't know.

This, this, this felt like a strange thing, but it was.

I mean, it was effective because she acted scared by clothes and that sold it so good.

Good on her.

But I was kind of like, I don't know.

This isn't you're gonna, you're gonna get caught.

This guy gets everybody.

Yeah.

So I don't, I don't know what to tell you.

Speaking of getting everybody, I was fully convinced John ate it here as well, so when he shows up later in the film, I was very surprised.

Yeah, yeah.

Yeah, well upstairs at the main party, the body in the fridge is finally discovered.

Right as John arrives back to tell everyone about Sylvia.

Axel panics and tells everyone Harry Warden is here.

TJ tries to call the police, but the phone line has already been cut.

TJ tells Axel about the minecart trip and they decide to go rescue them.

Hollis, Howard, Sarah and Patty joke about Harry Warden being in the mines as the miner looks down on them.

Oh irony.

As they head towards the main shaft, they hear the miner destroying the electronic lights.

Outside the station, Chief Newbie meets the group TJ sent to tell him what happened at the party.

Horrified, Chief Newbie sends the kids home and radios her back up as he heads for the mine.

At the main mine shaft, Hollis, Howard, Sarah and Patty wait for Harriet and Mike.

When TJ finds them too confusing, he tells them what happened and that they have to get out now.

But with the couple missing, they decide to split up and fetch them.

Howard stays to protect Sarah and Patty while TJ and Hollis try to find the missing group quickly.

Hollis, no what?

David said.

Yeah, it's not long.

Our beautiful Princess for this world.

Hyper No.

I just want to say the shot with the minor destroying the night, the lights as he goes along, that was fucking ominous.

I loved that.

And like the the shot of like Hollis and Howard, like standing there hearing the the light bulbs being fucking smashed and being like this is not good.

But we're not going to panic.

I thought that was fantastic.

Should have panicked.

Should have left.

Should have just left.

Should have just left.

Should have just left.

Because your friends have been impaled on like the most boring death of the entire film.

You're not like, you're not going to get them.

You're not going to help them.

You got to leave.

Go tell us.

Leave, if they had just left now.

But alas, alas.

Alas, alas, alas, alas.

This is where I in my notes, I wrote.

This policeman is this town big?

I don't know.

He's constantly driving back and forth from the mines and like, maybe he needed to call someone else and be like, just somebody stay here and I'll go here and then we're done.

For real.

Like, it's just the beginning of the film.

We watch all the kids drive from the mines to the the union hall.

It's in a kind of nice sequence of them, like racing their cars.

And Hollis has beat up a little like my my baby, but like, I don't know it.

This felt like we're we're like purposefully keeping a potential hero away from the scene, but then he will show up and he'll show up with like the Calvary, which is the wild thing about the end of this movie.

One of the many wild things about the end of this movie.

I was about to say there's many wild things that are happening at the end of this movie.

That's.

True, there's a lot of wild to come.

Speaking of, Hollis finds Mike and Harriet killed with a pickaxe.

When the miner finds him and shoots him with a nail gun, Hollis wanders back to the group and dies.

The miner starts to stalk towards them but disappears as Hollis.

A band, not Hollis.

Excuse me, our Prince would never.

As Howard abandons Patty and Sarah, Axel appears and tries to bring them to safety.

When they run into TJ, Chief Newbie arrives at the mines and tries to head down the the shaft, but the elevators aren't working anymore.

Down below, the group discovers the same thing.

They decide to climb up and out of the mind the old fashioned way.

Patty is terrified of heights and has a really hard time on the ladder when Howard's body is dropped down like on top of them.

They decide to go up on the rail cars instead and they go through a flooded section of the mine to get there.

When TJ, Sarah and Patty are separated from Axel, they hear a crash and realize he must have been pushed into the water.

There is no way to, there is no way to rescue him in the water this deep and they have to go on without him.

Hollis No.

What David said.

Hollis, you were such.

A real one.

I'm happy for the minor though, because I too would have nailed Hollis.

We're left to wobbling afterwards too, I could tell you that much.

Sure, what I've I.

Will say this movie now that joke has made this whole movie queer.

Sorry you've you've done this.

Nail gun to the temple.

Pretty.

I mean this, this is like 1981.

So like this was fine and delivery, but like conceptually pretty gnarly.

That's awesome.

There were also some like you guys again, you saw the uncensored version, so you saw the full thing, but there was a lot of stuff taken out of this kill as well.

Yeah, but even what we got was just I would say this was not as good as some of the other ones.

The effects later when you see his like corpse are great, but the actual nail to the temple.

I was like, wait to did you just I didn't get that it was a nail gun.

I thought he was like with a silencer, like he had a gun with a silencer and I was like weird choice for your otherwise like pretty like minor related arsenal.

And then I was like, Oh, it's a it's a nail gun.

I that that makes a little bit more sense and that it really took him loading the nail into the nail gun for me to understand that because at first I really just thought it was like a a peashooter.

And that was, like, really effective, though him loading the nail gun, like, it just kind of made it, like, more ominous and, like, more inevitable.

What was about to happen to Hollis.

Yeah.

But the IT just also let the audio, like, the sound effects do their thing.

Agreed.

Agreed.

And that made it extremely effective.

Yeah, I just guess maybe, maybe what I didn't realize, you know, what it is, is that James Bond is available on Netflix now.

So I've been watching a lot of Bond and a silenced PPK sounds very very similar to a nail gun is what I've learned.

Well, that's good to know.

Yeah, at least in Hollywood it does.

Yeah.

I don't know that it's helpful information for you to have because of either of those things are being shot at you.

It's not a good time.

Well, eventually I'm going to be on the Q division, so this is good to know.

Good.

To know, Good to know, yeah.

Someday, someday, our turn will come.

Someday, I do want to touch on Sarah and Patty real quick.

Yeah.

So this is when Sarah starts to go on the offensive and we get a little bit of, like, embers of a badass here.

So I did appreciate that it helped differentiate Sarah from the other women who are just kind of like the the girlfriends.

Unfortunately, Yeah.

And listen, I.

Appreciated that I really feel for Patty in this section because again, the love of her life, the lovely Hollis, dies right in front of her.

She has a breakdown about that and then she has to go up a wet drippy ladder when she's already afraid of heights in a very tense situation when she had like a panic attack 5 minutes ago.

I would also be doing very badly, so like give some respect on my girl's name.

Yeah.

Also, Axel's disappearance is like a blink and you miss it because I did blink and I missed it.

I had to go back and be like, what happened to Axel?

And a lot of it is like they're trying to throw you off being like, he fell in the water, but I was kind of like, what happened?

And then being like, we can't go into the water to save him.

It's too deep.

And I was like, you could have, you should.

I would rather them be like, we can't go into the water to save him because a killer is coming after us.

We have to escape.

He's on his own.

That would have sold a little better to me than like, we can't go in to save him because that's all you've been doing is making terrible decisions about saving your friends.

Why stop now?

I think that like and maybe the fact that they if they could have said we don't have any rope, there's no the water's dark or something like.

It looked very murky.

Oh yeah, no, like I wouldn't want to get in that water regardless of Axel's life on the line here, but like, something I felt really could have helped.

Something could have helped, Something could have helped, but alas, it was not to be.

Not to be at a divide, TJ sends Sarah and Patty down one way and goes up another way himself.

They hear a crash and the minor breathing and they realize he must have gotten TJ so they go on alone.

They make it to the rail cars and try to figure out a way to go forward when the miner appears and kills Patty.

Oh by Patty.

Sarah flees and she is found by an injured TJ.

He gets the rail cars working as the miner finds them and hops aboard as well.

And all of a sudden we are all on a train fighting each other.

A very slow moving train, TJ and the minor fight until they fall off the cars and head into an abandoned section that is falling apart around them.

The miner has the upper hand and is about to kill TJ when Sarah manages to remove his gas mask and reveal that he is Axel.

All along it was Axel.

And we get the motivation for that because we see a flashback revealing that Axel's father was the one murdered by Harry Warden 20 years ago.

And he saw the whole thing, which traumatized him in like a proto Dexter scene where he's like a baby with blood in his face and like, sucks his thumb.

It's kind of creepy.

I like that the mine shaft collapses on top of Axel while TJ and Sarah escape, running directly into Chief Newbie and his volunteers, who reveal Harry Warden died in the mental hospital five years ago.

As the volunteers try to free Axel, they discover he cut off his own arm to escape the collapse.

He flees deeper into the mines, clearly crazed, calling out to Harry, threatening the town and singing to Sarah, calling her his Bloody Valentine as the movie ends.

So the Axel.

Reveal the Axel Reveal.

The Axel, I kind of figured there was going to be some sort of reveal of the minor.

I don't know that I was there.

There weren't a lot of characters that are recognized, so Axel was kind of the only one left.

I, I for a lot of the movie, I was ready for it to be, I guess, the chief newbie or the mayor, one of the old guys.

I was ready for it to be an old person, but it was not.

And yeah, I don't know.

He was crazy looking.

I like that.

Yeah.

He did good job actually, like a crazy maniac.

Yeah, in this scene it was legit I the Axel surprise really got to me, especially since I saw the remake first, which spoilers actually has.

It's where TJ is the killer.

So yeah.

So I wish they had given more hints in this film that it was Axel along the way.

If only just mention even one time that Axel's dad was one of Harry Worden's victims even once would have been enough.

But I'm honestly not mad at the reveal.

I think that it it's perfectly cromulent.

It's it's definitely a 1981 movie, but it's fine.

Yeah, it's fun.

Yeah, it's OK, you know, it's fun.

Do you love though?

Sometimes, Yeah, You guys.

What do you love?

Verily.

You guys, you're so fun and delightful and I love my Co host, but I also specifically love the Harry Worden folk ballad that ends the movie.

It's fantastic.

It's very Gordon Lightfoot and I just.

So weird.

You hate it.

No, I don't hate it.

It's just such a this movie takes a lot of weird swings.

It's got that.

You know what it is?

This is like music at the end of of horror movies in the 70s and 80s is weird to me.

This was giving big strange instrumental or no strange pop music track at the end of Wicker Man.

It was kind of like it was kind of like where did this folk song come from?

Is this everyone knows this, do we all?

OK, cool.

Whatever.

Great.

Yay.

It was a bold choice.

I also thought of The Wicker Man, which was famously also a musical.

So I was I, I kind of like that they made their own folk ballad.

Yeah, that's fun.

It adds a little bit of like the urban legend sort of vibes that the that the minor has because the minor definitely feels like straight up out of an urban legend.

Yeah, it's, it's very much like the Hitchhiker, you know, like the idea of this character existing outside of the film really goes along with this.

Again, they wrote the song for the movie, but if you had just heard the song, I bet you could think that maybe Wharton was like, this part was like a real thing.

And I think that's neat.

I just think it's neat I.

Just think it's neat.

We're all Marge Simpson today.

We're all a little Marge Simpson today, So how do we feel about My Bloody Valentine from 1981 in terms of horror or queerness after our conversation?

And do you have any other final thoughts for this episode?

You know?

What I'll say is I'm really glad we watched it.

It feels like a very important horror film, even though it also sort of feels forgotten.

I guess it feels like, why isn't this as well known as Friday the 13th?

I know that the answer is that Friday the 13th spawned millions of sequels and he went to space and send the miner to space.

There's rocks in space, He could go to the moon.

Space mining is very much the thing.

Yeah, yes, space truckers are in Aliens.

Space miners are in other stuff.

Yeah, he could be in that 4th Avatar movie that's coming out to get an obtainium on Pandora.

See, I know what I'm talking about.

I'm I'm culturally aware.

I know what Giovanna Rivici was laying down in that that exposition dump during Avatar.

I'm glad we watched it.

Yeah, I think the remake sounds terrible.

It's not good.

So I'm glad Merrily watched it for us.

Many, many.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Merrily, I'm happy to take that bullet for you guys.

Please don't watch it again.

The the idea that it's TJ that's the the bad guy is interesting.

God, it's a it's a it's it is not good.

It is.

Let me tell you what that's the IT most it thought that's in the whole thing.

I think that this movie is a really solid slasher.

I think that this is the kind of movie that could have really easily been like lost to history.

But I'm glad it's survived the sins of time and I hope that it has a really happy 45th birthday.

It's coming up this month.

Blue Mouse Wow Blue Mouse develop this film.

Oh, I think they might be.

Actually, yeah, I merrily said it earlier.

Yeah, it's a development.

It'll happen, or it won't, whatever.

Well, I thought this was a fun movie.

It's a well executed pastiche or pastiche of various and better slasher and horror movies of the time.

Go see those instead.

I think this is it's fine, it's fun.

It's like it feels like a, a, a slasher movie that exists within the universe of a better slasher movie.

You know, it just feels like, hey, we're going to go see this new slasher.

It's stab, you know, it's that kind of vibe.

That's what this movie makes me think of because it's just so bland otherwise.

But I do love that it's Nova Scotia.

How many horror films are from like Nova Scotia or just like more rural parts of Canada that are like really kind of well known in our in our culture?

Not too many, yeah, except for ginger snaps.

We do we we enjoy ginger snaps enough.

So yeah, this was this is fun.

I'm glad we watched it.

I think this is a good way to start off our short lived return to themes with Valoine.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, thank you all so much for listening to this episode.

Please remember to rate, review, and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.

If you'd like to be our Valentine, you can follow us at Instagram and Blue Sky at Fear Coded Pod.

But please, no human hearts in our chocolate boxes.

OK, we've had enough of that.

Not again.

Yeah, if you want to give us a gift, you can of course support the podcast by joining the bats in our belfry and subscribe to our Patreon.

At patreon.com/fear Coded podcast.

You can show your appreciation at one of three levels early and add free episodes are available as low as $1.00 a month, and there is accompanying bonus content starting at the three dollar level.

This month we're exploring the endless hallway of Kojima's playable teaser for the Silent Hill game that never was.

But that's not all.

You also have access to our Fearful Phrases Patreon game.

We took January off as part of our winter break, but our December phrase was submitted by Will and Marilee snuck in Oh my Stars and garters into our malignant discussion.

Fear Coded is a proud part of the Glitter Jaw Queer Podcast collective.

If you'd like to listen to more queer media podcasts, check out the full roster shows at glitterjaw.com.

And join us next time as Valoine continues and I prepare fluffy cupcakes for Tyler and Mary Lee to encourage them to join me as we talk about Doki Doki Literature Club.

But for now, we will simply say goodbye.

But cancel the dance dance.

Dogs, hogs, Bogs.

50 feral bogs Call me the The Bog man Watch out.

Oh no, we're going insane, David.

Same as what else?

This is good.

This is getting cut.

What if he's the only one I'll ever miss?

Maybe I should run.

I'm only 21.

I don't even know who I want to be.

Shara be my bloody Valentine.